A Habit of the Blood by Lois Battle

Author:Lois Battle [Battle, Lois]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781101644720
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2001-03-01T00:00:00+00:00

Her hands clenched and unclenched. Her eyes flitted about seeking, as her old music teacher had told her to seek, a single person in the audience who would help her to focus her energy. “‘I love my Mister Man…’” Settling on Marsden, she found her voice and began to croon “‘Fish gotta swim/Birds gotta fly…’” with the abandonment of a seasoned chanteuse. Marsden turned his back but continued to watch her in the mirror above the bar. She raised her eyes a fraction, singing to his image in the mirror, until he shook hands with Shrimpton and moved to the patio door. She faltered, her confidence seeping from her until she stopped in midphrase. “I…I can’t remember the rest,” she said almost inaudibly.

“Come on, everybody,” Mrs. Cleardon urged. “We all know this one.”

“The men too?” Archie asked while she vamped.

“Yes. Men too,” Mrs. Cleardon insisted.

“I did go to an English public school,” Archie joked, “I suppose I can manage it.” Amidst general laughter that eased them into the next chorus, Gloria moved away from the piano and came to the patio doors.

Ceci stiffened and remained perfectly still. Marsden walked past her without noticing her. She took a sip of her drink and watched Gloria trail him to the deck chairs.

“You haven’t talked to me all night,” Gloria choked.

“I know you’ve spent much of your life in cheap bars, Gloria, but it isn’t necessary to entertain at private parties.”

“What did I do?” Her mouth gaped and her eyes opened so wide that her moon-shaped brows disappeared under her bangs. “They asked me to sing.”

“And you do what people ask you to do, don’t you. Don’t you?” He said it almost gently, running his hands down her arms, then, with a quick movement, pinioning them behind her. She whimpered and lowered her head.

Whatever he said to her was drowned out by applause and requests for another song, but Ceci was glad she couldn’t hear what he was saying because she guessed what it must be. She could see that his contempt had made his body taut and sharpened his features into something resembling lust; that Gloria, limp as a kitten, was begging his forgiveness. Her stomach turned. As Mrs. Cleardon started to hammer away at “Knees Up, Mother Brown,” she got up, wanting to go inside but galvanized by the spectacle. Marsden let go, almost dropping the girl. Gloria, massaging her arms, limped to the far end of the patio. Marsden watched her go, hitched at the belt of his pants, wrists turned upward, like a young tough, then spun around.

He had advanced a few steps before he saw Ceci. He smiled as though nothing had happened. “I suppose you’re out here because you prefer the native music from across the bay,” he said. He reached for her arm. “I think we’re ready to go home now.”

She flung her drink in his face.

Watching him blink, seeing the punch drip down his cheeks, she mirrored the amazement on his face. She’d had no

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