any of them. I didn’t really understand Iris’s tenacious desire to throw in her lot with Martin. I didn’t understand Sally’s demented desire to cling to a man who didn’t want her. And, God knows, I didn’t understand anything about Marietta. None of them operated the way a man would operate. They made no sense to me. I resented being sucked so profitlessly into their woman’s world.
Through the tall French doors that led from the bedroom to the living room, light still fanned in. That meant Marietta wasn’t asleep. She was probably lying there on the couch, smoking cigarettes, like me, and thinking. Of what? Of how to outwit Sally? No, that was too sensible and masculine. Probably she was shaking at the memory of red hairs on male wrists or yearning for Martin and the orchard on the home farm and the knobbly staffs made out of hawthorn.
I tried to believe in Sally’s vicious threats. I tried to believe that tomorrow, probably, would be vastly and ominously different for all of them. But, for some reason, this feminine danger seemed less real than a scene in the cheapest movie. I wondered where Sally was now. Driving back to Taxco? She was the sort of crazy woman who would leap into a car and drive furiously through the night. I thought of the perilous road to Taxco, snaking through mountains, flanked with canyons. I thought of Sally with her little hands clutching the wheel of the automobile, her hair gleaming dead pale in the moonlight, her eyes bright with relentless malice. She had only to make one false movement of the wrist to plunge herself and the red convertible coupé into eternity.
I considered cold-bloodedly whether life would be better for me with Sally dead. It would be better for the others, obviously. Iris would get Martin. Martin would get money. Marietta would get freedom from the fear that haunted her. But what would I get?
Nothing, I decided. But then there was nothing for me anyway. I stubbed my cigarette.
Curiously enough, it was Sally I dreamed of and not Iris. Sally, thin and hot, pressed against me, her metal-heavy hair weighing me down, her lips, unyielding as metal, locked against mine.
I was awakened by sunlight splashing through the window which looked out on the green patio. I opened my eyes and remembered Marietta in the next room. I remembered too what the day had in store for us. I put on a bathrobe and went into the living room. The couch was restored to its normal stiff majesty. There was a neat pile of sheets and blankets on the floor at its side. Marietta wasn’t there.
A piece of paper was propped against a lamp made out of a china blackamoor in pink lackey tights. I picked the note up. In Marietta’s sprawling, oddly ingenuous handwriting was scribbled:
Thanks, Peter. I’d have made breakfast for you if there’d been a kitchen and if I knew how to cook.
Love,
Marietta
If I’d been consistent, I’d have been relieved she had gone, but I wasn’t. I felt hurt. This was a bad day for her. I’d expected her to need me as a sensible, enterprising male—someone to plan for her and decide how to ready herself for Sally’s blow when it fell. I missed her too, and I felt uneasy. I hoped to hell she wasn’t going to try some scatterbrained last-minute maneuver.
I was shaving gloomily when the phone rang. Mexico has two competitive telephone systems. It always confused me. The wrong instrument always seemed to be ringing. This time I hit the right receiver on the first try. A Spanish voice said something which involved my name and Taxco. Then, like every other voice in Mexico, it said, “ momentito,” which should mean a little moment but means anything up to half an hour.
This time I didn’t have to wait long. I felt quite jittery, because Sally was the only person I knew in Taxco. It was Sally too. The pretty, light voice came across the wire, conciliatory with a faint bubbling of laughter behind it.
“Peter, did I wake you up?”
“Yes.”
“I
Through the tall French doors that led from the bedroom to the living room, light still fanned in. That meant Marietta wasn’t asleep. She was probably lying there on the couch, smoking cigarettes, like me, and thinking. Of what? Of how to outwit Sally? No, that was too sensible and masculine. Probably she was shaking at the memory of red hairs on male wrists or yearning for Martin and the orchard on the home farm and the knobbly staffs made out of hawthorn.
I tried to believe in Sally’s vicious threats. I tried to believe that tomorrow, probably, would be vastly and ominously different for all of them. But, for some reason, this feminine danger seemed less real than a scene in the cheapest movie. I wondered where Sally was now. Driving back to Taxco? She was the sort of crazy woman who would leap into a car and drive furiously through the night. I thought of the perilous road to Taxco, snaking through mountains, flanked with canyons. I thought of Sally with her little hands clutching the wheel of the automobile, her hair gleaming dead pale in the moonlight, her eyes bright with relentless malice. She had only to make one false movement of the wrist to plunge herself and the red convertible coupé into eternity.
I considered cold-bloodedly whether life would be better for me with Sally dead. It would be better for the others, obviously. Iris would get Martin. Martin would get money. Marietta would get freedom from the fear that haunted her. But what would I get?
Nothing, I decided. But then there was nothing for me anyway. I stubbed my cigarette.
Curiously enough, it was Sally I dreamed of and not Iris. Sally, thin and hot, pressed against me, her metal-heavy hair weighing me down, her lips, unyielding as metal, locked against mine.
I was awakened by sunlight splashing through the window which looked out on the green patio. I opened my eyes and remembered Marietta in the next room. I remembered too what the day had in store for us. I put on a bathrobe and went into the living room. The couch was restored to its normal stiff majesty. There was a neat pile of sheets and blankets on the floor at its side. Marietta wasn’t there.
A piece of paper was propped against a lamp made out of a china blackamoor in pink lackey tights. I picked the note up. In Marietta’s sprawling, oddly ingenuous handwriting was scribbled:
Thanks, Peter. I’d have made breakfast for you if there’d been a kitchen and if I knew how to cook.
Love,
Marietta
If I’d been consistent, I’d have been relieved she had gone, but I wasn’t. I felt hurt. This was a bad day for her. I’d expected her to need me as a sensible, enterprising male—someone to plan for her and decide how to ready herself for Sally’s blow when it fell. I missed her too, and I felt uneasy. I hoped to hell she wasn’t going to try some scatterbrained last-minute maneuver.
I was shaving gloomily when the phone rang. Mexico has two competitive telephone systems. It always confused me. The wrong instrument always seemed to be ringing. This time I hit the right receiver on the first try. A Spanish voice said something which involved my name and Taxco. Then, like every other voice in Mexico, it said, “ momentito,” which should mean a little moment but means anything up to half an hour.
This time I didn’t have to wait long. I felt quite jittery, because Sally was the only person I knew in Taxco. It was Sally too. The pretty, light voice came across the wire, conciliatory with a faint bubbling of laughter behind it.
“Peter, did I wake you up?”
“Yes.”
“I
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