The Troubled Air

by Irwin Shaw

  But not now, Archer decided. Not yet. He would tell her nothing. Marriage, among its other aspects, sometimes entailed the duty to lie.

  Fumbling in his pocket for his key, Archer experimented with his face. The object, he thought, is to achieve an expression of contentment. Not a permanent one, just a nice fifteen-minute expression to cover the necessary hellos and the small talk before he could escape to his study. Reject worry, fatigue and twilight desolation, but beware a fatuous and incredible grimace of happiness, which any wife would recognize as counterfeit in the space of the kiss of greeting. It took delicacy and a light touch. Talent is required to go through a door. Half-satisfied with what he thought his face looked like, Archer went into his home.

  There were voices coming from his study and the clink of cups. Archer listened, as he hung up his hat and coat. Jane and Kitty. Friday night, he remembered, an early dinner because there was a boy coming to take Jane to the theatre. Archer groaned inwardly as he thought of entertaining a shy young man that evening at the table. He fixed the expression firmly on his face and went through the living room into the study.

  They were having tea, seated side by side on the old sofa, with the silver teapot and a ravaged chocolate cake in front of them.

  “It’s gruesome to have to admit this,” Jane was saying, “but I think store cake is so much more exciting than anything you can bake at home.” She giggled. “And the cheaper the better. I couldn’t resist this little horror when I saw it in the window.” She waved at the remnants of the cake on the coffee table. “I suppose my taste is just depraved.”

  “Hi, girls,” Archer said. He went over and kissed Kitty.

  Jane stood up and kissed him, hugging him hard. She was a tall, solid girl, with what she despairingly called private-school legs, robust and muscular. She had blond hair that was growing darker and which she constantly threatened to bleach. She had eyes like Archer’s, large and deep blue, but youthfully alert and questioning, and a wide, vigorous, pretty mouth, at the moment several shades of red because she had chewed the lipstick off with the chocolate cake. She smelled scrubbed and young and her arms around Archer held him with enthusiastic strength.

  “Daddy,” she said, “we saved you a piece of the goo …” she gestured toward the cake, “at great personal sacrifice.”

  Archer grinned, as he sat down in an easy chair, facing his women. “Thank you, no,” he said. “You overestimate my stomach.” He turned to Kitty, who was smiling at both of them, the teacup balanced neatly on the swell of her loose skirt. “How is it today?” he asked.

  “I threw up twice this morning,” Kitty said, “but I’ve been eating ever since.”

  “I like the way George Bernard Shaw has it arranged,” Jane said, sitting down, with her legs under her and taking up with her cake again. “Back to Methuselah. Come out of the egg at the age of seventeen, speaking several languages.”

  “It’s easier on the stage,” Archer said. “As you’ll find out some day.”

  “I would have come out just one year ago,” Jane said. “Tapping on the inside of the shell and studying Greek. I suppose it has its disadvantages.”

  “Did you go out today, Kitty?” Archer asked.

  “No,” Kitty said. “I decided I was going to languish today. I stayed in bed until Jane came home and I’m going to have dinner in bed, too.”

  “I thought Jane had a friend coming for dinner,” Archer said.

  “Bruce,” said Jane carelessly. “I flunked him. He came up to see me last night and I decided he was weary-making.”

  Archer winced at the phrase. There were now about two dozen boys on whom Jane had made that pronouncement who no longer were met, blue-suited and rigidly shaved, in the Archer living room.

  “He’s too yearny,” Jane went on. “He wants to marry me. Too utterly sticky.”

  Good God, Archer thought, what are the English departments of our women’s colleges doing to the language?

  “You’re awfully cold-blooded, darling,” Archer said. He was unpleasantly disturbed by the news that anyone wanted to marry Jane, but he had sense enough not to bring up the subject.

  “Mother understands,” Jane said. “Don’t you?”

  “Yes, dear,” Kitty said placidly.

  “Anyway,” Jane said, “I gave him a life preserver. I told him if he wanted to take a chance he might drop in for an hour later. If he promised not to yearn.”

  “Some day,” Archer said, “some man is going to make you pay for this.”

  “I dare them,” Jane said coolly. “I just dare them.”

  “Oh,” Kitty said. “Dominic Barbante kept calling all afternoon for you, Clement. He wants you to call him.”

  “I’ll call him,” Archer said. “Later.”

  “He said to call him as soon as you came in,” Kitty said. “He sounded impatient.” She looked inquiringly at Archer. “Is anything wrong?”

  “No,” Archer said. “Nothing.”

  “You look tired,” Kitty said. “Did you have a bad day?”

  “No, not at all,” Archer said. “I just wandered around.”

  “Why don’t you take a little nap?” Kitty asked. “You really look dreadfully tired, Clement.”

  “I’m not tired,” Archer said, his voice louder than he expected it to be. Women, he thought, are convinced that one way of showing a man they love him is by telling him how badly he looks from time to time. “I feel fine.”

  “Dad,” Jane said, putting down her scraped plate reluctantly, “what are the distinguishing characteristics of a thirty-year-old woman?”

  “What?” Archer looked at her puzzledly.

  “I want to know how a thirty-year-old woman acts,” Jane said. “In all situations.”

  “Why don’t you wait and find out?”

  “I can’t,” Jane said. “I have to know next week.”

  “She’s in a play at school,” Kitty explained. “And she has to be aged for it.”

  “Oh,” Archer said. “What’s the play?”

  “The Male Animal,” Jane said. “I’m the wife of a professor.”

  “Why don’t you watch your mother?” Archer said. “I guarantee she’s thirty years old.”

  “Don’t be ugly,” Kitty said.

  “I thought about that,” Jane said candidly. “I’ve been watching her for an hour.”

  “Well?”

  “She just acts like everybody else. Anyway, she’s just Mother, I can’t make head or tail out of her.”

  “I’m mysterious,” Kitty said. “I’m an enigma in a dressing gown. I’m a pregnant enigma.”

  Archer grinned. “I understand your problem, Jane,” he said gravely. “I wouldn’t be able to describe the way the old lady acts myself. And I’m in the business.”

  “What makes it worse,” Jane said, “is she’s supposed to be funny. It’s a comedy and she’s supposed to make you laugh.”

  “Act very serious,” Archer said. “That’ll have them roaring.”

  “I have to act exactly twelve years older,” Jane said soberly. “It’s not easy.”

  “No it isn’t, darling,” Archer said. He felt touched and curiously moved as he looked at his daughter, sturdy and troubled on the sofa next to his wife, pondering on the problem of seeming exactly twelve years older than she was, reaching uncertainly out to capture the signs and portents of maturity. “Well,” he said, “I’ll try to help. Before you go on the stage,” he said reflectively, “consider your troubles, because that’s what makes people thirty years old. Think of how hard it is to make both ends meet on a college instructor’s salary. Think of how differently your husband acts now, after so many years of marriage, from the way he did when you first met him. Worry about his complexion and if he’s getting enough exercise and if he remembers to wear a coat in the springtime when the weather is changeable. Look in the mirror before you go downstairs for dinner and search for wrinkles and wonder if the wife of the chemistry professor who’s coming to dinner is prettier than you.
Worry about what you said to the dean’s wife at the last Community Chest meeting and whether she was offended. Be annoyed at the dress you have to wear because it’s the year before last’s and the length of the skirt isn’t right. Go into the nursery and look down at the baby and wonder if he’s coming down with the measles and if he is going to grow up and be bored with you and if he’s going to be killed in the next war …”

  “Clement!” Kitty said sharply. “Don’t be morbid.”

  “I’m sorry,” Archer said, displeased with himself for allowing his mood to expose itself this way. “I was just running on.”

  “But, Daddy,” Jane wailed, “none of this is practical.”

  “I suppose not,” Archer said wearily. “I’ll try to think of something better over the week-end.”

  “I’ll call Vic,” Jane said. “I’ll bet he’ll have dozens of hints.”

  “I bet he will.” Archer stood up slowly. He peered at his daughter. “You’re not planning to become an actress, are you?”

  “Oh, no,” Jane said carelessly. “It’s just to break the utter boredom. Why? Would you object?”

  “Yes.”

  “Clement,” Kitty said warningly. She had nervous theories about allowing children to develop themselves.

  “Why?” Jane asked.

  “Because one person who depends upon the ups and downs of public favor is enough for one family,” Archer said.

  “Don’t worry, Dad,” Jane said. “I intend to marry and have four children. Let my husband worry about the ups and downs of my favor.”

  “Excellent,” Archer said. “I approve. Now I’m going to go upstairs and try to nap.”

  “Will you call Barbante?” Kitty said. “I promised him faithfully.”

  “I will call Barbante,” Archer said. “Faithfully.”

  He went out of the room.

  “I’m going to have just one more insignificant, imponderable piece of cake,” Jane said as he left.

  Archer lay down on one of the twin beds. He closed his eyes. The lids felt weighty and hot. The hell with Barbante, he thought. I’ll call him tomorrow. I’ve done enough for the radio industry today.

  He fell asleep quickly, as though he had been exhausted for a long time. He began to dream. Jane was in the dream, in a short, little-girl’s dress, smudged with chocolate cake. There were many boys around Jane and she had a lot of papers in her hand. The papers were like the ones that Archer had marked term grades on when he was teaching in college. Jane had a fountain pen in her hand and she began to mark the papers. Zero, she put down on sheet after sheet, zero, and boy after boy disappeared. Then Jane was a woman of thirty, in a mink coat, looking like Frances Motherwell, and there were grown men around her. She was still marking papers. The faces of the men swam into the dream. O’Neill, Hurt, Pokorny, Atlas, Herres, Archer. “You’re too yearny,” Jane was saying, and she marked zero, zero, on the papers, dropping them on the floor. One by one the men vanished. Archer was the last one left. “You’re utterly weary-making,” Jane said and put a zero on Archer’s sheet. Archer dissolved in the dream. Zero.

  “Clement. Clement.” It was Kitty, bending over him, and shaking his shoulder softly. “Wake up.”

  “Zero,” Archer mumbled, blinking.

  “What?” Kitty asked.

  Archer shook his head to clear it. “Nothing,” he said. “I was dreaming.”

  “Mr. Barbante’s downstairs,” Kitty said. “I said you were sleeping, but he said he’d wait.”

  Archer sat up. “Have I been asleep long?”

  “A half hour,” said Kitty.

  “How long has Barbante been here?”

  “Twenty minutes. I told him you were tired and I wouldn’t disturb you for awhile. If you don’t want to see him, I’ll tell him you’re not feeling well.”

  Archer swung his legs over the side of the bed. “I’ll see him,” he said wearily. He went into the bathroom and rubbed his face with cold water, waking himself up.

  He put on his jacket and went downstairs, leaving Kitty in the bedroom. Kitty was standing in front of the mirror, staring speculatively at herself.

  7

  ARCHER WENT TOWARD HIS STUDY, FROM WHICH HE HEARD THE SOUND of Jane’s voice.

  “Soda or water?” He heard Jane say and then Barbante’s voice, very precise and actorish, answering, “Water, please. I always take water.” He opened the door. Barbante was sitting in the big chair, fluent in a dark suit, tapping a cigarette on his gold case. The bottle of Scotch in Jane’s hand seemed, to Archer, incongruous and vaguely disturbing.

  “Hello,” Archer said, coming into the room.

  “Daddy,” Jane looked up from the bar. “I’m entertaining for you.” She finished mixing the drink.

  “Hello, Clement,” Barbante said, getting up politely. “She’s doing it handsomely, too.”

  Archer shook hands with Barbante. “Glad to see you, Dom,” he said, trying to sound as though he meant it.

  “I was passing by,” Barbante said, seating himself again, balancing his glass on the arm of the chair. “And I thought I’d take a chance and drop in. There’re one or two things I have to talk to you about.”

  Archer sat down, conscious suddenly of the heavy smell of Barbante’s toilet water in the room. God, he thought, that man leaves a trail wherever he goes. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here,” Archer said, “when you called …”

  “Perfectly all right.” Barbante waved graciously. “It gave me a chance to become acquainted with the charming member of the family.”

  “Daddy,” Jane said, “can I make you a drink?”

  “No, thank you,” Archer said. He really wanted one, but he preferred not to have the scene too cosy and friendly.

  “I think I’ll have a Martini,” Jane said. She looked obliquely at Archer, half-daring him to object. She had been permitted to drink for the last two years, but only a little wine before and during dinner, and this, as far as Archer knew, would be her first Martini.

  “Here,” Barbante said, standing up and going over to the little bar, where Jane was irresolutely facing the collection of bottles, “let me make it. I have an objection to lady bartenders. Old family prejudice. Roughens the hands and coarsens the female spirit. You just get a glass, Jane,” he said easily, “and sit down and leave the rest to me.”

  My, Archer thought, putting up a cloud of smoke, he really makes himself at home fast. Twenty minutes and he’s taking over the bar, ordering the child around … Archer watched Barbante deftly mix the drink, his large gold cuff links flickering expensively over the shaker. Jane brought him a glass and Barbante rewarded her with one of his slow, enigmatic, ambassadorial smiles. Jane sat down on the couch near the bar and watched him seriously.

  “There,” Barbante said, giving Jane the brimful glass. “Salut.”

  “Salut,” Jane said self-consciously. “This is an utterly delicious Martini.”

  How would she know, Archer thought resentfully; why does she have to put on these grownup airs?

  “I was telling Jane about my father’s ranch, before you came in,” Barbante said, seating himself with his glass. “In California. About the roundup in the spring when the range begins to go dry and the drive up to the pastures in the mountains for the summer …”

  “He’s a cowboy, Daddy,” Jane said. “He can rope a steer.”

  “That must come in very handy,” Archer said, “at the Stork Club.”

  Barbante laughed easily.

  “You’d never guess he was a cowboy,” Jane said. “He looks so urban.”

  “Dom,” Archer said, “what is it you wanted to see me about?”

  “Oh, yes,” Barbante said. “Jane,” he turned familiarly to the girl, “don’t you think you’d better go up and dress? You can finish your drink while you’re doing your face.”

  “I’ll be down in a flash,” Jane said, standing obediently, subtly flattered at the conception of herself among the company of women who did their faces with the aid of alcohol.
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  “Are you going out?” Archer asked.

  “Yes, Daddy,” Jane said. “Mr. Barbante has two tickets for the ballet tonight and he’s invited me. And he’s going to give me dinner. Isn’t he a nice man?”

  Barbante, the ever-ready man, Archer thought, roaming the world with two tickets to something in his pocket at all times, always ready for any emergency.

  “Didn’t you have a date for tonight?” Archer asked, not looking at Barbante. “With Bruce?”

  “We left it up in the air,” Jane said carelessly. “I’d rather go to the ballet, anyway.”

  Poor Bruce, Archer thought.

  “Look,” Barbante said, “if your boy-friend—what’s his name …”

  “Bruce,” Jane said, standing at the door.

  “If Bruce shows up,” Barbante went on, “why don’t you leave a message for him? Tell him to meet us for a drink after the theatre. Say, the Oak Room of the Plaza, about eleven-fifteen.”

  “Daddy,” Jane said, “if Bruce happens to call, will you tell him?”

  “I’ll tell him.” Archer nodded. “The Plaza. Eleven-fifteen.”

  “I’ll just be a minute,” Jane said, starting out of the room, carefully holding her drink.

  I’ll bet she pours it down the drain, Archer thought, as soon as she gets upstairs. “Darling,” he said, “will you tell your mother we’ll be alone for dinner?”

  “I’ll pass on the happy news,” Jane said. She went out, leaving Archer vaguely annoyed at her flippancy. She wasn’t flippant with him at other times. Young people, Archer thought, turning to Barbante, invariably pick the most unpleasant techniques of appearing adult.

  “A delightful child,” Barbante said, making it sound like an official proclamation. “So fresh and unspoiled.”

  “Yes,” Archer said bleakly. “You said you had one or two things to talk to me about …”

  “Oh, yes.” Barbante rolled the ice around in his glass. Say, listen, amigo, what’s this about Pokorny?” He looked curiously at Archer.