The Bodies Out Back
by
Joseph E. Wright
Copyright 2009 by Joseph E. Wright
All rights reserved
Cover design by Joseph E. Wright
Smashwords Edition January 2009
This novel is a work of fiction. All characters and events portrayed in this novel are either fictitious or are used fictitiously. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or portions thereof, in any form. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the Author.
The Bodies Out Back
by
Joseph E. Wright
Chapter I
Dusk arrived on Manning Street the same time Phillis Toner did. She checked the number on one of the houses, then rang its bell. The sounds of traffic seemed excluded from this street, one of the oldest in the city of Philadelphia. She wondered if such intrusions had been banned by Molly Montgomary, the woman she had come to see. Phillis told herself not to be ridiculous. And not to be nervous.
A uniformed maid, an old woman with a halting walk, admitted her to the house, then quickly disappeared behind a sliding door. She immediately reappeared. “Miss Montgomary will see you,” the maid told Phillis, pointed toward the open door, then shuffled off, mumbling to herself.
“Good evening, my dear.” Molly was standing in the middle of a small parlor, a woman of white hair, stern features, and perfect posture. She was wearing a simple black wool dress and a single strand of pearls, which Phillis immediately recognized as being quite expensive. “Do come in.” Molly reached out, took the younger woman's hand, and led her toward one of a pair of chairs in front of the bay window.
Phillis was in her mid-twenties. Her auburn hair was cut short and her deep, almost-plum-color eyes were busy taking in both the room and the woman who was speaking to her.
“Please be seated,” Molly said as she sat down.
The maid reappeared with a small silver tray bearing a decanter and two glasses.
“Thank you, Margaret,” Molly said, then addressed Phillis. “I know you're coming from work, and you should take a moment to relax. A spot of sherry is just the thing, don't you agree?”
Phillis smiled. How quaint, she thought. Just what I'd expect, the dear offering sherry. I'd rather have a vodka gimlet. She thanked her hostess.
“I have the answer to the question you asked on the telephone today. Let me see now.” Molly took her reading glasses from the table next to her and began reading from a small notepad, which had also been on the table. “All the utilities will be paid--heat, electricity--so you see you don't really have to worry about them.” She put the pad aside and replaced her reading glasses in their case. “I understand Mr. Sutton-Sponge arranged to have someone show you the house in Society Hill. I believe you saw it yesterday?”
Phillis nodded.
“Very well, then. You know what it looks like. You would be renting the third floor. Quite handsome, if I do say so myself. And large. I daresay a dozen people could live in that house and not feel crowded, so you and Pat should have no trouble.”
“I understand your niece Pat won't be back from Europe until the fall.” Phillis was beginning to feel uncomfortable. There was something about the way the old woman was staring at her with her dark brown eyes, as though she were more than appraising a prospective tenant for her niece's house. It seemed--so Phillis felt--more like the witch in the woods wondering how Gretel would taste, once roasted in the oven.
“Pat is due back in a few months, my dear. And I just know you'll like one another.”
“That's one problem. Actually, it's the only problem I have. I really don't think it's very intelligent going into a sharing arrangement like this, even sharing such a large house, without first meeting the person I'm going to be living with. One should be... well, careful, you know.”
“Oh, I know, my dear.” She reached out and patted Phillis' knee. “You are right. Absolutely right. One should always be very circumspect in such matters. But, as I explained to you the other day, the rent is so reasonable because Pat is away so very much of the time and would like to have someone--the right someone, of course--living there. Sort of insurance, you might say. So, you see, it will be rented before Pat returns and I'm afraid if you don't take it, someone else will. And I do so wish you would. I like you. I don't mind admitting it. I do like you very much and I think you'd be the right person.”
Phillis stood up and stared out the window onto Manning Street with its old Philadelphia cobblestones and its narrow houses--some of them stone, most brick, with flower boxes and painted front doors. There were hitching posts, no longer for horses, but practical just the same. Since the street was so narrow, they protected both pedestrians and houses alike from careless drivers.
She had only a few days left before she would have to be out of her present home. She had returned to Philadelphia little more than a year ago, partly to stay with her aunt, the only family she still had left, and partly to search for some roots. At least those were the reasons she gave others and tried hard to believe herself. She never knew her father. A dozen years before while in her mid-teens, she had been uprooted from this city when her mother died and an aunt by marriage had taken her to Texas to live. Aunt Beth tried hard to be a mother to Phillis. After high school, Phillis got a job as secretary in a small office. She liked it. What she did not like was the interest her boss took in her: subtle remarks at first, then outright propositions. Compounding the problem was the boss' son, Ron, with whom Phillis fell in love. As she stood at the window, she remembered with bitterness the lost baby, the lost lover whose family sent him away--paid him off to forget her--and finally, the day she went to see Ron's father in that hotel room. She knew it was a mistake even as she walked the hall toward his room, but she wanted to plead with him to bring Ron back. She didn't care. With the recklessness of youth, she had been ready to swallow her pride for the man she loved. Flashing before her was the scene of herself running down a fire escape behind the hotel, the blood on her dress, her trying to burn the dress, and the fear that the police would find her.
Aunt Beth might have suspected something had happened. Then, two days later, she died in her sleep. Phillis wrote to her Aunt Olive, her mother's sister, and spoke of coming back East. Olive urged her to come to Philadelphia and said she thought Phillis would have no trouble getting a job. She came. She found a job. She was happy. Then Olive, like Phillis' mother and Aunt Beth, died. There had been times lately when Phillis wondered if she were somehow to blame for their deaths. Why was it , she asked herself late at night when she couldn't sleep, that those close to her, those who cared for her, were all dead?
Olive's heirs--of which Phillis was not one--sold Olive's house, giving Phillis very little time in which to find another place to live. In the past few weeks, she had contacted what seemed to her to be all the real estate offices in the city of Philadelphia and had answered dozens of ads for apartments, only to have nothing to show for her troubles. The places she liked, she couldn't afford; those she could afford, she either disliked or they were too far from where she worked.
This house, the one she and Molly Montgomary were now discussing, the one she saw yesterday, the one she'd have to share with someone else, was much more than she had ever hoped to find. It was perfect. There was an enormous living room, which left her near speechless when she first saw it, with its sixteen-foot-high molded ceiling and sweeping staircase leading up to the upper floors. On the first floor, there was also a formal dining room and an ultra-modern kitchen, both of which, she had been told, she could use whenever she wished to entertain. Off the kitchen, there was a garden with a lilac tree in full bloom, the scent filling the air. The garden floor was red brick and the walls were cement with built-in planters and benches along two sides.
The second floor of the house contained a library; Pat's--her possible housemate's--bedroom and bath; a sitting room; and two guestrooms. Off the end of the long hallway was a pair of French doors opening onto a balcony. Perfect for sunbathing, she decided when she saw it. The entire third floor was to be hers, if she decided to rent it. She'd have a sitting room the width of the house, a bedroom, a functional and sunny kitchen, bath, dressing room, a second bedroom or den, and more closets than she could ever fill. There was a fourth floor which, she was told, was not being used and was originally intended for servants. And the rent, that was the almost impossible thing about this whole proposition. It was less than she had allowed herself to spend. She'd have a little left over each month without having to worry about the cost of heat or electricity. It seemed too good to pass up.
There were only two drawbacks she could think of. First, she had not yet met Pat. Second, she would not have a private entrance. She would enter through the front door, use the staircase common to all floors, and there was no door to the third floor to ensure privacy. Still, she did not have to share the other floors, if she did not wish to, and would not really have to see any more of Pat than she wanted to. What the hell....
She spun around and almost startled Molly. “I've decided to take it, Miss Montgomary.”
Molly Montgomary beamed. “You have no idea, my dear, how happy that makes me. You've made the right decision, I just know that.”
Phillis signed the lease Molly placed before her, wrote a check for the first and last months' rent, wished Molly a pleasant evening, and left the house. What Phillis could not see as she walked away from the house on Manning Street was what Molly Montgomary was doing at that precise moment. With a smile on her face, Molly was tearing Phillis' check into small pieces and watching them fall like a mini snowstorm into her wastebasket.
*****
Two days later, on Friday, with the help of several friends (all of whom told her she was making a big mistake), and a rented truck, Phillis moved into the four-story house on Spruce Street in Society Hill, with its dusty-rose brick front, its cream-colored shutters, and its Wedgwood-blue front door. When the last piece of furniture and the last box were brought up to the third floor and the last friend had left, Phillis threw herself into one of her living room chairs and knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that she had made the right decision. They were all wrong, those well-intentioned friends of hers. It was not a mistake. She loved her new home and she knew she would be happy there. The deaths of the past year and a half were now all behind her.
*****
The same day Phillis moved into her new quarters, Molly Montgomary was on the telephone with Nathaniel Sutton-Sponge III, Esquire. “Now, Mr. Sutton-Sponge, you do understand what it is I want, don't you?”
“Yes, Miss Montgomary, I understand fully.” Mr. Sutton-Sponge and his father before him had been Molly's legal advisors these past fifty-one years since she had reached her majority.
“You'll let me know when you have the papers drawn up and I shall come into your office and sign them. You have the spelling correct? The young woman's name, I mean. It's spelled with an 'i' and not with a 'y.'”
“Miss Montgomary, the document you requested will be drawn up and I shall personally stop by your home for your signature.” He didn't need her to remind him how to spell the young woman's name. After all, wasn't it he who found Phillis Toner for her? And wasn't it also he who told Molly that the young woman in question had been followed into a real estate office, that the information had been gotten out of the receptionist at the aforementioned real estate office that Miss Toner was looking for a place to live?
“That is most considerate of you.”
“I do trust, Miss Montgomary, that you have given this matter sufficient thought.” Mr. Sutton-Sponge could not keep a tone of legal concern out of his voice.
“Yes, yes, I have,” Molly said, a bit too firmly. “This is what I want and I know it's the right thing to do.”
Mr. Sutton-Sponge III, Esquire, felt an urge. It was seldom that Mr. Sutton-Sponge felt any kind of urge, and when he did, his legal discipline always prevailed. His present urge was to pursue the matter further with Molly, having nothing more in mind than the welfare of his client, but experience had taught him one thing over the years: when Molly Montgomary made up her mind about something, neither he nor his father--and probably not even the Supreme Court--could change it. He sighed and bid her a good day.
Bertha Belmont was sitting at the opposite side of the table which held the telephone. After Molly replaced the receiver, Bertha took a sip of her tea and addressed her lifelong friend: “I do hope you know what you are doing, Moll. I remember an uncle of mine who had considerable money and he got it into his head to go to Pakistan--or was it Paraguay? I do get those two countries confused, don't you? I mean, they sound so much alike. Really, they should make the names of countries simpler and not similar, so people wouldn't mix them up, I always say. Anyway, he....”
“Bertha, this is not some fool idea I've gotten into my head. And, I'm not going away to some remote part of the world like your uncle. Let us say that what I am about to do is merely payment for service rendered by that young woman. Miss Toner doesn't know it, but when she agreed to rent Pat's third floor, she also took on a lot more than she bargained for.”
“Just the same, Molly, I trust you know what you're doing. I most certainly do. I for one wouldn't care to interfere with other people's lives the way you obviously are doing. Yes, indeed, I do hope you know what you're doing.”
That makes two of us, Bertha dear, Molly said to herself. Yes, I most certainly do hope I know what I'm doing.
Chapter II
On Friday evenings, Francis Heisler customarily came home several hours later than the official quitting time at Burgess and Burschak. This particular Friday evening, it was ten o'clock when he pressed the button on his car's visor and waited for the garage door to open. He drove his Cadillac in, turned off the engine, got out, and went up the three steps to the kitchen door. Sarah, the Heisler maid and cook, was sitting at the kitchen table.
“Eve-ning, Mr. Heisler,” she said as she went on with her sewing.
“Mrs. Heisler still up, Sarah?” Francis opened the refrigerator and took out a bottle of Perrier.
“I do believe so. Leastwise, she was no more'n a half hour or so ago. Fix you some dinner, Mr. Heisler?”
“No, thank you, Sarah,” he said as he poured himself a drink. He wanted to ask the woman he was staring at what kind of mood Mrs. Heisler was in. Was his wife talkative? he wondered. If so, that would be bad. Gertrude Heisler, when her tongue was wagging, was at her worst. She was known to go on talking hour after hour when in that mood, especially on the occasions he came home late. He would not ask Sarah, Sarah who had worked for them the past what? eighteen, twenty years? who had heard all their fights, who probably--he corrected himself-- definitely --knew them better than they knew themselves, was one of the few women in his life for whom Francis had respect. His daughter, Emily, he loved. His wife, Gertrude, he sometimes feared and sometimes hated. His secretary, he admired and depended upon. His mother, dead these past ten years, he had never really known. Becky, his mistress of seven years, he lusted after. Sarah, he respected too much to put her between himself and his wife. He placed the glass on the drain board.
“Good night, Sarah. Don't stay up late.” He pushed open the swinging door and headed toward the staircase leading to the second floor of the house, toward his bedroom, which was adjacent to his wife's, toward--as though he needed to remind himself--the inevitable lecture. He went into his bedroom and began to undress.
“Is that you, Francis?” the old, too-familiar voice called out to him from the next room.
“No, it's the Society Hill Strangler.” His tone did nothing to disguise his annoyance at such a stupid question.
“You need not use that tone of voice nor attempt sarcasm.”
Good God, it's one of those moods, he mumbled, loud enough to make himself think he was being brave in speaking his mind, yet low enough so that she could not hear. I should have left Becky's place a couple of hours ago, he continued, lecturing to himself, and smiled without being totally aware he was smiling as he remembered Becky. Or not at all. He threw his trousers on the back of a chair, followed by his necktie and shirt. He stopped for a moment in front of the mirror over the dresser and looked at himself. The gray hair at the temples was perfect, he thought. “Should be. Been paying Antonio a fortune for it,” he said as he turned his head from side to side. “Distinguished. Definitely distinguished.” He ran a hairbrush over each side of his head.
“...and don't insult my intelligence with one of your usual excuses.”
Had she been talking all this time? he asked himself. He wasn't sure. He hadn't been listening. God, I've got that talent down to an art, haven't I? She could talk for seven hours and I could shut her voice out the whole time. Not many husbands can do that, I'll bet.
“I know you were out with that tramp,” the voice continued from the other room. “Oh, don't act surprised. I know all about her. She's....”
...a thousand of you, he mentally finished her statement. She's beautiful, young, considerate. Everything you're not, you... you....
Becky had not been happy this evening. That's why he was later than usual. Ordinarily, they would meet at a bar on Friday evenings after work and have one or two drinks before he left for home. Mondays and Thursdays were their regular evenings to be together. Today, she had called him at work and said they had to talk. That wasn't at all like Becky. She never made demands on him or his time. She was grateful for the hours they had together. In that way, he told himself more than once, she was the perfect mistress. No strings. No ties. No demands. They had gone to her apartment on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, the apartment that was in his name.
Becky had a problem. Someone had been around the building asking questions about her. The concierge had discreetly told her about it, gently hinting that her position in the building was not unique, and that her privacy would be protected at all times. Just the same, Becky told Francis, she didn't like it. This came on the heels of what she had been refusing to believe the past two weeks, namely that someone had been following her. She had tried to convince herself that it was all in her imagination, but now with this, she was sure someone was prying into her life. “It must be your wife,” Becky said as she sat curled up on one end of the sofa.
He shrugged and smiled as he moved closer. He took her hand in his and kissed it, then told her not to worry, he would take care of it all. This was not the first time Gertrude's irritating amateurish snoops had tried to get something on one of his amours. The procedure was always the same: A fumbling job of trailing, so badly done that even someone as naive as Becky could spot it, then came the questioning of neighbors. Typical of his wife, always looking for a bargain. In a matter where most wives would want only the best that money could buy, Gertrude shopped around until she found the cheapest private detective available.
On his way out of Becky's apartment building this evening, he had made it a point to see the concierge. Francis knew his script only too well. He had played this role before tonight. He would greet the apartment manager; the texture of a hundred dollar bill crumpled in the palm of his hand could be felt as they shook hands. Rising to the demands of his own role, the manager would ask him if everything was all right with the apartment, and taking his cue, Francis would assure him that everything was indeed to his satisfaction... well, there was one thing. A minor point, to be sure, but... well, you know how women are. His cousin had mentioned that someone had been in the building asking about her and, well, being a very shy and private person, she didn't like having her privacy invaded.
At this point in the drama, the manager would insist in the strongest terms possible that no one--absolutely no one--would be allowed to disturb any of the building's tenants.
“Thank you,” Francis said, moving to upper stage right, prepared to make his exit. “I know I can count on you to take care of the matter. And, in the future, should anyone else ask concerning Miss Brown, please tell me about it. Don't bother my cousin. I prefer she not know.”
“I fully understand,” the concierge said with a knowing smile and a gracious, albeit unnecessary, bow.
And that was that, Francis told himself as he went into his bathroom to brush his teeth. Through the walls, even with the water running, he could hear Gertrude's voice droning on and on. He hoped their daughter, Emily, couldn't hear her. He didn't want Emily upset. He turned off the bathroom light, walked over to his bed, and turned down the cover. He was tired. It had been a hectic day at work, and no matter what others said about his getting his job thanks to his wife being one of the Burschaks, Francis Heisler always gave as much as he got from the company. He was tired, too, of Gertrude and her picking, her unending questioning, her infuriating self-righteousness.
I should have stuck my head into Emily's room and said good night to her, he reprimanded himself. He'd make it up to her in the morning. Emily, dear, dear Emily; the only good thing to come out of this marriage, he said to himself as once again the waves of guilt came over him. The pain had not let up as the years had gone by. He had hoped it would. He had hoped that the day would come when he could forgive himself for what he had done to his child, forgive himself for sending her away to that school at such a tender age, not letting her home even for summer vacations. How could I have let her come home? He dared not trust himself. He dared not give in to the temptation. He knew his own weakness when it came to his daughter. He knew that if he had let her come home, he would never have been strong enough to send her away again. Finally, the day came when she had to come home. School was over. She was a young woman. Still, the pain he felt never left him.
Tonight, the pain acted like a soporific, sending him off to sleep, thanks also to the constant sound of Gertrude's voice coming from the next room. In his state of semi-consciousness, he wondered if he would dream again tonight, dream his favorite dream, the one in which he leisurely places his hands around his wife's neck and in something approaching a sexual orgasm, presses and presses until her voice leaves her and her eyes begin to bulge and her tongue protrudes from her mouth, and then the neck and the whole body go limp, like a broken cornstalk he remembered as a child on the farm, and as with that broken cornstalk, he would casually throw Gertrude's body to one side, free at long last of that voice he swore was recorded in hell.
“...and if you think for one moment that you're going to continue seeing that slut, well, I have news for you, Francis Heisler,” Gertrude was saying. She was seated propped up in bed. A book, not looked at since she had heard Francis' footsteps on the stairs, lay next to her. The room was warm, the window was closed, and outdoors there was barely a breath of air stirring, but Gertrude was wearing a flannel nightgown buttoned tightly around her neck. She looked at her hands, always her pride and joy when she used to play the piano. She should have been a concert pianist the way her parents had wanted her to be, she told herself for what could have been the thousandth time. Her hands were now wrinkled and covered with age spots. Creams, prescription lotions--nothing had helped bleach away those ugly spots, and that made her both sad and angry. She hated growing old. It wasn't fair, she said to herself this Friday evening as she picked up a hand mirror from the table next to her bed and looked at her face. Her face was growing blank, as though the years had washed over it, leaving the marble still hard but the once sharp edges worn, smoothed over, with the suggestion that before long the features would disappear completely.
He was still handsome, she told herself as she continued her solitary orgy of self-pity. Handsom er , if you ask me. Just like a man. They don't age. Her once-blue eyes looking back at her from the hand mirror were now nearer to a slightly tinted white. She wondered why life had been so stingy with her, giving her nothing more than money. If only she had had a pretty face or a nicer figure or one of those smiles people can't resist, or even a sense of humor. But, no. Only money. And one child. Emily. Plain, unwanted Emily. That's all life had found in its bag of treats to give her, that and nothing more. She herself had been no raving beauty, as they used to say back in the days when she was of marriageable age, but her daughter was even plainer. If it had taken her father's money to get Gertrude a husband, it seemed now that her daughter, Emily, wasn't going to get a husband, not even with the help of all the family money.
“Serves her right,” Gertrude said aloud. “She doesn't deserve a husband. Just as well she never marries and never brings a child of her own into this world.” Emily had caused so much agony to her, the thought of a grandchild--a reflection of the daughter Gertrude had come to despise--was too much to bear. And the way Emily adored her father. “They deserve one another, those two. He still dotes on her, as though he was the only man in the world to have a daughter, and she thinks he's so wonderful. Her 'Daddy,' as she calls him. Let them have one another. I don't need either one of them.”
She leaned over and turned off the light next to her bed. She resolved she would not waste another word on him tonight. Why should she? He wasn't worth it.
Moonlight came into the room through a slit where the drapes did not quite reach the window frame. Gertrude studied the light illuminating a strip of pattern in the wallpaper. Something had happened today. What was it? Oh, yes, she remembered now. A young woman moved in next door. Imagine, a young, attractive woman. Into that house. Why would any young woman want to live there? And with Pat Montgomary? Who is she? Gertrude wondered. Whoever--or whatever--she is, she'd better keep her hands off Francis or I'll pull that young hair of hers out by the roots. With these charitable and neighborly thoughts, Gertrude Heisler fell asleep.
*****
As Francis and Gertrude slept and the night wore on, Emily Heisler sat cross-legged on her bed, propped against the pillows piled high against the headboard. She was staring across the room at her favorite toy, Kodi, the brown stuffed Kodiak bear sitting atop her bookcase. She had heard her mother talking a few hours earlier. Although she had not heard her father come in, she could tell he was home. She could always tell when her father was home. Tonight, her mother was--as her father often said--on her soapbox. She hated it when her mother treated him that way. He didn't deserve that treatment. He was kind. He had always been kind to her. Now, she too remembered the school her father had sent her to, remembered the other girls who made fun of her, taunted her, never included her in their games or their activities or their girlish secrets. Emily remembered the seemingly countless hours spent there, longing for her father to come take her away, yet at the same time afraid to go home with him, glad when she didn't have to go back to their house. She was afraid of something there, something she did not understand as a child. With age, she came to know what it was she had feared as a child, she was able to put a name on it, and it was that name which caused all her bitterness, allowed her hatred to grow over the years.
Even now, that fear sometimes reappeared and changed her daydreams into the old nightmares.
As she sat propped up in her bed, Emily played with her long mousy brown hair. During the day, she wore it tied in a bun, the hair plaited and swirled like an old-fashioned braided rug. She had seen such hair styles in an old book and she liked them. She wanted to look like those women in their hoop skirts and ruffles around their necks and at the ends of their sleeves. Before going to bed each night, she undid the hair and let it fall halfway down her back.
She kept her eyes fixed on Kodi, the soft, cuddly bear Daddy had brought back with him the time he went to Alaska. It had been all arranged; she was to go with him, just the two of them. He had promised. But, she --the one who had finally stopped talking and gone to sleep hours ago--wouldn't let them go. She said Alaska was too rough, too unladylike for their daughter. He had promised to bring her back something, and he kept his word. Emily could still remember how he came home from his trip and had teased her about not having anything with him, but she knew him better, she knew he would never do that. She watched as he unpacked his luggage and there it was, a brightly wrapped package she knew had to be for her. He spent that whole evening telling her about Alaska, about the Eskimos, about the bears that roamed the woods, and about the mountains, some of which were snow-covered all year round. He always brought back things with him, but not much anymore. Of course, she reasoned with herself, he doesn't go away on business trips much anymore. Not like he used to. She saw to that. She had called the office where Daddy works--Emily heard the whole conversation her mother had on the telephone--and told Daddy's boss not to send him on so many business trips.
“Poor Daddy.”
Emily's mind wandered. She thought about the young woman who had moved into the house next door today, the attractive young woman in blue jeans. She wondered what her new neighbor did for a living. She wondered why she was moving into that house next door. Pat Montgomary was away and wouldn't be back until the end of summer, so why was someone taking over that house?
“I'll see what she's like in the morning,” Emily told herself as she reached over and picked up her drink from the night table and took a sip. She made a face. The ice had long since melted, leaving a lukewarm, sweet, insipid liquid. “Of course, I don't have anything in common with her. She's younger than I am. Doesn't look more than in her early twenties. I'll be thirty this year. Thirty. Goddamned, stinking, rotten thirty.”
She flung her drink across the room, hitting Kodi. He fell to the floor and landed propped up against the foot of the bookcase, his head cocked to one side, staring at her. A stream of the liquid, which had been in the glass, ran from a corner of one of his eyes like a solitary tear.
Chapter III
Phillis looked forward to returning to her new apartment each evening after work in the human resources department of WDVI, one of Philadelphia's independent television stations. It was not the job she wanted, but there had been promises made to her that she would soon do occasional writing pieces and make some on-air appearances. In the apartment, there were pictures and mirrors to be hung, linens and the silver service Aunt Olive had given to her to be put away, and furniture to be arranged and rearranged until finally she felt the place was home.
She loved having the house to herself and pretended it was all hers, although the rooms on the second floor were not for her use. That didn't bother her. She had been brought up to respect both the privacy and property of others. She wondered often, though, what her new housemate was like. When she thought about it, Molly Montgomary hadn't really told her much about this Pat except that she was in her thirties and was the most wonderful person in the whole world to get along with. Phillis didn't even know what kind of work Pat did.
“She must have a great job or bundles of money to be able to afford a place like this,” she more than once said to herself.
*****
It was Thursday evening of the third week since moving in when Phillis came home from work at her usual time to find a letter waiting for her. It was in the pile of her other mail inside the front vestibule. It had no postage stamp on it. She went into the living room of the silent house and sat down. The particular envelope had beautiful, almost calligraphic, handwriting. The return address showed the name “Molly Montgomary” and her address on Manning Street. Phillis opened it and read:
My dear Miss Toner,
I do so hope you are happy in your new quarters. It is such a lovely house, so spacious, I don't know how anyone could not be happy in it.
I want to let you know that I have just heard from Pat, who will be arriving from Europe tomorrow morning, and should be at the house sometime around mid-afternoon. I fear this will come as something of a surprise to you. I know it did to me.
I tell you this so that you will not be alarmed should you come home from work on Friday and discover someone in the house.
I just know you and Pat will get along splendidly. I do hope the three of us might have dinner together some evening soon. I should enjoy that so very much. Until then, I am
Sincerely,
Molly Montgomary
Phillis was more than surprised. She was annoyed. She distinctly remembered the old woman telling her that Pat would not be back from overseas until the fall. She put the letter in her purse and went up the stairs to her rooms. So, I'll meet my new roommate tomorrow, she said to herself and settled down on the sofa in her sitting room to sort and read the rest of her mail. So much for the peace and quiet of having this whole house to myself. Now comes the acid test.
*****
The following evening, Phillis came home directly from work, full of curiosity about the new housemate she was about to meet. She let herself in and headed up the stairs. Music was playing on the second floor. Evidently Pat had arrived home from her trip abroad. Should she stop on the second floor and introduce herself? Or wait until she changed her clothes and come back down later? Better do it now and get it over with, she decided. As she reached the second floor, instead of going up another flight, she turned and followed the sound of Mozart's Jupiter Symphony. It was coming from the second room on the right. She stopped outside the door and knocked.
“Come in,” a deep voice called out.
Phillis opened the door. The sight which greeted her was undoubtedly the last one she was prepared to see. Standing across the room from her in front of a mahogany dresser, facing the doorway where Phillis now stood, was a man. A handsome man to be sure, she noted, but a man nonetheless. Phillis could not help but gasp. Not only hadn't she expected a man, still less had she expected a man who would have been naked had it not been for the towel around his waist.
“Who the hell?” they said in unison.
He had the good sense to grab the robe which had been lying on the bed and put it on.
“I didn't expect to see a woman,” he said. “And by the way, who are you? What is it you want? And, while we're at it, how did you get into this house in the first place?”
“For one thing, I live here. And in the second place, while we're at it, who are you? If you're a friend of Pat's, then someone should have warned me she'd be having semi-nude boyfriends running around the house. And just who did you think was knocking at your bedroom door?”
“For your information, lady, I am not a friend of Pat's. I am Pat . I don't know what kind of a game you're playing telling me you live here. This is my house. Has been my house for the past six years. And to the best of my knowledge, neither you nor any other woman lives here with me. I live alone. Besides which, I am not running around the house semi-nude as you put it, although I could if I so choose. I'm in my own bedroom, minding my own business. So, whatever you're trying to pull off, I'll be glad to escort you downstairs and out the front door, unless of course, you'd prefer to wait until I call the police and have them do it instead? And, not that it's any of your business, but I thought it was the man I recently hired to take care of this place. He has a key.”
Phillis clutched her purse in front of her. This was altogether too much, she decided, threatening her with expulsion from her own home. “See here,” she said with all the determination she could muster, “I do live here. The entire third floor is mine. Has been mine for the past several weeks. I share the house with a young woman who... Oh, my God, something's beginning to dawn on me. You... you're Pat? Don't tell me”--She pointed a finger at him--“you have an Aunt Molly, Molly Montgomary?”
“I do. Ever since I was a child. Where does she come into this? Did she...?
Phillis nodded. “She did. Signed, sealed, delivered. I paid her a month's rent and a month's security. The whole third floor.”
“I'll kill that woman, so help me, I will,” he shouted from the bathroom where he was in the process of getting fully dressed.
When he came out, Phillis was still angry, but calmed down enough to realize how handsome he was. She guessed he was about six-two, using Carl's height of six feet as a measure. Carl wanted to marry her. He was also on the police force. Maybe she should call him right now? No, she did not need the police. Not yet, at least. What she needed was a good lawyer--only she didn't know any lawyers, good or otherwise. She hoped this man standing in front of her with his curly black hair and jet black eyes and.... She stopped herself from examining him further.
“I think it would be a good idea if we got your Aunt Molly on the telephone, don't you?”
“I'll call her this instant. There's an extension in the guestroom across the hall. Why don't you get on the line and we'll both get to the bottom of this.”
Phillis did as he suggested.
A gentle voice came on the telephone.
“Aunt Molly!” Pat said rather severely
“Patrick, dear, you're home.” Phillis recognized the voice as belonging to the woman who had caused all this trouble. “It is so nice to hear--”
“Aunt Molly, what the hell have you gone and done this time? Honestly, can't I go away for even a short while without you getting into trouble?”
“Whatever do you mean?” Molly sounded genuinely innocent.
“Don't play the sweet little old lady, Auntie Dearest. You know perfectly well what I'm talking about. You rented... The young lady--I don't even know her name--is on the phone with us and she tells me you rented my third floor to her. You've got some explaining to do.”
“Phillis Toner,” Molly said in her calmest, most charming tone of voice. “I do so hope you are comfortable in your new surroundings, my dear. You'll see, Patrick, that she's a nice, pleasant young lady. I'm so glad you two have met and I just know that you will soon be getting along so well together you'll wonder why you didn't take my advice sooner and--”
“Auntie,” Pat screamed. “Knock it off. You're in trouble. Big trouble. You took this woman's money, you rented her property which doesn't even belong to you and, if I understand this Miss... Miss....”
“Toner, dear,” Molly said. “You'll have to learn her last name if you're going to live together in that house.”
“We're not going to... Oh, hell!”
“Now, don't be angry,” Molly said. “It's not good for you and you mustn't get yourself so excited, and most certainly not like that. Your father always used to get himself so very upset over things that were relatively unimportant, but of course you don't remember that. You were too young. You're just like him in so very many ways and....”
Phillis heard Pat swear under his breath.
“I'm coming right over to your place and we're going to talk about this,” he said.
“I'm sorry, Patrick, but that won't be possible. I'm leaving in just a few minutes. Bertha Belmont's granddaughter--you know her, Melanie? Such a sweet thing--well, Melanie is getting married tomorrow and Bertha and I have to catch a train from Thirtieth Street Station in forty-five minutes. We're a trifle late already. The taxi is waiting outside. I must run. It is so nice having you back from overseas and do try to get along with Miss Toner. I'll call you when I get back on Tuesday and we'll have dinner some evening next week.”
“Never mind, Auntie,” Pat said in total resignation. “I'll handle this myself.”
“That's a good boy. I knew you would,” Molly said.
Pat hung up and was coming out of his bedroom as Phillis was coming out of the guest bedroom. “You and I better sit down by ourselves and discuss this situation rationally. Downstairs?”
“Let me run upstairs first. Then, I'll join you. But I'm warning you, I'm in the right.”
She went up to her bedroom and threw her purse on the bed. As she changed into jeans, all she could think of was that her new housemate had arrived and now what was she going to do? She had no intention of living with some guy she didn't know. Just as bad, the very last thing in the world she felt up to right now was hunting for another place to live, repacking her belongings and moving again. She remembered how difficult it had been to find this place. She pulled a sweater over her head, picked up a brush from the dresser and ran it over her hair, took a deep breath, and said aloud, “Off to battle and may the best one of us win. Scratch that. May Iwin.”
She was almost to the bedroom door when her telephone rang. It was Carl. She had forgotten she was supposed to see him this evening. How was she going to explain Pat to him? All she needed now to make the whole situation perfect was Carl's jealousy. Hearing she was living with another man would be too much for him to accept. She'd be lucky if he didn't kill her and this Pat who turned out not to be a woman. She greeted Carl with a weak, “Hello?”
It was Carl who was apologetic. He explained that he had to work this evening, something about taking somebody's shift on homicide.
Phillis felt relief. “If you have to,” she said and tried to sound like the understanding fiancée she knew she wasn't. She said nothing about the latest development in her life: the man waiting downstairs to talk to her.
When she got to the first floor, the aroma of coffee was filling the rooms. She found Pat in the dining room. He suggested they sit at the table.
“The coffee will be ready in a few minutes,” he said.
She sat down at the table across from him. She hoped he wouldn't be too difficult. Like she said, she was in the right.
All this time, Pat was wondering why his Aunt Molly had done what she did. Molly wasn't senile. She certainly wasn't vicious. She was the kindest person he'd ever known. His parents died when he was ten years old. Molly brought him up and always loved him so very much. So, why, he asked himself, had she done this? She frequently did things he didn't understand, and he wrote them off as the fancies of an old woman, but actually putting someone in his house without his permission? And an attractive young woman at that. Surely, Molly didn't think... No, Molly knew better. If one thing was certain about Molly Montgomary, it was that she never nurtured illusions. She was so very down to earth, unless... unless Molly's memory was beginning to fail her.
“First of all, my name is Pat Montgomary. But I guess you've figured that out by this time. I know your last name--Aunt Molly impressed it on me enough--but I didn't get your first.”
“Phillis. Everyone calls me Phil.”
He smiled. Yes, Aunt Molly was right, he thought. Phillis was attractive with her light hair and deep purple eyes, and she certainly did have a nice figure--not that those things mattered at the moment. Would never matter, he felt certain.
“I guess I should start off by explaining Aunt Molly,” he said. “Only, I can't. Explain her, that is. No one can. No one who knows her would ever try. I certainly don't have an explanation why she did what she did to you. And to me, for that matter. Molly's really a dear. Wouldn't hurt a soul or even do anything to inconvenience anyone. That's why I just can't understand why she'd actually rent my third floor, drawing up a lease. I'm not even sure I'm allowed to.”
“Zoning?”
“Something like that. I've owned this house for the past six years. It's a single family house, even though it has a kitchen on the top floor, but I doubt I'm even allowed to rent it.” He stood up and went out into the kitchen. “I can imagine what some of my neighbors would say if they found out I had a tenant living here.” He came back into the room with the coffeepot and two mugs.
“It puts both of us in a very inconvenient position, doesn't it?” she agreed. “I mean, I took this third floor because it seemed perfect. The rent was reasonable. I moved all my things, including some pretty heavy furniture, into that apartment. At some expense, I might add.”
He nodded. “Didn't Aunt Molly tell you I live here? You didn't think you were renting the whole house, did you?”
“Oh, no. Your aunt told me I'd be sharing it with her niece, Pat.”
“Damn! That puts the kick in the old pants, doesn't it? I can't imagine what was going on in her mind, why she would do a thing like that. It's not like Aunt Molly to lie. And you mean to tell me she actually said I was her niece?”
“I think so. That is... You know, I'm really not sure she did. But I would never have rented a place that meant I'd be living with a strange man. Do you think she's playing matchmaker?”
Pat laughed. “No, Aunt Molly's not senile.”
She pulled back and stared at him. “Senile? Who said anything about... and why would anyone have to be senile to think that you and...”
“Don't take it personally,” he said. “Nothing against your feminine charms. When I said she wasn't senile, I didn't mean someone would have to be a bit bonkers to think you were attractive. On the contrary. You're very good-looking. It's because I'm gay. Aunt Molly knows that. She's known it since I was in high school. I told her. She was always the kind of person you could tell anything to. No, I don't think she's planning on changing me.”
“Why don't you demand she tell you?”
“That shows you don't know Molly. She'll tell me when she's ready and not half a second before. You heard her on the phone. When she wants to, she has a way of acting like the sweet little old lady, deliberately misunderstanding you and driving you to distraction. She wouldn't go through this... this fiasco... unless she had a good reason.”
“In the meantime, she plays around with my life.” Phillis couldn't help but let a little bitterness creep into her voice. “I move in here, and now what's going to happen to me?”
“That's simple. I'm sure you'll be able to find another place right away. Of course, I'll reimburse you for whatever expenses you incurred moving here.”
“That's very kind of you,” she said, the bitterness growing more noticeable. “And all the work, and inconvenience, and time I spent? Who's going to make that up to me? Of course, I could always have my maid do the packing and my secretary make arrangements for the move and my chauffeur and butler do the actual moving and I'll stay at the Four Seasons while all this is going on.”
He raised a hand. “Okay, I'll make it up to you. We'll come to some kind of arrangement. Whatever is satisfactory to you. But please don't bite my head off.”
She smiled. “Fine. That's the easy part. Now, want a real problem? I have a boyfriend. Carl. He's on the police force. A great guy. We'll probably get married one of these days. But, you see, he comes from a very strict family. He doesn't even approve of women working. Something of a dinosaur. Wasn't too thrilled when I took this place to live. Tell me--you and your Aunt Molly--got any ideas how I can break the news to him that I'm now living with another man? You can say you're gay until you turn purple, it won't make any difference to him. You're a man and I'm a woman--the woman Carl says he loves. I just don't think he'll break out laughing when he finds out you're my new roommate.”
“I agree that does make it worse.”
“Have you any suggestions what I can do about Carl?”
“I've already suggested: that you find yourself a place as soon as possible. In the meantime, tell this boyfriend of yours that you've met your new housemate and you don't like her.”
Phillis stood up. She excused herself and went up to the third floor.
“Aunt Molly, if I could get my hands on you this minute, I'd... I'd....” Pat mumbled to himself.
*****
“But, Molly dear, do you still think that what you did was wise?” Bertha asked as they sat side by side on the train, watching the scenery fly by. “You did it while your nephew was out of the country.”
“I know what I'm doing,” Molly answered and watched her own reflection on the window, superimposed upon rows of houses in the distance. She moved back a strand of her white hair, which she had had done that day. She couldn't as easily brush away the look of worry on her face.
“But the neighbors,” Bertha protested. “In that neighborhood....”
“In that neighborhood,” Molly said firmly as she turned away from the window and looked at her friend, “you have mostly yuppies, I believe they're called, who couldn't possibly care less. When you have the money it takes to live in Society Hill, your neighbors don't tell you who you can live with or who you can't.”
Bertha leaned sideways in her seat and whispered in Molly's ear, although there was no one close enough to hear their conversation. “Do you think it will help? What I mean, with Pat's... well, that phase he's going through and all... will it actually...?”
“If you mean will he jump into bed with her, Bertha Belmont, frankly I'm sure he won't. And it's hardly a phase he's going through. He'll be thirty this year, so if he hasn't found our sex attractive by this stage of his life, there's damned little chance it'll happen now, even with a beautiful woman living in the same house with him.”
“Then, why...?”
“Why put this Miss Toner in his house?” Molly finished Bertha's question for her. Molly, too, had by now lowered her voice, barely audible over the clickety-clack of the train's wheels. “Bertha, dear, I'm going to tell you something. You must promise me you won't repeat it.”
Bertha straightened up. “Molly Montgomary, have I ever, even once, repeated anything you told me not to? I have never betrayed a confidence of yours, not even that time--”
“I know, I know. Forgive me. It's just that... well, that this is so very important to me. I want the young lady in that house with Pat. It's important to me. I don't know her well--yet--but my instinct tells me she is perfect for what needs to be done. Please don't ask me more. All I can tell you is that it is imperative that this Miss Toner be in that house, at least at this present time. She has to be there.” Molly became lost in thought. When she spoke again, her voice was distant, trailing off, as though she were alone. “It's important that I learn certain things about my nephew and I don't know any other way to find them out.”
“Well, be careful, please,” Bertha urged Molly. “It can be dangerous butting into other people's lives, even if it is your own flesh and blood. Especially your own flesh and blood.” Bertha opened the small case she had on her lap and proceeded to offer her traveling companion a sliced chicken sandwich. “Anyway, Molly, it is wonderful of you to decide to accompany me at the last minute like this to Melanie's wedding. I wasn't looking forward to this trip alone. When you told me a few months ago that you couldn't go with me, well, I was disappointed, but yesterday, when you said you'd go, I was so delighted, especially with Patrick returning from Europe. I thought sure you'd want to spend some time with him. I feel so very much better having you with me. You're a very kind person.”
Ain't I, Molly said to herself as the train sped through the night.
*****
As Pat lay wide awake, going over everything Phillis had told him earlier, trying to figure out in his own mind what must have been going on in his Aunt Molly's mind when she took it upon herself to rent his third floor, he suddenly remembered something. He expressed his own stupidity by hitting the area between his forehead and top of the head with the open palm of his right hand.
“Demey! I should have called Demey and told him about Miss Toner. He'll start here tomorrow morning and probably run into her. I hope that won't be a problem. I've had more than my share of problems the past two days.”
Tonight--like his next door neighbor, Emily Heisler, had done the evening before--it was Pat's turn to go back in time to his boarding-school days. He had been a problem to his Aunt Molly, and boarding school seemed the only sensible solution. He had his problems there, too, and in later years he realized he probably would have been expelled if it hadn't been for Franklin York, the Latin instructor who knew what it was like to be twelve years old, away from home, trying hard to put up a good front, all the while feeling inside like a frightened child. Franklin made those first few months tolerable. Over the years, whenever he was in trouble and needed another man's help, he had turned to Franklin.
Pat began to feel drowsy as he thought over the events of the past two days: Hiring Demey to take the place of his former servant; the telephone call yesterday from Franklin; and finally coming back to his own home and finding a stranger living there, a stranger his Aunt Molly had rented part of his house to.
With his thoughts ending on that preposition, Pat Montgomary fell asleep.
Chapter IV