In a Yellow Wood

by Gore Vidal

  She looked at the buildings and saw that they were not tall. They looked like buildings in Paris or London. Squat and dirty and rather Victorian: the buildings were most ordinary but there was so much light over them, against them, all around them that they became as insubstantial as theater props.

  The movie houses which filled the lower parts of most of the buildings of the square had the most light. Their marquees rippled and glittered with names. Large posters were hung wherever there was no electricity. People moved in constant streams into the movies, while other people, as constantly, came out, blinking their eyes, adjusting themselves to reality.

  Then there was the noise. Not a really individual noise, not like an Italian crowd, hoarse and insistent, but a roar with sharp breaks and a rhythm like an automobile engine, a noise like a discordant piece of music with the rumblings of a subway train as a bass. The conversations of many people made a sound as soothing and as natural as the sea but the mechanical things made sharp overtones, set the rhythm of Times Square and of many lives.

  Slowly Carla and Robert Holton allowed themselves to become a part of the current of people, gliding with them toward the north end of the square.

  First of all were the young adventurers: boys with dark skins and dark clever eyes, dressed in the spirit of the jazz they had made their own without understanding. Looking for sex, they walked together in groups, talking in whining voices, unpleasant nasal voices.

  Young girls with bleached blond hair that looked untidy and unclean walked in twos together, looking for men. Their well-formed bodies with tight breasts moved self-consciously as they walked on awkward high heels. They laughed too loudly, giggled too much and stared at sailors.

  The couples were the happiest-looking of all. They always walked with wonder in their faces, conscious of each other as they walked through all the light and sound.

  Old men in dirty clothes moved slowly, looking for cigarette butts. This was not new to them; they had known the square before and found it good hunting though not as congenial as quiet places. They had stopped looking for sex: only cigarette butts.

  Cripples and bums sang songs and rattled tin cups. It was hard to tell what they were looking for besides charity. Perhaps they had stopped their long search. Carla was sorry for them.

  Hot stale air rushed out of the theater lobbies and from the bars and restaurants; stale air rushed upward from the subway ventilators in the sidewalk. The cool night was defeated by the city, even the darkness had been defeated for it was as light as day, as light as day and much prettier and more exciting.

  “What a place!” said Carla. “So much is here. Is this the dream Lewis was talking about?”

  “Maybe.”

  “I think,” said Carla, laughing, “this is the peak of your civilization.”

  “Probably; it’s the sign of the century.”

  “But there will be other centuries.” And they thought of other centuries when they would not be alive and they tried to see the square in future years—if the square survived with the dream.

  Outside the Bijou Theater Marjorie Ventusa stood, trying to make up her mind if she wanted to see her favorite actress suffer. Marjorie liked pictures that made her cry. She wasn’t sure, however, if she wanted to cry tonight.

  Mrs Merrin had been quite pleasant that evening when Marjorie left and this made her feel good. She stood now, undecided, Times Square all around her. She often faced the high prices of the square to see new movies. She liked crowded places because she felt happy with a lot of people around her.

  She stood beside the box office, warmed by the air from the theater. The sight of all the people and lights made her feel secure as though she were not really alone, for she identified herself with every couple that passed by. She had no envy.

  Marjorie was about to go into the movie when she saw Robert Holton crossing a street on the other side of the square. She had a sudden impulse to call him, to make herself heard over the hundreds of people. Then she saw that he was not alone. She saw that he was with a dark pretty girl: a woman from the world where he lived. Marjorie Ventusa watched him as he walked with this person across the street. Then, on the other side, she lost him. He had disappeared with the dark woman.

  The square had changed now and the lights were cruel. The noises became oppressive and she felt shut out of the lives of the people who passed her.

  Marjorie Ventusa grabbed her black patent-leather handbag close to her and, controlling herself, she walked along the square. She walked slowly, allowing others to push by her. She passed in front of many movie houses and many bars. There was a great noise all around her, harsh voices and much laughing. She hated the laughing the most. Two young girls were stopped by two sailors in front of her and they spoke together in the light of a red neon sign. The sailors said something and the girls laughed. Quickly Marjorie Ventusa walked by them.

  A group of boys were standing in a blue light and they were laughing in their harsh changing voices. She wished they would stop. Looking downward, she walked through the crowd, no longer with it.

  Marjorie Ventusa was the center now of laughing people and her eyes were dazzled by changing lights.

  Finally, out of breath, and at the northern end of the square, she stopped and pressed against a building. She looked back at the places she had just left and she was tired.

  A stout little man was staring at her. He was trying to figure out what she was and what he might dare do. She looked at him with disgust, but he was not bothered by this and, thinking her a whore, he separated himself from the crowd and came over to where she stood. He leaned against the building a few feet from her. Slowly, calmly he took a package of cigarettes out of his pocket. He turned to her now, offering her a cigarette.

  “Want a smoke?”

  She shook her head. “No, thanks.”

  He took one himself and lighted it. He inhaled to show how calm he was and then he said, “You want to walk maybe?”

  “No,” she said furiously, comparing him with Robert Holton. “I don’t want to walk with you.” She turned away from him and went quickly toward the nearest movie. Without once looking back she bought a ticket. As she gave the ticket to the man at the door she heard the stout man whistle as he walked past the theater.

  Setting her face, she walked into the marble and gold lobby. She walked, conscious of a thousand non-existent eyes watching her back.

  Then she entered the darkened hall of the movie. On the screen two characters, simulating love, were laughing loudly. Marjorie Ventusa was trapped.

  Caroline and Jim Trebling had been giggling all evening. Caroline had never known anyone quite so amusing as Trebling. He had no respect for anything; at least, no respect for the things most people did. He made fun of her office and her job and he was pleasant as he did it; not bitter as so many people were.

  He had suggested that they visit Times Square and go dancing in one of the large dance halls there. She had tried to talk him into going some place more expensive but he had said that he didn’t have the money and that as long as you danced somewhere that was all that counted.

  From Fifth Avenue they walked along Forty-Seventh Street until, finally, they came to the square. Trebling blinked.

  “It’s the damnedest sight! I don’t think it can compare with L.A. but there really is something wonderful about it.”

  Caroline regarded the square without much emotion. She had seen it all her life. “I think it’s too crowded,” she said finally, wishing that he had decided to take her to a better place, a place with a big name, one she could talk about later.

  He stood, however, staring at the lights; then he lowered his eyes from the lights and looked at the people. She noticed now that he looked at people a great deal. Even when they were talking he always stared at people as though there was something wrong with them.

  “Why’re you looking around all the time?” asked Caroline. “I don’t understand you at all. I don’t think they like being stared at.”


  “What?” He hadn’t been listening to her. “Why do I...stare? I just like to look at them and see what they’re so busy rushing around for.”

  “Don’t you know?”

  “No, do you?”

  “Well....” She hesitated, uncertain of her meaning, uncertain of what they were talking about.

  He laughed. She admired his way of telling when she couldn’t understand him; he never really embarrassed her by trying to talk over her head as some men tried to do: not that they really could, of course. She was an American woman and just as smart as any man. Caroline stood there looking at the square with Trebling who had just laughed and saved her from embarrassment; Caroline stood erect and sure of herself and her emancipation, her arm in his.

  Then, without speaking, he led her across the middle of the square. It was dazzling to cross between the many lights. Caroline liked the colors. They seemed rather cozy to her. Times Square was in many ways her symbol of home. It was no longer interesting because home is never interesting but she liked it still.

  “Look at all the movie houses,” he said when they had gotten over on the other side. “There’s so much of everything. But it’s dirty. It’s all awfully dirty.”

  “Is it?” Caroline had not thought of that. Perhaps the square was not very clean but how could it be? There were always so many people coming to be impressed or depressed by it.

  “Bob used to talk a lot about this part of town, about Broadway. I think he used to like it a lot,” said Trebling.

  “Is that right?”

  “Oh, sure. He was a playboy during the war.”

  Caroline was surprised but not very interested. “He sure’s changed a lot,” she said. “He’s a nice fellow and I know you think a lot of him but he’s a little dull...now, anyway.”

  “I think,” said Trebling, “that people sometimes feel they have to change to protect themselves. He’s just making a new life now.”

  “He’s certainly making a dull one.”

  “Not if it’s what he wants.”

  “Imagine working in an office if you could do something else!”

  “What about yourself?”

  Caroline flushed; she had found herself becoming so much involved with Trebling’s personality that she had begun to lose her own in his: she had begun to think that she was as free as he was or, rather, as he felt he was. She had to retrace now; she must go back into herself. “I can’t do anything else,” she said. “That’s all I know—working in an office.”

  “You could get married.”

  “I suppose I could.” Purposely she left it at that. He didn’t ask her anything else. They watched the square.

  Caroline was conscious of odors, too conscious of them. There were a great many unpleasant odors in the square: beer and cigarette smoke and exhaust; perfume and sweat and stale air from theaters and subways; food cooking—hot dogs, hamburgers, popcorn and peanuts. She got a little dizzy just breathing.

  “Come on, Jim,” she said, “let’s go find the dance hall.”

  They walked together along the crowded streets and as they walked he told her wonderful stories of freedom that were not true but still very interesting; and she thought him the most fascinating man she knew and not at all like his dull friend Robert Holton.

  At last they came to a dance hall. As much as she liked the glitter of the square it was a relief to go inside the red-upholstered, mirror-walled dance hall where the only odors were of perfume and cigarette smoke.

  “I haven’t been here for so long,” she said.

  Mr. Heywood came out of the theater. He had left in the middle of the last act. It was his personal strategy to do this because it meant that he missed the crowd and the long wait for his car to find him.

  The play had been dreary and he had seen it only because a friend of his knew the girl in it. Besides, Mr. Heywood did not like to go to plays alone. His wife no longer went with him and he was afraid of taking other women around with him because people talked. He did not like any men at all.

  The street was almost deserted. The theaters still were full and their chaste white light signs shone cleanly into the street. Two blocks away was Times Square. He could just barely make out the colored sign of a soft drink bottle. He shuddered as he thought of soft drinks.

  He stood in front of the theater, the light from the marquee shining dramatically down upon him. He would stand here now without moving until his waiting chauffeur saw him and took him away. To his left he heard the sound of a motor starting. He did not look to his left. He merely stood now, self-contained and passive, waiting.

  His car stopped in front of him. The chauffeur got out, opened the door and said something to him and Mr. Heywood said something to the chauffeur and an understanding was reached. Mr. Heywood got into the car and the chauffeur drove down the street into the square and toward home.

  Mr. Heywood shrank from the lights that suddenly made the inside of his car as colorful as a rainbow. He tried not to look out the window at the square but it was impossible not to look. His eyes were drawn by the force of the lights and he looked out finally.

  All the cheapness he hated was in the square. The people of whom he was terrified moved all about him now. The noises he hated to hear and the lights he hated to see intruded. He shuddered and wondered if he was going to be sick.

  Finally they left the square.

  He felt much better now that they were in the quieter darker places of the city. Mr. Heywood was lonely now. He had always been lonely and that was his personal sadness. He wished that he were young. It was impossible to be lonely when one was young. He wished that he were Robert Holton.

  Carla and Holton stopped to rest at the northern end of the square. They stood upon a small island of concrete surrounded by avenues. A red light shone across Holton’s face giving him a sinister expression. Carla laughed.

  “What’s so funny?”

  “Your face...you look like Mephisto.” He smiled and stepped out of the red light and stood beside her.

  “What do you think of it now?” asked Holton as they stood on their island, watching.

  “The things I’ve always thought. It’s very brilliant. It is a...production.”

  “Everyone comes to see it.”

  “And I think it means something different to each one. It’s like a work of art that way.” She paused and added, “It is a work of art.”

  “An unfriendly one, though.”

  She shrugged. “Art doesn’t have to be friendly. To me all this bad taste is very alive and miraculous.” She was going to say more but she was not sure of her English. The language she had learned had been literary and she was occasionally conscious of not speaking ordinary words. Holton had not been listening, though. Caught in the magic she had performed upon the square, he was melting into it, his eyes fixed on the effect and not the details.

  “What a place to make a decision,” he said firmly, turning to look at her.

  “A decision?” She was not sure of him now; not sure of the magic. “What sort of decision?”

  “I’ll tell you later.”

  “If you like.” She could see that he was not ready to talk to her yet. The signs were good, though. He was returning.

  Arm in arm they deserted their concrete island. They crossed the street and stood for a moment on the edge of the square, looking back at the lights.

  “Where do you want to go?” asked Holton.

  “Back to my hotel,” she said, not looking at him.

  “Shall I go with you?”

  “Do you want to?” She noticed that one of the largest signs had several dead lights in it.

  “Of course I want to,” he said.

  She was very happy then. The bridge was completed.

  “Shall we walk? It’s not far.” He nodded. They left the bright square and walked northward, not speaking. The bridge was not yet strong.

  Chapter Twelve

  THEY STOOD A MOMENT IN THE GRAY HEAVILY CARPETED Corridor
. The hotel was an expensive one and this was the first time Robert Holton had been inside it.

  “I’m down here,” said Carla, taking a key out of her bag. She led him down the corridor.

  She stopped, unlocked a door, and they went inside.

  “In America you always try to make everything look expensive,” she said. “But I like this room.”

  “Looks like Hollywood,” said Holton. Carla looked about her and agreed. The walls were dull green and the ceiling white. The furniture was low and modern and there was much glass in the room: mirrors and glass-topped tables. Two large windows looked out on Central Park. At the left was the doorway to the bedroom.

  “Bankton must have a lot of money,” murmured Holton.

  Carla smiled. “No, I have, but that’s not important. Sit down over there, Bob.” She motioned to a white couch by the window. “Would you like something to drink?”

  “If you want one.”

  While she fixed his drink she would be able to think of the right thing to say. She felt constrained still and her heart was beating rapidly. She prepared the drink deliberately and, satisfied that it was right, she turned and walked over to him. “Here you are.” Then she sat down beside him.

  They looked out at the city. Carla sat straight on the edge of the couch, her eyes fixed on the tall buildings. She was conscious of Holton’s slow breathing beside her. The silence was becoming difficult; then he picked up his glass and ice clattered and the silence broke.

  “Tell me,” she said, sitting back in the couch, “what do you do during the days? What does a broker do?”

  He opened his coat and relaxed. “Not much, I’m afraid. I get all sorts of statistical books and I make out reports from them. It’s pretty dull.”

  “How long are you going to have to do that?”

  “I don’t know...a year maybe. I think Mr. Heywood—he was the fellow we met at the party—I think he’s going to move me out in the selling end.”

  “You would like that?”

  “It means more money and it’s going to be my career.”