by Joan Ellis
Kathy opened the door almost the instant she rang.
"Hi." Kathy smiled brilliantly. "I'm so glad you could come—I was ready to talk to the furniture."
"I'm glad you invited me," Elaine smiled back, already relaxing a bit.
"Would you like a cocktail? I'm not very good at it," Kathy was wistfully apologetic.
"I'm not particularly fond of them," Elaine was candid. "I usually drink because people expect it of me."
"You mean for business," Kathy elaborated. "You're too strong a person to care very much about what people think."
Elaine laughed, settling herself onto the sofa. "You have some strange ideas about me."
"Eric's talked so much about you." Kathy tucked herself into a corner of the sofa, her eyes brightly inquisitive. "He wouldn't admit it of course, but you're sort of up on a pedestal for him."
"That's not really the problem." Elaine was serious now, guessing that underneath the light chatter Kathy was honestly concerned about her husband.
"Is it a problem?" A hint of alarm edged Kathy's voice.
"I hope not, Kathy." Elaine rose, walked over to the window for a moment, searching for words to convey her meaning. "You see, though neither of us has ever admitted it, there's always been this thing between Eric and me. I'm six years older—Dad made me his companion rather than Eric. Eric was constantly battling to work to keep up with me, whether it was school grades or an ability to play tennis or get a job. He was always out to prove to Dad he could do anything I could."
"That wasn't fair," Kathy said steadily.
"No, but those things happen." Elaine came back to the sofa. "That's why I thought it was good for Eric when he went off on jobs that separated him from the family. He wasn't always in there battling."
"But he is." Desperation crept into Kathy's voice. "He tries to appear cool and easy-going on the surface, but underneath he's all tied up in knots. It's worse since we've been here in New York."
"You'll work it out with him, Kathy." A hand reached impulsively to touch her shoulder in sympathy, but instantly Elaine withdrew it.
"I'm going to try." Kathy made a determined effort to throw off her somberness. "But this is a fine way to greet you, crying on your shoulder!"
"Eric and I are the only two left in the family—I guess we should worry about each other." Elaine reached for a cigarette now. "Tell me about you, Kathy. You know Eric—he can be so vague sometimes. All he really told me was that you were absolutely wonderful and you write poetry."
"I dabble," Kathy said candidly, "but I enjoy it. Back home before I married Eric I worked in an engineering office. Terribly dull, until Eric joined the staff. I lived at home with my mother and three brothers. Quiet little life in a quiet little town. Eric teases me sometimes—he says I married him just to get away from there." Now Kathy's eyes turned seriously upon Elaine. "But from what Eric tells me, you should be doing some tremendous things with your painting. He told me about that exhibit of yours in Paris—how your instructors prophesized such a wonderful future for you—"
"Everybody makes mistakes," her voice was tinged with bitterness. Must everybody throw Paris in her face right now? "Even the best instructors."
"Why don't you give yourself a chance, Elaine?" Her earnestness was unmistakable. "I know I have such a tiny little talent, but you've proved yourself to a point."
"I've thought of it now and then." Encased in horror Elaine heard herself talking, as though from a distance. She'd told this to no one up until now. No one! "I even started to rent myself a studio down in the south of the Village, where I could hide myself away and work. When it came to signing the lease, I reneged."
"Take a chance now," Kathy moved forward urgently. "Rent yourself a studio, gamble on yourself."
"I might," Elaine said unsteadily, "on one condition."
"What's that?"
"If you promise to pose for me." Suddenly, she wanted insistently to paint Kathy. That honesty, the inner beauty—if she could capture that on canvas!
"You mean that?" Kathy stared in astonishment. "You'd really want me to pose for you?"
"Only condition." Elaine waited quietly, her eyes fastened on Kathy, refusing to listen to that exhorting voice within her that told her this was sheer madness.
"I'd love it," Kathy agreed instantly, then her face puckered with concentration.
"What's the matter?" Alarm shot through Elaine.
"Could we keep it a secret from Eric, for a while?"
"Of course," Elaine agreed, a momentary premonition of trouble invading her. But this was what she wanted herself, wasn't it? Their secret, hers and Kathy's.
"Then we can surprise him later." Kathy's face lit up now like a delighted child's.
"Right." Elaine leaned back against the sofa, wondering into what strange paths fate was leading them.
"You must be starving." Kathy jumped resolutely to her feet. "I'll have dinner on the table in three seconds."
"I'll give you five," Elaine teased. "After that, the gallows."
Elaine was amazed at the ease with which the hours slid past. It was almost eleven when Eric's key sounded in the door and her eyes moved to her watch to check the time.
"Darling." Kathy rushed impulsively to greet him.
"Hi, sweetie," he kissed her, at the same time casting an oddly speculative glance in his sister's direction—or so she interpreted it.
"Wasn't Elaine an angel? I was popping with loneliness, and I asked her to come over and talk me out of it, and she did." Kathy bubbled vivaciously, enjoying the presence of the two of them.
"Good old Elaine," there was an undertone of mockery, "you can always depend upon her." He came over and dropped an arm about her shoulder, and Elaine caught the scent of Scotch on his breath.
"I gather you're keeping your nose to the grindstone," Elaine mentioned casually.
For a moment the nonchalant mask slipped from Eric's face, to reveal tension. "It's tough, coming into a new town, taking over a new branch like this. Most of the men are older than me—there's a certain resentment."
"You know your job. That'll earn you respect," Elaine reminded quietly. "They wouldn't have sent you here if they hadn't appreciated your capabilities.”
"Nothing like a doting wife and sister." Eric's eyes were veiled again, as he bowed with dramatic gallantry. "Say, has Kathy been keeping you on the wagon?" he accused, heading for the liquor cabinet.
"I didn't want a drink—she offered," Elaine interposed swiftly.
"Nobody minds if I have one?" He was already pouring.
"Eric, are you hungry?" Kathy jumped eagerly to her feet.
"Now there's a constructive idea." He came over to his wife now, pulling her close, and Elaine caught the apprehensive suspicion that captured Kathy. Kathy was just now becoming aware that Eric was one step removed from being tight. Elaine stifled an impulse to laugh derisively. What was there about the atmosphere tonight that brought on the need to get loaded? First Paul, now Eric.
"I’ll fix a tray of sandwiches, and some coffee." Kathy lost that look of open-faced ingenuousness now. She was bright enough not to let on to Eric that she knew, though the quick glance in Elaine's direction carried a note of apology. "Sit down and talk to Elaine," she coaxed.'
"Hey, you giving the old man the brush-off?" His mouth touched the base of her throat, his hands close about her waist. Instinctively, Elaine knew this show was for her. What's he trying to prove, she thought angrily.
"Honey," Kathy tried to laugh it off. "I'll bet you had a miserable dinner."
"Drank most of it," Eric conceded with a touch of defiance. "But I came home to the child-bride, didn't I?"
"Darling, I'm twenty-two years old," Kathy protested, miserably embarrassed by Eric's amorous roamings in front of Elaine. "Now be a good boy and relax while I go fix something for us to eat."
"What do you think of her?" Eric grinned, releasing Kathy.
"I think you did all right," Elaine repeated her evaluation of an
earlier occasion. "In fact, you couldn't have chosen better." For a moment their looks clashed in strange defiance, then it was over.
"I won't be long." Kathy was already headed for the kitchen.
Eric played with his liquor glass for a moment, then discarded it. "Think I did right in coming to New York?"
"Why not?" Elaine countered.
"I don't know—it's a tough town."
"No more so than Chicago. You did all right there, until you went further west."
"I was young and eager then," he smiled tiredly. "I talk my way into spots, and then I die inside over whether I'll make it."
"But you do," Elaine insisted. "And now you have Kathy to back you up."
"Yep, the happy couple," he tossed off gaily. "I'll bet people pass us in the street and pop with envy."
"Eric, be happy," Elaine said urgently. "You have every right to be."
"Are you?" he turned on her with such unexpectedness that Elaine gasped.
"Fairly so," she lied. "More than most people."
"Nothing's ever been right for you since you came back from Paris," he said, with an astuteness that stunned her.
"You're having hallucinations," she tried to laugh it off, but the attempt was a shambles. "I'm doing marvelously. As a matter of fact, I just sewed up a tremendous deal this afternoon. Big sister's doing fine," she tried for flippancy.
"Maybe." His eyes dwelt on her, full of unspoken questions that sent chills through Elaine. What was he thinking? How much did he suspect? That was the horrible, the most frightening thing of all—to wonder if you lived in a dream world of secrecy when all the world, in reality, jeered mockingly at your shoddy pretenses. Then Eric was on his feet again, charged with restlessness. "Think I'll run in for a fast shower. You don't mind, do you?"
"Go right ahead."
"Won't be more than a couple of minutes."
Eric took off in the direction of the bedroom, and she sat there, oddly at loose ends with herself. For a while this evening she'd forgot herself—about that stupid session with Stephie's camera, about the revolting battle with Paul earlier this evening. Now everything came rushing back in kaleidoscopic frenzy.
"Kathy?" Eric yelled from the bathroom minutes later, over the sound of the shower.
"Yes?"
"Come scrub my back," he ordered gaily.
"Be right there." Kathy appeared for a brief instant in the doorway to the living room. "Eric gets the wackiest ideas sometimes. I'll make him hurry up.
Kathy disappeared into the bedroom, and then Elaine heard her giggling in the bathroom with Eric. Suddenly Eric was bursting with exuberance, apparently. Elaine rose nervously, hating the thin walls of new apartments. Even luxury buildings like this. She felt like an intruder, listening to the sounds of Eric's playfulness across the rooms.
"Eric, you're getting me all wet," Kathy was protesting laughingly.
"Then take off your clothes," he ordered, apparently considering this a tremendous joke.
"Eric, honestly," Kathy was protesting. "Elaine’ll think we're crazy!" And Elaine caught the sense of anxiety in her voice, that she might hear the horseplay in the bathroom. Kathy was embarrassed, for both of them.
"Come on, get in with me," he was urging, his voice carrying with a clearness that pierced Elaine with the sharpness of a carving knife.
Was he out of his mind, Elaine wondered, panic overtaking her. Did he dare start up in there, with his sister right in the other room? Suddenly the room was oppressively hot. She moved to the window, opened it, willing herself not to hear even while her ears strained for every endearing phrase Eric was muttering in there.
"Now, isn't the water great?" Eric was saying accusingly. "Was I wrong?"
"Oh, Eric." Kathy sighed in defeat, and there was silence more torturous to Elaine than the sounds.
"Come on," he was teasing now, and Elaine realized he'd shoved open the bathroom door, and it was almost as though she were standing inches away. "Prove to me that wide-eyed innocence doesn't mean a thing. Come on, Kathy, show me you love me.”
"Eric, please." Her desperate whisper was barely discernible, but with her need to hear Elaine's ears caught the plea. "You know Elaine's out there."
"So what?" his voice was husky now. "Do her good to hear some honest passion. Besides, I'll be quiet. I promise, baby."
Elaine broke into a cold sweat, her heart pounding, her mind visualizing. What was the matter with Eric? Had he gone completely berserk? She stood there, immobile, her ears straining to hear the incoherent sounds inside. The faint unmistakable sound of their bodies falling across the bed, the incautious whispers, the mounting frenzy that made them less oblivious of their surroundings, that they were not alone.
Agony clutching at her, Elaine hurried into the kitchen, not wanting to hear, not wanting to admit the aching desire that captured her now. She wanted to run right out of that apartment, out into the street, but that would be admitting she knew. She kept herself busy with sandwich-making, taking the percolator off the stove, finally nervously pouring, hoping the dark, secretive sounds in the other room would cease to torture her.
With a sigh of relief she heard the other two emerging. Eric whistling with an undertone of triumph.
"I probably made enough for an army," Elaine said with a show of gaiety, "but I figured you wouldn't mind. Eric was never happy unless the table was loaded." Elaine made an effort to smile in Kathy's direction now.
"I'm starving," he laughed high-spiritedly, and still Elaine caught that odd sense of victory shining from him. What was he trying to prove? That this time he had something she could never attain?
"That shower!" Kathy made a valiant attempt at levity, though her discomfort touched Elaine painfully. "Eric splashed so much I had to change into a robe."
At that moment Elaine almost hated her brother, she admitted inwardly. But she loved her brother's wife…
CHAPTER 8
Opening the door to her own apartment, Elaine was flooded with relief that she could abandon the pretense of nonchalance. Her face flamed, remembering Eric and Kathy in the bedroom, with only the door and paper-thin walls separating her from that frank lovemaking. It was no use denying the truth any longer. She loved Kathy as she'd loved no one ever before. And there was no one more remotely removed from her. She sighed, sinking into a chair, visualizing Kathy's lovely face, the elfin body that every fiber of her being ached to hold. And she had to pretend! To pretend to offer friendship when her heart spilled over with love, her body trembled to possess.
The phone pierced the quiet with an ugly discordance. Still sitting there in the semi-darkness, Elaine reached for it.
"Hello."
"I thought you might be here when I got in," Terry's voice came sulkily over the wire. "You said you might," she reminded.
"I was terribly tired," Elaine began, and then the disturbing memory of Paul returned with jarring shock. Terry was supposed to be meeting him at eight. "How was your evening?" She didn't know why she asked that.
"Boring," Terry lied. "I came home early—I've been here almost an hour. I phoned and phoned, but you didn't answer." Obviously, she was waiting for some explanation.
"I went over to Eric's," Elaine told her, wondering subconsciously where Terry had spent the evening. At Maria's again, with Stephie and his friends? It struck her with an astonished sharpness that she didn't honestly care. The thing with Terry was at an end, for Elaine. Kathy had reduced it to ashes.
"Have fun?" The question was light, yet the undertone unmistakably malicious. This crazy streak in Terry, Elaine reminded herself with nagging alarm. Somebody at the office had been complaining about Terry being insolent, she recalled overhearing somewhere in the corridors. She'd meant to warn Terry, only it'd slipped her mind somehow. "You hit it off so well with your sister-in-law," Terry murmured with phoney admiration.
"Eric and Kathy are very much in love," Elaine said with all the calmness she could manage. "I'm awfully happy for them."
"Elaine," Terry’s voice was huskily appealing now, "you aren't angry about my going out with Paul Hennessy, are you?"
"Of course not." Irritation crept into her voice, without her meaning to permit that. Why must Terry keep up this childish pretense that she was out with Paul?
Paul was all right, she told herself desperately, visualizing him sprawled across the floor as she'd left him. But Elaine knew she'd spend a sleepless night, worrying about him. Taunting herself, too, over the precarious situation with Kathy. While Terry rattled on, Elaine's mind pondered over what to do about her feelings for her sister-in-law. Should she stop seeing Eric and Kathy altogether, make up excuses each time they asked her over? Or should she put herself through exquisite torture, seeing Kathy, wanting her, and pretending to be merely the affectionate sister-in-law? How long could she keep up such a pretense? Suddenly, she was aware that Terry was saying something about coming over to the apartment. "Sweetie, I'm absolutely exhausted," she said with credible sincerity. "I'll see you at the office tomorrow."
"Suppose we could go to a foreign film after dinner?" Terry was reluctant to let go. "There's a terrific one you haven't seen." Terry knew Elaine's enjoyment in foreign movies, so she'd hopped on this bandwagon as proof of how much they meant to each other, another tie. "Please," she coaxed.
"All right," Elaine agreed wearily, willing to promise anything now to escape that other presence. "We'll talk about it at dinner."
* * *
Going up in the elevator to Fleet and Comstock, Elaine fought an overpowering attack of jitters. How did she know Paul wasn't injured by that blow on the head? He'd struck the desk so sharply! She'd been upset and frightened and so she'd run. Perhaps she should have phoned for an ambulance. Perhaps it wasn't a drunken stupor, but a coma!
Walking from the elevator, through the reception room into the floor of cubicles, Elaine was punctured with self-consciousness. So sure that everyone was looking at her oddly, talking behind her back in whispers. Had Paul been found in her office this morning? Had he recovered consciousness and talked? What happened here, her mind demanded bitterly? What was she walking into now?
