Turn, Magic Wheel by Dawn Powell

Author:Dawn Powell [Powell, Dawn]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-58195-248-3
Publisher: Steerforth Press
Published: 2011-11-08T00:00:00+00:00

… family dinner …

O THE BOOK!” SAID PHIL BARROW, lifting his cocktail, third gin, third vermouth, third cold tea and a dash of bitters shaken up and if you-have-any-cucumber-in-the-refrigerator-I-usually-soak-it-peeled-of-course-in-the-cold-tea-say-for-half-an-hour—“To the book!”

“To the book!” said Corinne, lifting hers, and staring defiantly at Dennis don’t-you-dare-make-a-face-when-you-taste-this don’t-you-dare-say-what-is-this-mess—don’t-you-dare.

“Thanks,” said Dennis and politely drank it down. “It’s mighty nice of you people to celebrate for me this way. Say, that’s a fine drink you’ve made here, Phil, how did you tell me you made it?”

Corinne rewarded him with a grateful smile because it was no fair hurting Phil, it was strange but she simply could not bear for Phil to be hurt in any of his little vanities, whereas she was almost vengefully pleased when shafts were tossed in Dennis’s direction. But no one must tease Phil about his recipes or his anecdotes or his pleasure in his own good sense, no one must make a fool of him, no one, that is, except his little wife.

“I use cold tea as the basis for all my cocktails,” said Phil, eyes behind his spectacles faintly contemptuous of his guest’s ability to appreciate nuances of taste. “Iced tea and applejack, for instance, makes a darned fine highball, or a good punch base for the matter of that.”

“Dennis can’t make a decent cocktail to save his soul,” said Corinne proudly, and turned to Dennis—now you, now you say something.

“It’s the truth. Nor a salad nor a soufflé nor a gingerbread man. It’s mortifying,” agreed Dennis readily. The evening was on. Now we all join hands to build up Phil. What-a-cook—what-a-swimmer—what-a-financier—what-a-thinker—what-a-man-Phil!

“Let me give you another,” suggested Phil. “Pass his glass, Baby.”

“Here you are, Baby,” said Dennis maliciously, and passed his glass to Corinne. She kicked him under the table. Over the centerpiece of African tulips—lecherous-looking posies for a family dinner, he thought—he caught Olive’s significant, sarcastic half-smile. He wondered what would happen if one of these days he would shout out his hate for Olive, his hate for all women’s girlfriends. Must every woman in the world have some other woman best friend, always hovering in the background, voicing wisdom very bad for the sweetheart’s naïve ears, advising, reporting, knowing, always knowing so much more than the sweetheart herself? Olive, dear loyal Olive! If women were only as deceitful to their female friends as men hoped and said they were! But no, wherever a man went he must be annoyed and frustrated by sex solidarity. Olive, for instance, knew all about Dennis because Olive and Corinne had gone to Miss Roman’s together. Corinne always told Olive absolutely everything and Olive told Corinne everything, especially little things she’d heard here and there about Dennis, odd places she’d run into him. Olive was an old peach, that way. Every time he saw Olive’s smooth, rather handsome dark face across the table he thought of how much Olive knew about him and he shuddered, how much more she knew about Corinne, too, than he did. She probably knew of plenty little escapades

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