Dusk and Other Stories - James Salter [20]
FOREIGN SHORES
Mrs. Pence and her white shoes were gone. She had left two days before, and the room at the top of the stairs was empty, cosmetics no longer littering the dresser, the ironing board finally taken down. Only a few scattered hairpins and a dusting of talcum remained. The next day Truus came with two suitcases and splotched cheeks. It was March and cold. Christopher met her in the kitchen as if by accident. “Do you shoot people?” he asked.
She was Dutch and had no work permit, it turned out. The house was a mess. “I can pay you $135 a week,” Gloria told her.
Christopher didn’t like her at first, but soon the dishes piled on the counter were washed and put away, the floor was swept, and things were more or less returned to order—the cleaning girl came only once a week. Truus was slow but diligent. She did the laundry, which Mrs. Pence who was a registered nurse had always refused to do, shopped, cooked meals, and took care of Christopher. She was a hard worker, nineteen, and in sulky bloom. Gloria sent her to Elizabeth Arden’s in Southampton to get her complexion cleared up and gave her Mondays and one night a week off.
Gradually Truus learned about things. The house, which was a large, converted carriage house, was rented. Gloria, who was twenty-nine, liked to sleep late, and burned spots sometimes appeared in the living room rug. Christopher’s father lived in California, and Gloria had a boyfriend named Ned. “That son of a bitch,” she often said, “might as well forget about seeing Christopher again until he pays me what he owes me.”
“Absolutely,” Ned said.
When the weather became warmer Truus could be seen in the village in one shop or another or walking along the street with Christopher in tow. She was somewhat drab. She had met another girl by then, a French girl, also an au pair, with whom she went to the movies. Beneath the trees with their new leaves the expensive cars glided along, more of them every week. Truus began taking Christopher to the beach. Gloria watched them go off. She was often still in her bathrobe. She waved and drank coffee. She was very lucky. All her friends told her and she knew it herself: Truus was a prize. She had made herself part of the family.
“Truus knows where to get pet mices,” Christopher said.
“To get what?”
“Little mices.”
“Mice,” Gloria said.
He was watching her apply makeup, which fascinated him. Face nearly touching the mirror, intent, she stroked her long lashes upward. She had a great mass of blonde hair, a mole on her upper lip with a few untouched hairs growing from it, a small blemish on her forehead, but otherwise a beautiful face. Her first entrance was always stunning. Later you might notice the thin legs, aristocratic legs she called them, her mother had them, too. As the evening wore on her perfection diminished. The gloss disappeared from her lips, she misplaced earrings. The highway patrol all knew her. A few weeks before she had driven into a ditch on the way home from a party and walked down Georgica Road at three in the morning, breaking two panes of glass to get in the kitchen door.
“Her friend knows where to get them,” Christopher said.
“Which friend?”
“Oh, just a friend,” Truus said.
“We met him.”
Gloria’s eyes shifted from their own reflection to rest for a moment on that of Truus who was watching no less absorbed.
“Can I have