Linda Lee, Incorporated: A Novel. Vance Louis Joseph
on the back of his head and his arms full of lavender orchids, wavering irresolutely in the entrance to the Palm Room, surveying with a dashed expression its now all but deserted spaces; a festive spectacle that left no room for surmise as to what he had been up to. And with sickening contempt added to the bitterness already rankling in her heart, Lucinda made hastily for the revolving door.
Simultaneously Bel caught sight of her and, with a blurred travesty of his really charming smile, and a faltering parody of that air of gallant alacrity which she had once thought so engaging, moved to intercept Lucinda. And finding her escape cut off, she paused and awaited him with a stony countenance.
"Ah! there you are, eh, Linda! 'Fraid I'd missed you. Sorry couldn't get back sooner, but – "
"I'm not," Lucinda interrupted.
"Had to go over to Thorley's to find these orchids…" Bel extended his burden as if to transfer it to Lucinda's arms and, when she prevented this by falling back a pace, looked both pained and puzzled. "Ah – what say? What's matter?"
"I said," Lucinda replied icily, "I'm not sorry you couldn't get here sooner. Surely you can't imagine I'd care to have my friends see you as you are, in the middle of the afternoon. It's bad enough to have them know you get in this condition nearly every night."
"But – look here, Linda: be reasonable – "
"I think I have been – what you call reasonable – long enough – too long!"
Bellamy hesitated, nervously moistening his lips, glancing sidelong this way and that. But there was nobody in the foyer at the moment but themselves; even the coatroom girls had retired to their office and were well out of ear-shot of the quiet conversational key which, for all her indignation, Lucinda had adopted. For all of which the man should have been abjectly grateful. Instead of which (such is the wicked way of drink) Bellamy took heart of these circumstances, their temporary isolation and Lucinda's calculated quietness, and offered to bluster it out.
"Here – take these flowers, won't you? Plenty for you and all your friends. Tha's what kept me so long – had to go all over to find enough."
Again Lucinda defeated his attempt to disburden himself. "Oh, Bel!" she cried sadly – "how can you be such a fool?"
"How'm I a fool? Like flowers, don't you? Thought I was going to please you… And this is what I get!"
"You know all the orchids in New York couldn't make up for your drinking."
"Why cut up so nasty about a little drink or two? Way you talk, anyone'd think I was reeling."
"You will be before night, if you keep this up."
"Well, I'm not going to keep it up. I've made arrangements to have the afternoon free, just to be with you. We'll go somewhere – do something – "
"Thank you: I'd rather not."
"Don't talk rot." Most unwisely, Bellamy essayed the masterful method. "Of course we'll go some place – "
"We will not," Lucinda told him inflexibly. "My afternoon is booked full up already, and – "
"Where you going? I don't mind tagging along – "
"Sorry, but I don't want you."
Injudiciously again, Bellamy elected to show his teeth, stepped closer to Lucinda and with ugly deliberation demanded: "See here: where you going? I've got a right to know – "
"Have you, Bel? Think again. I never ask you such questions. If I did, you'd either lose your temper or lie to me, and justify yourself by asserting that no man ought to be asked to stand prying into his affairs. So – I leave you to your affairs – and only ask that you leave me to mine."
"Meaning you won't tell me where you're going?"
Lucinda shrugged and turned away; but Bellamy swung in between her and the exit.
"See here, Linda! there are limits to my patience."
"And to mine – and you have found them. Let me go."
She didn't move, but her face had lost colour, her eyes had grown dangerous. Neither spoke in that clash of wills until Bellamy's weakened, his eyes shifted, and he stepped aside, slightly sobered.
"Please!" he begged in a turn of penitence. "Didn't mean… Frightfully sorry if I've been an ass; but – you know – pretty well shot to pieces last night – had to pull myself together somehow to talk business at luncheon – "
"Oh! it was a business luncheon, then?" asked Lucinda sweetly, pausing.
"Of course."
With an ominous smile she commented: "It has come to that already, has it?"
"Ah – what d'you mean?"
"Since you tell me it was a business luncheon, you leave me to infer that your affair with Amelie has reached the point where you take her to the Clique Club to talk terms." Bellamy's jaw sagged, his eyes were dashed with consternation. "What else do you wish me to think, Bellamy?"
He made a pitiable effort to pull himself together. "Look here, Linda: you're all wrong about this – misinformed. I can explain – "
"You forget I know all your explanations, Bel; I've heard them all too often!"
"But – but you must give me a chance! Damn it, you can't refuse – !"
"Can't I? Go home, Bel, get some sleep. When you wake up, if you still think you have anything to say – consider it carefully before you ask me to listen. Remember what I tell you now: you've lied to me for the last time, one more lie will end everything between us, finally and for all time!"
Conscious though she was that her wrath was righteous, she experienced an instant of irresolution, of yielding and pity excited by the almost dog-like appeal in his eyes. But immediately she remembered Amelie, hardened her heart and, leaving him agape, pushed through the door to the street.
And instantly she effected one of those shifts of which few but the sensitive know the secret, who must hide their hurts from alien eyes though they spend all their strength in the effort; instantly she sloughed every sign of her anger and with smiling face went to rejoin Fanny and Dobbin.
As soon as she appeared the latter jumped out of the car and offered his hand. He said something in a jocular vein, and Lucinda must have replied to the point, for she heard him chuckle; but she could not, a minute later, recollect one word of what had passed between them.
With her hand resting on Dobbin's she glanced back and saw Bellamy – still with his armful of orchids – emerge from the hotel. He halted, his face darkening as he watched Daubeney follow Lucinda into the car. It drew away quickly, giving him no chance to see for himself that it held another passenger.
He stood still upon the steps, deep in sombre and chagrined reflection, till a touch on his arm and a civil "Pardon!" roused him to the fact that he was obstructing the fairway. As he moved aside he was hailed by name.
"Well, I'm damned! Bellamy Druce drunk, dressed up, and highly perfumed."
In his turn, he recognized the speaker, a personage of the theatrical world with modest social aspirations and a noble cellar.
"Why, hello, Whittington!" said Bellamy, smiling in spite of his disgruntlement, to see that carved mask of a wise clown upturned to his. "All by yourself? What's happened to the girl crop you should be so lonesome?"
Without direct reply, Mr. Freddie Whittington linked his arm and began to walk toward Fifth avenue.
"Just the man I'm looking for," he declared without a smile. "Come along. Got a thousand women I want you to meet 'safternoon. They'll take care of your orchids."
"Well," Bellamy conceded, "that sounds reasonable. But what do you say, we drop in at the Club? Got something there won't do us any good – in my locker."
VIII
On the far West Side, well beyond the drab iron articulation of the Ninth Avenue Elevated, in a region of New York whose every aspect was foreign to Lucinda's eyes, the brougham drew to a shuddering stop, in thoroughbred aversion to such surroundings, before a row