In Nina’s phrase, they did the town that night. Beth drank very little
at first, but as the evening wore on the little mounted up and she
realized, some time shortly after midnight, how tight she was. She was
quite fascinated, as she had been before, with the people she saw. Many
of them knew Nina and came over to talk to her. There was one pretty,
rather boyish girl at the bar whom Nina had never seen before who caught
her eye, and Nina kept calling her “Farley,” after a movie star she
resembled, until Beth in embarrassment asked her to quit.
The rest of the time Nina needled Franny. Beth was glad it wasn’t
herself that night. She thought she couldn’t have taken it. She would
have lost her temper in one big spectacular blast and that would have
been the end. She would have had to walk out on Nina and maybe on her
chances of finding Laura.
For Nina asked everyone, all her friends, if they knew any Lauras. And
some of them did, but none of them knew Laura Landon.
“It’s going to be all over the Village that there’s a great search on,”
Nina said. “Maybe that’ll help you.”
“Thanks, Nina.”
Toward two A.M. Nina succeeded in getting Franny on a crying jag and
Beth told her indignantly to stop torturing the girl. But Nina laughed
and said, into Franny’s face, “She’s enjoying it.” Whereupon Franny got
up and ran into the ladies’ room and didn’t return for a half hour.
Beth had nothing to say to Nina. She was afraid any words between them
would be angry and she kept quiet, answering Nina in monosyllables. Nina
saw it and was both amused and annoyed. When she got drunk she liked a
fight. She felt mean. At the very least she wanted to embarrass
somebody.
“You don’t really think I give a damn if you find that girl, do you?”
she asked Beth.
“I don’t care what you think.”
“You know something? I don’t believe there is any such person as Laura
Landon.”
Beth shrugged, determined not to get nasty.
“I think you’re just leading me on. You just want a free tour of the
Village,” Nina said. And when Beth still maintained silence she went on,
“You think you’re something, don’t you, Beth? Just because Franny has
been eying you all evening.”
“Has she?” Beth was surprised. She hadn’t noticed it.
“Don’t play innocent with me,” Nina said, and Beth wondered if she was
jealous. Perhaps Nina had dressed herself like Beth in at least a
partial effort to snag Franny’s eye.
But when Franny got back she slipped a little penciled note into Beth’s
hand under the table. Later Beth got a chance to read it. There was a
telephone number and a plea for a call scrawled in pencil on lined
paper. Beth smiled slowly across the table at Franny, largely for Nina’s
benefit.
And just then she noticed, out of the corner of her eye, the entrance of
a woman whose face and manner captured her interest entirely. She was
big, nearly six feet tall, wearing slacks and a man-cut jacket. She was
a little over her best weight but strikingly handsome with the
black-and-white hair—still mostly black—curling closely around her head,
and light eyes. She walked with a slight swagger, her hands thrust into
the pockets of her pants, and Beth wasn’t the only one who turned to
look at her as she made her way up to the bar.
The bartender apparently knew her and fixed her something to drink in
response to a nod she gave him. She stood alone at one end of the bar,
seemingly preoccupied, although now and then she smiled at someone near
her who spoke to her.
Beth watched her, captivated by her manner and the world-weariness in
her face, for five or ten minutes. Finally she leaned over to ask Nina
who she was.
Nina gave a quick glance at the bar, reluctant to turn her attention
from Franny, and said, “Oh, God! Beebo Brinker. You don’t want to talk
to her.”
“Why not?” Beth demanded.
“You won’t get anything straight from her. I mean that both ways.”
“Do you know her, Nina?”
“Hell, yes. Lousy bitch.”
“Why lousy?” Beth asked.
“Oh, it’s a long story. Leave her alone, Beth, she’s no good.”
“She might know Laura,” Beth said.
“If she does, Laura’ll never be the same. They never are when Beebo gets
through with them.”
“What does she do to them?” Beth said.
“I don’t know, Beth. Don’t bother me about it.”
“I want to meet her,” Beth said stubbornly.
“Okay, damn it!” Nina flared suddenly. “Go meet her, I don’t care a damn
what you do. She knows everybody in the Village. If Laura Landon is
living here she’ll know.”
“Nina,” Beth protested, “you brought me down here to help me find
Laura.” She stared at her bewildered. “Now you don’t want me to find
her. Is that it?”
“Go on, Beth. Go talk to her. It’s about as bright as most of the things
you do. But for God’s sake don’t bring her over here. I can’t stand
her.”
Beth looked at her a moment longer, and then at Franny, who was afraid
to talk to her. She turned on her heel and walked away from them.
Beebo had found a bar stool and was sitting down by the time Beth
reached her. Beth stood a little behind her, nervous and hesitant for a
moment, and then she touched her sleeve. Beebo glanced up and to one
side, seeing a girl there but not looking at her.
“Hello,” Beebo said. Her face was nearly expressionless.
“Beebo Brinker?” Beth said.
“The same.” She didn’t seem to care who Beth was.
“Beebo, I’m looking for a friend of mine. It’s urgent that I find her.
Someone told me you knew everybody down here.” Beth knew she sounded
breathy and frightened but her voice, her manner, were out of her
control. “I was wondering if you could tell me where she is.”
“Try me.” Beebo lighted a cigarette and Beth watched, mesmerized. Her
gestures were perfectly masculine right down to the snap of the match,
almost more masculine than a man’s, carefully learned, carefully
studied, tellingly imitated.
“Well....” Beth leaned against the bar on one elbow, facing Beebo’s
profile. Beebo still had not really seen her face. She smoked, or drank
from her whiskey and water, and gazed into the mirror behind the bar.
“Well, her name is Laura,” Beth said, once again with the frightening
feeling of exposing her love to laughter.
Beebo’s eyes narrowed and in the mirror she looked at Beth for the first
time.
“Do you know a Laura, by any chance?” Beth said.
After a long tense pause Beebo said, “Laura? What’s her last name?”
“Landon.”
Slowly, very slowly, like someone moving in a dream, Beebo turned around
and looked her full in the face. Her lips parted slightly and she
studied Beth so closely that Beth involuntarily drew away a little,
clinging to the edge of the bar for support. She felt suddenly weak,
although Beebo’s gaze was not unkind and Beth liked her face. It even
seemed to resemble Beth’s own in some ways, though Beth’s was softer and
smaller and feminine. Beebo, still in her early forties, looked like a
college boy—gray-haired to some extent, but still collegiate.
“Beth,” Beebo said, very softly, and it sounded like thunder in Beth’s
ears. “You’re Beth. _Beth!_ Goddamn! I never thought we’d come face to
face, you and I.”
For a long bewildered moment Beth simply stared at her. “You know me?”
she murmured at last. There was no other sound for her in all that noisy
bar but Beebo’s voice.
“Know you?” Beebo grinned. “Honey, I know you better than you know
yourself. I’ve spent the best years of my life hating you. You were the
only real rival I ever had with Laura.”
Beth’s eyes grew huge with astonishment for a moment and suddenly full
of tears. She turned her head away, one hand over her eyes, and Beebo
explained gently to her.
“I met Laura when she first came to New York,” she said. “I thought I
brought her out. I mean, I thought I was the first woman she had ever
loved. Until she called me ‘Beth’ in bed one night. That was how I met
you. Beth Cullison.” Beth looked at her again, unable now to look away.
“That is your name, isn’t it?” Beebo said.
“It was. It’s Ayers now.”
“Married?” Beebo said.
Beth nodded and Beebo gave her a little grin. “It figures,” she said.
“Laura used to tell me about how wonderful you were, how kind you were
to her when she was so young and scared and didn’t know what she was.
She never talked about you except with love. God, how I used to hate the
sound of your name. Have you ever had a rival that didn’t exist, Beth?
Have you ever been jealous of a shadow, a snapshot? I could tear up the
snapshots but there were always more. She had dozens of copies lying
around. She showed them to everybody. When I gave her hell for it she
said I should be glad we looked alike. And you know something? We do. I
didn’t use to think so from the pictures she had of you, but seeing you
now.... Of course, you’re pretty. And you’re a woman.” She turned away
and drank the rest of her drink.
“Have something with me?” she said.
“Thanks. Scotch and water,” Beth said, still too shocked to think
sensibly. Beebo ordered it for her.
“So now you’ve come back to find Laura,” Beebo mused. “Why?”
“Do you know where she is?” Beth said eagerly, her heart floating over
the things Beebo had told her. “Is she still living with you?”
Beebo laughed a small private laugh. “No,” she said. “Not for the past
seven years. We broke up long ago.” And something she left unsaid made
Beth feel that, though they had broken up, Beebo still felt love for
Laura. “She was an extraordinary girl,” Beebo said. “I loved her very
much.” And then she stopped abruptly and Beth knew she would speak of
that part of it no more.
“What happened to her?” Beth said. “Is she all right? Where is she?”
“She’s in New York,” Beebo said.
Beth gave a sigh of relief. “Where?” she said urgently. It was almost a
groan of impatience.
Beebo swiveled in her seat again to look at her. “Why do you want to
find her so badly, Beth? Who’s Ayers? Doesn’t he have anything to say
about this?”
“I—I left him,” Beth said. “It’s all over.”
“Do you think it’s such a good idea to take up with a woman just because
you left off with a man?” Beebo said.
“I’m gay,” Beth said quickly. “It was never right with Charlie.”
“Any kids?” Beebo said. Her skeptical eyes went deep and made Beth feel
suddenly guilty.
But she answered with a brazen show of assurance, “No.”
Beebo took a drag on her cigarette, watching Beth through narrowed eyes.
“That’s good,” she said at last. “You’d be in bad trouble otherwise.”
Beth had a momentary spell of sinking, of sickness, that made her shut
her eyes and wipe her forehead with one sharp nervous gesture. The faces
of Skipper and Polly were very clear before her during that moment.
“Something wrong?” Beebo said quietly.
“I—I guess I’ve had too much to drink,” Beth said.
“Where are you staying?” Beebo said.
“The Beaton.”
“Are you here alone?”
“No, I came in with Nina Spicer. Do you know her?” She looked up at
Beebo then to see if her reaction to Nina was as harsh as Nina’s to her.
But Beebo only grinned and said, “Sure I know her. Everybody knows her.”
Beth liked Beebo’s face even better, now that it was becoming more
familiar to her. She felt secure with Beebo, as if Beebo were a friend.
It wasn’t logical. Beebo had frankly admitted an unreasonable hatred of
her of some years’ standing—something Nina had never felt. And yet there
was nothing fishy, nothing odd and egotistical about Beebo.
“How did you meet Nina?” Beebo said.
“I wrote to her, after I read some of her books. When I left Charlie I
came here to find Laura and I thought Nina might help me. She knows the
Village.”
“Well, she can teach you a few things. But they won’t have much to do
with true love and happy endings,” Beebo said. “Still, I guess that’s
something to know. There isn’t much true love in the world. Did she give
you a few scars?”
“A few, I guess.” Beth smiled a little. “Nothing I won’t recover from.”
“Good. You’re lucky. Now tell me one more thing. Since you won’t tell me
why you want to find her, are you sure you do want to find Laura?”
“Yes. Absolutely.” She spoke ardently and made Beebo smile again, but
such a different smile from Nina’s! Warm and friendly and concerned,
somehow.
“What do you think it will accomplish?” Beebo said.
“I still love her. I want her back.”
Beebo finished the drink she had before her and then she said gently,
“Beth ... Laura is married.”
There was a moment of deafening silence between them and then suddenly
it seemed to Beth as if the whole bistro was coming apart at the seams.
She staggered a little and Beebo got up quickly from her stool and
steered Beth expertly onto it.
“You’re okay, baby,” she said when Beth had recovered a little. “Don’t
tell me it never occurred to you. Don’t tell me you never thought of it.
Damn, you got married. It happens, you know. Here, drink this.” And she
forced half a glass of scotch and water down Beth’s throat.
After a moment, when she could talk, Beth whispered, “I thought of
everything. Everything but that. I thought she might have gone to Europe
or somewhere. I thought she might be in love with somebody else. I
thought she might have disappeared. I even thought she might be dead.
But, God help me, God help me, I never thought she would be married.
Married! I hate him!” She whispered the words with near-despair, too
stunned even to cry.
Beebo half lifted and half pulled her off her stool. “Come on,
sweetheart,” she said in her hoarse low voice. “You’re coming home with
me. I’ll tell you about it. Believe me, I felt just the way you feel now
when I found out. But that was seven years ago, after she left me. I
didn’t think I could stand it but I did.” She spoke with a sweetness
that amazed Beth in one so gruff and strange, and Beth clutched at her
words for courage. She never thought to argue with Beebo about going
home with her. She never even tried to stop and tell Nina where she was
going.
But Nina saw her go out with Beebo’s arm around her and Nina said softly
to herself, “Damn!” She knew that was the end of her influence on Beth,
and Beth had held promise for more pleasure. It was for that reason that
she had tried to discourage Beth from meeting Beebo. Nina liked to
control her visitor, and she loved to make love to her. It piqued her
vanity to see Beth so easily slip out from under her only to go to
someone she disliked and feared. With alcoholic malice she watched the
two of them leave.
Someone else watched them go: a small rotund man, balding, with bags
beneath his eyes and an air of fatigue and boredom that seemed never to
leave him. When the door of the bar swung shut behind Beth and Beebo,
the small heavy man got up and walked slowly toward it and followed them
into the night.