The Girl at the End of the Line (15 page)

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Authors: Charles Mathes

BOOK: The Girl at the End of the Line
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Nell nodded. She actually seemed to be listening for a change, but her eyes were worried. She kept smoothing her hair with a nervous hand.
“Our actual grandfather,” Molly went on. “We're walking around with his genes. What do you say to someone like that? I mean, we can't just barge up and say, ‘See, here, fella, why did you walk out on Grandma and where will we find the Gales?' But he'll know, Nell. He'll know.”
Nell nodded again. Molly didn't feel any more confident, however, as she finally parked the car as directed by an attendant, next to a long line of other vehicles on the scrubby grass of a vast field.
The layout of the Bedlingham dog show resembled many of the county fairs that Molly and Nell had attended over the years. A series of colorful tents surrounded a large central lawn on which several different events were taking place simultaneously.
The people, however, bore little resemblance to the farmers and 4-H Club kids that Molly was used to seeing at big outdoor events in America. Here they dressed in silk and tweeds and spoke primarily in the clipped accents of the upper class, though Molly could also make out an occasional hard-boiled Cockney and soft Scottish burr. The men sported ties and carried walking sticks; the women wore expensive jewelry and sensible shoes. If the rain yesterday had inconvenienced anyone, it didn't show.
Molly had had no idea that a dog show would be so dressy. Both she and Nell had put on shorts that morning, and Nell had put on a tank top that did little to conceal her figure. The man who took their entrance fee at the gate gave them a curious stare. When Molly explained they were Americans, however, he ah-ed and nodded sympathetically.
The grounds were packed with tents of different colors. Under each one were benches on which dogs in various states of patience were being groomed by owners in various states of excitement. Each tent was devoted to a different breed. Scores of poodles yapped in one, dozens of bloodhounds snoozed in another.
As they walked from tent to tent, Nell, wide-eyed with happiness, accepted licks and nuzzles from dalmatians and Yorkies, collies and Airedales, as well as numerous breeds the identity of which Molly didn't have a clue.
After ten minutes or so they finally came to the Chinese pug tent, which was what Molly had been looking for. A congregation of the little buff-colored, goggle-eyed creatures with smashed-in faces greeted them with a warm chorus of barks and wheezes.
“Cease that defeatist attitude instantaneously, Tinkerbell,” ordered a stern-faced man to a panting pug who was drooling on his shoe. “To be a champion, one must think like a champion.”
Other inspirational talk that Molly could overhear ranged from, “Do keep the upper lip a bit more stiffened, Lester, old bean,” to “Izzy, Izzy, goo goo, yes.”
“I'm looking for Richard Julian,” said Molly to one of the more approachable-looking dog owners, a mild-mannered lady wearing a comfortable old sweater rather than the more fashionable togs that most of the others sported.
“Don't know where he is,” she said, beaming at the pug in her arms as if it were a baby. “She's over there.”
The woman tilted her head toward the other side of the tent. The only
she
in that direction was a stout, Margaret Thatcheresque figure with sculpted, hard-looking hair and a caboose like something one might find on the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe. Lady Stacey Farfel-Julian wore a peach-colored suit, heavy gold drops on her droopy earlobes, and a noblesse oblige smile. She didn't look like the type who played much peekaboo with her bosoms anymore.
Molly approached cautiously.
“Lady Julian?” said Molly, hoping it was the right way to address her.
“Yazzz?” said the woman, looking down her long nose with narrowing gray eyes.
“I'm Molly O'Hara, and this is my sister Nell. We're looking for your husband.”
“Why?”
“We're his granddaughters. From America.”
“How veddy creative,” sniffed Lady Farfel-Julian, her eyes slowing shifting from Molly to Nell and back again.
“Mr. Julian and our grandmother weren't married for very long,” stammered Molly beneath her withering gaze. “It was many years ago. When his name was Jellinek. He doesn't even know we're alive probably.”
“Oh, you needn't embellish, my dear. Your story is already quite amusing enough. Isn't it, Mr. Moto?”
The pug at her feet, a tawny creature with eyes that sparkled like diamonds, looked up inquiringly at the sound of its name.
“Well, don't just sit there, Mr. Moto,” Lady Julian commanded. “Say hello to these very amusing young gels. What did you say your names were?”
“Molly and Nell O'Hara.”
“And of course they are Irish, as well. Yes. Very amusing, indeed.”
“I don't think you understand …” began Molly.
“Oh, but we understand perfectly, my dear. Don't we, Mr. Moto?”
Mr. Moto broke into an aria of denunciatory yaps. Lady Farfel-Julian picked up her dog and stroked its gnarled brow.
“So veddy pleased to have met you,” she declared imperiously, shooting daggers from narrowed eyes. “I meet so very few of Richard's little … relatives … these days.”
Then she turned smartly on her heel and marched off to the other side of the tent.
Molly stood quivering in a daze of confusion and indignation. Nell petted a more amiable pug and smiled like she was having
the best time in the world. Out of the corner of her eye Molly detected movement. When she turned she saw a small man in a tweed suit blinking at her like some kind of elderly traffic light gone mad.
“'E's over at the refreshment tent, luv,” said the man in a loud whisper, having gotten her attention.
“Who is?”
“Richard. And I say every man is entitled to 'ave as many granddaughters as 'e can afford, if you catch my drift.”
Molly stood for a moment, basking in the fellow's good-natured leer and trying to decide whether to defend the O'Hara honor with Lady Farfel-Julian. The latter was now performing a maneuver on one of Mr. Moto's ears that resembled French-kissing. Molly decided that retreat was the more mature course of action.
“Come on,” she said, pushing Nell off in the direction that the leering man had blinked in.
“Can you believe that woman?” Molly said angrily as they made their way across the grass. “Who the hell does she think she is?”
Nell waved her hand and shook her head, as if to say it wasn't important, that it didn't matter. Molly was still fuming, however, when they got to the refreshment tent, two aisles over.
This tent was fully ten times the size of all the others. Beneath its shelter were rows of wooden picnic-type tables covered with red-and-white-checkered plastic tablecloths. At the back of the tent a long serving area featured sandwiches, beer, hot and cold drinks, and various varieties of bagged junk foods, the prices of which were enumerated on a large board behind the servers.
Only a few of the tables were occupied, it being too early for lunch, but a crowd was hovering by the tea and coffee urns.
At the back of the tent a tall white-haired man in an elegantly tailored suit stood with his hand propped against a pole. Leaning
with her back against the pole, under the shelter of his arm, was a smiling young woman wearing a black-and-white serving uniform that could not conceal an impressive figure. She seemed to be pleased with what the man was saying. So did he.
The moment of truth had arrived.
Molly didn't understand how she knew this was Richard Julian, but she was sure it was. Unlike Bobby Prince, their grandfather still looked every bit like a leading man, a Cary Grant type full of charm and sophistication, sexy even in his golden years and fully aware of it.
Molly stared at him, not knowing what to do. This was the man who had run off with Grandma when she was just a kid, who had acted with her on Broadway and fathered her child. This was the man who had known Tuck Wittington and had chased girls with Bobby Prince. Most important of all, this was the man who could direct her and Nell back to Grandma's family, back to the Gales.
Suddenly his silver head turned. As their eyes met, Molly felt something deep down inside her instantly relax. There was something in his face that seemed to say he recognized her, too, that he knew who she was and why she was here, that she was the most beautiful woman in the world and that he loved her deeply.
Molly shyly smiled back.
As she did so, Richard Julian's thin lips drew together into a kiss. He winked as he blew it to her.
Molly stood for a moment with her mouth open, not knowing what to do. Richard Julian had already turned his attention back to the serving girl. Molly had not flown a thousand miles across the ocean to wait around until he was free. She strode through the tent and right up to him. Nell followed at her side.
“Mr. Julian?”
Richard Julian turned and regarded Molly, his blue eyes full of curiosity and amusement. Up close he was still handsome, but it was apparent that his face was beginning to go to seed. Slight bags under the eyes. Broken capillaries in the nose. Puffy cheeks that would soon collapse to the twin adversaries of gravity and age.
“My sister and I would like to speak with you.”
“By God, I'm a lucky bastard,” Richard Julian said in a smooth confident baritone, giving another playful wink. “And I should like to speak with you, too, only Gwendoline, here, and I are just getting acquainted. Aren't we, my dear?”
Gwendoline giggled. Apparently Lady Julian wasn't imagining
her husband's roving eye. Molly felt almost sorry for her, but couldn't afford to be distracted by side issues. If she was going to get this man's attention she was going to have to be blunt.
“We're your granddaughters, Mr. Julian. From America.”
“Granddaughters?” he said with a choked laugh, his eyes darting from one of them to the other. “Is this some kind of joke?”
His accent was English, but his vowels drifted back toward the American pronunciations of his roots.
“Our mother was the baby that you had with Margaret Gale, back when your name was Jellinek.”
“Now see here,” said Julian, his face reddening.
“Perhaps I should see to my tea urn,” mumbled Gwendoline, twisting out from beneath his arm. “I'll speak with you later, Richard?”
“Sure, love, sure.”
Gwendoline escaped back into the serving area. Molly's grandfather frowned as he watched her go.
“Now what's this all about?” he said when she was out of earshot.
“I told you. We're your granddaughters. My name is Molly O'Hara. This is my sister, Nell. She doesn't talk.”
“Why not?”
“It's a psychological problem,” said Molly, wanting to keep things between them as simple as possible. “Our mother was your baby, Evangeline. She died when we were kids.”
Julian started to speak but then put a finger to his lips.
“Maggie is your grandmother?” he said finally.
“Was,” said Molly. “She died recently. That's why we're here. There was a lot about her life that we don't understand. We came to England hoping to ask you some questions.”
Julian frowned again, then suddenly his eyes lit up and his lips pressed together into a disarming smile.
*“I think I understand,” he announced in a happier voice. “My wife put you up to this, didn't she?”
“I don't know what you mean,” said Molly.
“Oh, come, come, my dear,” he laughed. “It's the only thing that makes sense. I know Stacey's jealous, but really, this is too much. If she wants to divorce and spend the rest of her life making love to Moto, I'll bring her all the evidence she wants on a silver salver. She doesn't have to go through this ridiculous charade.”
“I promise you, Mr. Julian,” said Molly.
“That
woman didn't put us up to anything. We're your granddaughters. We just want to ask you some questions.”
“Right. Yes. Ho, ho, ho.”
“Please, Mr. Julian, we've come a long way.”
“I'm sure you have, my dear,” said Julian smoothly, “And you're very charming. So is your silent sister, which is a nice touch, it really is. But I'll now have to take my leave, unless, of course, you can actually prove that you are who you claim you are.”
Molly hesitated for a minute, then unbuttoned the top of her blouse, and brought out the emerald ring. There was one person who had to know about Grandma's ring—the man who slept with her.
Julian stared at it for a moment, then let out a long breath.
“It's been a long time since I've seen that,” he said in a subdued voice.
“Will you talk to us, Mr. Julian?”
“It's all true then, about Maggie and the baby being dead?”
“Yes.”
Julian sighed deeply.
“Funny,” he said in a quiet voice. “I don't remember the baby much at all, just that it cried and cried whenever I rehearsed my songs. But I think of Maggie now and then. Your sister looks a bit like her. Not you, though.”
“Where did the two of you grow up, you and our grandmother?” said Molly, holding her breath.
“Hold that thought,” said Julian, raising a pink, perfectly manicured finger, his voice brightening. “I don't have much experience with these things, but if this is to be a family reunion then it calls for at least a cup of tea. Sit down over there and I'll be right back.”
He gestured to a table at the side of the tent, far away from the few occupied seats. Before Molly could stop him he had crossed back over to the catering area. There he reengaged Gwendoline in jocular conversation, some of which was apparently of a professional variety, because when he returned in a few moments he was carrying a box stocked with refreshments.
“In England we face all life's little celebrations and dilemmas over a nice cup of tea,” he said, placing steaming paper cups in front of them. “Sugar is here. Milk is here. Help yourself to the pastries. Gwendoline promises me they are very tasty.”
Nell already had the largest sweet roll in her mouth, and was nodding her head in agreement and licking her fingers as if she hadn't eaten for days. The girl was a bottomless pit.
“Cheers,” said Julian, raising his tea. The flirtatious twinkle had returned to his eye. Apparently he had already recovered completely from the news about the deaths of his daughter and ex-wife. As family Richard Julian ranked right up there with Clyde and Daddy.
“Thank you, Mr. Julian,” said Molly, determined not to let her disappointment in him show.
“Call me Richard. I like it when pretty young things call me Richard. Do you suppose this comes from vanity or is it merely part of the natural aging process?”
“Where did you and Grandma. grow up?”
“You are a rather direct person, aren't you, my dear?” said
Julian. “No small talk. No niceties. I suppose you take after Maggie in that. Didn't she ever tell you the story of our lost youth?”
Molly shook her head.
“Grandma never said a word about her life before she got to Pelletreau.”
“Pelletreau?”
“North Carolina. That's where she settled.”
“Yes, of course. She had a happy life?”
“Yes,” Molly lied. There was no point in letting him into their lives any further than she had to. “We came here to talk to you because you're the only one left who can tell us about Grandma's family, the Gales. Is it true they were rich?”
“Oh, yes,” said Richard Julian, drawing out the words. “They were rich, all right.”
“Where did they live? What were they like? We want to know all about them. And about you and Grandma.”
“Well, it isn't the nicest story in the world,” he said, sitting back. “But if it's what you want, it's what you'll get—that's the least I can do for my granddaughters. My granddaughters. Certainly is strange, finding those words together in one's own mouth, isn't it?”
Molly didn't say anything. Julian sighed and shook his head.
“Well, just please stop me when you can't stand any more,” he said. “I tend to rattle on. Old Jellinek trait. To answer your question, Maggie and I grew up on a little island in the Ashalaca River up above Montpelier, Vermont. Gale Island.”
“The Gales owned their own island?”
Julian nodded.
“That's how rich they were,” he said. “The family fortune had originally come from railroads. When I was a kid, Atherton Gale, Maggie's dad, ruled Gale Island like he was some kind of feudal lord. He was the eldest son and had inherited control of the family
interests, which he'd expanded into newspapers and radio stations. He was an incredibly nasty son of a bitch, which of course, made him all the more successful in business.”
Julian stretched back in his chair, took a sip of his tea, and remembered.
“Gale Island wasn't a very big place, of course. Population was never more than about sixty people. But it was a world unto itself. The Gales lived in this honest-to-God stone castle on the island's highest point. Gale Castle. Last time I talked to my sister she said there were still some of them living there, though Atherton's long dead, of course.”
A shiver went down Molly's spine. So there were still Gales. Molly and Nell had a family on an island in the middle of Vermont. It was almost too good to be true.
“When Atherton's father was alive, the whole family lived in the castle,” Julian went on happily, “but Atherton eventually chased them all away. Wouldn't let any of them into the business, of course. He was a real control freak, the sort of guy who was always revising his will in order to keep people in line.”
“And you lived on Gale island, too.”
“Yes,” he said with a nod. “Like everybody else on the island, we serviced Atherton. Dad and his brother had a trucking business, running back and forth, once a week, to bring in what was needed. We were about as far beneath the Gales as you could get.”
“How did you and Grandma meet?”
Julian smoothed his sideburn with a finger and smiled.
“All the island kids were bussed over to the public school in New Melford,” he said. “Atherton had wanted to send Maggie to some snooty private school, but Maggie's mother, Felicity, didn't want her boarded off. It was probably the only argument she ever won with Atherton. Usually he just ground Felicity into dust. Felicity
Gale was a tall, pale, elegant woman—very lovely and aristocratic. She always looked so sad, and it was no mystery to anyone on the island why. Atherton was as coarse and brutish as Felicity was beautiful. I think he married her just because he enjoyed having such a classy lady to humiliate.”
Julian shook his head sadly, then spoke again.
“Anyway, I knew Maggie from practically the time I was born—the way a cook's kid knows the master's daughter, I suppose. I never paid much attention to her, though, until we were cast together in the New Melford High School play, a production of
Pirates
of Penzance
. I was the Pirate King, of course. Maggie was Mabel. The rehearsals turned out to be the most fun either one of us had ever had. And everybody thought we were wonderful, which was a surprise since I'd just tried out as a lark. Same with Maggie, she never thought she'd get a part.”
Molly took a sip of tea and tried to imagine Grandma as a rich man's daughter living in a castle. It was difficult. Richard Julian took a sip of his own tea and continued.
“We had been rehearsing for about a month when Atherton Gale got wind of what was up. Instead of being pleased, he ordered Maggie to drop out of the play, said that no daughter of his was going to display herself for a bunch of riffraff. When she tried to argue, he announced he was going to send her off to a boarding school, that he should have done so years ago.
“Maggie called me on the telephone in tears. She had to talk with someone, but didn't have any real friends-how could she when Atherton made it his business to keep her away from everyone? She didn't know what to do. We met that night in the moonlight under the oak trees at the south end of Gale island. One thing led to another, and being as stupid and crazy as all seventeen-year-olds are, Maggie and I decided to get married, run off to New York
together and become professional actors. Then we sealed our love with a kiss. We thought it was the most damned romantic thing that had ever happened to two people in the history of the world.”
Molly couldn't help but smile. It was a sweet story, and it was nice to picture Grandma as young and happy for a change after all those years of seeing her old and without hope.
“We went back to Gale Castle,” continued Julian, “and I waited while Maggie packed a bag. Atherton had gone off to Boston on business, but Maggie's mother had heard us come in. Maggie told her what she was going to do and begged her not to try to stop us. Felicity said to wait a moment, and disappeared. She returned with all the cash she could find in the house—two hundred and sixty dollars, a lot of money in those days—which she gave to Maggie, along with her emerald ring. She said she wanted us to sell the ring and build ourselves a life together and never look back.”
“So you went to New York.”

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