The Listening Walls by Margaret Millar Read Free Book Online Page A

pleasure, both parents stiffened into silence, too stunned by the luxurious surroundings to do much of anything except sit and stare. Back home they were affectionately voluble about their daughter Helene, who had gone to Mills College on a scholarship and lived in a fine house in Atherton with her wealthy husband and three beautiful children.
    Face to face with her, they became mute and embar­rassed, and their visits were a nightmare, especially to Gill, who tried harder than Helene did to make the Maloneys feel at home. His tactics were peculiar: he sought to minimize his wealth by calling attention to some of his economies, by talking forcefully of having his thirteen- year-old son take a paper route and his seventeen-year-old daughter work her way through college. The result of this stratagem was more confusion on the part of the Maloneys and complete frustration for Gill, who meant, as usual, only to do the right thing. No one had ever been able to figure out why such good intentions as Gill’s often had such disturbing consequences.
    â€œAmy’s association with the Wyatt woman,” Gill said, “has meant nothing but trouble. She was obviously un­balanced. Anyone but Amy would have seen that and avoided her.”
    Helene mentally crossed herself. “Now Gill. De mortuis . . . Besides, they were friends. You don’t go back on a friend because she’s having, well, a few emo­tional problems. Wilma could be a very charming and entertaining person when she wanted to. That’s the way I prefer to remember her.”
    â€œYou have a very simple and convenient memory.”
    â€œAnd I intend to keep it that way. Eat your breakfast.”
    â€œI’m not hungry,” Gill said irritably. “Personally, I’m inclined to blame Rupert for this whole business. He should have vetoed the trip as soon as the subject was broached. Two women wandering alone around a foreign, uncivilized country—why, it’s preposterous.”
    It sounded rather pleasant to Helene whose traveling was confined to shopping trips to the city and summers at Tahoe. She munched on a piece of crisp bacon, listening to Gill the way one listens to waves breaking on a beach, knowing the noise will always be the same, only varying in volume now and then with the tides and the weather.
    So often the noise was about Amy, and Helene lis­tened out of habit, without interest. In her opinion, Amy was a dull little creature, invested with wit by her brother and beauty by her husband, and having, in fact, neither. Helene, too, had often wondered about the re­lationship between Amy and Wilma, but she wondered from quite a different point of view from Gill’s: why should such an intense and energetic person as Wilma have wasted so much time on a mouse like Amy?
    Gill turned up his volume. “I still think the American Embassy should have called me about this unfortunate affair.”
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œAmy’s my kid sister.”
    â€œShe is also a grown woman with a husband. If she needs looking after, let Rupert do it.”
    â€œRupert is incapable of handling certain situations.”
    â€œWhat’s to handle?” Helene said blandly.
    â€œThere are probably decisions to be made, actions to be taken. Rupert’s too soft. Now if I were down there I’d be firm with those foreigners.”
    â€œIf you were down there, dear, you’d be the foreigner.”
    â€œI suppose you think that’s terribly clever?”
    â€œIt’s just the truth.”
    â€œYou seem,” he said with a dry little smile, “to be hit­ting on a great many truths these days.”
    â€œOh, I am. Some large, some small.”
    â€œTell me a few of them.”
    â€œAnother time. You’d better hurry if you’re going to take El Camino instead of Bayshore.” She smiled at her husband across the table. In spite of his manner of talking she knew him for a gentle