Chapter 3

“Winnie!” The voice that crackled at me over the wire had all the implacable tenderness of a woman who has you in the wrong.

“Yes, dear!” I answered automatically, with a passing thought for my own lost Dorothy, marooned in Washington with a job in the O.S.S.

“What is the matter?” the voice continued, in its litany of angry possessiveness. “What on earth happened to you? I’ve been waiting for you since three o’clock.”

“Where have you been waiting?”

“Here--of course. In our place. In New York. Winnie, what’s wrong?“

Not a pleasant spot to be in, even if it was only part of a trial-run in purgatory.

“It’s a bit too hard to explain, Virginia,” I said, “but something came up and I don’t think I can go through with it. In fact, I know I can’t go through with it.”

There was one of those pauses which make a whole life-time seem like a split-second.

“Something came up!” The voice, now a pantherish contralto, purred dangerously. “Something went down, you mean. You see, Winnie, I’ve been talking to your friends. Johnny Walker, Black Label, that’s what went down. At the Pond Club. Tommy Morgan told me all about it. You went to the Pond, had too much to drink, woke up about four o’clock--one whole hour after you had promised to meet me--and woke up talking wildly and then staggered out. Now I find you’re back in Bedford Hills, and it--it’s my birthday--” The voice ended in a choke which might have been a sob or a paroxysm of feminine fury.

I summoned the old voice of authority, as inculcated at Quonset, into the well-tanned vocal chords of Winfred Tompkins. “Virginia,” I commanded, “just stop making a fool of yourself. I’m sorry I stood you up but things have been happening. I just can’t go through with it. I’ll explain when I see you.”

“You’d better!” And the slam of the receiver left my ears ringing.

When I turned around, my wife was smiling, with a glint in her eye which was far from sympathetic.

“Poor Winnie!” she observed. “You’d better stick to your office stenographers and not go picking up red-headed married women in Westchester. You haven’t got a chance.”

I refilled my glass and hers, in that order--a husbandly gesture which put me, I felt, on a solid married basis for the moment.

“Jimmie,” I announced. “I don’t need to tell you that I’m an awful heel. Now that we’ve got the wraps off I wish you’d tell me what you really think of me and Virginia.”

Mrs. Tompkins’ nostrils flickered slightly. “I never cared for bulging red-heads myself,” she said. “When she was at Miss Spence’s we called her Virgin for short, but not for long. There never was a thing in pants, up to and including scarecrows, that she wouldn’t carry the torch for. When she married Jerry Rutherford it was a great relief to her relatives. She had no friends.”

“A very succinct summary, for all that it should be written in letters of fire,” I remarked. “And now what do you think of me?”

She took a long sip of her drink and leaned forward. “You’re fat, soft and spoiled, Winnie, physically, mentally and morally,” she began, “and you know it. If you weren’t so stinking rich you’d--well, I don’t know. There’s something about you that’s--Well, after you bought me from my parents, I wanted to kill myself and then I sized you up. There’s no real harm in you, Winnie, it’s not hard to like you, but you never were love’s young dream.”

“What you say is absolutely on the beam,” I admitted. “But while we’re on the subject I wouldn’t call Jerry Rutherford the answer to a maiden’s prayer. That Hollywood doctor type with the swank suburban practice and the soft bedroom manner gets me down. He has only three ideas in the world and all of them begin with ‘I’. After the first antiseptic raptures you’d have nothing in common but your appendix and he’d want to get away with that--for a consideration.”

Jimmie giggled. “You forget that he already has it,” she said. “That’s how I was first attracted to him, under the ether cone. I was sick as a dog and he held my hand and told me I was being very brave.”

“And sent the hell of a bill to me,” I added.

“Well,” she asked, after a pause. “What do you really think of me?”

“I think, Jimmie, that you’re lonely, bored and unhappy. All three are my fault but they are driving you to make a fool of yourself. Nobody has tried to understand you”--which is catnip for any person of either sex, once you get them talking about themselves--”least of all your husband. You need what other women need--children, a home...”

“If this is a build-up for obstetrics, the answer is ‘No!’” she snapped angrily.

“Skip it!” I urged. “I’m telling you the truth, not making a pass at you. We can talk some more about you in the morning. In the meantime, I think I’ll turn in. I’m very tired, a little tight and I’ve had a lousy day.”

She flashed me a curious look. “Go on up, Winnie,” she said. “I’ll put these things away. You’ll need your strength for the morning, if I know Virginia Rutherford.”

Guided by luck and the smell of pipe tobacco, I found what was obviously the Master’s Room--with a weird amalgam of etchings of ducks and nude girls, including one Zorn, and all the gadgets for making sleep as complicated as driving an automobile.

I was awakened in the morning by a hand on my shoulder. It was Mary-Myrtle.

“You’d better get up and put on your pyjamas and dressing gown,” she remarked conversationally. “Dr. Rutherford is downstairs and Mrs. Rutherford is talking with Mrs. Tompkins in her bedroom.”

“Stormy weather?”

“I’ll say so--and see here--” she began.

“Sit down, Mary!” I ordered.

She subsided on the edge of the bed and looked at me rebelliously.

“From now on, Mary,” I announced, “things are going to be different around here. I won’t refer to what is past, because you’re old enough to know what you’re doing and so am I. If you want to stay on and really help me through a hard time, I’ll double your wages. If you’d rather go--and I wouldn’t blame you--I’ll pay you six months wages in advance and you can clear out. But I can’t be worried about you and your feelings when I have a big problem to clean up here. Will you go or stay?”

The girl thought for a moment, then rose, straightened her apron and gave me the first friendly smile I had received, since my arrival from the Aleutians.

“I’ll stay, Mr. Tompkins,” she said. “And here’s a pick-me-up I mixed for you. Better drink it before you see the Rutherfords.”