Case of Lucy Bending (9 page)

"How much?"

"I don't know. I'd have to talk to Luther to see if he'll play along."

"Before you do that, let me get a look at the presentation to see if it's as good as you say."

"It's better. Believe me."

"I'll let you know."

"Next week? At the motel?"

"Maybe. Give me a call. Now let's get back to the party."

"Don't forget the joint," he said, and began plodding after her in the soft sand.

Tables for four were set around the pool deck, with one long trestle table for the children. Tablecloths were paper, but the food was served on stoneware plates. Adults received stainless steel cutlery; the children were provided with plastic implements.

Each table had bowls of salad, condiments, arrangements of fresh hibiscus, crown of thorns, and birds of paradise. There were bottles of wine for the adults, soft drinks for the children.

Eddie Holloway and Wayne Bending had learned how to beat that system a long time ago; they disappeared briefly at regular intervals to fill empty Coke cans with stolen beer. They kept the fake colas in plain view on the table before

them. If the younger kids were aware of what was going on, none of them dared snitch.

One of the caterer's men came around with pad and pencil to take orders: how many rares, medium-rares, and well-dones. The expert barbecuer set to work while a hired accordionist strolled among the tables, playing "Lady of Spain."

Eddie Holloway, elaborately bored, sat at the head of the children's table. He had been charged with the job of maintaining discipline among the younger children, but he knew it was a hopeless task. He made no effort to halt the shouting, pushing, or the throwing of food.

Wayne Bending sat next to Eddie. Next to Wayne was his brother, Harry, and Wayne had promised his mother to help Harry cut up his steak. But the nutty kid was such a food freak that he grabbed up his steak and gnawed on it like it was an apple or something. Wayne gave up in disgust.

Most of the boys sat in a group at the head of the table, most of the girls sat side by side at the other end. Gloria Holloway was at the foot of the table with her best friend, Lucy Bending, on her right.

Gloria was a haughty, snippety girl whose dark brown hair was permed once a month into a cap of tight curls. She had a highly developed sense of social caste, but her supercilious manner was somewhat marred by a missing upper incisor.

She was skinnier and bonier than Lucy, and the development of her body had convinced her that she had a splendid career as a high-fashion model awaiting her. But as the two girls ate their dinners, ignoring the tumult about them, Gloria told Lucy she had changed her mind.

"I am going to be a famous actress of stage, screen, and TV," she announced. "First of all, you get to travel all over the world, and you can keep the clothes they give you to wear in movies and things. Also, you get all kinds of proposals from rich men, and when you make like, you know, a commercial, well, every time that commercial is on television, you get paid again, so you make millions of dollars."

"Who told you that?" Lucy asked curiously.

"My father. And he should know."

"My goodness, I should think so. Being a banker and all."

Gloria's eyes glazed over, and she leaned close to Lucy.

"Listen," she said in a low voice, "last night I came past my parents' bedroom, and they were in there, and the door was closed. I could hear, but not exactly. I mean, I didn't catch all the words. They weren't fighting, but mother's voice was louder. I couldn't hear daddy at all. And I heard mother say, 'You're important, you know you're important, so why don't you go to a doctor?' Isn't that strange?"

"Definitely," Lucy said, chewing her steak thoughtfully. "Definitely strange. If you're important, why do you have to go to a doctor?"

"I don't know," Gloria confessed. "That's why it's so strange. I mean, important people like the president and judges and movie stars and all, they don't have to go to doctors—do they?"

"I don't think so."

"Well, anyway, that's what I've decided to be: a famous actress. With ?cads of clothes and all the shoes I want. A bigger house than this old one. With a lot of servants to do the work. You know, cook and clean up and all. Maybe a big boat."

"And cars," Lucy added enthusiastically.

"At least two," Gloria said. "Maybe more. I'll be married, I suppose, to a very rich man. Older, you know, because he's in love with me. But I'll have boyfriends, too. Do you want the rest of my steak? I can't finish it."

"No, thanks, I'm full. But pass it up to my brother Harry; he'll eat it. He finishes everyone's food."

Gloria passed her unfinished steak up to Harry, who greeted it with glistening eyes behind his thick, horn-rimmed glasses. The two girls sat back with folded hands, waiting to be served dessert.

It was dark enough now to switch on the Japanese lanterns strung from the boles of bottle palms framing the Hollo ways' pool. After dessert had been served and consumed, the tables were cleared and pushed back. The caterer's men packed up their chairs and equipment, and departed. The accordionist went to his well-deserved rest.

Bill Holloway brought out two portable speakers connected by long cords to the hi-fi equipment in his library. He put on a tape of disco music, and some of the younger couples and children began to dance on the pool deck and on the band of lawn surrounding it.

Turk Bending sought out the hostess.

"Good dinner," he said. "I ate myself sick."

"And now you want that joint," Jane Holloway said.

"No, no," he said, lowering his voice, leaning close to her. "That's what I wanted to tell you: I don't need the joint. Tom Janssen brought some coke."

She brightened. "Good stuff?"

"He says so. He's got it in his car. The white Jaguar. Want a snort?"

"Sounds good to me."

"We don't want to go there in a gang. Just sort of wander over, one by one, casual-like."

"Who's snorting?"

"You, me, Tom, Luther Empt, and Tom's creamer."

"The kid in the red diaper suit?"

"That's the one."

"Tom better tell her she needs a shave."

"Maybe he's figuring on chewing it off," Bending said, grinning wolfishly.

So Jane Holloway didn't go up to her bedroom for a stick of marijuana. Which was fortunate, because if she had, she would have caught her son Edward rifling her bureau drawer.

Eddie had signaled Wayne Bending by jerking his head toward the Empt home. Wayne had nodded and drifted off into the darkness. He left it to Lucy or his mother to get Harry home. The kid had eaten so much he was sleeping sitting up in a chair, gripping his favorite pocket calculator. Wayne figured he'd be all right if he didn't topple over.

He moved slowly out of the lantern light glimmering on the surface of the pool. Then he began trotting. He came to the highway and jogged along the verge of A1A until he came to the white gravel driveway leading to Luther Empt's home.

The entrance was guarded by two big gates of wrought iron, but they were never locked. Wayne slipped through, closing the gate behind him. He stayed in the shadows of royal poinciana and tulip trees as he made his way onto the grounds. Dimly, muted, he could hear the music from the Holloways' pool party. By now, he thought sourly, the grownups would be getting bombed and feeling up their friends' wives. Someone fully dressed would fall, or be pushed, into the pool, and everyone would laugh hysterically. It was sickening.

Wayne was a stocky, squarish boy with a long torso and short legs. His shoulders were bunchy, his neck thick. He wasn't much to look at, he knew, but he could throw a football farther than any of his friends, and only Eddie Holloway could beat him at arm wrestling.

Sometimes he wondered if he really was his father's son. He obviously didn't have his father's good looks, and it seemed doubtful if he'd ever have his height. Also, his father was fair-haired, cheerful, and made out with women like a bandit. Wayne was dark and dour, and girls never gave him a second glance.

He found the place he was looking for: a spidery wood latticed gazebo Teresa Empt had erected on her well-manicured lawn near a fine stand of pink, yellow, and white frangipani. The gazebo was octagonal, topped with an open-worked cupola. Inside were two chairs and two loveseats of iron cast in a Victorian grape-and-vine pattern, painted white.

The gazebo was rarely used by the Empts, unless newspaper or magazine photographers were expected. But Eddie Holloway and Wayne Bending used it, to smoke pot, drink a beer, or just talk. One of these nights, Eddie kept saying, they would bring a couple of cunts there and make out like mad.

The cast-iron chairs and loveseats might have been decorative but without cushions they were hell to sit on. Wayne Bending squatted on the hard-packed sand floor, facing the Empt house. There was a dim light on downstairs, but he supposed everyone was still at the Hollo ways' party.

He sat there in the sand, hunched over and brooding. Wayne Bending, at the age of twelve, had had it. It was all so finky. Everything was. He wanted to set fire to the world. He could burn, pillage, kill; he didn't care. Nothing made sense.

What was so awful, what fueled his anger, was the gap between what people said and what they did. It was obvious to him that everyone lied. Everyone cheated. Everyone screwed everyone else. No one was faithful, to anything or anyone. People were shit; he recognized that, and it infuriated him.

Look at his father . . . And his mother . . .

He heard a low whistle and straightened up. Eddie Holloway came sauntering in, his blond hair gleaming. Wayne could see his teeth shining.

"Get them okay?" he asked.

"No sweat," Eddie said, sitting down alongside Wayne.

"I would have copped a couple more, but she's only got eight left."

"Won't she notice these two are missing?"

"Maybe," Eddie said, shrugging. "If she does, she'll think Maria lifted them. Jesus, what a night. That party was the pits; the
pits.
Let's light up, and away we go."

That was another thing that depressed Wayne Bending.

He had smoked marijuana twice before with Eddie Holloway, and it hadn't
done
anything for him. He had followed Eddie's instructions, inhaled deeply, held the smoke in his lungs, and waited. Nothing. He had watched Eddie get high and felt a vague panic at his own lack of response.

Because he wanted Eddie—the best-looking guy on the beach, the most popular and coolest—to think well of him, to like him. Because he wanted to be Eddie Holloway's best friend. So he had faked it.

He had rolled his eyes, slumped limply. He murmured, "Oh man, that's cool, that's really tough." He mimicked Eddie's high, pretending a euphoria he didn't feel.

That made him just as finky as everyone else, didn't it?

So they lighted up, dragged away, grinned vacuously, and told each other how great it was to get out of it. They smoked slowly, but soon enough they were down to tiny roaches they could not hold without burning their fingertips.

Then Eddie lay on his back, stretched his arms wide. He giggled, and drummed his heels lightly on the packed sand.

"Oh man," he murmured, "this is it. This is
really
it."

Then Wayne Bending, for reasons he could not understand, rolled onto his side. He propped himself up and leaned over Eddie Holloway. He brought his face slowly close and kissed Eddie on the lips.

It lasted. Not long, but not a short time either. Then Eddie rolled his head away and stared into Wayne's glittering eyes.

"You nut," he said, laughing softly, "what do you think you're doing?"

Former Senator Randolph Diedrickson was living out his days in a home that resembled a New England merchant's mansion more than an antebellum plantation. It was all white fretwork and gingerbread trim, with gables, dormers, bow windows, and a stained glass fanlight over the doorway.

The senator, confined to a wheelchair by rheumatoid arthritis, had an elevator installed in this rambling and somewhat fusty manse. So he was able to get around easily (the wheelchair was battery-powered), but spent most of his time in his upstairs study or on the sundeck at the top of the house, three stories up.

Since the house was centered in a three-acre plot, and the nearest neighbors inhabited ranch-type dwellings, the senator achieved complete privacy on his sundeck. He frequently assured visitors he felt close to God up there. He said this with a straight face, and they never knew whether or not he was serious. The majority decided he was.

Most mornings he spent dictating his memoirs into a tape recorder. He had spent thirty-six years in the Congress of the United States, and believed his recollections of events during those stirring days would be of interest to historians.

The tapes were later transcribed by a full-time, live-in secretary (white, male) who worked in the second-floor study. This amanuensis also made complete sentences and corrected the grammar of the senator's ramblings. He had already amassed 800 pages, and they were only up to 1956.

In addition to the secretary, a cook-housekeeper and a houseman, wife and husband, both black, also lived on the premises. They were kept busy; the senator did a great deal of entertaining and frequently had sleep-over guests.