WHATEVER THE WOMEN HAD BEEN DOING UPSTAIRS HAD evidently refreshed them, because they were all in high, if not raucous, good spirits when they returned.
The fuss they made upon entering would have wakened the dead, but at that it was barely sufficient to awaken their menfolk. Ponsonby’s Augustan sonorities had done much to dissipate whatever tensions the company entertained—so much, indeed, that about half the company was sound asleep. Perkins had adroitly extracted half-spent cigars from a number of gently snoring mouths, preventing them from either being swallowed or falling out and burning holes in perfectly good cummerbunds.
Waking the gang was clearly thought to be women’s work, and the women set about it with a vengeance, emitting shrill, drill-like peals of laughter and administering pinches, jabs, and an occasional well-aimed kick, as the occasion required.
One by one the men awoke, several of them exhibiting traces of surliness at the sight of their mates. Most of them simply sat and blinked, trying to get their bearings.
While I was watching them blink, Cindy came and stood at my elbow. She looked pleased, but it was hard to know what she was thinking. Her healthy smell held few clues.
“I can’t imagine why I brought you to a respectable party,” she said. “We could have just fucked.”
We both looked at Cunny Cotswinkle, who was going at her husband with such a vengeance that it was hard to tell whether her intent was to wake him up or beat him to death.
Cotswinkle had falled into a deep sleep—probably dreaming peacefully of Yalta, or the Treaty of Versailles, something appropriate to his years and eminence; but his wife was not disposed to let him dream in peace. To put it brutally, she was slapping the shit out of him, as John C. V. Ponsonby looked on with what was possibly meant to be a smile.
“Jake’s waiting for him to die,” Cindy explained.
“Why?”
“Jake’s writing his autobiography,” she said. “It’s called ‘The Last Professional.’ Actually, it’s finished, but he can’t publish it while Dunny’s alive, because Dunny’s a professional, too. I hope I’m around when he finally publishes it.”
“Eager to read it, huh?” I said.
“Are you kidding?” Cindy said. “I just wanta go to the parties. All the right people will give him parties. They do anyway, but these will be better parties. People from London and Paris will have to fly over.”
“Why is Mrs. Cotswinkle beating her husband?” I asked.
“That’s plain as a peanut,” Cindy said. “She just found out he’s fucking Oblivia Brown.”