“And the kids?”
“Oh, the kids,” she wept. “They’d be better off if they’d never been born. I guess Charlie will keep it from them, if it only doesn’t get out back there and ruin their lives.”
Beebo held her and comforted her for a long time, her arms warm and strong and profoundly welcome to Beth. She didn’t laugh like Nina, she didn’t shriek hysterically like Vega, she didn’t analyze, with devastating truth and painful love, like Laura. She said nothing, she judged nothing. But, oh, how good she felt, how sure and how reassuring.
“Beebo,” Beth whispered after a while, the urge for catharsis still in her. “Did you ever fall for a woman, a very lovely desirable woman, and then discover that she wasn’t at all what she’d made you think she was? Maybe she was sick, or deformed, or something. Something awful that shocked you badly and sort of—knocked the passion out of you. And you tried to go on like before until the whole thing made you sick and she got desperately jealous and finally you just ran away, without even saying goodbye, just to get rid of her?”
“Sounds like the story of my life,” Beebo said.
“Really?” Beth twisted in her arms, half sitting up to look at her. “Just like that?”
“Not just like that. But I’ve done some rotten things, baby. I’ve treated some girls like dirt. I could have been great friends with them, but I couldn’t be a lover. You can choose your friends but not your lovers. They just happen to you.”
“Did Laura just happen to you?” Beth asked.
Beebo smiled privately at the past. She released Beth and got up to light a cigarette, offering one to Beth from the pack. Beth took it. “I guess she did,” Beebo said, lighting them both. “She was so different from the others—to me, at least—that it’s hard to think of it happening the way any other affair happens. But I guess it did.”
“Beebo, do you think Laura was right about me?” Beth asked anxiously. “Do you think I’m just running away, looking for romance and all that?”
“I don’t know, baby. I don’t know you that well.”
“Laura says I only want what I can’t have. Once I’ve got it I don’t want it. And Charlie thinks so, too.”
Beebo grinned and scratched an ear. “They should get a license and set up practice,” she said. “Laura always did like to figure people out. Not maliciously, though, not for fun, like Nina. Just interested in people.”
“Is she right? Am I just chasing rainbows because they can’t be had?”
“I don’t know, Beth. I’d guess you just want to belong somewhere. Most of us do. When you find out where you belong the pieces seem to fall into place by themselves. The puzzle works itself out.”
There was silence for a few minutes while they smoked and thought and Beth felt a sort of calm, a near peace, that came close to being what she had sought so long and unsuccessfully. She didn’t want to move, to change things or spoil the mood.
But Beebo said, “You’d better get back. I called the hotel, they were on the verge of closing you out. You’ve been gone six days.”
“Six days!” Beth whispered, appalled. “Six?”
“That’s what they told me,” Beebo said. “Have you ever done that before?”
Beth shook her head. She dressed, putting on her freshly ironed clothes and eating some breakfast with Beebo. “What’ll I do if that miserable detective is out there?” she said when she was ready to leave.
“What can you do?” Beebo said. “It’s too late now. Just get a cab and go back to the hotel. And don’t flirt with any women.”
Beth gave her a hesitant smile. “Okay,” she said. And still she stood in the door as though reluctant to leave, even a little bit scared.
“What’s the matter?” Beebo said, running a finger softly over Beth’s cheek. “Got you down, sweetheart?”
“I don’t know,” Beth said.
“There isn’t anybody waiting for you, is there? I mean, besides the detective?”
“No. Unless—unless Charlie has gotten here already. Or my uncle.”
“Do you want me to go back with you?” Beebo asked.
Beth considered. What would it be like to walk into her room with Beebo and find Charlie there? He would decide at once that this was her new lover, that Beebo was what she had traveled across the continent to find, and no amount of talking would argue him out of it. But did it matter anymore? For she felt sure now that no matter what he said to her she couldn’t go back to him. She had burned that bridge behind her. Even if he wanted her she had gone too far. She had deserted her children, and when a woman has done that there is no atoning, no going back, no starting over. It’s final.
“Would you, Beebo? You don’t need to stay, just drive over with me. I’d feel better.”
“What if he’s there?” Beebo said.
“I’ve made my choice,” Beth said.
“Okay, baby.” Beebo picked up another pack of cigarettes from a table by her sofa and followed Beth out the door, pulling it to and locking it behind her.
Chapter Nineteen
OUTSIDE IT WAS MUGGY AND HOT, WITH AN OVERCAST SKY. “Rain,” Beebo said. “In an hour. It can’t miss.”
They walked over to Sixth Avenue and hailed a taxi, and all the while Beth was looking around her, behind and on all sides for the little man she was so sure was the detective. Now, when she was aware of him, when she knew who he was and what he was up to, she couldn’t find him anywhere. And yet she was convinced that his eyes were on her, peering around some shadowy corner.
“Do you
