“Perhaps you will find that your Beaverton is a fool’s paradise,” said Reynaldo.
“Yes?” said Lorna. My God, she thought, what if he’s fallen in love with Ella? When she had sent Ella to Dudley’s, she hadn’t fully considered what might result, she had just had an inspired idea for pulling Ella up from the dumps she was down in. Since then, she had begun to wonder whether she had done the right thing. Would Ella remain forever in love with Dudley? Lorna had begun to worry that she might. And now, if Dudley was serious about her —
“That’s something I’ll have to find out, I guess,” said Ellen.
Dudley pushed his cup and saucer away from him. He put his hands flat on the table. He bowed his head. He said, “Ella has — I may as well be direct — fallen in love with me.”
“Yes, I know,” said Lorna, without thinking.
Dudley’s face went white. “Has she — confided in you?” he asked.
“Oh, of course she has,” said Lorna.
“I’m trying to be delicate about this,” said Dudley.
“I’ll always remember you, Reynaldo,” said Ellen.
“I want you to understand, Lorna, that Ella has developed a deep and passionate love for me.”
“Yes, yes,” said Lorna. She turned to her work again. She stabbed the fork into a potato, pulled it out of the pot, and began peeling it.
“I think it’s just as well that she has,” said Dudley.
“Yes,” said Lorna. She didn’t turn around. She worked at the potato.
“I have no doubt about that,” said Reynaldo.
“I don’t mean to shock or upset you,” said Dudley, “but I think that I am just what Ella needed. I think that by falling in love with me she has broken the spell, so to speak. I have played the part of the handsome prince in a fairy tale, freeing the virgin — ah — freeing the princess — from her enchantment.”
Lorna compressed her lips and applied herself to the potato.
“What is necessary now,” said Dudley, “is to free her from her enchantment with me.”
“Good-bye, Reynaldo,” said Ellen.
“Yes!” said Lorna. Hope filled her like a breath of the sweet mountain air of Chacallit. She forked another potato. Dudley, you pompous dope, she thought, you’re exactly right.
“You must admit,” said Dudley, “that we are not exactly a match. Ella’s a darling girl, wonderfully attractive, with all the freshness of youth and so on, but I think I would be just too much for her.”
“I’m sure,” said Lorna.
“Goodbye, Ellen,” said Reynaldo. “You were — an amusing diversion.”
“I’ve given quite a bit of thought to this,” Dudley went on, “and I’ve decided that it would be best for me to go away for a while. I’ll be called away on family business — perhaps a death — or — no, perhaps not — money troubles, then. I’ll stay away until Ella finds someone better suited to her, someone who — ”
There was a knock at the door. Dudley and Lorna turned but saw no one. Ellen opened the door. “Is that Reynaldo guy gone?” asked Dave.
“It was the radio,” said Lorna.
“ ‘That Reynaldo guy’ has not yet gone,” said Reynaldo, “but he was just — ” Lorna reached up and turned the radio off.
Dudley went on talking. Lorna turned her back on him and returned to her work. She finished peeling the potatoes, sliced them, put them into a huge crockery bowl, poured vinegar over them, and began tossing them. While she worked, she wore a small, contented smile that Dudley couldn’t see, and she hummed, so softly that Dudley couldn’t hear, the up-tempo novelty version of “Lake Serenity Serenade” that Kay Kyser had made popular that winter. The kitchen filled with the odor of warm vinegar.
Dudley said, “Did you hear me, Lorna?”
“What?” said Lorna. She turned around and was surprised to find Dudley at the door, with coat and galoshes on, ready to go. “Oh, I’m sorry Dudley,” she said. “I did hear you. Yes. You’ll go away. Fine. It’s best. You’re right. Ella will find someone else. We’ll see you when you get back.”
They were startled by a knock at the door. Standing outside, his face framed in the window, his breath freezing on the glass, was Bert Leroy.
Issue Number 1 of The Babbington Review is now on Substack.
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🎧 364: “Perhaps you will...”