IT HAD BEEN a long morning, Dr. Chapman reflected as he chewed the last of the corned-beef sandwich and sipped the lukewarm coffee in the paper cup.
He sat at the head of the polished table, in the upstairs conference room of The Briars' Women's Association, and Paul and Horace sat to his right, and Cass to his left, all finishing the sandwiches Benita had brought in for them.
Dr. Chapman watched Paul, who was reading the sports page of a Los Angeles morning paper as he ate, and he wondered exactly what had transpired between Paul and Dr. Victor Jonas.
Dr. Chapman had waited up an hour past his usual bedtime, the night before, to hear from Paul, but near midnight, dozing off in the motel chair, he had finally given up and gone to bed. In the morning, they were all together before breakfast, and he had not wished to question Paul in front of the others. Going to their cars, he had touched Paul's elbow, and they had fallen behind and were momentarily alone. He had inquired, in an undertone, about Dr. Jonas, and Paul had shaken his head and said he did not think there was much hope there. Benita, arms filled with folders, had dashed in and interrupted, and Paul had promised to give a full account after dinner.
They had arrived at the Association building around half past eight. The rooms, prepared the day before, were ready, and between ten minutes to nine and nine o'clock when the first three women arrived, Paul, Horace, and Cass had been in their respective sound-proof offices, waiting.
The results of the morning's sampling were beside Dr. Chap-man's paper plate. Six lengthy questionnaires with the Solresol answers penciled in, so that each page appeared to have been sprinkled with alphabet soup and shorthand symbols. Crump-ling his napkin, Dr. Chapman dropped it on his plate and picked up the half-dozen sheets. The completeness of them, the solidity of these sex histories, always reassured him. They gave him a feeling of accomplishment, of going ahead, of adding to the world's knowledge. Often, at moments like this, the word immortality danced inside his head, and that gave him pleasure and, at last, displeasure (for his life was dedicated to the common weal, and personal vanity was too petty), and always he pushed it from his mind.
He scanned the top questionnaire and went slowly through the others, interpreting the foreign language known only to the four. The answers were the customary ones, although here and there a reply arrested his attention. After several minutes, Dr. Chapman placed the questionnaire beside his plate again. "Very good," he said. "No discards." He glanced at his watch. It was seven minutes before one o'clock. "Well, gentlemen, back to your stations. The women'll be here any minute."
Wearily, Cass rubbed his forehead. "Damn migraine," he complained.
"Less than two weeks to go," said Horace. "Just think of those poor analysts."
Paul pushed back his chair. "It hasn't been so bad. We may even miss it when we're done."
"Speak for yourself," said Cass. "I wasn't built for life in a gynecocracy."
They started for the door.
Somewhat winded, Ursula Palmer reached the top of the staircase. She leaned against the wall to catch her breath. Her gold wrist watch told her it was a minute before one o'clock.
All the way from her house to Romola Place she had been thinking of Bertram Foster's exciting offer. Fantasy had crowded fantasy: Time—"the miracle drug that has revived Houseday and doubled its circulation is California-born Ursula Palmer, a classical beauty with a salary of $100,000 annually"; Vogue—"U. Palmer, far and away the woman of the year"; Winchell—"Ursula P., hear tell, has taken over a palatial Bucks manse"; Mike Wallace—"and next week we have a real treat for you"; New Yorker's Talk of the Town—"decided to drop in on the cocktail party, and we had to push through layers of celebrities paying homage to the sacred object, Truman Capote, Jean Kerr, John Houston, Dean Acheson, Cole Porter, Leland Hayward, Fanny Holtzmann, the Duchess of Windsor, to find at last, behind her desk, champagne goblet in hand, that striking, brittle female publisher who .. ." Not until Ursula entered the cool Association building did she remind herself that it had not happened yet, but that it would and could if she kept her eyes and ears open and recorded the story properly.
Now, composing herself, she felt a guilt pang at not having told Harold of Foster's offer. She had instinctively avoided revealing the news, because it might create a scene. Occasionally, and in no predictable manner, Harold would redden in anger and stiffen and be disagreeable. His infrequent obeisance to Manhood. She could face such a scene, should it occur, and win, but she wanted no showdown over something that was not yet a reality. Once this interview was over, and she gave Foster her notes, she was sure that it would be settled. Foster's childish eagerness to see the unadorned notes irked her only briefly. It was little enough, she decided. Look at all those famous actresses. At one time or another, they had been forced to display more than notes of their sex lives.
The thought of notes reminded her of her job. She opened her purse, took out the small pad—two pages already filled with "a suburban housewife's" feeling on the morning of The Interview—and then located the pencil. Hastily, she wrote: "Wore lace silk blouse, powder-blue skirt, because felt consciously feminine, like schoolgirl first date; left house twenty minutes nine, arrived minute early; thoughts: never talked sex anyone except husband, not even all him, can I tell to stranger —knees weak as mounted steps." Her knees weren't weak, of course, and her thoughts had not been about the interview but rather about the result of it, but these notes were what House-day readers would expect.
She tucked pad and pencil back into her purse, briskly turned the corner, and proceeded up the corridor. Ahead she could see a pale, angular girl, in a gray suit, waiting behind a desk that had been moved into the corridor.
Ursula reached the desk. "How do you do. Am I late?"
Benita Selby shook her head. "No, the other two women arrived just before you." She inspected an open ledger. "You're Mrs. Ursula Palmer?"
"Yes."
"You'll be in office C, at the end of the hall. The interviewer is ready for you."
Benita Selby placed an ink check after Ursula's name and rose. She started to the rear with Ursula following closely. "What's the interviewer's name?" asked Ursula.
Benita seemed surprised. No one had ever asked that before. "Why, Dr. Horace Van Duesen."
"What's his background?"
"He's eminently qualified, I assure you."
"I'm certain of that."
"He's been with Dr. Chapman almost from the beginning. He was on the bachelor survey, too."
"What was his specialty before that?"
"Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Reardon College."
"Good God, deliver me," said Ursula, but Benita did not see the joke.
They had reached the office. Benita opened the door, and Ursula went inside. Ursula remembered the small room, painted aquamarine. It was here that the Association mimeographed its monthly bulletin. A large folding screen, almost six feet in height, its five panels or leaves open, divided much of the room, hiding what was behind. Ursula observed the screen closely. The upper half of each panel, inside the wooden frame, was made up of basket-woven cane, and the lower half of solid walnut. The panels were joined, top to bottom, by piano hinges, obviously to obscure any view through the cracks.
"Your own screen?" Ursula asked Benita.
"Yes. They were designed by Dr. Chapman and custom made for maximum concealment. Dr. Chapman studied choir screens, Georgian screens, even Chinese imperial jade screens, before he decided upon this. He's very thorough, you know."
Ursula nodded, and inspected the dark-brown leather pull-up chair, with wooden arms, that faced the screen, and the table with ceramic ash tray beside it.
"Right here," said Benita, indicating the chair.
Ursula settled herself in the chair, purse in her lap. As she did so, she noticed for the first time a square leather box, small and maroon, at her feet.
She nudged it with a sandal. "What's this?"
"The SE box," said Benita. "Special Exhibits."
At once, Ursula remembered Dr. Chapman's reference to it during the lecture. He had said that there was a category of questions to which the subject replied after reacting to exhibits from the mysterious box. "Oh, well," said Ursula, "as long as nothing jumps out and makes a pass—"
"I assure you—" said Benita, distressed, but then she saw that Ursula had been joking, and she smiled foolishly. Anxious to avoid any further exchange, she went to the screen. "Mrs. Palmer is here, Dr. Van Duesen."
"How do you do, Mrs. Palmer," said the disembodied precise voice from behind the screen.
"Hello, there," replied Ursula cheerfully. She looked up at Benita and whispered, "What's he got back there?"
"He's seated at a card table with several pencils and a questionnaire. Nothing more."
"No special brainwashing equipment?"
"Really, Mrs. Palmer, it's all quite simple."
"May I smoke?"
"Of course," said Benita, and then she added more loudly, "Well, I'll leave you two now."
She went out the door, shutting it softly behind her.
"Just make yourself comfortable," said Horace's voice. "Whenever you're ready—"
"In a few seconds. I'm trying to find a cigarette." She found one in her purse, lighted it, then took out her pad and pencil and held them ready. "Okay," she said, "I'm as ready as I'll ever be."
"Very well," said Horace's voice. "Try to answer all the questions to the best of your ability, and as accurately as possible. Take time to think. And, of course, say as much as you wish to say. If something is not clear to me, I'll let you know. If a question is not clear to you, let me know. And be assured, please, that the answers I mark are put down in Solresol and will be seen by no one except Dr. Chapman and his associates."
"I have a poor memory," she lied, "so you'll have to give me a little time." She had to allow for her note-taking. Quickly, she began to jot down her interviewer's name and background and some of his last speech.
"Of course," said Horace's voice.
"Fire away, Gridley."
There was a moment's silence. Then, evenly, without accenting word or phrase, Horace's voice resumed.
"Your age, please?"
"Must I? Forty-one."
"Your educational background?"
"High school. Two years of junior college. I went no further because I wanted to write. I'm a writer and editor.”
“Place of birth?"
"Sioux City, Iowa."
"How long have you lived in California?"
"We moved here when I was three."
"What is your current religious affiliation?"
"Episcopalian."
"Would you characterize yourself as a regular churchgoer, an irregular one, or one who seldom or never attends?”
“Umm . . I'd say—make it irregular."
"Irregular?"
"Yes."
"Fine. Now then, your marital status?"
"Meaning what?"
"Are you presently married?"
"Oh, yes."
"Were you married before?"
"Yes. Once. For three months."
"What was your first husband's occupation?"
"He wrote advertising copy when I met him. He intended to become president of the company. He became unemployed instead. He drank, slept, and read want ads through our entire marriage."
"Children?"
"One. Devin. He's all I got out of my first marriage. He's nineteen now. Studying engineering at Purdue in Indiana."
"Oh, yes ... Have you had children by your present husband?"
"No."
"How long have you been married to this husband?”
“Sixteen years."
"His occupation?"
"Accountant. He just opened his own firm"
"And you say you're a writer and editor? Are you active now?"
"Very much so. I represent a New York magazine out here." She was writing down his questions. Her own answers, she could fill in later.
"Now—" said the voice.
"Would you hold it a moment?"
"Certainly."
She caught up on her notes. "All right."
"We'll begin with a series of questions on your pre-adolescent period. These may be the most difficult for you to remember. You can have all the time you require."
Ursula waited impatiently. Who gives a damn about preadolescence? Not Foster, not the public, and not herself. Ursula wanted to skip all preliminaries, reach the provocative part of it, the part that guaranteed a cover line.
"Can you recollect at what age you first masturbated to orgasm?"
Ursula frowned. This is for Houseday? "Whoever did a thing like that?" she said with forced lightness.
"It's usual in pre-adolescence, between three and thirteen, and not unusual after."
This was ridiculous, even offensive, and at once she remembered when. Perhaps it had not been the first time, but it was the time she remembered clearly. There had been company that night, the resonant older voices from the living room, a thin wafer of light shining through the slit of door into her bedroom, and she wide awake in her new polka-dot flannel nightgown. "I was just trying to recall it," she said at last. "I must have been seven or eight—no, make it eight."
"Can you describe the method?"
The half-forgotten memory, now high-lighted by the stark frame of maturity, repelled her. How could this immature trivia be of any use to anyone? Nevertheless, the disembodied voice had disembodied ears, and they were waiting. In a firm, businesslike tone of voice, she described what she had done at eight.
The questions on pre-adolescent behavior went on in this vein for ten minutes, and Ursula found it difficult to hide her impatience. All of this was a waste of precious time, in terms of Houseday's million readers, and Ursula's answers became testier and testier. At last, having revealed that she had menstruated at twelve, she was relieved to graduate to premarital petting. She had too few pages of notes, but now she was sure that she would make up the lack.
"How would you define petting?" she heard Horace ask.
This was interesting—it would fascinate mothers and daughters who read Houseday—and she considered it. "Why, I suppose everything that might arouse you, short of actually doing anything final."
"Yes, but perhaps I had better be more exact."
He defined the component parts of petting. For Ursula, who had never seriously thought about these acts before—at least, not that she could definitely recall—the explicit vocabulary of science made it seem vulgar and unlovely. Nevertheless, she recorded the discussion. Foster must be served. The public, also. Anyway, her typewriter would make it more palatable, sand it down, buff it, varnish it, until the little word Galateas would be acceptable in any family living room.
He was inquiring if she had ever achieved satisfaction through petting.
"You mean the first time?"
"Yes."
"In high school, when I was a senior. I suppose you want to know how old I was? Seventeen. Does that mean I was retarded?"
No comment from the screen on her jocularity. Instead: "What was the method?"
That damn method, again. Curtly, she explained.
"Where was this done?" he asked.
"In his car. We parked in the hills, and got in the back seat. I thought I loved him, but then I changed my mind and—well, we just petted."
There was note-taking on both sides of the screen, and then the questions and answers continued, and, at last, they reached the subject of premarital intimacy.
"Three partners," she was saying.
"Where did these take place?"
"The first two in their apartments. And with the last one in motels."
"Were any one of these the men you finally married?"
"The second affair—he became my first husband."
"But no premarital experience with your present husband?"
"God, no. Harold wouldn't think of doing a thing like that before. The first affair was a college kid, when I was in school. Then—well, my other husband, the one who wrote copy—we were in the same office—it was my first job. The last one was after I had to go back to work—I was his secretary—for a short time."
"Did you reach orgasm on any of these occasions? If so—”
“No," she interrupted.
"During these intimacies, were you partially clothed or in the nude?"
"Nude."
"When did these intimacies most frequently occur—morning, afternoon, evening, night?"
"Well, I suppose you'd call it evening."
"Most often, was an artificial means used to prevent conception?"
"Yes."
"Did your partner use a contraceptive, or did you, or did both of you? Or did your partner practice Noyes' theory of male continence?"
"The men always used contraceptives."
"Now, returning to the actual act, in regard to method—" Ursula's upper lip was damp: heaven protect the poor working girl. And then she realized that her fingers were gripping the pencil so hard that they seemed bloodless, and that she had not made a single note in five minutes. Desperately, she tried to relax, to remember, to write.
"...name the one of these most frequently employed by you?"
She named one in a voice strangely not her own. She wrote and, writing, wondered what Bertram Foster would think.
When Ursula Palmer emerged into the sunlight of Romola Place at twenty minutes after two, she felt slightly let down and concerned, as she so often felt after sex and almost never after writing. The feeling was something that she could not precisely define. It seemed that there was more to be said that had not been said, though exactly what she could not imagine. The questions had covered every possible experience, and she had replied to all honestly. Yet, now, there was a hangover of an insoluble business uncompleted, and it was bothersome, for she was not sure if it involved the questions about sexual behavior or the behavior itself. The good part of it, of course, was the notes. Toward the end, she had been professional and put everything to paper, and already she could see that—with discretion and imagination—it would write well.
Her original intent had been to hurry home after the interview and transcribe the entire adventure while it was fully alive in her mind. But, at the moment, standing before the building entrance, she suddenly had no desire to relive the interview so quickly. It could wait until evening or tomorrow morning. She felt the need to be outside, among people, and not alone with the notes.
Remembering that she was almost out of stamps, she decided to cross the street to the post office and buy a roll. After that, she would see. There were a dozen household chores she had neglected since Foster's arrival. She crossed the street and was about to climb the concrete steps to the post office when she saw Kathleen Ballard appear at the top of the stairs and descend.
She waited. "Hello, Kathleen."
"Why, Ursula—"
"I was just across the street—delivering a rich and entertaining discourse on What Every Young Girl Gets to Know."
Puzzled, Kathleen looked across the street, then back at Ursula, and then her eyes widened. "You mean you've had your interview already?"
"I had it," said Ursula dryly.
"Oh, I'm dying to hear everything. I don't mean anything private, but what goes on, what they ask—"
"You've come to the right party. You are speaking to a veteran of the Chapman cabal rites."
"'They're interviewing me Thursday afternoon. Is it awful?"
Ursula did not want to discuss it, yet she did not want to lose Kathleen. "Let's find someplace to sit," she said. "Do you have time?"
"Deirdre's in dancing class. But I don't have to pick her up until three-thirty."
"Well, then, I'll give you the Palmer Abridged Version, skipping lightly over adolescent sex play and sundries, and concentrating mainly on coitus—yes, my dear, that's the word this season; learn to love it—coitus, marital, extramarital, and sort of marital."
"You mean they actually make you—" Kathleen's eagerness had given way to anxiety.
"They make you do nothing," said Ursula crisply. "We're all volunteers. Remember? Like Major Reed's yellow fever guinea pigs. All right, let's walk over to The Crystal Room. According to my prescription, this should be taken with something on the stomach."
Those healthy, dull young women, Cass Miller thought. Slouching beside the card table, one leg crossed over the other, his pencil found the question he had just asked. "Have you ever engaged in premarital intimacies?" His pencil hooked the cipher into the blank square, and the cipher meant, to four of them, "No." This, of course ruled out the next dozen questions.
These young women were all of a type, Cass decided, as he gloomily stared at the long sheet. Coast to coast, it was the same. In the East, the type was small and keen or horsey and well mannered, with dark bangs and big bosoms and legs that were good for lacrosse. They had been to Bennington and Barnard and would marry Ivy League boys, who would later drink too much at lunch, and they merged into Perfect Hostess, Tennis Anyone, Bermuda, and Normal Outlook. In the West the type was well dressed, tall and thin, with tangled boyish hair more sun-bleached than blond, and flat breasts and bony spines and bottoms. They had been to Stanford and Switzerland and would marry intense young professional men, and they merged into Conjugal Partnership, Golf Lessons, Santa Barbara, and Outdoor Living.
He had caught one of the latter. Cass's eyes scanned what was already written. Mrs. Mary Ewing McManus. Twenty-two. University of Southern California. Born in Los Angeles. Lutheran. Regular churchgoer. Presently married. First husband. Two years. Husband an attorney. Housewife.
His gaze continued down the page. Pre-adolescent heterosexual play. Routine. Premarital petting confined to kissing and brief breast contact. Usual. Petting always halted early. And finally, now, premarital intercourse—never. Dull. Dull as dishwater.
Cass knew that the rest was predictable. Nevertheless, the Great White Father and the STC machine must be served. He looked up at the cane folding screen, with little interest in Mrs. Mary Ewing McManus behind it, and resumed in the tired voice that she mistook for scientific objectivity. "Next, we have a series of questions on marital coitus—in short, the sex history of your marriage. What is the frequency of your lovemaking at the present time?"
"Well…"
"I know it varies. But can you strike an average per week or month?"
"My husband and I make love on the average of three times a week," said Mary clearly and proudly.
Cass detected the pride. Sardonically amused, he moved his pencil across the page. Children of this class, perhaps the young in general, were always proud of their frequency ratio, their vigor, their tireless acrobatics, as if they had discovered sex and planted a flag upon it and owned it exclusively. In twenty years, it would be once a week, if that, and she would wonder why her husband always had to work late nights, and she would take to heavier make-up and thinner dresses and a querulous note and wish that her husband's new young business partner would be more attentive to her.
"Do you engage in petting before intercourse?" asked Cass.
"Oh, yes."
"Can you describe what you do?"
"I . . . I don't know—I mean, it's hard to explain."
Nevertheless, hesitantly, but with Cass's encouragement, she described the preliminaries of love. Left breathless at the daring discussion of it, she was relieved that further necessity for exposition was done.
But no sooner had Mary relaxed than she was intimidated by a new series of queries on the act of marital love itself.
"I don't know exactly," she found herself saying. "A couple of times we timed it, just for fun."
"Well, how long did it take?"
"Once, three or four minutes, and then five minutes—about five minutes—and, the other time, the last I looked, it was almost ten minutes, but then I forgot to look again—maybe it was eleven or twelve minutes."
"Can you guess at an average?"
"Five minutes."
Steadily, Cass translated to symbols the mingled shy and boastful details of young love.
Often, in his mind, he mocked the naiveté of her worldliness, and several times he suffered the emotion of grudging envy.
"During the act of love, does it arouse you to watch your husband?" he asked.
"I don't watch."
"But when you do?"
"It makes me happy, yes."
Automatically, Cass recorded the replies, glancing down the remainder of the page and estimating that it would be fifteen minutes more and that they would be done at three-forty-five. He wondered if he could hurry it. He had the pressure and throb over his right temple, the usual prelude to migraine, and he wanted to lie down for ten minutes before the next interview at four o'clock. Well, what was left? The series of questions on extramarital experiences. Then the short second category on psychological attitudes. And, finally, the third category on reactions to sex stimuli. He was tempted to omit most of what remained. He could accurately forecast her answers. Several times recently he had been so tempted. But again, as before, remembering Dr. Chapman's persistent warning that all standard questions be read fully, he repressed the notion. Instead, for variety, he decided to skip to the third category and return to the rest later.
He found the place on the page.
"Do you see the maroon box at your feet?"
"Yes."
"Open it. Take out the first photograph on top. Study it for a moment."
He heard her fumble with the lid, then remove the photograph. He heard her strained silence.
"What do you see? I want to be sure you have the right one.”
“It's a . . . a picture of a classical statue—Greek, I suppose."
"A nude adult male and rather handsome," added Cass. "Is that right?"
"Yes."
"The Hermes of Praxiteles. Now to the question. Does observation of the nude male in that photograph arouse you at all?" Inevitably, the statistical summary to date came to mind. "Four percent are strongly aroused, eleven percent only somewhat, and eighty-five percent not at all." Her answer would be no.
"No," said Mary through the screen.
But Cass had already marked the answer before hearing it, and, stifling a yawn with the back of his hand, wishing he were free to take something for his head, he moved the pencil point down to the next question.
When Mary McManus arrived at the parking lot, hardly aware of walking the block from the Association building, she found the new Nash Rambler that was her father's anniversary gift and settled herself behind the wheel. She made no effort to turn the ignition key. She sat, holding the wheel with both hands, trying to sort out her emotions.
As in her attendance of Dr. Chapman's lecture, which had disappointed, she had expected something practical and useful for herself from the interview, and now realized that again she was disappointed. The past hour and five minutes had been far different from what she had anticipated. Her two years of marriage to Norman, in every respect normal if one believed those marriage manuals, had convinced her that she was sexually sophisticated. But now she saw that her father had been right (as ever). The interview, with questions bold, intimidating, and generally startling, had been an unexpected ordeal.
Yet, reviewing it, she could not find a single inquiry that had been either improper or salacious. Nor had she been interrogated about a single matter that she had not, at some time, personally experienced or heard about or read about. Until this afternoon, the act of love had been the most natural thing on earth. But the persistent and detailed questions about every aspect of it—foreplay, position, those proddings about the climax—behavior she had never before dwelt upon—seemed to inflate the natural act beyond previous proportions.
Now, thinking it through, beyond the spinning bewilderment, she began to see that her sexual life with Norman—how much she adored him! how special he was!—was not merely one more gift of growing up, one more activity appended to the threesome that had so long been father, mother, daughter, the Ewing family. Rather, it was an act of serious importance that stood alone and concerned only the husband and wife, the McManus family. It seemed to be the one pleasure that was peculiarly her own, that could not be superimposed upon her previous existence. For the first time, she understood that the intimacy she shared and enjoyed with Norman, suddenly so complicated and unique, had no relationship to the old family or the old way but was part of a new family and a new way that cleaved her sharply from the recent past.
Until this moment, nothing else had been entirely her own. The steering wheel beneath her hands, the miniature sedan that coolly enclosed her, were cords binding her to the safe, dependent, ancient life, as did her features, her blood, her memories. When Norman had wanted to purchase the used Buick on payments, her father had ridiculed the idea and generously surprised them with the new Nash. Her father had given Norman a ready-made career, future unlimited, and saved him and both of them the inevitable struggle that would have resulted had Norman plunged headlong into that romantic partnership with Chris Shearer. And the whole mature concept of remaining unburdened by children, until they were older, saner, more secure, had been the fruits of her father's wisdom. Yes, everything, it seemed, was tied to what she had been, was still part of, except the answers she had given to questions in that room of the Association building.
She reached for the dashboard and turned the key. The motor caught at once and hummed quietly. Even before the interview she had planned to visit her father afterward. She had felt guilty and unhappy in siding with Norman against him, in rebelling against his proved judgment by submitting to the interview. She had felt that the least she could do would be to heal the hurt. After the interview, she had told herself earlier, she would casually drop in on him at the plant, as she had so often before, and then father and daughter would chat of many things, in the old familiar way, not mentioning the interview but both tacitly understanding that she owed something to Norman's authority although still (as evident) her father's daughter.
But when she wheeled the small sedan out of the lot and drove down Romola Place to Sunset Boulevard, she knew that part of her plan, the most essential part, had been changed.
Inexplicably, her need was for Norman this moment, not for her father. She must find Norman, her poor darling, and go into his arms, and tell him how much she loved him.
She steered off the Sunset ramp onto the freeway, proceeding in the slow lane, behind trucks, until the freeway merged with Sepulveda. Riding south, past the International Airport, she presently made out the towering sign in the distance that read Ewing Manufacturing Company. After parking in the executive section, she hastened, in long strides, toward the imposing entrance and left behind the sticky outer air for the chilled interior of the plant's main corridor.
She was hurrying up the corridor toward Norman's office, in the wing behind her father's suite, when she saw Miss Damerel emerge from the ladies' room. Miss Damerel, whose hair was iron gray and severely shingled, whose suits were iron gray and sharply cut, was Harry Ewing's private secretary and had been such for more than twenty years.
"Why, Mary," Miss Damerel called out, "it's so nice you could drop by. Your father will be pleased to see you."
For a split second, Mary's step faltered, the stimulus of an elder's voice imposing upon her Pavlov's conditioned reflex, and then, with an effort of will greater than she realized that she possessed, she nodded and blindly hurried on. She knew that Miss Damerel was watching her, surprised and disapproving. She also knew that Miss Damerel would tell her father. But today Mary McManus did not care. She did not care at all.
At night, Villa Neapolis was illuminated by rows of blue and yellow lights shining from the roofs of the terraces on two levels, and by four hooded white floodlights projected from steel poles at the corners of the swimming pool. Seen at a distance, because the motel was on a hill against an arch of blue-black sky, the dots of colored light appeared to be a galaxy of artificial stars in a man-made firmament. But up near, from the vantage point of the pool, the effect was quite different. It was like setting up housekeeping under a mammoth Christmas tree, Paul Radford decided, as he came out of the shadowed dining room into the blaze of rainbow colors.
He had been preceded into the patio by Benita Selby, who had changed for dinner and was wearing a lilac Orlon sweater, new, over a sleeveless pale blue dress, old, and he was followed by Dr. Chapman, lighting his cigar, and Horace and Cass.
By mutual agreement, they had dined late, meeting at eight-thirty and eating at two tables joined together and lighted by four candles. The first day of interviewing had been, as it usually was in every new community, completely enervating, and this, combined with a constant sensibility of Dr. Chapman's dictum that the day's interviews not be gossiped about in his presence, reduced sociability to sporadic small talk and prolonged gaps of silence.
Once they were in the patio again, Cass wondered aloud if the two rented automobiles were spoken for. Benita said that she had to catch up on her journal and then write a letter. This same letter she wrote five nights a week to her invalid mother in Beloit, Wisconsin. Horace thought that he might want one of the cars. There was a movie in Westwood that he wished to see. Dr. Chapman told Cass that he could have the other car, since he and Paul were going to finish some work.
After Horace and Cass had gone off to the garages, and Benita had returned to her room, Dr. Chapman led Paul to a pair of wicker chairs near the hibiscus bushes at the far end of the pool. The patio was relatively quiet now, except for the two couples playing a vocal game of gin rummy behind the diving board. But now they were far enough away so that the card players' groans and hilarity were indistinct.
Dr. Chapman loosened his leather belt, rolling his cigar from one corner of his mouth to the other, and Paul filled his briar pipe and lighted it.
"Well, I've been waiting to hear about you and Victor Jonas," said Dr. Chapman. "All I got from you this morning was that there wasn't much hope." He searched Paul's face. "Does that mean some hope or no hope?"
"No hope," said Paul flatly and unmistakably.
Dr. Chapman grunted. "I see," he said. He stared down at the flagstone, thinking. At last, he said, "Tell me what happened."
Paul told him the events of the previous evening concisely and bluntly. He described Dr. Jonas, his wife, his sons, his house. He repeated parts of the early conversation in the rear bungalow, the parts where Dr. Jonas had deduced that Paul had been sent to do Dr. Chapman's "dirty work," and where Paul had defended Dr. Chapman's honesty, omitting only Dr. Jonas' remark that he was glad Paul had come alone. Then Paul related how he had been taken fully off guard by Dr. Jonas' knowledge of the work in progress.
Dr. Chapman's head lifted up and his eyes narrowed. "How can he know what we're doing?"
"That's exactly what I asked him. He said you were filing carbons of your female findings with the Zollman Foundation_"
Paul halted, and waited for an explanation. Dr. Chapman met his gaze frankly. "Yes, that's true. They're meeting before our report will be ready, and I decided it would be in our favor to keep them up to scratch."
"But the work's not ready—it's raw."
"They're not children. There are scientists in the Foundation. They know how to read and project unfinished data. I'm sure it'll serve us."
"Then it's serving Jonas, too. The minority group at Zollman who hired him—they sent him photostats—"
"Bastards," said Dr. Chapman. "They'll do anything." He was livid. Paul could not remember ever seeing him this way before.
"I suppose all is fair—"
"The hell it is," said Dr. Chapman. "What did he say about the new material?"
"He was very frank about that and about the bachelor survey. He put all his cards on the table—or most of them.”
“Like what?"
Paul summarized Dr. Jonas' objections, recounting all that he could now recall, except Dr. Jonas' remarks that Dr. Chapman was too much a politician and publicist to be a pure scientist. When Paul had finished, he saw that Dr. Chapman was chewing his cold cigar bitterly.
"I hope you didn't take all this lying down," said Dr. Chapman.
"It was give and take. He hits hard, but I counter-punched. He never conceded that we were right, but I think he knows now that we are sincere."
"Well, it's more than I can say about that bloodsucker. There's a whole tribe of them in this country—every country —ineffectual mental cripples, without imagination or guts, werewolves lying in wait to pick up the leavings or lap up the blood of the pioneers, innovators, scientists with vision who march ahead of the pack. They have nothing to build, so they tear down. It's their way to stay alive. What has Jonas ever done except scavenge?"
Paul did not disagree with Dr. Chapman. He had accurately characterized a certain breed of scientist, the calumniators who lay in wait and prey upon the investigators. But, despite his respect for his mentor's insight, Paul secretly did not feel Dr. Jonas was one of these. There was that new marriage-counseling clinic that was going up in Santa Monica. Dr. Jonas had even offered him a job. He knew that he could not mention the job, but he was tempted to mention the clinic, until he remembered that it had been told to him in confidence.
"He insists that he has the same goal that we have," said Paul obliquely.
"Blasphemy, if I ever heard it," said Dr. Chapman. "I hope you called him on that."
"No, I didn't. There was no reason to call him a liar. I think he means what he says—that we have a common goal but different approaches."
"What constructive approach has that sniping pygmy got?”
“He's been in marriage counseling for years—"
"Paul, are you out of your mind? That's microscopic, individual work, the work of a country doctor, no more, no less. Beside him, all like him, our program and accomplishments are Herculean. We're out to help everyone, the nation, the wide world, and we're doing it at great sacrifice, and we'll do more, far more, if a minor Judas like Jonas doesn't ambush us when our backs are turned." He studied Paul closely a moment. "He hasn't sold you a bill of goods, has he?"
Paul laughed. "Christ, no. He was impressive, certainly—he's smart and overwhelming—but I know what I believe in, what I stand for, and nothing was said that would make me repudiate it."
Dr. Chapman seemed relieved. "I've always counted on your good sense." He threw the wet stub of his cigar into the hibiscus bushes, pulled a fresh cigar from his lapel pocket, bit the end and lighted it
"I think what I'm trying to get across," said Paul, "is that Jonas may not be on the side of the angels, but he's decent enough. No one is simply black or white."
Dr. Chapman exhaled a stream of smoke. "When you're at war, everyone is either black or white. Equivocate, and you're dead. You can't fight with one arm tied behind your back. If you're not on the side of the angels, then you're in league with the devil."
"Maybe so." Paul's interest in the argument was dwindling.
"How did you present our offer?" asked Dr. Chapman.
"Straightforwardly," said Paul. "There are no child's games with this man. I said that you thought he might be useful to us, and that he could have a job as a consultant. I put it just like that. No adornment."
"What did he say?"
"He said you wanted to buy him out—and that he wasn't selling. That was it, in effect."
Dr. Chapman tilted back in the wicker chair, blowing clouds toward the sky. At last, he straightened with a thump. "Well, I can see we're not dealing with an ordinary adversary."
"No, we're not."
"He'll rough us up in his critique to the Zollman people.”
“I have no doubt of that."
"Well, I can't get the Mafia after him or anything like that. I'll have to fight him myself, fact for fact." He stared at Paul. His voice was soft and controlled again. "I'll lick him, you know."
Paul knew that he would. "Yes," he said.
"Type up a complete record of your meeting with Jonas. Every word of criticism of our survey. I want it as soon as possible. Start tonight."
"All right. I'm not sure I remember it all—"
"Whatever you do remember. Right after we get out of The Briars, we're going to whip the report into shape in half the time I'd originally planned, ship it to the Zollman directors before they meet. Then I'm going to write an overall paper anticipating and refuting all of Jonas' objections. As a matter of fact, Paul, I'm beginning to think that you accomplished more by learning his line of attack than by winning him over to us."
Paul felt no elation at the compliment. Instead, he felt a twinge of sadness at having acquired and delivered the enemy's battle plans. Of course, he had to remind himself, the battle plans were not secret, and Dr. Chapman's enemy was also his enemy.
"Yes," Dr. Chapman was saying complacently, "this may work out better than either of us planned. I'll be able to thoroughly discredit and demolish him." He rose heavily to his feet. "Nothing on earth's going to stop me. Thanks, Paul. Work hard. Good night."
He walked toward the Christmas tree of lights. Paul remained seated, looking after him. For a moment, the figure of the pure scientist was bathed in a halo of white light. And then, the next, he was streaked by the garish colors of blue and yellow, and, in that last moment before disappearing inside, he seemed less pure than earlier.