CHAPTER III
The Lennox apartment was on Knickerbocker Square which is one of scores of hidden relics of the past concealed on The Rock. There are elongated sycamore trees corseted with cement, a Greek cross of gravel paths, four square patches of grass, and a black and brass fence surrounding all. The houses facing the square are red stone Dutch style with copper roofs, bottle windows and glass orangeries in the rear. The old night lanterns and polished stone carriage posts are still standing. Lennox occupied a floor and a quarter in Number 33.
You entered from the street into the kitchen, decorated with Cooper's cooking utensils and garish butcher charts he had charmed out of an influential meat-packer in Grosse Pointe. There was also a lunatic side-arm Oliver typewriter which he had charmed out of a Brooklyn druggist. It wrote in minims and other pharmaceutical symbols, and Cooper typed recipes on it. He once sent me one that read like Witch's Brew. Turned out to be Fruit Soup.
Past the kitchen, through a short hall lined with cupboards, you came into the living room. It was forty feet long with high windows looking out on a rear garden, and had evidently been enlarged from two smaller rooms because there were two fire-places on the right wall. On the left was the door to Cooper's bedroom, the door to the bath, and a narrow flight of steps leading up to the other quarter floor Lennox had. This was a second bedroom and study where Lennox slept and worked.
The living room contained Cooper's piano, his Hi-Fi system, his records and his two Siamese which hunted in pack. The mink-dyed skunk had conceived a passion for the bathtub and only came out grudgingly when the shower was turned on. Lennox had four or five hundred books in walnut breakfront cases and a pair of butterfly wing chairs to which he was devoted and over which he waged relentless war with the Siamese who well knew how to punish him when he offended them.
There was an Italian couch before one fireplace, which was kept practical, as we say in the business, and a sawbuck table that doubled as a bar against the other which contained an aquarium of adenoidal goldfish. The walls were decorated with smouldering photographs contributed by Cooper's sister who had studied with Berenice Abbott, but had not yet recovered from the childhood influence of a Doré Bible. There was a magnificent refectory table with six captain's chairs near the windows.
It was a warm, pleasant apartment since Cooper had moved in. His easy style took the curse off Jake's stiffness. In the past we used to dread going to Jake's parties. He was such a punctilious host that he invariably chilled the guests. But Cooper, who came from fresh-water society, had lived with protocol too long to be impressed by it. He kidded Lennox into relaxing and showing us flashes of his real self ... the Lennox that Cooper knew. I think everyone would have loved Jake if they could have seen him the way he showed himself to his friend.
But this Christmas night Lennox was not lovable; he was impossible. It was his custom to make his prayers in the shower, asking God to keep him austere, kindly, infallible and sophisticated. He never begged. He made his request as one son of the Marquis of Suffolk to another. Now, however, he was raging. He stood under the hot downpour with uplifted head, fists clenching and unclenching, furious with himself and God.
"What next?" he asked the shower-nozzle. "What else? Don't pull any punches. I won't whine or beg off. Let's have it all, and I'll show You!"
He cut off the water, wrapped himself in a towel, kicked open the bathroom door and stalked out into the living room. The mink-dyed skunk galloped past him back into the bathroom and stamped its paws angrily when it discovered the tub was wet. Cooper had a fire going in the practical fireplace, and a pot of coffee tactfully exposed on an end table alongside one of the wing chairs. It was half-past ten and the Siamese were enjoying their bedtime magic hour, skittering crazily up and down the apartment with crossed eyes and flattened ears.
Lennox dried his back and rump carefully before he sat down. He poured black coffee and drank it as though it were poison hemlock. Cooper came in from the kitchen and appeared to be having a magic hour of his own, for he was wearing his chef's hat and a dinner jacket. Lennox stared at him.
"Black tie tonight, Scout Lennox," Cooper told him, removing the hat. "All out for the Christmas jamboree."
"What the hell, Sam?"
"Pull in your feet." Cooper poked at the logs with an old bayonet. "Must apologize, Sir Jasper. Only a cad would touch another man's hearth. They teach you that in Islip? Rules for Perfect Behaviour. Like passing the port to the left."
"They taught me nothing in Islip," Lennox growled. Nevertheless he filed this lesson away, until he caught the gleam in Cooper's eye. He squirmed a little. "What's this black tie routine? More Perfect Behaviour?"
"I'll tell you, son. There's no food in the house. So I thought we'd accept Alice McVeagh's invitation and free-load. She's giving a monster rally. A debutante party. Turkey, ham, chutney, kedgeree, boiled mutton, boiled guests, boiled debs—"
"Who's Alice McVeagh?"
"You'll like her. She always passes the port to the left. Gives Square parties. Strictly Square. Nobody in the business. A pleasant change."
"I'm staying home."
"Not a crust in the house, Jake."
"I'm staying home."
"Um. You want to brood, eh? In F-minor."
"Sam, I need a party like a hole in the head."
"The hole's there already. You need to fill it. Get dressed. We'll go mingle."
"Sit down."
"Get dressed."
"Sit down."
Cooper cocked an eye at Lennox, then sat down in the facing wing chair. Instantly one of the Siamese leaped on him. Cooper calmly extinguished it with the chef's hat and deposited it on the floor where it struggled ecstatically.
"Death to the invaders," Cooper murmured.
After a long pause, Lennox pointed to the frantic hat and said: "Look, Sam. That's me."
"The cat in the hat?"
"Yes."
Cooper gazed at Lennox with solemn perplexity. "You said you were like a smoke-stack."
Lennox waved his hand irritably. "I'm fighting blind, Sam. I'm in a hassle. The show's in a hassle. You know about my blackout. You know about Mason lousing the grand prize tonight?"
Cooper nodded.
"That's bad enough, but there's something worse. We've been getting letters. Threatening letters. The filthiest crazy letters you ever saw in your life. Five already. Blinky tells me there's a sixth up at the office ... more dangerous than the rest. If I don't do something about those letters, we may go off; but so help me, Sam, I'm so mixed up I don't know what to do."
"Told anybody about them yet?"
"No."
"The network?"
"How can I? All they have to do is smell trouble ... particularly dirty trouble like this ... and they'll yank us off. They've got a dozen clients hungry for that nine to nine-thirty spot. They've got nothing to lose."
"Um. Dangerous letters?"
"Filthy dangerous."
"That means trouble if you stay on?"
"Probably."
"What kind?"
"I don't know. It's an audience show. Suppose we let a lunatic in one Sunday night. You draw the pictures. Anything could happen."
"Police?"
"I'm afraid to go to the police."
"Why?"
"That turns it from a private stink into an official stink. That's why Blinky and I've been keeping it quiet. If the story gets out we'll be cancelled."
"Not positively."
"I won't take the chance."
"Why not? So you're cancelled. Is that the end of the world?"
"I won't be cancelled," Lennox said grimly.
"No, I guess not. You won't let anything be cancelled, will you, Jake?"
"Nobody's going to end anything for me except me."
"And you won't ever end anything."
"Why should I?" Lennox exclaimed impatiently. "I like what I've got. I'm thirty-five, Sam. I've come a hell of a long way from a kid telegrapher counting words in Islip, Long Island. What kind of a chicken-gut would I be to let it fall apart?"
"This I don't follow," Cooper said plaintively. "You mean the end of 'Who He?' is the end of everything? Exit Jordan Lennox, homeless, friendless, trudging back to that clam-shack in Islip, a broken man...."
"For God's sake, will you level with me! I've had a hell of a day and I don't feel like yakking it up. Who am I fighting, Sam? How am I going to fight? Jesus Christ on camera!" Lennox pointed again to the struggling hat. "I'm like that amateur tiger ... banging my brains out against nothing."
Cooper looked at the bounding hat, then back at Lennox. "Exactly like that," he said softly. "The cat's doing it for kicks. So are you."
"For kicks!"
"Yep."
"That's a lousy thing to say."
"Why? It's a compliment. Everybody says you've got deep freeze inside you. I know better. This is proof you've got emotions, Jake. Trouble is you only let 'em out of hock once a year, so you have to turn it into a production to make up for lost time."
"Who's making a production? We've got a law suit coming. We've got a lunatic knocking on the door. I've got a blank day full of memories I don't want to remember hanging over me. I've got emotions. What do you want me to do? Whistle 'Dixie'?"
"I want you to calm down and spread it out over the rest of the year. Make a note in your gimmick book: New Year's Resolution by Jordan Lennox. I will faithfully—"
Lennox started up from his chair. "My God! Where's the notebook?"
Cooper shook his head.
Lennox raced up the stairs to his bedroom. He carried a famous black gimmick book in which he noted down ideas, gags, references, characters, and so on. He had carried it for ten years. He was never without it, and had developed a nervous mannerism of feeling for it every few minutes ... a sudden sharp flexing of his right arm against his chest to see if the precious gimmick book was in place in his inside pocket.
He came down the steps a minute later. "Where's my overcoat?" he yelled.
"Which coat?"
"The one I wore tonight."
"You weren't wearing any coat."
Lennox raced to the front closet, pulled it open and tore at the racks. Then he swung around in dismay. "It's gone."
"Which? The burberry?"
"No. Yes. I must have carried it in the coat last night. I lost it in the blackout."
"Is the coat insured?"
"To hell with the coat," Lennox cried. "I'm talking about my notebook. It's gone. Lost. The gimmick book, Sam!"
"Forget it. I was hoping you'd lose it. It was beginning to fall apart."
"But I've got everything in it. A year of ideas...."
"You transcribe 'em every week," Cooper said comfortably. "You've got a complete file upstairs in the office. You haven't lost anything. Calm down."
"What the hell is the matter with you? Can't you understand? I've carried that book for ten years. I've never been without it."
"Then it's time you bought another one. Start the New Year right."
Lennox paced in agitation. "I've got to remember where I was last night. I've got to remember. I've got to find that gimmick book."
"Oh come on, Jake. How long are you going to milk this hysteria routine? Lost nights, lost books, threatening letters.... What d'you think you're doing? Auditioning? You need a new script writer, boy."
"You lousy bastard! Maybe I need a new friend," Lennox shouted.
"Maybe you do at that. Want to start a fight? You want to end it right now?"
"I'm damned well fighting right now."
"Then let's go." Cooper leaped up and faced Lennox aggressively. He cocked his right fist and pointed to his chin. "Go ahead. Let loose. I've been waiting three years to watch you throw a punch."
Lennox looked at Cooper uncertainly. In his blind fury he could not be sure whether Cooper was grinning in anger or amusement. At that moment the Siamese burst out of the hat, leaped to Jake's rump and clawed its way up his naked back to his shoulder.
"Jesus!" All the pressure in Lennox exploded in a strangulated yell. He doubled over. Cooper snatched the cat off his shoulder and hurled it onto the couch. He shoved Lennox into the bathroom, held his neck firmly and sluiced his back with rubbing alcohol.
"My compliments to Captain Bligh," Lennox said through his teeth. He stamped his foot in agony, almost trampling the mink-dyed skunk.
"Mutiny never pays," Cooper murmured, kicking the skunk out of the way. He swabbed efficiently with iodine, then led Lennox back to the fire and sat him down on a stool to dry. The Siamese, no fools they, had disappeared. Lennox sat rigid with control until the pain faded. He remained rigid.
"Stay mad; stay human," Cooper urged. "On you it's becoming. I could kill those cats for lousing our brawl. Let's find them, Jake. I'll hold them while you beat the bejezus out of them. Then the cats can hold me while you beat the—"
"Shut up. Don't be a damned fool, Sam."
"Which of us is the damned fool, Jake?"
Lennox took a deep breath and relaxed. "Me," he said. "A nuisance and a noodnick. Don't tell anybody."
"On the contrary. I tell everybody. That's why you're getting popular."
Lennox stood up, took Cooper's shoulder in his big grasp and clutched hard. He looked at his friend with a secret glance of devotion and gratitude, then turned away in embarrassment.
"After we eat," Sam said casually, "we'll go look for the gimmick book. You'll start remembering. We'll find it. And don't worry.... You won't remember anything to be ashamed of."
Lennox choked. "How's my back?" he asked. "Is there blood?"
"Nope. Just scars."
"Tsk! And me with that Hattie Carnegie backless collecting dust in the boudoir. Black tie?"
"Black tie."
Lennox went upstairs and dressed.
Myself, I don't like Square parties; neither does my wife. Squares are all right, but there's an invisible barrier between us and them. For one thing, our tempos don't match. We can throw away a dozen gags while a Square is beating a cliché to death. For another thing, Squares persist in thinking about the entertainment business the same way they did back in Victorian times. To them we're artificial, child-like and irresponsible. When Squares learn that I'm a writer, I can see that look pass over their faces ... the look that says: He's lazy and hates to get up in the morning.
They reveal this when they invariably ask the question: "Do you work all night?" If I say yes, they gloat, and I have to restrain the angry impulse to point out that I'm forced to work at night in order to avoid the interruption of Square phone calls and luncheon invitations and all the other pleasant devices which enable them to do four hours work from nine to five.
My wife has a tougher time. Her face and voice are highly expressive, naturally, being an actress. Whenever she's with Squares they watch her with appraising eyes and constantly interrupt with: "Oh stop it. You're acting now, aren't you? Why can't you be natural?" Once my wife lost her temper and answered a solid citizen: "You want to go to bed with me, don't you? Why can't you be natural?"
There was a gratifying hush of horror. I whipped out a pencil and scribbled on my cuff. "I've been watching you all with my keen eye," I announced, "and constantly analyzing ... dissecting. I'm going to crucify you in theNew Yorker." We swept out, and at the door my wife turned and said: "What's more, we're not even married. He's my brother and we're living in incest."
Jake liked Square parties. He enjoyed winning respect by admitting that he worked regularly from nine to five, by wearing proper conservative clothes, by showing the outward signs of success which business men understood and approved. He spoke about his profession like an industrialist; and although he was a sensitive, gifted writer, he pooh-poohed such matters as talent and inspiration, and discussed creativity as merchandise, his stock-in-trade.
He liked Alice McVeagh's party. It was given in her penthouse on East End Avenue, a Georgian duplex with delicate curving staircases, panelled study, oval library, a ballroom and two kitchens, one for the staff alone. The buffet in the dining room glittered with silver and crystal ... fresh caviar on crushed ice, scarlet lobsters, smoked turkeys, great oriental melons oozing thick nectar, a frosted copper cask in which peaches soaked in liqueurs, and dozens of coffee flagons bubbling over alcohol lamps.
The guests were charming. Cool young ladies and their energetic mothers. Pleasant young men Cooper had known at Loomis and Princeton, and the jolly old gentlemen they would in time become. They were all exquisitely casual about the perfection of their dress and manners. They were assured. They belonged. And how badly Jake wanted to belong on their terms. How badly all of us want to belong on somebody else's terms.
He was painfully well-behaved. He stood tall and erect and moved slowly, keeping his voice quiet and his hands at his side. He had two sherrys at the bar and chatted respectfully with guests ... a burly gentleman who owned half the cotton mills in New England and was devoted to game fishing, the goggle-eyed son of a near-East ambassador who discoursed in French and broken English onLe Jazz Hot, a red-headed man loading up on white Martinis who confessed he taught scene design at Yale, a pregnant young matron who had been a famous debutante.... Jake's deep-lined face was wooden and unrecognizable to Cooper who smiled privately.
There was music in the ballroom and couples dashed in to the buffet and back; crop-haired young men and boyish girls with delicious young figures and stereotype faces framed in straight honey hair. Lennox felt awed and hostile toward them. He escorted a brisk dowager to the buffet. She took an instant liking to him (older women always adored Lennox) and favored him with a ringing denunciation of the Metropolitan Opera Management and glowing praise for Charles of the Ritz.
Cooper rescued him at last and took him to the ballroom. "Eat enough?" he whispered. Lennox nodded. "All right, boy. Leave us mingle."
There was a Candle-Dance in progress in the darkened ballroom. Ten couples were turning and circling through a simple dance figure while the orchestra played "Pop Goes The Weasel." Each dancer carried a silver saucer candlestick in which a white taper burned. When the orchestra "Popped" the dance stopped, and the dancers tried to blow out each other's flames. When a candle went out, the dancer left the floor. The spinning and weaving of yellow flames gleaming on silk and satin and jewels made an enchanting picture.
Cooper nudged Lennox and handed him a candlestick and a burning taper.
"No, Sam!" Lennox protested.
"Come on, gents. All out for the sack-race."
Lennox perceived that a second dance circle was forming. There were two girls alongside Cooper, holding lighted candles and waiting impatiently to join the circle.
"But I've never danced this before, Sam. We had fire laws in Islip."
"You'll pick it up." Cooper whispered introductions to the girls. "My great and good friend, Arson Lupin. Ouch! Let's go."
The four slipped into the second circle and began the dance. It was bewildering for Lennox, but he had been a schoolboy fencer and was quick and graceful for a big man. Also, he was intensely competitive. He watched sharply, learned the simple figures and protected his flame. By the time half a dozen had been eliminated from his circle, he was able to look around and enjoy himself. There was one hand-clasp in particular that had electrified him, and he was trying to identify the owner.
It was a woman's hand, warm, slender and strong. Each time he grasped it, his spine tingled and he thought of the deep carpets in the network offices that produced leaping sparks when you touched a light switch. The hand had been helpful, too, turning him left and right with friendly pressures, leading him through his first confusion. The orchestra went "Pop." Lennox stopped, held his candle high and looked around the circle.
There was Cooper, looking solemn and perplexed in the glimmering light as he blew mightily in the direction ofLe Jazz Hot. There were two honey-haired stereotypes in thin-strapped gowns, shielding their candles with their hands. There was a horsy woman with an extinguished flame, tramping off the floor. The music started again before Lennox could examine the others. He was cynically certain that the horsy woman had owned the hand. Then, as he circled, again came that electrifying touch.
He looked quickly at his partner. Lennox had a weakness for straw-colored blondes, big-boned women who looked Swedish. This was the exact opposite. She looked like a slave on a Moorish auction block; cropped jet hair in tight ringlets, deep dark almond eyes, a full mouth, strong white teeth. The head was beautifully poised on a long neck. She had wide shoulders and the deep-cut jersey bodice revealed a high full bosom. Her skin was astonishing, very clear, very dark, and as lustrous as black pearl under the candle-light. She was slender, not tall, and moved with a lazy grace that was familiar to Lennox but not yet identifiable.
The orchestra went "Pop." Lennox and the girl stopped and examined each other, unmindful of their candles. She smiled. Her smile was sudden and changing, like the unexpected dazzle of light reflected from water. The music started again and she danced on to the next partner. Lennox watched her circling and weaving and suddenly recognized what was familiar about her carriage. She moved like a slender, graceful, cow-puncher; the shoulders square, the slim hips swaying, the arms slow and relaxed.
In that moment Lennox remembered that he had written a thousand love scenes and knew that every one had been a lie. There was a thundering confusion in his head; exultation and terror pounded in his heart. His whole life seemed drawn by the burning glass of this moment into a focus on this girl. She was smiling now at Cooper and murmuring to him. Lennox could have killed Sam.
He murdered each of her partners in succession until she came around the circle to him again. As he reached eagerly for her hand, the orchestra went "Pop." The other dancers stopped. Lennox continued until he was close to her and took her hand. In the flickering light, his face was black and white with shadows and highlights and looked almost ferocious. The girl's almond eyes widened slightly, and her smile faded, but her body did not lose its easy poise.
Dancers nudged Lennox politely. The music had started. The girl released herself and continued. Lennox went through the motions and grimly defended his flame from extinction while the girl remained in the dance.Le Jazz Hotleft. The stereotypes left. Cooper was eliminated. Six remained. Then five. Then three. Finally it was Lennox and the girl, circling and turning, hand in hand, candles fluttering no more than his own breath.
They danced for timeless moments, and Lennox, dazed and intoxicated, was not aware that he was speaking to her in silence ... by touch, by glance, by moving expression ... revealing the secret part of himself that had never been shown before. Then he did something extraordinary for Jordan Lennox, the man who never quit, who never conceded, who had wanted to win a victory before those awesome spectators. The music went "Pop." He held out his candle to the girl, and with his right hand extinguished the flame.
There was a burst of applause. The lights went up. The orchestra swung into a dance tune and the floor filled. Lennox lost the girl in the crush and wandered aimlessly to the side of the ballroom where an unidentified person took the candlestick from him. He went to the bar, now inhabited exclusively by the red-headed teacher from Yale and the bartender.
"Listen," Lennox began incoherently, "A dark girl. In an off-the-shoulder dress. She.... With cropped hair and oriental eyes. She gleamed...."
"Who?" the red-head inquired, weaving violently.
"A girl with black short hair. She—You heard me. Do you know her? Know who she is?"
The bartender shrugged. The red-head eyed Lennox fixedly, meanwhile shaking his head. "Never heard of her. Never-never-never. No such thing's dark girls anymore. Species extinct. Like used t'be everywhere poodles. Now only boxers. Poodles extinct. Also poodle brunettes, Q.E.D.?"
Lennox returned to the ballroom. He searched for the girl. He searched for Cooper. Two steps led up to the white door of the oval library. Lennox mounted them for a better view and found himself face to face withLe Jazz Hot.
"Who was she?" he burst out.
"Pardon, M'sieur?"Le Jazz Hotgoggled at him.
"The dark girl. In the dance with us."
"I am so sorry."
Lennox abandoned him, left the steps and prowled around the edge of the ballroom. He went again to the bar, regarded the red-head and the bartender without comprehension, wandered off and discovered, in a hall of Chinese teapaper, a small Christmas tree hung with corsages. A honey-haired girl in a thin-strapped evening gown was unpinning some orchids from the tree.
"I beg your pardon," Lennox mumbled.
She looked at him curiously.
"The dark girl who was dancing with us. Do you know her?"
"Dancing with us?" All her charm disappeared in the bray of her voice.
"My God!" Lennox thought in panic, "I haven't heard her speak. What if she...." Aloud, he said: "The Candle-Dance. The dark girl in our circle who—"
"I wasn't in the Candle-Dance," the girl informed him coldly and turned away. She was the wrong stereotype.
Lennox went back to the library steps and began searching the dance floor, couple by couple. Below him and to one side a voice called: "Psst! Hey Jake!"
He looked down. Cooper was standing there, grinning. "Three down from the drums. With a guy in hornshell glasses."
Lennox glared at Cooper, challenging derision, then stared at the dance band. He found her and murdered the man in the spectacles. Without moving his eyes he asked: "Who is she?"
"Don't know."
"I've got to meet her."
"Grab her after this dance."
"I've got to be introduced."
"Come on, Jake! This isn't the nineties."
"I want to be introduced. Can you swing it?"
"I can try."
Cooper departed. Lennox remained where he was, watching the girl as the man in the hornshell spectacles whirled her out to the middle of the floor. The dance ended, the couples applauded languidly and shuffled. Lennox looked around desperately for Cooper. When he turned back to the dance floor he had lost the girl again. Before he could get panicky he saw her as the music started. She was alone on the floor, walking toward him, with square shoulders and lazy arms and hips. He could not believe his eyes. She came directly to the library stairs, stepped up and held out her hand. Lennox took it and felt both of them tremble slightly.
"Why didn't you cut in?" she asked in a candid, transparent voice.
He could not believe his ears. Drawing her with him, he backed into the white and gold oval library. She was smiling uncertainly. After a tremulous pause she asked: "Is this how it happens?"
Lennox couldn't speak. There was a long silence; a long communication that seemed to dread words.
"I'm frightened," she said.
Lennox shook his head.
"At first I thought I'd help. You know, the dance? Then I thought you were being hasty. And then it happened, didn't it?"
Lennox nodded.
"If you don't let go of my hand, I'll faint ... I think. What do we do now?"
Before he could answer, Cooper appeared in the door with a magnificent white-haired woman wearing a bronze dress and a jade necklace. Both smiled.
"Ah! Just in time," Cooper said, "Our hostess, Madam McVeagh. Jordan Lennox."
"So nice to have you, Mr. Lennox." Alice McVeagh shook hands magnificently. Everything about her was magnificent and overpowering. "Gabby, dear, have you met the gentlemen? Jordan Lennox ... Sam Cooper. Gabby Valentine." She overpowered Lennox. "Sam tells me you're an author, Mr. Lennox. Do you write all night?"
Lennox pulled himself together before the Presence. "No," he answered in the voice of the second son of the Marquis of Suffolk. "I work from nine to five, Mrs. McVeagh."
"But how disappointing. Aren't you an artist?"
"No, Mrs. McVeagh, I'm a business man. I sell ideas for a living."
"Oh dear! And I had such a lovely picture of you ... working all night and smoking opium."
"Only when he's plastered," Cooper grinned.
Lennox looked at him stonily. Poor Jake! Standing there on his best behavior, tall and erect with his hands at his side; keeping his face wooden and unrecognizable, trying to belong on Alice McVeagh's terms, and destroying himself before Gabby Valentine. To his hostess he tried to appear austere, kindly, infallible and sophisticated. To Gabby he seemed hostile and unyielding. If only Cooper had come five minutes later. When he finally departed with the hostess and Lennox turned to resume the intimacy with Gabby, it was too late.
"Gabby...." he began.
"No," she interrupted, bitterly disappointed. "No. It was only the candle-light." She took a deep breath. Her smile was no longer a private matter between them. "Please forget everything I said. I thought you—" She broke off.
"You thought I what?" Lennox asked sharply. He was deeply hurt by her abrupt change.
"It doesn't matter."
"It matters to me."
"Please don't cross-examine me," Gabby said gently. "I made fool of myself, that's all."
"I think you're trying to make a fool of me."
"No. It's all right. I'm the idiot, not you. What do you write, Mr. Lennox?"
"I write better scenes than this, Miss Valentine. My characters don't play games."
"Neither do I."
"Then what the hell happened?"
"Nothing happened. That's why I'm an idiot."
Lennox was furious, and, consequently, icy and sardonic. He imagined that this was an impudent young society girl, willful and cavalier, who had taken it into her head to make an ass of him. He couldn't have been more wrong.
Gabrielle Valentine was a unique creature. You meet people like that occasionally, and if you're not too cynical you treasure them ... beautiful beings who've been loved and adored from birth and have grown up unspoiled and trusting, completely honest and without guile. This is rare because beauty is more often a curse for a woman and usually sickens her unless she turns it into her profession. No plain girl will believe this, but it's true.
Gabby had received affection all her life and gave it as freely. She was not brilliant, which was just as well. No one really likes brilliant people. She was a girl of average intelligence who had grown up in a world which she was able to treat with the disarming confidence of a child. Half the world treated her with the tenderness reserved for children. The cynical half could not abide her transparent honesty.
She was twenty-eight. Her father had been an old-line Socialist and had worked with Eugene Debs. He had come from a French Colonial family which had lived in Indo-China for generations and, I suspect, probably intermarried with natives. Certainly Gabby seemed to support the legend that women of mixed French and Oriental blood are the loveliest in the world. Her mother was still living and was a very smart couturiere. Gabby didn't see much of her. She was too busy making her own affectionate way in the world.
She had trained, of all things, as an architect, and worked as a free-lance draftsman. Drafting pays well and Gabby was able to afford her own apartment in one of the better Village studio buildings. She was political-minded, an inheritance from her father no doubt, and was an invaluable asset in fund-raising campaigns. She had once gone down to Wall Street and bearded a Republican financier in his den for a contribution to the Democratic party. Or maybe it was a Democrat for the Republican party. I forget which, not being political-minded myself. The point of the story is that she got the money.
She was an artist, but she didn't understand music. She had learned to be chic, but wasn't interested in clothes. She liked good food, but had to be told when it was good. She drank very little. She liked people more than anything else ... liked to be with them and talk to them, provided they were honest and unaffected. Everyone came to her with their troubles and she gave all her affection and help. She had never been in love.
And then had come this burst of flame in the glimmering darkness with Lennox, and there was a stranger in his body who had killed the flame with his rigid poise before Alice McVeagh and was trampling on the embers in icy fury.
"Please go away," Gabby said quietly. "You're making me hate you, and I don't like that."
"I'm sorry, Miss Valentine," Lennox answered. "I don't know the rules of your game. Is that a request or a challenge?"
"Why should it be? Do you like to fight?"
"I'm enjoying this fight ... with all my heart." Lennox showed his teeth in a smile.
"That's a sign of weakness, isn't it?" Gabby looked at him with steady eyes. "Like sick dogs that bite. Please go away."
"You've done the biting."
"Oh. You're hurt. I'm sorry."
"No, I'm enjoying the game. What do you do, Miss Valentine, when you can spare the time?"
"You can't be a very good writer if you talk like that," Gabby said slowly. "You sound as though you like to hate people."
"I'm a very successful writer."
"There's a difference."
"What big teeth you have, grandma."
"I don't like to be with people who hate," Gabby nodded gracefully. "Goodbye, Mr. Lennox."
"The end of Round One?"
"No. The end. I don't think we should see each other again."
"You'll see me often," Lennox assured her. "We'll fight this to a finish."
"There's nothing to fight."
"Something happened, and then you changed your mind. I'd like to find out how your gears mesh. Professionally, of course. I can always use a comedy gimmick." Automatically he flexed his right arm against his chest and was appalled to remember that his gimmick book was lost, but he was too angry with Gabby to concentrate on it.
"Who did you hope I was in the dark?" he asked. "Aly Khan?"
"You're making it worse."
"Who did you think I was?"
"I thought you...." She shook her head. "How can I say? I thought I—" Suddenly her dark eyes filled with tears. "You're not very kind. I've just made a fool of myself and I'm hurt too. Are you enjoying this?"
"Passionately."
"Please let me go."
She broke away from him and descended the library steps to the ballroom, her shoulders square, her carriage relaxed and graceful. The bright chandelier lights gleamed on her skin. Lennox followed her doggedly around the edge of the ballroom and into the bar. He could not let go. He would not let up. Gabby bent over the red-head sleeping on the bar.
"Phil," she said. "It's time to leave." She shook him gently.
The red-head snorted and slept. Gabby looked reproachfully at the bartender who instantly became apologetic, as though he had personally supervised the downfall of the teacher from Yale.
"It's not your fault," Gabby told him. "He comes down from New Haven full of undergraduate notions. He had to work his way through college. He never had a chance to be hedonistic."
Lennox stepped forward. "I'll take you home, Miss Valentine."
"It isn't me that has to be taken. It's Phil."
"To New Haven?"
"What if I said yes?"
"Bon voyage, Miss Valentine."
"Oh, why are you so hostile?"
"Because I'm a damned fool," Lennox answered furiously. "All right. I'll take him back to New Haven for you."
"Not New Haven. New York. The Harvard Club."
"A neat one-two. Next time I'll know when to duck. I'll take you both home."
"Not me. Phil."
"You and Phil both."
"That's your price?"
"It's a bargain, Miss Valentine. Snap it up."
"I think I'd better get someone else."
She left the bar. Lennox heaved the red-head up, powerfully but not unkindly, and hauled him to the door. There, an efficient man in black uniform located hats and coats without clues and helped Lennox dress the red-head. Then Lennox dressed himself. When Gabby came to the foyer with three eager admirers, Lennox looked them over and growled: "I'm taking you both home. I'm prepared to fight for it. If you don't believe me get ready for a scene."
Her eyes flashed, but she dismissed the men and got into her coat. Together they took the teacher downstairs in a burning silence and propped him in a cab between them. As the cab drove off Lennox asked: "Why the Harvard Club? He teaches at Yale."
No answer.
He contrived to peer past the red-headed barricade at her. She was impassive. The street lights flickered on her skin like lightning on jewels. He had never wanted anyone and hated anyone so badly in his life; nor known anything so inexplicably out of his grasp.
He said: "I worked my way through college too. I was a telegrapher."
No answer.
After five minutes he said: "Can you spell hedonistic?"
No answer.
They arrived at the Harvard Club and turned the teacher over to a patient doorman. Lennox did not ask permission to re-enter the cab. He got in and slammed the door. Gabby gave her address in the Village and the cab started. Lennox was startled. He had expected a number on Park Avenue. He revised his guess about her society background.
The cab crunched downtown through crusted streets. The rain and snow had stopped. There was no wind, but the air was still bitter. A few blocks from Union Square, Lennox abruptly called to the driver: "Stop here. On the right, two doors down. Don't argue with me. Stop."
The cab stopped. Lennox opened the door and got out. To Gabby he said: "Wait here for me. Understand? Wait." He turned and ran across the sidewalk to the open door of a Salvation Army Mission in a small store. There were candles burning in the window. He ducked into the store, removed two candles from the window, dropped a five dollar bill in their place, and ran back to the cab. He got in and shut the door.
"All right, get going," he told the driver. He handed one of the burning candles to Gabby without a word.
She smiled; that sudden dazzle of light on water, then her face lost its expression when she saw the cold fury in him. She shook her head.
Lennox slid the glass partition panel aside. "Can you sing?" he asked the driver. "Sing Pop Goes The Weasel."
"Have a heart, buddy."
"'Pop Goes The Weasel' ... in the key of C. Take it."
"That ain't no Christmas Carol."
"And this ain't no Christmas present." Lennox poked a bill through the slit and dropped it. "Sing."
The driver began a miserable croaking. Lennox sat back and eyed Gabby. She blew out her candle and turned her head away. He dropped his candle and trampled it.
"Listen to me," he said. "My name is Jordan Lennox, I'm thirty-five years old. Unmarried. My income is thirty-five thousand a year. I have no family left, but the Islip YMCA director will provide a character reference. My blood type is O. My eyes are twenty-twenty. My I.Q. is a hundred and nineteen. I understand people, but I don't understand you. I would like permission to get to know you better. If necessary, this oral request can be followed by a formal letter from my attorney and a bond will be posted."
The cab stopped before a squat studio building with great duplex windows, Lennox had the fare ready. He thrust it over the driver's shoulder, then helped Gabby out of the cab and with a fierce secret gesture signalled the driver to get lost.
"Well?" he asked.
She shook her head. He would not give up. He took her arm, escorted her the five steps to the doorway, thrust open the door and handed her through.
"Why not?" he asked.
"Goodnight."
"Why not?"
"You wouldn't understand."
"Make me understand."
"Goodnight."
His fingers gripped her arm. "Make me understand."
"What can I say? I thought you were somebody else. I thought...."
"What?"
"Once," she said slowly, "I had to study chemistry. And in the stockroom there was a glass jar filled with the most beautiful candy I ever saw. Then someone told me it was poison. Crystals of poison.... That's what happened."
"Poison!" he exclaimed. "I'm poison to you?"
"No; but you aren't what I thought you were. It's my fault. I made the mistake and I—" Gabby broke off in astonishment. The color had drained out of Lennox's face. The fury drained out of his body. He took a step into the foyer and let go of the door which swung heavily and smashed his hand resting limp on the jamb. He wrenched his hand free and took another hypnotic step toward the row of brass letter-boxes on the foyer wall. Each had a white call button underneath the name plate. In clear block letters alongside VALENTINE was FOX.
"What is it?" Gabby cried.
"'Fair is my love, for April's in her face,'" Lennox mumbled. "Her lovely breasts September claims his part...." He turned a wild face to her. "What made me think of that? What's terrifying about it?"
"What's the matter?"
"I don't know," he answered, swallowing hard and lifting a trembling hand to his face. It left blood smears on his cheek. "I'm lost. Again. I.... Christ!" He shut his eyes and pressed his fists together. "Sam," he whispered. "Sam. Come and get me. Please."
"You'd better come in," Gabby said in alarm. She took him upstairs to her apartment and through a barn-like studio to a tailored bedroom where she helped him off with his coat and sat him down on a chaise longue. He was shaking. He tried to joke. "We shouldn't be here," he said. "Very suggestive."
"It's too cold in the studio. What's the matter? What happened to you?"
"Downstairs. That name ... Fox. It cut me off from everything. I don't know why. I'm crying again," he groaned. "Crying. There's been nothing but dirt and tears all day. I don't know what happened."
"I'll get you a drink."
"No. Thank you. I'm not sick. It's just something trying to come back and hurting like sin."
"What do you mean?"
"I can't explain. Give me a minute.... It'll go away again, if I'm lucky. Then I'll go too."
He sat in silence, trying to control himself, looking around the room with smarting eyes. Gabby took off her coat, left the bedroom and returned a moment later with a glass and a sealed bottle of whiskey. She tried to remove the cap and failed. She handed the bottle to Lennox who took it, opened it mechanically and then put it down.
"I didn't know you lived like this," he said at last.
"How do you mean?"
"Like this. Not girly-girly. I thought ... Park Avenue and decorators. This could be a man's place. Do you play Boys' Rules?"
"You didn't."
"I know it. I've been trying to start all over again for the last two hours." He stood up, went to the bed and touched the pillow gently. "Hello, Gabby," he said. He went to the dressing table and touched it. He touched the window drapes, the lamps, the books, the pictures ... everything that was hers as though he were touching her heart.
Without looking at her he said: "You're right. I'm poisonous ... but I love you. I'm the wrong man, but I love you. It's too quick ... only a few hours, but I love you. I hate too much, I hurt too much because I'm poisonous.... And I love you. I'd better go now. Goodnight."
He searched blindly for his coat, ashamed to meet her eyes, and the real Lennox appeared, the Lennox she had seen by candle-light two hours ago.
"Oh!" Gabby exclaimed in tears, "Oh darling ... darling! Why did you hide from me? Why?"
He caught his breath. She came to him and he took her in his arms. After a moment he managed to speak.
"Is this how it happens? Has it happened again?"
She clung to him.
"Now I'm frightened, Gabby."
"Why did you hide from me? Why did you change like that? You were so cold and hateful...."
"I didn't know I was hiding. I didn't know what I was doing. I've been half crazy all day." He raised her hand and pressed it against his eyes. "I dreamed about meeting you, but not like this. I was going to be at my best. You know? Brilliant and successful. Scattering money and charm in all directions. Winning you ... not whining my way into your heart."
"No. No. You don't understand. No one wants to be won. We want to be wanted.... Needed."
"God knows, I need you. God knows, I—"
"Shhh." She seated him again, ran out of the room and returned with a warm moist cloth. She cleaned his hand and his cheek. Lennox seized her suddenly as she stood over him and buried his face in her body.
"It's all right, darling," she whispered. "Don't be afraid. You're just used to taking, that's all. Nobody ever gave you anything."
He looked up at her. "What happened to us after the dance? What did I do then? What's wrong with me? Was I mean dirty drunk? Did I—" He stopped. He stood up slowly. In a strange voice he said: "Mean dirty drunk. Clarence Fox from Philadelphia. The Quaker and the blonde. Yes. That's where the gimmick book is...."
Gabby was alarmed again. She put her hands on his shoulders.
"But why can't I remember the rest?" Lennox asked in terror. "The knot. What's so horrible about a knot? What is it? Why can't I remember what it is?"
She tried to press him back on the chaise longue. He was too big to be forced but he responded instantly to her pressure.
"You're in trouble," she said. "Let me help."
He tried to smile. "Yes. It's bad. I want to hide things from you, but you empty me out. Let me keep a few secrets for a little while. I can't do it unless you let me."
She nodded.
He took a breath. "I'm afraid to break this moment. I'm remembering what happened two hours ago."
She shook her head emphatically.
"But I.... But something's got to be written down before I forget it again. Someone has to go somewhere and get something for me."
"I'll go," Gabby offered.
"No," Lennox said sharply.
She picked up a sketch-pad and pencil from the bed table and looked at him. Lennox spoke as though each syllable were acid on his lips. "Aimee Driscoll. 900 East 33rd Street." Suddenly he burst out: "There's worse. There's going to be worse to remember!"
She came to him and took his face in her hands. "This isn't a moment, is it?"
"No," he said. "Please God, darling.... No." He pulled her down alongside him and kissed her until he plunged into a darkness which he did not fear.