Classic Love: 7 Vintage Romances

by Dorothy Fletcher

  He recovered himself at once. “Never mind. About my brother … he was a brilliant man. He was early on involved with the idea of a European Common Market. Of course he worked too hard. I daresay he was a rotten husband; that’s the only apologia I can make for Lisa, Richard’s mother. At any rate, last April Larry suffered a coronary, a serious infarction. He died early in the morning, on the sixteenth. I got the call — ”

  He fell silent.

  Kelly, stunned, tried to absorb this incredible bit of information. Did Richard believe his father was still alive? Or did he only want to pretend, to others, that he wasn’t an orphan? Was it pride or fantasy?

  “Is his mother Italian?” she asked. “Richard said something about a cousin, Gisela.”

  “Oh, that,” Comstock said impatiently. “One of those ridiculous things. Yes, Lisa is Roman-born. And I believe there’s some nonsense about an arranged marriage. If he talked about that, it’s more or less true. But still a lot of hogwash. These paternalistic Italian families. I have no patience with it.”

  He tapped his fingers on the arm of his chair. “You really mean to say that Richard told you his father was — ”

  “He said his father was in Afghanistan. His mother, he told me, was in Rome. Although he didn’t seem to be quite sure.”

  “I’m sure,” Constant said. “She is in Rome. Which is why I sent for my nephew. You see …”

  He hesitated, looked tentatively at her and then, apparently making up his mind, rose. “Do you mind waiting for a few minutes?” he asked. “There’s something I’d like you to see.”

  “Yes, all right.”

  He was back shortly, with a newspaper clipping.

  It was from a Rome newspaper, an item circled in red ink. “You don’t speak or read Italian, by any chance?” he asked.

  “I’m afraid not.”

  “Then let me read this release to you.”

  She sat back and listened. “It’s a rather free translation,” he admitted. “But you’ll get the gist.” He cleared his throat and then read aloud.

  An American woman, Mrs. Lawrence Comstock of New York City, was asked to leave the Hotel Excelsior this A.M. when two men fought with knives in the suite occupied by Mrs. Comstock. One man was severely injured and hospitalized at the Ospadele Miseracordia. The American Consulate drew a curtain over the incident, and Mrs. Comstock apparently took up residence in other quarters.

  He stopped reading, and looked up. “There’s more,” he said. “But that’s the meat of it. Not a very pretty picture, is it?”

  “No.” She was sickened. Oh, poor little Richard.

  “Lisa, my sister-in-law, is still a stunning woman,” Comstock said. “When I first saw her, I almost fell in love with her myself. But if she keeps on the way she’s going, she will be a wreck by the time she’s forty.”

  His face took on an almost fanatical look. “I don’t really like women,” he admitted. “Most of them are vile … and disgracefully selfish … uncaring …”

  There was a long, uncomfortable silence, and then he laughed rather sheepishly, his face clearing again. “That’s an outrageous thing to say to someone who’s a captive audience,” he apologized. “Please forgive me. Perhaps I’ve known the wrong women in my life. At any rate, I ask your pardon. But to get to the heart of the matter. This article …” he crackled the newspaper clipping, “was instrumental in my arranging for Richard to spend some time here with us. My wife is not the most domestic woman in the world, but she has a certain earthy stability. We live a fairly normal life here at the Casa Bondadosa, and I — ”

  He looked at her. “What would you do?” he asked. “Wouldn’t you want to intervene?”

  “I don’t know. I do think it’s … sad.”

  “It’s disgraceful.” His face grew hard and stern again. “I can’t allow it. Lawrence wouldn’t have wanted me to countenance it. These are Richard’s formative years, and I owe my brother something. I can’t simply close my eyes and let that … that dissolute, irresponsible woman wreck the boy’s life.”

  He folded up the clipping and put it down on a table top. “I don’t know what’s going to become of the child, but I’ve decided to take some kind of stand.” He gave her a long look. “But this is family business, and I shouldn’t bother you with it. It’s just that you’ve been so good to my nephew, and I know that you have some inkling of his needs and lacks … and problems. But let’s get off the subject of that child. Are you going back home right away?”

  “No, as a matter of fact I’ve arranged it so that I’m taking some time off. My plans are to fly to Malaga and then rent a car. Drive through the Andalusian countryside, ending at Seville, where I’ll hop to Lisbon and resume work on a 747.”

  “That sounds fine. I was seventeen when I first saw Andalusia. Just before starting college. I’ll never forget its fascination. Do you know Da Falla? ‘Nights in the Gardens of Spain?’ That composer caught the cadence of it, the perfumed beauty and the ancient decadence. Oh yes, I envy you your first Andalusian trip. It will bring you joy.”

  “I hope so.”

  “Oh, but I’m sure it will.”

  • • •

  “It’s only a little after one,” Steve said, as they climbed in a taxicab when they left the Villa Bondadosa, “I thought we could spend an hour or two in the Perico Chicote’s Museum of Drinks, at one or another of the places.”

  “Who told you about that?”

  “Miguel, at the desk. How about it?”

  “I don’t mind. I’ll sleep late in the morning.”

  They went to the San Jeronimo, a tiny little bar just off the Espoz y Mina, where mink-caped ladies, seated at miniscule round tables, mingled with local butchers and taxi drivers. The air was thick with tobacco fumes and the reek of candles on the table tops. They drank sangria, sucking the fruit at the bottom of the pitcher, and laughed quite a bit.

  “Oh, before I forget,” Steve said after a while. “What was that business when you came downstairs from the little girls’ room? You looked a little flushed. What’s the story?”

  She told him about it.

  “It wasn’t that I wanted to watch,” she said. “I was just so afraid I’d be spotted. And then they got very occupied with each other. At that point they were oblivious to everything else.”

  “Sounds like a foreign film,” he said. “So she was a prostitute when he met her.”

  “She was a model.”

  “It says here in fine print.”

  “I suppose she was a prostitute. That was made rather clear.”

  “She’s a gorgeous gal.”

  “Yes.”

  “Empty, though.”

  “Well — ”

  “Come on, she’s meat, that’s all.”

  “Steve, that’s a harsh judgment.”

  He looked uncontrite. “There are two kinds of women,” he said. “Good ones and bad ones.”

  “I think that’s simplistic.” She was a little bit angry.

  “No, it’s not.”

  “It’s a man’s point of view.”

  “What are you, Fem Lib?”

  “Not at all! I just don’t agree with you.”

  “I didn’t ask you to.”

  “Okay, then, okay.”

  “We’re having a little fight,” he said delightedly. “I like that. Our first quarrel. Shall we kiss and make up?”

  “Go to hell.”

  “Listen,” he said. “I know. I was married once. And burned. So I know whereof I speak.”

  “You were married?”

  “For two years. It was a mistake. A fantastic mistake.”

  “What happened?”

  “What do you think happened? She wasn’t exactly true blue, but I had to find out the hard way.” His face was bitter.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Happens all the time,” he said, and lit a cigar. “Why not to me?”

  There was nothing else for a while. Then Steve leaned back. “Look, I’m not cry
ing in my beer. I’m not a cripple. I have all my arms and legs. ‘Life is unfair,’ Jack Kennedy said, and it’s so. I just happened to meet you, and it looks good. The way you treat Richard. You’re one of the good ones. That means everything to me. All right, I was nasty about Scarsdale. But you have good, honest values. I admit I wouldn’t care about that if you were plain, or if you were cross-eyed. That’s the way we are. Men, and women too. We like pretty things, shiny things. It’s not equitable, but unfortunately nobody wants unpleasantness. Kelly, you’re a darling girl. There was someone on the flight with the most wonderful face — ”

  “You mean Wendy Warren.”

  “I don’t know what her name was, but she was a looker. But I didn’t want her. She left me cold. I saw you, and that was that.”

  “Steve, you said you were burned. It can happen again.”

  “No,” he said. “Because it was partly my fault. I didn’t really love her. I was too young.”

  He put his cigar, smoldering, in an ashtray, “I’m not young any more,” he said tiredly, passing a hand through his hair. “I won’t make the same mistakes I made before.”

  He exhaled a stream of smoke. “And now you know. I wanted to tell you that. It was a bad time in my life. I guess I thought you should see me in another light. Someone who’s been hurt. And anyway, the truth. So you won’t think I’m just playing around.”

  She started to say something and he held up a hand. “There were no kids,” he said. “No complications. I consider that important. I’m my own man. I never married again. She did.”

  A guitarist stopped at their table, waiting to hear their request number. “Kelly?” Steve asked.

  “ ‘Tierra del Ensueno’,” she suggested, off the top of her head, and the man strummed his instrument and sang the lovely song, his voice tender and caressing.

  Steve gave him a hundred peseta bill when he had finished, and the man glowed at the size of the tip, wanting to know what else the Senor and Senora wished to hear.

  “It’s enough,” Steve said brusquely. “Thank you very much, amigo.”

  • • •

  At three in the morning Steve held up a finger outside on the Espoz y Mina. A car pulled up and they piled in. “Hotel Fenix,” Steve said, and held Kelly’s hand. “It was nice?” he asked.

  “Lovely.”

  About five minutes away from their destination he moved in on her. His breath warmed her cheek. “You don’t mind,” he said, and turned her face up.

  She did mind … but she didn’t. And his lips closed over hers and he said, “I like you very much, more than I ever wanted to like anyone.”

  “Don’t do me any favors,” she said, and tried to pull away.

  “Please,” he said, and it was impossible to resist that gentle supplication. She gave him her lips, was with it all the way.

  The taxi came to a stop. “Oh,” Steve said, and let her go. He took out his wallet.

  “Gracias,” the driver said, giving them both an interested and sympathetic look. “Buenas noches, Senor, Senora.”

  The elevator rode them up.

  “Call you in the morning,” Steve said.

  “All right.”

  She took a quick bath and then got into bed. There was only one more day in Madrid. After that, Steve Connaught would be only a memory. He was a big talker. And hers was a life in which people came and went. Nothing had permanence. You chose it, she told herself, as she pulled the covers up in the chilled, air-conditioned room. You have no one to blame but yourself.

  CHAPTER 7

  It was totally unexpected to hear from Constant Comstock the next morning.

  He rang at shortly after nine o’clock, excusing himself for having possibly waked her. “It’s all right,” she said. “I got up a short while ago.”

  “May I take you to breakfast?” he asked.

  “Oh?” She was, to say the least, astonished. What could he want? But she said yes, since her woman’s curiosity was aroused, and they agreed to meet downstairs in the hotel lounge within the hour.

  He was there when she went in, after having left her room key with Miguel. He stood up and she thought, he’s a distinguished man, pleasantly ugly, quite sexual, and with a great deal of authority.

  They went to Lhardy’s, and of course it was brunch. Cocido madrileno, a delicious stew made of chick peas, potatoes, chopped meat, sausage and fatty bacon, headily seasoned, and afterwards a smooth, cool flan with dark coffee. With coffee Constant Comstock suggested cognac.

  When the amber liquid was brought, she sipped it, waiting for the meaning of his visit. And as he lit his cigarette, his eyes reflective and ruminating, she knew he was about to come to the point. He leaned forward and asked her if she had enjoyed her meal.

  “Yes, it was excellent. Thank you.”

  “It’s a good old place. And I was glad to be here with you. You’re the kind of woman who seems to know how to take care of herself.” His eyes looked admiringly, but without flirtation, into hers. “More than that,” he added, “you seem to be someone who can take care, not only of herself, but of others as well. Pretty women are everywhere. But pretty women with character are not to be found on every street corner.”

  “It’s my job to take care of people,” she said, faintly irritated. What was the purpose of this meeting? She was suddenly a little wearied of Constant Comstock’s didactic manner. She wondered if Steve had called her, wanting breakfast.

  “So you’re off to the Costa del Sol tomorrow morning.”

  “Yes, I’m leaving at ten.”

  “I hope it will be a good trip.”

  “I’m sure it will.”

  “You said you were flying to Malaga?”

  “Yes, and then spend a night in Torremolinos. Then hire a car for the rest of the time.”

  “You’ll hit the high spots? Cordoba, Granada, Seville?”

  “Right. In Seville I’ll pick up an Interline courtesy flight to Lisbon and then be on the job again on the return flight to the States.”

  “I see.” He smiled, said that it was a most pleasant itinerary and then let the bomb drop. “Richard would love a trip like that.”

  And before she could collect her wits, he added, “You see, I expect some trouble. With Richard’s mother. And my heart is set on keeping the boy out of it. I’m sure you can understand. It’s ridiculous of me to ask you this favor. But you see, I’ve been wondering if you’d be willing to take Richard with you. I know it’s asking quite a lot. But — ”

  He saw her raised hand and her shocked look. He went on talking, the red flush warming his cheekbones. “It’s an incredible imposition,” he was saying. “Yet it would … help the boy and help me. Keep Richard from the line of fire, which is sure to come. Oh, I know it would cut into your holiday, but — ”

  She stared at him. He wanted her to take Richard with her? She could scarcely believe her ears. “Trouble,” he said again, hurriedly. “Lisa will be sure to … I don’t want that child in the middle of it. Of course you can say no, the hell with it. I’m, in effect, throwing myself on your … mercy, good-will.”

  He sat back, tapping his fingers on the table top. “I suppose it’s way out of line,” he said at last. “Forgive me, it was a stupid request. Of course you want your time to yourself.”

  And she found herself saying, to her own surprise,” I wouldn’t mind taking Richard with me, Mr. Comstock. I think it would be rather nice to discover the countryside with your nephew. Admittedly it wasn’t what I had in mind, but just the same …”

  “You mean, you’re not saying no?” His face lightened. “You’d be willing?”

  I must be crazy, she thought, as she discussed what clothing Richard would need for the trip. “Shorts, shirts, sneakers.”

  “I think you’re wonderful,” Constant Comstock said, ordering another round of cognacs. “How can I possibly thank you?”

  When he left her off at the hotel, Miguel, frowning, said, “This is a mistake, Senorita. The other
man … he’s more for you.”

  “What?”

  “This one. He’s too old.”

  She laughed. “Miguel, the man I was with this morning is the uncle of the little boy. He’s very much married, and to a woman who looks like Helen of Troy. You’re barking up the wrong tree. Have you seen Steve?”

  “On the terrace. He has been calling your room, paging you, and walking up and down the whole place like a caged tiger. Now he’s outside, probably drinking it up, like a fish. He loves you.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “No no. Believe me.”

  “You’re sure he’s outside?”

  “Yes, drinking hard.”

  “Okay, I’ll find him.”

  “Senorita, be kind. He has it bad.”

  “Oh, shut up, Miguel. Did I tip you today?”

  “No.”

  “Then here,” She shoved some paper money across the counter.

  “I don’t want your money, darling.” Bur he took it.

  “See you later.”

  “Remember. Be nice to that man.”

  Steve, looking dour, was drinking martinis. He looked up as she approached and said sourly, “Where the hell have you been?”

  “Are you your brother’s keeper?”

  “Don’t give me any of that lip. Go away. Who needs you? I’m occupied.”

  He was rather looped.

  She sat down. “I have a companion for my Andalusian trip,” she told him. “May I sit down?”

  “You’ve already sat.”

  “May I have something to drink?”

  He waved a finger at a waiter who came running over. “Ask the lady what she wants,” he said, his voice slurred.

  “A dry martini,” Kelly said, and when the waiter, grinning, went away, she leaned toward Steve. “Did you hear what I said?”

  “No.”

  “Richard’s uncle wants me to take him to Andalusia.”

  “Fine,” he said. “Just what I needed. The three of us.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “Did you think you were sluffing me off?” he demanded, and suddenly his voice wasn’t so blurred any more. “I have a ten o’clock flight to Malaga tomorrow morning. Did you imagine you were going to throw me off just like that?”