Too Much Too Soon (12 page)

Honora’s tingle of anxiety came not so much from Gideon’s tone—he often was abrupt when it came to business matters—but by his use of the patronym he had bestowed. She glanced at Curt. He raised an eyebrow, indicating he was as mystified as she.

“Another scintillating Sunday evening watching ‘Show of Shows,’” Crystal sighed.

Honora paid no attention to Sid Caesar and Imogene Coca’s preenings on the ten-inch screen. Her attention was fixed on any sounds that might come from Gideon’s small office across the hall.

Once, over the televised laughter, she heard
Gideon’s raised voice. A web of her sympathy went out to Curt. How immeasurably difficult it must be for him to be dressed down by the man to whom he had given his most profound loyalty and affection. But what on earth was Gideon yelling about?

Me
, she thought.
Gideon’s telling him to stay away from me.

She could no longer bear the idiocies on the black and white screen. “I’m going upstairs,” she said laying two fingers to her brow. “A headache.”

Crystal stopped chuckling. “Honora, didn’t I warn you this afternoon? We just aren’t used to this strong a sun.”

Honora closed the music room door quietly and stood in the vast hall. She heard nothing except the faraway burbling of “Your Show of Shows,” then Gideon’s gravelly voice rose in a crescendo. She couldn’t make out the words, but the anger vibrated.

She retreated to the staircase, sitting halfway up the bottom flight, where the last of the afternoon sun came through the stained-glass windows in dusty shafts of ruby, azure and amethyst light that stained her pale pink dress and white face in unearthly colors.

After what seemed hours, Curt emerged. He halted, peering about as if he had blundered into some alien place.

Getting to her feet, she called softly, “Curt?”

He jerked. “Oh, Honora. I didn’t see you.”

She crossed the hall, poised to put a reassuring hand on his arm, but his flat, expressionless
eyes halted the consoling gesture.

“What happened?” she whispered. “Curt, I heard Gideon shouting.”

“He handed me my walking papers,” Curt said, his face contorting with misery.

“I don’t understand. You mean he gave you the sack?”

“If the translation is that I’m fired, yes.”

“Because of me?”

“Mrs. Ekberg saw us going into my place.”

Honora flinched.

“He called me a considerable number of names. I’ve never heard him use obscenities, but he sure as hell knows the whole vocabulary.”

“I never meant to make trouble . . . between you . . . .” She bit her inner lip in an unsuccessful attempt to regain her composure. “Oh, Curt. It must have been torture for you. But he’ll get over it, he’ll come to his senses. He relies on you, he needs you. He likes you.”

“Relied, needed. Liked. Past tense. Honora, he kept it up even after I told him if it’d cleanse us of our grievous fall into depravity, we’d fly to Reno tonight and get married.”

The dark wood whirled around her, and she gripped his arm to keep from falling. “Married?”

“Oh, for Christ’s sake, Honora, why the shocked look?”

“But you never asked . . . mentioned.”

“After telling you so many times how wild I am about you, I figured you also took marriage as a given.”

The door of Gideon’s office opened and he
stood gripping the jamb. The light shining behind him had the effect of making his short, thick body appear swollen with strength. “Why are you still here?” he barked.

Curt said, “How can I let it end on a sour note like this? You’ve done everything for me.” His voice was low, pleading.

Gideon took a tentative step toward Curt and for a few seconds stood with his hands at his sides, his fingers rubbing his trousers uncertainly. Then he noticed Honora. “Ivory, I want you out of this house immediately. And if your things are still at Talbott’s tomorrow morning I’ll have them shoved into a trash barrel.”

“Please, Gideon,” Honora murmured shakily. “Don’t be angry with Curt. You’ve told us he’s your right hand.”

“He doesn’t run Talbott’s, whatever line he might have given you.”

“You’ve been wonderful to me,” Honora said. “And I’ve returned your generosity and trust despicably. But we’ll be married right away—”

“Do you think you’re the first foolish girl to be taken in by his flashy car and flashy white smile and talk of marriage? Before you he was talking engagement to Imogene Burdetts.”

“That’s absolute crap,” Curt said harshly. “There’s nothing serious between me and Imogene.”

“
She
thinks there is.” Fixing his glittering little eyes on Honora, Gideon said, “It goes against my grain to allow you to stay under my roof with your innocent sisters. But I’ve told
myself that you’re not to blame if I brought you into contact with a man with the moral decency of a sewer rat.” Gideon’s coarse features twisted in a tormented expression, and his forehead gleamed. “Seducing you under my own roof—exactly what I should’ve expected from a nameless nobody.”

The thin lines around Curt’s mouth tautened. Without a word, he turned, his footsteps echoing across the beautifully inlaid parquet. He let himself out the front door.

Honora wanted to weep for him. Her hands clenched as if to throttle Gideon’s thick neck—how unfair his attack was—yet she doggedly continued her attempts at reconciliation. “Gideon, I’m positive he didn’t make Imogene any promises,” she said. “And as for his seducing me, I was in love with him from the beginning. I chased after him, I threw myself at him. It’s my fault, not Curt’s.”

Gideon’s jaw quivered and against her will Honora felt a dart of pity. “I’ve always wanted a son and sometimes I felt he was one. It was a mistake, a terrible mistake to care.” He blinked, as if recollecting her presence, and his voice rose vehemently. “I picked him out of a gutter in Vienna—I doubt he’s mentioned that—”

“He’s told me everything, Gideon.” Honora spoke through a dry throat. “You mean so much to him, he reveres you.”

“He was so thin you could see every bone. He didn’t even know his name, so I gave him one like any starving mongrel I’d take in. God
knows what kind of criminals spawned him. And let me tell you, Vienna had some pretty types running around between the wars, yes, there were some might pretty types.” Gideon’s voice had turned to gravel. “I shouldn’t be surprised if he’s diseased.”

Honora’s body was shaking with fury. “You horrible, horrible man,” she cried, searching for answering insults. “You’re . . . you’re common!” The inadequacy of this response added to her rage. She rushed to the front door.

“Go, you little tramp, I did my best with you. If you’ve got the bastard of a bastard in your belly that’s Sylvander’s problem, not mine.”

She wrenched the heavy brass knob, hurling the door shut after her.

*   *   *

Joscelyn and Crystal both looked up as they heard the reverberating slam.

“God, what was that?” Crystal said, fiddling with the knob—the picture was showing ghosts.

“Either Curt leaving or a second San Francisco earthquake,” Joscelyn replied.

The door opened and Gideon stood there, his sparse remnants of hair raised up as if he had been passing his hands over his scalp.

“Turn that off,” he ordered.

The low, gravelly timbre of his voice brought an automatic response to Crystal’s fingers. As the picture dwindled into a dot, Gideon walked across the music room and through to the main
drawing room. Normally he strode briskly, master of all surrounding space. Now he moved to the black marble fireplace almost shufflingly, as if he had recently undergone surgery. He sank into a chair.

Crystal and Joscelyn followed him.

“What is it?” Crystal asked timidly.

“Yes, what’s happened, Gideon?” Joscelyn asked.

“Honora,” he said.

“Honora?” Joscelyn’s voice rose. That headache, could it have been the onset of some galloping disease?

“She won’t be living here anymore.” Gideon’s voice was flat.

“What?” Crystal cried.

“Where is she?” Joscelyn wailed. A brain tumor. Yes. Honora had been taken to the hospital—no. There would have been sirens.

“She’s not staying in
my
house.” Gideon’s hands were clenched.

“Gideon, nothing you’re saying makes sense.” Crystal stood over him. “Honora had a bit much sun today, and fifteen minutes ago she went upstairs.”

“First thing tomorrow morning I want you to pack her things. Juan will drive the boxes over to her father’s.”

“Why can’t she do her own packing?” Joscelyn took off her glases to rub her twitching eye.

“She left the house a minute ago.”

“I don’t believe it.”

“
She
slammed the door?” Crystal asked
incredulously.

“Honora never slams doors.” Joscelyn’s reddened eye fluttered.

Mrs. Ekberg stuck her carefully coiffed head into the room. “Is there anything I can do, Mr. Talbott?” she asked with quavery brightness.

“Take Joscelyn on upstairs,” Gideon said.

“It’s not my bedtime—”

“Go!”

At the command in his voice, Joscelyn shrank toward the chaperon, blinking violently. “I want Honora!”

Mrs. Ekberg put her arms around the child’s thin shoulders. “Come on, Mrs. Ekberg will fix you some nice hot Ovaltine with marshmallows.”

The door closed, and Crystal put both hands on her beguilingly rounded hips. Determination carved away the pouting, movie-starlet prettiness so that her vitality and beauty blazed with near terrifying intensity. “I want to know what’s what,” she said in the loud, blunt tone that she used when intent on getting her way with the Sylvanders.

Gideon sighed, “You know how it’s disturbed me, Ivory chasing after your sister.”

“I never understood why. Honora’s nutty about him.”

“She’s been going to his apartment.”

Light-headed with shock, Crystal sank into the brocade love seat. She wasn’t surprised that Honora had tumbled, not with the lariat of chemistry between the two of them—but how could Honora have kept it from
her?
They
shared everything. Honora was too guileless to lie. Yet on the other hand, hadn’t she been known at Edinthorpe as the safest custodian of a secret?

“I didn’t mean to upset you,” Gideon said.

“How do you know?” Crystal asked in a subdued voice.

“Ivory didn’t deny it. And she, poor girl, was quite open when I confronted her.” Gideon paused. “Now you see why I can’t have her living here.”

Separated from Honora?

It was bad enough to live apart from their father. But she and Honora were indivisible. To exist without Honora steadfastly backing her up and admiring her and giving in to her? To live without her other?

“I’m not at all sure,” Crystal said slowly, “whether Joss and I can stay. Without her.”

The wrinkles in Gideon’s brow deepened and his expression turned dark. “Is that an ultimatum?”

“Gideon, the three of us have always been together.”

“Try to understand how difficult this is for me. I cared deeply for Ivory.” Gideon’s chin sank onto the new, bright tie. “I always wanted a son, and Matilda was a sickly woman from the first. She lost three babies and after that, well, we gave up.” He sighed heavily. “Curt was more or less in my care . . . . I paid for his keep and education and tried to guide him. He has the highest ethics—except when it comes to the opposite sex. He can’t restrain
himself when it comes to girls.”

“Poor Honora, she’s crazy in love with him.”

“She was under my roof, my responsibility. It hurts that he had to seduce her. It hurts.”

“She isn’t having a baby?” Crystal asked anxiously.

“Not that I know of. But, Crystal, Curt flagrantly abused my trust.”

Gideon looked up. There were odd-shaped tears below his small brown eyes.

His unexpected misery caught at her. “Why not let it rest for tonight?” she asked sympathetically.

“It’s not going to be any less painful in the morning.”

“Gideon, tonight’s not the time to make any permanent decisions. I’m positive this whole business won’t seem as bleak tomorrow.”

“You’ve got so much common sense, Crystal. You’re right. I’ll sleep on this unpleasant mess and settle it in my mind before we have our talk.”

She left him hunched in the huge, shadow-rimmed room.

Upstairs, she sank into one of her slipper chairs, her delicate, carefully manicured hands covering her face as her sobs began.

She pitied Honora profoundly. Honora adored Curt, but he would never marry her. He hungered after large-scale opulence—Crystal recognized the same passion in herself—and would marry Imogene or somebody rich like her.
The bastard
, Crystal thought.
Taking Imogene to big galas and sneaking Honora into
his apartment.

Joscelyn crept in, her cotton pajamas buttoned awry.

“What’s going on?” she whimpered.

“Gideon found out Honora’s been going to Curt’s apartment. She’s been sleeping with him.”

“What a lie!”

“She admitted it to Gideon. That’s why he’s sending her away.”

Joscelyn rushed out.

In her room the child stood peering around, then turned, running full speed into Honora’s room, climbing onto the high bed, flopping down on her stomach. She sniffed at the pillowcases, the tender, sweet odor of Honora. But soon the stale smell of her own tears erased all the other smells. It was impossible to believe that Curt had forced her sister into that obscene tangle of excretory organs. It was equally impossible that Honora had left her without a goodbye, a desertion incomparably more bitter than her unknown mother’s death.

At nineteen past seven Honora was sitting on Curt’s bed, the phone clamped between her shoulder and her ear as she gazed blankly at the hard morning sun slanting through the window.

Last night when Curt had pulled up outside the tall apartment house he had detached his
door key from his chain. “You go on up,” he had said. “It shouldn’t take more than an hour to clean up the office.” This was the umpteenth time that she had phoned Talbott’s, and with the identical results: a constant ring.
It’s a switchboard
, she told herself. But if Curt were in the silent building, wouldn’t he have heard and gone downstairs to discover who kept calling so relentlessly?