by Packer, Vin
“Oestrous. It’s a word referring to the oestrous cycle, the period of sexual heat.”
Boy Ames threw back his head and roared. Harvey was not smiling. He felt blood rush to his cheeks and ears. Boy slapped his knee and said, “Oestrous! Jesus, I have to remember that!”
“I’m surprised you weren’t familiar with the word.”
“There were no Gertrudes in my life, buddy! Oestrous! Ha! Ha!”
“I’m glad I amuse you, Boy.”
“Oh Jesus, oestrous! I wish some gal would write me a few oestrous notes!”
While Boy finished laughing and chuckling and sniffling, Harvey signaled to the waiter for another drink. While Boy was settling down, Harvey managed to say, “I’ll probably be getting married soon.”
“Really?”
“Yes. It’s not definite of course. Did Lake tell you anything about her? I mentioned her to him.”
“As a matter of fact, Plangman, we hardly discussed you. Lake was just in for a few hours Tuesday and we went down to Nick’s to hear some Dixieland.”
“Tuesday, Boy?”
“Last Tuesday.”
“That was the night I wanted you to come for a drink at my place.”
“Yeah, well, Lake was coming in.”
Harvey said, “It seems to me you could have mentioned he was coming in. I would have invited both of you. We might all have gone to Nicks, mightn’t we?”
“Sure, buddy. I just — didn’t think of it, Plangman.”
“That’s quite all right. I’m used to it by now.”
“Next time.”
“Sure, next time. Next time!”
“Tell me about the gal you’re marrying.”
“Always next time. I’m used to it.”
“Tell me about the gal you’re marrying, Plangman.”
“She’s not a gal, Boy. I wish you’d show some respect. She’s very prominent socially. Her father is on the exchange too, for your information. You may even know him. Hayden Cutler!”
“On the Mercantile Exchange?”
“On the Stock Exchange,” Harvey said. “On the New York Stock Exchange!” “Good for him.”
“I don’t know if the Mercantile Exchange is more important than the New York Stock Exchange, but her maternal grandparents were descended from John Alden and Henry Adams.”
Again, Boy burst into laughter. “Oh Jesus, I do remember Lake telling me something about that. I remember the John Alden, Henry Adams bit — ha! ha!”
“It’s true! It’s a true story!”
Boy was rocking back and forth in his chair, his face very red from laughing.
“Her uncle’s a Boocock!” Harvey said angrily.
“Boocock, Plangman! Jesus, but that sounds oestrous!”
Harvey picked up his drink and gulped it down. He could feel his heart banging against his new S.A. Avery narrow-pleated shirt. He signaled the waiter for another drink, his hands trembling with humiliation.
• • •
It was eleven-fifteen when Harvey Plangman arrived back at his apartment. He was quite drunk. He had gulped his last three, and his very last he had been forced to drink by himself. Boy had said he had a date downtown, when Harvey suggested Boy wait, so they could cab home together. Boy had said he would give Harvey a ring one day soon. Harvey never wanted to see Boy Ames again. The whole episode had failed miserably. At one point Boy had laughed so hard, tears had run down his cheeks and he had said his stomach hurt from laughing. Harvey had forced him to be serious only once, at a point when Harvey spoke of Boy’s father’s death. Harvey had begun to be high at that point and he had asked Boy just exactly how Lake had broken the news to Boy.
“Just exactly what did Lake Budde say,” Harvey had asked. “I’m just curious.”
Boy Ames had answered. “You don’t remember things like that in terms of exact words, Plangman, but Lake handled it just great! Lake,” Boy Ames said solemnly, “is a beautiful person!”
A beautiful person — as Harvey stumbled around his apartment, getting out of his clothes, fixing himself a nightcap, and wrapping himself in his red Sulka dressing gown, he kept thinking back on those three words. Boy made them sound so spiritual, so damned special — the way Boy had said them, they no longer seemed like ordinary, everyday words — the combination of them and Boy’s tone, made them seem as though they had never been spoken before. A beautiful person. Harvey liked it. He wished someone would say that about him; he wished there were someone he could say it about — just as Boy had said it. It was as though they enhanced whoever said it, more than the person it was said about.
Harvey sat down on the bed next to the telephone. Boy had made him feel 100 times as left out as he felt after his German classes. It was his lowest point since the change in his life. It had put him back where he had been a year ago, that far back, and he stared at the telephone as though only that instrument could reinstate him now. The trouble was, there was no one to call but Lois. With Lois, he had never established a habit of casual chit-chat over the long distance phone. Both of them were slightly self-conscious on the telephone, and he had never called her without an excuse for the call. He would have to think of an excuse. It was eleven-twenty now, too. He would have to have a reason for calling that late. On the bedtable was a stack of cookbooks. He had spent that afternoon searching for a recipe he might use for the dinner he was fixing Lois and her father. One of the cookbooks was open to a recipe for a pie, made of bottled gooseberries and scalded cream. Tears came to his eyes as he looked at the recipe. Why was everything in life so very complicated? Why did he need to scald cream and make excuses to telephone the girl he was planning to marry? Never mind. He was used to it. He sat there afraid to shut his eyes because he would become very dizzy, and he tried to make up an excuse. At last he decided to say he was going out of town until Saturday — that he would not return until late Saturday afternoon, and that they had better decide on the dinner time this evening.
He lifted the phone’s arm from its cradle and gave the number to the operator.
“This is Harvey Plangman,” he told Hayden Cutler. “I hope it’s not too late to call Lois.”
“She’s at the Playhouse,” Cutler said. “Play’s probably over now. She ought to be home soon.”
He wanted to keep Cutler on the phone, until he felt reinstated. He would not be able to wait for Lois. He was very, very tired, growing dizzy even without closing his eyes.
“I’m expecting you for dinner Saturday,” he said. “Yes.”
“I’m fixing something special. Scalded cream.” “Pardon me?”
“Gooseberries with scalded cream,” he said. “Look, Harvey, Lois should be back in a half hour or so.”
“Mr. Cutler?” “Yes.”
“Would it be better if I called her ‘morrow morning?”
“I think it would.”
“’Morrow morning, first thing.”
“All right, Harvey. I’ll tell her you called.”
“How are you?”
“Fine thanks. I’ll tell Lois you’ll call tomorrow.” “How’re things at the Tock’change?” “Just fine, Harvey.”
“I hada drink Mercantile Exchange, Mr. Cutler. T’night.” “Yes, well, I think you’d better call tomorrow, Harvey.” “Mr. Cutler, sir?” “Yes, Harvey!”
“Mr. Cutler, sir, you’re a beautiful person.” There was a momentary pause, a click — and then the dial tone.
In his red Oriental-style Sulka Luxury Lounging Robe, Harvey Plangman spent the night passed out on the floor beside his bed, with all the lights burning.
TWELVE
RAYMOND BATTLE had arrived at Mrs. Carson’s early. Her mother, Mrs. Hill, had gone hours ago to St. Louis, and the children, Chrissy and Carla, were already tucked in bed. It was quarter to eight by Raymond Battle’s wristwatch. Time enough for a few amenities before Mrs. Carson left and Raymond began his chore of baby-sitting.
“Ah! You’ve added a desk up here, I see,” said he, as young Mrs. Carson
came from the bedroom to the living room. She was wearing a light blue skirt and a white sweater, with light blue Keds and no stockings. Her hair was a fiery red, and she had many freckles, a round sort of pretty baby-girl face, and a small but very well-developed figure. She certainly did not look like the mother of two children, but more like one of the new freshmen at the University. She was throwing things into a tan leather shoulder bag, murmuring to herself, “… my lipstick, my pencil, my compact, my saccharine, my hay fever pills …"
Again, Raymond Battle said, “You’ve added a desk up here, I see.”
“It’s all right, isn’t it?” She took a wad of Kleenex from her bag and blew her nose, then rushed across to a table where a pair of pearl earrings were resting. Hurriedly, she screwed them on her lobes, saying, “It was my husband’s mother’s desk. It’s a Governor Win-something. I don’t remember. Not an original, natch.”
“A Governor Winthrop,” said Raymond Battle, wishing she would stand still for a moment and behave politely. After all, he was doing her a favor. He was certainly not going to accept payment for this chore.
He said, “These fall-front desks are called that. They’re patterned after the fall-fronts from the Chippendale period, only their name is a misnomer.”
She was nodding her head, but her attention was fixed on her change purse, which she was pushing through with her finger, counting to herself.
Raymond Battle walked closer and spoke louder, peeved at her disinterest. She behaved like a spoiled child. “You see,” he said, “although there were several governors named Winthrop, they all lived a good century before this type desk came into existence.”
His voice, his nearness, had forced her to give him her attention. She fidgeted, looked at him with very vacant blue eyes.
He sighed and turned away, and she said, “The children should sleep right through, Mr. Battle. They didn’t have naps this afternoon, natch.”
He was slightly surprised at himself for remembering that little bit about eighteenth century furniture; he had really never been very interested. Everything he knew he had picked up from Margaret’s talk, and he had always had the idea that he never listened to anything Margaret had to say on the subject — but there you were, he had. With such a good opportunity for conversation with a relative stranger, he was disappointed to find it thrust back at him, as though it were a boomerang, he had thrown out.
Mrs. Carson said, “Chrissy whimpers in her sleep. It doesn’t mean anything. She’s the baby, the two year-old.”
Mrs. Carson was standing at the mirror in the living room now, fluffing up the sides of her short feather-cut hairdo with the palms of her hands. “There’s some kind of wine there in the decanter on the table,” she said. “I don’t know what it is. I don’t drink much. It’s Mother’s, but help yourself …"
“Oh, no, thank you,” said Raymond Battle. “I’m going to write a letter. Probably watch television.” “Well, help yourself to anything you want.” “Thank you.”
She turned around and their eyes met again. Her way of looking at him annoyed him — it was so much a way of not looking at him. He had no interest whatsoever in this person, and for that reason she irked him all the more — the very fact that she had imposed on him, and then could not even go through the simple social motions of attentive discourse or the gestures of a smile, or an expression of receptivity when he spoke. Before he knew it, she was out the door. Her footsteps on the stairs were every bit as self-concerned as she was, banging and important and rushing.
Raymond Battle was glad she was gone. His impulse earlier this afternoon, to talk with someone, was gone along with Mrs. Carson. There was no one worth talking with. On his way to Apartment 3, Battle had a brief encounter with Professor Bullard, who was going down the stairs as Battle was going up. They met on the landing. Raymond inquired, “And how are you, Professor?” to which the old man nodded, unsmiling — as seemed to be the custom at 702. Raymond had then said, “There’s a runner loose on the stairs, about the third step. I’ll fix it, but be careful as you go down.” And Bullard’s response? Not even waiting to hear the end of the sentence, Bullard clattered down the stairs reciting Shakespeare in a loud voice: “I am amaz’d, methinks, and lose my way, Among the thorns and dangers of this world.” He bounced off the bottom step crying, “King John, Act Four!” He was out of the house without so much as a thank-you-for-the-warning to Raymond Battle.
Battle settled himself at the imitation Governor Winthrop, brought out his stationery box and ball point pen, and spread the equipment in front of him. He had an hour before the English mystery movie on television, and he lit his pipe (he was still new at it, still had difficulty keeping the pipe going) and began his letter.
Dear Plangman,
He sat back, gave four or five quick sucks on the pipe stem, then leaned forward and began with a determined air.
I am up here on 3, baby-sitting for a most annoying individual. I would guess she is no more than twenty-three or twenty-four — a redhead, with none of the volatile or tempestuous qualities redheads are alleged to have, but in their place, a vacantness. This is particularly evidenced by her way of looking at you. It’s as though she’s off somewhere in a very unexciting place. You know, of course, the expression “looking right through you.” It’s that. I suppose you would call her pretty; she has all the physical qualities that earn the adjective — but her inability to be present spiritually, at the same time her body is physically present, makes her more like some store window mannequin — worse, an animated one. One who says “natch!” for “naturally” and who suffers from hay fever and is dressed as a bobby-soxer. So much for that, I have already exaggerated her importance by devoting a paragraph to her.
You mention that you would like to serve the Cutlers something simple but unusual. Was “chic” the word you used? There’s a very common Roman pasta dish which Margaret used to make occasionally on Thursday nights, way back in the beginning of our marriage. We had tasted the dish in Rome (it’s everyday fare there) and Margaret had added a few improvisations of her own. I’ll give it to you with her improvisations … It’s called spaghetti alla carbonara
1. Fry bacon while you are boiling the wafer for spaghetti.
2. To the bacon, after it is fried, add ground pepper and a few dashes of sage.
3. Place the cooked spaghetti (plain) on a plate. Add the bacon-sage mixture. On top of that add lots of grated Parmesan cheese.
4. Top with a raw egg yolk.
5. Serve as is, leaving it to the individual to stir it all together.
Serve it with a green salad and a bottle of red wine. I think …”
At this point, Raymond Battle heard a banging in the bedroom. He dropped his pen and rushed into that room. He was confronted by the sight of the two year-old in her crib, on her knees, with her eyes closed, banging her head against the wooden headboard.
“Here, here,” he said, bewildered and awkward, as he turned the child over on her back. “Go to sleep!” he said, ridiculously, because she was already fast asleep. Her thumb went to her mouth, and Raymond snapped off the overhead light, just as the child in the bed across the room from the crib, murmured “Nighty, Mum!”
Feebly, Raymond whispered, “Nighty.”
He shut the door, uncertain about the whole thing. What on earth was the baby doing hitting her head against a wall! He had no idea, but somehow he thought of the silly redheaded person rushing off to a play rehearsal in blue sneakers, and he decided it had something to do with that. Perhaps the child was deranged.
Back at the desk in the living room, Raymond wadded up the letter to Plangman and tossed it in the wastebasket. On another piece of paper he simply wrote, “Dear Plangman, this a good recipe,” copied down the recipe, and signed the letter: “R.B.” He took an envelope from his stationery box, put a stamp on it, and shoved the paper inside.
Then he walked across the room and turned on the television.
He found he could not concentrate on the
program which was finishing up, prior to the movie showing. He kept thinking of spaghetti alla carbonara — of that, and inevitably of the trip to Rome with Margaret years ago.
They had stayed at the Excelsior on the Via Vittorio Veneto. Long ago on trips they had learned to split up during the day and pursue their individual interests, meeting for cocktails in the evening. Margaret’s interests were the same as they were in any city of the world. The beds in their hotel room would be stacked high at day’s end with boxes from Fontana Arte, Myricae, Castelli, Buzzetti, Cartoni, and Bellini. Margaret would be both exhausted and exhilarated from her day of shopping, and Robert would be worried about paying for her purchases and tired from his own wanderings through museums and churches. It was not that Robert Bowser was unhappy about their periodic visits to Europe. He enjoyed them; he looked forward to them. But inevitably there was that corner of his thoughts which was wholly occupied with the dread knowledge he could not afford them. The incident Raymond Battle remembered, as he sat before the television set, was a strange little isolated one out of many, many trips as Robert Bowser, with spouse. They had met for cocktails that afternoon at the Fagianno, in the portico overlooking the famous column of Marcus Aurelius. He remembered that he was discussing the stoicism of that emperor with Margaret, going into the details of his reign, which was plagued by earthquakes and the attacks of Parthians, Germans and Britons — and he was at that point in Marcus Aurelius’ life, when he was victor over the Marcomanni, when suddenly he noticed that Margaret was flirting with a man at the next table. He sat shocked, watching her. She had not even noticed that he had stopped talking. Her head was slightly tilted to one side, and she was alternately staring directly at the man and dropping her eyes for some slow seconds to her glass of Soave, only to lift them again and search the face of the man. The man looked very greasy to Robert Bowser, and hairy and too plump. He wore a cheap suit, and he needed a hair cut. He was smiling at Margaret, and Robert saw that his teeth were yellow and misshapen.