'You see he could arrange the telegrams,' Stella said, 'very easily.'
That was true. And with the idea that perhaps her uneasiness was justified, Joel grew angry: if Miles had trained a camera on them he felt no obligations towards Miles. Aloud he said:
'That's nonsense.'
There were Christmas trees already in the shop windows and the full moon over the boulevard was only a prop, as scenic as the giant boudoir lamps of the corners. On into the dark foliage of Beverly Hills that flamed as eucalyptus by day, Joel saw only the flash of a white face under his own, the arc of her shoulder. She pulled away suddenly and looked up at him.
'Your eyes are like your mother's,' she said. 'I used to have a scrap-book full of pictures of her.'
'Your eyes are like your own and not a bit like any other eyes,' he answered.
Something made Joel look out into the grounds as they went into the house, as if Miles were lurking in the shrubbery. A telegram waited on the hall table. She read aloud:
CHICAGO
Home tomorrow night. Thinking of you. Love.
MILES
'You see,' she said, throwing the slip back on the table, 'he could easily have faked that.' She asked the butler for drinks and sandwiches and ran upstairs, while Joel walked into the empty reception rooms. Strolling about he wandered to the piano where he had stood in disgrace two Sundays before.
'Then we could put over,' he said aloud, 'a story of divorce, the younger generation, and the Foreign Legion.'
His thoughts jumped to another telegram.
'You were one of the most agreeable people at our party -'
An idea occurred to him. If Stella's telegram had been purely a gesture of courtesy then it was likely that Miles had inspired it, for it was Miles who had invited him. Probably Miles had said:
'Send him a wire - he's miserable - he thinks he's queered himself.'
It fitted in with 'I've influenced Stella in everything. Especially I've influenced her so that she likes all the men I like.' A woman would do a thing like that because she felt sympathetic - only a man would do it because he felt responsible.
When Stella came back into the room he took both her hands.
'I have a strange feeling that I'm a sort of pawn in a spite game you're playing against Miles,' he said.
'Help yourself to a drink.'
'And the odd thing is that I'm in love with you anyhow.'
The telephone rang and she freed herself to answer it.
'Another wire from Miles,' she announced. 'He dropped it, or it says he dropped it, from the aeroplane at Kansas City.'
'I suppose he asked to be remembered to me.'
'No, he just said he loved me. I believe he does. He's so very weak.'
'Come sit beside me,' Joel urged her.
It was early. And it was still a few minutes short of midnight a half-hour later, when Joel walked to the cold hearth, and said tersely:
'Meaning that you haven't any curiosity about me?'
'Not at all. You attract me a lot and you know it. The point is that I suppose I really do love Miles.'
'Obviously.'
'And tonight I feel uneasy about everything.'
He wasn't angry - he was even faintly relieved that a possible entanglement was avoided. Still as he looked at her, the warmth and softness of her body thawing her cold blue costume, he knew she was one of the things he would always regret.
'I've got to go,' he said. 'I'll phone a taxi.'
'Nonsense - there's a chauffeur on duty.'
He winced at her readiness to have him go, and seeing this she kissed him lightly and said, 'You're sweet, Joel.' Then suddenly three things happened: he took down his drink at a gulp, the phone rang loud through the house, and a clock in the hall struck in trumpet notes.
Nine - ten - eleven - twelve -
V
It was Sunday again. Joel realized that he had come to the theatre this evening with the work of the week still hanging about him like cerements. He had made love to Stella as he might attack some matter to be cleaned up hurriedly before the day's end. But this was Sunday - the lovely, lazy perspective of the next twenty-four hours unrolled before him - every minute was something to be approached with lulling indirection, every moment held the germ of innumerable possibilities. Nothing was impossible - everything was just beginning. He poured himself another drink.
With a sharp moan, Stella slipped forward inertly by the telephone. Joel picked her up and laid her on the sofa. He squirted soda-water on a handkerchief and slapped it over her face. The telephone mouthpiece was still grinding and he put it to his ear.
'--the plane fell just this side of Kansas City. The body of Miles Calman has been identified and--'
He hung up the receiver.
'Lie still,' he said, stalling, as Stella opened her eyes.
'Oh, what's happened?' she whispered. 'Call them back. Oh, what's happened?'
'I'll call them right away. What's your doctor's name?'
'Did they say Miles was dead?'
'Lie quiet - is there a servant still up?'
'Hold me - I'm frightened.'
He put his arm around her.
'I want the name of your doctor,' he said sternly. 'It may be a mistake but I want someone here.'
'It's Dr - Oh, God, is Miles dead?'
Joel ran upstairs and searched through strange medicine cabinets for spirits of ammonia. When he came down Stella cried:
'He isn't dead - I know he isn't. This is part of his scheme. He's torturing me. I know he's alive. I can feel he's alive.'
'I want to get hold of some close friend of yours, Stella. You can't stay here alone tonight.'
'Oh, no,' she cried. 'I can't see anybody. You stay, I haven't got any friend.' She got up, tears streaming down her face. 'Oh, Miles is my only friend. He's not dead - he can't be dead. I'm going there right away and see. Get a train. You'll have to come with me.'
'You can't. There's nothing to do tonight. I want you to tell me the name of some woman I can call: Lois? Joan? Carmel? Isn't there somebody?'
Stella stared at him blindly.
'Eva Goebel was my best friend,' she said.
Joel thought of Miles, his sad and desperate face in the office two days before. In the awful silence of his death all was clear about him. He was the only American-born director with both an interesting temperament and an artistic conscience. Meshed in an industry, he had paid with his ruined nerves for having no resilience, no healthy cynicism, no refuge - only a pitiful and precarious escape.
There was a sound at the outer door - it opened suddenly, and there were footsteps in the hall.
'Miles!' Stella screamed. 'Is it you, Miles? Oh, it's Miles.'
A telegraph boy appeared in the doorway.
'I couldn't find the bell. I heard you talking inside.'
The telegram was a duplicate of the one that had been phoned. While Stella read it over and over, as though it were a black lie, Joel telephoned. It was still early and he had difficulty getting anyone; when finally he succeeded in finding some friends he made Stella take a stiff drink.
'You'll stay here, Joel,' she whispered, as though she were half-asleep. 'You won't go away. Miles liked you - he said you--' She shivered violently, 'Oh, my God, you don't know how alone I feel.' Her eyes closed, 'Put your arms around me. Miles had a suit like that.' She started bolt upright. 'Think of what he must have felt. He was afraid of almost everything, anyhow.'
She shook her head dazedly. Suddenly she seized Joel's face and held it close to hers.
'You won't go. You like me - you love me, don't you? Don't call up anybody. Tomorrow's time enough. You stay here with me tonight.'
He stared at her, at first incredulously, and then with shocked understanding. In her dark groping Stella was trying to keep Miles alive by sustaining a situation in which he had figured - as if Miles's mind could not die so long as the possibilities that had worried him still existed. It was a distraught and tortured effort to
stave off the realization that he was dead.
Resolutely Joel went to the phone and called a doctor.
'Don't, oh, don't call anybody!' Stella cried. 'Come back here and put your arms around me.'
'Is Dr Bales in?'
'Joel,' Stella cried. 'I thought I could count on you. Miles liked you. He was jealous of you - Joel, come here.'
Ah then - if he betrayed Miles she would be keeping him alive - for if he were really dead how could he be betrayed?
'--has just had a very severe shock. Can you come at once, and get hold of a nurse?'
'Joel!'
Now the door-bell and the telephone began to ring intermittently, and automobiles were stopping in front of the door.
'But you're not going,' Stella begged him. 'You're going to stay, aren't you?'
'No,' he answered. 'But I'll be back, if you need me.'
Standing on the steps of the house which now hummed and palpitated with the life that flutters around death like protective leaves, he began to sob a little in his throat.
'Everything he touched he did something magical to,' he thought. 'He even brought that little gamin alive and made her a sort of masterpiece.'
And then:
'What a hell of a hole he leaves in this damn wilderness - already!'
And then with a certain bitterness, 'Oh, yes, I'll be back - I'll be back!'
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and Six Other Stories Page 21