“Come back when Venus shows you out,” he said kindly. “Our bunk is your bunk,” and he put an arm over Pat’s shoulder.
“She won’t show me out,” Beebo said with what pride she still had. “Jackson, take care of that Paula for me.” She caught his shoulders in a hard grip. “I don’t know if I can stand to do this to her.”
“You’re doing it,” Jack commented.
Beebo looked at her bag, then grabbed it and ran down the hall and front steps without daring to look back.
Jack shut the door softly and gazed at Pat. “You’re tanked,” he said indulgently. His thoughts were elsewhere.
“You didn’t tell her about Pete and Mona,” Pat said. “Why?”
“She’s going three thousand miles from here. Let’s hope she doesn’t need to worry about those two twerps any more.”
“I’ve heard some of their sickening stories about Beebo around the bars lately,” Pat brooded.
“Well, don’t give Pete and Mona all the credit,” Jack said shrewdly. “Not that they ever say anything nice about anybody. But it helps to have someone else feeding them information…. Somebody whose initials are Pat Kynaston.” It was as sharp a reproof as Jack had given him.
“I only say good things about Beebo!” Pat protested, instantly wounded. “I adore that girl!”
“I know. Good things. That’s all they need. Somebody in the Cellar heard you carrying on Tuesday afternoon: Beebo’s father, her home town, even that thing at the livestock exhibition. You want Pete to hear that, Pat? Think what he could do with it, if he wanted to.”
Pat sank dismally to the living room floor. “Lord, I didn’t realize. I thought I was telling them how great she is. I thought Pete and Mona were inventing their stuff.”
“They are, but not all of it. The nearer the truth they can get, the louder they’ll shout it—screwed around just enough to make Beebo look like the type of witch decent citizens should spend their Sundays burning.”
Pat’s chin trembled. “I could strike myself dumb,” he said bitterly.
Jack sat down and put an arm around him. “Just watch it, lover. She’s put herself in a spot to be crucified, if Pete has anything against her…and Mona already has, or thinks she has. All that girl needs is a whim, anyway.”
The Bogardus home was located in a lush and secluded area of Mandeville Canyon Road in Bel-Air. It was huge, elegant, well-staffed and maintained. The grounds were a glowing sweep of hand-tailored grass, tropical palms exploding against the sky like green rockets, swimming pools—two—and the noisy brilliance of equatorial blooms.
Toby showed Beebo around. They walked over the lawns in bare feet, and Beebo marveled at it. It dazzled her eyes enough to take her mind off her sore heart a while. “Every time you push a button, somebody runs up with a martini,” she said. “It’s fantastic, Toby.”
“I wish it weren’t,” Toby said. “I wish I had an ordinary house to live in.”
“Poor little rich boy,” she grinned. “Wants an ordinary mama and papa, too, no doubt. Maybe when you’re older you’ll be glad you’re different.”
“How would you know? You didn’t have to grow up this way.”
“No, but I had to grow up,” Beebo said. “I would have traded my problems for yours any day.”
“That’s what Leo says. His family didn’t have a dime,” Toby told her as they picked their way over the manufactured rustic rocks circling one of the pools.
“Where is that guy, anyway?” Beebo said. Leo worried her, like a family ghost: much was made of him, yet he was rarely seen.
“He’s in S.F.,” Toby said. “The servants expect him back the end of the week. He’s talking to a sponsor for Mom’s show.”
“What’s he like? How do you talk to him?” Beebo said.
“Oh, you don’t have to worry. He likes kids. Beside, he’s been talking about getting somebody to help with the horses for years.” Beebo felt a sudden wave of relief. She had not brought up the reason for her presence here, and it seemed odd to her that Toby hadn’t either—till she realized how Venus had explained it to him. “Besides,” Toby added, “It’ll be nice to have you around. You can help me with my homework. You ought to be good with the biology. For once, Mom didn’t get a square for me.”
Beebo wondered how many other young people had preceded her in this household; how many synthetic friendships with young tutors, horsemen, and valets Venus had tried to promote for Toby, hoping he would turn into the easy-mannered socialite she somehow pictured him being when he was grown.
At least it was reassuring to have a job, something legitimate to do to explain her membership on the family staff.
Toby sat down at the pool’s edge and put his legs in the cool water. He was well-developed for his age, though still only five-feet-six. Beebo looked at his young male body, so carelessly normal, and she envied him painfully.
“Leo’s jealous, but he’s tolerant, too,” Toby said. “I mean, he’s put up with so damn many men tailing Mom, he knows how to outsmart or outlast all of them. He doesn’t like it much, but he knows she needs them. At least, that’s what she says. I don’t know why a woman can’t be happy with one man…especially if he’s a good one.”
“Some women can,” Beebo said. But she was thinking that a man of Leo’s knowledge and well-founded suspicions would doubtless take one look at Beebo and know good and damn well what his beautiful wife was up to. There was nothing to do but wait till he got home for the showdown.
She confronted Venus with her misgivings about Leo. “He won’t hurt you, darling,” Venus said. “Don’t offend him and don’t defy him. He’s nervous as hell with a girl around the house.”
“If he puts up with your men, why
