CHAPTER XI
Audibon took Gabby's hand and pressed it gallantly. Then he led her across the sidewalk to the waiting cab. He helped her in, followed, and gave the network address to the driver.
"I'm sorry," he explained. "My baby's in rehearsal tonight. 'Operation Universe.' I've got to look into the studio. You don't mind?"
Gabby was examining his bruised face with concern. "That happened last night, Roy?"
"Yes."
"That's awful.... Awful."
"You ought to see my ribs," he laughed. "I'll let you autograph them."
"You mean you're in a cast."
"No, just tape."
"Let me see."
"Sightseeing on odd Mondays only."
"Let me see, Roy," Gabby repeated firmly. She reached out, unbuttoned Audibon's shirt and opened it. His entire left side was bound with white adhesive tape from spine to chest. She was so shocked and upset that Audibon's hopes began to kindle. He let her rebutton the shirt and adjust his tie.
"Artistic, isn't it?" he said. "They're poets of the intercostals up at Gracie Hospital."
"I want to pay," Gabby said.
"Pay? What?"
"The hospital bill."
"Why?"
"It was partly my fault. Maybe it was all my fault."
"No," Audibon said. "Not your fault. Never."
"I think I should make it up to you somehow."
"Do you?" Audibon's hopes rose even higher. "We'll discuss it."
The cab dropped them at the network and they took the elevator up to the big studio. It was an enormous room, half the size of an armory, blazing with flesh-colored lights hanging in thick clusters fifty feet overhead. On the studio floor were set up a country schoolroom with a blackboard on which the solar system was chalked, a miniature space-station, the interior of a rocket ship, half an observatory including a six-inch telescope, half a laboratory with an electronic microscope. The telescope and microscope were practical.
Before a fifty-foot moonscape cyclorama, a symphony orchestra was rehearsing "The Music Of The Spheres" from Gustave Holst's "The Planets." Alongside the orchestra, a technician was sprinkling glitter on the show title HOW TO KNOW THE UNIVERSE. There were six cameras on the floor. Six hundred yards of cable coiled around the sets.
The door from the dressing rooms opened and Galileo entered the studio. He was followed by Albert Einstein in violent dispute with Jules Verne. They were joined by Sir Isaac Newton and a striking red-headed girl who looked incongruous in a Victorian dress and pince nez. Six children from the Professional Children's School clustered around a piano on which a man in a spacesuit and fishbowl helmet played softly.
"THIS IS YOUR UNIVERSE!" a voice blasted on a loud-speaker. There were muffled commands from the control talk-back and the voice tried it again with different inflections: "THIS IS YOUR UNIVERSE!"
Audibon rejoined Gabby after a lightning tour of the studio and took her to a dark corner behind stacked flats, inhabited by a soda fountain and a potbellied stove. It was illuminated by the twelve-inch screen of a small monitor which cut dizzily from camera to camera, picking up a fag director, a fag assistant, a fag floor-manager, a fag camera director, a fag makeup artist, and finally following the red-headed girl's interesting bottom as she strolled around the studio.
"THIS IS YOUR UNIVERSE, EXPANDING WITH THE SPEED OF LIGHT INTO NEW INFINITIES!"
"Hello, pet," Audibon said softly.
"Hello, Roy."
"I'm sorry about last night too."
"I'm glad you're sorry. I hope it's for the right reasons."
"I'm sorry I wasn't with you."
"That's not the right reason." Gabby lifted a finger to lecture. Audibon caught it and held it.
"You're a schoolmarm, pet," he said, motioning to the monitor which now showed the schoolroom. "You belong on that set." He kissed the finger gallantly. Gabby reclaimed it.
"I was looking at that water color you did out at Fire Island. You know I've got it hung in my shop?"
"I wish you didn't," Gabby said slowly. "It isn't a happy picture."
"We were happy when you painted it."
"No. Not inside, Roy. That's why it turned out so badly." She looked away.
"It's a happy picture. We were happy." Audibon smiled. "Do you remember ... I had an idea for a show? Following the summer around the world. I didn't want that summer to end. I wanted it to go on and on ... with you getting darker and darker, and that old shirt of mine you wore getting tattier and bleached.... What made us imagine it ended?"
"You're frightening me, Roy."
"Why, pet?"
"I'm afraid to say."
"Maybe you're afraid to remember. No. Listen to me. Looking at that water color and remembering how you looked high up on that dune, I did a take. The summer never ended. There's been a little winter-type weather, but it's only a station break. I don't think our summer will ever end."
"What do you want, Roy?" Gabby asked quietly.
"I'm propositioning you," Audibon smiled. He took her arms and pulled her close. "I'm asking you to make a dishonest woman of yourself and have a fling with me. It's summer in North Africa. I'm spending February in Egypt. Fly over with me, pet. Let's spend the month together. I'll bring an old shirt. You bring your brushes. We'll live in sin and improve our minds."
"And afterwards?"
"Why worry about afterwards? Maybe it'll be cold weather when we get back; on the other hand, maybe not. Let's enjoy our summer again and see how long it lasts this time."
Gabby came around a corner abruptly. "What does this have to do with last night, Roy?"
"Last night?" Audibon was taken aback. "What do you mean?"
"This is the first time you've been romantic since we separated. Something special must have happened." Gabby examined him candidly. "It was last night, wasn't it?"
"No, pet."
"I was with Jordan Lennox and he hit you."
Audibon's fists clenched. He recovered himself and abandoned the tenderness. "All right," he said crisply. "If you insist on being cerebral ... I'm worried about you. I hate the idea of you free-lancing around from job to job, never knowing where the next check is coming from. I want to offer a contract."
Gabby looked at him steadily.
"I want to offer security and success. Not materialistically, but Rennaissancewise. Don't waste time and talent on subsistence-type jobs to keep bread in the house. Do the creative work you're equipped to do ... and you know how stratospheric my opinion of your talent is. It needs an oxygen mask."
"Thank you, Roy."
"Stop slumming, pet. Come back to me. You and I are top-level talent. You've got to work where the work counts. Architectural design? The network's dreaming up a new office building in Cuba. Take a dive at it from the twenty-foot board. Stage design? Come into our set department and rub up our imagination."
"You're very kind, Roy."
"Not kind. Practical. New talent is our priority headache. We know it's around, but we can't tap it. The slobs outside the network think there's a cabal to keep new talent out. There isn't. We just can't mock up an efficient screening operation to locate it. But once we bark our shins on new talent, we burn incense and work overtime building it up. Let me build you up, pet. Don't waste yourself on the outside."
"This is quite a change," Gabby murmured. "When last heard from, the picture you painted of me was a Gibson girl in mink doing public relations for you."
"I've graduated since last year," Audibon smiled. "I took a post-graduate in Women's Rights. I'll even go along with your politics.... And think for a minute how much more you can do as the wife of the network veep."
"You really are a wonderful salesman," Gabby said with admiration. She came around a corner again. "Why are you so angry with me, Roy?"
"Me? Angry?"
She nodded and blurted out the truth. "You're furious. That's why I'm frightened. I.... It's a secret I don't have to keep any more. You only called me 'pet' when you hated me. You're hating me now."
"No."
"You are." Gabby faced him squarely. "Don't you think I remember all your tricks? You smile. You flatter. You call me pet.... And then you pounce. I want to know why. Why are you hunting me now?"
"I'm asking you to come back to me," Audibon said in a fury.
"Why?"
"To save your neck." Audibon whipped out his wallet, opened it and removed Macro's slip of paper. "This was left in my office by a man named Macro. Do you know him?"
"I know all about John Macro." She looked at the slip of paper, holding it up to the greenish light of the monitor. "So he's got around to me at last. Did you send him?"
"No. I talked him out of it. That's why he left this slip. I saved you, pet. I told Macro you were my wife and he dropped you. I'd like to keep on saving you ... as long as you're my wife."
"So you are hunting me."
"Listen!" Audibon grabbed her wrist and wrenched her toward him. "Macro can hound you out of work. I can run you off The Rock. How would you like that? Network veep sues for divorce. Communism and adultery. Think how the papers would play it up. Gabby Valentine, the party girl, recruiting new members in her bed. The latest volunteer ... script-writer Jordan Lennox. Oh yes, I know all about your roll in the hay with Lennox. We had a long talk about what a lovely piece you are."
"Roy!"
"Do you know what you've done to me?" He thrust her violently against the monitor and trapped her with his body. "Do you know why I was up at the Midnight Sun last night? Why I'm up there every week? I'm looking for substitutes. I'm tying to find a replacement for you. I've tried all kinds. They don't work. Nothing works."
Gabby caught her breath.
"You know that's always been my problem. Even when we were living together, I—You said you'd take nothing from me when you walked out, but you took my last chance. You took the one thing a man can't lose. Why shouldn't I hate you? Do you understand? Do I have to spell impotence for you?"
"No," Gabby whispered.
"I'm fighting for my self-respect. You're the only woman who can give it to me. For God's sake, come back!"
"But why me? Why only me?"
"I wish to God they could tell me. Maybe they will some day, but I'm desperate now. I'm begging. The nights I've thought of cutting my throat.... You've got to come back. On your terms. On any terms. You can't lose. I've put the whip in your hand."
"No, Roy. No."
"Some of those bitches I tried are talking," Audibon went on savagely. "The word's getting around. You know you can't keep a secret on The Rock. You've got to come back. The talk's got to stop. It's the one thing no man can stand. You can lose an arm or a leg and they're sorry for you ... but when you lose that, they laugh."
"Please, Roy...." Gabby tried to escape the trap. Audibon held her.
"I'm being honest now, pet. No romantic pitch from me. I'm not asking for old-fashioned marriage and virtue and chastity. Understand? I said on your own terms. You'll be free. Completely ... so long as you're discreet." Audibon's face twisted. "I'll give everything. All I want is you in my house."
"So I'm back to public relations again."
"And you in my bed ... once in a while, to give me a fighting chance. Just once in a while. Take time out from whoever it is and give me a break. For God's sake, is that unreasonable?"
"No. It's generous and horrible." Gabby stopped struggling and looked at him with disgust. "If you don't let me go, I'm going to scream."
He flung her from him. She stumbled against the soda fountain and one of the stools toppled with a crash.
"So help me God," Audibon said, "I'll ruin you. I'll tear you apart ... you and Lennox. I'll run you off The Rock. I'll run you out of the country. You'll lay for him in a two-bit flea-bag remembering this. Now get out!"
He turned, stalked around the monitor and walked back onto the sets, the dazzling smile corroding his face. Gabby began to cry. She opened her purse, groping blindly in it for a handkerchief, scattering the contents of her purse over the soda fountain and the floor.
"THIS IS YOUR UNIVERSE!" the voice roared suddenly. "AN INVITATION TO EVERYMAN TO ABANDON SELFISH THOUGHT AND JOIN THE GREAT GALAXY ... CONCEIVED AND PRODUCED BY LEROY W. AUDIBON!"
When Gabby regained control of herself, she gathered her possessions and returned them to her purse. The last thing she picked up was Macro's slip of paper. She examined it again, then followed Audibon out onto the sets. She walked with her lazy carriage, shoulders square, arms relaxed, followed by wolf-whistles from the technicians. Audibon was in the schoolroom, one foot on a bench, lashing the director and assistants with his smile and his words. Gabby went to him, apologized for interrupting and handed him the slip of paper.
"You forgot this, Roy," she said quietly.
"Oh? Will I need it?"
"Of course. That's why I returned it." She held out her hand. "Goodbye, Roy."
He ignored her hand and turned away. Gabby smiled and left the studio. Downstairs, she went to a telephone booth and called Jake's apartment. Cooper answered the phone and sounded cold when Gabby asked for Lennox.
"He's not home, Gabby."
"Do you expect him? I'd like to leave a message."
"No, I'm not expecting him, I'm happy to say."
"Why do you say that?"
"I'd rather not discuss Jake with you, if you don't mind."
"You still don't like me, Sam."
"What's your message, please?"
"Tell him I can't see him tonight."
"I can't guarantee he'll get it."
"Oh," Gabby said. "That's bad. I don't want to stand him up without warning."
"Why don't you try the theater? They'll still be rehearsing. He may be there."
Gabby called the Venice Theater. The stage doorman was the deaf, quaint type ... wonderful for anecdote, impossible for messages. After two minutes of patient shouting, Gabby got Tooky Ween on the phone.
"Tooky Ween speaking," he rumbled. "Make it fast. We got headaches."
"I'm sorry, Mr. Ween. That man made a mistake. I want Jordan Lennox."
"Lennox!" Ween roared. "That lousy, chiseling son of a—He wouldn't have the crust to show his crust here. If he did he'd be dead and couldn't answer the phone anyway."
Ween hung up. Gabby considered, then called the Grabinett office. It was after hours and only the line to Grabinett's desk was open. Blinky took the call himself.
"Is Jordan Lennox there?" Gabby asked.
"No," Grabinett snarled. "I only wish he was. I'd kill him with my naked hand. I'd kill him dead and do a repeat for the west coast, that—" Grabinett caught himself. "Excuse me. Are you a relative?"
"No," Gabby said. "I wanted to leave a message."
"Not here!" Grabinett shouted. "Not with this office. I wouldn't do that Almighty vandal a favor if I was to get paid for it."
Blinky hung up. Gabby made one last try and called me. When I answered the phone, Ned Bacon was in our living room, murdering our Bourbon and Lennox. Gabby could hear him cutting Jake to pieces while she gave me the message. I wanted to ask her up. I'd seen enough of her at the Rox Record party to be interested, and I had about twenty-seven questions to ask her, but there was no way of getting Bacon out of the house and we couldn't have the two of them there together. So I promised to deliver the message, if possible, and let her hang up.
That was about seven o'clock. She wandered east to the 59th Street Bridge, cutting through some of the toughest sidestreets on The Rock. She went through those streets unmolested. Gabby had a miraculous quality of escaping the common dangers that make every woman think twice. Perhaps it was because she never thought of them once. Perhaps it was her candid, virginal manner that forced the world to give her extra special treatment ... the way men are reluctant to swear before a child, unwilling to be the first to teach it what they know it must inevitably learn.
She went to a gloomy candle-lit restaurant under the bridge. It hadavant-gardemurals on the walls, Puccini records on a phonograph, and hectographed menus. Half the waiters were enrolled with the Art Students League and were friends of Gabby's. Half the patrons knew her too. Nevertheless, she sat alone, consumed half a plate of pasta and half a bottle of California wine. She began to cry again, and had to snuff out the candle on her table. She was so upset that she wandered out of the restaurant without paying. No one made a fuss. They tucked her check in the cash register for another day.
It was half past nine when she got home. She took the elevator up, trembling, aching, yearning for a hot bath and ten hours of sleep. As she stepped out of the elevator and glanced down the corridor, she stopped short. A man was squatting on the mat before her apartment door with crossed ankles, knees high, forearms draped on his knees. It was Lennox. He arose as she approached.
"Didn't you get my message?"
He nodded. "From Sam."
"Please go away, Jordan. I can't see you now."
"I've got to see you, Gabby."
She was so weak she dropped her key. Lennox picked it up, unlocked the door and opened it for her. He followed her into the apartment, shut the door and switched on the lights with a practiced hand. Then he pulled up the giant shade that covered the studio window. Gabby sank down on a low, quilted bench before the cold fireplace and said nothing.
"I wasn't parked here because I was jealous," Lennox said anxiously. "Please don't think that. I mean ... I am jealous, yes; but I trust you."
Gabby didn't look at him.
"I've loused myself beautifully today. I've been tramping around the Village waiting to see you."
"I can't talk, Jordan."
"Could you listen a little?" He smiled appealingly. "Comes a time in every man's life when he knows he's done bad things and feels guilty. That's when he needs a friend to reassure him. Everybody has to have somebody who believes he's never wrong."
She shook her head. "I haven't got the strength."
"Then could I just be near you a little? Maybe we can help each other without words."
"No," she said. "Please go."
"What's the matter, darling? You're in trouble too."
"I can't talk about it now."
"Something's happened?"
"Yes. You loused me beautifully, too."
"I did?"
She nodded.
"How?"
"With Roy."
Lennox went cold. He waited for her to continue.
"Roy delivered an ultimatum. Either I go back to him, or—"
"That Communist routine?"
"And adultery."
"What!"
"Adultery," Gabby repeated. "You let something slip this afternoon.... Or did you boast?"
"This afternoon! I—Oh my God!" Lennox sat down heavily.
"Don't sit down, Jordan. Please go."
"Sit down? I'm groveling. I'm on my knees. How in Christ's name could I have...."
"Be quiet. Just go."
"We've got to discuss it. We can't let him pull off a filthy trick like that. We've got to fight him."
"No!" Gabby wailed. "No! No more fighting. I can't stand it any more. I feel filthy. You're like starving dogs, all snarling and fighting and eating each other. I won't be a part of it any more."
"You're just scared, darling. Don't...."
"You can't drag me into it again. Never again. Go away, Jordan. Go away. Don't come back."
"Wait a minute," he said slowly. "You don't just mean tonight? You mean for good?"
"Yes. I do."
"What the hell's got into you?" he demanded roughly.
"And now you're fighting with me again." Gabby pounded her fists on her knees in desperation. "Get away from me. Leave me in peace, for pity's sake!"
"That's a hell of a way to talk. Hello. Goodbye. I thought we were in love."
"No," she said bitterly. "It was a roll in the hay with a stranger."
"For God's sake, Gabby...."
"That's what you're turning it into. You're not the man I met. You're somebody else. I'm really meeting you for the first time, and I'm ashamed. I ... If you love me ... whatever your idea of love is ... for pity's sake go away!"
"My idea of love isn't running away," he answered. He put his hand on her shoulder. "It's sticking together right down the line and fighting it out together."
"Please don't touch me," Gabby said, shrugging her shoulder out of his grasp. "And stop using that horrible childish word over and over again. Fighting. Fighting. Fighting. That's all you know."
"What else is there?" Lennox glared at her. "Will you grow up! Somebody mentions fight and you start screaming. Do you know what you're screaming about? Have you ever been in a scrap?"
"Don't argue like a child."
"I'm asking a question. I want an answer. Have you ever been in a fight?"
"No."
"I thought not. You're so damned pretty and so damned sweet-tempered you've never had to fight for anything. Life's handed you everything in your lap."
"I haven't had everything."
"Only because you haven't wanted everything. Sweet God, why don't you find out what it's all about before you pass sentence on slobs like me who've had to fight every inch of the way." Lennox pounded a fist into his palm. "You're blind. You've had it too easy. A writer-type guy once made up a circle. Life is Character, he said. Character is Conflict. Conflict is Life. That's the vicious circle we're all trapped in. You too."
"No! I won't be trapped in the dirt."
"Yes, you too! And it isn't dirt. You're like the prudes who think sex is dirty. What the hell are you afraid of? Try a fight. Maybe you'll get to like it. Maybe you'll get to grow up a little and come out of your dream world."
"You're impossible!" she cried. "You're hateful!"
"You make a big pitch for peace," he growled, his face darkening. "You talk it up about feeling filthy because the dogs are fighting; but that's just cover-up, girl. That isn't the truth of what's in you."
"No?" Gabby answered steadily. "What is?"
"Jealousy. Envy."
"Of what?"
"What every man has and no woman has. You love to castrate us. That's the one burning drive in you with your career and women's rights and politics. You can't forgive us for that. You try to cut every man down to your size, your sex, your weakness. I don't know what you did to Audibon with your knife, but you're not doing it to me!"
She turned white. "You're horrible," she whispered. "You're worse than Roy. Worse! I don't want to see you again ... ever! Go away. Don't come back ... ever!"
"So you can go back to Audibon?"
"Is that what you think I'll do?"
"What else can I think if you won't fight and won't let me fight? How else am I supposed to take this?"
She leaped up, ran to the front door and opened it. She held it open, her dark eyes flashing furiously at Lennox. He picked up his burberry and went to the door. There he hesitated.
"Listen," he began. "We can't do this. We've got to help each oth—"
"Go away!" she cried. "Go away and fight. Find your Aimee Driscoll and beat her up again. Or would you rather stay and beat me? That would make you feel manly, wouldn't it? Then I could go to Aimee and show her my bruises. Would you enjoy that ... you big, virile beast?"
"Go to hell, you God damned bitch!" he shouted and blundered out into the hall. Gabby slammed the door and locked it. She began to sob and gag painfully. She ran to the bathroom and was violently ill. One thought persisted through the sobbing and the sickness, Lennox had destroyed everything and finished with her ruin.