The Rich Shall Inherit (28 page)

Each evening after roll call, the girls were permitted to read and converse genteelly in the “salon,” as Miss Henderson called the big front parlor on the first floor. They took turns playing Chopin nocturnes on the ebony Steinway grand, and occasionally someone would sing or they would read romantic poetry, but mostly they just chattered and gossiped.

As usual, Angel was the center of a small group of girls, giggling together and whispering secrets, and Poppy watched jealously from her seat by the window where she was pretending to read a book. She and Laura never spoke to each other, and though the other girls were friendly, no one was “her friend.” And now it seemed Angel no longer was either. Unable to bear it any longer, she grabbed her coat from the closet, ran down the stairs, and unlocked the big front door. She hurried down the street and around the corner, not thinking where she was going, just glad to breathe the fresh air of freedom.

The clock in the hall said eight-thirty as Poppy slid back through the front door of the Academy, wondering whether she’d been missed. Tossing her hat and coat into the closet under the stairs, she walked into the drawing room, glancing around apprehensively; but she needn’t have worried. Meredith McGuinn was playing the “Moonlight Sonata” for the hundredth time and
still getting it wrong, and the other girls were gossiping in small groups. It seemed no one had even noticed she was gone.

“Poppy!” Angel thrust her way through the small crowd of girls around her. “Poppy, where on earth have you been? Miss Tremaine was looking for you and I had to tell her you had a headache, but the housemaid said she’d seen you slipping out the front door!”

Silence fell as twenty pairs of eyes contemplated Poppy in amazement.

“Did you really go out?” Dorothea asked, awed.

Poppy shrugged. “Of course I did,” she said casually. “I don’t know how you can all bear to be shut up in this boring dump day after day. I just thought I’d pay a visit to … to a place I know.”

“But Poppy—where?” breathed Angel excitedly.

Poppy knew she had their attention now and she smiled secretively. “I can’t tell you,” she replied, “but I’ll be going back there again soon. It’s so much more fun than here.” Standing up, she yawned exaggeratedly. “I’m dreadfully tired,” she said, throwing them a superior glance. “I must go to bed.”

Angel couldn’t imagine where Poppy might have gone, she was quite sure she knew no one in San Francisco. Leaving the other girls talking in hushed voices about her escapade, she followed her upstairs into her room.

Poppy was sitting on the edge of her bed, her hands in her lap and a hopeless look on her face. “I was so worried,” Angel confessed, hugging her. “Why did you disappear like that? I was so scared when Miss Tremaine called the register for bed and I had to lie for you. I just said you had a headache.”

“Well, it’s true, I do.” Poppy trailed a hand across her furrowed brow.

“But
where
did you go?” Angel asked, exasperated.

Poppy shrugged again. “I just walked,” she said bleakly, “that’s all. Anything to get away from here.”

“How can you say that?” demanded Angel, surprised. “Why, it’s such fun here.”

Poppy sighed. “Of course it is, Angel,” she said grimly. “Of course it’s fun—for you.”

“Do you know what sexual intercourse is?” Poppy asked one evening as the girls sat around chatting as usual. An awed silence fell over the room as she added, “I do.”

“You do?” they gasped, edging closer.

Angel watched her warily. It seemed that ever since she’d come home from her walk, Poppy had been trying to behave more and more outrageously.

“Sexual intercourse is what bulls do to cows,” Poppy declared, “only it’s men and women.”

The girls gasped at her daring even to speak such words. “But how?” whispered Dorothea eagerly.
“How
do they do it, Poppy?”

She grinned at them. “Well,” she said, “the man has a thing like the bull and he puts it inside the woman.”

“Inside where?” Meredith asked, bewildered.

“Down below,” Poppy said, brazenly, “you know.” She pointed with her finger and their eyes followed in amazement. “I know it’s true,” she added, “because I read all about it in Miss Henderson’s medical book in her study. It has pictures too … really strange pictures. I mean it shows the man’s penis and everything ….”

The girls’ hands flew to their mouths as she said the word, and they stared at her, shocked. “I don’t believe a word of it,” scoffed Laura, “you’re just making it up, like you do everything.”

“No, I’m not,” Poppy retorted belligerently, “and what’s more I’ve got the medical book upstairs. Anyone who wants to see it, can,” she added magnanimously.

“Oh, Poppy,” murmured Angel, distressed, “you shouldn’t …” But Poppy was already leading the eager girls upstairs.

“Only one at a time,” she ordered as Dorothea followed her giggling into the room, “the rest of you can wait outside.”

A few moments later Dorothea emerged, scarlet-faced and looking subdued. “What’s it like?” the others whispered. “Does she really have pictures?”

Dorothea just nodded and then, clapping her hands to her mouth, she ran down the corridor to her room, and threw up.

There was a buzz of excited speculation and giggles as they waited for the next girl to emerge …. “What’s it like?” they chorused as she appeared a minute later. She laughed, her face pink with embarrassment. “Goodness, I had no idea I looked quite like that,” she said, “and as for men! Ugh!”

Miss Henderson heard the commotion as she crossed the hall on her way for her usual nightcap of hot cocoa laced with a strong dash of French brandy, a little recipe that had helped put her to sleep without fail for the past twenty years. As she mounted the stairs she patted her smooth white hair into place and adjusted her topaz brooch, wondering angrily what the girls
could be up to now. She stared in surpirse as she saw them huddled together outside Poppy’s room. “What is going on here?” she boomed, making them jump. “Is something wrong?” She added with a touch of alarm.
You just never knew with that Mallory girl ….

“No, oh, no Miss Henderson … sorry, Miss Henderson,” they murmured, edging away along the corridor toward their own rooms.

“Ah, Miss Henderson, there you are,” cried Angel, desperately trying to divert her. “I’ve been meaning to ask you a few questions about a trip to Europe that Mama is planning for us next year. I wonder if it would be convenient to come to your study now and discuss it?” She flashed Miss Henderson a brilliant smile, heading for the stairs, praying that she would follow her.

“Certainly not, child,” Miss Henderson snapped, thinking of her cocoa; then, remembering who Angel was, she smiled genially. “Why not come to my study tomorrow at three,” she suggested, “we can talk then.” She glanced up in surprise as Meredith McGuinn dashed from Poppy’s room, her shocked face bright scarlet.

Flinging open the door, she marched in. “What’s going on in here?” she demanded, purpling with rage as her eyes fell on the book open at a certain page. Poppy made no attempt to hide it, staring insolently as Miss Henderson slammed it shut and tucked it under her arm.

“You wicked girl,” Miss Henderson shrieked, her prominent Adam’s apple wobbling as she struggled for words to tell Poppy what she thought of her.
“You little slut! You are a disgrace,”
she spat finally, “but then with
your background
it’s only to be expected. I knew I should never have taken you in. If Mr. Konstant had not been so insistent, I never would have done it!”

Poppy stared at the floor saying nothing, but Angel noticed that her fists were tightly clenched.

“You will be removed from this school immediately,” fumed Miss Henderson. “I shall telephone Mr. Konstant right now and tell him so. Laura,” she barked, “you will sleep in the room down the hall tonight. No one is to go near that … that
disgusting
girl!”

“Oh, Poppy,” wailed Angel desperately, “just look what you’ve done! Now you’ll be expelled.”

“Good,” Poppy replied sullenly, “that’s exactly why I did it.” But the expression in her eyes was bleak and Angel flew to her,
clasping her in her arms. “I won’t let them take you away,” she promised, “we’ll never be separated Poppy,
never.
I promise you … I just won’t let them do it.”

Poppy’s pleading eyes met hers. “Do you mean it, Angel?” she whispered. “Do you really mean we won’t be separated?”

“Of course I do. I shall telephone Papa right now,” she promised. “I’ll tell him it wasn’t your fault, the stupid woman should not leave books like that lying around where girls can just find them. It’ll be all right, Poppy, I promise you.”

By noon the next day Miss Henderson was forced to take a small snifter of brandy while she contemplated her dilemma. Nik Konstant had castigated her roundly for possessing such a book, even though she’d protested that it was purely medical. “Then if it’s medical,” he’s said logically, “what is the great harm? It’s just a little human biology, Miss Henderson, and every woman knows about that. I had thought your establishment would be better supervised but now I’m almost of a mind to remove
both
my girls. I’m quite sure you can understand what a scandal it would cause if I were forced to do such a thing—and for such a reason. I imagine the other parents would be none too pleased about this little affair, now would they?”

Sipping her brandy carefully, Miss Henderson knew she had no choice but to let Poppy stay.

Poppy had been moved to a single room and Angel went along to see her later that night. She was sitting up in bed with her wild hair tamed into two braids, and Angel thought she looked somehow pathetic and vulnerable despite all her bravado. “Poppy, now you’ve got to behave yourself,” she said sternly, “because next time Miss Henderson really will expel you.”

“I don’t care,” Poppy replied, “don’t you understand, Angel? I can’t stand it here. I just want them to send me back home where I’m happy!”

“Happy?” snapped Angel. “And how
happy
do you imagine you’ll make Mama and Papa if you are expelled from here? Hasn’t Papa already come to your defense once? Think how
unhappy
you’ll make
them
, Poppy, before you do anything else stupid.”

“I didn’t think about it that way,” Poppy confessed, staring at Angel miserably. “I’m so selfish and stupid, I only thought about myself.”

“I’ll help you,” Angel said, her flash of temper gone as quickly as it had come. “We’re here together. Just try and enjoy yourself. I promise you it really can be fun,” she added wistfully.

Poppy really tried hard to redeem herself in Nik and Rosalia’s eyes. She began to keep her room tidy and her clothes neat. Her hair was swept up and secured with a thousand pins so it was impossible for it to stray. She was attentive in class and behaved impeccably on their visits to the theater and to the great houses of San Francisco, whose portals were opened to Miss Henderson’s smart girls so they might study the collection of paintings and sculpture and fine antique furniture. The other girls admired her daring and were now much friendlier toward her, and she and Angel were once again sharing a room. Despite Miss Henderson’s disapproval she was beginning to feel that at last she had carved a place for herself at the Academy and that she might even begin to enjoy it.

Each week certain girls were delegated to arrange the flower displays in the house, and on a cold December day, dry and crisp with a promise of Christmas in the air, it was Poppy’s turn to do the front hall. She had chosen sprays of holly and mistletoe, thick with shiny red and white berries. The woody stems were proving difficult, so she had borrowed a knife from the kitchen to split them. It was hard work, but she intended it to be the grandest Christmas display yet seen at the Henderson Academy. She was so engrossed in her task, she scarcely noticed when the doorbell rang, but as the young parlormaid hurried past her to answer it she tucked a spray of mistletoe mischievously into her dark hair.

“Oh, miss, whatever will people think!” the girl giggled as she scurried to open the door.

“Mistletoe, eh?” said a familiar voice from the doorway. “Well, now, we all know what that means, don’t we, me girl?”

Poppy swung around just in time to see Jeb plant a kiss on the parlormaid’s astonished mouth.

“Hi there, Papa’s girl,” he cried, with that same jaunty grin, just as though nothing had ever happened.

Poppy felt herself grow faint as she watched him walk toward her. He looked just as she remembered—and yet he didn’t. He looked older—much older; his eyes were puffy and his face deeply lined, and the hands he held out to her shook with a faint insistent tremor. But his eyes were still the same bright sparkling
blue as her own and his face was the one she saw in her own mirror every morning.

Remembered hate swept through her as she backed away from him, and the other girls gathered curiously on the stairs as the frightened little parlormaid ran to fetch Miss Henderson. “I’m not ‘your girl,’” she cried in a voice that trembled.

“Sure and you are … you remember, don’t you? You were always Papa’s girl. And didn’t I always say I’d come back and get you? Well, here I am, me darling, your old Papa is finally here!”

Angel ran along the landing toward the group of silent girls. “What is it?” she cried. “What’s going on?”

“It’s Jeb Mallory,” hissed Laura excitedly, “he’s come to fetch ‘his girl’ … oh my, what a story
this
will make!”

Angel stared horrified at the scene in the hall. Poppy’s voice was quavering as she repeated, “I’m not
your girl.
Please go away. I never want to see you again.
Ever!”

“Sure and you do,” Jeb replied, walking toward her. “Now don’t tell me you’re gonna turn out to be as unforgiving as your mother just because a man made a few mistakes. What d’ya say you put on your coat and we’ll go for a bite of lunch and get reacquainted? I’ll bet you won’t want to be staying here now that your Papa’s home, will you? And I guess the Konstants’ll be glad to get rid of you now that I’m back. I’ve rented a suite at the St. Francis; it’ll be just like old times, me and Papa’s girl!”