Baker Towers (9 page)

Quietly she closed the door.

S
HE WAS NEARLY ASLEEP
when Patsy came into the room, dropping her pocketbook loudly on the floor. Dorothy could smell her across the room, perfume and cigarettes, the fried-food odor they’d breathed all night. She switched on the lamp. “Is everything all right?”

“Fine.” Patsy kicked off her shoes.

“What were you talking about with Chick?”

“Oh, nothing interesting.” She sat heavily on the bottom bunk. “He isn’t all that fascinating when he’s sober. Never mind with a few drinks in him.” She stretched out on the bed. “Your brother’s a dreamboat. A real gentleman. Where did he run off to?”

“Upstairs, to bed. He was exhausted.”

“He’s a nice fellow.”

Dorothy waited for more—
Did he ask about me?
—but the question never came. When she reached down to turn off the light, she saw that Patsy was asleep.

H
E HAD BEEN
dreaming of the ocean. The sickening lurch, the eternal smell, briny and dank, like rotting fish. As always in his dreams, on his way to somewhere. The destination secret at first, revealing itself later in a terrible moment of clarity and dread. The same dream, always with some small variation. This time Gene Stusick was there—his old buddy Eugenius—now, somehow, the ranking officer on board. They had been hit; men wounded on deck, pandemonium below. George was bleeding from the back, his shirt wet with blood.

A sound woke him. He lay on the cot, still dressed; his throat raw, his shirt reeking of cigarettes. His undershirt was soaked with sweat. He glanced around the room and remembered where he was. Someone was knocking at the door.

“Who’s there?” His head throbbed. Unclear how much he had drunk. A steady stream of beers, furtive swigs from the flask when Rowsey remembered to pass it.

The door creaked open. The blonde stood in the hallway, still wearing her blue dress. She held something behind her back.

“Whatcha got there?”

Smiling broadly, she produced a bottle. “Kentucky bourbon. I keep it for when my daddy comes to visit.”

“Where’s Dorothy?”

“It’s past her bedtime. But I knew you’d be awake.” She closed the door and sat on the cot beside him. “I only had the one glass. You don’t mind sharing, do you?”

He shook his head to clear it. The room was very hot. Outside, he heard rain, the civilized hum of traffic. “What happened to Rowsey?”

“Oh, him.”
Glug-glug-glug
as she filled the glass. “I sent him home. I had enough of his company for one night.”

“What’s the problem? He seems like a nice fellow.”

“He’s not my type.” She handed him the glass. “It’s your sister he’s after.”

“No kidding.” George considered this. For two years he’d carried a certain picture of Dorothy in his mind, the way she’d looked the morning he’d left: bare-legged, in short cotton socks, hunched and shivering in her old coat. Earlier, at the station, he’d barely recognized her. It seemed odd that Rowsey had chosen her over the blonde, but only a little. Odd, but not impossible.

Patsy reached for the glass. For a moment her breasts fell forward, offered like pastries on a plate.

“Cheers.” She tucked a leg underneath her. He caught a flash of skin, a white glimpse of thigh.

“They’re fake,” she said, following his gaze.

He frowned.

“My stockings. Look at the seams.” She stood and turned her back to
him. She lifted her skirt a few inches. The dress clung to her backside. “It’s Magic Marker.”

He ran a finger down her leg. The flesh was smooth and warm.

“Pretty good. They’re almost straight.”

She laughed. “I can’t take any credit for that. Dottie drew them on.”

Dottie.
For a moment he wondered who she was talking about.

The blonde set down her glass and turned to face him, her skin pale in the low light. He saw that she was dead sober.

She knew exactly what she was doing.

T
HE NEXT MORNING
Dorothy and Georgie took a cab to the station. They rode in silence; the easy warmth of the night before had vanished. She felt the old awkwardness between them. Still, she tried.

“I had fun last night,” she said. “Didn’t you?”

“Sure.” He stared out the window. “It was a kick to meet your friends. Rowsey and—” He pretended to grope for her name.
Nice try,
he thought.
That’s some slick acting, pal.

“Patsy,” said Dorothy.

“Where is she, anyhow?” He avoided Dorothy’s eyes. “I figured we’d see her at breakfast, so I could say good-bye.”

“It’s the strangest thing. She got up at the crack of dawn. She’s spending the day in Richmond with her father. I guess he’s there on business.” Dorothy frowned. “She didn’t say a thing about it until this morning. That’s not like her.”

“You two seem pretty tight,” said Georgie.

“She’s my best friend.”

There was something girlish in her voice, a childish pride.
She’s still a kid,
he thought.

“We tell each other everything,” she said.

Good Christ,
he thought,
let’s hope not.

“Well, tell her good-bye for me.” He stared out the window, thinking of her body in the darkened room, her buttocks compact and round, small enough to fit in his hands. He’d been stunned when she reached for him.
Let me,
she said. She would not allow him inside her. Instead she finished him off expertly with her hand.

I won’t see you tomorrow,
she told him, dressing before the window.
I’m tied up all day.
She leaned over and kissed him.
Don’t worry, I can keep a secret.
The door closed silently behind her.

It wasn’t right; he knew it wasn’t. But a part of him felt he deserved those few moments of pleasure, a single happy memory to fortify him in the dark months—maybe years—to come. Evelyn had thrown him over, and he was still smarting. Gene Stusick’s betrayal had wounded him deeper still. Under the circumstances a painkiller was in order, a stiff shot of something to get him through. If he’d used Patsy for this purpose, she certainly had consented. More than that: she’d sought him out, come to his room of her own volition. She was not a conscript, but an enlisted girl, an enthusiastic volunteer.

“Chick liked meeting you,” said Dorothy.

George thought of Rowsey and Patsy in the front seat of the Ford, their blond heads inclined toward each other. Had she volunteered for him, too? Oddly, the possibility did not trouble him. Rowsey had been wounded; he’d taken his licks. He, too, deserved a little comfort. At that moment George would have loaned the guy his shirt.

“Rowsey’s a good guy,” he said.

“I think so,” said Dorothy.

George eyed her closely. He took her hand.

“Be careful,” he said. “Guys like Rowsey, they’re a little mixed up when they first come back. They need time to sort it all out.”

She stared at him, wide-eyed. She looked utterly perplexed.

“It’s none of my business,” he added, reddening. “Just be careful, is all. I don’t want you to get hurt.”

The cab pulled in front of the station. Georgie reached for his wallet. “Take her back where we came from,” he told the driver.

“But I’m coming with you,” she protested. “To see you off.”

“What’s the point? It’s pouring rain.” He embraced her quickly. “It was good to see you, kid.”

She clung to him.
Too fast,
she thought, feeling sick.
Too fast.
She had deliberately not thought about him leaving, or what he was returning to.

“Georgie, be careful,” she whispered.

“Don’t worry,” he said. “It’s almost over.”

S
ummer settled over the city. Electric fans hummed in every window. Pedestrians moved listlessly: office girls with shiny faces, men sweating through their shirts. The streetcar passengers fanned themselves with newspapers. The outdoor air smelled burned and tarry, as though the avenues were melting. Women languished on stoops and porches, listening to the radio, waiting for a breeze.

In August Dorothy went home to Bakerton for a visit. She had worked at Treasury six months, entitling her to five days of leave. Tack a weekend to either end, and that made nine luxurious days at home.

She slept in her old room, on the soft, sagging mattress next to her sister. Joyce was fifteen that summer, a slight, pale-faced girl, not shy but reserved, with a quiet certainty that made people treat her like an adult. She planned to enlist after graduation and worried that Hitler would surrender before she had the chance. She kept the room bare and orderly, as though an inspection were imminent. Above the bed hung a recruitment
poster, wheedled out of a clerk at the post office:
ARE YOU A GIRL WITH A STAR-SPANGLED HEART
?
JOIN THE
WAC
NOW
!

The family had changed since Dorothy left, but they seemed not to have suffered. Her mother had grown plump and healthy. Lucy had begun to crawl. Sandy had turned into a little savage. He spent the days playing in the woods and refused to have his hair cut. That and his strange coloring—brown face and arms, hair bleached white by the sun—gave him an odd, aboriginal look.

Dorothy envied his freedom. For months she had dreamed of home; but now that she was there, the time weighed upon her. She took walks to fill the afternoons. Once, walking down Main Street, she’d spotted Mag Spangler’s mother arranging hats in the shop window. Dorothy waved but didn’t stop to chat.

She returned to Washington a day early, Saturday instead of Sunday. It was only sensible, she told her mother; the trains being what they were, she’d be crazy to travel on the busiest day of the week, with all the soldiers returning from furlough.

The boardinghouse was quiet when she arrived. “Everyone is on holiday,” Mrs. Straub told her. The blond stenographer had gone to the shore for the weekend. The deaf schoolteacher spent summers with her people down south.

“What about Miss Sturgis?” Dorothy asked.

“In and out. I haven’t seen her all day.”

Upstairs, the girls’ room was a wreck. Ashtrays overflowed. Both beds were draped with Patsy’s clothes. Dorothy folded them and placed them on the bureau: sunsuits and Bermuda shorts, the red bathing suit she’d borrowed to wear at Glen Echo. She wondered where Patsy had worn it, if she, too, had gone to the shore. She thought of the long, eventless week in Bakerton and wondered what she had missed.

At ten o’clock she climbed into bed. The night was close; she expected to toss and turn, but the trip had tired her. With her eyes closed, the world seemed to rush past, as though she were still on the train. In minutes she was asleep.

L
OW VOICES
, a whisper. “Hush. The old lady hears like a bat.”

Dorothy opened her eyes. She had been dreaming of home. Her baby sister had crawled away, and Dorothy had found her under the porch steps. The room was dark. The bed seemed to shift slightly. Too late, she realized the voices were beneath her, and one of them belonged to Patsy.

“Don’t hit your head.” Giggles, a stifled laugh.

The bed rocked softly. It was a moment before she understood.
No,
she thought.
It can’t be.

There was a smell in the room, liquor and cigarettes; they had been out drinking. Dorothy stared at the ceiling, grateful that she hadn’t spoken. She wished herself invisible. If they saw her, she would die of shame.

The movement quickened. Someone breathed loudly. She had no idea how long the act would take. Minutes? Hours? She thought of the three-penny nails they had used to secure the beds.

Underneath a kind of sigh, deep and guttural. Abruptly the movement stopped. The breathing slowed, as though an animal were sleeping.

She wondered if it was over.

“Don’t get too comfortable,” Patsy whispered. “You can’t stay here.”

The bedsprings creaked. Dorothy squeezed her eyes shut.
Don’t see me,
she prayed. Dressing sounds, a zipper closing. Then the doorknob turned.

She opened her eyes a crack. A man stood at the door, his back to her. His left hand was tucked in his pocket.

“Sleep tight, dreamgirl,” he whispered, opening the door.

Beneath her Patsy rolled over in bed. “ ’Night, Chick.”

D
OROTHY ROSE EARLY
Sunday morning. Quietly she dressed for church, stepping around the stockings and underpants on the floor. Patsy lay on her side, snoring softly, facing the wall.

When Dorothy returned, Mrs. Straub was setting the table for breakfast. The blond stenographer complained about the crowds at the shore. Dorothy ate in silence, forcing down the oatmeal. She left the bacon on her plate.

After breakfast she climbed the stairs to her room. Both beds had been made. Patsy sat on hers, fully dressed, smoking.

“Hey there,” she said, butting her cigarette.

“Hey, yourself.” Dorothy stood at the mirror, removing her hat.

“When did you get back? I saw your suitcase when I woke up.” Patsy reached for her pack and lit another, her hands shaking.

“Yesterday afternoon.”

“I wasn’t expecting you until today.” Patsy’s voice quavered. “I didn’t see you when I came in last night.”

“Well, I saw you.”

“Honey, I’m sorry.” Patsy rose from the bed. “I’m so ashamed. I don’t know what to say.”

The girls stared at each other, their eyes tearing.

“Patsy,” said Dorothy, her voice breaking. “How could you?”

The question held a hundred others, none Dorothy was able to ask, none Patsy was prepared to answer. Yet she struggled an instant, as though she might try.

“I don’t know what you heard, or thought you heard,” she said finally. “But boys are different when they come back. Chick, your precious brother. All of them.”

My brother?
Dorothy thought.
What does this have to do with my brother?