The Dud Avocado - Elaine Dundy [102]
“Sure, Larry went off with the Contessa,” I said wearily. “That proved only one thing. It proved he wasn’t in love with me. Thanks for pointing it out. I’ll never forgive you for it. And I’ll never forgive you for doing it by sicing the sort of person the Contessa is on him.”
“There is no point at present in going back over that,” said Teddy quickly. “What I must try to warn you of as fast as possible is that he is not just an opportunist; he is a very dangerous man. He is a killer. It is he you should send the police for, not me, I assure you.”
I looked at Teddy with revulsion and astonishment, wondering what I’d ever seen in him. And then suddenly I just laughed in his face.
“Do you mean to tell me you’ve come tooling all the way down from Paris dragging that hop-head Lila with you for the sole purpose of getting off a statement like that? A killer! I hope you remembered to bring his criminal record with you.”
“I have brought it with me,” said Teddy gravely. “Unfortunately I have brought this poor girl Lila with me. Excuse me if I express myself badly. It is because I cannot put it to you strongly enough. And let me make it quite clear that I never for a moment would have set foot down here if I’d known we were going to run into him. Quite the opposite. Her only hope is to get as far away from him as she can. As it happens he told her he was spending the summer in Germany. To state the case in the simplest terms: he ruined her. He was, I believe, the first man she’d ever known. The rest I imagine it was fairly easy for him. Do you know what she is now?” He paused. “She is a call-girl.”
“So?” I felt myself trembling.
“Can’t you understand? She works for him
I really felt sick. I wanted to strike him and I didn’t have the strength to. I couldn’t have touched him. Everything about him revolted me so; the hair on the back of his hands, his manicured fingernails, the way he held his cigarette. I looked at his face and thought, I am looking at the face of evil.
“You are hell” I said, my voice shaking so badly I could hardly hear it. “Do you know I wouldn’t believe you if you swore on a stack of Bibles?” Then I stopped talking. I was completely at sea. I couldn’t find any words to tell him what I thought of him. Why is it that the most insulting things you can ever find to say in those circumstances are as meaningless and unhurtful as you-dirty-lousy-double-crossing-son-of-a-bitch? I mean, have nine more meaningless unhurtful words ever been strung together? “You—you European!” I said finally. “You nasty, suspicious, vicious European. Stop ascribing your own vicious motives to everyone else. Anyone capable of playing the tricks you played on me is capable of anything, but I never dreamed you’d go so far. Why don’t we take my case for a change? You were the first man I ever knew and you can hardly be said to have ruined me. I don’t even remember you terribly well, if you want to know the truth. I wasn’t very moved.
“I know what gets you about all this,” I said—and suddenly I did. “I know what you can’t stand. The only people you’ll tolerate have to be stuffed into one of two pigeon-holes: they either have to have pots of their own money like the Contessa— you don’t mind that at all, do you, as long as you have a hand in the spending of it—or they have to have good steady jobs like you. What you can’t stand is the whole new young adventurous floating population with either just a little money or no money at all, no jobs, nothing, just a desire maybe to see the world awhile. Then all the jealousy and envy in your mournful little unfulfilled life rises up inside you and you have to invent all