THE ALARM ERUPTED with a brassy scream. Paul Radford's hand fumbled for the clock, clamped over it, pressing down the button and suffocating the reveille.
It was nine-thirty, Sunday morning.
For a while, allowing consciousness to rise, Paul lay motionless on his back. The only evidences of hangover were a thin wire of pressure inside his forehead and a tongue that had been coated with dry gravel. He sat up, unbuttoning his pajama top, and then he remembered the day.
Leaving the bed, he took up the telephone in one hand, removed the receiver with the other, and dialed the desk. "Good morning," a woman's voice said.
"This is Mr. Radford. Room twenty-seven. Do you have the Sunday papers?"
"Only one left, sir. The other is sold out."
"Can you send it up?"
"Yes, sir."
"Also, tomato juice, two eggs sunny side up, coffee black.”
“Will that be all?"
"Don't forget the paper."
"Very well."
After returning the telephone to the table between the beds, Paul untied the cord of his pajama trousers, let them drop to the floor, lifted one foot free, then, with the other, kicked the trousers upward into his hands. He folded both halves of his pajamas and set them inside his open wardrobe, already packed. He checked the apparel he had hung out for his last day in The Briars. Gray sharkskin suit. Check. Blue Dacron shirt and knit tie. Check. Shorts on the chair, socks and shoes on the floor. Check, check. He went into the bathroom to brush his teeth, shave, and shower.
When he had finished the cold shower and begun to dry himself with the abrasive surface of the white Turkish towel, he finally reviewed the events of the night before.
He had intercepted the two detectives in time, introduced himself, shown them Cass Miller's letter, and replied to a dozen questions. They had been excited about the letter, grateful to Dr. Chapman and himself, and had driven down the hill recklessly to deliver the confession to their chief and, Paul assumed, eventually to the district attorney. Returning to the pool, he realized at once that Dr. Chapman was nowhere in sight. Later, having packed, Paul had learned from the desk clerk that Dr. Chapman had departed in the Ford, leaving word for the press that he would not have a statement until the following day. The series of violent and sad events that had warped the entire day had finally had their effect on Paul, and he had gone off to the Beverly Wilshire bar in Kathleen's car. During a long evening, he had consumed five Scotches and fallen into a conversation with an Englishman on the next stool who had recited the history of Mount Everest, being particularly affecting in the passages pertaining to Andrew Irvine and George Leigh- Mallery. At midnight, Paul had re-turned to the motel and slept at once.
Now, thoroughly dried, and dressing, Paul wondered if this last day in The Briars were not the last day of Dr. Chapman's entire project. He tried to imagine the consequences of Cass Miller's letter. Certainly Sam Goldsmith would be released by now—to what?—and the press notified. The newspapers, this Sunday morning, would be full of the sensation. He imagined the headlines: "Dr. Chapman Protégé Goes Sex Mad; Slays L.A. Housewife ... Mother of Two Murdered by Sex Crazed Chapman Associate ... Chapman Co-Worker Commits Suicide after Killing Woman He Had Interviewed .. . Chapman Sex Expert Strangles Society Matron; Destroys Himself . 'She Was a Sinner!' Cries Dr. Chapman Colleague after Garroting Actress."
Paul had no doubt that already the hound dogs of virtue and retribution had been loosed on Dr. Chapman. A telegram from the Zollman Institute, withdrawing. A phone call from the president of Reardon, suspending. A letter from the publisher, canceling. The coded questionnaires of more than three thou-sand married women would rest, untouched, in the bank safes until the curiosity of another age found them. A Sex History of the American Married Female would join the population of creative works stillborn, like Lord Byron's Memoirs and Sir Richard Burton's The Scented Garden. And millions of women, young and old, unmarried and married, awaiting liberation from fear and ignorance, would continue to stagnate in that darker part of the soul. Yet, Paul told himself, other great men had survived lurid scandals. He tried to recollect their names. Henry Ward Beecher for one, yes. But not Shoeless Joe Jackson. Say it ain't so, Joe. No, not Shoeless Joe.
Paul felt sorry for Dr. Chapman, and as sorry for himself, for having been the agent of his mentor's destruction. Judas had done it for money, unforgivable, and all those atomic traitors, Fuchs, the rest, for love and money, unforgivable, but at least he had done it to save an innocent life. You're welcome, Sam Goldsmith.
He was dressed, except for his shoes, when the knocking on the door came. He opened the door, and a bald-headed dining-room waiter entered with the breakfast tray and the thick Sunday newspaper. Paul signed the bill, gave the waiter a half dollar, and closed the door after him.
Alone again, he peeled through the endless sections beneath the colored comics, located the news section, and yanked it free. Drinking his tomato juice, he opened the front page wide on his lap.
The banner headline: President Says Berlin something. Photograph and caption: Singer Elopes Las Vegas. Smaller headline: Earthquake Razes Mexican something. Smaller photograph and caption: Dr. Chapman Associate Dies.
Smaller headline: Sex Historian Miller Killed in Auto Accident.
Quickly, Paul read the half-column story. "Losing control of his rented sedan high on a mountain road in Topanga Canyon, Cass Miller, thirty-two, bachelor authority on sexual behavior and associated with Dr. George G. Chapman in the current Reardon College survey of married woman, plunged one thousand feet to his death. According to police, the accident, the sixth such ..."
Paul sat back, incredulous. The fact of death was a fact, but all of the rest, a parcel of lies by omission. Not one word was there about Cass's murder of Sarah Goldsmith, not one word of confessed suicide, not one word referring to or quoting from the letter.
Paul scanned the rest of the front page, then the next page, and the next, and continued until page seven, where he found the two-inch story.
Smaller headline: Briars Housewife Found Dead.
Paul read on. Sarah Goldsmith, thirty-five. Kitchen. Broken neck. Police investigating. Husband held for questioning. Sarah Goldsmith. Born in. Member of. Survived by.
Again, no reference to Cass's confession of rape and murder. Again, only the implication of accidental death.
Two strangers had been extinguished in the vast city by sheerest chance. Accidents happen. They happened yesterday. They would happen tomorrow. Two strangers, the first interred on page one, the other on page seven. Relationship, none. Cause and effect, nil. Case closed. Almost closed. Dr. Chapman? Intact. Sam Goldsmith? Interrogated. Cass Miller's confession? What confession?
The letter, Cass's letter, was a fact, Paul decided. No matter who had quashed it, or how, it had been seen by persons official. Certainly they knew Sam Goldsmith was innocent. In the end, they must dismiss him. But would they? What of the coroner's report, the autopsy, the vaginal smear indicating intercourse before death? But no microscope could separate voluntary intercourse from involuntary. Who would be the indicated partner? Sarah's anonymous lover, of course. Sam had come upon them, or upon her as the lover left, and so it would be Sam. But if Cass's confession had been ignored, so, too, might the coroner's report. Or perhaps he could be brought into the conspiracy of silence. How many children did he have? And, if so, Sam would be safe; Sarah's death, an accident.
Paul's mind reeled. He tried to think of direct action. At once, he recalled the detective's name, the one to whom he had entrusted the letter. His name had been Cannady. Paul threw the newspaper aside and went to the telephone. He dialed the operator, and she gave him information, and information gave him The Briar's police department branch number. Paul dialed one-one-one. A sergeant answered, and when Paul asked for Cannady, he was transferred to a lieutenant. No, Cannady wasn't around and wouldn't be for a week. He was in New Mexico on an extradition case. Paul asked for Cannady's partner, the other detective. He was in Encino, and wouldn't check in until evening. Paul tried to explain about the letter, but soon realized that the lieutenant was treating him like a crackpot. Paul asked if Sam Goldsmith was still being held in custody, in the matter of his wife's death. The lieutenant explained that Paul would have to call downtown about that, but information in such matters was usually not given out over the telephone.
After the receiver was back on the hook, Paul tried to consider the various possibilities. At once, he saw clearly what he had refused to see the night before. The crack in the armor.
He asked himself if it were possible, and the probability of it chilled him.
He glanced at the clock. Forty minutes to air time. He had promised to join Horace and Naomi in viewing the television show. After pulling on his shoes and slipping into his suit coat, he hurried to the car Kathleen had loaned him. He decided that he would not miss the guest of honor for anything. Last night, in a matter of life and death, he had played the role of the Omnipotent. But he had been an ineffectual Zeus, with powers limited, after all. Now, he would see the original, the still undefeated and still champion Jehovah, the King of Kings.
Borden Bush's weekly half-hour program, "The Hot Seat," originated every Sunday morning from a former legitimate theater, purchased by the network and located two blocks from the giant glass and steel buildings that housed the network itself. The theater had a seating capacity of fifteen hundred, so the network executives had assigned it to Bush, because his show had been exploited to saturation among institutions of learning. On Sunday mornings, the auditorium was jammed full with teachers, older students, and their families. The network regarded the show as prestige and the papered house as good will.
This Sunday, as usual, every seat in the theater was occupied. The one difference was that there were also spectators standing along the walls and in the rear. The drawing power of the guest of honor, Dr. Chapman, was setting a new record. This Sunday, too, as usual, Borden Bush found it necessary to defy the instruction on his bottle of Donnatal and take another pill, the second within the hour, in an effort to moor his stomach.
At thirty-four, Borden Bush, tan, thin, frenetic, possessed a Peabody and an Emmy, but was prouder still of a skin rash and ulcer, both of which he wore like campaign ribbons. On the strength of having been a distant cousin to a network vice-president, of having done a thesis on communications, of having directed a book review show that no one had ever seen, and of having told a columnist on Variety that he had read Seutonius in his search for story springboards, he had been handed "The Hot Seat" two years before and had made it a social requisite among television snobs and university undergraduates. Now, having washed down his white pill, he waited unhappily for the discomforting moment ahead.
As producer of one hundred and seven of these egghead shows, he was used to temperament. He had learned early, and had always said afterward, that this program had taught him one thing—that the big names of the academic world possessed twice the temperament of any thespian, diva, or dancer alive. Now, here again, was Dr. George G. Chapman, a case in point. Borden Bush had regarded Chapman, from the first, a box-office plus and a personality minus. He had seemed to project about as much irascibility as an elderly sheep and had even been agreeable to the network censorship memo demanding that the word coitus not be spoken on the air. Therefore, his sudden thunderclap of temperament, an hour before, had been doubly unexpected and had thrown the entire production staff into a frenzy of telephone calls. But now that difficulty was settled, and there was only the last disagreeable task left.
There was a knocking on the door, and Borden realized that it had been going on for some seconds.
"Come in!" he shouted.
Sheila, his secretary, was holding the door open. "Dr. Victor Jonas is here, Mr. Bush."
"Show him in."
Borden leaped to his feet and came quickly around the desk as Dr. Jonas, carrying his thin leather portfolio of notes and statistics, appeared in the doorway and entered the room.
"Dr. Jonas!" exclaimed Borden, pumping his visitor's hand.
Dr. Jonas smiled uncertainly. "How are you? Forgive me, if I'm somewhat breathless. That climb—"
"I've fought them two years for an elevator.... That'll be all for now, Sheila.... Two years, but no, you can't put it on the screen, so it's a waste of money. Here, sit down, right here." He succeeded in shoving Dr. Jonas into the chair across from his desk. "Cigar?"
"No, thanks."
Borden Bush returned behind the fortification of his desk, hands uttering. "Used to be some singing queen's dressing room up here—that's why the tall, steep stairs—all back-stages have them." He waved his hand at the room. "We've done a nice job, don't you think?"
Dr. Jonas observed the room. It was painted a restful pale green, with indirect lighting, and the office furniture was all shining walnut and pale yellow leather. On the walls, matted in narrow black frames, were advertisements of past programs. A glass-front book case, partially filled, held orange television almanacs, Kahlil Gibran's The Prophet, Mildred Cram's Forever, Walter Benton's This Is My Beloved, and Who's Who in America.
"Attractive," said Dr. Jonas.
"Doctor, we're almost on the air, so I won't waste your time or mine," said Borden Bush with a briskness that belied his stomach's embarrassment. "I don't like to tell you what I have to tell you. It's never happened before. But here goes—I'm afraid we can't use you on the show today."
Dr. Jonas said nothing for a moment. A feeling that had already been inside him, prepared for this, absorbed it now. "I'm sorry to hear that," he said quietly. He took out his corn cob and filled it.
"Something came up."
"You mean, Dr. Chapman came up?"
The wind was out of Borden's sails, and the sheets went limp. "Something like that. How'd you guess?"
"Dr. Chapman's afraid of me. I was puzzled, from the start, that he would allow me to be included on a panel of interrogators."
"That's just it," said Borden, relaxing a little. "He didn't know. We never inform our guests who the panelists will be until they arrive in the studio. That's so they can't anticipate questions. It makes for spontaneity."
"What happened when you showed him my name?"
"Bam. Went up like Krakatoa. Said he wouldn't appear on any platform with you—you were out gunning for him, et cetera, et cetera. Said either you went, or he went. I don't mind telling you, I was stunned. Well, I'm sure you can be realistic about this. It's just like pictures. He's the star. Everyone else is little people. I tried to get you at home, but—"
"Did you tell my wife?"
"Too bad. She was having friends in to watch me. What did you do about a replacement?"
"Oh, we've got a couple of garrulous old hacks, stand-bys at the local schools. I caught one at home, an anthropology associate—he'd do this just to get Chapman's autograph. I am sorry, Dr. Jonas. You will be paid, of course. Maybe we can use you another time, on another show."
"I'll be quite busy. We're opening a clinic—"
"Maybe we can plug it," said Borden Bush.
"I'll leave that to you." He rose and extended his hand.
Borden Brush grasped the hand with his right hand, covering both with his left hand, and encouraging his eyes to moisten slightly, a physiological talent that had given him a widespread reputation for sincerity.
"You're aces, Doctor," he said.
After Dr. Jonas had closed the door behind him, he slowly descended the precarious, winding staircase, holding the railing all the way down. Once on the lower landing, backstage, he surveyed the chaotic preparations. He studied the masses of cabling, coiled like sleeping pythons, and the unwieldy cameras on rollers and tracks, and the monitor sets, and so many people in shirt sleeves hastening about, seeming to do nothing.
Thinking of several glimpses he'd had behind the scenes, he wondered why it was that show business was the one business where so many hurried so frantically amid such disorder to accomplish so much less than was accomplished in the Pentagon, Johns Hopkins, General Motors, the United Nations, where activity was relatively quiet and unhurried. The answer, he decided, was that most personnel in show business did not come to their positions, originally, out of dedicated and careful apprenticeship, and, in contrast to those in other fields who did, were mightily overpaid and over-publicized, and therefore had an exaggerated sense of self-importance. They hurried because they believed the myth, created by their own hands in print, that if they didn't, the earth would stand still, and everyone would fall off. To an outsider, the gaudy flea circus, unable to relate its true proportionate size to outside worlds, was pathetic, and somehow, Dr. Chapman had allied himself with this circus, and that was the worst part of him.
Dr. Jonas could observe the stage now, and a small portion of the sea of faces beyond the footlights. Two cameras were being rolled into position. Someone was vigorously dusting the panelists' table. Dr. Jonas turned to leave, and then he saw, near a flat depicting a forest, the bulky figure made familial' by hundreds of periodicals, newspapers, newsreels, and telecasts. Without rancor, he watched the enemy: the broad, smiling countenance Indian red with make-up, as an elderly woman dabbed a Kleenex against the forehead and cheeks.
When the elderly woman left, Dr. Jonas replaced her. "George Chapman?"
The bulk was all affability. "That's right."
"I'm Victor Jonas." He did not offer his hand.
The broad face, darkening, hid nothing. "Well," he said. The tone was clearly that of estate gamekeeper, rifle under the arm, to the poacher.
Dr. Jonas touched his leather portfolio. "I had looked forward to questioning you—"
"Questioning me? You mean, trying to execute me. You'd like nothing better in public."
"You're quite wrong there," Dr. Jonas said mildly. "I don't have the cruelty to—well, to use a television stage as arena for the showdown between our philosophies. I never intended that this be the place to expose the fallacies in your approach. My paper to the Zollman Foundation will be the proper medium for that. No, what I had hoped was, as one scientist to another—"
Dr. Chapman snorted his interruption. "Scientist? You still have the effrontery to call yourself scientist? I'm glad you're here now. I'm glad to tell you what I think, to your face. You're an academic hitchhiker, Jonas, offering nothing, taking the free ride on the accomplishment of others—like that small thing that clings to sharks, to feed—the barnacles that cling to the hulls of vessels—"
Although Dr. Jonas had determined, from the moment of confrontation, to maintain an even temper and not snap angrily if incited, he now found himself involuntarily reddening. "Are you often accustomed to such outbursts, Dr. Chapman?"
"You have one career and one career only," Dr. Chapman continued, "and that's to destroy me."
"Why on earth should I want to do that, as a mere act of destruction? I've never set eyes on you before, and, besides—"
"You're hungry and ambitious, that's why," said Dr. Chapman. "As long as my theories are proved, accepted, there's no place for you. You're like ... like a horse and buggy manufacturer in 1895, when Duryea came along—"
Momentarily, Dr. Jonas' good humor was restored. He had a witticism at tongue's tip. "You mean—"
But Dr. Chapman, bludgeoning forward, overrode him. "... fighting to maintain the old, outmoded ways, fighting for your existence. If you can discredit me by any means—like sneaking into this program or playing footsies behind my back with the Zollman crowd—you'll do so. In order for you to live, I've got to die. You want to be able to step over my carcass to grab yourself a Zollman grant—oxygen for your little quack clinic on the beach—"
Dr. Chapman had run out of breath, and now Dr. Jonas threw himself recklessly into the conversation. "Yes," he said sharply, "I want to destroy you—"
"There!"
"... but not as you imagine, for self-advancement. Surely your legmen have reported that I already have full support for my clinic and my ideas. I need no more." He had the desire to wound this righteous, condescending adversary. "Understand this, Chapman, the voracious hunger for success that seems to have warped your scientific faculties—it hasn't possessed me, not yet. At the risk of being pompous, I'm telling you all I want is truth—truth, dammit, no more, no less, and I won't apologize for the word. To me, your ideas are not truth but a lie—no, not a lie but a half-truth that you persist in peddling as the full truth, the only truth. It's because I feel you've abandoned all efforts at patient inquiry, unspectacular investigation, trial and error—you can admit to no error, you've lost the humility and objectivity to confess a wrong, to try another way, to revise or improve your methods—because I feel you are performing this way—have to perform this way, because you've gone to the public too soon—because of that I am intent on fighting you. Yes, I shall fight you, and every pretender like you who disguises himself as pure scientist in-stead of showing himself as the promoter that he is. The mask you wear is Einstein, but behind it I see Barnum and Tex Rickard—"
Dr. Chapman's hands had bunched hard, and his massive head trembled on his neck like one afflicted by St. Vitus's dance. "If I didn't know you were purposely baiting me," he said in a furious undertone, "wanting me to strike you, so that you can get your name in the papers, drag me down to your hooligan level, I'd hit you. I still may."
"I see," said Dr. Jonas. "That would be further evidence of your cool detachment, I suppose? Is that what you advocate to settle differences of scientific opinion—first barring public discussion of your survey, then threatening to slug your critic? I'm not surprised."
"I repeat, you're neither scientist nor critic—you're a hooligan and fool, Jonas. You can't even manage your own little back yard. What have you done out here in California? Talked to a few impoverished Mexicans and slut wives of truck drivers, and then bleated about marriage counseling as the supreme answer? Is that your idea of sexual enlightenment, of improving the species? A fat chance you'll have to convince anyone. I've come two thousand miles out here, to accomplish in two weeks the job you failed to accomplish in two years—ten years."
"You've accomplished nothing. You've done infinite mischief."
"I have, have I?"
"Yes, you have. And I'm not guessing. I've had the opportunity to consult with several of the married women you and your associates have interviewed. In one case, a young woman —one of the volunteers you interviewed—was dangerously stimulated, became involved with an entire group of men, with results you can imagine. I'm not blaming this entirely on you —yet, I have every reason to believe that the excitement engendered by your questions, with no attendant warmth of—"
"Don't sermonize me! If that's the sort of Police Gazette tripe you're intending to peddle to Zollman—"
"I'm peddling nothing that is not corroborated by careful counter-testing. No, I have no real evidence to prove that your interview technique is harmful in itself. I have only a suspicion, backed by a few isolated cases. But you're giving me an idea, Chapman, I'll tell you that. It may be something worth going into one day—an examination of the harm left in the wake of your samplings. But for the moment, I'm satisfied to know that the net result of your work—"
Dr. Jonas was suddenly aware that the two of them had now become three. The third party was Borden Bush, who, descending the circular staircase, had seen them bitterly embattled and had arrived to break it up.
"Well, well, gentlemen," he interrupted too loudly, nervously washing dry hands, "I see you've met and had your private question and answer session off camera." Firmly, he took Dr. Chapman's rigid arm. "Better take your place, Dr. Chapman. Only five minutes more. We want to do a warm-up. And I want you to glance at the new intro—we're explaining the panel substitution, since the network earlier advertised Dr. Jonas' name on several station breaks—yes—and then, I thought, well, a sentimental word about Cass Miller would be in order."
Borden Bush had Dr. Chapman's attention at last, and he began to lead the larger man toward the stage.
"Good luck," Dr. Jonas called after them, not without irony.
Dr. Chapman looked back over his shoulder. "You go to hell," he said.
It was shortly after three o'clock when Paul Radford hurried into The Briars' Women's Association building and made his way up the stairs, two at a time.
Striding down the empty, stretching corridor, the totem beat of his heels reverberating against the barren plaster walls, Paul carried his outrage high and visible, so that those who wore cracked armor could see it plainly and take to their battlements.
Since early morning, since page one and page seven, the necessity for the tournament of truth had been growing upon him. Actually, he surmised, the necessity for it had been born the evening before, by the swimming pool, with the brief exchange over a dead man's letter. Yet, the exact form the challenge now took had been shaped over the breakfast tray.
He remembered the shock of the opening announcement on Borden Bush's "The Hot Seat." He had been seated beside Horace and a drowsy Naomi, and he remembered the bewilderment he had felt, he and Horace both, at the moderator's suave statement that Dr. Victor Jonas, psychologist, had withdrawn from the show and that a last-minute substitution had been made.
After the sugary half-hour program, a brief portion like a mutual-admiration society in conclave, the remainder a winning monologue by Dr. Chapman, Paul had jumped to his feet and, the applause of the television studio audience still loud in his ears, he had gone into Naomi's kitchen to telephone Dr. Jonas. His call had been answered by Peggy Jonas, who also confessed mystification at her husband's non-appearance. "I can't understand it," she had said. "He was up half the night preparing questions to ask Dr. Chapman." Paul had left Naomi's telephone number with Peggy Jonas, and then, pacing, turning over the possibilities in his mind, he had waited and waited, until finally Victor Jonas had called him back. Then it was that Paul had heard the details of the cancellation. Then it was that the outrage had developed into a formidable weapon.
Too agitated and impatient to eat lunch, Paul had sought to track down Dr. Chapman by telephone, ringing the motel and the Association building, and then each again and again.
At last, after two-thirty, Benita Selby had replied from the phone in the conference room of the Association building. Yes, she had said, Dr. Chapman and she had just returned from the broadcast and the luncheon given afterward by the network and motion-picture producers. Yes, she had promised, they would be cleaning up last-minute work in the building for at least another hour.
Now, arriving at the conference room door, a hundred thoughts wheeling through his brain, Paul halted, inhaled, and raised his hand to knock. Then, instead, he reached down for the knob, turned it, and strode inside.
Dr. Chapman was not alone. He was in the act of dictating to Benita Selby, who sat across from him, her pencil gliding steadily across the shorthand pad on her crossed knee.
"... was truly a martyr to science and scientific advancement," Dr. Chapman was dictating. "For fourteen months, he gave unsparingly—"
Dr. Chapman acknowledged Paul's arrival with a nod. "Just completing the press release. Be done in a moment, Paul."
Woodenly, Paul crossed to a metal folding chair nearby and sat on its edge.
Dr. Chapman pointed at Benita's pad. "The last, again."
Benita lifted the pad and read, "Saddened by the untimely death of his devoted associate, Dr. Chapman today issued the following statement to the nation: 'Cass Miller was truly a martyr to science and scientific advancement—"
"Benita, make that, 'to science and the pressures of scientific advancement.' Go on."
She, poked at her pad, then resumed reading from it. "'For fourteen months, he gave unsparingly ..." She allowed the last to hang in the air.
Dr. Chapman pursed his lips, regarded the light fixture above, and smoothly took up the continuity. "... of his mind and body, toiling, not eight-hour days, but ten- and twelve-hour days and nights, so eager was he to see my pioneer work in sexual behavior brought to a successful conclusion. But Cass Miller's martyrdom will not have been in vain. The forthcoming volume to which he contributed so large a part, A Sex History of the American Married Female, scheduled for publication next spring, will be dedicated to the memory of Cass Miller. And because of his share in it, I feel sure, all humankind will be the healthier and happier. Services for Mr. Miller are being conducted today in the College Chapel at Reardon, Wisconsin, where colleagues and friends will mourn him. His remains were shipped this morning from Los Angeles to Roswell, New Mexico, where his only surviving relative, his beloved mother, Mrs. R. M. Johnson, resides."
Dr. Chapman looked to Paul for approval, but Paul dropped his gaze to the floor. Paul had been remembering how Cass had admired Rainer Maria Rilke and spoken several times of the poet's soul-sickness. Paul thought of something that Rilke had once written in a letter. He was aware of Dr. Chapman's eyes still upon him, and he could recollect two lines of Rilke's letter: "All the great men have let their lives get overgrown, like an old path.... Their life is stunted like an organ they no longer use."
"That does it, Benita," Dr. Chapman was saying. "That winds us up. Make six copies and send them Red Arrow to the wire services and papers on the list. Better get right on it They've been nagging all day."
Benita, gripping pad and pencil like a penitent possessed of holy relics, dashed out of the sacred grotto to spread His word.
Dr. Chapman pulled his chair in Paul's direction, the legs rasping on the floor. "Grim business," he said. "Glad to have it done." He shook his head. "Poor devil." He allowed a decent moment of reverence to pass, as a transition to the world of the living. He sighed. "Well, now," he said, laying his palms together. "Well, Paul—you saw the show, I hope?"
"I saw it."
"What'd you think?"
"The usual."
"Now, what's that supposed to mean?"
"Nothing more or less. You gave them a lot of platitudes, titillated them with a few flashy sex references, and said nothing particularly new or useful."
Dr. Chapman's eyes narrowed, but he remained calm since he had been expecting Paul to demand an explanation about the letter. He decided that there was yet no reason to be offended. "It's a family program. It goes to all ages, all homes. What would you expect me to do?"
"Are you asking me?"
"Yes."
"For one thing, I'd expect a man of your stature not to insist that the network set you up with a panel of sycophant dummies. Those three asses. You could have lifted any one of them up, bent him over, and he would have squeaked `Bravo, bravo,' like a rubber doll mouthing `Mama.' You needed an eligible challenger, not a tanktown setup. Why did you kick Dr. Jonas off the show?"
Dr. Chapman bristled. This was unexpected. "Who said I did?"
"Dr. Jonas said it. To me. And I believe him."
"Jonas? You've been talking to that charlatan?"
"You're the one who sent me to him first, with your little bribe. Certainly I called him. When I heard the announcement on the air, I couldn't believe my ears. They made it sound like he'd chickened out. I had to be sure. So I called him. And I made him tell me, too."
"You know how we feel about him."
"Not we, Doctor. You, alone."
Dr. Chapman narrowed his eyes again. His high-pitched voice settled a key lower. "I don't have to defend my actions to you, Paul. That man's a paid destroyer. Worse, he's mad for power. He wants my mantle. If he were a bona fide scientist—interested in truth—that would be different. I'd have welcomed him. But to have my potential assassin foisted upon me without my knowledge, on my show—do you think I'm mad?"
"I think you like success more than science. I think you're afraid of losing the limelight. And, in the matter of Jonas or anyone else who honestly disagrees with you, I think you're fast becoming paranoiac."
"That's damn reckless talk—from one who knows my work —and disappointing—from one whom I had hoped to make my successor. You're not drunk, are you? If you are, perhaps it will be easier to forgive you."
Paul sat erect. "I've never been more sober. Liquor could never make me speak like this—to you. Disenchantment might."
"We're all overtired, Paul."
"I'm not. And you don't seem to be. You still seem to have had enough energy left over from yesterday to fire Victor Jonas, and apparently yesterday you had enough energy to transform Cass Miller from rapist and killer into martyr of science. That's impressive alchemy. How do you do it?"
Dr. Chapman remained silent a moment, studying his hands on the table. "Yes, I've been expecting to hear from you—after you'd read the morning papers." He looked up, but not at Paul. "If you think you can be reasonable for a while, I'll discuss it with you. You see, I think in the end it comes down to a matter of proper perspective. You look at a problem up close, too close, and that's all you see, for you see nothing beyond. But step away from it, far enough away, so that your own being isn't involved, and you get a fuller view of the situation and can judge it and what's behind it and around it. Now, take the matter of Cass's letter—you saw only that someone was being held for questioning or arrested, and the letter might save him, and so, emotionally, you ran off to prove the man was being unjustly held, and to devil with the greater consequences. I, on the other hand, kept my head. Perhaps because I was trained as a scientist. You, unfortunately, were not. You behaved as an author, a layman, a romantic. I don't blame you for this. But you were a victim of your background. You see, Paul, I believe that in approaching a crisis of the moment, the true scientist has much in common with the Catholic churchman. Both of us know we have been in business a long, long time and will continue to be in business. We look down on the earthlings through the telescope of history, and we see that every year, decade, generation, age, repeats its critical moments constantly, over and over again. If we became permanently embattled in each and every one, we would lose ourselves to foolish detail, forget the ultimate goals—"
"You are now speaking of survival, not justice," said Paul quietly. "Is that it, Doctor? Let an innocent go hang, he's too small in that telescope of yours, he's a speck, so that you and your grand survey are spared?"
"All right. I'll bring this down to the petty platform on which you insistently wish to engage me. Yes, I'll concede it, the necessity to transform Cass Miller from murderer and rapist to martyr of science. Because I saw that the thoughtless masses would react even as you are reacting. After reading a confession made by an unsettled mind, they would judge us emotionally, without patience for the pertinent facts. But what are the facts? Technically, Cass did not murder that woman. The coroner says she died of a fall. There is no evidence that she was struck. Technically, she was anything but a woman of sterling character. By her own admission, she was unfaithful to her husband and preparing to walk out on her children."
"And you feel that justifies rape?"
"Nothing of the sort. I merely state the facts. As to the rape part, suppose the letter you had so generously passed on to the police had been published with accompanying headlines today? How would it have served the poor woman, the memory of her, to her children and relatives alive? How would they ever have been able to know that it had been rape and not—"
"What kind of rotten insinuation is that?" Paul demanded.
"I've stated her record of infidelity, Paul. Benita's checked the questionnaires, and it was Cass who interviewed her. Perhaps she invited Cass—"
"Cass would have crowed about it in his post-mortem note. Instead, he wrote in abject shame and guilt."
"At any rate, we'll never know. Furthermore, at present, only the deceased woman's husband and a handful of others know that she was engaged in an extramarital affair and prepared to abandon her family. Had the letter been published, the sordid sensation would have branded her children for life. Had you thought of that?"
"I thought of one thing, Doctor. And your sophistries don't make me think differently now. I thought of Sam Goldsmith in the gas chamber, and the children as orphans, unless someone acted with honesty on their behalf."
Dr. Chapman ignored this. "But the even more damaging consequence of the letter was in exposing a member of our team to the public as a maniac who had committed suicide. How the press and readers would have gloated over this. How they would have crucified us. Because of one bad egg, we would have all been rejected forever. Can you imagine, if our enemies had got hold of this—Dr. Jonas—"
"Dr. Jonas knows."
"Knows?" Dr. Chapman echoed, rising to his feet. "What are you saying?"
"Before I came here, I told him the whole thing."
"You stupid fool!"
"I think you're the one who's behaving foolishly, Dr. Chapman. I know Jonas. You don't. He reacted in an objective manner. He even said that there could be some justification in suppressing Cass's letter—because of the ultimate harm it would do, to the family, to your project—if Sam Goldsmith could be saved some other way, if there were no risk to it. He felt that if your project is to be destroyed, it should be destroyed by scientific refutation, intellectually, and not by reason of scandal."
Dr. Chapman remained standing, flushed. "So now we're dealing with Jesus."
"I didn't agree with Jonas, either. I still won't let an innocent bystander be sacrificed to your ego."
"He wouldn't have been sacrificed," Dr. Chapman said angrily. "The district attorney did not burn the letter until he had evidence, this noon, that Goldsmith was indeed innocent."
Paul felt an emotion of relief. "You mean he's free?"
"Of course. He was in Pomona at some damn business meeting or other and finally located witnesses to prove his alibi. Now you have your innocent bystander. There's been no sacrificial lamb. It turns out I'm no tyrant after all. What do you say to that?"
He sat down, more or less controlled, his arms folded across his chest.
"I say nothing's changed," said Paul quietly. "This man is free. I'm glad. But the fact of you, as I've seen you all this day, is the same fact. You are not free, in my eyes. You were prepared to do anything to preserve your work, your future—"
"Not true. No evidence."
"I'm satisfied with the evidence. Somehow, you did manage to subvert truth before it was made public. You did this before it was known that Goldsmith was innocent. I don't know what would have happened had he proved no alibi. Would you have finally relented and allowed the letter to be published? I don't know. I don't want to know any more. Maybe even you don't know. But I tell myself, This man whom I have admired for so long, he doesn't care for people as people. I tell myself, maybe that is the weakness in our work, our approach—that it doesn't treat people as warm blooded human beings but as numerals in charts, that this approach, a product of your own neurotic personality, is not the whole truth, and I am a victim of it as much as you—and people who will try to live by these inhuman facts—"
There was a persistent knocking on the door. Dr. Chapman, the color high on his cheeks, considered the door without reply. After a moment, the knob turned, and the door squeaked open tentatively.
It was Benita Selby.
"I'm sorry," she said to Dr. Chapman, "but Emil Ackerman is on the phone—"
"Not now," said Dr. Chapman brusquely. "Later—I'll call him later."
"He only wants to know what time Sidney should meet you at the train."
Dr. Chapman avoided Paul's sharp glance. "Six forty-five tonight," he said to Benita. "I'll give him the details later." After Benita had shut the door, the two men sat in silence.
Dr. Chapman studied his fingernails, and Paul packed tobacco into his pipe.
"I was about to inform you of that," Dr. Chapman said. "We had to have an immediate replacement for Cass," he added.
Paul put the match to his pipe, then shook it out and dropped it. "Well, at least it answers the question I wasn't going to bother to ask. I'd wondered how, in a democracy, one suppresses an important document after it's been delivered to the law. Now I understand. You find a man who owns the district attorney or the chief of police, and you make a deal with this man. So it was Ackerman. I shouldn't be surprised. You once said he was in the business of being paid back. Now you've settled your debt."
"The practice is not uncommon, Paul, even among savants of highest virtue."
"I'm sure you're right about that. I've read a-little in history. Presidents and monarchs have stooped to low deals. Philosophers, too. And men of science. But one always has hopes that somewhere there is someone—"
"Paul, you're behaving like an uncompromising child toward an erring parent. This immature inflexibility doesn't suit you. We're adults. I'm saving years of labor in the past, our present, our future—everything—by the most harmless horse trade. For a politician's help, I agree to take on his nephew for a year or two. After all, the boy is a sociology major—"
"He's a snot-nosed voyeur. You said it yourself. You said you'd give up your work before debasing it by employing that unhealthy—"
"Hold on now. Things change. You know me better than that. I'd never give him a key assignment."
"The hell you won't. If you don't feed him females, he'll go running to Boss Tweed."
"Never. Trust me on this Paul. Never." He paused. "Look, what's done is done, and after a while you'll see it's for the over-all good. I think you've let your emotions dominate you entirely. By tomorrow, you'll—well, both of us—we'll look at all this in a different light. We've talked too much, puffed the whole disagreement out of proportion. I'd suggest you go and pack, and after a day on the train—"
"There'll be no day on the train."
"I can't believe you'd be so irrational."
"It's not a matter of rational or irrational. It's come down to blind faith, at last. And I've lost my faith in you—in you and your whole approach. There are too many ghosts now—Sam Goldsmith, Dr. Jonas, Sidney Ackerman. But they're the least of it. Perhaps it comes down to so simple a factor as language. I mean, the language of our once common faith, which is love. You speak of love in numbers—so much this, so much that—and the suspicion is slowly growing on me, stronger and stronger, that mere numbers will not penetrate the screen we raise between ourselves and our subjects, or between our subjects' heads and their hearts. I'm beginning to understand, I think I understand, that human beings are hardly numbers at all, that no numbers can add up devotion, tenderness, trust, pity, sacrifice, intimacy. I think love wants another tongue. What it is or will be, I don't know yet, but I'm prepared to seek it."
"I look at you, Paul, but it's Dr. Jonas' voice I hear."
"Yes and no. I think I found the way myself. He gave me a hand, but I'm still my own man. You see, I don't know what Jonas is for. I know what he's against, but I don't know what he advocates. But I do know what I believe and advocate. I believe that the dissection of love's quality will bring me closer to truth than any study of love's quantity. That's the essence of it. Because of this, I believe that every romantic in history, often fumbling, often foolish, was closer to this truth than you. I believe every medieval wandering troubadour, every passionate Abélard, every pitiful Keats, every Shakespeare with his Juliet, and Tolstoy with his Anna Karenina, was closer to the full meaning of love than are you with your charts on orgasm and masturbation."
Dr. Chapman shook his head. "No, absolutely no. Believe that idiocy and you are the one who compounds ignorance with ignorance. I'm as aware as you of history. It offers more than you suggest. There is more to learn of sexual behavior—or love, if you prefer—from the fact of Shakespeare's second-best bed, from the fact of Byron's falling upon a chambermaid in Calais before he'd had time to unpack, from the fact of Abelard's love letters being written after he was castrated, from the fact of Madame de Pompadour's hating the sex act and dieting on truffles and celery to give her more ardor, from the fact of Boswell's having intercourse thirteen times between Paris and Dover with Rousseau's mistress, Theresa Le Vasseur—there is more to learn from that than your inaccurate nonsense poems and novels and so-called love letters."
"I won't argue with you any further," said Paul. "Quantity is always more sensational than quality. You will have your audience, but no longer will I help you entertain it—or defraud it."
"Walk out then. Quit. Run to Jonas and spill our secrets. But if you do, I promise you, hear this, Paul—I promise you—I'll see that you will be branded for what you are, a traitor and a nuisance. You'll never work in academic circles again. Because I'll ruin you."
Paul nodded slowly. "Yes, I think you might. But I rather expect you'll ruin yourself, first. Somehow, I think I'll survive you. I think Dr. Jonas will survive you. And our concept of love—as something more than an unfeeling act of animalism—I think that will survive you, too." He rose to his feet. "Goodbye, Doctor."
Dr. Chapman remained in the chair. "Paul, think carefully—carefully—because if you walk out that door now, like this, without reconsidering, without apology, I'll never let you walk back through it again."
"Goodbye, Doctor."
Paul had reached the door. The mechanical part of the decision was, finally, the easiest part. He opened the door, stepped through it, shut it. He strode down the corridor, down the steps, and outside.
For a moment he stood on the pavement, studying the novelty shop beside the post office across the street. There was a placard in the window. He had not seen it before. It read: "Before you act—think!"
He remembered something that he had once read, long ago, and he was not surprised. Sigmund Freud had written, or said, that on the day a son lost his father, he became a man at last, on that day and not before. It was sad, he reflected, that the great gain could only be accomplished through the great loss. Well, today he had seen a parent die. Requiescat in pace.
Amen.
How many miles he had walked, or how many hours, he did not know. There had been a seemingly endless panorama of chunky date palm trees and thick eucalyptus and Chinese elms, and begonias and roses and birds of paradise. There had been manicured lawns populated by tall men in swimming trunks, and long-legged women in shorts, and children in sun suits and denims.
Not once in his aimless wandering had he again thought of Dr. Chapman. All that was important to be said, he had said, and now the tiny satans had been exorcised, and he made his way without burden. The future he did not search at all. The past, the more distant past, he evoked constantly. But for the most, his mind was as directionless as his legs, churning memories, happy, unhappy, without significance or conclusion.
Now, for the first time in an endless breadth of time, he was aware of the cotton clouds floating in the gray-blue sky and aware that the bright disk of sun showed only its rim above the irregular heads of the jacaranda trees.
When he arrived at the street on which Kathleen Ballard lived, his sensory perceptions sharpened. He was more knowledgeable now of the avenue beneath his shoes, and the fresh green things, and the houses beyond.
He thought of The Briars as The Briars, a place unknown to him before, where now so dramatic an upheaval had shaken his life, and the lives of Horace and Cass, and perhaps the women, the women too, he supposed.
Lazily, he tried to fathom the meaning of this kind of suburban community in America, in the world, a suburb that was a limb of the urban whole, and yet distinct and separate, and he wondered how representative it was of the sexual mores of this time and age. There could be no capsule answer, of course, except that supplied by Dr. Chapman. And now, at last, he thought of Dr. Chapman and The Briars.
Dr. Chapman's eventual report on this community's sexual mores, or one aspect of its mores, this printed report, would represent a minute segment, although the most widely publicized and known, of The Briars' standing and meaning in its own time. Perhaps, for one hundred years, the report would be passed along from one generation to the next, in the mammoth relay race of evolution, but each time being carried a shorter distance and by fewer couriers. For, gradually, the report on American women in general, and in The Briars specifically, would be less applicable to new times, conditions, morals. Through the decades, it would have a diminishing number of readers and eventually become quaint and unidentifiable, until one day only scholars would consult it as historical source material, and what the scholars digested, culled, rewrote, would be all that remained of Dr. Chapman or The Briars.
How, then, could the distant future ever know this community now, alive on this placid Sunday? Suddenly, with a stab of intellectual pain, the helpless pain of a frustration that must be lived with, Paul realized how haphazard and warped was all history, all knowledge. If he, this day, walking through a street that would one day become a fourth layer of ruins beneath a hump of dirt, could not clarify a picture of life in The Briars—what then could the scholars of the future, the students, his heirs, in not a hundred years but in five thousand years, make of it?
He tried to project this street five thousand years into the future. By then, based on nature's past performance, The Briars, all of Los Angeles, no doubt, would have been buried again and again and again under explosives, floods, fires, earthquakes, with new cities built on old cities, and then crumbling, disintegrating, continually so, until some defeat had left it a vast mound of earth covered by grass or water.
And then, one day, five thousand years hence, an archaeologist—perhaps a nonconformist, outlawed by his colleagues for his absurd conjecture that once there had been a city in this place, once in the twentieth century A.D.—would come with his copies of ancient fragments, with his belief in myth and legend, and direct the diggers. Months would pass, maybe years, and down, down beneath the layers of silt, they would discover their first telltale remnants of an ancient race.
What would have survived the dust? What fossilized pieces would outlast Dr. Chapman and give their own history of this street in The Briars? A mud-caked enamel slab? Would this archaeologist of ten centuries later know the door of a freezer? A remarkable fin of hard substance? Would this archaeologist deduce it had belonged to an extinct beast, or somehow learn it had been the arrogant rear end of a four-wheeled vehicle known as Cadillac? A fancy bottle crusted with the loam of eternity, a portion of its label still legible? Would the cipher experts ever know the word on the label read bourbon? A small, gold-plated, faceless idol? Would the experts understand that it was one of the long dead religions, between Judaism and Mormon, or relate it some way to the folk play of the ancient time, when men awarded the idols in prolific number to mimics who permitted their images to be thrown in crude reproduction on a screen of cloth? A skeleton of a young person, probably female, no more than sixty-seven, buried in a time when life was that brief? Would they know that she had once lived in beauty, possessed of a dark and enigmatic soul, and that she had given her sex history to an investigator associated with Dr. Chapman (referred to in the Lake Michigan Scrolls), and that her sex history had been a deceit?
Would this be The Briars in five thousand years? An enamel slab, a fin, a bottle, a statuette, a skeleton? Yes, Paul realized, this might be The Briars. The archaeologist's discoveries would be heralded widely, and the hoary civilization and place reconstructed on countless papers, a place and people of frail women, pagan idols, dead languages, and monster vehicles.
Paul scanned the street and wanted to reject the fantasy It could not happen here, to this place so alive. To accept so total an extinction, made life pointless and impossible. Yet, his harder heart knew that it had always happened, and would happen again. Thus, the inexorable years made of all history a lie. How ever again to believe that the Egypt, Greece, Troy, Pompeii, of antiquity were what the historian supposed them to be from his faint twentieth-century conjectures?
What did all this mean, after all? It meant, thought Paul, that The Briars existed truly but once. Now, on this day, at this time, in this place. The Briars that Dr. Chapman would record, or the one that he saw, for he and Dr. Chapman were no longer one, was all the reality that remained or that mattered. This was the gift to accept and appreciate: the living particles of time in this living place, chosen for him by some Fate, to be used and not squandered before the inevitable oblivion, before the erosion of never-stopping tomorrows, before the fossils formed, and the diggers came, and the lies began.
Behind him, he had buried the past. Ahead, he could see no future recognizable. Momentarily, he was landless, stateless, and, with no desired haven, the journey ahead would be unendurable.
Resolutely, Paul Radford entered Kathleen's driveway.
She had been so sure that he had given her up, because it was nightfall, and the train was to leave at seven, and he had not called, and he had not come.
While she fed Deirdre in the kitchen, he recounted the events of the critical day past. The child, sensing the importance of it, feeling the security of his presence, ate silently, listening, not understanding, but enjoying it Kathleen moved about the kitchen, more tense than he had known her to be, and he spoke briefly but fully of Cass's letter, of the newspapers, of the television program, of Dr. Jonas, of Sidney Ackerman, of Dr. George G. Chapman. He reported his actions, but not his emotions. The essence of the day was enough for now. They both understood this. If there should be other days, there would be time for the detail.
Once, she asked, "What are you going to do?"
"I don't know. You mean, my work?"
"Yes."
"I don't know."
"You could go back to books."
"I don't want to run."
"Then you should see Dr. Jonas."
"I might. As for what else I do—it depends."
"On me?"
"On you."
She had gone on with the dishes and pans, and since neither wanted to eat, because there was still too much unsaid, she had asked for a drink. While she carried Deirdre off to bed, he had gone to the bar and prepared double Scotches with water.
Now they were two, locked in by the night. She stood with drink in one hand and cigarette in the other, before the wide picture window that faced out on the patio and the enclosed garden, and she said nothing. Patiently, he remained on the sofa, respectful of her isolated silence, and he drank and watched her. Remembering the first time he had seen the lovely child face, the short dark bob, the Oriental eyes, the tiny nose, the cherry-red lips, in the wallet, in the doorway returning the wallet, he felt again the same surge of passion and desire. Her lithe body, high-breasted and narrowing to long, curved hips and thighs, drew close to each projection and concavity the golden silk dress.
He rose and came behind her, encircling the soft breasts with his arms. He kissed her raven hair, and the warm ear shell, and her cheek. "Kathleen," he whispered, "marry me."
She revolved slowly, ever so slowly, her breasts pressing in-ward and releasing fully inside his arms, until she faced him. Her red lips were unsmiling.
"Paul, I love you."
"Then—"
"But I can't marry you, because I'm afraid."
"But you love me."
"That's it, darling, don't you see? I always knew I'd marry again, for Deirdre at least, for loneliness, for social conformity, but I also knew it would never be someone I loved. With a man who didn't matter, a friend—well, it would be a bargain understood in advance. I would be wife and wifely, and even a bed companion. But if it had to be more, I knew I could not do it. I knew I could never marry for love, be-cause too much more would be expected of me. I would expect too much more of myself. And, Paul, try to understand this—I'm inadequate, incapable; I can't give real love."
"How do you know?"
"Because I know." She closed her eyes, lips compressed, and shook her head. "Or maybe I don't know. But I can't chance it. If I failed again, it would be the worst kind of hell. And I haven't the strength to face that. You see, it's because I love you so—"
"Exactly what are you trying to tell me, Kathleen?”
“What I intended to tell you yesterday morning, when I came to your office."
"What, Kathleen?"
"The truth."
She disengaged herself from him. He waited, very still. She took his hand and, wordlessly, led him back to the sofa. He sat down. She sat beside him.
"Paul, when you interviewed me for Dr. Chapman that Thursday afternoon—"
"Yes."
"I lied. I lied and lied."
"Yes," he said again. "I know."
She stared at him incredulously. "You knew I lied?" He nodded. "It's part of our training."
"And still you.. . you wanted to love me?"
"Of course. One thing has nothing to do with the other.”
“But it has, Paul." She hesitated. "I only lied about the married part."
"That's right."
"And still—"
"I love you, Kathleen."
"But you won't, Paul! That's the whole point of it. That's what I went to tell you yesterday. I wanted to have it done and over with and forget it I wanted you to know about my marriage, and I tried to tell you, and I'm going to now."
"I don't want to know, Kathleen."
"You have to know! Paul, I came to ask you a favor yesterday. I'm going to ask it"
He waited apprehensively.
"Interview me again."
"What?"
"You know the questions by heart. Ask them again. The ones about marriage—marital intercourse—the ones I lied about. Ask them again, and let me tell the truth this time."
"But it's— look, Kathleen, that kind of ordeal isn't necessary
"You've got to do it. There's nothing more to say unless you do it." She rose and removed herself to the farthest end of the sofa and looked at him. "Go ahead."
"I can't see what'll be gained—"
"You'll see. Go ahead. No screen. The truth this time. I'm scared sick—"
"No--"
"Please, Paul!"
He found his pipe and filled it. Her eyes did not leave him. The pipe was lighted, and he saw her eyes.
"All right," he said. "You were married three years?”
“Yes."
"What was the frequency of coitus with your . . . your husband?"
"The first six months, twice a week, then once a week. The last two years, once a month."
"Once a month?"
"Yes, Paul."
"Sex play before coitus?"
"Almost none. Sometimes a minute—sometimes."
It was curious, he thought, how soon the inadequacy of the Chapman method had demonstrated itself. Here was a statistic, a numeral. A minute, she had said, sometimes. But the fact had no life, and therefore less truth. Hell, he thought, I'm not bound to Chapman any longer. The question is not what he must know, but rather what I must know to help her.
He resumed his examination, abandoning the formula of the questionnaire in order to seek not numbers but an understanding of her. He solicited Boynton's attitudes toward petting, and then her own, and, although high-strung, she replied to each inquiry without evasion.
"Did you ever take the initiative?" he was asking.
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because—I don't know why not."
"Let's go on."
Mercilessly, but with increasing aversion, he probed her libidinal history. Her answers continued, dulled by pain, and when, again, he tried to halt, she demanded that he continue.
"All right," he said. "Did you attain physical satisfaction always, almost always, sometimes, rarely, or never?"
"Never."
"Were you most often clothed, partially clothed, or in the nude?"
"Partially clothed."
..why?
"I didn't like him to see me naked. I didn't like to see him either."
"Was it always that way?"
"I don't know. I don't remember."
"What time of day did you usually—"
"After midnight, when he was drunk enough."
"Was the act ever physically painful to you?"
"Sometimes, yes. He could be rough."
"But generally he didn't hurt you?"
"No, generally he didn't."
Paul watched her a moment. "What characteristics in men do you find most sexually repellent?"
"Men or Boynton?"
"Men."
"Do you mean physical?"
"Anything."
"I don't like fat men," she said, "or the super-Nordic type." She thought about it. "No, that's not what matters, really. I don't like brutality, vulgarity—"
"What do you like, Kathleen—what do you find sexually attractive in a male?"
"Intelligence, empathy, a kind of gentleness."
"An effeminate man?"
"God, no—I mean, mature authority in a man, strength—a solid, grown man, not a thoughtless acrobat. I want all the things in a man my husband never had."
"Did he have anything at all for you, Kathleen?”
“What do you mean?"
"Did he—well, let me get back to the Chapman questions. You never had an orgasm with him. But otherwise—" He paused, then continued. "To what degree did you enjoy the sex act with your husband—very much, somewhat, not very much, not at all?"
"I hated it. I hated every damn minute."
Her hand trembled as she pushed the cigarette into the tray, and then fumbled for another.
"Go on," she said, "go on."
"No, Kathleen," he said. "This is foolishness. You're the one who must go on. I don't need statistics. Just tell me what really happened, how you felt—that's all that counts—how you felt."
She stared at the tea table, drawing steadily on the cigarette. "He came from Korea, this hero—handsomest man on earth—everyone wanted him, and he wanted me. I was flattered silly." She remembered a moment, and then began again. "We eloped. It was in all the newspapers. I'd never been with another man before him. He'd had a hundred women, but never a love affair, I'm sure. He'd had prostitutes, call girls, camp followers, and, well, just easy girls who were worshipful and wanted it on the record." She faltered. "I'm trying to explain him. I don't know. From the first night, he did what he wanted for himself, and that was all. I didn't know what to do, or what was expected of me. And I never had a chance to react. I never reacted. To what? There was no love—only intercourse. He wasn't inadequate or anything like that. I was the one who was inadequate. I came to despise the time and avoid it. He called me cold, frigid." She looked up. "Do you know French?"
"Slightly."
"He had a stock of expressions picked up in bordellos. Femme de glace, he called me once—woman of ice." She bit her lip. "He kept calling me frigid. He never stopped."
"Why did he call you that?"
"Because I was frigid, I guess," she said helplessly. "I guess I was. How could I know? At first, I thought it was his fault. But I wasn't sure. And he was always sure. And so, finally, I decided that it was my fault. That was after he had died—no, even before, yes, even before, I was beginning to believe it was me. I never felt anything, Paul, and I couldn't give anything. I don't mean orgasm. Forget orgasm. I mean, passion, excitement, tenderness, desire—oh, love, just plain love. Eventually, he stopped coming home nights at a stretch. When he was home, I was stiff, I avoided him, I pretended I was tired or ill. Once a month maybe, he'd take me, or I'd let him, when he was drunk, and I was drugged with sleeping pills."
"Did you try to do anything about it?"
"What do you mean?"
"Seek help?"
"Yes, one month I went to an analyst I'd heard the women discuss. I saw him a dozen times, I think. We just talked. He was always speaking of beautiful women who were inhibited by narcissism—women so much in love with themselves that they had no love left for anyone else—but that wasn't me, because I never felt beautiful, not even when I was younger. Also, he quoted Stekel at me—unconscious punishment of a man who disappointed—well, maybe unconscious, but I tried consciously in the beginning to give something to Boynton. Then the analyst thought possibly it went back to the time when I was six. The neighbor girl and I always played with our dolls, and one day my mother caught us touching each other—you know—and I was punished. I guess I was always nervous about sexual behavior after that. I remembered, when I was twelve, I think, being ashamed of my breasts, walking hunched—anyway, there was no help from the analyst; he was too formal and unsympathetic, like Boynton in a way, and so I didn't go back—just lived on and on in the ice palace."
"And you still think you're frigid?"
"The night I first met you—just before—a friend of Boynton's who had been courting me came over and, well, I'd had the interview in my head and was upset about lying and wanted desperately to be normal, so I decided to give him what he wanted, hoping it might be different. I wanted him to take me. I led him on. But at the last moment I just froze. It was involuntary. I couldn't help it. I stopped him. He was furious." She paused. "And you. When I thought you were trying to pet—you saw—I froze again. I couldn't control myself. I was afraid. I'm still afraid. You say marriage, and I say, how?"
Paul rubbed the briar of his pipe across the back of his hand. "Kathleen, have you ever had another man?”
“No."
"How do you know it's all you then? How can you be sure you're—well, as you put it, frigid?"
"Because I'm afraid of the act, I don't enjoy it, I'm not stimulated, it leaves me cold."
"Have you wanted to sleep with me?"
"Yes," she said immediately.
"That's a rather warm emotion. That's not cold."
"Oh, yes, when we're apart, and it doesn't count. But if I knew it were to happen—"
"You can't be certain how you'd finally feel. Actually, except in the case of a pelvic disorder, there's no such thing as frigidity."
"Please, Paul. I've read those ridiculous books."
"Nevertheless, it's true. Perhaps thirty-five to forty percent of all women get little pleasure from intercourse—anesthesia of the vagina, the analysts call it, and it's not uncommon—and the reasons vary from guilt to fear of pregnancy to some distant psychic trauma. But in every instance, it is not an inherent coldness the woman suffers, something that can't be overcome, but rather an emotional block that can be worked loose to free the natural warmth down deep inside.”
“You think it's an emotional block?"
"With you? Possibly. But possibly not. It may have much less to do with you than you think. It could have been your husband, you know. Too often, it is the man's lack of technique, his poor judgment, his insensitivity, his neuroses, that make the woman unresponsive." Paul laid down his pipe and looked at her anxious face. "You told me yourself," he went on, "that you were shy and timid from the start. Had your husband understood this, then or later, and catered to it, you might have gradually begun to respond. But he couldn't help you because he was ignorant, too. He mistook experience for knowledge, but experience, like common sense, can be a pack of stupid misinformation. And so, to bed. You found him sexually distasteful at once. Emotionally you closed up shop and threw away the key. But, believe me, because ardor and desire are asleep inside you does not mean that they don't exist. They're there, alive, waiting to be freed. But no man, no matter how cherished, can do it without your help. Such prodigies do not exist. I think if you understand how much I love you, how much I love you and want you and need you—there's no question in my mind that you'll find the capacity to love me back."
"But if I don't—can't?"
"You will, Kathleen." He smiled. "End of interview." He held out his arms. "Come here."
She went into his arms.
"Now," he said, "will you marry me?"
Her head was in the safe comer of his shoulder. She turned it upward. "I'll let you answer for me—after you've slept with me."
"You want me to make love to you first?"
"I want us to make love together."
"Why, Kathleen? So I can audition you—have a preview?"
She closed her eyes, and he kissed her hard, almost angrily, and then, his heart wildly pounding, with persistent tenderness. Her breasts strained against his chest, and her body arched high in his arms, and her free hand caressed his face.
Briefly, he held her off, and found speech difficult. While he could, he wanted to have her understand. "Kathleen, I love you. But I've learned something, too—sex is only one part of love."
"I want that part now."
“Why”
"Because I want you now. I want your sex—and your love —and you."
"All right," he said softly. "Now, darling, right now."
Naked and together on her bed, they were joined.
It was still not love, she decided, and never would be. She had not enjoyed a moment of it, and because of this, she knew that he could feel no differently. She had meant to pretend, to at least do that, but this was too important for a lie, and now her heart was heavier than the weight of him above her.
Femme de glace, she had warned him. And now he knew for himself.
Long minutes before—how many? five? ten?—he had crowned the countless kisses and caresses by entering her. She had wanted him and welcomed him with her mind, but her open thighs had been as rigid and lifeless as planks of wood. Yet, somehow, the desired and dreaded penetration had been effected, mechanically and with hurt, and ever since, she had laid stiffened by fear, knowing that each thrust and withdrawal pushed them further apart.
The guarded awareness of her hateful brain, the unyielding flatness of her shameful nudity, kept captive all response and repelled all rapture.
I told you, I told you, she wanted to scream in mortification. I'm infirm below the neck, infirm and petrified, I'm no good. Why didn't you believe me? Why must it end this way?
Her eyes were closed to shut out all embarrassment, but from behind the lids, she imagined the stranger whom she loved and yet could not love because he was a man. She was conscious of each movement of his lean, muscular frame, of his lips and hands and loins, of the piercing of her flesh. Why, oh, why did she belong to that branch of living things that mated in this ridiculous, complex way? How did flora procreate, and fish, and birds? Weren't there some living things that were fertilized by pollen and others that reproduced by splitting themselves into halves? Somewhere she had read—heard—of more sensible means—the tapeworm that possessed both male and female organs and mated with itself; and the oyster, yes, silly oyster, changing from female to male and back again. But this—this exacting complexity—forcing one dignified being to accept a foreign body inside its own? The foolishness of it!
She opened her eyes and stared up at the face she loved, and saw its love for her, and was sorry for what she was and was not. "I'm sorry, Paul," she whispered. She wanted to say more, but his lips stopped her, and the lingering kiss and touch of his marvelous fingers on her breasts sent a wave of warmth slowly through her. And for miraculous seconds, because he was so precious, her white body became pliant and malleable. For the first time this night, although she hardly realized it, that part of him so deep inside her seemed less intrusive and more pleasurable.
Embracing him, she closed her eyes again and turned her face sideways on the pillow. She ceased to deliberate, allowing her flesh to relish this new contentment. Almost without knowing it, as an act quite apart from her intent, she had relaxed her thighs. A physical transformation, quite uncontrollable, seemed to possess her—the brown nipples of her breasts had swollen to points, and her womb had started to throb, and in her entire body a fierce genii took shape, a form unknown, a lust unknown, now known. Mindless she was, briefly—and then, suddenly angry at her helplessness and the indecency of it, she opened her eyes and forced her mind to check and repress this unseemly reaction.
She tried objectively to see herself, to see this act of sexual intercourse. Always, before, she had thought Constance Chatterley's melting beneath the ardor of the mustached game-keeper an absurdity of fiction. How could any man release a woman from bondage to her inhibited past? And by means such as this?
And yet, now, clinging to her lover, the old doubt seemed less certain. Objectivity seemed to slide away. Because now, now, his love was so full inside her, parting and rending her flesh from its old inertia, heating her skin so recently cold, arousing her limbs with his consummating desire, lifting her passivity to the turmoil and rage of rapture and lust.
For a frantic moment, as in the old, old way, she tried to keep her identity, her aloof identity, to prevent losing it to the other individuality, prevent absorption into the other flesh. Desperately, she tried to curb the rising excitement and replace it with the habit of safe fondness and esteem. Ridicule this unnatural thing, she told herself, this unnatural thing, mock this ancient coupling, mock the awkwardness of the position, with limbs so ludicrous, mock the act itself, this unaesthetic muscular exhaling and inhaling, see the constricted breathless face above divested of all nobility and friendship—fight it, fight it, reach for the smooth used weapons of retreat and resistance, find them, grip them, fight it, fight it.
But grope as she would, there were no weapons, and she was helpless and alone with this wild engagement, and she was weak, weak, and all at once she did not care, and was almost happy. For now, more and more, conscious thought and control slipped away from her. Against her broken will, hating what was happening and loving it, she found her enemy body an ally with the one above.
Gradually, and at last, it was easier not to think than to think. It was easier to feel, and to allow her wandering mind finally to betray her and join her inflamed torso and surrender to the one above. Yet, in defeat there was a special victory, for the conqueror offered her more than she had ever known love to possess, not timid tenderness alone, not mere security, not simply art, but savage, joyous sensuality.
And suddenly the remote identity was gone and she wished only to be blended into the oneness of him. That instant, fused by passion, she let go of something held so many years—let go her separateness—and joined him without reservation. Crying out, she gave herself totally, gasping words she had never spoken aloud, demanding that he take her, take her, remove her from this unendurable rack of pained pleasure.
Momentarily emerging from the animal agony of suspension, one human fear flashed through her head, and with it her heart seemed to stop. What if there would not be another time like this, and another and another? How could she live a day without this? Without her beloved? What if he awakened her for this wondrous night only, and then left her a corpse, shattered for an eternity of years? Oh, couldn't he see? She had come alive. She had crossed the barrier. She was his own. She had loved him before this night, but it had not been her entire life, but now she could not live without him.
She opened her eyes, meaning to ask him, but found that she had no voice except in her womb, and so with that, wildly, shamelessly, proudly, she told him her need. And he answered in her womb, and then with his lips whispering against her eyelids and parted mouth.
The past had dissolved, and there was left the present she could trust, and so she abandoned herself fully to carnal love. Thus impaled, champion over pride and fear, she clawed his shoulders, urging him closer, closer, closer, begging for release, caring for nothing but to be emptied of herself and all that had coursed into her loins and had risen dammed to the bursting point.
"Don't stop," she heard herself cry out, "don't stop—don't—"
Pitched to a frenzy by her chant, his love-giving became a ferocity matched by her own primitive love-taking. Distantly, she heard him. "Kathleen—"
And herself. "Yes—oh, yes—"
Oh, Paul, she groaned.
And Paul—Paul—Paul
Oh, Paul.
. . . thank God, Paul forever, forever.
When she awakened in the night, a vessel so wondrously drained, so peaceful with self and all the world, she was neither startled nor surprised to find her mate asleep beside her. She caressed his consumed naked body with her eyes, and gently she rubbed her neck on his arm heavy with slumber, and blissfully she luxuriated in the gift of an immortality of living years ahead.
Moonlight had invaded the room, and touched them both, and heightened the sense of eternity. Quietly, Kathleen slipped off the bed and padded in nudity through the moonlight, like a goddess that had made her offering and received the ultimate blessing.
At the window, she parted the drapes slightly and lifted her gaze to the serene blue sky, observing how the multitude of stars, in crystal clarity, blinked their approval and paraded in celebration. Silently, she thanked them for miraculous life, as once she had on a Christmas Eve in childhood.
She thought, Old earth, I love you, love you.
When she returned to the bed, he was waiting. She went into his arms, joyful for their all-pervading intimacy.
She wanted to tell him about this, and against his chest she spoke, and he kissed her sweetly, and then he spoke. They talked bit by bit like this, softly, surely, occasionally, of what had been and what would be and what they were, and, after a while, they slept again....