12:15 p.m. Grant has been helping Mrs. Clark clean cabins. He just
came in to tell me he's taking her home now, and to ask what we need
from the store. We always buy our groceries in town because these
little highway markets are very
12:25. Well, I just took a reservation by phone, for next Saturday
night. Business is certainly
1 p.m. I was just cornered by a long-winded salesman. I would have
sent him on his way sooner but
1:10. I just rented a cabin, to a man who's going to spend the day
in Palm Springs and wants to be sure he'll have a place to sleep
tonight. As I was about to write a few minutes ago, business
1:30.1 just had to leave that time, I thought it was a wreck. A
screeching of brakes outside--turned out to be just a dog run over.
He didn't seem to be hurt very
2:30. I had to take time out to make lunch, as Grant came back. Our
hours of eating and sleeping are certainly erratic. Grant has gone
now to pick up David from school. I hear the baby waking up now so
I'll have to close. Please write to us."
At the same time I mailed the letter to Miss Nestleburt, I mailed a
small box to her husband. The box contained a cockroach David had found
outside and borne into the house triumphantly. I thought of Mr. Hawkins
the moment I saw the creature. "Two can play his game," I thought to
myself.
I had put the cockroach carefully into the well-padded box, not really
expecting it to be still alive when it reached its destination, but
satisfied that, dead or alive, it would be a handsomely macabre gift.
I didn't make a practice, of course, of sending out such incoherent
letters as the one to Miss Nestleburt that accompanied the cockroach.
Usually after an interruption I returned to the letter I had been
writing, picked up the thread of what I had been saying, and resumed as
though there had been no interruption. But occasionally it amused me to
let evidence of each interruption appear in the letter.
It's so customary to find strangers in the living room, talking or
using the telephone, that when I am ready for bed at night I don't dart
out of the bathroom and leap into bed as I did at first. First I press
my ear against the door, so that I can hear the rumble of voices if
anyone is in the living room. If I don't hear anything, I open the door
slowly and stick my head out. If only Grant is in the living room, and
if the door between the living room and the office is closed, so that
no one can suddenly open the outer office door and see me in all my
pajama-ed glory, I rush across the floor and jump into bed.
When winter was well under way, our irascible old neighbor Mr.
Featherbrain still had not spoken to us since summer, when he had been
so incensed at Grant's pulling in off the highway customers that might
have been his. Whenever I met him in the grocery store across the
street, I smiled up at him sweetly, only to be rewarded with a
tightening of the thin line of his mouth and a slight quivering of his
roseate chin.
One night when Grant was in Arizona on a business trip, the office bell
rang. I put on my robe sleepily and went to the door. Our "no vacancy"
sign had been blazing for hours, so I was surprised to hear the bell.
It was the young sailor to whom I had rented the last cabin that night.
"We was just gettin' ready to turn in," he explained, "and we was gonna
take a shower, but there wasn't any water. Not even enough for a drink.
We can get along okay, we'll just turn in without a shower, but I
thought I oughta let you know, so you could maybe get it fixed by
morning so we could take a shower before we pull out."
I thanked him feebly, a little stunned at the realization of what a
calamity had befallen me. I tried the faucet in our kitchen; there was
a hiss of air and a dispirited gurgling, and three large drops fell
into the sink.
It lacked ten minutes of being midnight--hardly a time to be making
phone calls. Anyway, I didn't know whom to call. All the service shops
were closed, and the workers home in bed.
The office of the Blue Bonnet motel, across the street, was dark. All
the motels in town were full by now, of course; therefore the owners
would all be asleep.
Oddly enough, though, there was a light at the Palace Motel, in the
room that I knew was Featherbrain's living room.
Well, I wasn't going to ask them for help, I resolved. Mr. Featherbrain
would be very pleased to know that I was having trouble.
I tried to figure out what Grant would do about the situation if he
were home. Of course, he would have the difficulty resolved, and
everything going smoothly, in less than twenty minutes--but how would
he do it? And why couldn't I myself do whatever it would be that he
would do?
I drew my robe more tightly around me, and sat down on a cold kitchen
chair. I thought.
Dimly I recalled hearing something about the water having been turned
off, before we bought the motel, by a bunch of mischievous Indian boys.
I knew that the meter was out back in the field, near the deserted road
where I had learned to drive. Maybe there was a handle out there with
which our water could I be turned on and off.
My duty was clear. I put my coat on top of my robe, took a quick glance
at David and Donna to be sure that they were sleeping soundly and
wouldn't be apt to awaken before I came back, armed myself with a
flashlight, and set forth into the frigid night.
Nothing can describe the utter blackness of a midnight in Banning, six
hundred feet from the highway and civilization. When my back was turned
to the few neon signs that were still shining, and the intermittent
flash of headlights, it was as though I were alone in a cold, windy
world of pressing, almost tangible darkness. There was no moon to point
up the ghostly, shadow-like mountains--lowering shapes that I felt,
rather than saw--and the stars, so many and so brilliant that they
looked like glittering jewels that had been tossed up there by a
lavish, wasteful hand, selfishly drew their light closely around them.
All I knew about the water meter was that it was somewhere toward the
back of our land, near the road. The smug certainty of men in general
that men are superior to women in every respect, except possibly
motherhood, has always annoyed me. However, I admitted to myself as I
stumbled over the rocky road toward the back of our land, the chances
were excellent that no man who had lived at the motel as long as I had
would fail to know the exact location of the water meter, and what to
do to it if the water suddenly refused to come into the cabins and be
sociable. I resolved, feeling my way along with tentative, reluctant
toes, that from this bleak hour forward I would take an efficient,
masculine attitude toward everything that had bolts or screws. I'd show
the world that it's due to early training and environment that women
aren't mechanically inclined or good fixers, and not to any lack of
brain power; while it is mostly the pressure of public opinion that
makes the average boy grow up to be a minor mechanical genius.
I turned the flashlight on only intermittently, only at the moments
when the darkness was pressing too forcibly upon me. I felt the
presence of ogres and banshees (whatever they are) and even a few
werewolves. I didn't want to make myself conspicuous by shining the
flashlight any more than necessary; if all these horrible things could
hide from me in the dark, then I could just as well hide from them,
too, instead of lighting myself up so they'd know exactly where to
pounce.
When at last I reached Williams street, which marked the end of our
property, I turned the flashlight on bravely and began to search for
the water meter. Coyotes were howling close in the hills to the north,
which didn't help matters any. All of the land around me was settled by
fat, stickery bushes which regarded me stolidly, defying me to dispute
their squatters' rights or to try to get any information from them.
They knew where the meter was, all right, but they had no intention of
letting me in on the secret.
I stood on our private road, in a rocky tire-rut, and began to flash
the beam of the flashlight systematically across the field in such a
way that the light had finally covered every foot of the area in which
I thought the meter must be. There was no sign of the meter, though. I
wasn't really surprised, because the wind-battered, huddled-together
bushes, which by now wore faintly mocking expressions, were high enough
to obscure the meter from any eye except that of the person who knew
exactly where to look.
I waded a few feet into the despicable little bushes and repeated the
process of flashing the light around systematically. No soap. No water
meter.
After a lull the cold wind was coming up again, and the bushes began to
move and whisper among themselves. I could almost make out what they
were saying.
"Can you imagine," one seemed to hiss indignantly, "Thinks she can find
the meter we've got hidden!"
"Yeah, look at the fool," another replied with derision. "Trying to
find it with just a little flashlight. Think we ought to trip her up
and stick a few thorns into her?"
Apparently they decided against it, and perhaps they even took pity on
me, because eventually I found the meter, about ten feet from Williams
street and twenty feet from our private road.
When I found it, of course, I didn't know what to do with it. It was a
small, complicated structure of curving pipes and gadgets and smooth,
leering faces of glass. One round handle was particularly conspicuous,
and I felt certain that it was with this handle that I must commune. I
turned the handle cautiously. It seemed agreeable, so I turned it still
further. And then I came upon another hurdle I must jump: no matter
with how much firmness and artistry I turned the handle, I wouldn't
know what effect it was having, if any, until I trotted back the whole
cold, black, dismal distance to the house and tried the faucets. I
girded up my loins, grasped the flashlight grimly, and started back.
I was approaching the rear cabins, which were silhouetted against the
occasional headlight-glow from the highway, when I remembered that
there were faucets spaced regularly in the field. I captured the
nearest one with the flashlight beam, went up to it and turned it on.
To my joy, water gushed out--the loveliest, most sparkling, most
appreciated water in the world.
The children were still asleep when I got back, and all seemed to be
well. I went to the kitchen, to try the water at the sink. It spurted
forth as gloriously as had the water from the faucet in the field. I
looked out the kitchen window at the drowsy highway. The two
service-station markets were closed, their lights out. There were no
cars on the road at the moment; no lights except the rotating beacon at
the airport. The Peacock's sign was out, Featherbrain's sign was
out--but wait! There was still that light in Featherbrain's living room.
Even as a horrible suspicion was crawling over me, Mr. Featherbrain's
gaunt shoulders and head appeared in his window. A smile (probably ill
at ease in such an unaccustomed place, I thought) was on his face.
Mr. Featherbrain shoved up his window and thrust out his head. I opened
our kitchen window so that I could hear what he was going to say.
"I betcher durned old water wouldn't turn on!" he cackled. "Durned old
Indians are allus turnin' it off, ain't they? Yuh oughta put the Indian
sign on 'em, that'd fix 'em!" He chortled at his own wit.
I was quivering with reaction, cold, and indignation. I realized that
the "Indian" who had turned off our water tonight had been a tall, thin
black-haired one, with a white stubble sprouting over a pink chin. But
I couldn't think of an appropriate, biting enough retort.
I didn't know exactly what I was going to say, but I leaned forward,
waiting for the enraged words to come.
They did. "I oughta bust evvy bone in yer head!" I snarled.
One day the grapevine which twined around the various motels in town,
linking them together, vibrated with the information that Mr. and Mrs.
Garner had sold the Peacock. And for one hundred thousand dollars!
"One hundred thousand. A tenth of a million," we said, rolling the
words around on our tongues and tasting them critically.
They tasted wonderful to Grant. "A hundred thousand," he mused. "Do you
suppose, if we advertised once and really tried, we could get anything
like that for this place?"
"Well, this place is worth more than the Peacock," I said cautiously.
"But we don't want to sell, do we?"
"No--o--o, I guess not," he said; but the thoughtful expression didn't
fully leave his eyes for several weeks.
When, after the period of escrow had passed, the Peacock was taken over
by its new owners, Mr. and Mrs. Needham, it was fun to stand by the
kitchen window as dusk crept through the Pass and watch them struggle
with their neon sign switches. It was a gaudy sight. First the green
"vacancy" sign would flash on and off; then, gaining certainty, it
would go on and stay on. Then the lamps at the highway end of the white
walls surrounding the motel would light up brilliantly. Then the
"vacancy" sign would go off. Then the peacock would burst into glorious
color, only to leap back into darkness again. Next, the bright red
words "Peacock Motel" would flare out of the blackness like a splash of
red paint, followed by the green "vacancy." Then, one after another,
all the signs would be turned off, as the new owners sought, by the
trial and error method, the switch that turned on the little light
outside the office. And by the time they located that switch, they
turned the office light off again hunting for the switch that turned on
the big white "vacancy" sign on their lawn, between the rows of units,
or for the one which turned the ordinary-looking, roof-sheltered little
well between the office and the highway into a blazing, neon-outlined
wishing well that could have dropped out of a fairy story.
I knew exactly what the new owners of the Peacock were going through. I
remembered how hard it had been for us--or for me, rather--to know
which switch would turn on which light or sign. And the Peacock,
obviously, had a lot more switches than we did. But even though I
sympathized completely with their bewilderment, I never missed standing
at the kitchen window in the early evening when the contagious wave of
sign-turning-on began to sweep along the highway through Banning.
The aurora borealis had nothing on the Peacock, for a couple of weeks.
When we left Los Angeles we brought with us two radios, one of them the
small white one Grant had given me before we were married, and which I
had, in Los Angeles, kept on the kitchen sink so that music could
mingle with the splashings of dish water. We planned to rent it now, at
fifty cents a night, to our customers.
We put the radio on the desk in the office, but for some reason we
didn't get around to putting on it a sign that would apprise our
customers of the fact that it was for rent. Naturally, no one asked to
rent it, and when we had been there for several months it hadn't earned
us a penny.
Fixing a sign to put on the radio was one of those things that seem
inexplicably to suggest procrastination, like changing the lining paper
in bureau drawers, or like writing to your husband's Aunt Minnie and
inviting her to come out for a few weeks.
One day, though, when I had a few minutes to spare and was wondering
what useful thing I should do during that short time (and afraid I
would think of something pressing enough to get me out of the chair
where I was lolling) I decided to make a "for rent" sign for the radio.
I printed the words neatly on a piece of white cardboard and stood it
up against the radio.
Within a few days I was beginning to think that magazine editors who
pay ten cents a word for manuscripts were cheapskates. Those two words
I had written began to bring in fifty-cent piece after fifty-cent
piece, until at last the radio had paid for itself over and over again.
We discussed getting a few more radios, but that, too, was easy to put
off. Occasionally one of the many motel-to-motel salesmen with whom we
were blessed would want to install in our cabins, at no expense to us,
coin-operated radios, from which we were to have a percentage of the
take. I felt that such radios in the cabins would put our motel on too
obviously commercial a basis, while Grant was beginning to toy with the
idea of putting ordinary little radios in each cabin for the free use
of our customers, as a deluxe touch to the accommodations. Unaccustomed
to such luxurious details as free radios, many of the people who
occupied the cabins would be sure to choose our motel in preference to
any other if they ever went through Banning again. However, putting a
thirty dollar radio in each of thirteen units would cost nearly four
hundred dollars--a large sum to pay for the good will of customers who
already seemed pleased with our motel. We filed both that idea, and the
idea of letting a salesman install coin-operated radios, away in our
minds for future reference.
Grant, after working on the children's bedroom so long that I had
really given up any idea that it would ever be completed, finally
finished it. The walls and ceiling were covered with cedar siding, the
floor with linoleum of a swirling green color, and we hung crisp white
curtains at the windows. I put one of the motel spreads, a green one,
on David's bed.
I had converted into draperies a matching green spread which had been
burned by a smoker-in-bed, and these I hung over the closet doorway and
in front of a big cabinet of shelves Grant had made. After I had cut
away the burned parts and made the draperies, there were still several
fairly good-sized pieces of the material left, and of these I made
scarves for the two small chests in the room. (From remaining scraps I
made little curtains for the window of the door between the office and
the living room--curtains that would be easy for me to move slightly in
order to peek into the office to see what might be going on there.)
The total effect was very pleasing. The room looked a lot different
than the ugly garage into which we had put the children's beds the day
we arrived.
I had been in the habit of hurriedly shutting the bedroom door whenever
anyone came to visit or to telephone, so that they couldn't see into
the upset, unfinished room. Now, however, I always made it a point to
see that the door was boastfully, confidently ajar.
I gestured vaguely toward the telephone one evening when Grant ushered
in a man who wanted to make a long distance phone call. I pulled the
bedroom door open with an unostentatious gesture, and sat down,
apparently to read a book, but actually to study the man and listen to
what he would say. If you were to stand on the corner of a busy street
and watch the hordes of people hurrying past, you'd mark them off as
just ordinary, unoriginal, all-alike people, none of them possessing
noticeable peculiarities or even individuality; but if those hordes
were to separate and come singly into your living room, to sit for five
or ten minutes using your telephone, the realization would slap you in
the face that people are different from one another, that they do
possess amazing or amusing idiosyncrasies, and that whatever scientist
it was who stated that every human being has a counterpart somewhere,
must have had his fingers--or his wires--crossed.
There couldn't have been, anywhere on the face of the earth, a
counterpart of the man whom Grant had just brought in. He looked like
an expectant elephant, nearing the end of a two year pregnancy. His
long nose, which drooped a little at the end, was a dull violet color;
and the skin of the surrounding rather insignificant face was a
brilliant shade of peach--occasioned, I guessed, by either dipsomania
or habitual bad temper. His ears were deformed; they were simple holes
in his head, with a small external bulge of flesh to indicate the
location of each. His small eyes were obscured by horn-rimmed
spectacles. The glasses were apparently held up by some natural law
(seemingly in conflict with the law of gravity) which my high school
science teacher had neglected to explain. Certainly those impotent
little bulges of flesh that masqueraded as ears couldn't have had
anything to do with supporting the glasses.
The man, putting in a long distance call, was trying to make the
operator understand his unusual name. The back of his fat neck was
getting redder and redder. It wasn't surprising, though, I thought,
that she found it hard to understand his name.
"No, not Dugan!" he spat at her. "Dubaf! DUBAF!" He moved his bulk
heavily on the chair, and I half expected it to fold under him. His
free hand, drumming irritably on the desk top, was shaking with rage,
the veins knotting up as he shouted "Dubaf! Dubaf!" into the
mouthpiece. "I didn't say Dusle!" he screamed. "Dubaf! D-U-B-A-F. No, I
said D-U-B-A-F!" He mopped his forehead. He clenched the telephone
tighter, his eyes distended.
"D as in dammit!" he roared. "U as in you silly slut--"
I retreated hurriedly, throwing down my book and rushing into the
kitchen to see whether I had remembered to wash yesterday's breakfast
dishes.