The Jack Finney Reader

by Jack Finney

  What have you done to my heart, sang Nat King Cole, and Vic turned and began transferring wallet, keys, and small change from the pockets of his wash pants. I can afford to do whatever I feel like, he was thinking. Fly to Las Vegas, only I hate the place. Or take a suite at the Plaza, and live like a king till Monday morning. Damn it, he said aloud, crossing the room to the radio, I want to do something unique. He snapped the radio off. Rent the grand ballroom at the Waldorf, and throw a party for everyone in the phone book named Johnson. He walked to the closet and took out his suit coat. Or buy a brand-new Rolls-Royce, have the front end lowered and flames painted on the hood.

  He walked to the bedroom window, hands thrust into his pants pockets, and stared down at the afternoon street again. Something I'll remember for years, he murmured. Something no one in his right mind would even consid— He stopped abruptly, his chin lifting; staring at the apartment building across the street, he actually held his breath for a moment. Because suddenly he knew what he wanted to do with his weekend, and he laughed aloud, gleefully, at the sheer absurdity of it. I must be going nuts, he muttered. It would cost five hundred bucks. More than that; six or seven, time I got through. And it couldn't be done, anyway.

  Just the same — on impulse, for the fun of playing with this fantastic notion — Vic walked to the phone and dialed information. The operator gave him the number he asked for. Vic thanked her and, grinning at his own foolishness, began to dial. But then he put down the phone and walked to his closet. From the shelf, he lifted down the small japanned metal box in which he kept a handful of papers of more or less importance to him. He set the box on a chair, opened it, and found the documents he wanted. He looked them over carefully, then slipped them into the inside pocket of his suit coat, walked to the phone, and dialed.

  A pleasant-voiced girl answered immediately. He asked a question, and she answered at once. Four-forty-five, she said.

  Vic glanced at his watch: seventeen minutes to three. Well — momentarily, he hesitated, but was impelled to continue immediately, as though he were serious — I guess I could make that. He asked another question, and the girl said, Just a moment, please. As he waited, he found himself hoping that the girl would say no, but she did not.

  She said, Yes, there is. Just one, though. Shall I hold it for you?

  It was time to say no, but he could not; for then the entire conversation would become pointless, downright silly. He was unable to allow himself to be embarrassed in even the telephonic presence of this girl, and he said, Why, yes. Yes, of course, please.

  What is your name?

  Instantly suppressing the impulse to give a false name, he heard himself saying, Talburt. Victor Talburt, and now he slowly sat down on the edge of the bed, and his grin was completely gone. He spelled his name, then added eagerly, But I don't suppose you can take my check. The banks are closed. But yes, of course they could, and when Vic then voiced the last objection he could think of and the young voice described the two papers in his suitcoat pocket, he simply nodded dumbly. All right, he said then, somberly, and for simple lack of any other reply. I'll be there.

  Then, as he was in the very act of replacing the phone, his mood changed to a sudden wild exultation. He began to grin. Well, why not? he murmured, then stood up. Why the heck not he said more loudly, and he smacked a fist into the palm of his hand and grinned excitedly. It'll cost — well, whatever it costs, it'll be too much. It's crazy, it's insane! But I can do it just the same, and nobody'll even miss a meal!

  It took him less than four minutes to pack two clean shirts, two pairs of shorts, a gray sleeveless sweater, some socks, handkerchiefs, and toilet articles. They fitted easily into his dispatch case. Then he was pulling his apartment door closed behind him. Downstairs, he cashed a check at the delicatessen, and he was in a cab, on his way, within seven minutes. In just short of one hour after his first wild impulse to pick up his telephone, Vic Talburt was at the airport, paying the cab driver.

  He was hardly thinking any more. He felt the way he sometimes did at work when he would glance up from his drawing board and let his eyes drift out of focus. This would seem, momentarily, to shut off thought. Then, blinking, he would return to full awareness, his eyes dropping once more to his work. Now, pushing through the door, then walking across the glossy floor of the airport building, he felt in very much the same state of nonthought. And, passively, he continued to allow things to happen.

  Standing at a counter, he obediently spelled his name when asked, filled out a form, presented documents for inspection. Only once — making out a check for several hundred dollars — did he blink his eves, figuratively speaking, and return to full and focused awareness. The utter recklessness and absurdity of what he was doing rose up clear and sharp in his mind; then he simply let himself slip back into the dreamy luxury of surrendering his will and self to the chain of events he had begun an hour before.

  They took off exactly on time. Two hours after he'd made his plane reservation in order to avoid being embarrassed before an invisible girl, Vic Talburt sat strapped in a cushioned seat, moving from the earth toward the sky in a steep, straight line. Within minutes, he was flying over the earth at more than five hundred miles an hour. He did not seem to be flying, though; there was hardly any sense of moving. As he unfastened his seat belt, it seemed to Vic that they were gliding, drifting, the only sound from the plane the faint hiss of air over its skin. It was like nothing he'd ever experienced before.

  He was given a drink, and then he ate dinner, and he sat suspended over what seemed to the eye like a gray sheet of lead far below him, seen through wispy layers of clouds at many levels. Two hundred and fifty miles ahead, through the window at his shoulder, he could see the edge of night sliding toward him. And before he'd finished dinner, while he still was sipping his coffee, they entered the premature night that had rushed at them, and he saw the stars ahead, and then, moments later, overhead and all around him.

  He slept. Once lie awakened in semidarkness, the plane lights dimmed, the other passengers asleep or silent. Almost immediately, he slipped into sleep again, and when he was wakened by the stewardess' shaking his shoulder, he glanced at his watch. It showed only half an hour past midnight, but the stars were gone from the sky now, and it was gilded by the rising sun. Here, it was half past five in the morning, he knew, and he sat up, coming wide-awake with a sudden surge of excitement; he gave himself the little thrill of setting his watch to the entirely different time of the entirely different world he had so incredibly entered.

  A few minutes ahead of schedule, at just six o'clock in the morning, Paris time, they landed at Le Bourget field; and one hour and five minutes later, Vic was stepping onto the sidewalk from the bus at the aérogare, the air-terminal building, within easy sight of the Eiffel Tower.

  But he did not turn to look at it. Just as he had on the bus from the airport — sitting nearly the whole time with his eyes closed — Vic Talburt now made a point of looking at no more than he was obliged to see to get where he was going. In the lounge in the air terminal, he brushed his teeth, washed his face and hands, combed his hair, changed his linen and socks. He checked his dispatch case, and then, outside once more, turned to the left, and never lifting his eyes from the sidewalk, he walked to the street corner less than a block ahead. There he turned right, and at the first café he came to, a small one with a half dozen sidewalk tables, all vacant just now, he sat down.

  A waiter appeared; he saw the man's unshined black shoes stop beside the table. In his passable French and without glancing up, Vic ordered coffee and croissants, the crescent-shaped rolls served at breakfast throughout much of Europe. He had been offered an elaborate breakfast on the plane, but had refused it; this was the breakfast he wanted, and this was where he wanted it.

  But he would not let himself think of that. Elbows on the small, round tabletop, his closed eyes resting on the heels of his hands, he deliberately concentrated on thinking of New York and the apartment he'd walked out of
only a few hours before. He could picture it clearly; in his mind, as though he'd just left the room, he saw the shirt and pants he'd tossed on his bed and, lying on a chair, the japanned metal box from which he'd taken his passport and his smallpox-inoculation certificate. He thought of the street below his apartment windows. bringing he entire recency of it clear and sharp.

  Metal and crockery rattled, and the tabletop under his elbows tilted minutely, its weight shifting from one of its three supporting legs onto another as a loaded tray was set on it. Removing his elbows, Vic opened his eyes, and a plate holding two napkin-wrapped croissants slid into his circle of vision, and then he smelled the coffee, very strong and black, and watched it set before him. Merci, he murmured. Then, he lifted the cup, took a sip, and now — the smell and taste of French coffee in his nose and throat — he lifted his eyes, and for the first time looked at Paris.

  It was worth it; the elaborate game of not actually looking at the city until this moment. For now he was astounded, his heart beginning to pound; as though he'd been instantly transported, it was absolutely beyond belief that he should be here. Across the asphalt-paved street before him, he saw a line of trees ablaze with tiny, bright-green spring leaves. They were real trees; he could see the leaves twinkling in the small stir of the morning air and knew that if he chose to walk over and touch them, he would actually feel them indisputably real. Beyond the fresh April leaves, he saw the breeze-ruffled surface of the Seine, and knew he could plunge his hand in to the wrist, and feel it wet.

  Again he sipped his coffee, eyes moving along the low, gray-stone wall beside the river and, across the Seine, the top of a gray-stone stairway leading down to the water. Beyond, his eyes lifting, he saw the great, open Place de la Concorde. He could see, leading from the Place, the beginning of the Champs-Elysées.

  His hands were trembling as he broke a croissant and buttered a piece. His eyes swept along the green of the Tuileries gardens, and then along the gray, castlelike buildings that had been a royal palace and were now the Louvre museum. Far down the Seine, beyond the Louvre, he remembered, was Notre Dame cathedral, with its spire and its twin towers. Suddenly Vic turned, to look over his shoulder, and there, rising above the rooftops, stood the Eiffel Tower, black against the sky, the red-white-and-blue stripes of the flag of France fluttering from its tip; then he heard a sound from the river and swung back to it. A tug pulling two barges was passing under a bridge — the Pont Royal, he believed — and he could hear the small, steady thrash of its propeller, and suddenly his eyes smarted, because he knew it was true; he was here again, really here in Paris, the most beautiful, exciting city in the world.

  He ate quickly then, eyes on the passing street and sidewalk traffic; you saw more bicycles here in ten minutes, he thought, than you'd see in New York in years. An elderly Frenchman, wearing a wide-brimmed hat of black felt and with a clipped poodle on a leash, strolled past, reading a newspaper as he walked. Vic grinned. He couldn't finish his coffee; suddenly he had to be up and moving, and he paid his bill with francs he'd bought at the airport bank in New York, leaving a very large tip, out of gratitude to the waiter for being a part of Paris.

  He left the river, walking to the Boulevard Saint-Germain. This was his neighborhood; this was where he'd lived; and this was where he'd spent most of his spare time, of which — an Army clerk in peacetime — he had had a good deal. Now, walking along the wide, Sunday-morning street under the trees, he was remembering again that Paris is a city of greenery, of public parks and gardens, large and tiny, and of miles of tree-bordered streets, and his heart was full of the joy of simply being here in this magnificent city. Half the buildings he passed now, and every street corner, Metro station, and public monument, were familiar reminders of the most carefree days of his life; and when he passed an American soldier walking with a girl, he had to resist the impulse to stop him and urge him to savor every instant of the life he was now living.

  At the Boulevard Raspail, Vic came to an open-air art exhibit of a kind he'd often seen on a sunny Paris Sunday. Dozens of canvases stood propped against the iron railings that guarded the entrance to the subway. Seated on the walk near them, on a canvas stool, the artist who had painted them was sketching his next canvas, a view of the tree-lined boulevard. He was a very thin, sad-faced man of perhaps thirty, and Vic thought his paintings were not actually very good. They were all conventional in subject, painted for tourists, no doubt; and yet, Vic decided, strolling around, studying the paintings, they had a certain charm. Out of sheer exuberance, he bought one — a view of the Seine, rather large — priced far too high, he knew. But he wanted it; he wanted something tangible of Paris that he could pick up and take with him. Without argument, he handed over the franc notes, picked up the big painting, and walked on.

  The purchase increased his excitement and euphoria, and when, a block farther on, he came to a bakery preparing for its post-Mass Sunday trade, the clerks setting out trays of fragrant, fresh-baked rolls and bread, he stepped inside and bought one of the yard-long loaves of fresh bread, out of simple delight at seeing them again. Next door, at a café, a street vendor was moving among the sidewalk tables, a tray suspended from his neck loaded with toy animals, and Vic bought three of them for Ralph — a rabbit, a bear, and a giraffe. His arms were full now, and he sat down at a table, piling his purchases on a chair. Glancing up, he saw a cab driver, parked at the cab stand before the café, watching him in amusement, and Vic grinned and beckoned to him. The driver got out, smiling, and when he stopped beside the table, Vic told him what he wanted him to do — check his purchases at the aérogare and bring the key to him here.

  For eight hours, Vic Talburt roamed the city, stopping at a café for an occasional coffee, for lunch, and later on, for a Pernod. He got as far south as the Luxembourg gardens, where he stood watching the children — several of the smaller boys were wearing smocks — sailing their boats in the great basin. And on the other side of the river, he walked to the Place de l'Opéra, then walked the length of the Champs-Elysées, to the Etoile, and back. Always, though, wherever he walked, he found himself returning to what he thought of still as his own neighborhood, the area of a few blocks around the church of Saint Germain-des-Pres. Finally, at three in the afternoon, his legs aching, he sat down at an outside table of a café he had been to many times before, facing the wide Boulevard Saint-Germain and near the street corner.

  He ordered a Pernod and then, after a while, another one, sitting tired and bemused, watching the unending traffic of vehicles and pedestrians. Among the passers-by, he saw people he'd known — most of them only by sight — but also several acquaintances, and two or three he'd known well. But none of then noticed him, or if they slid, they failed to recognize him out of uniform, and he did nothing to attract their attention. He was not surprised — for of course this was her neighborhood, too — when, after three hours, he saw Suzanne.

  From a quarter of a block away, she was approaching, sauntering along and carrying a string bag containing several paper-wrapped packages. She was wearing a short-sleeved pink dress, and white sandals on stockingless feet. Vic narrowed his eves as he saw her and leaned forward, palms flat on the tabletop, to stare intently. But he knew it was she, and now he understood that although he had never once consciously thought of her, Suzanne had been in some part of his mind ever since the moment he'd reached for the telephone in his apartment in New York. For three hours, he also understood now, he had been sitting here waiting for her.

  Less than a dozen yards from the chair in which he sat, staring, she walked on toward the street corner, a dark-haired, brown-eyed, pretty girl, gazing at the traffic beside her; and Vic saw that she looked very nearly the same as she had the last time he'd seen her. She was five years older now, but they were the years between twenty-three and twenty-eight and had made very little alteration in this face he had once known so well. Staring, his heart pounding, everything he'd felt about his return here at climax, he sat waiting for Suzanne to turn and s
ee him. But she didn't glance toward the tables. Once she would not have failed to do so; all their friends spent at least part of each day here. But now her head didn't turn. It was time to stand and catch her eye or call to her, and in complete bewilderment, Vic sat wondering why he did not. Instead, absolutely motionless, he watched her approach and then pass, not ten feet from him. He could actually see the faint blue vein on the inside of her left elbow, down which his forefinger had so often traced. If he simply opened his mouth and spoke her name, he knew she would hear it, and know it, and turn around. But, beginning to understand why, he said nothing and did not move.

  At the street intersection, she stopped at the curb, to stand with half a dozen others, waiting to cross; stooping momentarily, she set her string bag on the walk at her feet, then stood erect, looking absently across the wide, busy street.

  The traffic light changed, and Suzanne picked up her bag and stepped off the curb. She crossed with the others, her pink skirt swaying. Did he actually remember that dress, or was it another like it? She was across now, stepping onto the curb on the other side; if he were to leap to his feet this instant and run hard, he could still catch her. Then the light changed again, the traffic started up, and now it was too late, absolutely, and he sat watching until — across the wide boulevard and far down the block beyond it — his final tiny glimpse of the pink of her dress was lost among the pedestrians, and she was gone; this time, he knew, forever.

  There had been nothing to say to her, he was realizing, still staring after her; the string bag in her hand had said all it was necessary to know. Five years had passed; not a long time, Vic thought. Yet now he was no longer a youngster in his early twenties, but a man approaching thirty. For twenty-three-year-old Suzanne, five years had passed, too, and now she was caught up in domesticity, carrying a string bag of groceries to — it didn't matter where or to whom. Her parents were aging, Vic remembered; maybe she was caring for them.