Grant couldn’t picture her daintiness at the controls of a Mach Three jet transport. It was impossible. “Well, a lot of us feel we have talents we don’t possess. It’s only when we test our desires in reality-”
“I tell you, I was made for it,” the girl said. “It’s the thing I was made for. But I’ve got to convince the higher-ups now.”
“Show them you can, you mean?”
“Oh, they know I can,” she said. “No, I have to prove I’m worthy. You see, when I was younger, I got into trouble. I got drunk in Chicago.”
Grant smiled. “Most kids get tight sometime.”
“But I was drunk from the night before Thanksgiving until two days after New Year’s Eve,” she said. “Does that shock you?”
“It surprises me,” Grant said.
“I was just a baby then,” she said, explaining. “I was so new. I got drunk and lived in expensive hotels and bought marvelous clothes and went on the town every night and spent all the gold they’d given me and charged things and ran up enormous bills. And twice I picked pockets.”
“Really,” Grant said.
She leaned close to him and whispered, “It’s not hard. Want me to show you?”
“No,” Grant said. “I don’t think so.”
“Well, here’s your wallet, anyway,” she said, handing him his wallet; it had been in his jacket pocket.
“No wonder you got in trouble,” Grant said. “Drinking that way and spending company money and stealing.” He looked at her closely. “There was a man involved, too, wasn’t there? A handsome, no-good, worthless-”
She blushed a pretty, rosy pink. “That is none of your concern,” she said stiffly. “And you are no one to lecture me, John Grant. You drink that way, too, sometimes. And you have been involved with women.”
“Oh, that’s a cute trick,” Grant said. “But I’ll tell you how you did it. My name’s in my wallet. And you know I’ve been drunk because that’s only human. And, as for women, well, you’re guessing.”
She giggled. “Oh, that’s the easiest of all. You’re a man. It’s bound to happen.”
Grant smiled. “Your headquarters in New York?”
“No, they’re elsewhere. But I come here often. I like it. There’s so much life, so many people.” She hesitated. “You’ll probably think I’m crazy, but you know what I do when I’m here? I go down to the Bowery, and if I find someone who’s really down and out, and sick, I buy him a drink, and get him a meal and a place to sleep. I always do. You probably think I’m crazy.”
“No, that’s a kind thing to do,” Grant said seriously. “I think that’s a real act of kindness.”
“Oh, do you really?” she said, looking at him with her eyes shining. “I’m so glad you told me that. You see, I’m not very good at defining things.”
“It’s an act of kindness,” Grant said stoutly.
“Well, I’d like to tell you something else,” she said, and she leaned closer to him. “I’m not a nut or anything, I don’t want you to think that, but I meditate.”
“You meditate?” he said.
She nodded. “Yes, I do. Now and then. Pretty frequently, actually. And I’d like to tell you about it.”
“All right,” Grant said.
“Some people think you have to go to a chapel or temple, some place that’s got a sign that says open daily for rest, meditation and prayer. But you don’t. I find sacred places. I mean, I could sit down in that booth and meditate, but it’s better in a sacred place.”
“A sacred place?” he said.
“You find them when you’re closest to nature. Perhaps at the shore, at night, with phosphorescence coming in with the waves. Or alone in the stillness of a pine forest. I recommend those places to you. It’s an experience that will be beneficial and rewarding for you.”
“Well, I like nature,” Grant said.
She glanced at her watch, the large one on her right wrist. “Oh, I must fly. But I’ll buy you one quick drink,” she said, signaling the bartender.
“No, I’ll buy you.”
“Oh, no,” she said. “I have to.” She lifted the fresh glass and smiled at him. “Happy days.”
“Amen to that,” Grant said.
She put her gloved hand on his shoulder, then lightly against his cheek. “Bless you,” she said.
“What?” Grant said.
“I said goodbye to you. Tell me, do you have some problem with your hearing?”
“Oh, no. No,” Grant said firmly.
She walked to the door, then suddenly turned back. She was carrying the ebony stick in her right hand and she lifted it, gesturing at him. “Oh, there was one other thing. You’re to take very good care of your women.” Then she laughed, winked at him and walked out.
Oh, hell, I forgot to ask her name, Grant thought. He went to the door, glanced down the street, then across the block. She was gone. She had probably got right into a cab. Grant walked back to the bar, smiling. What a charming girl, he was thinking. A real little angel. His hangover seemed to be cured.
~ * ~
Grant left the bar and walked uptown. He did not want to go to his office. At 51st Street he turned and walked east to the river. He leaned against a railing, staring at the water, standing so still a sea gull circled twice over his head before deciding Grant was not edible, or would not make a firm perch. It had been years since he had stood there. When he had first worked in New York he had gone there almost every day. He had stared at the water and planned what he would accomplish. Sometimes he had told Frances. She was his girl then. A Greenwich Village girl with a copy of something by Sartre under her arm, talking to people instead of going to her classes at the New School. They had lived in one room with an electric hot plate and no refrigerator, and they had washed dishes in the bathroom. Sundays she got up before he did, walked to Sutter’s and bought pastry for breakfast. When she returned, it would still be warm.
The sea gull alighted on the railing.
“I’ll tell you something, bird,” Grant said. “It’s a long way from an electric hot plate to Stamford, Connecticut. And I don’t plan on losing any of it. Not one lousy dandelion, not one miserable crab-grass seed. Understand?”
The sea gull screamed in horror and flew off.
Grant stared into his palm, as if his life rested there. Two full acres of Fairfield County with an authentic 19th Century house and an authentic 20th Century swimming pool; a full-time maid who slept in, and a part-time gardener; a Buick station wagon, a Porsche, an old Morgan he tinkered with on weekends; soon he would buy a boat—his son was seven, old enough to learn to sail; the children went to the proper schools in winter, and in summer to proper camps; a full-time wife, Edith, who also slept in; she was always doing something for the League of Women Voters or something; she had got him to adopt the Greek girl—oh, you didn’t really adopt them, you only sent money and wrote letters; and he had his partnership with Fred.
Grant closed his hand, as if he had seen the future. My God, it’s only one account, he thought. If I’ve lost it, I’ve lost it. There are other accounts; And Edith will have to understand that I was tight, that’s all. She knows that.
Grant walked back across town. He saw a cigar store and went inside and telephoned Jack Regal. The secretary asked him to hold, please.
In seconds Regal was on the line. “Grant? Jesus, buddy, you still alive today?”
“Well, I spent the morning curing a hangover,” Grant said. “Do you know, I don’t even remember leaving your house? I don’t remember driving to Stamford.”
“Listen, I don’t remember dinner,” Jack said. “The last I remember was sitting, laughing and drinking it up in the playroom. Then, boom! it’s nine o’clock this morning and Jackie’s giving me hell for getting us stinking. Listen, did we ever have dinner?”
My God, he doesn’t remember, Grant thought. He doesn’t remember me with his wife; he was too drunk! “I’ll put it this way, Jack. From what I remember the wine was excellent. But, why
I called. Could I buy you a lunch?”
“Not today, buddy. I got long-distance calls hanging on right this minute. Let’s make it lunch tomorrow and I’ll pick you up, because we got to discuss details. I decided I want you and Fred to handle my account. I decided you and Fred will devote the time and energy to my account that I want devoted to it.”
I got it, Grant thought. I got it, after all! “Jack, that’s wonderful,” he said. “We appreciate that very much. Both Fred and I appreciate it very much.”
“So I got to go now, buddy. Calls waiting.”
“Lunch tomorrow,” Grant reminded him.
He was still smiling when he walked into his office.
His secretary took off her glasses and pinched the bridge of her nose, something she did when she was nervous. “Mrs. Grant is in your office, Mr. Grant. She wanted to wait for you. She, well, she seemed upset, so--”
“That’s all right, Ruby,” Grant said. But he thought, Damn it, not here. He couldn’t afford a scene in the office; he’d get her into a cab, take her to lunch. He went briskly into his office, said, “Hello baby,” to his wife, and kissed her.
Edith was tall, blonde, and always immaculately groomed. But she looked as if she had just dashed from catastrophe, flinging herself into clothes as she ran. He knew that Jack Regal might not remember seeing, but that Edith remembered hearing, or something.
“Are you as hung over as I am, doll?” he said. “I had a couple, but I’m going to have one more. How about you?”
Edith closed her eyes, as if she couldn’t bear to look at life. “I should be in bed, but I had to talk to you. I had to talk to you face to face, not over a phone.”
Oh, God, Grant thought. He walked to a small bar in the corner of the room. “I’ll make some highballs. And tell you some good news. I got Jack Regal’s account.”
Edith took a deep drink from her glass. “I don’t like some things you have to do to get accounts.”
“Mixing business with our social life?” Grant said. “Oh, I’ll be able to hire a bright young man to do that now.”
“Oh, I don’t understand how you can be so calm!” she burst out. “You know what happened last night. I don’t see how you can stand there and look at me so calmly! Don’t you care? Don’t you care about anything but the agency?” And she began to weep.
“Let me fix you another drink, baby,” Grant said heavily. “And I’ll try to explain.”
When Edith did weep, which was seldom, she went all out, sobbing, hiccuping, her nose running, strangling for breath. After the second drink she gained some control. “Never in my life have I felt so ashamed and embarrassed, so deeply, deeply ashamed and embarrassed.”
“Well,” Grant said, taking a long breath.
“Oh, I would have told you about it,” Edith said. “Even if you hadn’t walked in and seen me with that horrible little man. I would have told you about it.”
Grant lifted his glass carefully and drank.
“It was bad enough what I did. Letting him paw me like that. I mean, this morning when I realized I’d let him, not even saying no. Oh, my God. Then you walked in and there we were, sprawled on that sofa . . .” She began to sob again.
When the hell did that happen, Grant thought. He did not remember anything about that.
“Oh, how can you stand me?” she wept. “I’ve never done that since we’ve been married. I feel so ashamed.”
“Now cut that out,” Grant said, rather automatically. “That’s not getting us anywhere.”
The phone on his desk buzzed. He had forgot to tell Ruby no calls. “Yes?” he said into the phone.
“There’s a woman calling who won’t give her last name. I thought it might be a friend, from Stamford or someplace. She said to tell you Jackie.”
Grant felt the skin on the back of his neck prickle. Her name brought back her image. He could remember her fingers trembling in his palm, kissing her and the taste of perfume.
“Get the number,” he said. “I’ll try to call back.”
As he put the phone down he thought, Maybe she saw Edith with Regal, maybe she’s going to make trouble. But how could she cause trouble? Regal ran the corporation. And then another thought occurred to Grant: But perhaps Regal’s wife runs him. Oh, Goddamn, Grant thought. Now I’ll have to call her back, I’ll have to see her.
“I’ll go,” Edith said. “I’m interrupting.”
“No, stay,” he said quickly. He smoothed her forehead with his hand and smiled. “Look, you never saw that guy before. You haven’t been having an affair with him. You got a little tight at a party, a little affectionate.”
“I went pretty far,” Edith said soberly.
“Listen, you know when a person gets loaded the censor in his mind relaxes. Last night Regal reminded you of something subconscious. Some old, atavistic thing, connected with your past, perhaps your father-”
“Oh, no! Daddy’s a tall man.”
“That doesn’t matter. As far as you and I are concerned, Jack Regal is a father figure. An authority figure. Because he controls the money, money that I want. And so you are bound to react as if he was-”
Edith shook her head. “No. It’s simpler than that, I’m afraid. I didn’t want to go to dinner there, I didn’t like him or his wife. I was leading him on, really. Just so that, finally, I could say no to him. To put him down, to put him in his place. I was being a bitch.”
Grant saw she no longer felt so bad. “Look, do you want another drink? Because I want you to get on a train and go home and sleep. I want dinner in tonight, not out.”
“No, not another,” Edith said. She kissed him goodbye quickly. “See you later,” she said, smiling at him as if she were promising him something.
Grant gave her ten minutes to go downstairs and get a cab for Grand Central. Then he put on his topcoat and went out to his secretary. “Ruby, dear, this isn’t my day. Something’s come up about the children. Will you stay until Fred gets back? Then take the rest of the day off.”
“Oh, I’m sorry you have an emergency. But what about the woman who called?” She handed him a slip of paper.
Grant stared at the telephone number. It was in Manhattan. He memorized it, then tossed the paper into the wastebasket. “It’s not important. Some charity thing.”
He rode the elevator down to the lobby and telephoned. “Hey, Jackie?--”
“Yes, this is Mrs. Regal. Is that you, Mr. Grant?”
Damn, she is going to cause trouble, Grant thought. “Yes, it is, Mrs. Regal. John Grant.”
“Are you in the office, Mr. Grant?”
“No. I’m in a telephone booth.”
“Oh,” she said, and her voice relaxed and became warm. “I just didn’t want a bunch of secretaries listening to our conversation. Listen, why I called. He didn’t see a thing. I thought you might worry, so I called as soon as I could.”
“Are you certain?” Grant asked.
“Listen, he drinks three martinis and everything’s blank. Nobody knows, he looks the same. I asked him this morning, and the last thing he remembers is me coming downstairs. And that was right at first, if you recall.”
Grant realized she hadn’t seen Edith and Regal, or else she didn’t care. You’re out of the fire now, boy, he told himself. From now on there was one rule he was going to obey: Leave the clients’ wives strictly alone.
“Hey, you there or what?” she said.
Her voice was husky. He could picture her holding the phone, moistening her lips with the tip of her tongue. Oh, Goddamn, he thought, I shouldn’t do this. He took a deep breath. “Listen, Jackie. I want to see you very much.”
“Well, me, too. It’s what I came to Manhattan for. You got a pencil? Take down an address.”
It was in the East 70s.
“It’s an apartment of a girlfriend of mine,” she said. “Jack doesn’t know I know her anymore. He doesn’t know who she’s married to. Well, they went to South America and left me the key, so I could look in. There’s no doo
rman. The elevator’s automatic. You coming now, or what?”
“I’ll be right over,” Grant said. He decided he would stop by Sherry’s and buy some champagne.
The elevator door opened into the apartment, but it could only be opened from the inside. Grant buzzed and saw her face looking through the small window, then she opened the door. “OK. Everybody out of the elevator. Everybody into the apartment.”
Grant put his hat and the package from Sherry’s on a small table. She had walked into the living room. He went after her and put his arms around her; he tried to turn her around, so she faced him—she struggled away.
The Playboy Book of Science Fiction and Fantasy Page 21