Memories of Another Day

by Harold Robbins

  He shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. Right now, neither of us is working.”

  “You people aren’t going to win. You know that, don’t you?”

  “I’m not working,” he said.

  “What do you want to talk about, then?” she asked.

  “You,” he said.

  “What about me?” she asked.

  “I’ve been sitting here with a hard on from the moment you sat down,” he said. “I want to fuck you.”

  She caught her breath. A sudden light moisture broke out on her face and she flushed slightly. She stared at him.

  “Are you all right?” he asked.

  She moistened her dry lips with her tongue. “I just came.”

  He laughed. “That puts you one up on me.”

  She laughed with him. “May I have another drink, please?”

  He signaled the waiter. When the drink had been brought and the waiter had gone, he said, “We’ll have dinner first. Then we’ll go to your compartment.”

  “Why not yours?”

  He laughed. “I don’t have any. Union men ride coach.”

  The train took almost forty hours to Chicago from Los Angeles, and the only time they ever left her compartment was for meals. In Chicago, she clung to him as he prepared to change to the train to Pittsburgh and would not let him leave until he promised that he would call her as soon as he returned.

  He never knew how she had found out, but when he got off the train in Chicago two weeks later she was waiting for him, and she stayed with him until he was ready to return to the Coast.

  One day in the car driving back to Chicago from Gary, Indiana, where he had gone to complete a field survey, she put her hand on his arm. “I love you,” she said. “I want to marry you.”

  He glanced at her. “You’re nuts.”

  “I mean it,” she said.

  “You know I’m married. That Tess is expecting in less than a month.”

  “I can wait for you to get a divorce.”

  “You forget the kind of money I make. I can’t afford to support Tess and a baby and have another wife.”

  “I have money.”

  “No, thank you,” he said.

  “You don’t have to stay with the union,” she said. “You and Uncle Tom would get along great together. I’m sure he’d give you a job in a minute. At a lot more money than you’re making now.”

  He glanced at her again. “We’re doing great. Why press and spoil it?”

  “I love you,” she said. “I’ve never known a man who could make me feel the things you make me feel.”

  “You’re confusing love with fucking. Just because we fuck great together doesn’t mean we have to fall in love.”

  “But I do love you,” she insisted like a child.

  “Good,” he said. “I want you to love me but don’t fall in love with me.”

  “Do you love me?” she asked.

  “Yes,” he answered. “But I’m not in love with you.”

  “I don’t see the difference. Are you in love with your wife?”

  “No. But I do love her.”

  “Then I don’t see the difference.”

  “Give yourself time,” he said. “You will.”

  She was silent for a moment. “Why do you stay with her if you’re not in love with her?”

  “We’re the same kind of people,” he said. “Same background, same ideas. It’s easy. I’d never fit in your society and you’d never be comfortable in mine. And since there’s no way we can spend the rest of our lives in bed, it just won’t work.”

  “You’re wrong,” she said. “You’d fit in very well anywhere. Uncle Tom is no different from you. He began with nothing and worked his way up. He fits.”

  “Our basic philosophies are different,” Daniel said. “I’ve seen my whole family die because of men like your Uncle Tom. I’ve seen too many people hurt and hungry because of something called company policy. I could never be a part of it.”

  “Maybe if you were you could change it.”

  He laughed. “Now you’re being naive, and you know it. It isn’t only your Uncle Tom or any one man that makes the policy. It comes from a lot of places. Banks, Wall Street, something called stockholders’ profits. They put pressures on that you either go with or they find someone else to do it. If your uncle tried to change the policy, he wouldn’t last a week in his job. He has no more choice to go with what he wants—that is, if he wants to change anything—than the man in the moon.”

  “I still want to marry you,” she said.

  He took a hand from the wheel and placed it over hers. “It’s beautiful the way it is,” he said quietly. “Let’s keep it like that.”

  Her voice was suddenly tense. “I want to fuck. I saw a sign for a hotel about ten miles up the road. Let’s stop there for the night.”

  “But I have to be in Chicago in the morning.”

  “I don’t care,” she said harshly. “I want your cock inside me.”

  He looked at her, and after a moment he nodded. They pulled off the road, and he didn’t get to Chicago until late the next afternoon.

  Chapter 12

  Five months later, Daniel walked into the office of Philip Murray, president of the United Steelworkers, CIO, carrying his valise. There were several men sitting in the office with Murray, but he quickly dismissed them and turned to Daniel. “What did you find out?” His voice was right to the point.

  Daniel put his valise on the floor. He was equally direct. “You won’t like what I’m going to say.” He paused for a moment. “Do you have a bottle of whiskey?”

  Silently, Murray turned to the bottom drawer of his desk and placed a bottle of bourbon on the desk between them and one glass. He waited until Daniel had taken one drink and refilled his glass. His voice was quiet. “Tell me.”

  “I’ve been on the road six weeks. I’ve been in fourteen cities in eight states, and I don’t like what I saw. We’re being suckered into a trap. They’re all ready and waiting for us. Girdler of Republic Steel has a fucking army waiting for us, and where he hasn’t got his own army he’s got the local police sewed up to do the dirty work for him. He’s pushed the harassment of the workers and the union members as far as he can go. Now he’s waiting for a strike call so that he can teach the union a lesson.”

  “It’s that bad, is it?” Murray asked.

  Daniel nodded, taking another drink. “Maybe worse.”

  “How did you find out so much about what he’s doing?”

  “From a member of his family.”

  “A girl?”

  Daniel nodded. “She also works in his office.”

  “Does she know who you are?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then why would she talk to you?”

  Daniel was silent. He took another drink.

  Murray stared at him for a long time. “She could be laying it on you.”

  “I don’t think so,” Daniel said. “She wants to marry me.”

  “Does she know you’re married?”

  Daniel nodded. “That doesn’t bother her. She thinks divorces are easy.”

  “And what do you think?”

  Daniel shook his head. “I’m married. In another week or so I’m going to be a father. I told her that. She says she can wait until I’m ready.”

  Murray was silent.

  Daniel continued. “You said I could go home in time for the baby to be born. I’m planning to leave tomorrow.”

  “I don’t know whether I can spare you right now,” Murray said.

  “You gave me your word,” Daniel said.

  Murray nodded. “I did.”

  “Then I’m going.”

  Murray was silent again. His face was drawn and white. He began to tap a pencil against his desk. “I’m under a lot of pressure to call this strike.”

  “Don’t do it,” Daniel said. “Remember what you told me a long time ago about Bill Foster. Don’t start a strike unless you know you can win it. Now you’re ready to
do the same thing. And there’s no way you can win this one.”

  “You really believe that?”

  Daniel nodded silently.

  “Damn!” Murray snapped the pencil in half between his fingers. “Everybody’s after my ass. Lewis settled with Big Steel almost a year ago, and they’re blaming me for letting Little Steel hang out there so long. Even the membership drive seems to be losing its momentum. The men want action.”

  “If they want action, that’s what they’ll get,” Daniel said. “But that won’t win the strike for them. All it will get them is time in the jails and hospitals.”

  “Reuther settled with General Motors. That’s a big one. Now they’re saying we can do it.”

  “Ford is still out,” Daniel said. “Reuther’s a long way from home there. And Girdler is just as organized as Ford is.”

  Murray stared at him. “What do I do?”

  “What does Lewis say?”

  “He doesn’t say anything. Deliberately. He’s just laying back there like a fat cat waiting for me to make the move. If we win, he’ll jump on the bandwagon.”

  “And if we lose?”

  Murray shrugged. “He can always say that we moved without asking him.”

  “Then why don’t you ask him directly?”

  “I tried to. But you know the way he is. There’s no way you can get him to talk about anything he doesn’t want to.”

  The bottle was half empty now, but Daniel refilled his glass again. “Stall,” he said.

  “I can’t stall much longer,” Murray replied.

  “Two weeks,” Daniel said. “I’ll be back from the Coast by then. I want to be in South Chicago when it comes. If I can keep the lid on there, it may not be too bad.”

  “How can you be sure?” Murray asked. “Babies have been known to come as much as three weeks late.”

  “This one won’t,” Daniel said. “If it looks like that, I’ll get the doctor to do a caesarian. I’ll be back here by the middle of March.”

  Murray stared at him. “Two weeks?”

  Daniel nodded.

  “Okay. But I won’t be able to hold back much longer. The Commies are already beginning a campaign to get me out of this job.”

  “Lewis has to know about that,” Daniel said.

  “Of course he does,” Murray said angrily. “But you know his policy. Hands off. He’ll take help from anywhere as long as he can build membership. That’s why he let them in when Green wouldn’t take them into the AFL.”

  “They’re doing good with the Textile Workers?”

  Murray nodded. “Hillman’s flooding them with support out of New York. They’re going to stonewall in the South, but they’re a year away from that. Right now they’re riding high.”

  Daniel got to his feet. “I’ll be back in two weeks. Thanks for the drink, boss.”

  Murray rose behind his desk. “Do you honestly think we can’t win this one?”

  “We haven’t got the chance of a snowball in hell.”

  Murray held out his hand. “I hope everything goes all right at home.”

  “Thanks,” Daniel said, taking his hand. “I’ll give you a call as soon as it happens.”

  ***

  It was sleeting when he came out of the building, his valise in his hand. He peered up the street, looking for a taxi. There was a black Chrysler limousine parked at the curb. Its door swung open and a girl’s voice called him. “Daniel!”

  He stared for a moment, then walked toward it. Standing in the sleet, he stared down at her. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  “Get in the car,” she said. “It’s stupid to stand there in the snow.”

  He threw his valise into the car and followed it. The door closed and the car began to roll. He turned to her. “You’re supposed to be in Chicago.”

  “I was getting bored there,” she said. She leaned over and kissed him. “Surprised?”

  “How’d you get here? You weren’t on the train.”

  “Plane,” she said. “There’s regular service now between Chicago and the East.”

  “Drop me at the Chelsea,” he said. “I’ve got to get some sleep.”

  “I have a suite at the Mayfair,” she said. “You’re staying with me.”

  “I said I’ve got to get some sleep.”

  “You have a two-day train ride tomorrow. You can catch up on your sleep then.”

  He was silent. “You’re crazy. You know that, don’t you?”

  “I’m in love with you. You know that, don’t you?”

  “Look, Chris, it was great. But it’s no good chasing it. We live in different places. There’s no way we can ever get it together.”

  “I can live in your world. I don’t need the family’s money.”

  He looked at her. “What about this car and the Mayfair?”

  “We can leave the car, take a taxi and go to the Chelsea. I don’t care. As long as I’m with you.”

  He shook his head slowly. “You shouldn’t have come. If your uncle finds out about it, he’ll raise holy hell.”

  “I don’t give a damn about what Uncle Tom thinks. Let him run his steel companies. He’s not going to tell me what to do.”

  The car pulled up in front of the hotel. A doorman opened the door. He reached in and took Daniel’s valise, then stood there while they got out of the car.

  “Send the bag up to my apartment,” Chris said.

  “Yes, Miss Girdler,” the doorman answered.

  Daniel followed her into the hotel. They took the elevator up to the fifteenth floor. She pressed the doorbell. A butler opened it. “Miss Girdler.” He bowed.

  “They’re sending a valise up,” Chris said. “Put it in the guest room.”

  “Yes, Miss Girdler.”

  “And I’ll have a dry martini.” She looked at Daniel. “The usual?”

  He nodded.

  “A bottle of bourbon for Mr. Huggins.”

  “Yes, Miss Girdler.” The butler bowed.

  “Thank you, Quincy,” she said, leading the way into the living room. She gestured Daniel to a seat on the couch. “Make yourself comfortable. We’ll have some lunch in a little while.”

  Daniel looked around the hotel suite. He had been in many hotels, but he had never seen a setup like this. It was like a private house right in the middle of the hotel. “Not bad,” he said.

  “It’s Uncle Tom’s,” she said. “He keeps this apartment all year round.”

  “Of course,” Daniel said. “It’s the only way.”

  “He says it’s cheaper to do that than to try to get a good suite each time.”

  “Economical too,” he said. “I didn’t think he paid attention to things like that.”

  “You’re being sarcastic,” she said.

  He feigned innocence. “Of course not. It’s just in keeping with his character. After all, his average steel-mill worker makes less than five hundred and sixty dollars a year for a sixty-hour week. This can’t be much more than that. Per day.”

  “Now you’re not being pleasant,” she said.

  The butler brought them the drinks on a silver tray and placed it on a coffee table in front of the couch. “May I pour, sir?”

  “I’ll take care of it,” Daniel said.

  “Thank you, sir,” the butler said, and left the room.

  Daniel filled his glass. He held it up toward the girl. “I apologize. I have no right to talk like that about the man and drink his whiskey at the same time.”

  “And don’t forget one other thing.” She grinned.

  “What’s that?” he asked.

  “And also fucking his favorite niece.”

  He laughed and tossed the drink down his throat. “You’ve made your point.”

  She drank her martini in one swallow. He saw the flush rise into her face as the drink went down and began to pour himself another drink. She put out a hand to stop him. “My cunt is soaking. How about a fuck before lunch?”

  “Mind if I take a shower first? I stink from
sitting up in that train all night.”

  “Don’t,” she said. “I love the smell of the sweat that comes from your balls.”

  Chapter 13

  He sat at the coach window staring out as the train rolled slowly out of the Pasadena station. Forty minutes more and they would be in Los Angeles. Around him the passengers were already busy gathering up their belongings, lifting down their suitcases and getting ready to leave. A trainman came walking through the coach. “Los Angeles, next stop. Los Angeles.”

  The bright sun hurt his eyes, and he leaned his head against the seat back and closed them. It had been two months since he had been home and seen Tess.

  She had been at the end of her sixth month and already huge, her belly swollen, her breasts like over-ripe giant grapefruits and the strong, stocky body already gone to fat, even her face round and heavy.

  He had spent almost five days at home that time, and when he’d mentioned that maybe she should check with the doctor, that she had been gaining too much weight, she had replied it didn’t matter. She would lose it as soon as she could begin to move around again. The only reason she had gained the weight was that there was nothing else for her to do but eat and go to the movies. Besides, she was lonely, and she didn’t even see the few friends she had made because she was too big to get behind the wheel of the car and drive anywhere.

  That night when they went to bed she reached for him. He was flaccid. After a moment: “What is it? Usually you’re hard as a rock.”

  He couldn’t tell her that she didn’t excite him. “I’m tired. I’ve spent five weeks working day and night, and the train trip didn’t help. The only thing I could get was a coach seat all the way from Chicago.”

  “It has to be more than that. I don’t excite you the way I look.”

  “That’s not it,” he said. “Besides, I’m afraid to hurt you. It could do something to the baby.”

  “The doctor said we could go right up to the last month,” she said, still stroking him.

  He forced himself to feel the touch of her fingers. One thing she could do was manipulate him. She was expert at that. The sensuous stroking of his cock and cupping of his testicles. He felt himself growing hard.