“Nobody worried about your Uncle Pen, either,” said George.
“What the hell are you trying to say?”
“I’ve already said it. You are what you are. Shit is what you called the kind of life I prefer to lead. But what kind of a car did you buy for yourself? A Rolls-Royce. A Ford or a Dodge would have done just as well, but you bought a Rolls and then invented an excuse for buying it. I have a Lincoln, a Pierce, and a Packard. And a Ford, half-ton. I could manage a Rolls, but I didn’t need it to express my individuality. And if I had, I wouldn’t make excuses for it. I’ve never made excuses to anyone for anything I’ve ever done.”
“No, not even when you should have,” said Bing. “Well, Father, this isn’t as bad as I thought it might be, but it isn’t very good, either. So if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to take a ride out to the cemetery.”
“Your mother’s grave is two away from your uncle’s. I imagine there’ll be some workmen around there,” said George. “And judging from this conversation, you don’t wish to have me go on holding a plot for you.”
“No thanks. In fact, I’m surprised you’d saved a space for me.”
“I hadn’t exactly saved it. I just hadn’t given it up,” said George Lockwood.
“What time is dinner? I may ride around for a while.”
“Seven, as a rule. Ask your stepmother. This phone connects with her sitting-room. Just push the button that says 2F-SR. Second-floor sitting-room.”
“I’ll be back before that,” said Bing. “There isn’t much I want to see.”
The women went for a drive, making a clockwise circle that enabled Dorothy James to see the farming country, the forests, the coalmining patches, the county seat, Gibbsville, and back to the Lockwood house. They were gone a couple of hours, but they were back ahead of Bing.
“Well, what’s your verdict?” said George Lockwood.
“Beautiful, and horrid,” said Dorothy James. “Therefore fascinating. To see what care the farmers have taken of their land, how hard they must work to keep everything looking so neat and orderly. Then a few miles later, the forest primeval. I could amost see Indians hiding behind the trees. Then those hideous coal mines. Those mountains of coal dust and those shabby little villages, and the gouges in the land. I really shouldn’t say that, of course. Sherry’s uncle is a director in one of the coal companies. And then we drove down that street in Gibbsville, the one with the lovely chestnut trees.”
“Lantenengo Street,” said George Lockwood.
“Some ladies were coming out of one of the big houses. An afternoon of bridge, I suppose. Limousines lined up on both sides of the street. Precisely the same ladies that come out of the Plaza after one of Mr. Bagby’s Musical Mornings. I couldn’t help but wonder how long it’d been since any of them had seen one of those mining villages.”
“Well, not lately. There’s been a strike, and the limousines try to avoid the mining villages. They’re known here as patches, by the way.”
“I think one or two of them recognized our car,” said Geraldine.
“What if they did?” said George. “What time are we having dinner?”
“Wilma would like to lie down for a half an hour, and I thought we’d have dinner at seven-thirty,” said Geraldine.”
“Bing hasn’t gone, I hope,” said Wilma.
“No, he went for a drive, too,” said George.
“Such an attractive boy—man, he’s turned out to be,” said Dorothy James. “It’s so encouraging to see them after a long period of years, if they turn out well. The others—well, there are enough of those. But your young man is the sort we can count on. The country, I mean. I wish we had many more of them instead of those tiresome polo-players and their chorus girls.”
“Dorothy, I’m beginning to think you must be a reader of Heywood Broun,” said George.
“Oh, I’m afraid I don’t think so very much of him, either,” said Dorothy James. “Sherry tells me he comes into the Racquet Club every day, and I’d like to know what Heywood Broun is doing in the Racquet Club in the first place? Why would he want to belong to the Racquet Club? No, I never see the New York World. I love Don Marquis, though, and I miss Christopher Morley in the Post. The Post isn’t the same without him, really. Didn’t he come from this part of the world?”
“Oh, I don’t think so,” said George. “As far as I know, there’s never been anyone literary in these parts.”
“Do you know who I thought of today? D. H. Lawrence,” said Dorothy James. “Have you ever read anything by him? He’s one of the younger English writers, and I wouldn’t recommend him to everybody. But those coal mines made me think of him. Wilma! I’m keeping you from your nap. You go right upstairs and I’ll sit here and have a cigarette with George.”
Wilma and Geraldine left.
“I drove her away,” said Dorothy. “On purpose. I wanted to talk to you about Wilma. I know that she’s going to be comfortably fixed, financially. But we’re all going to have to do something to keep her occupied, or Wilma’s going to make a mess of things. She’s been perfectly splendid these past few days, but she’s said certain things to me that I don’t like. She has a lover. You knew that.”
“Yes, I did,” said George.
“And, he could be a godsend for her, to get her through the first few months. But she’s said things to me that—well, I wish I knew you better, George.”
“Pretend you do,” said George.
“I guess I’ll have to, because I know I’ll get no help from Sherry. You know Sherry. Everything is black or white to him. No middle ground in between. I couldn’t tell Sherry that Wilma has a lover. He wouldn’t have her in the house. And goodness knows, some of the things she’s confided in me, he wouldn’t let me see her again. To put our cards right on the table, Wilma has practically told me in so many words that the sky’s the limit.”
“The sky’s the limit, eh?”
Dorothy nodded. “She spent most of her life looking after Pen, but she accuses herself of having failed there. I don’t agree with her, on that. Everything was all right until Pen fell into the hands of a designing woman. It’s exactly like the case of that Judd man. The corset salesman, and Ruth Snyder.”
“The outcome was different,” said George.
“Not really, you know. Everybody says they’re going to get the chair, both of them. So it’s going to be just the same as if the Judd man had murdered her and committed suicide.”
“Well, if you look at it that way,” said George.
“They’ve never solved that other case. The minister, Hall, and Mrs. Mills. Do you remember that? That was hushed up, if anything ever was.”
“It seemed that way,” said George. “Go on, Dorothy.”
“The corset salesman, of course he shouldn’t be mentioned in the same breath with Pen. But the Hall and Mills case involved some very prominent people. I don’t know them, but I know people who do. I’m trying to explain to you that regardless of your station in life, or how carefully you were brought up, there comes a time in some people’s lives when they forget all about their upbringing and so on. Unfortunately that happened to Pen, and what worries me is that it may happen to Wilma.”
“Ah, now I see,” said George.
“Not that I foresee anything like what’s just happened to Pen and Marian What’s-Her-Name.”
“Marian Strademyer.”
“Incidentally, I didn’t say anything, but we passed a farm this afternoon with that name on the mailbox. Fortunately, Wilma didn’t notice it.”