Backlands (29 page)

She tugged at his sleeve. “There it is, the White House. Will you buy me another Manhattan?”

Matt nodded. “Then will you marry me?”

Beth shook her head teasingly. “I said not yet, but soon, maybe.”

The gate opened onto a charming, serene courtyard filled with outdoor tables and chairs under the broad, leafy limbs of old trees. A series of rooms with large windows and heavy doors faced the courtyard, and from the far end of the hacienda, away from the street, came the sound of occasional laughter and soft, stringed music. It was a grand saloon with a high ceiling, furnished in rich, dark handmade tables and chairs. The bar had a mirror that ran the length of the back wall. In front of an open window a man with beautiful hands sat on a stool strumming a guitar. Because of the early hour, only a few tables were occupied, solely by couples. The young women, all of them petite and stunning, were in long dresses, the much older men in shirtsleeves, collars open at the neck.

At the bar, Matt and Beth dallied over their drinks, watching couples come and go. In the dining room, visible on the other side of a beamed hallway, waiters were polishing glassware and silver in preparation for the evening meal.

Once Matt figured out why all the couples leaving the saloon headed down the hall in the direction of the rooms that faced the lovely courtyard, he couldn't help but chuckle.

“What's so funny?” Beth asked.

“This place is more than just a fancy saloon and restaurant. You've brought me to a house of soiled doves.”

“Soiled doves?”

“A high-class house of ill repute,” Matt clarified.

Beth's hand flew to her open mouth. “A bordello? I'm speechless.”

“That's a first,” Matt said with a roguish grin.

Beth grabbed his hand. “Don't you dare leave my side.”

“I have no urgent plans to wander off.”

“That's not what I meant.”

Intrigued by their newfound knowledge, they stayed a while longer watching the girls with their customers. Beth found the whole idea of prostitution distasteful, thought it degrading for the girls, and couldn't fathom how pleasure was to be found in the arms of strangers.

“Have you ever?” she asked, unwilling to finish her question.

Matt shook his head. “But I think my pa has.”

“Does that bother you?”

Matt shrugged. “I don't care much what he does.”

They detoured from the main drag on their way back to the border crossing, passing a group of old vaqueros smoking and talking on the porch of a small, run-down hotel, a ramshackle livery with a donkey hitched by a rope to its halter on a post outside, and rows of adobe casitas along a narrow lane that looked like Matt's Griggs Avenue neighborhood. They ventured through an area of small farms with fields watered by acequias before veering back to the noise and bustle near the International Bridge.

A lingering orange sunset greeted them as they crossed into El Paso and strolled hand in hand to the hotel.

“I don't want this day to end,” Matt said.

Beth leaned against him. “Me either.”

At the hotel, Matt tried hard to appear blasé about the grand lobby, the attentive doorman, the smiling desk clerk who handed him the room key, the elevator that whisked them to the third floor, the fancy room with pleated drapes covering the windows, the fresh, pressed bed linens, the authentic Mexican furniture, and the modern bathroom. He'd never stayed in such an elegant place before.

Beth slipped into the bathroom, and Matt eyed the double bed, wondering if he'd be sleeping in it or on the floor. He pulled his boots off and plopped down on the bed, propped a pillow under his head, and listened to the sound of running water from behind the closed bathroom door.

He pulled his remaining money from his pocket and counted it. He had enough to buy them dinner at the taco place he'd spotted earlier on the plaza, pay for the welding job on the car radiator, and get enough gas to go home. Barely enough.

He glanced at the closed bathroom door. Beth was taking forever and he was starting to feel hungry. The door opened and she stood there wearing only her panties, her arms crossed over her breasts.

“Why are you still dressed?” she chided.

Words failed him. He tugged at his shirt, fumbled with his belt, yanked off his socks. When he turned to her, she was hidden under the covers with only her head showing, smiling timidly at him. She'd never looked more beautiful.

He slipped into bed and reached for her with a trembling hand. She turned and came eagerly into his arms. The touch of her naked body was an electric shock. They kissed, fondled, nibbled, stroked, looked at each other in amazement, and finally joined together with delighted gasps and contented sighs. Afterward they snuggled quietly, Beth's head on Matt's chest, their legs intertwined.

Finally, Beth whispered in his ear, “Can we do that again?”

Matt nodded.

She rolled on top of him, sat up, and put her hands on his shoulders. “Now?”

Matt grinned up at her. “Yes, ma'am, I am all yours.”

B
ack home, Matt and Beth held firm to their story about the breakdown—which after all
was
true—fibbed about sleeping in the car, and left out all the rest. Augustus and Consuelo looked skeptical but didn't attempt an interrogation.

Beth was neither regretful nor ashamed of her night with Matthew at the Hotel Paso del Norte, and although she was fairly certain she'd timed her seduction of Matt to avoid getting pregnant, the thought she might have misjudged panicked her. During her weekly checkup at the sanatorium, she bravely confided to her physician, Dr. Bernard Stinson, that she was no longer a virgin and asked for advice about contraception. Stinson, who had served in France as an army doctor during the Great War, was well informed on the subject, having treated and counseled many doughboys suffering from syphilis and gonorrhea. Additionally, he was quite liberal in his outlook about a woman's reproductive rights, due to the constant tutelage of his extremely modern, freethinking wife, Abigail.

After reminding Beth not to aggravate her tuberculosis with unnecessary physical exertion, Stinson explained how to use the rhythm method, discussed douching and the cervical cap, and strongly recommended her partner use condoms, which were just now becoming widely available in drugstores. As a precaution, he described the early symptoms of pregnancy and did an extra-thorough physical examination before sending her home with the good news that her remission had stabilized.

Beth continued to worry about being pregnant until her period arrived on time a week later. Greatly relieved, that evening she told Matt about her recent fear of being pregnant as they strolled around the Mesilla town plaza.

“From now on we need to use protection,” she stipulated.

“I should have known better,” Matt replied. “Boy, was I a sap.”

Beth took his hand. “We were both in a hurry.”

Matt grinned. “Yeah, we sure were.” But the reality of what could have happened hit him like a sledgehammer. “I don't think we need to be making babies together yet.”

“Not yet,” Beth agreed. “But when the time is right, I want six babies.”

“Six?” The number stunned him.

“Okay, five, if you think six is too much.”

“You're bedeviling me.”

“Only a little bit.” Beth snuggled against him as they turned down the lane to the hacienda.

***

B
eth's prediction that her parents and younger sister, Emily, would love Matt didn't quite pan out as she expected. Beth's mother, Clara, a sweetly disarming woman who seemed a bit flighty, took to Matt immediately. There was a touch of girlish enthusiasm about her that showed when she talked about the exciting possibility of living in Southern California. She had dreams of Emily becoming a movie star, Beth becoming a renowned medical doctor, and living on a beach in a climate where she could enjoy the sand and water no matter what the season and happily entertain the prospect of many grandchildren.

Emily, who was two years younger, but no prettier, no smarter, and no taller than Beth, was nonetheless a doll in her own right. She quickly took to shamelessly flirting with Matt and constantly teasing Beth about being in love, clutching her breast and sighing romantically with great dramatic effect whenever she found them together. Beth retaliated with good-natured teasing of her own, accusing Emily of a streak of petty cruelty that would surely turn her into an unmarriageable, miserable old maid. Their sisterly affection charmed Matt but also made him quietly lament the loss of CJ.

Beth's prediction that Matt would be embraced by all fell short with her father, Darcy Merton, an overweight bluenose of a man with a pinched face, a downturned mouth, and a self-important air; a man who dominated conversations and had opinions about everything, which he freely shared as though they were gospel truths. Darcy was so different in personality from Gus, if Matt hadn't known otherwise, he never would have guessed the two were brothers.

It wasn't that he spent a lot of time in his company. In fact, Matt was with him only twice before Mr. Merton departed for California, when the family arrived at the train station and the following night at the dinner hosted by Gus and Consuelo. In both encounters, Darcy Merton showed an eagerness to ignore Matt that included a reluctance to respond directly to anything Matt had to say.

Matt soon stopped trying to talk to him at all, but to be so quickly and unfairly dismissed dismayed him. He said nothing about it to Beth, but he found little to like about her father other than the fact that he delighted in his daughters and wife.

Soon after Mr. Merton left for California, Matt and Beth took a moonlight walk along a quiet Mesilla Valley lane near a sweetly gushing acequia watering a field of green chilies. As they walked hand in hand, Beth raised the subject of her father.

“Daddy's not really a prig; it's just that he's never comfortable with strangers. It was twice as bad with you because you're courting me and I told him we're in love. Mama promises to give him a good talking-to if he's rude to you again.”

“I guess he doesn't want to lose his daughter to an uneducated no-account like me.”

“Don't say that. He's not a snob. He just doesn't want me to get married too young and give up my dream to be a doctor.”

“I don't want you to give up your dream either.”

“Good.” Beth pirouetted. “And will you be an engineer or a rancher? An army officer or a cowboy? A scholar or an auto mechanic?”

“Maybe all of those things,” Matt teased.

“Oh, I like that,” Beth replied, raising her face for a kiss. “A man of many talents.”

***

W
ithin two days of Darcy Merton's arrival in Los Angeles, he sent word by telegram that he'd been offered the position with the Pacific Electric Railway Company and had been asked to start work immediately. Clara and Emily were asked to return to Cleveland as soon as possible to supervise moving the family's possessions and then join him in California. He would rent until more permanent housing could be secured after they arrived. Beth would remain with Augustus and Consuelo until the family was completely resettled.

Beth thought the news was wonderful, but Matt wasn't so sure. Her father hadn't given her permission to stay and finish her degree at A&M.

Beth calmed his worries. “Daddy always needs to be pestered until we get our way, and Mama isn't opposed to me staying with Gus and Consuelo and going to college here as long as I go home on holidays and school vacations.”

“Are you sure?” Matt inquired.

Beth nodded. “You just wait. Daddy will come around. I'm bursting to see California. I love the water. Lake Erie in the summertime was so much fun, swimming and boating and picnics on the shore. To be on the ocean will be magical—I just know it. Can't you imagine sunsets casting rainbow colors on the water? How beautiful it must be.”

“I'd miss the mountains,” Matt said.

“There are mountains near the ocean,” Beth countered. “And miles of sandy beaches. We'll walk the beaches together and watch the waves break against the shore from the hillsides.”

“You make it sound wonderful,” Matt said.

Beth leaned against him. “It will be if you're with me.”

“I don't want to miss out on that.”

“You'll come with me on school vacations. We'll go swimming every day.”

“Except for paddling around in a stock tank, I can't swim a lick,” Matt confessed. The thought of being in an ocean of water with nothing firm underfoot or to grab on to made him shudder.

“I'll teach you,” Beth promised. “And I won't let you drown.”

“Promise?” Matt asked.

“Cross my heart,” Beth replied as she skipped away.

She'd started coughing again. It was not a hard, troubling, long-lasting cough, and it would quickly subside. But it happened often enough to worry him. She said it was nothing, but Matt wasn't so sure. She was like Ma in that regard, always making light of what ailed her. When he pressed her about it, she gave him a chilly look to drop the subject. He did so reluctantly.

Three months after Darcy Merton relocated the family to Los Angeles, Beth received a letter from her mother.

My dearest Beth,

We are finally settled! Your father continues to be very happy in his new position and we have found a lovely cottage to purchase in the town of Santa Monica just outside Los Angeles. Our new house is in a modest but pleasant neighborhood with tree-lined streets and it is especially favored in occupying a bluff that overlooks the ocean. Although the cottage is smaller than our house in Cleveland, you and Emily have separate bedrooms that look out on a charming backyard with a large eucalyptus tree and a lovely flower garden. The ocean is but a short stroll down the hill. A nearby amusement pier attracts a lively crowd on weekends.

We are all becoming extremely spoiled by the weather. The climate is not unlike New Mexico, except the ocean breezes refresh and cool us and the sun is not so fiercely hot. I think when you come here you will find it just as salubrious as Las Cruces if not more so.

We've all decided you must visit your new home and soon, so I'm enclosing your train ticket and a money order your father purchased for expenses during the trip.

We will meet you at the station. We are all anxious to have you with us. Emily sends her love and says she is eager to take you exploring and have you meet her new friends.

Love,

Mother

Beth's excitement about the trip wasn't shared by Matt, who immediately wanted to know when she would return. She teased him about being a worrywart, which only made him mope and wonder if she'd vanish from his life. As the time for her departure drew near, her enthusiasm for the trip was so infectious, it made him more than slightly envious. He wanted to go with her except he hadn't been invited and didn't have the money anyway. Freight shipments on the railroad had dwindled to the point that there wasn't any work for him, so he was back to looking for a job, living on his coffee-can savings, and trying to sell the Studebaker again.

The day before Beth left, he gave her Ma's cherished fountain pen, which had been put away untouched since her death. He'd filled it with ink and wrapped it in some fancy paper from Ma's old stationery box.

“This was my ma's and now it's yours,” he explained. “Write and tell me you miss me and when you'll be coming back.”

Her eyes filled with tears. She hugged him tightly. “I already miss you and I promise to come back.”

“I wish I had something nicer to give you.”

“This is perfect.”

The following morning he stood on the platform with Gus and Consuelo and watched Beth's train pull out of the station, already feeling lonely, already missing her.