TWO O’CLOCK, EASTERN WARTIME

by John Dunning

  “Well, that’s it,” said Waldo as he came out of the booth. “It ain’t exactly the Ziegfeld Follies, is it?”

  “It’s fine,” Jordan said, warming to it. “All you need to decide now is whether you want to do it the other way.”

  “I want it to be heard, that’s what’s important. Anything that dresses it up is fine with me.”

  “Then the next question is, do you want to write it yourself?”

  “I’m no writer, I don’t fool myself about that. I’d be grateful for any help I can get in that pit of snakes.”

  “Then you get me. If that’s okay.”

  They spent the morning roughing out ideas. Jordan was no stranger to the unwritten history of the black race, but in Waldo he had met a walking almanac. For their first show, one week from today, they would do Blind Tom Bethune, the musical prodigy born in slavery on a Georgia plantation. It was one of the stories Jordan knew well enough to write on short notice. For their second week he suggested Isom Dart, the black cowboy—expert roper, bronc rider, cattle thief, and according to legend, murdered by Tom Horn. Half a dozen true-life black stories raced through his mind, and Waldo added a dozen more.

  Waldo would remain the driving force. He had collected enough material for years of radio. He knew his way around a library, knew where dusty tales and memoirs were buried, and had an acute sense of what a drama required. “We’ll be hard pressed next Sunday,” Jordan said. “I’d suggest coming early to iron the bugs out.” They decided to meet at 5 A.M. “We’ll do two or three table readings, till you’re all easy with it. Then at seven the organist and the sound lady will come in and we’ll have a dress rehearsal just before we go on.”

  After that it would get easier. Jordan would also have the Isom Dart script finished and back from mimeo this Sunday. “That’ll give you a week to play with it in New York. I’ll try to keep at least one-up after that.”

  They left around noon with everyone feeling high. At one o’clock he settled into his cubicle to write his first show. The magic began: the spirit that had touched him last night ignited again and he stepped across a century and out of his white skin, and became Blind Tom Bethune. By five o’clock he had a finished script, and in the late afternoon he walked alone on the beach, south toward Holly’s.

  ( ( ( 12 ) ) )

  IT was Tuesday before his chance came. He walked up the beach at noon and there she was. She was dressed not to be noticed: scarf, plain blouse, long skirt. No shoes, he guessed, as the surf was breaking over her feet and she made no effort to avoid it. Beyond her house the crowds thinned and she stood out clearly in the bright sunlight. No one was swimming: the rolls of barbed wire kept them back and there was still a faint hint of oil on the sand as the tide went out. A body had washed ashore last week, many miles from here, but half a dozen of the sunken dead had never been recovered and that was enough to keep even serious grandstanders out of the water on this hot day.

  He felt no urgency. She was trapped on the beach and there was no hurry to catch her. The barbed wire petered away and the sea to the south was clear and bright as she moved on toward the gully that fronted the hook. She was less than a hundred yards from the cut with the distance between them half that, and a small party of people on a spread of blankets was all that kept them from being alone.

  She splashed into the gully to her ankles. She hadn’t yet seen him, except possibly as a dark shape at the edge of her vision. Then she did see him and knew: she looked straight into his eyes ten yards away and she knew him. Her face was scrubbed free of makeup: she seemed almost like a child until her eyes gave away her age. Her dress was wet to the knees, flattened against her by a stiff wind that set the curves of her legs and the deep furrow of her backside in bold relief, as if she’d worn nothing beneath it. He veered away slightly, intentionally passing between herself and the people on the blankets. There was a hail of “Howdy’s,” the common manners of strangers separated from the anonymity of the crowd. She looked expectant but he continued giving her whatever space she might need, speaking to them all as a group. He said, “Isn’t this a wonderful day?” and the woman on the blanket said you couldn’t ask for better, if only the war would go away. “It will,” Jordan said. “One day you’ll wake up and it’ll be gone like a bad dream.”

  He splashed into the gully, out to the edge of the sea. So far the encounter felt right, to that happy part of his mind that had pushed him into it. It was his cautious half that begged to differ. Caution said she was halfway back to town by now.

  But she hadn’t moved. She stood watching him and he knew he had to speak but he had no idea what he’d say till he opened his mouth and said it.

  “I believe you’re the woman who sings on the radio.”

  She shook her head, the movement barely perceptible. The people on the blankets were watching her curiously, not yet sure if they should be impressed. Jordan came back up the cut, holding his hands over his eyes as if to get a better look. “Aren’t you Miss O’Hara?”

  “You’re thinking of someone else,” she said.

  The woman on the blanket wiggled around to face them, draping her arm over the shoulders of the man beside her. “We tried to get in last Saturday,” she said. “Didn’t come close to making it. You’ll have to tell us how you do it.”

  “I work there,” he said, looking at Holly.

  “Isn’t that fascinating!” The woman laughed. “Too bad you’re not that singer. Wouldn’t you find that just fascinating?”

  “To her it’s probably just a job,” Holly said.

  “Anything can get that way,” Jordan said. “I think I’d be ready to move on myself if something more important came along.”

  “Isn’t that just like a man,” said the woman on the blanket. “Wonderful job like that and he wants to move on. I think it would be so exciting to watch them put on the shows.”

  “There’s really nothing to it. The listener does all the work.”

  “I listen to the radio all the time. I never thought of it as work.”

  “That depends on what you listen to.” He moved away as something caught his eye, a shell tumbling in the foamy surf. He picked it up, a flawless little moon snail, he thought it was called. Holly still hadn’t moved from the spot where she’d first seen him, and he came toward her with the shell held out like a calling card.

  “Here you go, miss. A remembrance of the day.”

  She took it and their fingers touched. Her eyes probed his face and he gave her finger a little squeeze and smiled so only she could see it.

  “Some people think it brings luck,” he said. “But you’ve got to give it to the first person you see while it’s still wet from the sea. Do you believe that, miss?”

  “No. But I’ve never been one for superstitions. I’d rather just take it because it’s beautiful.”

  “I’ll make the formal gesture anyway. To Miss . . .” He tilted his head and blinked at the unfinished statement. “I almost did it again. Almost said Holly O’Hara, that’s how much you remind me of that singer.”

  “Then the charm wouldn’t work, since my name isn’t O’Hara.”

  Caution held him in check. Then she said, “It’s Carnahan,” and his heart fairly rumbled with hope.

  “To Miss Carnahan, then. Go in beauty and good fortune.”

  She said nothing. Her hand had closed around the shell and when she opened it, it was still wet. She slipped it into a pocket as the woman on the blanket spoke again. “I saw a radio show in New York last year. My sister took me to Radio City and we got in the audience for an Ellery Queen. Have you ever heard that show?”

  “That’s on the Red, isn’t it? We’re Blue, y’know, and I’m kept pretty busy with what’s on my own air.”

  “What do you do there?”

  “I write the continuity. The stuff they say between things.”

  “What’s your name, if you don’t mind me asking?”

  “Jordan Ten Eyck.” He looked at Holly. “My name is Jordan.”<
br />
  “I was never so surprised as I was when I saw them do that radio show. None of the actors look like the parts they play and it’s amazing watching them make all those sounds. My sister can’t listen to it anymore.”

  “The illusion is gone.”

  “Exactly. Now when she’s supposed to be picturing a thunderstorm, all she sees is a man shaking BBs in a drum.”

  “That’s probably the danger of having any kind of magic explained. It’s better not to know.”

  “Not always,” said Holly, coming out of the water.

  She came past him very close: a nape of neck, a swirl of honey-colored hair. She stopped on the sand and wrung the water out of her hem, and her eyes came up and she smiled the way a stranger might. He asked, “Are you leaving us, miss?” and she said yes, and, “Thank you for the lovely charm.” Now he took another chance, letting his bold side run mad. “Say, miss . . . do you think it would be proper to ask if I might walk you back up the beach?” She stood up tall and smiled. “It sounds very proper when you put it that way but it’s not a good idea. I’m meeting a friend and he gets . . . well, you know how some men get. But thank you for the thought.”

  When she was fifty yards away he threw her another good luck wish and she waved over her shoulder. Behind him, the woman on the blanket said, “What a lovely girl. I was pulling for you there, but I guess you win some and lose some. It’s too bad, though, a woman like her with a man like that. Such a pretty girl and all.”

  She was gone when he came back up the beach. The crowd was growing and she had lost herself in it; her cottage looked impregnable in the noonday sun and he tried to hang on to the thought that he had made some kind of progress. He slogged through the soft sand and climbed to the boardwalk south of the Ferris wheel, and there, when he turned, he was shocked to see her out on the beach again, coming along behind him.

  She had changed her clothes and now had a dark scarf and a parasol to hide her face. She stopped fifty yards behind him, as if waiting for him to move on. He passed the amusement park and headed up toward the pier, and when he stopped again and looked casually around he saw that she was doing the same. Keep going, he thought; that’s what she wants.

  He clattered down from the boardwalk and crossed the graveled square, passed the phone box, and sat on the farthest bench in the park. For a long time she watched the sea, occasionally turning her back to it so she could look across the square where he sat. What was she telling him? . . . what was she trying to say? She wants to talk but not here in the open. So he got up and walked out of the park, across the street to the beer garden, through the cluster of outdoor tables, and into the building. The cool, damp beer smell closed around him. The place was dark and uncrowded, with only a sprinkle of faceless talk from shadows hunkered along the bar. He sat and ordered a draught.

  The mirror behind the bar gave him a perfect wide-angle view and he nursed his beer as he watched her. Suddenly he made a new decision—he would speak to her, this time alone and of things far more important than seashells. If she left now he would get up and go after her. If she went home he would knock on her door. Perhaps he would do none of these things, but the beer was cold and it was a good way to pass the time. At least she would understand that. She had always admired his patience.

  Half an hour passed before she came. He saw her cross the park and duck her head under the canopy. He didn’t move except for his heart. He heard her footsteps and felt her looming presence, then she was there. She had come from his left but she went around and sat on the stool to his right. She had remembered his bum ear.

  “Well, Jack Dulaney.”

  “As you live and breathe,” Dulaney said.

  “What’s all this Jordan Ten Eyck business?”

  “It’s whatever you want it to be.”

  They were looking at each other in the mirror, their faces deep in shadow. Dulaney kept his there but she turned slightly as she spoke, becoming a pale crescent moon, a sliver of some old dream in the light reflected from the street.

  “I guess it finally dawned on me, Jack. I should’ve known we had to have this talk. It was just a matter of time.”

  He turned to her now but she had looked away, leaving him a shadow to talk to. “I’ve had a hard time figuring you out,” he said.

  “It’s simple, really. I kept thinking you might leave town.”

  He didn’t like the way this was going. He liked it less when the bartender asked what she’d be having and she said, “Nothing, thank you, I won’t be here long enough.” A powerful sense of doom came over him as he waited for her next words.

  “Couldn’t you see that’s what I wanted you to do?”

  “Is that what I was seeing?”

  “Oh, please. Let’s not fool around anymore, Jack, I don’t have the time for it. I’m supposed to be rehearsing in twenty minutes.”

  “Then you tell me. Is that what I was supposed to think when you looked right through me? . . . that you wanted me to leave?”

  “What else?”

  “I thought lots of things.”

  “What things?”

  “Everything but that. Everything from threats . . .” He shrugged and gave a friendly laugh. “I even considered that you’d lost your mind.”

  She didn’t share the laugh but there was a hint of distant amusement, of the old Holly. “That’s really disappointing, Jack. In the first place, who would threaten me, and why? And you should know better than anyone how mentally tough we Carnahans are. Haven’t we weathered famine, war, death, and loss of faith? What else can happen to us?”

  “I won’t make that mistake again. I knew you could sing but I had no idea what an actress you are. That first night you had me believing I really was a stranger. I don’t think I could’ve done that. It takes a cool head to pass an old friend by without blinking an eye.”

  “You’re making more of it than it is. You didn’t quite catch me flatfooted, I knew you were there. When we got off the bus I saw some excitement behind the building. Just a silly volleyball game. But imagine my surprise when I saw who was playing.”

  “Just killing time. The real question is, what happens now?”

  “Nothing.” She looked at him, then away. From the dark she said, “I don’t mean to sound cold, but my life is very different now.”

  “So I noticed. Congratulations.”

  “Now who’s being cold?”

  “That’s the last thing I ever imagined, being cold with you.”

  “Be happy for me. I’m having the time of my life.”

  “If that’s true I’m damned happy. And listen, in case enough people haven’t already told you, you really are something wonderful. The best part is, you just keep getting better.”

  She coughed softly. “I guess none of us knows what we’ve got inside us till the moment comes. You think you know yourself, and suddenly you learn you’re deeper than that. And no matter how deep you go, there’s always more. I’m learning something new about myself every day.”

  “And you think . . . what? . . . I’m gonna get in the way of that?”

  “You could. Whether you mean to or not. I’ve got an opportunity here, the chance of a lifetime. But I could lose it all if I’m seen with you.”

  He laughed. “Hell, I knew my reputation was a little rough in some places. Didn’t know it had followed me this far.”

  “Not just you, any man. The gentleman who’s going to mold my career is a jealous master.”

  “Well, you haven’t been seen with anybody yet. You’ve got to admit I’ve kept my distance.”

  “You’ve been very discreet. Thank you for that.”

  “Oh, my pleasure. I was never quite sure what I was being discreet about, I was just following your lead.”

  “You always did have such great instincts, Jack. Such wonderful judgment. Such a grand sense of what’s the right thing to do.”

  “With one great and shining, thundering exception.”

  “Well, we won’t get into tha
t now. It’s water over the dam, all finished and done with.”

  “I never really felt it was.”

  “It is, take my word for it.”

  He could feel her tensing up beside him. She reached over and took a drink of his beer. “You made that choice, Jack. You chose, remember? You were the one who packed up and left town. You, not me. You made your choice and that was the end of it. It wasn’t my fault if it never had any real beginning. You cut it off and now we’ll live with that, so please don’t come vaulting back into my life at this late date and tell me you never considered it over and done with.”

  She took a deep, shivery breath. “What do you want from me? Do you want me to say I loved you? What good will that do now? If I said yes, I loved you so desperately that I wanted to throw myself in front of a subway that night, would that make you feel better? Do you have any idea what you did to me, how desolate I was when you left me there? All you ever thought about was you and Tom, what was right for you, and I was just the spoils. And when I finally did the only thing I could do, you were both gone. But I didn’t die, Jack. The old Carnahan backbone bucked me up and I came out of it stronger than ever.”

  “There’s a lot in what you’re saying. Some of it I didn’t know then.”

  “You didn’t want to know.”

  “Holly, I couldn’t know. So I made sure I wouldn’t.”

  “Goddammit, even then you had to know.”

  She gave him an angry look in the glass. The look he returned was only sad. “I plead guilty,” he said. “I was a damn fool. Deaf and blind, mostly dumb.”

  “Well, it doesn’t matter anymore, you can put it to rest. I’ve learned how not to be in love, and life’s a lot better this way. I’ve got a program now, I can see where my life’s going. The man who’s handling me won’t tolerate any changes in the program and that’s just fine with me. So that’s what I came to tell you. I don’t have time for a personal life and I don’t care. I can’t make it any clearer than that.”