Was his question a trap? I wondered. Had he already checked on what I’d said to Mrs. McKenna? “I’m a writer,” I told him.
“Oh?” He obviously disbelieved me. “Newspaper articles?”
“Plays,” I said.
Was it my imagination or, for one fleeting instant, was there actually a respectful tone in his voice as he repeated, “Oh?” There might have been. If he were capable of ascribing any virtue at all to me, it would have to be in the area of theater.
It ended as he asked, “And have any of them been produced? Your name is unfamiliar to me as a dramatist, although I think I know all the major ones.” Emphasis on major.
I returned his goading look in silence, tempted by but, thank God, not succumbing to the urge to answer: Yes, I had a “Movie of the Week” on Channel Seven in September; you did see it, didn’t you? Not that it would have been a victory on my part. After momentary confusion, he would only have thought me mad. “Not on the professional stage,” I told him.
“No,” he said. Vindicated.
I looked at Elise. I wanted to impress her and knew that my answer could only have disappointed her since the theater was paramount in her life. Still, it was safer than getting involved in a lie from which I couldn’t extricate myself.
“What sort of plays are they, Mr. Collier?” she asked, obviously trying to assuage embarrassment on my part.
Before I could reply, Robinson said, “My tip is drama—high drama.” He made no effort now to restrain a mocking smile. I felt myself begin to tighten with anger but repressed it, resorting to a cheap, albeit unspoken, counterthrust: He wouldn’t be so arrogant if he knew he was going to die on the Lusitania.
“They vary,” I told Elise. “Some of them are comedies, some dramas.” Don’t ask me any more, I thought; there’ll be no answers.
She did not pursue the subject further and I sensed, to my distress, that her attitude, while obviously not as harsh as Robinson’s, was similar: She believed me to be an amateur and there was nothing I dared say to dissuade her.
Time became vague at that point. How much or little of it passed is beyond my recollection. I remember only minor details of the conversation, though more than minor details of the eating.
Elise had very little—also a bowl of consommé, a half-slice of bread, some red wine. I suppose she always eats sparingly when close to production. I may have read that.
Robinson and Mrs. McKenna more than compensated for her meager appetite. It was, I think, the observation of them at work on their respective suppers that applied the coup de grâce to my system—and my patience.
Robinson, especially, laid me low. The man ate with a gusto which can only be described as carnal. Nausea threatened as he stuffed his mouth with food and chomped away at it. Averted eyes enabled me to avoid the sight of his merciless gourmandism—but the sound of it prevailed. It was all I could do to restrain myself from leaping to my feet with a scream and diving out the window. Only now can I appreciate the tragicomical essence of that scene. Ah, beauty, ah, romance; ah, sweet idyll of consuming passion. My stomach bubbling like a pit of lava while they ate and conversed; conversed and ate; ate and ate. Ate. Elise said nothing. I said nothing. She sipped wine and consommé and looked uncomfortable. I sipped consommé and nibbled on toast and felt semiterminal.
Once, Robinson included me in his conversation with Mrs. McKenna; well, not so much included as put me on the spot again. Did I shoot? he asked after mentioning the bird hunting in Coronado. When I shook my head, he said, “Too bad. I’m told there are good plover—and snipe and curlew are abundant too—also black brant.” (I swear that’s what he said.)
“Sounds exciting,” I said. I didn’t mean it as a gibe but that’s the way it came out. Robinson scowled at my irreverence but Elise’s repressed smile was, at least, a momentary reprieve for me.
About that time, the mayor of San Diego—a man named, as I recall, Carlson—came to the table to introduce himself and welcome Elise to the city. He looked awfully young to me despite his handlebar mustache. His handshake, like Robinson’s, was bone-cracking.
I was near the end of my resistance as Carlson and Robinson conversed, Robinson complaining about the lack of quality and quantity of cigars since the beginning of the Cuban revolt, Carlson suggesting that he take the afternoon train from the hotel to Old Mexico where he could purchase all the good cigars he wanted. No time, Robinson replied; again for my benefit, I suppose. The company was leaving for Denver the moment production was over.
At that point, I could take no more. What in God’s name was I doing sitting there with Robinson and Mrs. McKenna when I’d willed myself across a void of seventy-five years to be alone with Elise?
I was on the verge of insisting that she walk with me when common sense prevailed. She was hardly in a frame of mind to have demands imposed on her. Still, I had to get her out of there.
The answer came and, acting on it, I leaned toward her and spoke her name as softly as I could.
She looked up from her bowl of consommé, a tightening around her eyes. I should have called her Miss McKenna, I remembered, then let it go. “I don’t feel well, I think I need air,” I told her. “Would you—?”
“I’ll have you taken to your room,” Robinson interrupted; obviously I hadn’t spoken softly enough.
“Well—”
I stopped as he twisted around to summon the maitre d’. Was he going to have his way after all? Discover that I had no room, no luggage, nothing? “I just need some air,” I told him.
He looked at me with apathy. “Up to you,” he said.
“Elise, please go with me,” I said, knowing that only an appeal to her empathy could possibly overcome Robinson’s resistance.
“Miss McKenna,” he rumbled in turn, “must look out for her health.”
I chose to ignore him; there was no other course. “Please help me?” I asked.
Robinson’s voice rose in volume as he informed me that I was becoming offensive.
“That’s enough,” Elise said, cutting him off. Our eyes met as we stood and I saw that my success was painfully conditional. She was going to do as I requested but not because of sympathy; simply to avoid a scene and, perhaps—the idea chilled me suddenly—to rid herself of me elsewhere.
“Elise,” said Mrs. McKenna, sounding more shocked than offended. I knew, in that moment, that her convictions were nowhere near as ironbound as those of Robinson and that he was the only enemy I had to fear.
His glowering presence was afoot now. “I’ll assist you,” he declared. It was less an offer than a command.
“Never mind,” Elise told him, her tone so disconcerted that I wondered if I’d lost more than I’d gained.
“Elise, I cannot permit this,” he said.
“Cannot—” Her voice broke off, her cheek planes tightening suddenly.
No more was said. I felt the rigid grip of her fingers on my arm as we turned away from the table. Glancing at Robinson, I reacted to the venom in his face—his mouth a hard, thin, whitened gash, his black eyes riveted on me. It was, if I have ever seen one, an expression “of dark intent.”
I began to say something of comfort to Elise when I remembered I had told her that I wasn’t feeling well. How deeply should I play the scene? I wondered; considering that, in all conscience, I’d have to tell her the truth eventually, I settled for uneasy silence as we crossed the room. Uneasy because it seemed, at the time, as though the eyes of every diner, as well as those of Robinson, followed us. I’m sure, in retrospect, that I imagined most of it.
As we started down the corridor which led to the veranda, I began to wonder where she was taking me; her fingers were guiding me, of that there was no doubt. “You’re going to dump me in the ocean,” I said. She did not reply, looking straight ahead, her expression disturbing me; of empathy there was no sign whatever.
“I apologize again,” I said. “I know—” I did not continue, angered at myself. Enough apologies, I thought. I wanted to
get her out of the Crown Room and I’d done it. All’s fair in love and war, my mind recited. Don’t be bromidic, I told it.
When she opened the veranda doorway and I saw the dark, steep flight of stairs leading downward, I drew back with involuntary surprise. “Hold on to the railing,” she told me, taking my withdrawal for alarm, I guess. I added her reaction to my store of guilt and, nodding, started forward.
There were two sets of steps descending to the Paseo del Mar, I saw, one heading south, the other north; we went down the north steps. I tried to moderate my downward steps as though the sea wind on my face were helping my condition. There was no point in running this illness thing into the ground; I certainly didn’t want her to regard me as some kind of physical misfit. Still, I couldn’t let my recovery be too miraculous either; and, if the craven truth must out, I was enjoying the grip of her hand on my arm, the pressure of her shoulder against mine.
Now the sea walk was beneath my feet and, with her continuing assistance, we started toward another short staircase which descended through a planted slope about six feet wide, small palm trees growing on it, hard fronds rattling in the wind. Ahead of us, the surf boomed menacingly, its proximity unsettling to me. The moon had been obscured by clouds and I could barely distinguish the waves as they rolled in quickly. It seemed as though, in no time, we’d be struck by them.
We went down the steps and started across another walk. Convinced, by then, that we would shortly be soaked by spray if not by the waves themselves, I said with some concern, “Your dress will be ruined.”
“No,” was all she answered.
In a few moments, then, I saw that the surf was farther off than I had thought, the edge of the walk six or seven feet above a breakwater of rocks. There was a bench near that edge on which Elise bade me sit. I did, obediently; she hesitated, then sat down beside me, telling me to breathe in deeply.
Risking additional guilt, I leaned my head on her shoulder. Cad, I thought, only half in humor. I didn’t really care, though. All the hours and hours of working toward this moment flashed across my mind. I had earned it and I wasn’t going to let it go merely for the sake of brave confession. Not then, at any rate.
She had stiffened when I’d placed my head on her shoulder. Now, bit by bit, I felt the tension ease. “Are you feeling better?” she asked.
“Yes. Thank you.” Maybe I could ease myself up from pretended depths in stages rather than in one confessional surfacing which would certainly anger her. “Elise?”
“Yes?”
“Tell me something.”
She waited.
“Why are you being so nice to me? I’ve done nothing but distress you from the moment we met. I have no right to expect such kindness. Don’t stop,” I added hurriedly, “for God’s sake, please don’t stop but … why?”
She didn’t answer and I began to wonder if there were an answer she could give me or if I had only made the situation more awkward for her than ever.
Her reply was so long in coming that I’d already decided it wasn’t going to come when she spoke. “I will say this,” she told me, “then no more. Please do not ask me to explain it now for I cannot.”
I waited again, conscious of my heartbeat like a hovering pulsation in my chest.
“I was expecting you,” she said.
I started so abruptly that she caught her breath. “What is it?” she asked.
I couldn’t speak. Without thinking, I raised my head until my cheek was touching hers. She began to draw away, then, as I made a faint sound, stopped. And I almost think if I had died right then, her cheek to mine, her words etched in my consciousness, I might have died without complaint.
“Richard?” she finally asked.
“Yes?” I drew my head back, turning it to look at her. She was gazing toward the ocean, her expression somber.
“When we were on the beach before, you said—‘Don’t let me lose it.’ What did you mean?”
I stared at her in hapless silence. What was I to tell her? It couldn’t be the truth; I knew that absolutely now. From what place did you come to me? I thought. To what place—?
No. I thrust aside the memory. She would never write that poem. Her gardener would never find that scrap of paper. “Let me echo what you said,” I answered. “Please don’t ask me to explain it yet.” I saw her features tense and added, hastily, “It’s nothing terrible. It’s just that—well, it isn’t time for me to tell you yet.”
She continued gazing at the ocean, starting to move her head back and forth, too slowly for me to describe it as shaking, although her feeling was, without a doubt, a negative one. “What?” I asked.
The sound she made seemed to combine tribulation and dark amusement. “It’s all too mad,” she said, as though she were thinking aloud. “I sit here with a perfect stranger and I don’t know why.” She turned to me. “If you could only understand,” she said.
“I do,” I told her.
“You could not.”
“And yet I do,” I said. “I do, Elise.”
She turned from me again, murmuring, “No.”
“Spend time with me then,” I asked her. “Get to know me and decide—”
I stopped, about to add, “—if you can care for me.” I wouldn’t offer her the choice. She had to care for me; there was no other possibility. “Just spend as much time with me as you can,” I finished.
She was silent for a long while, looking at the ocean. Then she said, “I have to go inside now.”
“Of course.” I stood and helped her up, wanting to put my arms around her but dispelling the urge. Step by step, I told myself; don’t bungle this. As we turned, I saw the hotel lights, the vast, red-shingled roof, the flag waving high above the Ballroom tower, and I felt a surge of affection for this wonder-working structure which had enabled me to reach Elise. I offered her my arm and we started toward the hotel.
“And now I must confess,” I told her as we started up the steps through the planted slope.
Her hand drew away from my arm as she stopped.
“Keep walking,” I said. “Hold my arm. Look straight ahead and brace yourself for terrible revelation.” I was conscious of trying to make light of what I was about to say despite a feeling of definite trepidation.
“What is it?” she asked suspiciously, not following any of my instructions.
I drew in a quick breath. “I wasn’t sick.”
“I do not—”
“I only told you that I wasn’t feeling well so I could get you to myself.”
What did her expression signify? Acceptance? Shock? Disgust? “You tricked me?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“But that is loathsome.”
I thought her tone belied the harshness of the word and was impelled to answer, “Yes, it is. And I’d do it again.”
Once more, the look, as though she sought to understand me totally in the examination of my face. Abruptly, then, she shook herself, making an impatient sound. Turning, she started toward the hotel again, myself beside her. “Guess it’s time I found a room,” I said.
She glanced at me. Dear Lord, did that sound ulterior too? I thought. “You have no room?” she asked.
“There was no time to get one,” I told her. “I started looking for you as soon as I arrived.”
“You may have difficulty then,” she said. “The hotel is very crowded.”
“Oh,” I murmured. One more thing I hadn’t taken into consideration. Still—I force-fed confidence to my mind—there was sure to be something available. It was the winter season, after all.
As we entered the Rotunda, Robinson was standing by one of the pillars, obviously waiting for our return.
“Excuse me,” Elise said and I saw a whitening around her nostrils as she started toward him. There were sparks between them, sure enough; the books had been correct on that.
I wondered momentarily about how I was going to see her again, no arrangements having been made. Then I realized that first I had to h
ave a room and quickly turned toward the desk. How could I have a room though? The contradiction was disturbing to me. My signature was destined for tomorrow, not tonight.
The answer was not long in coming. Clerk Rollins, eyeing me with cool disdain, took obvious relish in informing me that not a single room was available for occupancy. Perhaps tomorrow.
Irrevocably tomorrow, I almost replied. Instead, I thanked him, turned, and started from the desk. Elise and Robinson were still engaged in what was, clearly, not an amicable discussion. My pace decreased, faltered, then stopped. Now what? I thought. Sit on a lobby chair all night? I felt the start of a smile on my lips. Perhaps that giant armchair on the mezzanine. That would provide a curious—albeit sleepless—satisfaction. Maybe I could ask Elise if I could sleep in her private railway car tonight. I discarded that idea instantly. I had done enough to make her suspicious. I would risk no more.
I started slightly as she turned from Robinson, her features tensed by an expression of wrath which cowed even me. Seeing me, she altered her direction and walked to where I stood. “You have a room now?” she inquired. I could not tell for sure whether it was concern or challenge in her voice.
“No, they’re all taken,” I answered. “I’ll have to get one in the morning.”
She gazed at me in silence.
“Don’t worry about it, I’ll manage something,” I told her.
She didn’t look excessively worried about it, her expression still on the harsh side; a carry-over from her talk with Robinson, I hoped. “I’m more concerned about seeing you—” I began, breaking off as she turned and started back toward Robinson. Now what? I thought. Was she about to order him to punch me in the nose? I watched with wary interest as she stopped in front of him and said something. He shook his head, glanced angrily in my direction, looked at her again, and spoke with obvious fury. What in God’s name was she saying to him? I wondered. Whatever it was, his monumentally adverse reaction led me to believe that she was requesting him to help me.
Now he reached out suddenly and took hold of her right arm. She jerked it away from him, that striking look of command on her face again. I was newly awed by the fact that this woman, capable of such monarchical possession, had been so kind to me. If she had wanted to, she could have sent me packing in an instant; that was obvious.