Fortune's Hand (21 page)

She put out her hand. “How do you do?”

“Pleased to meet you.”

“What about lunch?” Devlin said. “I've got a table where they'll bring stuff to us. I hate standing in line at a buffet. Reminds me of a soup kitchen. Eddy, I hope you didn't slip up about that table in the shade. Better check on it.”

With his followers, he moved toward the shade, confiding as they went that Eddy Morse was “his man,” a great lawyer and a great friend. He welcomed the
MacDaniels today because any friend of Eddy's was a friend of his.

Although in the usual fashion men and women alternated at the table, it was also usual for conversations to crisscross in the air, men talking to men and women to women. All these people apparently were well acquainted, the men being involved in various businesses and politics, while the women, only secondarily involved with them, had their own interests. Few of them were working women in the usual sense of “earner,” but they seemed to work hard at child-rearing, entertaining, charity fund-raisers, and country club life. And in a subtle way, they all seemed to be deferring to Olivia Devlin.

Ellen observed them with interest. Olivia was definitely not the one whom anybody would identify as a leader in this group. Every other woman present was much prettier—many were exceedingly pretty and fashionable—than this bizarrely costumed person who was either fairly old but looking younger, or fairly young but looking older. Every other woman was better spoken than she was. And Ellen came to the conclusion: Eddy had not exaggerated. Devlin must indeed be fabulously rich.

As if to confirm this conclusion, Olivia was speaking with assurance. “Yes, we saw it last month and Dick said I might buy it. They're holding it for us, but only till the end of the week. I don't know—of course, it's a Matisse and the colors are so nice, this one has a lot of pink in it, but our library's just been done over, and all
the old book bindings are so dark, I can't make up my mind whether—”

A general discussion of the subject followed. Ellen turned to the chicken salad, made with fresh pineapple and was delicious. She was hungry. The food was well worth the hour's journey.

In a moment's lull, she heard Robb speaking her name. “That's Ellen there, in brown. She's a writer, had a very fine book published a while back. She's an artist, too. She does her own illustrations.”

Ellen flinched. A while back? Only eight years ago and nothing since! She wished he wouldn't talk like that. But he was so proud of her one small accomplishment … She ought to be grateful.

Her right-hand neighbor had caught his words. “You're a writer? Under what name?”

“My own. Ellen MacDaniel.”

“I can't place it. And I keep up with all the bestseller lists.”

“It wasn't on any list. It was a little book for children.”

“Oh.” Interest had vanished.

The left-hand neighbor inquired whether she was a new member here.

“No, we're guests today. Eddy Morse's guests.”

“Oh, I know Eddy. He's a personality, isn't he? A great friend of the Devlins, of course. You're planning to join, aren't you?”

“I'm afraid not.”

“I heard wrong, then. Somebody said you were.”

She must make the denial sound more friendly. “We
have two young children and my husband's home so little that we like to spend all his free time with them.”

“Just as well,” the woman said, to Ellen's surprise. “I wouldn't recommend it to any attractive young couple. A woman has to keep an eye on her husband in this place. Especially a stunning one like yours,” she added.

“I suppose,” Ellen replied, being expected to reply, “that's pretty true everywhere these days.”

“Yes, but in clubs like this it's worse. It's so intimate, the same people week after week. It gets too warm and cozy, you know, like a hothouse. Things flower. And then, with the bar right there, you can imagine.”

When someone interrupted, Ellen was relieved. The subject was not one for a fine afternoon in the country. Yet there were many people who would only find it titillating. And I, she thought, felt awful over Robb's breakup with that girl when they weren't even married!

Her “stunning” husband was in animated conversation, holding his hearers' attention. Needless to say, he was vastly more dignified than Eddy could ever be, and still he had acquired some aspect of Eddy's expansiveness and affability. This was not unattractive, perhaps it was even very attractive. It was just different, and unlike him. Different.

The new job and the new income were plainly the cause. Thinking then of her father, now aging by the hour, she felt a few minutes of sadness. But people do grow and change, don't they? In the thirties a man isn't what he was in his twenties. That was life. That was marriage, moving along and growing old together.… As long as love stayed the same. And of course it
would. Ellen and Robb would live as their parents had done, in full faith until death.

“What did you think?” Robb asked after Eddy had taken them home.

“Of what?”

“The whole day. The place.”

“The day was relaxing. The setting reminded me in some ways of that place where you and I met.”

“The imitation Versailles? I didn't see any resemblance.”

“Not the architecture, but the dressed-up bustle and all the name-dropping are what I meant.”

“They don't bother me too much. They're the world.”

“Not every world.”

“Well, enough worlds to matter. They were saying again that Devlin's going to run for the Senate. Not this term, or maybe not even the next, but eventually. There must be something to the rumor, since you keep hearing it so much.”

“State or federal?”

“Federal. Devlin aims high.”

“I didn't like him, did you?”

Robb laughed. “He's certainly not my idea of a best friend, but very certainly my idea of a superb contact.”

“Because Eddy told you so?” she asked curiously.

“What? I have no judgment of my own?” Robb was undressing. He ripped off his tie and shoved his shoes into the closet. “What have you got against Eddy, anyway?”

Ellen was brushing her hair. In the mirror she saw his frown. He was annoyed.

“I've nothing against him. He's your friend. But he seems to have a kind of fly-by-night life, no wife or family, never home—”

Robb interrupted. “For Pete's sake, he has a job that keeps him traveling! And as for wife and family, if he doesn't want any, that's his privilege, isn't it?”

Laying the brush down, she turned from the mirror and answered quietly, “It's simply that I'm not sure he's being the best influence on you right now. Those people today—they're not for you.”

“He is not influencing me, Ellen. Not! I don't need influencing.”

“Don't be so angry, Robb. Haven't I a right to my opinion?”

“Yes, of course you have. But it's not like you to be so critical. You're the one who tries to look for the best in people. You always tell me to do it, don't you?”

He means my father, she thought, and said nothing.

“As for those people, I know Devlin's a rough diamond, but if I can befriend him—oh hell, I've told you this before, so why repeat it. And maybe he's not as rough as he seems. They collect art. Just bought a Matisse, he said.”

Still she said nothing. She was remembering the remark about joining Glen Eyre.

“Olivia Devlin's a decorator, just as a hobby. She does houses for their friends. In spite of her appearance, you might get to like her, Ellen. You both know art, and you're an artist yourself.”

“I am not an artist. I'm an illustrator, or rather I was once.”

“You sound so bitter.”

“I didn't mean to. I was only stating a fact.”

“All right, I won't quibble.”

“A woman said something about our joining the club. You're not possibly considering it?”

“Eddy proposed us and Devlin seconded it. That's all.”

“Why didn't you tell me?”

“Because it's no sure thing.”

“You know it is, Robb. It's sure if Devlin's involved. And I think it's a horrible idea. We don't fit there.”

“You don't have to love everybody in the place. It will be great for tennis and swimming. Great for Julie.”

“If a club for that is what you want, why not join Harte's club? At least we know people there. We'd feel more comfortable. It's simple. And you know as well as I do what I'm talking about. And Harte's being a member would be nice for you, even though they are a lot older than we are.”

“Why do you keep failing to understand that it's the contact with Devlin I'm looking for? I already have one with Harte; I see him every day.”

“Perhaps I don't think you should have the contact with Devlin.”

“You may not, but are you a judge?”

“No, but I have an instinct. I sense something.”

“I sense something, too. Business. The man's a phenomenon. He buys land, builds a mall, and a town
grows up around it. Well, not exactly, but Eddy's shown me figures that would astound you.”

“Oh, Eddy and his advice again! Why in heaven's name is he so concerned about you?”

“He isn't ‘concerned,' Ellen. He's just a nice guy, very kind to us, too, in case you forgot. He likes to seem important. I understand him. He's no intellect, but he's clever. And I'm clever enough to see the difference, that's all.”

She was thinking that they were being drawn into the unknown. Her mind—her ‘writer's mind,' she mocked—had flashed a picture: They were driving a car inch by inch through a suddenly risen fog; there might be a clear road ahead, or there might be a sharp curve at a cliff.

“I don't know,” she said slowly. “I just don't know. I never thought of you as being particularly ‘clever.' ”

“Spoken by a loving wife! I'll be damned,” he cried.

“You think that's an insult? I just gave you a compliment, Robb.”

“All you've done is find fault from the minute I suggested going there today.”

“That's not true. I was perfectly nice to everybody.”

“You were finding fault all the time. Internally, you were. You know what? You've taken all my pleasure, all my enthusiasm out of the day.”

Standing there, even in his loose pajamas, he was indeed a “stunning” man. She had planned to give him the woman's compliment and watch his masculine attempt to hide his pleasure. Then they would laugh together, and she would put her arms around him.

“I'm tired,” he said. “I'm ready for some sleep.”

This was to have been their long, sweet night of love. Most probably she could, if she were to make the effort, smooth away his cross resentment, and they would have their long, sweet night. Perhaps she ought to do that. But she, too, was tired now, and ready for sleep.

A
fter the first of the year, the poinsettias in the corridor were being replaced with azaleas in full hothouse bloom. A small container of them had even been put at Robb's window.

“Nice room you've got here,” remarked Devlin. “Classy. The Lenihan offices can't hold a candle to it.”

Robb smiled. “Very fine firm, all the same.”

“Spoken like a gentleman. Oh, I'm not taking any of my stuff away from them. Don't get me wrong. I split my business. And of course I have Eddy to keep an eye on everybody.”

At the idea of Eddy, or anybody, “keeping an eye” on Will Fowler, Rob had to restrain a smile.

“Well, you're in very good hands both ways,” he said heartily.

“You don't do any real estate work?”

“No, that's Fowler's specialty. I'm one of the people who stand around the courthouse.”

Devlin laughed. “That's what I like about you. No airs. As if I don't know darn well you don't stand around. Eddy says you're an orator. Gift of gab, eh? I ought to go down and listen to you sometime. They tell me you like to fight for the underdog.”

“If he's in the right, I certainly do.”

“That's good. We need people with a heart. Need more of them in government, too.”

Robb nodded. “That's true.”

An open folder lay on his desk. Devlin had interrupted him, but the fault was his own for having instructed his secretary to let Devlin interrupt him whenever he came. The man was touchy and was easily capable of taking his work elsewhere because of some imagined slight. Bringing him here in the first place had been a fine feather in Robb's cap, a feather that Eddy called “no feather, but a big chief's headdress.”

So whenever Devlin had an appointment with Will Fowler, Robb could expect an inconvenient, unannounced visit, too. Fortunately, it did not occur very often.

“How's your missus?”

“She's fine, thank you.”

If the man only knew how Ellen despised him! At the country club she tried to avoid him, but he always managed to find her. She was not only a beautiful woman, but she also had “class.” She stood out, and Devlin recognized that.

“My missus is down in Florida for the next few months, so our house is mostly closed up. No social life for a while. Not that I have a lot of time for it, anyway.
I'm too busy flying around the country. You can't believe what's happening to real estate. Property values soaring. No end to it. It's like scooping up gold by the pailful. Say, maybe you'd like to ride out on my plane sometime just for the heck of it and take a look. Bring Ellen, too. She'd enjoy the scenery, the change.”

“Thanks very much, but not right now. She has so much responsibility at home.”

“Oh, yeah. I've heard about your boy. Tough luck. We never had kids, but I can imagine.”

No you can't, Robb thought, and waited most courteously for Devlin to leave.