“Well, then break it up. Let’s go.”
“I want you to behave, Rusty.” She spoke softly, but there was a governess threat of punishment in her tone that caused an odd flush of pleasure, of gratitude, to pink his face.
“You don’t love me,” he complained, as though they were alone.
“Nobody loves naughtiness.”
Obviously she’d said what he wanted to hear; it appeared to both excite and relax him. Still he continued, as though it were a ritual: “Do you love me?”
She patted him. “Tend to your chores, Rusty. And when I’m ready, we’ll go eat wherever you want.”
“Chinatown?”
“But that doesn’t mean sweet and sour spareribs. You know what the doctor said.”
As he returned to his duties with a satisfied waddle, I couldn’t resist reminding her that she hadn’t answered his question. “Do you love him?”
“I told you: you can make yourself love anybody. Besides, he had a stinking childhood.”
“If it was so stinking, why does he cling to it?”
“Use your head. Can’t you see it’s just that Rusty feels safer in diapers than he would in a skirt? Which is really the choice, only he’s awfully touchy about it. He tried to stab me with a butter knife because I told him to grow up and face the issue, settle down and play house with a nice fatherly truck driver. Meantime, I’ve got him on my hands; which is okay, he’s harmless, he thinks girls are dolls literally.”
“Thank God.”
“Well, if it were true of most men, I’d hardly be thanking God.”
“I meant thank God you’re not going to marry Mr. Trawler.”
She lifted an eyebrow. “By the way, I’m not pretending I don’t know he’s rich. Even land in Mexico costs something. Now,” she said, motioning me forward, “let’s get hold of O.J.”
I held back while my mind worked to win a postponement. Then I remembered: “Why Traveling?”
“On my card?” she said, disconcerted. “You think it’s funny?”
“Not funny. Just provocative.”
She shrugged. “After all, how do I know where I’ll be living tomorrow? So I told them to put Traveling. Anyway, it was a waste of money, ordering those cards. Except I felt I owed it to them to buy some little something. They’re from Tiffany’s.” She reached for my martini, I hadn’t touched it; she drained it in two swallows, and took my hand. “Quit stalling. You’re going to make friends with O.J.”
An occurrence at the door intervened. It was a young woman, and she entered like a wind-rush, a squall of scarves and jangling gold. “H-H-Holly,” she said, wagging a finger as she advanced, “you miserable h-h-hoarder. Hogging all these simply r-r-riveting m-m-men! ”
She was well over six feet, taller than most men there. They straightened their spines, sucked in their stomachs; there was a general contest to match her swaying height.
Holly said, “What are you doing here?” and her lips were taut as drawn string.
“Why, n-n-nothing, sugar. I’ve been upstairs working with Yunioshi. Christmas stuff for the Ba-ba-zaar. But you sound vexed, sugar?” She scattered a roundabout smile. “You b-b-boys not vexed at me for butting in on your p-p-party?”
Rusty Trawler tittered. He squeezed her arm, as though to admire her muscle, and asked her if she could use a drink.
“I surely could,” she said. “Make mine bourbon.”
Holly told her, “There isn’t any.” Whereupon the Air Force colonel suggested he run out for a bottle.
“Oh, I declare, don’t let’s have a f-f-fuss. I’m happy with ammonia. Holly, honey,” she said, slightly shoving her, “don’t you bother about me. I can introduce myself.” She stooped toward O.J. Berman, who, like many short men in the presence of tall women, had an aspiring mist in his eye. “I’m Mag W-w-wildwood, from Wild-w-w-wood, Arkansas. That’s hill country.”
It seemed a dance, Berman performing some fancy footwork to prevent his rivals cutting in. He lost her to a quadrille of partners who gobbled up her stammered jokes like popcorn tossed to pigeons. It was a comprehensible success. She was a triumph over ugliness, so often more beguiling than real beauty, if only because it contains paradox. In this case, as opposed to the scrupulous method of plain good taste and scientific grooming, the trick had been worked by exaggerating defects; she’d made them ornamental by admitting them boldly. Heels that emphasized her height, so steep her ankles trembled; a flat tight bodice that indicated she could go to a beach in bathing trunks; hair that was pulled straight back, accentuating the spareness, the starvation of her fashion-model face. Even the stutter, certainly genuine but still a bit laid on, had been turned to advantage. It was the master stroke, that stutter; for it contrived to make her banalities sound somehow original, and secondly, despite her tallness, her assurance, it served to inspire in male listeners a protective feeling. To illustrate: Berman had to be pounded on the back because she said, “Who can tell me w-w-where is the j-j-john?”; then, completing the cycle, he offered an arm to guide her himself.
“That,” said Holly, “won’t be necessary. She’s been here before. She knows where it is.” She was emptying ashtrays, and after Mag Wildwood had left the room, she emptied another, then said, sighed rather: “It’s really very sad.” She paused long enough to calculate the number of inquiring expressions; it was sufficient. “And so mysterious. You’d think it would show more. But heaven knows, she looks healthy. So, well, clean. That’s the extraordinary part. Wouldn’t you,” she asked with concern, but of no one in particular, “wouldn’t you say she looked clean?”
Someone coughed, several swallowed. A Naval officer, who had been holding Mag Wildwood’s drink, put it down.
“But then,” said Holly, “I hear so many of these Southern girls have the same trouble.” She shuddered delicately, and went to the kitchen for more ice.
Mag Wildwood couldn’t understand it, the abrupt absence of warmth on her return; the conversations she began behaved like green logs, they fumed but would not fire. More unforgivably, people were leaving without taking her telephone number. The Air Force colonel decamped while her back was turned, and this was the straw too much: he’d asked her to dinner. Suddenly she was blind. And since gin to artifice bears the same relation as tears to mascara, her attractions at once dissembled. She took it out on everyone. She called her hostess a Hollywood degenerate. She invited a man in his fifties to fight. She told Berman, Hitler was right. She exhilarated Rusty Trawler by stiff-arming him into a corner. “You know what’s going to happen to you?” she said, with no hint of a stutter. “I’m going to march you over to the zoo and feed you to the yak.” He looked altogether willing, but she disappointed him by sliding to the floor, where she sat humming.
“You’re a bore. Get up from there,” Holly said, stretching on a pair of gloves. The remnants of the party were waiting at the door, and when the bore didn’t budge Holly cast me an apologetic glance. “Be an angel, would you, Fred? Put her in a taxi. She lives at the Winslow.”
“Don’t. Live Barbizon. Regent 4-5700. Ask for Mag Wildwood.”
“You are an angel, Fred.”
They were gone. The prospect of steering an Amazon into a taxi obliterated whatever resentment I felt. But she solved the problem herself. Rising on her own steam, she stared down at me with a lurching loftiness. She said, “Let’s go Stork. Catch lucky balloon,” and fell full-length like an axed oak. My first thought was to run for a doctor. But examination proved her pulse fine and her breathing regular. She was simply asleep. After finding a pillow for her head, I left her to enjoy it.
THE FOLLOWING AFTERNOON I COLLIDED with Holly on the stairs. “You” she said, hurrying past with a package from the druggist. “There she is, on the verge of pneumonia. A hang-over out to here. And the mean reds on top of it.” I gathered from this that Mag Wildwood was still in the apartment, but she gave me no chance to explore her surprising sympathy. Over the weekend, mystery deepened. First, there was the Latin who ca
me to my door: mistakenly, for he was inquiring after Miss Wildwood. It took a while to correct his error, our accents seemed mutually incoherent, but by the time we had I was charmed. He’d been put together with care, his brown head and bullfighter’s figure had an exactness, a perfection, like an apple, an orange, something nature has made just right. Added to this, as decoration, were an English suit and a brisk cologne and, what is still more unlatin, a bashful manner. The second event of the day involved him again. It was toward evening, and I saw him on my way out to dinner. He was arriving in a taxi; the driver helped him totter into the house with a load of suitcases. That gave me something to chew on: by Sunday my jaws were quite tired.
Then the picture became both darker and clearer.
Sunday was an Indian summer day, the sun was strong, my window was open, and I heard voices on the fire escape. Holly and Mag were sprawled there on a blanket, the cat between them. Their hair, newly washed, hung lankly. They were busy, Holly varnishing her toenails, Mag knitting on a sweater. Mag was speaking.
“If you ask me, I think you’re l-l-lucky. At least there’s one thing you can say for Rusty. He’s an American.”
“Bully for him.”
“Sugar. There’s a war on.”
“And when it’s over, you’ve seen the last of me, boy.”
“I don’t feel that way. I’m p-p-proud of my country. The men in my family were great soldiers. There’s a statue of Papadaddy Wildwood smack in the center of Wildwood.”
“Fred’s a soldier,” said Holly. “But I doubt if he’ll ever be a statue. Could be. They say the more stupid you are the braver. He’s pretty stupid.”
“Fred’s that boy upstairs? I didn’t realize he was a soldier. But he does look stupid.”
“Yearning. Not stupid. He wants awfully to be on the inside staring out: anybody with their nose pressed against a glass is liable to look stupid. Anyhow, he’s a different Fred. Fred’s my brother.”
“You call your own f-f-flesh and b-b-blood stupid?”
“If he is he is.”
“Well, it’s poor taste to say so. A boy that’s fighting for you and me and all of us.”
“What is this: a bond rally?”
“I just want you to know where I stand. I appreciate a joke, but underneath I’m a s-s-serious person. Proud to be an American. That’s why I’m sorry about José.” She put down her knitting needles. “You do think he’s terribly good-looking, don’t you?” Holly said Hmn, and swiped the cat’s whiskers with her lacquer brush. “If only I could get used to the idea of m-m-marrying a Brazilian. And being a B-b-brazilian myself. It’s such a canyon to cross. Six thousand miles, and not knowing the language—”
“Go to Berlitz.”
“Why on earth would they be teaching P-p-portuguese? It isn’t as though anyone spoke it. No, my only chance is to try and make José forget politics and become an American. It’s such a useless thing for a man to want to be: the p-p-president of Brazil.” She sighed and picked up her knitting. “I must be madly in love. You saw us together. Do you think I’m madly in love?”
“Well. Does he bite?”
Mag dropped a stitch. “Bite?”
“You. In bed.”
“Why, no. Should he?” Then she added, censoriously: “But he does laugh.”
“Good. That’s the right spirit. I like a man who sees the humor; most of them, they’re all pant and puff.”
Mag withdrew her complaint; she accepted the comment as flattery reflecting on herself. “Yes. I suppose.”
“Okay. He doesn’t bite. He laughs. What else?”
Mag counted up her dropped stitch and began again, knit, purl, purl.
“I said—”
“I heard you. And it isn’t that I don’t want to tell you. But it’s so difficult to remember. I don’t d-d-dwell on these things. The way you seem to. They go out of my head like a dream. I’m sure that’s the n-n-normal attitude.”
“It may be normal, darling; but I’d rather be natural.” Holly paused in the process of reddening the rest of the cat’s whiskers. “Listen. If you can’t remember, try leaving the lights on.”
“Please understand me, Holly. I’m a very-very-very conventional person.”
“Oh, balls. What’s wrong with a decent look at a guy you like? Men are beautiful, a lot of them are, José is, and if you don’t even want to look at him, well, I’d say he’s getting a pretty cold plate of macaroni.”
“L-l-lower your voice.”
“You can’t possibly be in love with him. Now. Does that answer your question?”
“No. Because I’m not a cold plate of m-m-macaroni. I’m a warm-hearted person. It’s the basis of my character.”
“Okay. You’ve got a warm heart. But if I were a man on my way to bed, I’d rather take along a hot-water bottle. It’s more tangible.”
“You won’t hear any squawks out of José,” she said complacently, her needles flashing in the sunlight. “What’s more, I am in love with him. Do you realize I’ve knitted ten pairs of Argyles in less than three months? And this is the second sweater.” She stretched the sweater and tossed it aside. “What’s the point, though? Sweaters in Brazil. I ought to be making s-s-sun helmets.”
Holly lay back and yawned. “It must be winter sometime.”
“It rains, that I know. Heat. Rain. J-j-jungles.”
“Heat. Jungles. Actually, I’d like that.”
“Better you than me.”
“Yes,” said Holly, with a sleepiness that was not sleepy. “Better me than you.”
ON MONDAY, WHEN I WENT down for the morning mail, the card on Holly’s box had been altered, a name added: Miss Golightly and Miss Wildwood were now traveling together. This might have held my interest longer except for a letter in my own mailbox. It was from a small university review to whom I’d sent a story. They liked it; and, though I must understand they could not afford to pay, they intended to publish. Publish: that meant print. Dizzy with excitement is no mere phrase. I had to tell someone: and, taking the stairs two at a time, I pounded on Holly’s door.
I didn’t trust my voice to tell the news; as soon as she came to the door, her eyes squinty with sleep, I thrust the letter at her. It seemed as though she’d had time to read sixty pages before she handed it back. “I wouldn’t let them do it, not if they don’t pay you,” she said, yawning. Perhaps my face explained she’d misconstrued, that I’d not wanted advice but congratulations: her mouth shifted from a yawn into a smile. “Oh, I see. It’s wonderful. Well, come in,” she said. “We’ll make a pot of coffee and celebrate. No. I’ll get dressed and take you to lunch.”
Her bedroom was consistent with her parlor: it perpetuated the same camping-out atmosphere; crates and suitcases, everything packed and ready to go, like the belongings of a criminal who feels the law not far behind. In the parlor there was no conventional furniture, but the bedroom had the bed itself, a double one at that, and quite flashy: blond wood, tufted satin.
She left the door of the bathroom open, and conversed from there; between the flushing and the brushing, most of what she said was unintelligible, but the gist of it was: she supposed I knew Mag Wildwood had moved in, and wasn’t that convenient? because if you’re going to have a roommate, and she isn’t a dyke, then the next best thing is a perfect fool, which Mag was, because then you can dump the lease on them and send them out for the laundry.
One could see that Holly had a laundry problem; the room was strewn, like a girl’s gymnasium.
“—and you know, she’s quite a successful model: isn’t that fantastic? But a good thing,” she said, hobbling out of the bathroom as she adjusted a garter. “It ought to keep her out of my hair most of the day. And there shouldn’t be too much trouble on the man front. She’s engaged. Nice guy, too. Though there’s a tiny difference in height: I’d say a foot, her favor. Where the hell—” She was on her knees poking under the bed. After she’d found what she was looking for, a pair of lizard shoes, she had to search for a blouse,
a belt, and it was a subject to ponder, how, from such wreckage, she evolved the eventual effect: pampered, calmly immaculate, as though she’d been attended by Cleopatra’s maids. She said, “Listen,” and cupped her hand under my chin, “I’m glad about the story. Really I am.”
THAT MONDAY IN OCTOBER, 1943. A beautiful day with the buoyancy of a bird. To start, we had Manhattans at Joe Bell’s; and, when he heard of my good luck, champagne cocktails on the house. Later, we wandered toward Fifth Avenue, where there was a parade. The flags in the wind, the thump of military bands and military feet, seemed to have nothing to do with war, but to be, rather, a fanfare arranged in my personal honor.
We ate lunch at the cafeteria in the park. Afterwards, avoiding the zoo (Holly said she couldn’t bear to see anything in a cage), we giggled, ran, sang along the paths toward the old wooden boathouse, now gone. Leaves floated on the lake; on the shore, a park-man was fanning a bonfire of them, and the smoke, rising like Indian signals, was the only smudge on the quivering air. Aprils have never meant much to me, autumns seem that season of beginning, spring; which is how I felt sitting with Holly on the railings of the boathouse porch. I thought of the future, and spoke of the past. Because Holly wanted to know about my childhood. She talked of her own, too; but it was elusive, nameless, placeless, an impressionistic recital, though the impression received was contrary to what one expected, for she gave an almost voluptuous account of swimming and summer, Christmas trees, pretty cousins and parties: in short, happy in a way that she was not, and never, certainly, the background of a child who had run away.
Or, I asked, wasn’t it true that she’d been out on her own since she was fourteen? She rubbed her nose. “That’s true. The other isn’t. But really, darling, you made such a tragedy out of your childhood I didn’t feel I should compete.”
She hopped off the railing. “Anyway, it reminds me: I ought to send Fred some peanut butter.” The rest of the afternoon we were east and west worming out of reluctant grocers cans of peanut butter, a wartime scarcity; dark came before we’d rounded up a half-dozen jars, the last at a delicatessen on Third Avenue. It was near the antique shop with the palace of a bird cage in its window, so I took her there to see it, and she enjoyed the point, its fantasy: “But still, it’s a cage.”
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