He forced another smile. “Just let me run you over to your house,” he said. “Believe me, April, you’ll never get a ride in a better car.”
The timing could not have been more perfect. Just as he was saying this, hands on hips and smile on lips, April heard a roar, a most familiar roar, as a car took a corner two blocks away. She looked up and Bill looked up, and they saw Craig’s Mercedes, sleek and lovely, burning up the street at a speed way over the legal limit. Craig dropped the car down into second, hit the brakes, and the Mercedes pulled up at the curb.
Bill was staring at it.
“Bill,” she said, “I guess I’ll never get a ride in a better car, will I?”
Then she told him what he could do with his camshaft. She wasn’t too clear on what a camshaft was, but she guessed that one shaft was as good as the next for what she had in mind. She turned away from him, wanting to race to Craig, but controlling herself, playing the scene for all it was worth.
She walked like a queen to the Mercedes. Craig leaned across to open the door for her, and she stepped in regally, seating herself in the snug bucket seat, fastening the belt around her middle. She leaned over to kiss Craig quickly on the cheek, then turned around slightly just as Craig dropped the Mercedes into first and put the accelerator on the floor.
She would not have traded the expression on Bill’s face for anything in the world.
7
TOGETHER they laughed over Bill. Craig suggested that Bill had a great career ahead of him as a gas-pump jockey, April added that he might have trouble making change for a dollar and they laughed their heads off.
“Where are you taking me?” she asked suddenly. Home.
“My home?”
“God, no,” he said. “I’d just as soon not make sad comments about the danger of the welfare state with your petit bourgeois father, if you don’t mind.”
“Dad’s working.”
“Or make church talk with your mother. Let’s go to my place, April.”
“Fine.”
“You can cook me a dinner,” he went on. “And then I’ll help you with your homework. Or won’t your mother let you out on a school night?”
“She likes to have me home. But since I’ll be with you—”
“She’ll know you’re perfectly safe,” he finished for her. “That’s fine. You need a great deal of help with your homework, little girl.”
She arched an eyebrow. “I thought I was doing fine.”
“For a beginner.”
“I still have a lot to learn?”
“Of course,” he said. “It takes a lifetime to become an expert in the art of love.”
The art of love, she thought. She liked the sound of the phrase. A woman who was good in bed was an artist, like a person who wrote or painted or acted. The notion seemed to make everything she did with Craig that much more proper and correct. It was not sin, not at all. It was art.
“I’ll do my best,” she said. “And maybe I can work my way up to a whorehouse in Marseilles.”
“Maybe.”
She glanced at him and he seemed quite serious. She shrugged and sighed. “It’s nice weather,” she said.
“Let’s not talk about the weather.”
“What should we talk about?”
“About dinner.”
She bit her lip. “I don’t cook very well,” she said. “You’ll have to put up with me.”
“I’ll try.”
“What should I cook?”
“Whatever your best dish is.”
She squeezed his hand. “I make a wicked peanut-butter sandwich,” she said, “but it’ll probably be pretty pallid after Kardaman’s. Are you used to fancy cooking?”
“I’m used to good cooking. It doesn’t have to be fancy.”
“But it has to be good?”
“It’s better that way,” he said, grinning.
“Well,” she said dubiously, “I’ll see what I can do. But I’m not guaranteeing anything.”
“You said the same thing about bed. And you did very well.”
She closed her eyes. This was nice, she thought. Rocketing along in the Mercedes, heading for Craig’s house where she would cook him a dinner just like—well, like a wife. This would be fun, a way to pretend, a way to have a good time.
She realized with a start that she wanted more than the pretense. She wanted to be Craig’s wife. To be April Jeffers, Mrs. Craig Jeffers. She kept her eyes closed, afraid to let her expression give her away.
Because Craig would not approve.
Craig did not want a wife. He had not said this in so many words, but she knew it was so. He wanted a mistress and—since she functioned satisfactorily in that capacity—he was willing to spend time with her. But a man like Craig was by no means ripe for marriage. He cherished his independence far too much to throw it away easily.
Still, she was going to marry him.
To accomplish that, she knew, would take time. But in time he would love her, would love her so completely that he would want nothing more than to spend the rest of his life with her. She would have to play her cards close to her pretty chest to keep him from the realization that she had her cap set for him. But she would do what she had to do. She would give him her love until he returned it in full measure, and then he would ask her to marry him, and she would.
April Jeffers.
Mrs. Craig Jeffers.
She called her mother from Craig’s house.
“This is April, Mom.”
“Where are you, dear?”
“Craig picked me up after school,” she said, honestly enough. “You know I’ve got a paper to write for English, on Hamlet.”
“I know.”
“Well, Craig majored in English at college. He took a great Shakespeare course and he’s helping me with the paper. I’m over at his house now.”
“At his house, April?”
“Well, sure.”
“Why didn’t you bring him here, April?”
“Well, he’s got all his books here,” she said. “And his notes. There’s nothing wrong, is there, Mom?”
There was a pause. Then, “No, I don’t suppose so, April. Just be careful, dear.”
“Careful?”
Another pause. Then, “April, when you get home, I’d like to talk to you.”
“What about?”
“I’ll tell you when I see you. I heard something about your young man, April. I don’t know that it’s true, of course, but it’s not too pleasant, and I’d like to discuss it with you.”
“Mom—”
“Not now,” her mother said. “Will you be home for dinner?”
“Well, we’re eating here, and—”
“I see. I’ll talk with you when you get home, April. And don’t be too late. You have school tomorrow, you know.”
“I know, Mom.”
“Goodbye, April.”
She heard the click as her mother replaced the receiver. For a moment she stood still, holding the dead phone in her hand. Then, slowly, she replaced it.
“Something wrong?”
“Nothing really,” she told Craig. He had taken a quick shower while she phoned her mother and his body was still glistening with droplets of water. He had a towel wrapped around his waist.
“What’s the matter with Mrs. North?”
“I don’t know exactly. She said she wanted to talk to me.”
“What about?”
“About you.”
“Me?”
“Uh-huh. She said she heard something about you and she doesn’t know if it’s true, but she wants to talk about it. And she told me something else.”
“What?”
“She told me to be careful.”
He roared at that. “She means don’t get pregnant,” he said. “Wonderful.”
“What do you suppose she heard?”
“That I play with girls,” he said. “Did you know that, my dear?”
She grinned. “I wouldn’t have believed it for
the world.”
“But it’s true.”
“Really?”
“Really”
“Now?”
“Now.”
“Not with that towel on,” she said. “I’ll bet you can’t do anything like that with that old towel on.”
“Then do something about it.”
She reached out. Her hands touched his chest, cool and moist from the shower. They found the towel, opened it and dropped it to the floor.
“My God,” she said. “I have all these damn clothes on.”
“Take them off.”
“Should I?”
“You had better,” he said. “Otherwise I’ll tear ’em to shreds.”
“It sounds like fun.”
“But it might throw your mother, April.”
She giggled. Then she pulled the sweater over her head. She was wearing a bra—if you went without one at school you bounced going up and down the stairs, and the boys had enough ideas about her as it was. She unhooked the bra and discarded it and her breasts leaped free.
“You like?”
“You’re still overdressed, April.”
She got the skirt off and kicked her shoes halfway across the room.
“You like?”
“You’ve still got your socks on,” he said.
“I want to keep my socks on.”
“You do?”
“You told me it’s sexy when a girl wears stockings. What’s wrong with socks?”
“Get them off, April.”
Teasingly, she lifted one foot, peeled the sock down and off. Then she stood on that foot and removed the other sock. She threw both socks away, put her hands on her hips and posed.
“Look.”
“Come here, April.”
“No,” she said playfully. “No, you have to catch me. Do you think you can catch me, Craig?”
He lunged for her, almost comical in his eagerness. He lunged and missed and she danced away, light on her feet, eyes flashing in excitement. She ducked behind a low-slung modern chair and he raced after her. This time, when he made his lunge, his hands brushed her breasts but she got free again, skipping into the center of the room, still, his touch had affected her. She was excited now, needing him, aching for him, but waiting for him to catch her and master her.
“Can’t you catch me, Craig?”
He lunged and missed again.
“Damn you, April.”
“Catch me, Craig.”
And, of course, he did catch her. She tried to dodge behind the sofa but she was off-balance and caromed off the wall instead, and his arms snaked around her waist and dragged her to the floor. She thrilled with excitement that was half pleasure, half pain. His hands were everywhere, setting her afire, and her need grew.
He laughed. “Beg for it,” he said. “Beg for it, April.”
“Please—”
“Beg,” he taunted her. “Tell me what you want.”
She told him.
“Tell me what you want me to do to you.”
She told him.
“Tell me how much you need it,” he said. “Beg for it, burn for it, itch for it—tell me!”
She told him.
At last he rewarded her, burying himself in her soft hot body. Her flesh was pulsing now, flaming, and her hips were thrusting and her breasts were crushed beneath his hard chest. She locked him to her, making sure he wouldn’t escape, making sure he would not retreat to leave her screaming in agony …
She cooked dinner, after a fashion. There was a huge barbecue pit in the backyard, and there were two prime sirloins in the refrigerator, and there were two old Idahoes in the potato bin, and with all that equipment any low-grade moron could have cooked dinner. Craig built a fire in the pit and she wrapped the potatoes in foil and tucked them away in the coals, then smeared the steaks with a little salt and a speck of pepper and chucked them onto the fire. The steaks came off the fire burned on the outside and raw in the middle, just as they should be, and the potatoes, improved with a tablespoon of sour cream and some chopped chives, were fine.
“You’re a good cook,” he told her.
“It was tricky.”
“But good.”
“How about dessert?”
“I know exactly what I want for dessert, little girl.”
“Oh?”
“Don’t smirk at me. Yes, I know what I want for dessert. I want you for dessert.”
“It sounds like fun,” she said. “But I’ll go hungry. Did you ever think of that?”
“I thought of it.”
“Well?”
He sighed mightily. “April,” he said, “you have a lot to learn, little girl.”
“I do?”
“Yes.”
“Teach me, Craig.”
He smiled gently. “You shall have dessert, too,” he told her. “I could hardly bear to eat while another went hungry. Do you understand, April?”
And, some moments later, they were head-over-heels in love.
A few minutes past nine, she left the Mercedes and walked to her front door. The door was open. She went in and her mother and father were waiting for her in the living room. She kissed them both hello, hoping the brushing she had given her teeth was sufficiently thorough.
Her mother took her to one side. “I mentioned that I wanted to talk to you, April.”
“Yes, Mom?”
“Let’s go upstairs, dear. I don’t want to upset your father, April.”
They went upstairs, Mrs. North leading and April close behind her. Whatever Mom had heard about Craig, April thought, was undoubtedly true. Well, she would have to find a way to talk Mom out of what was bothering her. If her mother ordered her to stop seeing Craig there was going to be trouble. Because she would not dream of giving Craig up.
But the talk would not go that far, she thought. Maybe her mother was just going to give her the usual sex talk, and don’t-let-boys-put-fingers-up-you routine, the save-it-for-your-husband bit. The old lady would probably fall over in a faint if she knew there was nothing left to save for a husband.
They went into April’s room, closed the door. April sat on the edge of the bed while her mother took the one chair and planted her ample rump upon it.
“April—”
“Yes, Mom?”
Mrs. North sighed. “This may be difficult for both of us,” she said. “Especially after the approval I’ve voiced over your Craig. But I’ve asked around about him, April, and—”
“Why, Mom?”
“Why, because you’re dating him, dear. A mother wants to know the sort of young man her daughter is seeing.”
“I see.”
“And what I’ve heard is not—well, not exactly favorable. There are rumors about that boy, April.”
There are probably more rumors about your own daughter, she wanted to say. How had her mother missed hearing about her? Everyone else in town seemed to know that April North was no longer a virgin. But her mother existed in a calm little dream world, untouched by truth.
She asked, “What kind of rumors?”
Mrs. North sighed again. “It’s hard for me to tell you, April. He seems pleasant enough, but people in town have told me he’s a mite wild. That he dates girls and seduces them—and he drives around in that car of his at very fast speeds and runs with a fast crowd. He drinks a great deal and—”
It was time for a counter-offensive.
“Mother,” she said, “if you had told me this yesterday I wouldn’t have believed you. But now I know what you mean. I understand.”
“Did he—”
“Try anything? No, he didn’t. Can I start at the beginning, Mom?”
“Why, of course.”
She gathered her forces, her verbal soldiers. “I talked to Craig today,” she said. “After I spoke to you. I mentioned what you said, how you wanted to talk to me about something you heard about Craig.”
“I don’t know that you should have told him, April.”
“It was
the right thing. Because he sat me down and he told me all about himself, Mom. It was quite a story.”
“Oh?”
“He used to be very wild,” she went on, inventing brilliantly, “when he was just a boy. Oh, you know how it is—his parents were rich and I guess they spoiled him something awful. He always had everything he wanted and he went to exclusive prep schools and he ran around with a wild crowd.”
“That’s what I heard.”
“That was because he didn’t have any responsibility,” April went on. “He was rich and he didn’t have to work and he was wild. But then his parents died. It was very sudden and all at once he was all alone.”
“How dreadful!”
“I guess the shock made him settle down. All at once he was all alone in the world, with no one to love him or take care of him, and he saw that his past life was wrong and that he couldn’t live that way any more.”
“The poor boy.”
She went on, elaborating on Craig’s reformation, telling how he had joined the church again, and how he was serious and sincere, how he was a prince among men. As she talked, she watched the play of expressions across her mother’s face. It was obvious that she was swallowing every last word.
Which, April thought, was fine. She felt pleased with herself. She was lying magnificently, playing to her mother skillfully, working every gambit in the book. Her mother’s weak points were church and family, and these points played predominant roles in April’s story.
“He told me he wouldn’t have had anything to do with me before,” she finished up. “Because he knows I’m a good girl from a good family, and that wasn’t the sort of girl he was interested in before—before his parents died. He wanted wild girls then. Girls who would— well, you know.”
“Of course, dear.”
“But now he needs a girl he can respect. And he respects me, Mother.”
Mrs. North beamed. “He well might,” she said. “You’re a girl deserving of respect.”
“Well, I come from a good family. And I know the difference between right and wrong.”
Mrs. North beamed more brightly. These were the key words, April thought. God, she should be an actress.
She finished and waited. Her mother sat silent for a moment or two, her head bobbing in thought. At last she raised her eyes.
“April,” she said, “I’ll tell you something, my dear. Quite often we tend to judge men and women differently, and this is as it ought to be. A man is different, April. A man is born with a certain amount of wanderlust in him, and a man often has to let loose and run free as the wind. A woman cannot do this. A woman must stay pure for the man she will someday marry.”