Well Bred and Dead

by Catherine O'Connell

  “I’ll call you the next time I’m in the States.”

  “Yes, please do that.”

  I shut the door behind me and threw the security lock with a firm thrust. My mind was a whirling tornado of confusion. Why had I met such a perfect man, attractive, virile, sexy and exceedingly rich, to be led down the garden path and left at the gate by the gardener himself? It was beyond my realm of comprehension. What motive could he have for chasing around the English countryside, and then the South Carolina countryside, with me if he didn’t find me desirable?

  There was no chance of sleep. I tossed the entire night, my torturously unrealized sexuality as disabling as a migraine. I ticked through the possible reasons that Terrance Sullivan refused to make love to me, refusing to entertain the notion that he found me unattractive. His eyes told me otherwise. Could it be he was involved with someone else? Charmian had said he was a bachelor, but that didn’t rule out a long-term girlfriend. Maybe he was actually a man with principles and could not be disloyal. Or perhaps he had an embarrassing deformity. Or a social disease. He had herpes and it was active. Or he was impotent. I tried to console myself by telling myself that at least he wasn’t using me.

  And then, when I could think about it no longer, my mind turned to a far less tormenting but equally baffling issue. What to make of what Terrance and I had learned today about Ethan Campbell and Daniel Kehoe? Could I deny the possibility something macabre had taken place between them? Once again, I thought about my Ethan’s suicide note and his mention of the guilt he could no longer live with.

  Though the obvious was staring me in the face, I chose to turn my head from it. For one, I couldn’t fathom Ethan performing a violent act. He was simply too small. Perhaps there had been an accident. Perhaps something had happened to the original Ethan, the English Ethan, and my Ethan had stumbled across his papers left behind in the hotel. My Ethan was a romantic. Perhaps he had just fallen in love with the name and kept it. There could probably be a million explanations for how Daniel Kehoe became Ethan Campbell.

  Or there could be one.

  19

  Date Rape?

  The next day was one of the worst in my life. I would have said it was the absolute worst, but it was superseded by what would come to pass later. After finally managing to sleep for two whole hours, I awakened to heartache and disappointment upon learning Terrance had already checked out. The entire ride to the airport and flight home he was all I could think of, my mind so preoccupied with him, I practically forgot about Ethan Campbell and Danny Kehoe.

  It wasn’t until I opened the door to my apartment that reality came trickling back in. My phone was ringing and I dropped my bag and ran for it. The optimist in me was hoping it was Terrance. Instead my already touchy nerves were jangled by a remotely familiar voice, one that brought to mind visions of unkempt self and the smell of unwashed bodies. I was in absolutely no frame of mind to deal with the barbarian at this specific point in time.

  “What can I do for you, Mr. Keifer?” I asked, hoping to keep it brief.

  “I’ve been leaving messages for days. I want to know when someone is going to come over here and clean out all the junk in this apartment,” he whined in his nasal voice. “I’ve got a renter coming in.”

  “I don’t suppose Mr. Campbell paid his rent for the month of April?” I asked, thinking if he had it would buy some time.

  “No, and it’s the fourteenth. I’ve already lost half a month. Now if somebody don’t get over here and take care of it tomorrow, everything is going into the Dumpster.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Keifer. I would expect no less of you.”

  I hung up the phone beyond aggravation with the slovenly excuse for a human. How dare he put such unnecessary pressure on me? I pictured the cluttered apartment filled with copious notes and Ethan’s—he was still Ethan to me—things. Despite everything I’d learned an overwhelming sadness came over me. I recalled how excited he had been when he started research on the never-to-be-written Daisy Fellowes book. He would call me daily with anecdotes about the one-time ugly duckling who with the aid of a mountain of cash had reinvented herself as a swan. Now I wondered if he hadn’t done the same, reinvented himself to escape his depressing and ugly upbringing. Maybe cleaning out his apartment wouldn’t be such a bad thing after all. Maybe I might just find some more insight as to who he was. Maybe it would be therapeutic.

  I played the messages I had ignored before my trip to Charleston. Sunny called twice asking what was going on with Ethan’s body. Whitney called several times, asking me to please call her back. There were Mr. Keifer’s messages. There was a message from Sean saying he had tried to reach me in Rochester, but I had checked out and where was I now?

  The last message was from my accountant telling me to call him right away. It was urgent.

  Ivan Epstein answered on the first ring. An intense squinty-eyed man who looked as though his nose belonged in a book, he sounded more frenzied than usual. “Pauline, do you know what day it is?”

  “Tuesday, Ivan.”

  “Tuesday, what?”

  “Tuesday, April 14.”

  “Which means your taxes are due tomorrow.”

  With all the running about I had done, I had completely forgotten about taxes. “I thought we were filing an extension.”

  “We are, but you still need to sign it and send in a check. You had quite a capital gain on those securities you sold.”

  That money was long gone. “How much do I owe?”

  “In the area of fifty thousand dollars.”

  “Ivan, what if I don’t send the check now?”

  “You still have to file the extension. And you’ll have penalties. The IRS starts the meter running right away.” He said it in the manner of a parent chiding a child.

  “Well, I’ll just have to pay them later then. I’ll sign the extension and get it back to you.”

  My next call was to Sean. I didn’t want to put it off. No matter what the outcome might be, meeting Terrance had shown me the folly of this purely physical liaison. It had shown me that I wanted more, that I needed more, that after all these years of feeling dead myself after Henry’s death, I wanted to care for someone again. I had forgotten what that happy-to-be-alive feeling was like, that all-consuming thrill. It frightened me to feel it again, because once one knows it, it can never be equaled.

  Sean wasn’t home, but I left him a message asking him if he wanted to have dinner. I had to end it while my resolve was still strong.

  I called Sunny and excruciatingly told her the same story I would have to tell at least a hundred more times in the ensuing days. Ethan had been born Daniel Kehoe in Rochester, New York, his mother had been a domestic and his father had worked on the streetcar. I left out that he was a bastard and mentioned nothing of the trip to South Carolina. Connie Chan would never write a column accusing him of murder. Whatever happened at the St. Alder Arms in 1965 would remain a secret forever as far as I was concerned. The waters of time had long since run beneath Ethan’s bridges. I could only judge him as I knew him.

  Sunny was humiliated and angry to learn how badly she had been deceived. “You aren’t still going to bury him, are you?” she asked.

  “I was thinking he’d prefer cremation, but yes, whenever the body is released, I’m going to take care of it. After all he was my friend.” I left it at that.

  And then I called Whitney. The notion of returning to Ethan’s blood-spattered apartment alone was unsettling, especially with Mr. Keifer running about at will, so I had decided to take the former lingerie model up on her offer to help me.

  Her phone was answered by her housekeeper who informed me Mrs. Armstrong was in her gym and didn’t want to be disturbed. She would pass my message on as soon as the lady of the house finished her work-out. My phone rang a scant minute later. It was Whitney, huffing and puffing. If I hadn’t known she was in the gym, I would have assumed she was in the middle of the act.

  “Pauline,” she said, “pleas
e forgive me. Miranda just gave me your message. Of course, I would have taken your call had I known it was you. I’ve been trying to get in touch with you for days.”

  “I’ve been traveling,” I said, “and I’ve solved the mystery of Ethan. It isn’t very glamorous, I’m afraid, but at least we know who he was now.”

  “Oh,” said Whitney in that little girl voice of hers after I told her of Ethan’s humble origins. “And to think of the way he put on airs when he was no better than anyone else.” She sounded perturbed. I wondered if I should rethink my idea of asking for her help, but I was too emotionally and mentally frayed to try and come up with an alternative.

  “I’ve got to clean out his apartment tomorrow. Are you still interested in helping?”

  “Pauline, of course. When?”

  I knew I would want to sleep in late. “Tomorrow afternoon. We’ll have lunch at the Casino first.”

  After I hung up, I went into my bedroom and fished Fleur out from under the bed against her will. Forcing her to stay in my lap, I stroked her silky hair until she forgave me and broke into a contented purr. I sat there wishing a certain Irishman would stroke me like that. I would purr even stronger than my beloved cat.

  I treated Sean to dinner that night at a sushi restaurant just around the corner. I’m not particularly fond of raw fish, but I knew he loved it and wanted to be extra kind to him that evening. The crowd was young and many of the young girls made no qualms about giving the eye to my date. It irritated me to no end because I’m sure they thought he was eating with his mother. I had always told him our age difference was the reason I had never taken him to any social events, but the truth of the matter was he simply wouldn’t have fit in. Whereas he was a beautiful specimen to look at, our worlds were entirely different. He could never be a part of mine. He had become for me, despite all his youth and beauty, about as appealing as, well, Desmond Keifer.

  As opposed to Terrance Sullivan. He had risen above his humble beginnings and carved out a place for himself in this world. I believe it was Cervantes who said, “It’s not with whom you are bred, but with whom you are fed.” Terrance was eating in good company. As opposed to Sean, who, at the moment, was eating with his mouth open.

  “So what did you find out about Ethan?” he asked, regaling me with a brief view of rice and tuna. I wondered what had possessed me when I entered into this affair in the first place.

  Picking at my food, I told him how my quest for the truth took me from England to Boston and ended in Rochester where I finally identified my old friend as Daniel Kehoe. I didn’t mention Charleston. Sean didn’t appear at all disturbed at Ethan’s deception. He was more disturbed by the story of my flat tire in the Boston ghetto.

  “Pauline, I can’t friggin’ believe you drove around there by yourself. Do you know what happens to white women in those neighborhoods? Were you crazy? You should have brought me with you.”

  “Well, I’ve lived to tell the tale,” I cut him off. “And now I have my answer and I’m done.”

  “Unbelievable,” he said. “So Ethan pulled a fast one, heh?”

  “I’m afraid it looks that way.”

  “I wonder where he came up with the other guy’s birth certificate.”

  “I don’t suppose we’ll ever know the answer to that one,” I lied. “Perhaps he found the man’s wallet in the street or something along those lines.”

  “Oh well, no harm, no foul,” said Sean. “Like I said before. It’s not like he hurt anybody.”

  I remember thinking to myself, If he only knew. Possibly there was a great deal of harm done. But I did not voice this concern. I only said, “Except perhaps some of his friends. And his own memory.”

  We finished our meal and I paid the check. It was only fair I pay since I was about to make the break with him. I had hoped to accomplish the task over dinner, but hadn’t been able to find the right moment. Naturally he walked me home, and since there was no reason for him to do otherwise, he followed me through the door Jeffrey held and into the elevator. On the ride up, I kept rehearsing the words in my mind while working up the courage to say them. The doors opened and we stepped into my foyer. I stopped short of opening the interior door. I could feel the warmth radiating off his skin as he stood next to me.

  “Sean, I’ve done some thinking over the past week,” I said, staring at the house keys in my hand. I did not want to let him in my inner sanctum where I might be tempted to compromise my resolution. “The difference in our ages is great, too great. I don’t believe our friendship is a good idea anymore. I think it’s best if you go home tonight.”

  There. I had done it.

  I turned to face him. He looked stunned as though I had just slapped him with my open hand, his eyes with a hurt look I had never seen before. The thought occurred to me that perhaps I meant more to him than a “sugar mama” after all. I suffered a rare moment of self-loathing for taking his feelings so lightly, for thinking of Sean as disposable. I had always thought things would end the opposite way.

  “Pauline, you aren’t saying that we’re through.” His words were a statement, not a question. He shook his head in denial with his soft bowed lips parted slightly and his chestnut eyes penetrating me.

  “Well, yes, Sean, that is exactly what I am saying.” I tried to meet his gaze in a compassionate, yet firm manner.

  “Don’t I please you? Don’t I satisfy you?”

  My mind flashed back to the countless hours we had spent thrashing about under the canopy of my bed not to mention a few other select places in my apartment. There was no way of saying those times had not held some redeeming value. But the complex feelings Terrance evoked in me completely overrode the far more basic ones I had for Sean. “You have satisfied me completely. You have been…you are…a wonderful lover. But there is more to a relationship than sex. We don’t make a good couple. In the long run it’s not good for you and it’s not good for me.”

  “It’s up to me to decide what’s good for me,” he stated fiercely. His intensity overwhelmed me. “And I know I can be good for you. Pauline, don’t end us like this. I need you. I need to be with you. I want to learn from you. I love the way you handle yourself, your self-confidence, the way you put yourself above other people. Even the way you talk is so different.”

  I didn’t want to point out that the way I talked was known as proper English. This was not an appropriate time. I stared right through him, going back to last night when I stood in the open doorway of my hotel room begging Terrance for the same thing Sean now wanted from me: intimacy, attention, sex. Why was one willing to give it when the other was not? Sean did not appear to be getting the message, causing me to wonder if I had let my relationship with my young paramour get out of control.

  “Sean, I’ve had a tortuous week. Maybe I just need to think a little more. Go home and I’ll call you tomorrow.”

  My words went as unheeded as the “no” of a teenage girl in the backseat of a car. Suddenly, his supple lips were upon me, working their way down my neck until I felt them reach the point where soft tissue meets bone, an area of particular sensitivity for me. As much as I hadn’t even considered sex with him a minute ago, his actions boiled up the desire that had been simmering inside me since I met Terrance Sullivan. Sean’s lips never stopped as he fell to his knees, drawing me down with him. I believe I tried to resist, but he was far stronger than I was. His hands went beneath my skirt and inside my panties. What his fingers found told him I was ready. What he couldn’t know was my body wasn’t responding to him. It was primed by a man halfway around the world.

  “And you say you don’t want me, Pauline?” he growled coarsely as he pushed me back on the hardwood floor. He tore my undergarments off. My skirt was up around my hips, and he parted my legs and buried his face between them. My protestations grew weaker as my irrational body betrayed my rational mind. He rose to his knees and unzipped his pants. His erection virtually sprung from them. Climbing atop me, I could feel the hard tip of his penis be
gin the easy slide into my dampness.

  “Sean, wait,” I gasped. “Condom.” But he ignored me and kept thrusting himself at me. Though my mind said to stop, my body said what the hell as I felt him driving rock hard inside me, finding that sweet spot that compelled me to throw the last vestiges of caution to the wind and welcome him into me even further. My thoughts were raging and it felt as if all the blood had drained from my vital organs to engorge that epicenter of pleasure. My eyes were closed and in my head the name, Terrance, Terrance, Terrance, echoed with every thrust. I clung to him, climbed him until my body released itself into a series of sublime spasms that felt they would never end.

  But end they did, and as the blood began to flow back to my brain, so too did common sense. Sean was still atop me, wrangling away at the same pace that had brought me to such heights, telling me he hadn’t ejaculated yet. “Sean, stop,” I insisted. “You must use a condom.”

  “It’s all right,” he panted without missing a beat.

  “No, it isn’t.” Thoughts of disease dominated my consciousness as I tried to wriggle out from beneath him. But he wouldn’t let go of me and didn’t let up. I was getting angry and screamed for him to stop. That only seemed to provoke him and he drove into me until he was hurting me. I pulled at his hair and tore at his shirt. Finally with a shudder and a sigh he started to release himself. I took advantage of his weakness to pull myself away, and his sperm spilled out onto my abdomen and my Chanel skirt. He raised himself onto his elbows and stared at me.

  “I’m sorry, baby, I just couldn’t stop.” I glared into his penetrating doe-like eyes. All traces of pain were gone and I realized he had been lying. He didn’t really care about me at all. He cared about having control. What I had just gone through was as close to what they call date rape as one could ever come and I cursed myself for permitting it to happen. Then I wondered if I actually could have stopped it.