AT TEN MINUTES after eight on Thursday morning, Kathleen Ballard, in answer to Paul Radford's urgent summons of almost an hour earlier, arrived at Naomi Shields' house and was admitted by Paul.
The reason for the emergency was still not clear to Kathleen, except that Paul had said on the telephone that Naomi had been on a date with some hoodlum, had been mistreated, had been put to bed by her doctor, and that a friend or neighbor was needed to stay with her until the registry found an available nurse.
Although Kathleen was not a close friend of Naomi's, and saw her infrequently (the last time had been the occasion of Dr. Chapman's lecture at the Association), she had responded immediately. Her private feelings about Naomi had always been ambivalent: at once a secret kinship for another who had been married and was now husbandless, and a secret discomfort in the presence of one whose unrestrained sexuality (if all those terrible stories were true) had become standard parlor gossip in The Briars. Now, for Kathleen, another element had been added. She had met Horace at lunch yesterday and learned that he was formerly Naomi's husband, and because she liked Horace (and, in fact, everyone and everything associated with Paul), she was. compelled to look upon Naomi as on official member of the new circle into which she had been drawn.
"How is she?" Kathleen asked as she entered Naomi's attractive but obviously decorated Chinese-modem living room, and realized with surprise that it was unfamiliar to her.
"Dozing," said Paul. "She was heavily sedated last night. She'll be all right." For a moment, he enjoyed Kathleen's morning face.
Conscious of his eyes fixed upon her, Kathleen lifted her fingers to her cheek. "I must be a sight. I hardly had time to make up." She glanced off worriedly. "Is there anything I can do for Naomi?"
"Nothing, for the moment, except standing sentry," said Paul. "I can't tell you how grateful we are, Kathleen. Horace and I don't know Naomi's friends. We didn't know where to turn."
"You did the right thing."
"What about Deirdre?"
“I dropped her at school on the way and left a note for Albertine to watch for the carpool auto at noon and stay on until I returned. Have you had breakfast?"
"I don't remember."
"You've got to have something. Let's find the kitchen."
There were neither eggs nor bacon in the refrigerator, and the bread in the white metal box was several days old. Dirty dishes filled the sink. Kathleen dropped two slices of bread in the toaster, prepared coffee, and then washed and dried several dishes. As she worked, Paul settled himself on a dinette chair with a grunt and explained what had been happening.
Several times, since Horace had learned Naomi lived in The Briars, he had called upon her, but not once had he found her home. Last night he had tried again, and when again she was not present, he had parked before her porch, determined to await her return. After midnight, she had appeared on her lawn, drunk and mauled. Horace had carried her inside, revived her, learned the name of her physician, and called him. The doctor had come at once, and had reported that, except for requiring three stitches, her injury was mainly psychic. He had recommended that she be placed in a sanitarium and be given intensive psychiatric treatment. He had left the names of several analysts, and by daybreak, Horace, exhausted and confused, had telephoned Paul for his advice.
"What could I tell him?" Paul said to Kathleen as she served the buttered toast and coffee. "We're strangers out here. And, knowing what I know of Naomi, it was something you just don't play by ear. Of course, Dr. Chapman has the best medical connections, but Horace and I agreed that this was something we had best leave him out of. He'd have immediately worried about the newspapers. This was strictly Horace's personal matter, to be handled as quietly as possible. Then I remembered Dr. Victor Jonas."
Kathleen, seating herself across from Paul, remembered Dr. Jonas, too. Paul had spoken of him with affection on one of their first dates.
"And even though, technically, he was Dr. Chapman's adversary, I knew Naomi's problem was in his area and that he could be trusted. So I called him from the motel and explained the situation, and I met him here. And then I called you."
"Is Dr. Jonas here now?"
"In the back, talking to Horace. I told Horace to accept whatever he has to say."
There was little to add. They drank their coffee in silence. Kathleen remembered the time when her sister had been in the hospital to have her adenoids and tonsils removed, and after the surgery, while her sister was in the recovery room, she and her parents had gone down to a cafeteria and had sat in the early morning drinking coffee, and it had smelled like this. But then, placing it in time, she realized that it must have been her parents' coffee that smelled like this. She would have had milk.
They heard footsteps, and Dr. Victor Jonas came into the kitchen. Paul tried to stand, but Dr. Jonas kept him down with a hand on his shoulder, acknowledged the introduction to Kathleen with a warm smile, and decided that he would pour himself some coffee. Consciously, Kathleen had to cease staring at him: his rumpled hair and suit, and the prow of a nose, made him seem so unprofessional and eccentric.
"Horace just went to look in on her," said Dr. Jonas as he brought his coffee to the table and sat. "I think he understands what must be done."
"Is there hope for her?" Paul wanted to know.
"Maybe," said Dr. Jonas.
Paul and Kathleen exchanged a glance, he perturbed, she perplexed, for they had expected the usual confident ,social platitude which ranged from "of course" to "where there's life, there's hope." Paul had momentarily forgotten, and Kathleen did not yet know, Dr. Jonas' habit of candor.
"What does that mean?" asked Paul.
"Psychiatrically, there's every likelihood that this thing can be cured. It's really in their own hands, more in Horace's, I'd say. If she's to be helped, she's got to understand that she can be helped, that this is an illness, the symptom of a deeper illness. But since she is the one afflicted with a wish to self-destruction, she'll need a hand. So that puts it squarely up to Horace. He's got to know that she's not depraved but sick. Not so easy for him. He's educated, oriented, but there's an enemy, and that's his old religious upbringing. If he decides that he wants her, that she's worth saving for himself, then he'll come around. And he can bring her around. Then I have the place for them and the man. In Michigan. It wouldn't be too far for him."
"Have you actually seen cures in cases like this?" Paul asked.
"Of course. I told you, nymphomania's a symptom of something that can be healed. Reach down, touch it, treat it, and there's no more reason for nymphomania."
Kathleen felt the inner tremor of shock and hoped she did not show it. That word, always the word in a joke or rental novel, had now a frightening quality, for it was real, and Naomi, sedated, was real. Suddenly, Kathleen recalled the gossip and shuddered. The stories were true. But how could any woman behave that way? But then, he had said, she could not help it, she was helpless, she was ill.
"What are the causes?" Kathleen found herself asking.
Dr. Jonas finished his coffee. "They vary. In this case, from the little I've heard, I'd guess she wasn't much loved as a child." He felt his pockets for the corncob pipe and found it. "I'm oversimplifying, of course. But this hypersexuality could be one means of trying to get that love now, as an adult. But it doesn't work, you see—no man, no hundred men, can give her what her parents failed to give her twenty-odd years ago." He filled the pipe and lighted it. "I tried to explain this to Horace. I told him she'd grown up without tenderness, security, authority, without the feeling of having been a person of value, and so the problem grew as she grew, and then she tried to run away from it by this endless series of unsatisfying episodes with other men. When I was through, Horace said, `You mean, it's not just sex she's looking for; you mean, she doesn't want all those men?' and I told him no, she doesn't. In fact, underneath, she's deeply hostile toward men. That may have opened his eyes a little. And it's true." He looked at Kathleen and welcomed her again with a shy but reassuring smile. "Analytic treatment can help fill in what has been missing. It can make her learn who she is, and why, and that she is a person of value. It will restore her identity. These suicidal sexual episodes will cease." He shrugged. "It's up to the two of them."
After a few minutes, Horace, wearily rubbing the bridge of his nose with the hand that held his glasses, appeared. He glanced at the three around the dinette table with a blank expression. Kathleen tried to smile, and at last Horace recognized her and greeted her.
"She's still sleeping," said Horace, "but she seems restless.”
“Naturally," said Dr. Jonas. "That wasn't exactly a picnic last night."
Horace looked at Kathleen. "It's good of you to come, but maybe I'd better be here until the nurse arrives. In case Naomi wakes up. I think I'll call Dr. Chapman and have him take over for me."
Horace found the Association number in his billfold, and then telephoned. He got Benita Selby on the other end and explained that he might be detained and wondered if Dr. Chapman could manage for him until noon. He listened then, nodding at the phone, seeming sadder than before, and finally said that he and Paul would be on hand for the first interviews.
Returning the receiver to the cradle, Horace faced Kathleen. "Well, they can't spare me," he said. And then, to Paul. "Apparently Cass is down with the flu again, so Dr. Chapman's taking his list."
"Don't worry," said Kathleen. "I'll look after her."
"If she wakes up," said Horace, "explain that I'll be here right after work, by six-thirty, if possible."
Kathleen nodded. Paul and Dr. Jonas stood up. "I think she'll sleep most of the day," Dr. Jonas said to Kathleen. "You might look in every once in a while, to see if she's comfortable."
There was a mournful canine wail from the maid's room. "Christ, the dog," said Horace. "I forgot." He looked helplessly about. "Who's going to take care of it?"
"I will," said Dr. Jonas promptly. "My boys can care for the dog until Mrs. Shields is on her feet." He disappeared briefly through the service porch and then returned with the grateful cocker spaniel in his arms.
Kathleen followed the men to the front door. After Horace
and Dr. Jonas had gone out, Paul lingered a moment. "Special thanks," he said to Kathleen. "I'll call you at noon to see if everything's okay. May I see you tonight?”
“That would be nice."
"Dinner?"
"I won't have you leaving California flat broke. A hamburger at a drive-in would suit me fine."
Paul smiled. "You're not the type, but whatever you say.”
“Are you sure you know what type I am?"
"Pheasant under glass and caviar with a sprig of Edelweiss.”
“Sometimes, yes. But also hamburger with a sprig of grass roots." She wrinkled her nose. "Have a good day."
After she had closed the door, she went into the hall, tiptoeing as she sought Naomi's room. Finding the bedroom, she peered inside. The shades were drawn, and the room was in semi-darkness. Naomi lay with her head resting on her curled arm.
Turning away, Kathleen had an image: a creature from her private mythology, from the neck up an angel, from the neck down, a strumpet. Quickly, she was ashamed of the image and banished it.
In the over-decorated living room, surveying the pieces, she realized that what had at first seemed studied chic, now appeared garish. The fine old Chinese porcelain lamps were not genuine but cheap San Fernando Valley copies, and the vases were not cut crystal but pressed glass. Suddenly, she felt ashamed for these discoveries, as if caught peeking into private drawers when the owner was away. Because she didn't care about other people's furnishings anyway, because she had no such snobberies, only the knowledge of what was tasteful and what was not, she turned from the pieces and sought a book.
In a few minutes, she had found a rental-library mystery and decided that it would help consume the morning. Arming herself with cigarettes, matches, ashtray, she made herself comfortable on the thick sofa, crossed her legs, carefully put her heels on the coffee table, and attempted to read. But it was difficult. Her mind had fastened on Paul Radford.
During the past week, she had seen him every day but one. She had never before felt so contented, so quickly, with a man. Yet the old worry hung over her like a naked sword. She would not dare to let herself think of it or of what might happen between them, before he left on Sunday. Now, as she invited him to wander through her head, she felt suddenly cheating and unworthy. She tried to think about the other women that she knew in relation to Paul. How would they manage him? Who did she mean? Naomi? Oh, God, no. But someone as ... as cool and controlled, outwardly, as herself. Who was like herself? No one, really. Yet, there was Ursula Palmer. She was a writer. Paul was a writer. Things in common. More than that, Ursula was so in-control-of and self-assured. Those were characteristics required in a situation like this. None of the black uncertainty. She envied Ursula....
"Well," said Bertram Foster at last, after having placed the glass of champagne on the coffee table before her, "I bet this is the first time you ever had bubbles in your nose at breakfast."
"Yes," said Ursula Palmer dutifully.
The day before, Foster had telephoned her to change the time of their meeting. He had complained that Alma simply would not give him a night off, even to work, and so he had arranged the next best thing. He had conspired with a studio to have her taken on a visit to a location shooting at Lake Arrowhead. She would be back by dinner. But, at any rate, this would give Ursula and himself all of Thursday morning and afternoon together. He had suggested that they begin by breakfasting early in his suite.
Ursula had felt better about the breakfast. Increasingly, the dinner date had troubled her. Breakfast had an uninvolved, unromantic, anti-sexual atmosphere. After all, who could be inspired to fornicate after Wheaties? But when she had arrived, morning attired, in her open-throat blouse and pleated light wool skirt, she had been dismayed to find Foster wearing a thin, polka-dot silk robe over his gray silk pajamas. His round face was freshly shaved and smelled of pine and talcum. And behind him, on the breakfast cart, was the open bottle in the iced bucket.
He held his glass aloft. "Piper Heidsick," he said. "The best money can buy. Go ahead, go ahead—try it."
He drank and watched over his glass as she brought her glass to her lips. Ursula tried to keep from grimacing. It tasted like something squeezed out of wet wood. "Delicious," she said, and felt the heat of it rise to her temples.
"Umm," said Foster, drinking. "Breakfast can wait." He came around the table to her, set the glass down, and dropped heavily on the couch beside her. He peered owlishly at the cleft made visible by her open-throat blouse. "Well, Miss Editor," he said, "where is it?"
For Ursula, the long-deferred, dread moment had finally arrived "Here," she said, patting the large manila envelope beneath her purse. The completion of the notes on her sex history had been a miracle of ambition. Constantly during her typing of it, she had been delayed-and held up by involuntary mental odysseys into her childhood, her years with Harold, her inadequacies as a sexual partner. In a busy, eventful life, where love had been sublimated to a lesser part of it, her shortcomings had never been fully faced or even partially apparent to her. But once concentrated in one place, as a separate biography of her behavior, this portion of her life loomed larger than heretofore, and its failures were evident and haunting. The distasteful task of reliving this segment of her biography, of knowing it would be soon seen by another, these facts as well as the knowledge that her husband was being serviced in his office by a German chippy, had made the last days unbearable. Several times the thought, unthinkable weeks ago, that the cover line and the job in New York were not worth the price, had crossed her mind, but in the end she had gone on and finished the loathsome assignment.
Now, unclasping the manila envelope, opening it, extracting the clipped pages of typed notes, she wondered if it would be less galling simply to sleep with Foster rather than let him peek into the bedroom and watch her perform through the years.
"It's twenty-seven pages," she said, and she handed it to him.
He held the notes in his hands, and held also a serious, businesslike face. "A real contribution," he said.
"It'll take a while to read, Mr. Foster. Maybe I could go for a walk and come back."
"No. I want you here to discuss. Have champagne."
Already he was eagerly reading. Ursula tried to avoid his face, but several times glanced sidelong at it and saw that this was the face that stared at stag films in darkened living rooms and avidly read the classic eroticism of John Cleland. Ursula swallowed her champagne, feeling sick at heart, feeling Belle Boyd delivering Harold's secrets to the enemy, feeling betrayer of the only God-chosen private part of her life. (When you sold this, what else was left?)
She was aware that he was beginning to skip pages, hurriedly.
"What's the matter, Mr. Foster?"
"The kid stuff—who cares? Where's the grown-up part?”
“You mean premarital?"
"Whatever you call it," he said impatiently.
"Page eighteen."
He found the page and began to read again. His eyes did not blink. He kept wetting his lips.
After a while, he looked at her. "So you put out before?"
"I was very young, Mr. Foster," she said hastily, resenting her defensiveness but not wishing to give him license.
He read on and looked at her again, and she had the strange sensation that his eyes reflected not Ursula Palmer but a side of stripped beef. "You live and learn," he said.
"What?"
"Position is everything," he said, and he showed his teeth and winked. Her skin went cold.
He read on. She saw, from the corner of her eye, the pages steadily flipping. She judged that he was reading about her life with Harold. She despised herself and wanted to snatch the manuscript from his fat hand.
He held his finger on the page and shifted toward her. "He's not so much," said Foster. -She met his eyes.
"Who?"
"Your husband."
She was blinded by indignation. "He's as good as anybody—as you or anybody."
"Not by my book."
Losing restraint, she fought back. "Why are men so conceited? They always think they can do better for a woman than her husband."
"Loyalty, I don't knock—but facts are facts." His lardy lips spread. "Excuse me; maybe he improves with age."
He resumed reading. She trembled with the outrage of it. This misshapen old lecher, with his soiled brain, derogating and mocking Harold, dismissing her whole married life with his filthy tongue.
He had turned a page, and now he brought it back again and reread it slowly. His lips silently formed the words. He held the page stiffly, not turning it. He began to speak without looking at her. "It says here, `Question: Do you—" His bloated face was turned toward her. "Come here," he ordered. His finger was on the page. "Read this and tell me if I understand."
Tensely, she edged beside him, inclining her head to follow his finger on the page. She felt his asthmatic breath on her cheek.
"What does that mean?" he demanded.
She pulled back, sitting upright. He stared at her. She wanted to burst into tears. His expression was queer. He was breathing through his mouth only.
"What does that mean?" he repeated.
Her voice was almost gone. "What it says."
"What I think?"
"Yes, but .. . it's different—"
“...Ah—" he wheezed.
His face was before her, and his command came in a harsh undertone.
Her temples were ablaze. "Mr. Foster—"
"Yes!" he shouted, reiterating his command.
He reached for her, but she tore free of his grasp and slapped him with all her strength. "You pig—you filthy pig!”
“You're the pig."
She leaped to her feet, to evade him, grabbing for her purse and then the manuscript.
He sat, wheezing, and his voice was now a pleading whine. "Ursula—listen, sweetheart—I can help you—anything—" She started for the door.
"You did it before!" he shouted. "You like it!"
She had the doorknob.
"You leave, and you leave the job—everything!"
From the open door, she wheeled. "You know what you can do with your job?" she shouted back. And then, like a longshoreman (she would remember later), she told him. And then she fled, past the elevators, down the three flights of stairs, through the lobby, and she did not stop running until she had reached the car. Then, and only then, did the full impact of her break with the past, not the future but the past, strike her forcefully.
Curiously, she felt no need to weep. Through the windshield, between the two tall, gray office buildings ahead, she could see the towering blue-green mountains to the north, every furry crag and crevice defined. It was a wonderfully clear day for California, she was pleased to note.
Still comfortable on Naomi's sofa, Kathleen Ballard had hardly moved in a half hour. A dozen playlets, produced by daydreams, had intervened between herself and the mystery novel on her lap. In each playlet, the hero was always Paul, but the heroine bore a different countenance imposed upon her own person. Ursula Palmer had come and gone, and Ruth Joyce, and Felicia Scoville, and now she had introduced Sarah Goldsmith into her corporeal being, on her private stage, and had presented her to Paul.
Considering Sarah, Kathleen could see how her natural warmth, her down-to-earth housewifeliness, her air of fecundity, would appeal to a man like Paul. Surely, in Kathleen's situation, she would react affectionately and generously. It was a matter of the forty-eight chromosomes, in the end. How did the Creator distribute them? How Sarah hers, and how me, mine, my mashed, dried gelatinous genes that gave me my meness? Genetically, Sarah has it by a unanimous decision.
Never, since that Halloween night when she was six or seven and the headless skeleton had risen shrieking from behind the fence, and she and the others had bruised and bloodied themselves in their heart-stopping scramble to the illuminated shelter of the main street, had Sarah Goldsmith known such icy fear.
Flattened against the living-room wall, behind the drape, beside the large window, she peered outside. The Dodge had not moved, nor the dark avenging spirit of haunting guilt that was inside it. Withdrawing from the glass pane with a breathless gasp, Sarah pushed herself from the wall, and, steadying herself on the furniture she passed, made her way on collapsible legs to the kitchen.
For the third time this morning, since she had first sighted the car and the driver after Sam's departure, she was dialing Fred's number. Since the terror of Monday, she had awaited the return of the avenging spirit, the adhesive conscience, the all-knowing eye. But on Tuesday, and again Wednesday, the street had remained empty, and, following Fred's advice, she had remained away from his bed and stayed anchored to Sam's house.
This morning she had mystically, neurotically, compulsively, latched her peace of mind to the number three. If three days would pass with the street empty, then she and Fred were safe, and it had all been a coincidence. But on this, the third watch, the Dodge had been inexorably waiting, and her magical incantation had melted before a demoralizing reality. Even as she had telephoned Fred to report the terror, her dependence had been on the number three, the third call that would find him in his apartment. But her wizardry had vanished. The devil rode a Dodge, and bewitchery had fled from her hands to his.
The telephone buzz hummed persistently, mechanically subdued, controlled, unable to exclaim the urgency of her panic.
At last, she returned the receiver to the hook. Fred was out, and she was alone with their evil. The slant walls of the house were the rising tide, engulfing her, and the only refuge lay in the sun, where also waited the danger. But outdoors was the sanity of her living street, and friends, and the path to Fred's apartment, and ultimate safety.
Who was the shadowing, four-wheeled figure anyway? A man. A car. A detective on duty. A commercial shadow, fifty dollars a day, hire, fired. By whom? Mrs. Tauber? Sam? But look, she was invincible, Sarah told herself, free, white, a mother, a shopper, with daylight her armor. How could the four-wheeled figure harm her more? Follow again? Make another note? For Sam? Mrs. Tauber? There were notes enough, surely, already. More did not matter. What mattered was seeing Fred, measuring, evaluating, deciding, knowing someone stood beside her, flintlock in hand, defying the world to jeer her scarlet letter.
She found her leather jacket in the closet and reached the front door and opened it. For a moment, she hesitated, saw the gardener across the way, then the Dodge, and then she hurried into the sun and daylight. Once in the cool station wagon, she swiftly started it, backed out, attained the street, made the turn away from the parked conscience, and then turned again, and when she was in the traffic on Wilshire Boulevard, she was relieved to find no reflection of the Dodge in her rear-view mirror.
There was no memory of the ride to Beverly Hills, and no sight of the terrifying shadow. But crossing Santa Monica Boulevard, past the great hotel, she thought she saw in her mirror, two cars back, the familiar grill. She made the right turn south, then two blocks, and, across from Fred's apartment, she parked. She tore herself from the front seat, searched behind, and felt limp pleasure in the view of the street barren of traffic and enemy.
She hastened into the apartment building, up the flight of stairs more familiar than Sam's front door, and it was when she turned to touch the doorbell that she saw the sheet of paper pasted with Scotch tape above the knocker.
There was a message, classically slanted, printed, in Fred's hand. "Reggie," it began—a name unknown to her, but male —"Had to skip out early to the barrister—" jocular, although maybe not, but indicating no crisis—"and will be closeted with him through lunch. Will settle the matter and call you late afternoon. Forgive me. Sit on the phone and wait. Fred."
Sarah's disappointment at Fred's absence was now tempered by a new bright hope. It would require no Champollion to decipher this discovery. Fred had spoken often about seeing an attorney to divest himself from the juiceless Mrs. Tauber. But always Sarah's questions had hung unanswered, deferring to the immediacy of their clinging bodies, and afterward the questions had evaporated into thin air; nor did she mind, for the more demanded answer had been given.
She had removed her spectacles, before ascending the stair-case, and now she returned them to her face. She studied the note for a word wrongly read, a phrase misunderstood. But the message was all clarity. Fred was closeted with his attorney. This could mean, at last, at long last, he was arranging the divorce, a proceeding, a word, not yet part of their vocabulary of love. Her body was permeated by the marvel of it, the glittering utopia of it. A divorce. But who was Reggie? Here was needed Champollion. Or merely Fred.
She opened her purse, dug through a miniature cosmetic warehouse, and found the gold pencil. She reflected a moment, and then, at the bottom of the sheet pasted to the door, she wrote: "Fred—came calling to discuss business—will call later today—S." She considered her handiwork, crossed out business, and replaced it with Dodge. This was unmistakable.
As she descended the staircase, a momentary trepidation held her elbow, escorted her to the heavy door. Outside, she met her car. She examined the street, right and left. There was no other car.
As she crossed the street, a deduction entered her mind. It was so obvious that it had almost eluded her farsightedness. Why was Fred conversing with an attorney today, why now, after these many weeks? Because of her urgent call Monday, because of M. Javert. Fred was anticipating Mrs. Tauber. Or Sam. The inevitable detective had produced the inevitable crossroad of decision. Why await confrontation? Scandal? A grand slam? Anticipate. Disarm. Poor Mrs. Tauber. Or Sam.
She had reached the car. She was proud of Fred, her Fred, her Fred. The Dodge was ineffectual now. Pitiful Dodge. Stupid, foolish Dodge. Those wasted notes ("Subject left home 10:32. Entered Tauber ap't. 10:57. Emerged 12:01. Halted to comb hair, adjust make-up"), so promisingly erotic, so suddenly respectable. She wondered if it would be in the newspapers. She remembered that she had promised Jerry and Debbie that she would not disgrace them again by forgetting the PTA paper drive. Nevertheless, she felt almost gay.
Kathleen Ballard had finally got past the first chapter of the mystery novel, aware early that it was of English origin because honor was spelled honour and aware also that the nephew Peter was too detestable to have done it (yet the author—at his twenty-fourth novel—would surmise that Peter, being detestable, would be dismissed, and therefore it might be wise to make it Peter, after all). She turned the page, having just met Lady Cynthia returned from Nepal, when the telephone shattered the stillness.
Kathleen swung to her feet, limped on the leg that had almost gone to sleep, and snatched up the receiver in the kitchen after the third peal. A remote telephone operator's voice announced the nurse's registry. Miss Wheatley, who had been assigned at noon, would be detained until six. But she would definitely appear. Kathleen protested. There was a patient requiring expert care. Wasn't anyone else available? The remote voice avoided involvement. No one available before evening, but then Miss Wheatley would be on hand. Kathleen fought the detached system. What if there was an immediate emergency? Would they have a nurse then? The remote voice would not be baited, no more than would a phonograph record. The voice was in no position to reply to the questions. The voice accepted messages and delivered them. Good day.
Kathleen was used to these lesser disappointments, and once having adjusted herself to the six hours ahead, she took inventory of the kitchen for sustenance. Naomi, it was evident, always ate out. Or, more likely, based on the single stocked cupboard, did not eat at all, but drank her meals on the rocks. A determined search disclosed, at last, a bent can of pea soup, a mammoth can of beef stew, a dusty, unopened box of cheese crackers, and several bottles of Seven Up (seasoned survivors of an old lost battle against gin). Kathleen decided that the beef stew would suffice, and this was a good day to start a diet, anyway.
She had succeeded in decapitating the mammoth can when the telephone rang a second time. The caller was Paul, and, hearing his voice, she was grateful for the companionship, and then certain that he would not have been happy with Sarah Goldsmith at all.
She told him about the nurse, wanting only the affection of his concern, and was then able to tell him that she would manage very nicely until six. Was she sure? Absolutely. Damn sorry to have gotten her into this mess. Of course not; it was the least that she could do. What about Naomi? Sleeping. Good, good. Horace would be relieved. She hadn't forgotten dinner, had she? Oh, no. Well, until later then. Yes, later.
The stew was in a pot and heating over a burner when she heard Naomi's outcry. "Horace!"
Kathleen turned the burner low and hurried toward the bedroom. When she entered, she found Naomi on her back, beneath the blanket, eyes pointed to the ceiling.
Kathleen went to the bed. "Are you all right?"
The eyes shifted. "What are you doing here?"
"Horace had to go to work. The nurse hasn't come on yet. So I'm filling in."
"Why you?"
"I . . I've been seeing a friend of Horace's, and they called me."
"I don't need anyone. I don't need a nurse."
"Well, the doctor—"
"That horse's ass."
Naomi did not move. She closed her eyes, then opened them. Kathleen, worried, walked closer to the bed. "Naomi, can I get you anything?"
"No. I'll be up soon as this junk wears off."
"How do you feel?"
"Like someone's pinching my crotch."
"Stitches."
Naomi averted her head on the pillow. "Bastards," she said from profile and with no anger. She was still again, and Kathleen stood waiting uncomfortably.
"Do you know what happened last night?"
Kathleen quickly shook her head. "No."
"I was gang laid."
"Oh, Naomi—"
"It might have been instructive, if I'd been sober. I'm submitting a supplementary report to Doc Chapman."
"You mean they forced—"
Naomi met her eyes. "I'm not so sure." She created the brief facsimile of a smile. "Go away. I contaminate. I'm a slut.”
“Don't talk like that."
"Men's language. I like it. The only true language. They don't know women. But they know sluts."
“Naomi, try to rest."
"Who was here? This morning?"
"Your doctor. Then Horace brought a psychologist.”
“Head-shrinker?"
"No. He was just trying to help out, give advice.”
“What did he advise?"
"I think we should wait until Horace—"
"No, you."
"I'm not sure."
"Get off it, Katie. I've been banged by a battalion. I've got to know what the high command says."
"They spoke of treatment, analysis."
"You think lying on a couch for a year telling dirty stories will help?"
"I can't say. I suppose they know."
"Screw that." She turned on her side. "Let me sleep." Her voice was fading.
Kathleen looked on helplessly a moment, distressed by Naomi's sickness, sickness and sickly vulgarity, and then turned to leave. At the door, Naomi called out to her.
"What's Horace doing here?"
Kathleen was surprised. "I thought—why, he's with Dr. Chapman."
"I didn't know." Her voice drifted off. "No kidding?" In a moment, her labored nasal breathing told Kathleen that she was asleep. Softly, Kathleen drew the door shut and went into the kitchen.
Later, having eaten only a small portion of the stringy beef stew and finished the soft drink, she returned to the sofa and the mystery novel. All through the meal she had thought of Naomi, trying to reconcile her beauty with her coarseness, trying to separate her sensuality from illness. She wondered if men, taking that voluptuous body, were ultimately conscious of the decay beneath. Would Paul, given the opportunity, take her? Enjoy her? Or be repelled? Of course, Naomi's aptitude was sex. Her physical loveliness and dexterity might offset all else. Committed to lust, no man was a sensitive, perceptive, thinking animal. When he was that way, Boynton would have ravished a corpse. There was a medical name for that. Boynton, yes, but not Paul. No, Paul would not enjoy Naomi, ever. He would prefer someone tidy, composed, restrained. Like herself, of course. Not herself, no, for she was merely the polar opposite of Naomi, which also was a kind of sickness, although less obvious and appalling. Who, then, tidy, composed, restrained? Who, normal? Teresa?
Sitting on the sofa, the unlighted cigarette between her fingers, she considered Teresa Harnish and Paul. Teresa's practicing intellectuality and artiness might become a bore. But she was attractive, she was a lady...
Teresa Harnish had arrived ten minutes early, and now he was ten minutes late. She began to worry for the first time whether or not he had received the message. Even if he had received it, would he take it seriously, would he be free, would he remember her?
Impatiently, she circled the pool of seals just inside the entrance of Paradise Park, and disinterestedly she scrutinized her fellow pleasure-seekers. A dumpy, shapeless young mother with a sticky boy in knee pants. Several teen-age girls, in some kind of middy uniforms, giggling behind their hands as if it were sinful and not allowed at the seminary. An elderly, gray gentleman in a blue serge suit that had the shine his shoes needed, elbows on the rail, mournfully throwing dead fish from a bag to the slimy black seals below. She listened to the barking of the seals and abhorred their hoarse, guttural gruntings.
She wondered if the breeze from the ocean beyond the pier had disturbed her hair. She fished in her purse for the French silver compact, sprang it open with her thumb, and regarded her hair and make-up. Everything was in place, unmussed, unsmeared. Returning compact to her purse, she examined her attire and was pleased. It had taken her half the morning to select the proper outfit. Over her shoulders, the tawny cashmere sweater. Pressed by the wind to her body, the transparent white silk blouse, almost revealing the lace brassiere beneath. Flaring below, the short, full, tan pique skirt. Legs stocking-less; Rembrandt-brown leather moccasins simulating ballet slippers. The effect: youth.
The morning's choice had been between provocation and juvenescence. After leaving Geoffrey at the shop, she had returned to the study, located Dr. Chapman's previous book and learned that the male achieves greatest potency between the ages of eighteen and twenty-eight. (Also, the happy footnote quoting the Terman and Miles M-F tests: athletes scored highest in masculinity; artists scored lowest.) She calculated, based on education, graduation, football service, that he could be no more than twenty-five. It was all-important that the eleven-year chasm be narrowed. Her wardrobe reflected her final decision. Now his youth vigor, he would see, would be matched by her own.
She peered down at her platinum wrist watch and saw that he was sixteen minutes late. Unless her watch was fast. She swung about girlishly, scanning the whip, the Ferris wheel, the roller coaster, the hall of mirrors, the visit to the moon, and then, from somewhere, he strode into her vision.
He wore a jaunty white sailor cap, a t-shirt bearing the fresh imprint that read "Paradise Park," khakis and open brown sandals. His face was Apollo, and the bulging biceps and chest, Milo of Greece.
She watched Ed Krasowski come to a halt across the pool, searching for her, looking directly at her, and still searching. She hurried around the pool toward him, and then he recognized her.
"Hiya," he said. "Didn't see you at first."
"Because I have a dress on," she said. "You always see me in shorts. Besides, if you're used to seeing a person in one place, and suddenly you see them against a different background, they look different."
"Yeah," he said.
There was an uneasy pause.
"I'm glad you could make it," she said quickly.
"Sure. Jackie told me."
The teen-agers were giggling again. Ed glanced at them, and Teresa followed his glance.
"Can't we find somewhere to talk?" she asked quickly.
"You mean to sit down?"
"Anywhere."
He held up his large steel wrist watch. "Well, lady, I got only half an hour for lunch—old Simon Legree don't like me late—so maybe I better eat while you talk."
"I'll have something, too. Is there a restaurant—"
"Couple fancy ones. But I'm not blowing my bankroll there."
"I'd love to treat."
He bridled. "What do you take me for? No. Dutch."
She felt a wave of pleasure at his manliness and his gallantry. "I'm sure any place you say—may I call you Ed?”
“Everybody does." He nodded toward the main promenade.
"Tuffy makes the best dogs in the Park. Come on."
She walked hurriedly beside his hugeness, skipping several times to keep up, and feeling proud and possessive of his size. He uttered not a word as they progressed, until they reached the whitewashed wooden stand with the monstrous metal frankfurter on top and the four empty stools below, and then he said, "Right here."
She ascended a stool, elegantly, and he squatted on the one beside her. He wheeled toward the counter. "Hey, Tuffy—"
A wrinkled, toothless old man, wearing a ridiculous starched chef's hat and a spotted apron, appeared from a rear room, hoisting in greeting the arm tattooed with an anchor. "Hiya, Rams."
"What you doing back there, Tuffy, burying money?”
“Got better to do with money."
Ed Krasowski wheeled toward Teresa. "What you having?”
“Whatever you have."
Ed winked, pleased. "Specialty of the house. Two dogs, Tuffy. The supers. Everything."
Teresa observed Ed's arms, the subtle play of muscles beneath the tanned surface as he cracked his knuckles and then proceeded to arrange toothpicks on the counter in some curious formation.
"Are you going to be working here long?" she asked.
"Couple months maybe. Until we go back to practice.”
“Do you like it?"
He shrugged the big shoulders. "Makes no difference.”
“Your friend said you had one of the booths. Which?”
“Knocking over the wooden milk bottles."
"What do you have to do?"
"Nothing much. Make change. Pick up the balls. Set the bottles. Jolly the dames and kids along. It's like finding money.”
“I'll bet you meet interesting people."
"Never noticed."
She pushed on like this, leading him, understanding his halting, monosyllabic answers, appreciating the inarticulate strength of the man of action. The change was stimulating, exhilarating. How many years had she wasted listening to cultivated, hollow words? Listening all those dull years, listening to all those chattering effeminate men? She stroked Ed with a glance. What had Napoleon said? Voila un homme!
The burned frankfurters were served. They were mammoth, twelve inches in length, protruding from either side of the roll, heavy with chopped onion and relish. She held the elongated frankfurter awkwardly, gazing at it, and then at Ed.
She nibbled. He chewed. He swallowed a mouthful, spun partially on the stool toward her. "Jackie said you had some private business to talk to me about."
She nodded, as he made inroads into his frankfurter. Until now it had seemed vaguely possible, less and less so, but possible, that her planned and rehearsed proposal of mating could be openly broached. But the frankfurters made it impossible. Amid such wine as this—root beer on tap—could Isadora and Essinine flourish?
His nearness was maddening. The magnificent thing must be kept alive. Another way? "I.. . I've watched you—on the beach—"
"I thought you was always reading."
"I read, too. Don't you?"
"Sure. Not books, though. Takes too long. Hated them in school. Coach got the grinds to cram me. Mostly I got time only for magazines nowadays. Anyway, about the beach—"
"I observed you playing ball. You're extremely agile. You have a good body for it."
"I keep in shape," he admitted with undisguised pride.
"Well, that brings me to why I wanted to see you." She put down the ridiculous frankfurter and faced him earnestly. "I'm an artist, quite a good one," she said, almost believing it, "and from the moment I saw you, I said to myself, I must capture him on canvas."
His forehead was puzzled. "Paint me? You mean a regular picture?"
"Dozens of pictures," she said enthusiastically. "I've watched you, as I said, closely, and you're a human being of many facets. I want to know all of them. I want the world to know you as Greek God, Olympian, Roman Emperor, Gladiator." She had heard Geoffrey's artists sometimes speak like this, not precisely so, but similarly, and she was sure it sounded correct. "I hope you'll consent."
"I never thought about it. Who are the pictures for?”
“Myself. Exhibits. Perhaps some will be reproduced in magazines or books."
"Does it take a lot of time?"
"An hour or two a day, no more."
He finished the frankfurter and wiped his mouth with a paper napkin. "I don't know. I ain't got much time what with this, and practice, and a man's got to relax a little."
"You'll find it relaxing."
"Not what I mean."
"What do you call relaxing?"
"Few beers with the boys, maybe a movie, and—well, some fun."
"You mean, girls?"
"Yeah, that's right."
Her lips were compressed. She wanted to shake him, scream at him: I'm girls, look at me, all girls, all women, the best, the best you ever met, I'm attractive, well dressed, witty, cultured, I have a large home in The Briars, I'm desirable. I am fun.
She swallowed. "Well, I understand that. But, Ed, you'd be surprised at what good sport this can be."
"I don't know," he said.
Desperate measures were indicated. Finger on the emergency button. Press. "Of course, I don't expect you to model for nothing."
He looked up sharply.
"I told your friend I wanted to see you about business," she added. "What do you make here?"
"Eighty bucks a week."
"I'll pay you twenty dollars for each ... each session you pose."
"You mean for a couple of hours?"
"That's right."
He grinned broadly. "Lady, you got a deal."
Inside her, something eased. She had not wanted it to go this way, nor would he want it this way, once he understood her better offer, but for the moment this was enough. There would be the private meeting. It was all that she desired. And now she ached to have it at once.
"Wonderful," she said. "When can we have our first ... meeting?"
"You name it."
"Tomorrow—eleven in the morning."
"I'm not free tomorrow until five."
It was so long a time to wait. But, all right, anything. "I can meet you at your place at five-thirty." She opened her purse and took out pencil and the white leather pad on which she jotted her aphorisms. "Here, write your address."
He wrote it, returned pad and pencil, and looked down at his metal watch. He rose from the stool "Back to the salt mines," he said.
She slipped off the stool. He hesitated, staring down at her. "Funny," he said.
"What?"
"You don't look like a painter."
"No? What do I look like?"
"Well, I don't know—"
"You mean—I look like ... like just a woman.”
“Something like that."
Her heart leaped. "You're very nice," she said. "I'll be looking forward to tomorrow."
"Okay. Be seeing you."
She watched him lumbering off, swaying, Brobdingnagian, magnificent. She wondered exactly how it would happen finally, and what it would be like, and she shivered. She watched the Ferris wheel revolving and somewhere heard a calliope. She didn't feel like de Pompadour or de Poitiers, that was for sure. But she felt like more, far more, than she had been be-fore, and that was good enough.
By five-fifteen, the sun no longer high through the kitchen window but the afternoon still bright, Kathleen had abandoned the mystery novel and busied herself heating water for tea.
When the telephone rang out, startling her, she hastened to pick up the receiver, to prevent it from awakening Naomi.
"Hello?"
"Naomi?" The voice was a girl's voice.
"I'm a friend of Naomi's—Mrs. Ballard."
"Kathleen?"
"Yes?"
"Mary McManus. What are you doing there?"
"Oh, hello, Mary. I. . . well. .. Naomi wasn't—she came down with a bad cold, and I'm baby-sitting until a nurse comes in."
"Nothing serious, I hope?"
"No, no."
"I'm sorry about Naomi. I've been promising to get together with her, and tonight Dad's having some people in for a barbecue—and, well, Norman couldn't make it, and we have extra food, so I took a chance that maybe Naomi was free, but, this way—"
"I know she'll be glad you called."
"Tell her I'll talk to her tomorrow. How have you been?”
“Domesticating."
"What?"
"Synonym for vegetating. No, I've been fine, Mary. Do call me some afternoon and come over for tea."
"I'd love to. I really would. Tell Naomi I'm sorry. She's going to miss a good steak. Well, good to talk to you, Kathleen. Bye."
"Goodbye, Mary."
After she had poured the hot water and then removed the tea bag, Kathleen drank, admired the built-in stainless-steel gas range, and thought about Mary McManus. She decided that Mary was an argument for zest over beauty. Mary's bronzed outdoor vigor, her bouncing enthusiasm, made Kathleen feel old. She supposed that she was really no more than six or seven years Mary's senior, yet she felt used and worn, deep inside. Only technically could she offer Paul a chassis less than thirty years old. Mary, on the other hand, could give a bachelor the miracle of resurrection. Wasn't it curious, though, that last Sunday she had been at the tennis club with her father and not her husband? Well, young girls and their fathers...
Mary McManus went out on the cement patio where her father was still poking at the heating charcoal in the brick barbecue grill. Nearby stood the portable table, the layers of thick red steak, separated by wax paper, piled majestically high. Mary watched a moment and then sat on the edge of a checkered lounge.
"Put one steak back in the freezer," she said. "Naomi can't make it."
"You're sure Norman won't come down?" Harry asked without turning.
Mary was faintly irritated with the way the question had been posed. Unaccountably, she felt like bickering. "It's not a matter of `won't come down'; he can't, he doesn't feel well—don't you ever feel that way?"
Her father spun about and blinked at her. "Aren't we a little touchy about semantics tonight?"
"I just thought you wanted to say it that way." She hesitated. "I'm sorry. But he did come home with an awful headache, Dad. You should know; you drove with him. He was sure a nap would get rid of it, but just now he said he felt no better. He doesn't want to throw a wet blanket on the party."
"It seems to me he's getting more than his share of headaches lately—for a healthy, strapping young man. Why don't you get him to see a doctor?"
"He insists he's all right. They go away."
Harry Ewing grunted, seemed lost in thought a moment, pursed his lips, absently wiped his hands on the comical chef's apron, and walked slowly to the lounge across from Mary.
"Did he tell you we had a talk today?"
Mary raised her eyebrows. "No."
"We did. About his new assignment."
"New assignment?"
"Remember—Sunday—I told you I was cooking up something extremely interesting?"
Mary nodded eagerly.
"Well, we've decided to tackle those Essen people on the pre-fab patent case. We're going into the German courts. I'm shipping Norman and Hawkins off next month."
"To Germany?" Mary clapped her hands with delight. "It's one place I've always wanted to—"
"No, Mary," Harry Ewing said quickly, "not you. He'll be up to his neck there. No place for wives. I told Hawkins he couldn't take his missus, and I can't show partiality to Norm because he's my son-in-law. It would be demoralizing, bad precedent."
Mary's delight had given way to somber concern. "How long?" she asked.
"Who knows? Those court things drag on. And there's a good deal of preparation to be done on the scene with our German—"
"How long?" she persisted.
"Oh, four months—at the most six."
"Without me?" Her tone was ominous.
"Look, Mary—"
"What did Norman say?"
"Well, I will admit he didn't take too kindly to it. I wanted to keep this from you. But he was most disappointing. I reminded him that, family or no, he was still an employee. No preferential treatment. It was an important job, and I expected him to do it."
"But will he do it?"
"He'd better. He said he'd talk it over with you. 'It's up to Mary,' he said. I'm depending on you to pound some sense into that boy. I'm through coddling him."
Mary sat rocking her body on the lounge, staring at her father in an odd, new way.
Harry Ewing met her gaze, then exhaled. "Well, the steaks—" He began to leave.
"You want us apart, don't you, Dad?" Her voice held no harshness, merely understanding.
"Are you crazy?"
"I think you even want him to fail—"
"Mary!"
"Yes." She stood up. She started inside.
"Where are you going?" Harry Ewing called after her. "To give Norman my answer."
She climbed the stairs gradually, giving herself time to adjust to the new decision, like an ascending deep-sea diver surfacing slowly against the changing pressure.
Upstairs, she moved to the bedroom, opened the door, closed it behind her, and turned the key.
Norman, lying on the bed, on his back, arms behind his head, staring at the ceiling, now watched her. She went to the foot of the bed.
"How's your headache?"
"I never had a headache."
She nodded. "That's what I thought. Norman, he told me.”
“Deutschland über alles?"
"Not über alles—I told him."
"Oh?"
"Not über us."
She kicked off her shoes, and crawled on the bed, and lowered herself beside him.
"Norman, I love you."
"Ditto."
"Just you."
He examined her face warily.
"Norman—"
"Uh-huh?"
"I want us to have a baby."
He lifted himself to an elbow. "When did this happen?”
“It happened." She tried to smile. "We can travel when the baby's grown up."
"You mean it, don't you?"
"With all my heart."
He reached out for her, and she went into his arms, cuddled close to his chest.
"When?" he asked softly.
"Now, Norman—now."
Miss Wheatley, the special, a large masculine woman with down on her upper lip and a severely starched nurse's uniform, had appeared at six-twenty, and Kathleen had rushed home to assist Albertine in feeding Deirdre and to change for dinner.
Paul had picked her up at eight, and instead of hamburgers, they had driven east to an Italian restaurant on the fringe of metropolitan Los Angeles. Although no Angeleno, and especially no native of The Briars, would have been caught dead in that unlovely business part of the vast city after work hours (except for the Philharmonic season and the New York plays), Kathleen had remembered the restaurant as charming, from a visit once paid to it with Ted Dyson.
The intimate, candlelit room, decorated with hanging Chianti bottles, made them feel near and private. They had ordered minestrone and lasagna, and consumed great numbers of breadsticks and a greater quantity of red wine. They had talked a long time of Paris—she had visited it with her family in the summer between high school and college, and he during weekends from the job in Berne—and she had remembered "Just Tell the Driver 'Sank Roo Doe Noo' " and he had remembered the chansonniers in Le Lapin Agile, and both had recalled the view from the Sacre-Coeur.
They had returned to The Briars slowly, reluctantly, through the balmy night, conversing less, and self-conscious for being so close and yet so far apart.
Now they were parked in the darkness of Kathleen's driveway.
He looked at her: the achingly delicate profile, the full scarlet lips, the blouse draped from her breasts, the silk skirt outlining her thighs.
She turned her head and looked at him: the wonderfully creased and lived-in face.
"Kathleen," he said.
"Yes," she said, almost inaudibly.
The moment was understood by both. Without thinking further, he did what he had not yet done. He drew her to him, and as she shut her eyes and parted her lips, his mouth found her lips. The kiss was long and electric. For a moment, he released her, both breathless, and when he sought to bring her to him again, closer, his arm went fully around her back and his hand came to rest on her breast, cupping it fully. Before he could withdraw it, for it had been accidental, she stiffened in his arm and wrenched free. The moment was ended.
"Kathleen, I didn't mean it."
"It's all right."
“—I was—I wanted you as close to me as possible."
How dreadful, she thought, to force such an apology. Her swift anger had turned away from him and inward. Here she was, an adult female of twenty-eight, married once, inviting tenderness, love, desiring it from a man she had imagined in every high-school dream, and yet reacting, behaving, as no juvenile teen-ager, no gauche or frightened adolescent, would behave. But then, as a female, she was a fraud, and now he would know it, at last. There could be no recovery. She, not Naomi, she more, needed the analyst. What had Ted Dyson called her?
His troubled face. She was so ashamed. "Paul," she said with difficulty, "I didn't mean—"
The vestibule lights went on, and in the glare, they both started. She swerved in the seat. The front door was open, and Albertine stood behind the screen, craning her neck, peering toward them.
"Mrs. Ballard?" she called.
Kathleen hastily rolled down the window. "Is anything wrong?"
"There's been two urgent calls for your gentleman friend. One not five minutes ago."
Paul leaned across Kathleen toward the open window. "Who was it Albertine?"
Albertine consulted the pad in her hand. "Mr. Van Dooten.”
“Horace," said Paul.
"He said to watch for you and have you call the motel." Paul frowned. "Must be something wrong."
He jerked the handle of Kathleen's car door and shoved it open. She stepped out, and he followed her. They hurried into the house.
In the study, Paul dialed the motel and asked for Mr. Van Duesen He waited, and at last Horace came on. "Hello?"
"It's Paul."
"Thank God! Listen—Naomi's gone off; we don't know what the hell's happened to her."
"I don't understand."
"Naomi—she ran away. The nurse went to the bathroom around nine, she says—and when she got out, Naomi was gone. Her car, too. The nurse didn't know where to turn." were you there?"
"That's just it, I wasn't. I was stuck with Chapman until about nine-thirty. When we broke up, I phoned to ask Naomi if she wanted anything before I came over. That's when I found out. The most I could get straight was that she blew her cork, because I wasn't there with her when she woke up. I guess she figured I was letting her down."
"Forget it. You know she's not very rational right now."
"That's what worries me. I'm worried sick. I don't even know where to start looking. Maybe she went to some friend's place. That's what I'm hoping. Ask Kathleen about her friends."
"All right." But something else had occurred to Paul. "There's another possibility—"
"What?"
"I'm not sure. I'll tell you when I see you. Look, Horace, sit tight. I'll be right over. We'll hunt for her together."
After hanging up, Paul explained to Kathleen exactly what had taken place. Kathleen knew none of Naomi's close friends, except Mary McManus, if Mary was a close friend. Immediately, Kathleen telephoned the Ewing residence. Harry Ewing answered the call. He sounded distant and cotton-mouthed. He said Mary couldn't come to the phone because she was asleep, and he had seen nothing of Naomi Shields. Undiscouraged, after she had finished with Ewing, Kathleen remembered that Naomi had once mentioned her father in Burbank. She tried information, learned there were several Shieldses in Burbank, and took all their numbers. The second proved to be Naomi's parent. He was gruff, unpleasant, and said he had not seen his daughter in months.
After this rebuff, Kathleen had one more idea. She telephoned the agitated, defensive Miss Wheatley and ordered her to search Naomi's kitchen and bedroom for an address book or list of personal phone numbers. After five silent minutes, Miss Wheatley returned to the mouthpiece empty-handed. She had been unable to produce an address book of any kind. Firmly, Kathleen told her to remain where she was, in case Naomi returned, and, if Naomi did return, to contact Horace Van Duesen at the Villa Neapolis at once.
During all of this, Paul had hovered restlessly nearby. Now Kathleen set down the telephone and confronted him. "Well," she said, "I guess I have struck out."
Paul nodded grimly. "There's one more longshot “
“What's that?"
"The nightclub where she got herself picked up last night. It's out on Sunset Boulevard. Horace knows the name.”
“Why on earth would she go back there?"
"If she wanted to kill those men, that would be logical. But maybe she wants to have them again, and kill herself. That would be abnormal, but for her, in her present state, perfectly logical. Don't you see? Perverse logic. Indulging the self-destroying death wish."
"I can't believe it."
"She despises herself, Kathleen," he insisted. "This would be the ultimate flagellation. Anyway, we'll know soon enough." Kathleen trailed him to the living-room door.
"Paul—"
Hand on the knob, he waited.
She hoped to explain about that moment in the car, that she hadn't meant it, that she cared for him, but now it seemed too callous and trivial in the light of Naomi's disappearance. Still, she supposed, it must always be like this with everyone: you set the human brain on a track marked sorrow, but it does not always stay there. What did people really think during a funeral? She recalled the rites around Boynton's grave, before the coffin was lowered.
"Paul ... I ... I hope you find her. And look out for yourself."
He nodded solemnly.
Suddenly, blindly, she ran to him, finding his cheeks with her hands, then standing on tiptoe to kiss him. This was wrong, too, she supposed, staying the Minute Man from his emergency, but, dammit, dammit, she was as lost as Naomi. For a moment, as their lips met, her instinct was to lift his hands from her hips and place them on her breasts. She wanted to do it, boldly, to show him that she had not meant her earlier prudery, to assure him that she was as warm as any woman alive. But what surprised her most was her dominating emotion: she wanted to do it because the flesh of her breasts strained for his touch. She held the desire and held it, but a cold paralysis gripped her, and then the kiss was ended and it was too late.
At last, she was sorry to have delayed him. "You'd better hurry. Let me know if you have any luck."
"I'll call you in the morning." For another moment, he stared down at her. "You know what? You're the most beautiful girl I've ever known."
And he was gone.
She leaned against the closed door and thought the cliché: But beauty's only skin deep, and my hidden ugliness is deeper, much, much deeper, the greater part you cannot see, below the surface like an iceberg, like a lump of dough in a buried coffin.
Sitting at the ringside table in the noisy, smoky nightclub, only half aware of the gliding shadows of dancers before her eyes, Naomi Shields wondered why she was not drunk.
She had consumed six, seven, eight gin somethings, and her head was clear; she was sure it was clear. True, the knifing pain of the stitches had dulled, and the hurt of Horace's absence had numbed. But the clarity of her original desire had not blurred: to be impaled on a cross, on a bed, until she bled to death and found peace, at last.
The music had ceased, and now there remained overhead the shrill cacophony of human voices. A tall presence loomed, then lowered itself to eye-level in the chair across. The be-loved, pocked death head. The lipless smile. Here, the Reaper, beloved Reaper, to wrap her in a shroud.
"How's my honey child?" Wash was asking.
"I'm tired of waiting," Naomi said.
"You don't want to wait?"
"No. Now."
He shook his head with admiration. "You're something, honey."
"Now," she repeated.
"You know, you're getting me excited. Maybe it can be arranged. You really want ol' Wash, don't you?"
She wanted calvary, the purge of pain, and the final nothingness. She nodded.
"Okay, honey, you got me." He rose to his feet. "Not jus' you," she said. "All."
Wash whistled under his breath. "Christ."
"All—" she insisted.
"Okay, honey, okay. Come on. Let's get the show on the road." He helped her from the chair and led her across the slippery dance floor. As they passed the bandstand where several of the boys were relaxing, smoking, he held up his hand, joining forefinger and thumb in a circle. He opened the side exit and started her along the edge of the parking lot beside the kitchen.
"My car's behind there," he said, "all by itself."
"Where you taking me?"
"Nowhere, honey. I got a nice private backseat."
She heard a motor behind, and stopped, and looked off toward the bright area nearer the street. The car was an MG. An attendant was holding a door open, and a girl stepped out. Her face was indistinct at the distance, but she was young, patting down her taffeta and petticoats, and holding her corsage of camellias, and her escort was young and straight. Later, at her door, they would kiss, and tomorrow she would build a dream house, a dream life, a dream universe of happiness.
"Come on, honey. I got it bad now."
Naomi stared at the hideous death head, and suddenly the revulsion filled her throat. She was alive, a living entity, and all around, all around, were the living, the fresh, clean, alive living, and they were the race to whom she belonged, they and not this gruesome skeleton.
"No," she said.
"Come on."
"No, not in the car. What do you think I am?"
She pivoted uncertainly and tried to move away. Wash's hand was on her arm and she winced. The lipless smile was gone. "You're my girl, an' you're coming with me—so let's not have any trouble."
Dignity, dignity. "Let go of me," she said archly.
"Look, honey, no little bitch is getting me hepped up, and taking a powder. This is the big leagues, honey. We deliver. You're going with ol' Wash—and the boys, the boys, too. I'm not letting them down for nothing."
"I'm sick," she said suddenly. "You can't hurt somebody who's sick."
"You'll be sicker if you give me any more trouble."
He wrenched her violently after him and hastily dragged her toward the corner of the kitchen and the shape of the vehicle in the blackness beyond. Off balance, she stumbled after him, choking, trying to find her voice. She fell to her knees on the gravel. As he pulled her upright, she tore free. She tried to scream but felt his hand smashing across her face.
She sobbed. "No, Wash, no—"
He had her about the waist, off her feet. She tried to tear at him, tried to kick, but he continued with her toward the blackness. There was no sound but their breathing and his feet biting the gravel, and then there was a shaft of light behind, a door slamming, other feet.
Wash dropped her and whirled about, too late to lift his hands, as Horace's fist exploded in his vision. The blow sent Wash reeling backward, crashing into the side of the car. Grotesquely, he hung there, then slipped down to the ground. Horace was over him again. Groggily, Wash pawed for his legs, missed, and received the full impact of Horace's shoe on his jaw.
By the time Wash had brought himself to a sitting position, the pair of them were beyond the bright area and out of sight. Wash touched his mouth, a meaty mass, then considered the palm of his hand that now held his blood and a broken tooth. He blinked incredulously. All this, and she wasn't even a good lay.
When Horace reached the car, Naomi's hysteria had subsided. Until then, she had clutched him desperately, and wept, to the bewilderment of the parking attendant and a passing couple, and not once had she spoken a coherent word.
Paul was waiting with the car door open.
"Is she all right, Horace?"
"I think so. I caught up with them in the parking lot. I really slugged him."
Horace worked her into the front seat, then pushed in beside her.
"We'd better move," said Paul. "We'll have the whole gang on our necks."
"I don't think so," said Horace. "One of the men in the orchestra told me where she was. For twenty bucks."
Later, as they were driving alongside the bridle path through Beverly Hills, after she had wiped her eyes with Horace's handkerchief, and blown her nose, Naomi spoke at last.
She pointed to the torn knees of her stockings. "Look at me," she said.
"You're all right. That's all that counts," said Horace. "Never leave me, Horace—never, never leave me.”
“Never, I promise."
"I'll do what you say—whatever you say. Get me an analyst, put me in a place, a sanitarium—have them help me, Horace. I want to be well, that's all I want."
He brought her close to him. "Everything's going to be all right, darling. From now on. Just leave it to me."
Her voice was muffled. "You won't think of the other?" Horace's eyes were full. But he tried to smile. "What other?" he asked.
After leaving Horace and Naomi at her house, Paul returned to the Villa Neapolis.
Now, trudging between the stately royal palms to the motel entrance, Paul thought once more of Kathleen. The incident in the car had been curious. As curious as her temper the first night he had met her. As curious, in fact, as the spontaneous kiss she had favored him with as he left her several hours before. And then, so long ago it seemed, the sex history she had recited at him through the screen. No truer woman on all the earth existed, of that he was certain, yet her history had been incredibly false. Or credibly false? It depended on the point of view. She seemed to care for him, that was evident, and he knew the churning excitement he felt this moment, thinking of her. Yet, between them, stood an unidentifiable barrier, as real as the cane and walnut folding screen that had separated them the day of the interview. Perhaps between every woman and man, there rose this screen, defying total intimacy. Perhaps between every woman and the entire world, there was a screen, always. ...
At the reception desk, the night clerk, who resembled a retired jockey, gave him his key and a sealed envelope. Puzzled, Paul opened the envelope and extracted a penciled note.
"Paul," it read, "Ackerman just called and is coming over. I'm anxious that you be present during this meeting. Whenever you return, come to my room. Urgent. G.G.C."
The wall clock above the desk showed the small hand between the twelve and the one, nearer the one, and the big hand on the ten. Twelve-fifty. Could Dr. Chapman possibly want to see him at this hour?
Paul went outside, past the placid pool, then mounted the wooden staircase. At the door to Dr. Chapman's suite, he paused and listened. There were voices behind the door. He knocked.
The door was opened by Dr. Chapman, whose casual blue smoking jacket did nothing to offset the tension at the corners of his mouth.
"Ah, Paul," said Dr. Chapman. "I'm glad you made it before we broke up. You know Emil Ackerman—" he indicated the portly Ackerman, and then waved his hand at a small, slender young man, of college age, with a high head of hair combed back, bulging eyes, and a sallow face, slumped in the chair across the living room—"and his nephew, Mr. Sidney Ackerman."
Paul crossed to shake Ackerman's genial hand, and then went to the nephew, who tentatively made an effort to rise, and Paul shook his hand, too.
"Have a seat, Paul," said Dr. Chapman. "We're almost finished."
Paul took a straight chair from the wall, carried it closer to the group, and sat down.
"I like to have Paul in on everything I do," Dr. Chapman was telling Ackerman. "He has good judgment."
"Maybe you better bring him up to date, George," said Emil Ackerman.
Dr. Chapman bobbed his head. "Yes, I intend to." He shifted on the big chair toward Paul. "You know, of course, how deeply interested Emil is in our work."
"Yes," said Paul, "I do."
Ackerman beamed. The nephew, Sidney, scratched his scalp and worked his upper lip over his yellow buck teeth.
"I think, in a way, he's appointed himself my West Coast representative," said Dr. Chapman.
Ackerman chuckled, pleased.
"At any rate, Paul, to make a long story short, Emil has been looking out for our interests and keeping an eye on the activities of his nephew Sidney."
"I've guided him every step of the way," said Ackerman.
"I'm sure you have, Emil," Dr. Chapman agreed, projecting admiration. He sought Paul's attention once more. "Sidney's a sociology major at the university here. He graduates in two weeks. The young man's ambition is to be associated with our project. Emil feels he can be most useful to us."
"I'm positive of it," said Ackerman.
"I've tried to explain," Dr. Chapman continued to Paul, "that our roster is temporarily filled, but, of course, we'll be expanding very soon. He knows we have an impressive waiting list, many eminent scientists with excellent records—still, as Emil has pointed out, we dare not shut our eyes to fresh young minds, eager young newcomers."
"Plenty of rookies have helped make pennant winners," said Ackerman.
"Indeed they have," agreed Dr. Chapman. Then to Paul: "I've been briefing Sidney on our operation, and I've been inquiring into his background. And that's where we stand now." He looked across the room at Sidney. "Perhaps you'd like to ask some questions of us?"
Sidney hoisted himself erect, crossed his legs, and then uncrossed them. He picked at his scalp nervously. "I read your books," he said.
Dr. Chapman nodded paternally. "Good."
"I've been wondering—what's your next project?"
"We haven't determined that yet, Sidney," said Dr. Chapman. "We have several under consideration. We may undertake the whole subject of motherhood—a survey of mothers."
"You mean, a lot of old women?"
"Not exactly. There are millions of young mothers, too—in fact, some very young ones. After that, we may tackle married men."
"I'd like to be on the women survey," Sidney said flatly. He grinned, revealing the protruding yellow teeth. "That's normal, isn't it, Doctor?"
The good-natured social expression on Dr. Chapman's face hardened. He moved his bulk uneasily in his chair. "Yes," he said, "yes, I suppose it is."
Paul tried to watch Sidney's face without too obviously staring. Perhaps he was being unfair, but he felt that he had detected a bright, leering quality in the young man's bulging eyes. There was about his manner, his voice, the rancid air of unhealthy sex. His questions reflected the voyeur, not the scientist. Paul had seen him before, in many places, lounging before small-town drugstores to comment on girls' bosoms and legs, telling a dirty story as he cued the tip of his pool stick in some shadowed billiard parlor, standing at a magazine rack devouring the semi-nude reproductions of models and starlets. Paul decided: He thinks our project is like attending a daily stag film.
"Uncle Emil will tell you," Sidney was saying, "I've always made a study of women. I've read everything that exists—history, biology, sociology."
"That's right, George," Ackerman said to Dr. Chapman.
"I want to be part of your great movement," Sidney went on. "I think when you can get women to talk about sexual intercourse, that's an important advance. Like the survey you're just finishing—it's like the bachelor one you wrote about, isn't it?"
"Yes," said Dr. Chapman quietly.
"Well, I think that's something," said Sidney. He scratched his scalp with his nails. "Imagine getting women to talk about ... about how they feel. They do, don't they?"
"Most of them," said Dr. Chapman grimly.
After ten more minutes, the meeting was concluded. Dr. Chapman and Paul walked Ackerman and Sidney down to the guest parking area, beside the top of the road, where Ackerman's shining Cadillac stood alone.
Before getting into the car, Ackerman looked at Dr. Chapman. "Well, George," he said, "what do you think?"
"You're sure you want him in this kind of work?" asked Dr. Chapman. "It's drudgery and exacting, you know."
"It's what he wants. That's the important thing, I think. Enthusiasm."
"Mmm. All right, Emil. Let me see what I can work out. I'll do what I can."
After the Cadillac had gone down the hill, Paul and Dr. Chapman remained standing by the roadside, in the cool night.
Paul hated to look at Dr. Chapman, but then he did. He knew what his eyes sought: the crack in the armor. As he had waited to find it in Dr. Jonas, and had not, he waited now for sight of it in the giant figure who, heretofore, had been invincible. He waited, his chest constricted by the suspense. He waited.
"Imagine the nerve of him," Dr. Chapman said angrily, "trying to foist that snot-nosed pervert on us. Did you hear the little fiend? He thinks we're staging sex circuses and films." He took Paul's arm and guided him toward the motel. "Remember, I once told you Ackerman's in the business of making people beholden to him. Well, this time, I assure you, he's not getting paid off. I'd sooner junk the whole project than take that little brute on. I'll placate Uncle Emil with a letter that will be a masterpiece of generalities. I'll tell him we're keeping Sidney on file. He's got as much chance of getting out of that file as out of a time capsule buried in concrete. Right, Paul?"
"Right," said Paul, and even on this moonless night, he could see that Dr. Chapman's armor shone brighter than ever.