to the coast.
The three islands of grass are surrounded by white cement curbs, and the graveled driveways curve around and between the islands as well as in a direct path in front of every cabin. Each island of lawn has three small Chinese elm trees, and the nine trees form a prim, straight row.
In front of the motel is a big green and red neon sign which says "Moonrise Motel." Directly beneath that is a smaller sign saying "no vacancy," or, if the metal cover is over the "no," saying "vacancy." The sign is double; each "no" has a cover.
Behind the four rear cabins which face the highway is half an acre of rocky, desert ground, with a bumpy private road on one side leading from our driveways back through one of the open angles of the U to the dirt road, Williams street, at the end of our property line, which runs parallel with the highway and leads into town.
I wandered out behind the rear cabins and looked at our big back yard. After six years of living in the crowded outskirts of a big city, that barren half-acre looked like a little chunk of heaven. It was a safety valve as far as the busy highway was concerned. We would fix it up so that the children could play out here happily and safely. We could plant an orchard. We could even build a little house out here for Grandma. The opportunities presented by that half acre of ground were limitless. But that would all come in the future. Right now, there was the present to consider.
I stood at the edge of the highway and looked in each direction. We are nearly a mile from the business district of Banning, and that mile is thick with motels. Directly west of us is a new restaurant, and east, toward the desert, there are only a few motels between us and the Mojave. Across the highway are a cocktail lounge, several small motels and two service-station markets. Beyond those, I saw the beautiful ranges of mountains, with the afternoon sun forming little cups of shadow, like dark dimples, on their steep sides–Mt. San Gorgonio towering on the north, and Mt. San Jacinto rearing its lovely head on the south.
I breathed deeply. Banning had a scent all its own, one I had noticed before–a scent compounded of freshness and clear skies and blossoms, and the essence of the mountains. My tour of inspection completed, I went back into our cabin. It was small, but so attractive and so new that living in it, I thought, should be more pleasant than in our old home in Los Angeles. There was a large living room, which contained, besides the usual amount of living room furniture, the bed we would sleep on; a small kitchen, and a bathroom and closet; and the adjoining garage at the time was half converted into a bedroom–that is, two windows and a cement floor had been put in it, and a door connected it with the living room. Unfinished as that bedroom was, the children would have to sleep in it.
The office was actually the partitioned-off front part of the children's bedroom. It was completed, and plastered to match the rest of the interior, with dull red broadfelt carpeting like that in all the cabins. There was a large built-in desk in the office–chest high, to be stood at rather than sat at–with registration cards and a desk set on top of it.
We finished unpacking and storing our belongings in the few inadequate drawers and shelves. Donna was still asleep in her crib, and David was out exploring.
Grant and I sat down and looked at each other.
Grant has blue eyes and coarse brown hair, just as I do. Our children never had a chance to have different coloring; they, too, have brown hair and blue eyes. David has long black curly lashes, and thick hair, while Donna's hair is so fine it won't even hold a bobby pin or a ribbon. It grows straight forward on her head, and usually hangs down over her face. We call her "Little Chief Hair-in-the-Face." I have consistently refused to have her hair cut into bangs, in spite of the arguments of Grant and Grandma. "It'll grow long enough to curl or braid one of these days," I always tell them.
"Well," Grant said, "it's five o'clock–about time we were getting our first customer."
He is tall and slenderly built, and so wonderfully competent–even if he isn't very systematic–that I always feel awkward by contrast. But I never in my life felt so helpless as when, just as he finished speaking, we heard the scrunch of tires on the graveled driveway outside.
"Oh, someone's coming," I said nervously. "You go see who it is. You go."
I sat in a corner of the living room where I could hear and not be seen from the office. I alternately twisted my hands and bit my nails as Grant opened the office door and stepped out to meet the driver of the car. This was a momentous occasion. I strained to hear as the men began to speak.
"This motel's just changed hands, hasn't it?"
"Yep, that's right."
"Well, I've got something here that I know will interest you, as the new owner. A revolutionary kind of vacuum cleaner … cuts your work and your cleaning bill in half … no motel owner should be without one."
I sighed and relaxed.
If the rule is true that women are the worst gossips, Grant must be the exception that proves that rule. He can outtalk any woman; he has more endurance, more lung power, and far more enthusiasm, when it comes to a prolonged conversation on any subject, than any avid old lady, or any young girl draped about a telephone. This habit of his annoys me, partly because he usually indulges it just when I have some work for him to do, and partly because I am jealous of his ability to get along well with everyone. I have such a shy nature that I am seldom able to get past the polite amenities with anyone whom I have known less than three years … a great disadvantage for anyone as extremely inquisitive and curious as I.
Being so talkative, and so unable to end a conversation, Grant is easy prey for salesmen. That is, although he seldom buys what they are trying to sell, he lets them waste hours of his time.
When Grant finally got rid of the vacuum cleaner salesman, I went in to get the baby. The conversation about vacuum cleaners had awakened her. It wasn't, I realized, the last time that noises from the office, so close to her bed, would awaken her.
I fixed dinner, clumsy in a new, differently arranged kitchen. While I washed dishes, Grant dried them, and there followed an uneasy evening during which we both pretended to read, but actually sat straining to hear above the children's voices the sound of a car driving into our driveway.
The sun was sinking, and the mountains were clothed in soft shadows. I stood looking out the kitchen window, which faced the darkened east, and I saw the neon sign of the second motel from us turned on. It was a big, impressive sign, with the name of the motel–the Peacock–in bright red letters, and a green "vacancy" sign above it. There was the likeness of a huge, stately, graceful peacock above the name of the motel, blazoned in bright blue and red neon.
"Our sign!" I exclaimed suddenly. "It's time to turn it on!"
Grant had thought of it the same instant I had, and, like greedy children with a new toy, we rushed to the dark office. The light switches–five of them–were side by side in a neat and very confusing little row on the wall behind the desk.
I yanked Grant's outstretched hand aside. "I want to do it!"
He offered a compromise. "We'll take turns once."
"All right. Me first!"
I hovered over the switches with loving indecision. Finally I pushed up the one on the extreme right.
The office light beamed suddenly on us from the ceiling. "Oh, that isn't fair!" I cried. "I didn't know that was the office light–I didn't–"
"You had your turn," Grant said firmly. He reached out one thin brown finger and flipped up the switch that was second from the left. I looked out the window woefully. Sure enough, he had lit up the "Moonrise Motel"
