Villiers Touch

by Brian Garfield

  “A great many things are.”

  He turned to face her. “What’s all this about, Carol?”

  “I want off the hook, Mason. I want to pick and choose among the dirty jobs to suit myself.”

  “Are you going to force me to remind you of the same tired old things we’ve been over before?”

  “I’m not afraid of Albuquerque anymore. With a good lawyer I think I can beat the rap.”

  “Possibly. And if you did, what do you suppose Rocco would be inclined to do?”

  “You could use your influence. Persuade him I have no intention of making trouble for him.”

  “Why should I do that?”

  “Out of friendship, Mason. It’s the kind of thing a friend does for a friend.”

  When he made no answer, she added mildly, “All you have to do is point out to him that even if I did accuse him of anything, it would only be my word against his.”

  He began to smile; he said nothing, and Carol said, “That’s right, isn’t it? Rocco’s known that all along—that’s why he never made trouble for me. It never had anything to do with you, did it? You just used it as something to hold over my head. It only worked as long as I didn’t think it through.”

  “You’ve learned to use your head, haven’t you?”

  “I just don’t see how it could possibly be worth your while to go to the trouble of turning me over to the New Mexico cops, not when I’d probably be acquitted anyway. Look, why not drop it right here and go on like equals?”

  He shook his head gently, watching her. She said in a rougher voice, “You just can’t do it, can you? You just can’t have any kind of relationship with anybody where your money or your blackmail doesn’t give you an edge.”

  He ignored it; he said, “You’re ass-deep in muck, Carol. With your history it’s far too late for a declaration of independence.”

  “Why? What could you prove against me? You can’t use anything you’ve got on me without implicating yourself. You’d hardly do that. You’ve got thousands of feet of infrared film on me, but you’d never use it because you can’t afford to expose the men who appear on the film with me. Besides, who would you show it to? I haven’t got a family. The law wouldn’t care, and even if they did, I’d survive a fifteen-day sentence for prostitution.”

  “I admire your guts,” he said. “But you haven’t thought it all the way through. Working for me, you’ve learned too much about too many people. Some of them couldn’t afford to let you off the hook, even if I could. You’re locked in, Carol. There’s never been any way out. You’re a white chip in a no-limit game, and there are too many people in it who wouldn’t care if they had to tie weights on you and drop you off a motor launch in Long Island Sound.”

  “You could keep them off my back, if you wanted to. You could convince them I was no danger to them. I’ve built up a complete new identity, false passport and bank accounts—I can fade out of sight and come to the surface in England or on the Riviera with a whole new identity. If you cover for me, the rest of them will never find me.”

  “Maybe I could,” he said, turning toward the door, “but I won’t. Not now. Maybe I’ll think about it later. In the meantime, you’ll stay put and do as you’re told.”

  She felt exhausted; she had nothing further to say. At the door he paused and said absently, “That lawyer from the SEC who asked you about my shares—have you heard from him again?”

  “No.”

  “All right,” he said. “Don’t do anything foolish.” He gave her a flat, hard glance with his hooded eyes, and went.

  She put on a dress, walked into the living room, and stared at the door he had shut behind him; crossed the room to the stereo and put an album on the turntable. It pushed a slow, soothing beat through the room. She was adjusting the volume when she heard a knock at the door.

  Surprised, frowning a little, she walked to the door.

  It was Russ Hastings.

  He smiled and said, “May I come in? I’m unarmed.”

  Not certain how to respond, she stood looking at him. He was dressed in a rumpled seersucker suit, and he had an unassailable amiability on his pleasant, blocky face. He was searching her face with an odd intensity, but his manner was pleasantly abrasive, like a coarse towel after a bath. He said, “What a beauty you are, Carol,” and grinned at her. “Look here—my palms are sweating from the effort of pronouncing your name.”

  “Good Lord,” she said. She shook her head in amazement. “The hell with it. I need cheering up—come on in, then.” She stepped back to let him enter; she thought, I’m being a fool.

  18. Russell Hastings

  She walked away from him into the room, moving slowly, because it was more graceful; all her movements were studied.

  Russ Hastings said, shutting the door, “You’re gorgeous.”

  “What’s on your mind? I’m not sure I should have let you in.”

  “I think I’d like a drink. I don’t mind fixing it myself—have one with me?”

  “Why not?”

  He went to the bar and watched her settle on one of the sectional pieces, drawing her lovely long legs up under her with a trim display of swelling calves and shapely ankles.

  He mixed two drinks, heavy on the Scotch, and said to her, “I have been thinking about you all week. I decided Wednesday that I was in love with you, and Thursday that I wasn’t. Today I’m somewhere in the middle. Maybe I’m not in love with you, but what the hell does it matter? Whatever you want to call it, maybe it’s a way to ease loneliness. I need somebody—I guess that’s all it amounts to.”

  He brought the drink across to her. “Very grave,” he judged. “Very self-possessed and cool and competent and bemused by my foolishness. Very beautiful, above all. The trouble is, you see, in my vague fantasies it’s far too easy to see you making a warm, serene home.”

  “You’re drunk.”

  “Only a little.” He tasted his drink, standing above her. “That piano record makes the room feel emptier, doesn’t it? It’s a good night for blues.”

  “I’m sorry you’re so depressed,” she said evenly. “Is it something you want to talk about?”

  “Excuse me. I thought I already had.”

  “Oh,” she said. “That. I’m ignoring your little speech—hadn’t you noticed?”

  “Then I’ll repeat it. I’ve decided I’ve fallen in love with—”

  “Horse shit,” she said, smiling up at him. “You’ve decided. Sure you have. A strange bedfellow is better than none—that’s about the extent of it, isn’t it?”

  He took his drink to a chair facing her and sat back, taking a long pull and feeling the heat of the whiskey travel his throat and chest. “I suppose you get this sort of thing from drunks all the time. You must have learned to shut your ears off—build a shell of indifference, it’s no good anybody trying to push themselves against it. That right? Okay, let’s see if I can bust it down. What do you do if I ask you flat-out to marry me?”

  “Are you?”

  “Am I what?”

  “Proposing marriage to me.”

  His grin turned sheepish. “Who knows?”

  “Don’t you ever commit yourself to anything, Russ?”

  He recoiled. “I guess I asked for that, didn’t I?”

  “I hate helping you pour salt in your own wounds, that’s all.”

  He took another swallow and slid way down in his chair until he was sitting on the back of his neck. “Marry me. Just like that. How about it?”

  “No.”

  “No pause for thought? No moment to consider how I could take you away from all this?” He waved his arm around.

  She laughed. “You’re funny when you’re drunk.”

  He scowled. “I’m not sure it’s altogether a joke.”

  “Let’s pretend it was.”

  “Looking at you now, I’m absolutely certain of it. I do love you.”

  “And how would you feel tomorrow or next week? I recommend a cold bath and aspirin. Anyh
ow, this dewy-eyed love business repels me. I suppose most women have some sort of atavistic mating instinct for a warm cave and children, but that got washed out of me a long time ago. Domesticity isn’t my thing. A life sentence of dirty dishes and diapers and orthodontists’ bills? Hah.”

  “You’re a cruel and heartless wench, verily.”

  “You don’t know me at all, Russ—and you’re not going to. Nobody likes a whore for long.”

  “Ouch.”

  “I’ve got too many fingerprints on me, and they all belong to men who know there’s nothing any of them asks that I won’t give them. Nothing. You understand?”

  “Is that your biggest artillery? Because if it is, you’ve just fired a blank. I’m not scared off. This is the age of enlightenment and Aquarius.”

  In a rich Kentucky twang she said, “Hawss shee-yit.”

  He said, “I was sitting in a bar watching my drink sweat, and suddenly I said to the glass, ‘And here I sit alone with you.’ So I came up here. I haven’t got a lot of money on me. I suppose you wouldn’t be impressed by my wallet. What would you charge to marry me?”

  “You’ve beaten that joke to death, Russ.”

  He felt a little dizzy; he sat up straighter. It took him a moment to marshal his thoughts. Finally he spoke with slow care. “I am getting very old,” he said. “The world I grew up in seems to have disappeared someplace while I wasn’t looking. I grew up equipped with a sense of how things ought to be. Standards—things that ought to matter, right and wrong. There used to be a point to things, you know? But now everything seems to be beside the point, somehow—I don’t even know what the point is anymore. Look, I’m thinking of tossing it all up and going out West, live in the country someplace and raise dairy cows. How’d you like that?”

  “I’d hate it. I’m an indoor girl. I like soft pillows and air-conditioners, and I never enjoyed getting dirt in my hair.”

  “You sound just like my ex-wife,” he mused. “What was her name? Lorelei.”

  “You told me her name was Diane.”

  “So I did.”

  “Lorelei was the woman who lured men to their deaths.”

  “The same,” he said, “the very same.” He blinked at her and waved his half-empty glass extravagantly before he brought it to his mouth.

  “Do you always get romantic and maudlin when you’re drunk?”

  “My darling, I am always romantic and maudlin. It shows more when I’m drunk, that’s all.”

  The stereo rejected and switched itself off. After that the room was thick with silence until he roused himself groggily and peered at her. “I guess this is what they call a pregnant silence.”

  She gave him a distant smile; the telephone rang, and she went to it. He watched irritation and resignation chase each other across her face while she spoke and listened; she hung up, and her eyes looked harder than before. She disappeared into the bedroom for a moment and returned carrying a pair of shoes; she sat down and crossed her legs, arched one stockinged foot, and put a shoe on, sliding her forefinger around inside the heel like a shoehorn.

  He said, “I find that whole series of movements insanely erotic. You don’t suppose I’m a foot fetishist?”

  “There are worse things.”

  He said, “You’re throwing me out.”

  “Stay if you want. I have to go out. I may not be back for a while.”

  He said in a sour way, “Then you’re not going to abandon all this and fly away thither with me.”

  “You give me an almost uncontrollable urge to snicker, Russ.”

  He nodded wisely. “All my life I’ve been a figure of ridicule and scorn.”

  “Oh, crap. You’re all right, Russ, you’re fine, all you need is a good stiff belt across the mouth to get you straightened out. Once you’ve broken loose from self-pity, you’ll quit floundering around.”

  He said, “You’re just full up to here with cynicism, aren’t you? Only I suppose you call it realism. I never want to get that way myself, thank you.”

  She glanced at him with a bittersweet sort of smile. “Nobody wants to get that way,” she said. “But we all do. You will, too.”

  “What for? Look, I am thinking about moving out West.”

  “Then do it. Good luck.”

  “Come with me, Carol.”

  He heard the small crisp snap of her purse, and he felt suddenly alone and forlorn. She came to him, bent down, and touched his cheek with a light, pecking kiss. “I hope you find a nice fluffy homey girl and have “steen babies and spend the rest of your life cuddling calves and fixing barbed-wire fences and hoisting beers at the corner saloon with the hands.” She went toward the door.

  “God damn it,” he roared. “I’m flying to Arizona tomorrow morning.”

  “Forever?”

  “I’ll be back Monday,” he said in a small voice.

  “And you’ll stay,” she said. “This is where it’s at, baby. All you have to do is make things matter.” And she left.

  He thrust himself angrily to his feet. What the hell; they were just two people who’d met one day. But by Christ she was lovely.

  He would go home through the steamy, polluted evening and take an Alka-Seltzer, and in the morning he’d go and see Elliot Judd, and maybe, in the clean open solitude of the desert, he’d be able to sort himself out and decide what the hell to do with himself from here on, to justify his existence.

  19. Anne Goralski

  At the kitchen table, Anne had the telephone at her ear; she was listening with a hollow, sinking resignation to the endless unanswered ringing on the line.

  Steve had come to her desk at five o’clock and told her he couldn’t see her tonight. She had whispered, pleading, “When am I going to see you?”

  “I told you, darling, I have to go out to my mother’s. I always do on Friday evenings. No telling when I’ll be back—I may stay over. But we’ll be together tomorrow—we’ve got the whole weekend.”

  She had come home and sunbathed in the last sunlight on a towel on the buckling tarpaper roof. Her mind was full of Steve. She longed for him to return tonight; love had transfigured her existence—he had become the center of her world; without him she was wrenched from life. She had started ringing his number at nine o’clock, wanting him tonight; she was dressed and ready.

  She put the receiver down in its cradle and stood up to open the window wider. The heat was grotesque. She was beginning to turn away when she saw her father’s figure come in sight at the corner.

  Barney Goralski’s heavy shoes thudded and echoed on the pavement. Isolated pedestrians swirled by, their faces as gray as the smoggy air. He was tramping the well-worn route from the taxi garage home, not hurrying, reluctant to arrive, and his head was ducked because he didn’t need to look where he was going.

  She sat down by the phone and dialed Steve’s number quickly, and listened to it ring. She tensed at the heavy sound of her father’s tread in the hall; she watched the door furtively. When the knob turned she cradled the phone.

  His looming hulk filled the doorway; he came straight through into the kitchen shaking his head. “Rotten miserable day. How’s your mother?”

  “She had a headache—she’s gone to bed.”

  “Yeah,” he said, and opened the refrigerator. He took out a beer and pulled the snap-ring top; it came off with a pop and a hiss. He sat down at the tiny oilcloth-covered table and said again, “Rotten miserable day. Hot days like this the stinkin’ commuters all bring their air-conditioned cars in. Been a puking jam all day long. Crawl all the way. Some clown didn’t give himself enough time, wanted to make a train at Penn Station, naturally we missed it, and the sonofabitch blames me. I got the fare out of him, but not a nickel for a tip. Then I pick up some egghead professor insists we go the hard way, straight uptown through the traffic jam all the way to Columbia University, fifty minutes, for a twenty-cent tip. Big puking spender. Don’t these guys know the stinkin’ Internal Revenue assumes you make tips that amount to twenty p
ercent of what shows on the meter? I gotta pay taxes on them tips whether I get it or not.”

  He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. She could hear the abrasive scratch of his beard stubble when he rubbed it. His black, entrenched eyes came around to lie against her, and he said, “You ain’t listening.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m waiting for a phone call.”

  “Yeah? How long you been waiting?” He loomed forward, scowling at her. “Gotchaself a boyfriend, hey?”

  She couldn’t keep from flushing; she felt her cheeks heat up. She nodded briefly.

  Goralski said, “You look like you got hit with a ton a bricks. What’s the guy’s name?”

  She shaped her mouth around the word: “Steve.”

  “Whyn’tcha bring him around here sometime?”

  “I—I—”

  His scowl darkened. “Ashamed of the way we live, ain’tcha? Christ, I can’t blame you.” He opened the refrigerator and lifted out another can of beer, yanked the ring-top opener off, and glugged out of the can, throwing his big head back to drink. He sat down opposite her at the little table, both huge hands wrapped around the can of beer while he brooded. He seemed to be lost in his own miseries, but suddenly, without looking up, he said, “You all dressed up like that for a date tonight? Kinda late for it, ain’t it? Whatsa matter, he won’t phone?”

  “He’s gone to his mother’s for dinner.”

  His head shot back, and he glared. “You’re ashamed to bring him here, let him see this slum we gotta live in, that’s okay. But he’s ashamed to take you home to meet his mother?”

  “Poppa, he—”

  “What kinda sonofabitch is this guy? Hah?”

  “He’s wonderful,” she said. “He’s the best, Poppa, and I won’t have you—”

  “You won’t have! That’s rich! This bastard don’t mind keeping you out nights till the sun comes up—you think I ain’t noticed?—but he won’t interduce you to his mother, hah? Christ, honey, y’unnerstand what I’m saying?”

  Hot, stiff, eyes flashing, she said in a taut low voice that trembled, “I understand perfectly well, and I don’t want to listen to any more of—”