The Prettiest Girl I Ever Killed (12 page)

“Why don’t you tell her?” I asked.

He shook his head. “No, actually she wouldn’t be happier. Guilt would weight her down. She couldn’t be a straight dyke; she’d have to tie it up with a little ribbon of social acceptance…. Maybe she and some young chicks could go off to Africa as missionaries….”

“Curt, while you’re analyzing—”

He said it before I finished. “What type are you?”

“Yes.”

“You’ve ceased to be a type and become an individual. Everybody does that eventually.”

“But you had me typed?”

“Sure.”

“Okay. What?”

“Frustrated romantic, good brain but too easily screwed up by emotions—”

“You can stop now.” He grinned. “Don’t want to hear?”

“You … go too deeply, Curt. You miss a lot that happens on the surface.”

“Eating, sleeping, talking, what else happens on the surface?”

“Well … emotional relationships. Love …”

“Symbolic,” he said. “Sublimated narcissism.” He got up suddenly, giving me a pat on the hip. “We’d better go.”

This was as near as we’d gotten to a personal relationship; we could talk about sex but we couldn’t do anything about it. We were as intimate as old lovers, but we’d never been lovers. I suppose that’s why it hurt so much when the community turned against me. I was going to work; the morning was clear and sparkling as a diamond, birds twittered, and the air was full of green, growing smells. Suddenly I stopped. Chalked on the sidewalk in front of the bank were the words:

VELDA BAYRD LOVES CURT FRIEDLAND.

My face burned as I scrubbed it out with my foot. Just then I looked through the window of the bank and saw Bob Sieberling, the vice president, polishing his glasses and watching me. There was no friendliness in his look; I knew he’d seen the words and waited for me to come along and rub them out.

That afternoon I told Curt about it. “I felt I didn’t know any of those people … Bob Sieberling … the person who wrote the words … I had a feeling they’ve hated me for years and all their smiles and kind words were faked.”

“Did you notice the handwriting?”

“I …” I blushed. “No, I was so embarrassed, I just wanted it erased—”

“Embarrassed of course because it implied you were the aggressor, the brazen hussy pining for unrequited love. If it had said Curt loves Velda you’d have been flattered—”

I swung at him but he ducked. “Be serious. You think it was the killer?”

“Didn’t have to be. Once it starts, others will pick it up. As you say, they’ve been storing it up. Poor little hill girl marries man for money—”

“I
didn’t.”

“I’m speaking with the voice of Sherman. Blood will tell, they’ll say, and point out that your sister Anne was a naughty girl. Some of them have waited twelve years to say I told you so. I’d say it’s only the beginning, Velda.”

He was right, because the next day Fern Blake came in and said she’d decided to do her trading in Franklin. She’d never been a very levelheaded woman, and I was cool and polite to her. I simply handed her the bill which had been accruing for ten years. We’d never presented it because her husband had been Lou’s partner. I think Fern had some chronic illness; she was a pale, bony-faced woman who wore gloves in the hottest summer. She always dabbed pink rouge high on each cheekbone and smelled as though she’d dumped a whole bag of cheap talcum powder over her body. Her hands shook as she ripped apart the ticket. Her voice trembled as she said:

“Velda, for ten years now I’ve kept my husband’s secret. But I’ve known, and your nicey-nice ways haven’t fooled me. If you bother me with this—”

I could only stare at her. “What …
what
are you talking about?”

“I know. Don’t think I don’t. Just remember that.”

She walked out then, and I remembered…. Lou had wanted to borrow money to go into the turkey business; he’d needed Jerry’s signature on his note because there’d be a mortgage on the store. Jerry had come out one night while Lou was attending some meeting in Franklin. (I could never keep track of Lou’s organizations.) Sharon was a baby then and in bed, and Jerry pulled a pint bottle out of his inside jacket pocket and said he’d wait for Lou. Jerry was a big, thick-necked redfaced man. He was sweating, and I should have known something was wrong. But the Blakes were family friends; Jerry and Lou owned a boat together and we all four spent weekends on the lake, went bowling together and all that. Jerry and I were on a kidding, platonic basis … I thought. Jerry took a couple of drinks then brought up the note. He didn’t think he could sign it. I was surprised, because I’d thought it was all settled. Then I shrugged; it was between him and Lou. Jerry drank twice more from the bottle and said it all depended on me. He had a little cabin on the lake which his wife knew nothing about. If I’d tell him when I could get away he’d give me a key. I didn’t intend to torture Jerry; I just couldn’t understand. Jerry squirmed and finally blurted out that we could meet there and nobody would ever know. I kept my temper; I stood up and said I was going into the bedroom. If he left immediately I’d keep quiet. If he didn’t I’d call either Lou or the sheriff. I left the room and Jerry left the house. How his wife had found out, and how she’d managed to find any implication of misbehavior on my part I didn’t know. Jerry had been all bluff anyway; he’d signed the note and I’d seen no sign of friction between him and Lou. Of course, I’d avoided Jerry after that and two years later he died.

I was getting sick of the citizens of Sherman. They were more narrow and bigoted than I’d thought. When I told Curt about it that afternoon he asked: “Did Lou know about it?”

“I never told him.”

“Could Blake have told him, or Blake’s wife?”

“Why would they, Curt?”

He was silent a moment; we were sitting on a ridge where a tilted rock stratum stuck up like the exposed spine of an ancient dinosaur. I’d picked the year’s first bouquet and the flowers were slowly drooping in my hand. Finally Curt gave me a sidelong look: “Not many weeks ago you upheld Jerry Blake as a moral saint. What do you think now?”

“The same thing, I guess. Who knows what I might have done unconsciously to give poor Jerry the idea I was available. He might have thought I was flirting when I was just trying to be friendly.”

A faint smile flickered around his mouth. “In other words, it isn’t immoral for a man to desire you. Whereas if he desires another woman, as in Gil Sisk’s case—”

“Oh Curt! Do you examine your own motives as closely as you do mine?”

He nodded slowly. “Yes. As a matter of fact, I do.”

I wanted to ask him then what his motives were toward me. I hadn’t been much use to his investigation lately, yet I had a feeling there was something he wanted me to do, something he couldn’t ask because he wasn’t quite sure of me …

Gladys came into the store the next morning and started talking about the days when she was my teacher and had great hopes for me, and how I must realize she was interested only in my own welfare, and finally: “You must know, Velda, you’re being talked about.”

I felt icy cold. “Am I? Concerning what?”

“You surely know, Velda. Apparently I was mistaken about Curt Friedland. He’s just like his brothers.”

“You happen to be mistaken about me at this very moment, Gladys.”

“Indeed. Why is it that I see you driving west out of town every afternoon?”

Gladys wore a weird smile which revealed the orange-colored gums of her false teeth. Her prominent hooked nose and narrow chin stood out in sharp relief, almost like a parody. “Maybe it’s because you’re a spying old witch, Gladys.”

I regretted the pointless insult at once, but it was too late; Gladys strode out with her head high and I knew that whoever didn’t already know my shameful story would hear it before sundown.

I looked out the window; a bleak spring drizzle fell on the street. There’d be no meeting with Curt today. The branches of the elm trees drooped under the weight of moisture and I knew exactly how they felt. I went back into the office with the idea of crying, but even that seemed pointless. I called up Doris and told her I was sick, then I went home and drank beer alone all afternoon.

Next day I noticed a coldness in the people who came in the store. None of the usual gossipy conferences around the cash register; now they talked out on the sidewalk, looking inside occasionally at where I was standing. There was more than one reason for it. A few had stopped trading in the store and left outstanding bills of nearly two hundred dollars.

My father called me up that night. “Stay away from him, Velda. That family’s brought us nothing but grief.”

“Suppose Frankie didn’t do it?”

“I don’t give a damn if he did it or not. She ruined her life chasing that man. He’s guilty, one way or another. Let him rot in jail, and keep away from his brother.”

He hung up. My father had never been much interested in legal subtleties, but all the same, I was beginning to see what a chunk Curt had bitten off.

The next day my brother stomped in. Gordon and I had always been on good terms; the fact that Anne had been between us in age had saved us from any sibling rivalry. He’d competed with Anne instead of me. But today his face was hard.

“Dad called me last night. I told him I’d go tell Curt Friedland to leave you alone.”

I blazed up. “You big helpful oaf. Does it occur to you that I’m thirty-five—?”

“Then go tell him yourself.”

“What if I don’t want to be left alone?”

“Then you oughta be whipped. Too damn bad your husband is a flatlander or he’d do it himself.”

He stomped out the door and got into his car. I stood there a minute, then I realized this was an encounter I couldn’t let take place. Curt and my brother fighting … how could anything good come of it?

I locked up the store—business had fallen off anyway—and drove to Curt’s as fast as I could. When I got there Curt was sitting on the steps and Gordon was standing. Their poses didn’t look belligerent; they weren’t even talking about me. They were talking about Anne and Frankie. Gordon was saying:

“… doesn’t matter who did what. If he hadn’t come back she wouldn’t have chased him.”

“Gordon,” I said. “You can’t hold Curt responsible for what his brother did.”

Gordon turned to me, but Curt spoke.

“That’s the way it works, Velda You know that. I am responsible for what Frankie did. But he didn’t do anything.” He turned to Gordon. “See if you can answer yes to just one of these questions. Did you ever see Frankie hit a woman? No. Was there any reason why he’d kill Anne? Were they fighting? Was she threatening to leave him? No. In fact, it looked like they were going off together. Somebody didn’t like that idea. Somebody else—”

“Curt, Frankie’s lawyer said all this. It didn’t save him then, how can it save him now?”

“With proof—”

“Proof! You’ll just stir up a stink, I agree with Dad. Let it lay.”

“Sure, Gordon. Pretend Frankie’s dead. You ever see a prison? Nothing grows around it, no trees, no grass. It’s like a poison seeps through the walls and kills all life. Put a man away and forget him. The authorities will take care of him because they’re paid to. People outside can assume he’s dead; he won’t pop up and remind you he’s alive. He isn’t really. He’s got nothing to do in there but watch himself die.”

Gordon turned and started away. Curt called after him. “You think he’s guilty?”

Gordon shrugged without turning around. “It’s out of our hands.”

He got in his car and drove away without looking at me. Obviously he’d forgotten what he came for. I looked at Curt. “He planned to warn you away from me. How’d you get him off that?”

“A soft answer turneth away wrath.” Curt smiled. “I saw he was mad, but I remembered seeing him in a fight once. You were there. The other guy got him down somehow; you jumped on the guy’s back and started pulling his hair and biting and scratching. You were a little savage, all skinny elbows and legs. I didn’t want to fight you this morning.” He stood up and slid his arm across my shoulders. “Come in. Gaby’s got coffee made.”

It must have been his fraternal gesture—perhaps his nonchalance—but I suddenly choked up with bitterness. “Curt, listen, if I’m a fool for taking this thing seriously, will you kindly tell me? If it’s all a game just … tell me so I can laugh and have a ball too …”

He pulled away and gave me a studied look. “You’re really bugged, aren’t you?”

“I shouldn’t be, I suppose. I’m in trouble with my folks, I’ve made enemies I didn’t want and friends I don’t need—”

“You can step out.”

“Can I?”

“Sure. Tell them I deceived you. They’ll take you back and gladly, because you’ve done something that makes you interesting. You’ll be invited places and women will take you aside to tell you about their affairs so that you’ll tell about yours. You’ll find life full and complete and with a richness you never dreamed—”

“Oh, shut up.” I wasn’t mad anymore.

“Seriously.”

“Sure. You make the whole community sound like a gabbling chicken coop.”

He shrugged. “I see what I see. You want out or not?”

“When I want out I’ll get out. I don’t need your release.”

He smiled, and somehow it all faded away. It always did; you never really came to grips with Curt unless he wanted it that way; it was as though he had spent all his life avoiding traps.

That night, for the first time in weeks, Lou arranged one of his quiet family evenings. He washed the dishes, helped Sharon with her homework, and watched TV. After Sharon had gone to bed, Lou turned off the TV and regarded me with an expression of sadness and pity.

“You know they’re talking about you, Velda?”

It was his commiseration which infuriated me; that and the fact that I’d been told so many times. “How nice,” I said. “How utterly suburban.”

“You know what they’re saying?”

“The worst, I suppose. I’m carrying on shamelessly while you, the faithful husband, slaves away in blind devotion. I’m pregnant with Curt’s child, expected to slip off to St. Joe for an abortion at any moment….”

He smiled faintly, and I could see the picture amused him.

“You know,” he said, approaching the subject from left field the way he often does, “your family has a strange self-destructive urge. Once a structure shows a few chinks, you yell whoopee, damn the torpedoes, school’s out, let’s burn the building. Just because one little piece is tarnished, you tear down the whole goddam edifice.”