Everett. Take her swimming.”
“I don’t have my swimming suit.” Lily remembered that Martha not only jumped horses at the State Fair every year but had twice beaten the Del Paso Country Club junior swimming champion in unofficial competition. “That child sees a bird, she tries to race it,” Edith Knight had once observed of Martha. An admirer of competitiveness in all forms, Edith Knight had frequently urged Lily to “take a leaf from Martha McClellan’s book”; that Martha was a notoriously poor loser did not bother her, since she did not believe that losing was the point.
“There’s one thing Martha has plenty of, that’s tank suits,” Mr. McClellan declared. “We can suit you fine.” Pleased with this play on words, he repeated it, and then bounded up to the house, screaming ahead for China Mary to get Martha on the stick and rustle up some tank suits.
The McClellan house had the peculiarly sentimental look of a house kept by men. There were pictures of Sarah and of Mildred McClellan, who had died at Martha’s birth; above the piano (“How’s that for a piano?” Mr. McClellan liked to demand affectionately. “Came ’round the Horn in ’forty-eight”), the California Republic Bear Flag hung at what appeared to be half-mast. One wall was covered with framed certificates from the Native Sons of the Golden West and river maps showing channel depths during the summer of 1932; China Mary’s efforts toward brightening up ran to crocheted antimacassars on the chairs and orange zinnias crushed haphazardly into Limoges cream-soup bowls. In one corner of the living room, on a table covered with a mantilla, was an assortment of gold nuggets and ivory fans. Although the table had always been there, there had been, since Lily’s last visit to the McClellans, certain additions: over the table hung an old Vanity Fair cover, a photograph of Katherine Cornell and her cocker spaniel as Elizabeth Barrett and Flush, and a yellowed front page from the Sacramento Bee showing pictures of the Duke of Windsor and the English princesses. The headline read “KING EDWARD ABDICATES! DUKE OF YORK WILL RULE. ‘My Mind Is Made Up,’ Says King.” The words Sacramento Bee had been partly obscured with adhesive tape, in deference, Lily assumed, to Mr. McClellan, who had little use for the English but even less for the Bee .
“I see you’re admiring my memorabilia,” Martha said from the stair landing.
Startled, Lily looked up: she had not seen Martha since the Christmas parties, at which Martha had, night after night, in some indefinable way made a spectacle of herself. Although she had not been drinking and had done nothing extraordinary, it had been impossible not to notice her, as it might have been impossible not to notice someone running a high fever, or wearing a cellophane dress. She had the same look about her now: her long straight blond hair hung loose around her thin face, so tanned that her eyebrows looked bleached, and she had on what appeared to be a leotard and a long green silk jersey skirt which trailed after her on the stairs.
“What in the name of sweet Christ is that get-up?” Mr. McClellan said. “You been practicing your ballet dancing?”
“I haven’t taken ballet since I was twelve years old, thanks to the fact that nobody in this family except Sarah would ever drive me to my lessons. I’ve been reading.”
“Nobody gives a goddamn what you’ve been doing. Get Lily Knight here a tank suit.”
“Everett,” Martha called imperiously. “Guess what I’ve been reading.”
Everett looked up. Throughout this exchange he had seemed to withdraw: Lily had watched him fish in his pocket for a cigarette, inspect the cover of a Reader’s Digest which lay in a chair, whistle between his teeth.
“What,” he said now. “What have you been reading, baby.”
“The Anatomy of Melancholy . It’s number twenty-two on the list.”
“She asked me for a reading list,” Everett said as Martha
“I don’t have my swimming suit.” Lily remembered that Martha not only jumped horses at the State Fair every year but had twice beaten the Del Paso Country Club junior swimming champion in unofficial competition. “That child sees a bird, she tries to race it,” Edith Knight had once observed of Martha. An admirer of competitiveness in all forms, Edith Knight had frequently urged Lily to “take a leaf from Martha McClellan’s book”; that Martha was a notoriously poor loser did not bother her, since she did not believe that losing was the point.
“There’s one thing Martha has plenty of, that’s tank suits,” Mr. McClellan declared. “We can suit you fine.” Pleased with this play on words, he repeated it, and then bounded up to the house, screaming ahead for China Mary to get Martha on the stick and rustle up some tank suits.
The McClellan house had the peculiarly sentimental look of a house kept by men. There were pictures of Sarah and of Mildred McClellan, who had died at Martha’s birth; above the piano (“How’s that for a piano?” Mr. McClellan liked to demand affectionately. “Came ’round the Horn in ’forty-eight”), the California Republic Bear Flag hung at what appeared to be half-mast. One wall was covered with framed certificates from the Native Sons of the Golden West and river maps showing channel depths during the summer of 1932; China Mary’s efforts toward brightening up ran to crocheted antimacassars on the chairs and orange zinnias crushed haphazardly into Limoges cream-soup bowls. In one corner of the living room, on a table covered with a mantilla, was an assortment of gold nuggets and ivory fans. Although the table had always been there, there had been, since Lily’s last visit to the McClellans, certain additions: over the table hung an old Vanity Fair cover, a photograph of Katherine Cornell and her cocker spaniel as Elizabeth Barrett and Flush, and a yellowed front page from the Sacramento Bee showing pictures of the Duke of Windsor and the English princesses. The headline read “KING EDWARD ABDICATES! DUKE OF YORK WILL RULE. ‘My Mind Is Made Up,’ Says King.” The words Sacramento Bee had been partly obscured with adhesive tape, in deference, Lily assumed, to Mr. McClellan, who had little use for the English but even less for the Bee .
“I see you’re admiring my memorabilia,” Martha said from the stair landing.
Startled, Lily looked up: she had not seen Martha since the Christmas parties, at which Martha had, night after night, in some indefinable way made a spectacle of herself. Although she had not been drinking and had done nothing extraordinary, it had been impossible not to notice her, as it might have been impossible not to notice someone running a high fever, or wearing a cellophane dress. She had the same look about her now: her long straight blond hair hung loose around her thin face, so tanned that her eyebrows looked bleached, and she had on what appeared to be a leotard and a long green silk jersey skirt which trailed after her on the stairs.
“What in the name of sweet Christ is that get-up?” Mr. McClellan said. “You been practicing your ballet dancing?”
“I haven’t taken ballet since I was twelve years old, thanks to the fact that nobody in this family except Sarah would ever drive me to my lessons. I’ve been reading.”
“Nobody gives a goddamn what you’ve been doing. Get Lily Knight here a tank suit.”
“Everett,” Martha called imperiously. “Guess what I’ve been reading.”
Everett looked up. Throughout this exchange he had seemed to withdraw: Lily had watched him fish in his pocket for a cigarette, inspect the cover of a Reader’s Digest which lay in a chair, whistle between his teeth.
“What,” he said now. “What have you been reading, baby.”
“The Anatomy of Melancholy . It’s number twenty-two on the list.”
“She asked me for a reading list,” Everett said as Martha
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