The Inheritors (41 page)

“Aren’t you turning on a little early?” I asked.

She didn’t answer.

I went over and kissed the top of her head. “You can talk to me,” I said. “I’m your friend.”

“I have to get a job,” she said. “I have to.”

“Why the blues?” I asked. “You’re only out here a few weeks. It takes time until you get established.”

“Daddy’s raising hell,” she said. “He says if I don’t get something within a month, he wants me to come home.”

“You spoke to him?”

“Just before you came home,” she answered. “He and Mother called me.”

“Keep on making the rounds,” I said. “Something will turn up. They’re beginning to cast next fall’s shows.”

“So what?” she asked. “I keep losing the job to somebody’s girlfriend. Maybe I’m using the wrong approach.”

“No, you’re not,” I smiled. “You’ve got a friend at Sinclair.”

She looked up at me, a hope in her eyes. “You mean you’ll do something to help me?”

“I might,” I put on a false leer. “Of course you know what that means. You’ll have to show your appreciation. You might even have to sacrifice your honor.”

“I’m willing, I’m willing,” she laughed. She got to her feet and pulled off her dress. “Now?”

“It’s as good a time as any,” I said, pulling her to me.

The next morning I heard they were looking for a new girl in one of our Western series. I had her go up for it. It wasn’t much of a part, but it was good exposure and she got it.

***

At the end of the month I had to go into New York for the board meeting. Besides, the rock show was ready and I wanted to see how Jack would juggle the schedule to accommodate it. She drove me out to the airport.

“You hurry back,” she said.

“I will,” I promised.

“And stay away from the New York girls. I’m a very jealous woman.”

“I know that,” I laughed. I kissed her and went into the terminal as she drove off. But the airport was socked in by fog and at one o’clock in the morning when they announced that all flights were canceled for the night, I caught a taxi and went home.

She was fast asleep, curled in a ball, the sheets kicked down around her feet. There was a kind of childlike defenselessness about the way she lay there that made me smile to myself. A dozen burglars could have come and gone and she wouldn’t have known the difference. Gently, I picked up the sheet and covered her.

I undressed in the dark and went into the bathroom, closing the door before I turned on the light so that I would not disturb her.

I went over to my washbasin and turned on the water. As usual, it ran cold and I waited for the hot water to come through the pipes. I glanced over at her washbasin and forgot all about the hot water. The two washbasins were built into the same marble counter. Her side was normally cluttered with her makeup and hairpins and combs and brushes. Tonight there was something added. A teaspoon, some burnt wooden matches, and a hypodermic needle.

There was a small envelope lying beside the hypo. I picked it up and opened it. There were several small packets inside. I took one out and opened it. It was filled with a fine, white, crystalline powder. I put some on my finger and tasted it. The sickly bittersweet taste of “shit” lingered on my tongue.

Suddenly it all made sense to me. Her peculiar attack of nervousness the day the car didn’t arrive. The strange glazed look in her eyes that night in New York I went to pick her up at the party. The funny way she slurred her speech at times as if her tongue were too thick to say the words. No one ever traveled that far on pot.

But I still couldn’t believe it.

I took a washcloth from the rack and held it under the hot water until it was soaking wet. I squeezed it out and went back into the bedroom. I pulled the sheet away from her and hit all the lights.

She came awake with a start. “Steve!”

I grabbed her by the wrist and pulled her arm out straight. I began to rub the inside of her elbow with the washcloth.

She tried to pull her arm away. “Steve! Have you gone mad?”

I held her arm tightly without answering. The makeup came off all over the washcloth. I looked down at the suddenly naked white flesh. The needle marks were there. All around the purple-blue veins.

I flung the washcloth angrily across the room. “Damn you!” I said. “Damn you for a stupid bitch!”

My Darling Girl was a first-class addict.

CHAPTER TWELVE

I sat at the bar in the living room, swirling the Scotch in the glass. I heard her footsteps on the staircase behind me. I didn’t turn around.

She crossed the room and sat down at the bar beside me. “Steve.”

I didn’t look at her. “Yes?”

“I’m not on the stuff. Really. It was only because I was lonely. I missed you and I couldn’t sleep.”

“Don’t lie to me, Myriam,” I said. I turned to look at her. “I counted at least six punctures on your left arm. How many have you got on your right?”

“I can kick it anytime I want.”

“Who are you kidding, Myriam?” I asked. “Did you ever try?”

“I’ll prove it,” she said. “Look.” She opened her hand and showed me the small packets. She got down from the stool and went behind the bar. She turned the water on in the sink and began to open the packets one by one and empty them.

I reached over the bar and took one packet from her hand. I opened it and tasted it. Bicarbonate of soda. I gave the packet back to her. “I never knew a junkie yet who could pour the stuff down the drain.”

She stared at me. Slowly she turned off the tap. “I love you,” she said. “Do you know that?”

“Sure,” I said sarcastically. “I would not love thee half so much, loved I not heroin more.” I put Scotch in my glass and walked away, leaving her. I sank into the couch facing the window. Los Angeles lights were out there in the night. But somehow it didn’t look all that beautiful anymore.

She came from behind the bar and stood in front of me. “What are you going to do?”

“Nothing.” I looked up at her. “It’s your problem, not mine.”

The tears began to well into her eyes. “Don’t turn me off like that, Steve.” She sank to the floor in front of me, clasping me around the knees. The racking sobs shook her entire body. “Help me, Steve. Please help me.”

She grabbed at my hand and began to cover it with quick tiny kisses. The hot tears burned my skin. “Help me, help me, help me,” she kept murmuring over and over.

I looked down at her. For a moment I could have cried. After all, it wasn’t that far back that she was a little girl. I stroked her hair.

She caught my hand and held it to her cheek. “What am I going to do?” she asked, her voice filled with despair.

I was silent, looking at her.

“Tell me, Steve,” she said insistently, almost fiercely.

“There are three things that I can think of that you can do,” I said. “But I don’t think you’ll do any of them.”

“Tell me,” she said again.

“One, you can go back to New York and tell your parents. Have them help you.”

“No,” she said. “It would kill my mother.”

“Second,” I said, “you can go to England and sign on. At least that way you’ll get the stuff under medical supervision.”

“No. That would take me away from you. I’ll be over there and you’ll be here. And I couldn’t come back.”

“The third is the roughest,” I said.

She didn’t speak.

“Sign yourself in at Vista Carla.” It was probably the best private narcotics rehabilitation center in America. And the most expensive. But they had every modern technique that was needed. Medical and psychological. “In the morning.”

I felt the cold shiver run through her. Fear was a very real thing. “Is there anything else?”

“Sure there is,” I said harshly. “Don’t do anything. Just keep on the way you’re going and slide into the shithouse.”

She was silent for a long while. I lit a cigarette and gave it to her, then lit another for myself. I watched her. There were lines on her face that had never been there before.

The cigarette had burned almost to her fingers before she spoke. “If I do that,” she asked, “you won’t leave me?”

“No,” I said.

“You’ll come and see me?”

“Yes.”

“You mean it?”

I nodded.

“I won’t make it without you,” she said. “I know that.”

“You’ll make it,” I said, drawing her up into my arms. “I’ll help you.”

***

Vista Carla was set in the rolling hills just back of Santa Barbara. We got there about noon. If it weren’t for the ten-foot iron fence around the ground and the uniformed guard at the big gate, it could be mistaken for a rich man’s country mansion.

I stopped outside the closed gate and gave the guard my name. He went back into the gatehouse and came out with a small book.

“Is that the patient with you?” he asked.

“Yes,” I answered. “Miss Darling.”

He peered into the car at her for a moment. She didn’t look at him, just down at her nervously twisting hands. He nodded and stepped back. “You go on up the driveway,” he said. “Turn left at the top and stop at the main entrance. You’ll find a place to park there. Dr. Davis will be waiting for you.”

He went back into the gatehouse. Through the window I saw him press a button. The large iron gates began to swing open. He picked up the telephone as we drove in. The gates swung closed as soon as the car had passed.

An attractive young woman was waiting for us on the steps leading to the entrance. She was wearing a white smock over her short dress. She came down the steps as soon as I had parked the car.

“Mr. Gaunt?” she asked, her hand outstretched.

Her grip was firm and businesslike. “I’m Dr. Shirley Davis.”

“Good to meet you,” I said.

She turned toward Myriam as she came around the car. “Miss Darling? I’m your doctor, Shirley Davis.”

Myriam nodded. She looked at me questioningly.

Dr. Davis laughed. It was a pleasant laugh. “In case you’re wondering about it, I really am a doctor. I’ll show you my diplomas and certificate when we get to my office.”

Myriam laughed. She held out her hand. “Happy to meet you, Dr. Davis.”

I looked at Dr. Davis approvingly. Score one for her. For a moment, Myriam almost sounded as if she meant it. We went up the steps. Dr. Davis took a key from her pocket and opened the door. We went inside and the door swung shut automatically behind us.

“The foyer is furnished in genuine Mexican-Spanish antiques of the nineteenth century,” Dr. Davis explained as she led us through it to her office. “It was donated to Vista Carla by a foundation.”

We paused in front of a dark oak-paneled door. Again Dr. Davis took a key from her pocket. Again the door locked automatically behind us.

The room was comfortably furnished. The only sign that it was a doctor’s office was a small wooden cabinet behind the desk, through the windows of which I could see various colored vials of medicine.

“Why don’t you sit here on the couch, Mr. Gaunt,” Dr. Davis said, “while Miss Darling and I attend to the necessary routines? There are some magazines on the table if you care to read.”

I sat down as they went to the far end of the room. Dr. Davis took out some forms. She began to read the questions in a low voice.

I picked up the magazines. They were back issues of medical journals. I imagined they would be very interesting if you were a medical historian. I put them down and looked out the window.

An occasional patient went by, always accompanied by a nurse. Other than that, the green rolling lawns seemed almost pristine in their virginity.

“I guess that about completes the forms,” I heard Dr. Davis say. I turned back into the room from the window.

The doctor was standing, holding a large manila envelope. “If you’ll place all your valuables in this,” she said, “we’ll keep them in the safe for you. They will be returned when you leave.”

Silently Myriam took off her rings, a bracelet, and the gold chain she wore around her neck. She dropped them into the envelope.

“Your wristwatch also,” Dr. Davis said.

Myriam unclasped her watch and dropped it into the envelope. The doctor sealed it and placed in on the desk. She pressed a button.

A gray-haired motherly nurse came through the door behind the desk. She stood there waiting.

“Mrs. Graham will show you to your room,” Dr. Davis said. “You will take off all your clothes and put on a hospital gown. Then we’ll begin our examination and tests.”

“This way, my dear,” the nurse said in an agreeable voice. She held the door open behind her.

Myriam got to her feet. She glanced apprehensively at me.

“Don’t worry,” Dr. Davis said quickly. “Mr. Gaunt will be in to see you in your room just as soon as we get you comfortable.”

I smiled reassuringly at Myriam. She tried to return the smile, but she didn’t quite make it. She turned and followed the nurse through the door. I walked over to the desk.

Dr. Davis sat down again and gestured to the seat that Myriam had occupied. I sat down. It was still warm.

“Do you know when the patient had her last shot?” Dr. Davis asked in a cool, businesslike voice.

“As far as I know—last night,” I answered.

“Do you know how long she’s been taking drugs?”

“No.”

“Do you know about how often she takes drugs?”

“No.”

While she had been asking questions she had been studying the papers in front of her that had the information she had gotten from Myriam. Now she looked up at me. “Did the patient come here voluntarily, or under coercion?”

“Voluntarily.”

“Do you think she has a genuine desire to rehabilitate herself?”

“Yes.”

“She’s a very pretty girl,” she said. “I hope we can help her.”

I didn’t answer.

“You know, in cases like this, more depends on the patient than ordinarily.”

“I understand,” I said.

She took out a form. “Please let me know where you can be reached in case of any special problems.”

I gave her all the numbers, including the apartment in New York.

“I hope it won’t be necessary to disturb you,” she said. “But one can never tell. While, as you see, we do observe maximum security precautions, this is a clinic not a prison and sometimes patients do manage to elude us.”