December 20, 2010

The Diamond Bikini by Charles Williams(page 10)

She snapped her fingers at him. “Break it up, dad,”
she says. She sauntered out the door and sat down in
one of the canvas chairs and crossed her legs.
“God, this is really back in the jungle,” she said.
“Fine climate, though,” Pop says. “Best place in the
world for anemia.”
“Well, that’s fine,” Miss Harrington said. She
brushed a gnat off her leg, and looked at Uncle
Sagamore again. “If you run across anything you’re
not sure about, Zeb, don’t hesitate to ask me.”
“Well sir,” Uncle Sagamore says to Pop, “I reckon
this is the first time I ever met up with the anemia.
You don’t suppose Bessie’d be likely to catch it?”
“I reckon not,” Pop says. “She’s probably done past
the age when she’s apt to come down with it.”
Just then Dr Severance came out with the two
drinks. He gave them to Pop and Uncle Sagamore
and sat down in the other chair.
The Diamond Bikini— 59

“Well, here’s to Miss Harrington’s recovery,” he
says, and they all raised their glasses and drank.
Uncle Sagamore looked in his glass, and then says
to Pop, “He must of spilled some water in it,” He
fished the ice out with his fingers and threw it away.
Dr Severance fiddled with the radio dial. “I keep
trying to pick up a New Orleans station,” he says.
“Miss Harrington gets home-sick, and it would make
her feel better to hear a familiar voice. It’s hard on a
young girl, being torn away from her family and the
social whirl of a big city like that, because of an
illness.”
The music stopped. He hit a new station, and a
man’s voice was talking: “And now for the local
news,” it said. “Police reported today there have
been no new developments in the sensational
gangland killing of Vincent (Tiger) Lilly which shook
the city a week ago. The prosecution’s star witness is
still reported to be—”
He turned the dial again and some more music
came on. “But this place is going to be wonderful for
her,” he went on. “It’s just what I was hoping to find
when I took charge of the case. She can get the rest
her condition calls for. You gentlemen probably don’t
realize the absolutely man-killing social pace a
debutante like Miss Harrington has to keep up with.
Parties, balls, receptions, charity bazaars—it never
lets up for a minute. I tell you, going through medical
school is a cinch compared with it.”
Miss Harrington nodded. “It’s rough, MacDuff.”
“And with that anemia sapping her strength by the
hour,” Dr Severance went on, “well, it was killing
her, that’s all.”
Miss Harrington finished her drink and put the
glass down on the table. She got up and walked down
to the end of the trailer where you could see out over
the lake.
She kind of swung and swayed when she walked,
and Pop and Uncle Sagamore watched her real
anxious like they was afraid she might fall or
something.
The Diamond Bikini— 60
Dr Severance went on talking what hard work it
was being a debutante, whatever that was. Miss
Harrington stood looking out over the lake, and I
figured she was probably homesick all right, and
lonesome. I liked her, because you could see she was
real nice and she wasn’t always wanting to grab ahold
of you and make a fuss like them Welfare ladies,
so I felt sorry for her and wished she didn’t have to
go away from home like that, and eat vegetables.
Just then the radio changed to another tune, a real
pretty one that made you want to tap your feet. Miss
Harrington was still looking the other way, but you
could tell she heard it because she started moving
her feet in time with it and swaying her body like she
was going to dance. It was real pretty to see.
Dr Severance was still talking and didn’t notice,
but Uncle Sagamore and Pop was watching real
close. She swung around in her dancing, but it didn’t
seem like she even saw us. She had a faraway look in
her eyes and you could tell she was humming the
tune. Then she swung back facing the other way, and
doggone if she didn’t reach up behind her back and
unsnap the end of that bosom thing she was wearing.
As it came off she took one end of it in her hand
and waved it like a streamer while she swayed back
and forth in time to the music. She was still faced the
other way, but you could see she didn’t have nothing
on but them little candy-striped pants. Then she
turned back towards us, and as she did she caught up
the bosom thing and held it pressed to her with one
arm where it would have been if she was still wearing
it, smiling kind of dreamy like, and I could hear her
singing the words of the song.
She had a real nice voice.
Well, Pop and Uncle Sagamore was just enchanted
with it, it was such a pretty dance. They leaned
forward on their hunkers till they like to fell over,
with their eyes bugged out, and the drinks in their
hands was spilling on the ground. Miss Harrington
swung on around away from us again and as she did
she pulled the bosom thing away once more and
The Diamond Bikini— 61
started waving it in her hand like she was directing
the orchestra.
Pop dropped his glass on the ground. He started to
clap his hands, but then he caught hisself and looked
at Dr Severance and didn’t. But just then the doctor
noticed the funny expressions on their faces and
glanced around and saw Miss Harrington’s dance.
He jumped half out of his chair and knocked his
drink over. His eyes were as cold as ice. He clapped
his hands together real hard and yelled. “Choo-Choo!
Uh—Pamela!”
She jumped, and looked around, like she’d just
remembered where she was. “Oh,” she says, slipping
the bosom thing back on. “I wish they wouldn’t play
that.”
Dr Severance glared at her. She came over and
picked up her glass and went inside the trailer to get
a drink.
As soon as she went in the door Dr Severance
looked at Pop and Uncle Sagamore and sighed, and
shook his head real sad. “There you are, gentlemen,”
he says. “That’s what a nervous breakdown will do
for you. Some people will try to tell you it’s no worse
than a bad cold, but you saw it with your own eyes.
Her mind just stopped dead there for a minute and
she was lost, and the only thing she could grab hold
of was clear back in her childhood. All the little girls
in her social set had to go to dancing school and take
ballet lessons.” He shook his head again.
“Well, that’s too bad,” Pop says. “It sure is shame.
But you can see she’s had a lot of trainin’. She might
have made a great dancer.”
Uncle Sagamore nodded too. “She sure has the
knack.”
When Miss Harrington came back she had two
drinks with her. She walked over to where I was and
smiled down at me. “What’s your name, junior?” she
asked.
“Billy ma’am,” I says.
The Diamond Bikini— 62
“Well, Billy, they seem to have left you out when
they passed the drinks around, so I brought you a
coke.” She handed me the glass, and says, “Why
don’t you and me walk down to the lake and see if it
looks good to swim in?”
“Why, it’s fine swimmin’,” Pop says. “As a matter of
fact, I was just thinkin’ I might be able to spare a
little time off from work, an’ teach you.”
“Down, boy,” Miss Harrington says. “I already
know how to swim. And I know all about being
taught.”
She went back in the trailer and in a minute came
out with her handbag slung over her shoulder. We
finished our drinks and went down through the trees
towards the lake.
Uncle Sagamore and Pop started to get up like they
wanted to come too, but Dr Severance shook his head
at them and says, “Boys, I wouldn’t. Why don’t you
just stick around and talk?”
* * *
When we came out in the open we was right close to
where Uncle Finley was working on his boat, Miss
Harrington stopped and looked at it and at him
hammering away up on his scaffold.
“What in the name of God is that?” she asked.
I told her about Uncle Finley and the Vision and
how they figured all the sinners was going to drown
when the rain started.
“Well, they sure got some ripe ones around here,”
she says.
We started to go on past, and just then Uncle
Finley looked around from his hammering and saw
us. He just ignored us, like he had me and Pop, and
took another swing at the nail with his hammer. Then
all of a sudden he jumped and jerked his head around
again and stared at Miss Harrington like he hadn’t
really seen her the first time.
He waved the hammer at her. “Jezebel!” he yelled.
The Diamond Bikini— 63
Miss Harrington stopped. She looked at him and
then at me. “Well, what bit him?” she asked.
Uncle Finley walked along the scaffold towards us,
still craning his neck at her and pointing with his
hammer. “Bare naked Jezebel!” he says, furious like.
“Paradin’ around here with your legs a-showin’, and
causin’ sin.”
“Oh, crawl back in your fruit cake,” Miss
Harrington says to him.
“He can’t hear you,” I says. “He’s deaf as a post.”
We started to go on. Uncle Finley kept walking
along the scaffold looking at Miss Harrington’s legs
and yelling, “Jezebel,” and when he came to the end
of it he didn’t even notice. He just walked right off
into thin air.
Lucky he dropped the hammer and managed to
grab the side of the boat, or he’d have fell about six
feet and likely hurt hisself. When we went on he was
still hanging there with his face against the planks
yelling, “Sinful, naked hussy—” and trying to turn his
head so he could see.
We walked on down to the edge of the lake. There
wasn’t any trees right here. There was a little sandy
beach and the water looked shallow close to the
shore. Further along there was trees on both sides,
and up about a furlong the lake bent to the left and
went out of sight around a point. The water was still,
and you could see the trees reflected in it. It was real
pretty.
Miss Harrington looked around and then back at
Uncle Finley’s boat and the house, “If we want to
swim,” she says, “we’ll have to get further away from
the bald-headed row.”
“Have you got a bathing suit?” I asked.
“Well—yes,” she says.
“Why don’t you go back and get it?” I said. “And we
can go on up to that point and go swimming now.”
“Oh, I’ve got it with me,” she said. “It’s here in my
purse.”
“Well, fine,” I says.
The Diamond Bikini— 64
We walked on around the edge of the lake and into
the trees. In a little while we passed the point where
the lake turned left and when we walked out to the
edge of the water we was out of sight of the house
and everything. It was nice. The lake was about fifty
yards wide here, and the trees made shadows clear
across it now that the sun was about to go down. It
was real quiet and peaceful.
“Do you reckon it’s too deep close to shore?” I
asked. “I don’t know how to swim.”
“No,” she says. “I think we can wade out. And I’ll
help you. But you wait till I change into my suit.”
She went into some bushes and ferns that was
growing along the bank off to the left. I stripped
down to my boxer shorts and waited for her. It looked
like a fine place to swim, and I was anxious to start
learning. Pop was always going to teach me, but they
never seemed to have any pools close to the race
tracks.
She came back in a minute, and when I looked
round the first thing I thought was that Dr Severance
had sure been telling the truth when he said her folks
was rich. Her bathing suit was made out of
diamonds.
Of course, there wasn’t much of it, just a string
around her middle and a three-cornered patch in
front, but it was all just solid diamonds. It must of
cost a fortune. I wondered if it was comfortable to
wear.
And then I saw the vine, the one there was such a
hullaballoo about in the papers later on. It had little
blue leaves, and it wound around her bosom like a
path going up a hill, and right in the center there was
this little rosebud. It was the prettiest thing I ever
saw.
She stopped, all of a sudden, when she noticed how
I was looking, and her eyes snapped. “Hey,” she says,
“what goes on here? Are you a midget, or something?
How old are you, kid?”
“Seven,” I says.

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