Wrong Information Is Being Given Out at Princeton

by J. P. Donleavy

  The taxi drawing up at the front entrance of this somberly elegant building. Sylvia, who complains of no money, giving the driver one of her new crisp twenty-dollar bills from the bank built like a mansion over on Madison Avenue and, after handing back a big tip, stuffing all the change in a secret side pocket of her mink coat. Follow the rich. As I do in trepidatious anticipation as one approaches the mausoleumlike solemnity of this entrance. The chiseled stone. The perfume scent. The polished brass. The green-uniformed doorman holding open the door.

  “Good evening, Miss Sylvia. How nice to see you. Good evening, sir.”

  No recognition of our marriage in his greeting, you bastard. Or that Sylvia had ever recently been staying at Sutton Place. At least he didn’t say, Hey, bud, where do you think you’re going. And don’t try to steal the flowers off the marble table in the lobby. And why don’t you get your zoot-suit shoes shined.

  The elevator operator smiling at Sylvia and at least a little more polite, nodding his head at me. Takes the shiny brass knob in his white-gloved hand and turns it downward. And upward we go. In the darkly paneled chamber smelling of lavender wax. Past doors on each floor. And so that New Yorkers can avoid bad luck, no thirteenth floor. And no need to worry, as we’re not going that high. Slowing gently to a stop. At the Witherspoon Triumphingtons’ private entrance on their private floor. Step out into the glowing light of this domed vestibule. With its pillars flanking marble busts in niches around the wall. Philosophers upon their plinths. Drusilla standing there. In the center of this white marble area.

  “Why hello. Didn’t expect you quite this early. But come in.”

  Sylvia flinging her fur onto a chair. A stooped white-haired butler in a crimson brass-buttoned waistcoat emerging from the shadows. Takes my torn overcoat and Sylvia’s mink. Drusilla, a long ivory cigarette holder waving as she leads along a long hall to a vast drawing room. She’d only very occasionally smoked but always liked to have something in her hand. Just walking on the gleaming parquet from the domed entrance hall, you could see in the different directions, all the doors, and that ten families could easily live here and squeeze in a few more families of their relatives, and still have room for family wars. And with every architectural nuance to make you uncomfortably feel you were something the cat dragged in.

  “Sylvia, I know, hates daiquiris. Even though she has them. But you’ll have your usual grapefruit juice, won’t you, my dear. What would you like, Stephen.”

  “I’ll have a beer.”

  “Gilbert does make wonderful daiquiris. He will be along in a moment. Poor old fellow, he’s only just recovering from the flu. He is, you know, rather getting on, takes an afternoon nap. I’m having a daiquiri.”

  As we sit surveying the array of canapés in the sitting room, the stooped-over Gilbert ferrying in his tray of drinks. Out of his black coat and now in his white, the light flashing on the brass buttons of his crimson satin waistcoat. These Witherspoon Triumphingtons have a butler in the country, a butler in town. The hoot of a tugboat on the river below. Out the windows, the lights of Brooklyn in the distance. Walls along the hall decorated with etchings and glass cabinets full of snuffboxes. And in this room one or two fabled paintings I have actually seen pictures of in books. A portrait of a woman in a great black hat and black gown holding a small bouquet of purple flowers and a hound on a lead in front of her.

  “Ah, Stephen, I see you’re looking at that painting. Are you perhaps a connoisseur.”

  “Hardly that, ma’am. But, as the saying goes, I know what I like and I like that painting. Might it by any manner of chance be a Boldini.”

  “My, you are a connoisseur.”

  “Well, I have now and again visited a few galleries and looked at a few auction catalogs.”

  Drusilla stands and moves to serve canapés. A curvaceously stunning figure revealed in a long dress of raw silk. Décolletage exposing the gentle outline of her creamy soft breasts. The delicate fragrance of her perfume. One’s own mother, by dint of a large family, always seemed to smell of her kitchen and had no choice but to be in an apron all her life. Sewing and mending, she further enveloped herself with her children, keeping them around her like a great protective cloak. And was never to be found in restaurants for dinner or in nightclubs all night for champagne. The Irish always like to say they worked their fingers to the bone and endured every sacrifice for their progeny. Certainly my mother’s hands were calloused and certainly were less tapered and fingernails less long than this elegant Drusilla’s, upon whose wrists diamond bracelets glitter blue-white and bright.

  “Now tell me, what have you two lovebirds been up to downtown, or rather, especially you, Stephen, whom we haven’t seen for such a good long while. You know, you musn’t ever think we don’t always want to see more of you. Do you play canasta. I’d love to invite you, you know.”

  “Well ma’am, I don’t believe I’ve ever played canasta. I’ve been under pressure with work with a deadline.”

  “Oh, now that is good to hear. How many people do we know who are under pressure with work with deadlines. Who I do really think should be, you know. And how refreshing to hear that someone is. Solitude must really be so meaningful to you. And what are you working on now, Stephen. I know that can be an infuriating remark, for its not always a genuine question, but is often asked by way of saying you’ve never done anything yet and if you do, it will equally be of no importance. But I mean the question in its best sense.”

  “Well ma’am, yes, it is kind of you to give me the benefit of the doubt.”

  “There you go again, so damn formal. Why haven’t you done something about that, Sylvia.”

  “Well, he’s not always that formal.”

  “Then Stephen, please call me Dru. As in the past tense of draw, as with pen and ink. And so if I may so inquire, what is it you’re actually working on now.”

  “Well Dru, I’m presently composing a minuet. And also I’m rehearsing conducting in the Russian manner.”

  “Oh. I didn’t know there was such a manner.”

  “Well, yes, there is. As one might imagine can happen with some of the more temperamental Russian conductors such as Nicolas Slonimsky, who is, as it happens, a foremost champion of contemporary American composers. Some Muscovite conductors can be too bizarre and behave like they are big birds, arms flapping as if to fly them off the podium. As indeed did happen once to one of them in Saint Petersburg conducting the explosions at the end of the 1812 Overture. It blew him in an arc right off the podium.”

  “Oh my dear, I don’t mean to laugh, but how funny.”

  “He landed feetfirst, going through a kettledrum being kept in the well of the stage. And wore it like a hula-hula skirt. And then did a rumba.”

  “Ha, ha. How utterly rich. Well, I sincerely hope you’re not going to end up doing that, Stephen.”

  “Well, of course one does eschew the conducting of some of these prima donnas. Imperceptibility is called for in one’s movements and not too much of this jumping up and down unless the music absolutely demands it. Then it is best done by a certain flexing of the knees. Calls for one always remembering to do one’s deep knee-bending exercises.”

  “Ha ha, I never would have thought conductors had to be so on their toes. How wonderfully interesting, and it must for you, too, Sylvia.”

  “Yeah, it’s pretty fantastic. To stand around and watch prodigies springing up from nowhere to become major virtuosi playing at bar mitzvahs and weddings and Italian picnics. And all they need in the beginning is to be in their underwear, up on a reinforced orange crate, practicing in front of the mirror, bowing to the wall, shaking imaginary hands all around them and then doing deep knee bends. And then falling off on their ass.”

  “Oh, that sounds rather more than a little impatient of you, Sylvia. Someone not knowing you would even say spiteful. Stephen is going to look very nice on the podium, and indeed, although I’m not familiar with the Russian manner of conducting, I’m sure once mastered it�
�s extremely effective. Stephen, let me replenish you. Do, instead, have a daiquiri. You’ve hardly touched your beer, and you must be a thirsty boy.”

  “I don’t mind if I do try a daiquiri, ma’am.”

  Drusilla pressing her little ivory servant’s button. Gilbert swaying in with another tray. Pouring out the drinks. His shaking hand an unsteadiness giving the impression old Gilbert was, by way of testing their strength, sampling the absolutely powerful daiquiris. The ambience beguiling as one sat on the down-filled pillows. Sylvia at one end and I at the other of what had to be a Louis XV gilt-wood sofa. Resting back and breathing comfortably amid the splendor everywhere. The carpeting, the statuary, the tapestry, the wonderment of the paintings. One’s eye changing focus. From the silver bronze figures to the other myriad objets d’art. Silkily soft napkins around the bottom of drinking glasses and coasters featuring foxhunting scenes on the polished, gleaming tabletops. Preserve above all the patina from the potential devastation of where one might place the moistured bottom of one’s glass. Should, of course, the napkin not have absorbed such wetness. Water puddles on your finer things could be as lethal as acid. At least I’m thinking that’s what propriety and good manners are all about. Don’t fuck up, if you can avoid it by decent behavior, another’s property. And no fear, that wasn’t the way it was growing up in my house. Every surface fucked up beyond restoration or redemption. But not in this outfit on Sutton Place. To which, as the alcohol seeps into my brain and knocks my neurons for a loop, I must confess I am taking an inordinate liking. Anything here could be shoved into an auction house to be bid upon and the proceeds support me through the writing of at least five major symphonies. And who cares if they are played at bar mitzvahs and weddings. Although I’d prefer the Italian picnics, quaffing red wop wine and sausages. And then when I’ve put my last note upon paper, and the last tremulo comes out of the string section of the last orchestra ever to play my minuet, and I hear my last standing ovation, then there would still be enough money left to support me, retired in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, in luxury for the rest of my life.

  “And Sylvia, you must keep on nibbling on a little something, you know. And you, too, Stephen.”

  “Thank you, ma’am. I think I might just try this little sliver of smoked salmon.”

  Sylvia’s adopted mother did, as she then passed the canapés closer, brush her hand over mine. Nor could one take one’s eye off a strange fanciful sculpture nearby on a side table, depicting, of all people—for there he was, absolutely, his head atilt, dancing the tango with Natasha Rambova—none other than Rudolph Valentino. The legs of the figures on point in the attitude croisée and their sculpted faces ivory white. Which whiteness seemed in contrast to remarks always made of his reputed darker-shade resemblance to me. The two of us both sure looking white tonight. A nice thought to contribute to the conversation, which, stilted as it was, was distinctly not the most stilted of all time. For on every occasion of Dru waving her ivory cigarette holder as she drawlingly spoke, she also winked and further stiffened my most uncomfortably situated cock.

  “Well, since one hardly gets anything of news these days out of Sylvia, perhaps Stephen, having already brought the subject up, do tell me now is the minuet you are working on presently what one would term a ‘serious work.’ I mean, of course it’s serious. But I mean in the sense of its being something like a score, as part of a much larger work like an opera or a symphony. Perhaps for a special performance.”

  “Well, ma’am—”

  “Stephen, if you call me ‘ma’am’ again, I think I shall raise my voice in not-so-mild protest.”

  “Well as a matter of fact, Drusilla—”

  “Dru, please.”

  “Well, Dru, I do not eschew operas or symphonies but often prefer to work on something light, short, and perhaps even sweet. Preludes, mazurkas, impromptus, and scherzos. But for the moment, and not being too embroiled in a creative panic, the minuet has, as a musical form, overtaken my attention.”

  “Oh, how nice.”

  “One looks for a certain perfection of tonal combination and pitch, occasionally dissonant, to be performed by a major virtuoso on the concert platform. I’m also trying to instill in it a certain quality inspired particularly by the majesty of Russian choirs in singing their wonderful folk songs. Availing of the soulful sadness and clarity of their voices in chorus. It is so marvelous when one of their voices breaks exquisitely loose in solo performance to permeate the air. In effect, the musical nature of what I should attempt to emulate.”

  “Oh isn’t that marvelous. To hear this. To know firsthand as to how the artistic spirit works. That when bestirred by inspiration, it immediately takes pen to paper, the notes flying onto the page. Don’t you think that’s spirit stirring, Sylvia.”

  “Yeah. Maybe.”

  “Oh, dear Sylvia, considering that we are talking about Stephen’s work, that is a singularly unenthusiastic response.”

  “Well, yeah, why not. I haven’t heard the minuet yet.”

  Solemn, sulking Sylvia. As I once called her. And multiorgasmic, as well. Crossing her exquisitely tapered legs, which these days kept inciting a vision of the gang-bang guys of her college days for whom she had expressed so much enthusiasm. Beer-boozing, water polo-playing fraternity brothers with their Green fraternal letters emblazoned in lipstick across their chests. Seven of them. They stood in a row, because if they stood in line, they’d be poking their pricks up one another’s asses. And all of them foaming at the mouth, ready in turn to jump on her and shoot their wad, as she said, one after another. It was, she said, after she said it was true, a phony story she invented because if it happened, she didn’t want to ever know who might be the father of any child she might ever have. It sounded too damn true to me not to be enraged, and I shook my fist at her. Somebody else could be the father if ever she got pregnant. She said, “Waiting to be a mother isn’t driving me nuts yet, but when it is, it’s my body, my ass, my mind, and I’ll do what the fuck I want with them. And you can take your squeamish Catholic bullshit morality and shove it as far as constipation will allow up your own ass.”

  “Well now, my dears, are your daiquiris all right. Oh, sorry, I altogether forgot you’re not having daiquiris. Oh, but you are. Both of you. Do have another, Stephen.”

  “Thank you, Dru. It’s having an effect. They sure pack a wallop.”

  “Ah, that sounds better. So good to see you two young things together. Jonathan is away now so much and one is more than one likes these days on one’s own. One does get sick of playing bridge and backgammon and uselessly gossiping away at cocktail parties and dinner parties and balls. Saying the same things over and over again. I ought to go visiting downtown, where you are, where all the action is.”

  “Well, Dru, it’s pretty much besmirched down there near the Bowery, with a bunch of bums hanging around all over the place, you must be warned.”

  “Well, I know I should be simply charmed. But what a lovely word, besmirched. I had thought of going to Paris for a few days. But hardly know enough people there anymore, and the ones I do know are getting old enough to die. Hey, what’s with you two saying nothing to each other Sylvia. What fucking well gives. If I may be so bold as to inquire in an old-fashioned vernacular.”

  “Nothing much fucking well gives.”

  “Well, Sylvia, you do don’t you, as I’m sure Stephen does, like your Verdi. And such weeping sound as is found in passages of Puccini’s ‘Nessun Dorma.’”

  “Christ, I hear plenty enough already of the abstruse about music in my dancing classes without wanting to go into any more of it just now.”

  “Well, I guess that signals our move toward dinner. At least I know you like Italian food. Stephen, you’ve nothing against Italian food.”

  “No, ma’am. Sorry, I mean Dru. I love Italian food. And excuse me a moment. If I may inquire where the nearest men’s room is.”

  “You may inquire. Just out and down the hall, third door on your right.”
>
  A nice long wink and smile from Drusilla as one stands up. One, too, did get a shock both of recognition and surprise at the use of the word fucking coming from this most elegant woman’s lips. Who was ready with a sledgehammer to break the ice of our overly polite conversation. And then finding that she knew more about music than she let on. Especially as I was aiding and abetting her every wink coming now, which made my already-rigid prick stiffen even more and made it feel a few inches longer. And after half a beer and three daiquiris consumed, left one more than desperate to take a pee. And as I got up to stand, I knew, Christ Almighty, that Drusilla knew I knew she was staring at my crotch as I headed to open one side of the double mahogany doors. And go counting to the third door, foot stepping on this glowingly golden carpet, and enter this exquisite little powder room off the hall. A dozen face towels, embroidered with the initials WT, hanging on gleaming hot rails. Scents and toilet waters. Soaps and powders. The washbasin in the shape of a great pearly shell. Unzip my fly. Can’t get ahold of my prick. Which I know is in there, because it’s busting to get out. Holy cow. In my emotional backlash panic down on Pell Street, after busting the bed with Aspasia, and changing my clothes, put my shorts back on, back to front. Leaving even less space for my hard-on and no space at all to get it out to take a pee. Before I piss in my pants. Have to take them off. And to get them off, because of the slight peg in the cuff of the leg, I have to take my god damn shoes off as well. Everyone is going to wonder what am I doing to be gone so long. Casing the joint to steal valuables. Well, standing in my socks, I’m looking at the unfunny cartoons on the wall, for a start. And I’m waiting for my prick to detumesce so the urine can flow. And I’ve just pissed, missing the toilet bowl. Momma meeo. Soaked my smelly long-unwashed socks in the puddle on the marble floor. And into which puddle, now to wipe it up, must go the most pristine towel I have ever laid eyes on in my life. Turned a butterscotch color. Sorry, Dru, I just pissed all over your house and just tried to do a little wiping up. And even as I rinse out the towel, it’s going to remain soaking wet. Will leave Gilbert, the butler, or whoever cleans up in here, wondering what the fuck hit the place. As I squeeze the piss out of my socks. And spin them in the air to hopelessly dry. Christ, and put goddamn spots of drops on the mirror and the rest of the fucking towels. And no time left to obliterate, never mind clean the piss-tinted desecration or to lay my socks for an hour or two on the hot rail along with the warm towels, which now also need a washing. This is all just perfect to lead to long-term psychotic manic depression. To which I suspect I’m already prone, with my recurrent bimonthly relapses conducted at myself in the mirror, which results in frenzied foaming at the mouth driving me into making accusatory assaults not only on myself but on the surrounding air.