‘Josie,’ he said, ‘it’s brilliant. If the rest is as good as the pages I’ve read it deserves to be a bestseller.’
She had stopped again, her hand on the doorknob. He thought, Why am I saying this? He continued, to assuage his guilt, ‘And please don’t feel bad about last night. These things happen.’
‘You mean your female authors are always hopping into bed with you?’
‘I mean,’ Harker said with a bleak smile, ‘that I don’t misinterpret your motive. Indeed,’ he added, trying to make a joke of it, ‘I rather hoped it was because of my big blue eyes.’
She looked at him, unamused. ‘So, I should come back to bed now, huh?’
Oh, he would love her to come back to bed now. ‘No. And no hard feelings, that’s the deal we made yesterday.’
She looked at him, then demanded, ‘Do you want me to stay?’
Oh Christ. ‘Only if you don’t want to go.’
She snorted sulkily. Then: ‘It’s just that I feel such an ass. Christ, I’m twenty-six years old, I’ve been in half the battles of the world, and here I am giving a vivid impersonation of a silly little tart.’
Harker snorted. ‘Please don’t feel that, it’s not true.’
Her hand was still on the doorknob. ‘Do you really like my book so far?’
Harker had to dash back to his guns. ‘Yes, it’s good –’
‘You said “brilliant” before!’
Harker had to steel himself. ‘Yes, when it’s edited.’
Josephine groaned. ‘But I spent the whole of last fucking week re-editing for you!’
‘Well, authors don’t always make the best editors of their own work.’ Stick to your guns. ‘Josephine, it’s good but I don’t think Harvest House should publish it. I think that you’ll do much better with a bigger house, like Random or Doubleday.’ He added for good measure: ‘I’m afraid it’s too political for Harvest.’
He could see the cloud cross her soul. She stared at him a moment; then said, ‘Of course. Thank you for the advice.’
‘Josephine, your agent will advise you – you must get an agent – but I’m sure he’ll tell you the same. Harvest is too small.’
She smiled thinly, still holding the door-handle. ‘Thank you for that selfless advice.’
‘Josephine, believe me –’
‘The trouble is I don’t believe you, Jack. If another publishing house can make it a bestseller I don’t understand why Harvest is passing up the opportunity to do the same and make money!’
‘Josie, we simply haven’t got the budget to do all the publicity razzmatazz your book will need – will deserve.’
‘Of course,’ she said quietly. ‘I understand. Perfectly. And, as you say, it’s rather too political.’ She forced a bright smile. ‘And there’s one thing I want you to understand perfectly, Jack: I went to bed with you only because I was inflamed by strong drink and lust – not because I hoped thereby to persuade you to publish my pathetic book!’ She flipped the lock and opened the door.
Oh Jesus. ‘Josephine – let me call you a taxi.’
‘I’ve already called one, from your bedroom telephone. Bye-eee …’ She flashed him a dazzling smile from the corridor.
‘I’ll come outside and wait with you till it comes.’
‘Bye-ee.’ She twiddled her fingers at him and closed the door.
Harker strode back to the bedroom. He cast about for his shirt, snatched it up off the floor, pulled it on as he hurried back to the front door. He dashed barefoot across the courtyard into the archway of the front block. He burst out on to East 22nd Street.
It was deserted. Josephine’s taxi was disappearing round the corner. Harker retraced his steps grimly. He locked the door behind him and walked back to the bedroom. And there, on his bedside table, were her earrings. He looked at them regretfully. Then he collapsed on to the bed and stared up at the ceiling.
Oh, what a crying pity. He closed his eyes and breathed deeply, heart-sore.
Well, he had done the right thing, if that was any consolation. He had saved her from Dupont’s clutches, sent her packing on her way to the success she deserved. At least he didn’t have it on his conscience that he was deceiving her. But, God, what a crying-out-loud shame that Harvest House wasn’t going to zoom to the top of the bestseller list for the first time in its life and make a fortune.
And even more sad was the fact that he was not going to possess that glorious body again. Not going to fall in love with her after all, the most captivating woman he had ever met – oh, those long legs, those perfect breasts – and her ravishing smile as she tumbled joyfully into bed and took him in her arms, her pelvis thrusting to meet him. He would love to be meeting her for lunch again today, love to go walking through the park with her, hand in hand, finding out about her, going through that delightful insanity of falling in love, feeling on top of the world, laughing and being frightfully witty and wise. Oh yes, he was infatuated, and it was a tragedy that it wasn’t going to happen.
He swung up off the bed and looked at her earrings lying on the bedside table. A sad memento of a lovely day. He would take them to the office and post them to her. He walked to the kitchen and poured more whisky into his glass.
But it was for the best. She was a very sensitive person – you’d have to be on guard all the time lest you upset her. Volatile. Doubtless moody – most creative people are. A delicate bloom, yet with robust convictions. She would have been a difficult soul to be in love with, it would have been no bed of roses with her – perhaps indeed a bed of neuroses. Goddam writers are a load of trouble, all steamed up then flat as a pancake, locked in a love-hate relationship with their work.
Yes, it was all for the best. But, oh, what a crying-out pity.
11
He was woken late Sunday morning, with a hangover, by the buzzing of his entry-phone. He draped a towel round his waist and went to his front door. ‘Yes?’ he said into the apparatus.
‘Sorry, did I wake you?’
Harker’s heart seemed to miss a beat. ‘I was just getting up.’
‘I’ve got a letter for you,’ Josephine said. ‘I was just going to slip it into your mailbox, then I remembered my earrings.’
‘A letter?’
‘Of apology, for flouncing out like that last night. I was very boring and girlie and rude and unfair and I apologize, you’d done nothing to deserve that. Okay?’
‘Okay,’ Harker smiled. ‘And you weren’t any of those things.’
‘May I come in, just to get my earrings?’
‘Of course.’ Harker pressed the button and hurried back to his bedroom. He pulled on a bathrobe and ran his fingers through his hair. He dashed into his bathroom and took a swig of mouthwash. As he re-entered the living room Josephine was crossing the courtyard. He opened his front door wide. ‘Good morning.’
‘Hi.’ Josephine entered, her brow a little lowered, half-smiling. She seemed even more beautiful. ‘Sorry again.’
‘Nonsense. Sit down, I’ll fetch your earrings.’
‘I won’t stay. Here’s your letter.’ She held out an envelope. ‘Please don’t read it until I’ve gone in case the earth really does swallow me up.’
Harker smiled and put the letter on the dining table. Oh, he didn’t want her to stay, he didn’t want to destabilize his resolution, but he had to be polite. ‘Would you like some coffee?’
She hesitated. ‘If you’re having some.’
‘Actually I’m going to have a beer. I was up until dawn.’
‘So was I, must have drunk a gallon of wine. Re-editing my bloody book, I feel like death. It’s far too intense and flowery. But …’ She looked at him almost pleadingly. ‘It’s not a heap of crap, is it?’
Here we go again. Harker wanted to take her in his arms and tell her Harvest would be the luckiest house in town if it could publish it – but he had to stick to his guns. He turned for the kitchen. ‘No.’ He opened the refrigerator, took out two bottles of beer and reached for glasses. �
��And don’t, repeat don’t,’ he said as he re-entered the living room, ‘edit out the flamboyance and the floweriness.’ He handed her a bottle and glass. ‘Leave those decisions to your editor. Just cut out some of the repetition.’
She was looking at him from under her eyebrows, hanging on his words. It was hard to imagine this was the hard-bitten photo-journo who screwed her way to the front lines. In fact he didn’t believe that that was how she got there. ‘You really think so?’ She put the glass on the table, upended the bottle to her mouth and glugged down three big swallows, looking at him round the neck. She lowered it and breathed deeply. ‘Thank God … I believe you now, you weren’t bullshitting me last night. I know because that’s exactly the decision I reached at dawn – “Leave it to the editor”.’ She flashed him a grateful smile and stretched up her arms. ‘I’m so happy!’
Harker wanted to get off this painful subject. ‘Won’t you sit down?’
‘No.’ She held up her hand. ‘I must fly.’ She turned and began to pace across the room, head down, holding her beer bottle. She waved a hand. ‘Neat,’ she said.
Harker stood by the sofa. He did not sit down because then she probably would do the same. ‘What is?’
She waved her beer bottle and paced back towards him. ‘Your apartment. Tidy. Suppose that’s because you were a soldier, soldiers have to be tidy, right?’
‘The army drums that into you, yes.’
Josephine paced back towards the window. ‘Like your mind,’ she mused. ‘You see things clearly. Put your finger on the essence straight away.’ She smirked. ‘You should see my apartment. Untidy as hell. Like my mind. A psychiatrist would make heavy weather of that, I guess.’
He would love to see her apartment. And into her untidy mind. She turned at the window, and pointed absently at the door behind him. ‘What’s through there?’
‘Madam Velvet’s.’
Josephine stopped. ‘Did you say “Madam”?’
Harker smiled. ‘Velvet. That door leads down to the basement. This apartment used to be Madam Velvet’s upmarket whorehouse. Speciality, domination and sado-masochism. One of my authors, Clive Jones, he works part-time for Screw magazine. Know it?’
‘Every New Yorker knows Screw magazine. Though nice folk like me don’t read it.’
Harker smiled. ‘Well, the first night Clive came around here he immediately identified this place as formerly Madam Velvet’s den for the kinky – he had come here some years earlier to write it up for Screw. There’re still some of her fixtures down there – the cage, a few ringbolts on the walls, the Roman bath. But she took the rack and whips and chains with her when she left. I just use it as my gym.’
‘How exotic. Can we go down and have a look?’
‘Sure.’ He turned for the door.
A staircase led down into darkness. He switched on a light and led the way. They descended a dozen stone steps, into a stone-lined basement the size of the apartment above. A neon light illuminated the scene.
A bare cement floor had a few scattered rugs on it: there was a cycling machine. In one corner was a tiled whirlpool bath, empty. In another was a pinewood cubicle, a sauna. Between them stood Harker’s washing machine. In the third corner was a brick-built bar with a curved wooden counter, a few wooden shelves behind it: the other wall was lined by a row of rusty iron bars, a prison-cage, the door open.
‘Wow,’ Josephine said.
‘And note the ringbolts on the walls, where the silver-haired sado-masochists liked to be chained up while Madam Velvet and her girls did their thing.’
‘What an extraordinary place … Do the whirlpool and the sauna work?’
‘Sure.’
‘You should replace that neon light with flickering candles. And have a water-bed on the floor. Wow …’ She turned and paced off across the dungeon, head down. ‘Look,’ she said, ‘I fully understand that Harvest doesn’t want to take the risk of publishing a political book like mine – and I’m not asking you to change your mind. But …’ She turned and faced him across the dungeon. ‘But I would be terribly grateful if you read the rest of my book and gave me your opinion on it. Your advice.’ She explained wanly: It’s all in my humble letter. I mean I’m terribly fortunate to have you here in New York, not only a literary man with artistic judgement but somebody who knows Africa well and can correct me on historical detail.’ She appealed: ‘Is that a terrible cheek, after the way I flounced out last night?’
Harker smiled. He knew he should make an excuse and get rid of this problem once and for all – but he did not have the heart. Nor did he want to. He heard himself say, ‘Certainly, Josie.’ He added, to salve his conscience. ‘But you shouldn’t rely on my judgement alone – you must get a good agent, and take his advice above mine.’
‘Oh, great!’ Josephine strode across the dungeon, wreathed in smiles, and planted a kiss on his cheek. She laced her hands behind his neck and leant back. ‘Oh, I’m so lucky to have my own African guru!’ Then she stepped backwards and waved a finger: ‘But there’ll be no more girlish nonsense like last night – our friendship is going to be purely platonic. That’s the only thing I was right about yesterday, that’s why I was so angry with myself.’ Then she smacked her forehead: ‘Oh, I am an ass! I don’t mean I find you unattractive. On the contrary I find you very attractive. I simply mean –’ she waved a hand – ‘that it won’t be a problem again.’
Harker grinned. ‘A problem?’
‘You know, getting all uptight about a simple thing like an injudicious one-night stand.’ She looked at him. ‘And,’ she said, ‘I insist on paying you a fee.’
‘A fee?’
Josephine slapped her forehead again. ‘Oh God, that sounds terrible.’ She laughed. ‘No, not a stud-fee – an editorial fee! Your face! No – you’re going to be devoting many precious hours to my book and I insist I pay for your time. And thereby keep our relationship on a businesslike, platonic keel.’
Yes, he could be smitten by this woman. And, yes, as he wasn’t going to publish her book, couldn’t he pull this trick off, have his cake and eat it? He heard himself say, ‘And what if I don’t want your fee? What if it isn’t a businesslike, platonic relationship?’
She looked at him from under her eyebrows. ‘You mean if we become lovers?’
Harker grinned. ‘Well, you haven’t exactly got to commit yourself for life. It wouldn’t be hard to just sort of carry on from where we left off last night.’ Christ, what was he saying this for?
She looked at him solemnly. ‘You mean we should go back to bed now?’ Before he could deny it she made up her mind. ‘No.’ She held up a hand, ‘No, just friends. So I insist on paying you a fee. You’re going to help edit my book, I’m extremely grateful, I’m not going to endanger all that with emotional, messy, untidy sex stuff.’
Fine, so that was understood again, his conscience was clear – more or less.
‘I’ll help you with your book on two conditions,’ he said. ‘One, no fee. Two, you must tell absolutely nobody that I’m helping you. Not your friends, not your agent, not your publisher when you’ve got one – not even your father.’ Harker did not want Dupont learning that he had any access to her book or her.
Josephine said earnestly: ‘Do you mind telling me why not?’
‘Personal reasons – and professional. And there’s another thing I feel I must tell you.’
Then he changed his mind. As he was sticking to his decision about theirs being a platonic relationship he had been moved to confess to her that he had been less than honest about the Battle of Bassinga, that it was probably he who had shot her lover, that it was he who shot the fourteen-year-old boy with the wooden gun, that it was he, Harker, whom she had tried to kill and wounded so badly that he had been disabled out of the military, that he knew she had tried to commit suicide, that it was he who had plugged her wounds. But he stopped himself – why embarrass her by refuting the romantic version which she had given him, why mortify the woman by confronting her wit
h her attempted suicide?
‘What?’ Josephine asked. ‘What’s the other thing?’
‘Nothing,’ Harker smiled.
‘What?’
‘No, it’s unimportant.’
‘Please.’
‘It doesn’t matter. Well, as that’s decided why don’t we go upstairs and have a decent bottle of champagne to kill the germs in that beer?’
Josephine took both his hands and squeezed. ‘Thank you for helping me!’ she said. ‘I’m so excited. But I think I’d better fly now, I’ve got so much work to do if I’m going to take full advantage of your help, you’ve got me all fired up. And I can tell by the twinkle in your eye that if I stay for a bottle of celebratory champagne we’ll end up in bed.’ She pointed her finger to his nose: ‘Platonic friendship only!’
He grinned. ‘Absolutely. So let us seal the deal with that bottle of champagne.’
PART II
12
They had a lovely time that long hot summer of 1988.
Mostly she slept at his place. Before dawn she crept out of bed so as not to wake him, pulled on her tracksuit, shouldered her small backpack, donned her crash-helmet, tiptoed out, unlocked her bicycle and set off up the quiet canyons of Manhattan. She rode the sixty blocks to her apartment as fast as she could to get the maximum benefit from the exercise while the air was comparatively unpolluted. Soon after sunrise she was at her desk, chomping through an apple and two bananas as she peered anxiously at her computer screen, marshalling her thoughts, picking up the threads from last night. By lunchtime she had done about a thousand words: she changed into a leotard, pulled a tracksuit over it, stuffed some fresh underwear into her backpack and rode her bike flat out across town to her dance class at the Studio: for the next forty minutes she pranced around with thirty other women of various shapes and sizes in a mirrored loft, working up a sweat under the tutelage of Fellini, a muscle-bound bald gay who volubly despaired of ever making a dancer out of any of them. For the next half hour she had her first conversation of the day while she showered before adjourning to the health bar for a salad and colourful dialogue about boyfriends, husbands, bosses, work, fashions, waistlines. By two-thirty she was cycling back across town to knock out another five hundred words. At four-thirty she permitted herself the first beer of the day to try to squeeze out another two hundred words. At about five-thirty she hit the buttons to print and telephoned Harker at his office. ‘The workers are knocking off, how about the fat-cats?’
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