Jane Bowles - My Sister's Hand in Mine - The Collected Works of Jane Bowles

They heard screams from the next floor. Mrs. Copperfield recognized Pacifica’s voice.

“Oh, please, let’s get the police,” pleaded Mrs. Copperfield.

“Are you crazy?” said the woman. “Pacifica doesn’t want to get mixed up with the police. She would rather have both legs chopped off. I can promise you that is true.”

“Well then, let’s go up there,” said Mrs. Copperfield. “I’m ready to do anything.”

“Keep seated, Mrs. — what’s your name? My name is Mrs. Quill.”

“I’m Mrs. Copperfield.”

“Well, you see, Mrs. Copperfield, Pacifica can take care of herself better than we can take care of her. The fewer people that get involved in a thing, the better off everybody is. That’s one law I have here in the hotel.”

“All right,” said Mrs. Copperfield, “but meanwhile she might be murdered.”

“People don’t murder as easy as that. They do a lot of hitting around but not so much murdering. I’ve had some murders here, but not many. I’ve discovered that most things turn out all right. Of course some of them turn out bad.”

“I wish I could feel as relaxed as you about everything. I don’t understand how you can sit here, and I don’t understand how Pacifica can go through things like this without ending up in an insane asylum.”

“Well, she’s had a lot of experience with these men. I don’t think she’s scared really. She’s much tougher than us. She’s just bothered. She likes to be able to have her room and do what she likes. I think sometimes women don’t know what they want. Do you think maybe she has a little yen for Meyer?”

“How could she possibly? I don’t understand what you mean.”

“Well now, that boy she says she’s in love with; now, I don’t really think she’s in love with him at all. She’s had one after another of them like that. All nice dopes. They worship the ground she walks on. I think she gets so jealous and nervous while Meyer’s away that she likes to pretend to herself that she likes these other little men better. When Meyer comes back she really believes she’s mad at him for interfering. Now, maybe I’m right and maybe I’m wrong, but I think it goes a little something like that.”

“I think it’s impossible. She wouldn’t allow him to hurt her, then, before she went to bed with him.”

“Sure she would,” said Mrs. Quill, “but I don’t know anything about such things. Pacifica’s a nice girl, though. She comes from a nice family too.”

Mrs. Copperfield drank her gin and enjoyed it.

“She’ll be coming down here soon to have a talk,” said Mrs. Quill. “It’s balmy here and they all enjoy themselves. They talk and they drink and they make love; they go on picnics; they go to the movies; they dance, sometimes all night long.… I need never be lonely unless I want to.… I can always go and dance with them if I feel like it. I have a fellow who takes me out to the dancing places whenever I want to go and I can always string along. I love it here. Wouldn’t go back home for a load of monkeys. It’s hot sometimes, but mostly balmy, and nobody’s in a hurry. Sex doesn’t interest me and I sleep like a baby. I am never bothered with dreams unless I eat something which sits on my stomach. You have to pay a price when you indulge yourself. I have a terrific yen for lobster à la Newburg, you see. I know exactly what I’m doing when I eat it. I go to Bill Grey’s restaurant I should say about once every month with this fellow.”

“Go on,” said Mrs. Copperfield, who was enjoying this.

“Well, we order lobster à la Newburg. I tell you it’s the most delicious thing in the world.…”

“How do you like frogs’ legs?” asked Mrs. Copperfield.

“Lobster à la Newburg for me.”

“You sound so happy I have a feeling I’m going to nestle right in here, in this hotel. How would you like that?”

“You do what you want to with your own life. That’s my motto. For how long would you want to stay?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” said Mrs. Copperfield. “Do you think I’d have fun here?”

“Oh, no end of fun,” said the proprietess. “Dancing, drinking … all the things that are pleasant in this world. You don’t need much money, you know. The men come off the ships with their pockets bulging. I tell you this place is God’s own town, or maybe the Devil’s.” She laughed heartily.

“No end of fun,” she repeated. She got up from her chair with some difficulty and went over to a box-like phonograph which stood in the corner of the room. After winding it up she put on a cowboy song.

“You can always listen to this,” she said to Mrs. Copperfield, “whenever your little heart pleases. There are the needles and the records and all you’ve got to do is wind it up. When I’m not here, you can sit in this rocker and listen. I’ve got famous people singing on those records like Sophie Tucker and Al Jolson from the United States, and I say that music is the ear’s wine.”

“And I suppose reading would be very pleasant in this room — at the same time that one listened to the gramophone,” said Mrs. Copperfield.

“Reading — you can do all the reading you want.”

They sat for some time listening to records and drinking gin. After an hour or so Mrs. Quill saw Pacifica coming down the hall. “Now,” she said to Mrs. Copperfield, “here comes your friend.”

Pacifica had on a little silk dress and bedroom slippers. She had made up her face very carefully and she had perfumed herself.

“Look what Meyer brought me,” she said, coming towards them and showing them a very large wrist watch with a radium dial. She seemed to be in a very pleasant mood.

“You been talking here one to the other,” she said, smiling at them kindly. “Now suppose we all three of us go and take a walk through the street and get some beer or whatever we want.”

“That would be nice,” said Mrs. Copperfield. She was beginning to worry a bit about Mr. Copperfield. He hated her to disappear this way for a long time because it gave him an unbalanced feeling and interfered very much with his sleep. She promised herself to drop by the room and let him know that she was still out, but the very idea of going near the hotel made her shudder.

“Hurry up, girls,” said Pacifica.

They went back to the quiet restaurant where Pacifica had taken Mr. and Mrs. Copperfield to dinner. Opposite was a very large saloon all lighted up. There was a ten-piece band playing there, and it was so crowded that the people were dancing in the streets.

Mrs. Quill said: “Oh boy, Pacifica! There’s the place where you could have the time of your life tonight. Look at the time they’re having.”

“No, Mrs. Quill,” said Pacifica. “We can stay here fine. The light is not so bright and it is more quiet and then we will go to bed.”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Quill, her face falling. Mrs. Copperfield thought she saw in Mrs. Quill’s eyes a terribly pained and thwarted look.

“I’ll go there tomorrow night,” said Mrs. Quill softly. “It doesn’t mean a thing. Every night they have those dances. That’s because the boats never stop coming in. The girls are never tired either,” she said to Mrs. Copperfield. “That’s because they sleep all they want in the daytime. They can sleep as well in the daytime as they do at night. They don’t get tired. Why should they? It doesn’t make you tired to dance. The music carries you along.”

“Don’t be a fool,” said Pacifica. “They’re always tired.”

“Well, which is it?” asked Mrs. Copperfield.

“Oh,” said Mrs. Quill, “Pacifica is always looking on the darkest side of life. She’s the gloomiest thing I ever knew.”

“I don’t look at the dark side, I look at the truth. You’re a little foolish sometimes, Mrs. Quill.”