Beauty and the Brain (6 page)

She was staring at him as if he were a rare
and interesting life form. Colin couldn’t recall the last time he’d
been this embarrassed.

“I mean,” he floundered on, “I was thinking
about the Gabrielino Indians, who did a lot of fishing, and, er,
thinking about some of their skills in preparing fish.”

“Oh.” Her brow unwrinkled, but she still
looked confused. Colin didn’t blame her. “I see, I think.”

They both turned to their plates, and Colin
shoveled in a piece of fish much less politely than his mother had
taught him to do. Brenda, he noticed as he chewed, was as dainty
with her silverware as she seemed to be with everything else. She
cut a very small bite of fish and gracefully lifted it to her
beautiful lips. Dash it, he wished he hadn’t thought about her lips
as being beautiful. She chewed like a lady.

He noticed her hands, too. They were small
and smooth and porcelain-white. Her fingernails, although not long,
were shaped and buffed and very, very pretty. She must take awfully
good, care of them. And that, he snarled internally at himself, was
a stupid thing to think. Of course she took good care of her skin
and hands—and every other part of her delectable body. Her looks
were her livelihood, for heaven’s sake.

All at once, he stopped chewing.

Her looks were her livelihood. He peered at
her, hoping she wouldn’t catch him staring. Fortunately, her
attention had been caught by her right-hand neighbor, and she
didn’t notice his glance.

He’d never considered what a burden it must
be to have to pamper and protect and cultivate the package one
presented to society, and to know that it was your only means of
income—and that, with the inevitability of the years, it would
fade, and you’d be without the means to earn your living. He hoped
very hard that Brenda was saving her money during these years of
her success.

All he had to do to earn a living was be
himself—with the occasionally forced social grace tossed in for a
bonus—and he was set for life. When he got old and gray, he
wouldn’t be out of a job; rather, he’d probably have solidified his
academic reputation, and students would be flocking in droves to
take his classes.

It was something to think about. And it was
a lot safer than thinking about the Gabrielinos’ penchant for fish.
He ate another bite of his present fish and enjoyed its savory
flavor. They’d used a mighty tasty sauce on it.

“I do like fish, don’t you, Colin? When it’s
prepared as well as this one is.”

All his nerves seemed to jangle at once, and
he cursed himself for being so sensitive to her voice, which wasn’t
all that great. All right, she had a nicely modulated tone, neither
too high nor too low, and not breathy. He couldn’t stand breathy
female voices. But she couldn’t seem to rid herself of traces of
that ghastly New York accent. Whatever the quality of her voice,
there was no reason for him to react to it like this. He gave
himself a hard mental shake.

“Yes, it’s very good.”

“Do you know what kind it is?”

“Trout,” Colin said immediately. While he’d
never made a study of fish, he’d been on enough nature expeditions
in the course of his education to be able to recognize a trout when
he ate one.

“Really? We don’t have trout back east. I
like it a lot.”

Colin cleared his throat and made a
determined effort to play the role of socially adept gentleman.
“Er, one time when I was in Iceland—”

“Iceland,” she exclaimed. “How
fascinating.”

She sounded sincere. Colin decided not to
dip into that pool at the moment. “Er, yes, it was rather
fascinating. Anyhow, we were served a fish that tasted exactly like
salmon—”

“Oh, what’s salmon? I’ve never even heard of
it.”

Peering at her, Colin could determine no
reason she should appear so avidly interested in salmon, but she
did. Nevertheless, he answered her politely. “It’s a fish native to
the northwestern territories. Delicious. It swims upriver every
year to spawn. Sometimes bears will wait on the banks of the river
and scoop the fish right out of the water, they’re so numerous.” He
wondered if he should have used the word spawn in Brenda’s
presence, but it was too late now.

“Oh.” Her expression conveyed distress for a
second. “Poor fish.”

She probably didn’t know what
spawn
meant. “Er, yes. Well, at any rate, this fish we ate in Iceland
tasted like salmon to me. Salmon has a red flesh, and this fish
didn’t, but the taste was remarkably similar.”

“Was it salmon?”

“No.” He grinned. “It was an ocean trout. I
was very much surprised to learn that.”

She contemplated this information for a
moment. Just as Colin was beginning to feel monumentally stupid for
having told such an insignificant and ridiculous story to so
beautiful and sophisticated a woman, she said, “How strange. You
wouldn’t expect an ocean trout to taste like a freshwater salmon,
would you? I mean, it is odd. I don’t blame you for remembering the
experience because it’s intriguing.”

Actually, she was right. Surprised, Colin
said, “Yes. Yes, it was intriguing.”

Her face held a world of fascination. “But,
do those poor fish really have to swim upstream to lay their eggs?
Isn’t that very difficult for them, even without the bears?”

“Yes,” said Colin, surprised by the
question. Apparently she did know what
spawn
meant. “It’s
very difficult. They even have to climb up waterfalls in some
places.”

Her eyebrows dipped a trifle. “Are you
joking with me, Colin? If you are, I don’t appreciate it, because
I’m really interested.”

“No!” Horrified that she would think such a
thing, he hurried on. “Good heavens, no. I so seldom find anyone
who’s interested in my research that I never joke about it.” Or
about anything else, although he didn’t mention that because it
seemed somehow rather pitiful at the moment. It wasn’t his fault
he’d been more interested books than people, although it had made
him a trifle dullish. “Believe me, while the mating ritual of the
salmon might seem strange and to require astonishing vigor and
persistence, it’s far from being the most unusual. The mating life
of species is a fascinating subject. The salmon demonstrate Mr.
Darwin’s theory of survival of the fittest remarkably well.”

Her wide smile made him feel pretty darned
foolish, and he gave himself another mental whap in the chops.
Imagine, speaking about such things with a female. Even an actress.
He ought to have his head examined. Brenda herself seemed far from
shocked, which didn’t surprise him a bit. She was probably used to
hearing more racy talk than this from any number of people.

“I’ll have to look it all up in a book
sometime, I guess,” she said after a very long minute.

Colin grunted.

“You promise you’re not joking about the
salmon?”

“Absolutely not.” His voice was sterner than
it needed to be, but he still suffered from acute
embarrassment.

“I see. Okay, I’ll believe you for awhile,
then—until I find out you’re teasing me.” She gave him one of her
beautiful smiles

“I never tease,” he said solemnly.

“Really?” She ate her last bite of fish. “I
love to tease and joke around.”

Colin might have predicted that. “Yes, I’m
sure.” Thank God they’d veered away from mating rituals.

“But I’ve been on the stage half my life,
and that’s just part of it, I suppose. Theater people are loads of
fun. Sometimes. When they aren’t wanting to commit suicide.”

Her comment, spoken in a casual and easy
way, managed to divert his attention from his own mortification.
His eyebrows soared, and he must have appeared either astonished or
horrified because she laughed gaily.

“It’s true. Theater folks are a sensitive,
high-strung lot for the most part. They have lots of ups and downs,
partly because the business is so uncertain, and partly because
that’s the way they are. They live through their emotions, I
suppose because they have to. I like them a lot. Most of them.”

Hmmm. Colin, who enjoyed learning about
things no matter where they presented themselves, asked, “And are
you like that, too, Brenda? Up and down, I mean. High and low.”

She shrugged, attracting Colin’s attention
to her creamy shoulders and distracting him from the subject under
discussion momentarily.

“Not so much,” she said.

He’d forgotten his question. Fortunately,
she went on without waiting for him to add a comment, so it didn’t
matter.

“I went on the stage because my, family
needed money,” she said matter-of-factly. “My poor mother didn’t
know what to do after my father died. She used to make clothes for
other people, but that didn’t generate much income. I was quite a
pretty girl”—she smiled in so self-deprecating a manner that her
words were free from any hint of vanity—”and I had good hair, so I
went to Bloomingdale’s and applied for a job modeling hats. They
took me on. That was a pretty good job, and steady work, but I got
to talking with some of the other models, and a couple of the girls
and I decided to try our luck at one of the musical comedy theaters
in town. I was very fortunate to be picked up. Thank God I have a
voice. Which, I might add, I’ve been trying to rid of its ghastly
New Yorkness for years now.” She heaved such a heartfelt sigh that
Colin almost believed she was as unpretentious as she sounded.

He caught himself staring at her, blinked,
and turned away. He wished they’d replace the fish course with the
roast beef so he’d have something to do with himself besides fiddle
with his napkin and feel uncomfortable. “I’m, ah, sure that you
were more than merely fortunate. Surely you have talent. You
mentioned your voice, for instance?” He elected not to add that he
was pleased to know she was working on the accent.

Again she shrugged. “I’m no more talented
than lots of other girls. I’m prettier than some, which is another
piece of luck, and I can carry a tune. I guess I have a knack for
projecting personality onstage or something. Some people don’t.
It’s an odd commodity, stage presence. There are many, many people
who are more innately talented than I am, believe me, but they
don’t project it as well.”

He guessed he’d have to believe her, since
he had no means of comparison. He’d never been to a Broadway
production, musical, comedy, drama, or any other sort. He didn’t do
those sorts of things when he was in New York City. He paid visits
to the Museum of Natural History.

However, he couldn’t fight a strong gut
instinct that she was trying to put one over on him. He’d met
perishingly few beautiful, successful women in his day, but he
couldn’t imagine one as beautiful and successful as Brenda
Fitzpatrick being so casual about her own accomplishments. “Um, I’m
sure the competition must have been tremendous,” he offered, hoping
to nudge her natural egotism out of wherever she was keeping it
hidden.

“Oh, sure.” She smiled at the waiter who set
a plate before her. The waiter, a young man probably working at the
lodge for the summer, couldn’t maintain his stony expression in the
face of her smile and turned red.

“Thank you,” Colin said to the waiter,
thereby surprising himself. He seldom thanked waiters because his
mind was generally occupied in thinking about something other than
food when he was eating.

“I’m really kind of a fraud,” Brenda said
after she’d tasted her roast beef “Mmm. This is delicious.”

“A fraud?” Colin stared at her. Then he
recalled the beef. “Yes, it is good.”

She swallowed and began carving another
piece of her meat. “And I suppose it wasn’t fair of me to become so
successful. After all, there are hundreds of women who are dying to
make it big on the stage. I just sort of showed up and got a job,
they liked me, and here I am. I don’t have the ambition a lot of
other actresses have.”

“No? How do you account for your
success?”

“Luck. Luck and timing. And determination. I
can’t discount the fact that we desperately needed the money, and I
was willing to put myself on display to get it. It’s been a good
thing for my family, so I don’t feel too guilty. We could have had
a really hard time of it if I hadn’t had a face and a voice and the
gumption to use them.”

“Er, if you don’t think the question
impertinent, do you mind telling me how old you were when you set
out to earn an income for your family?”

She laughed, a golden, tinkling laugh that
made his head swim for a second. “I don’t mind at all. I was twelve
years old when I started modeling hats. Lucky for all of us, I
looked older when I made myself up, so I could do the live shows in
front of all those female gorgons. Mrs. Vanderbilt.” Brenda
wrinkled her nose, giving Colin some indication of her comic
inclinations. “Mrs. Morgan. I’d almost feel sorry for her if she
wasn’t so darned rich. Imagine, having one’s husband frolic all
over the country with his mistresses in tow, while you hold down
the house. If it’s the Morgans’ house, I suppose a woman can learn
to adjust.”

She laughed again, a wholehearted, gutsy
laugh. “And that nose of his! Why, it just makes me laugh to think
that he considers himself God’s gift to womankind, when if he
weren’t rich, he wouldn’t be able to find a woman to save
himself.”

But Colin’s brain had got clogged back there
in Brenda’s twelfth year. Good God. He couldn’t even imagine a
twelve-year-old girl setting out independently to earn a living for
her family. He began to have a niggling mite of respect for Brenda
Fitzpatrick, although he knew better than to allow it to grow. For
all he knew, this was merely a publicity story she’d developed over
the years to make her softhearted and softheaded fans feel sorry
for her.

He recalled Martin telling him something
about Brenda having supported her family after her father died and
wondered if he was being needlessly hard on her. But no. As a
dedicated researcher, he’d learned to take everything regarding
human nature and its history with a grain of salt. He decided to
take Brenda’s story with two grains. After all, Martin had
undoubtedly heard this story from Brenda’s own lips. Martin, not an
academician, and a good-hearted man into the bargain, wouldn’t have
doubted it for a second.