One cloudy afternoon, when Ralph was giving God a walk, a long walk that would take Ralph yet again through Minetta Street to Macdougal then to West Third Street, he saw Elsie walking toward him with a suitcase.
A paralysing shock of surprise went through Ralph, and he stopped where he was. Fifteen or twenty yards away from him, she turned and hopped up the front step of the house where she had used to live, and where Ralph thought she lived no longer. Was she moving back? Ralph crossed Minetta Street and advanced until he was opposite the house. The third floor, he remembered, and there was light at the window, because the day was so overcast. After a minute or two, he saw two figures and Elsie’s, a bit shorter, drew back and turned, and disappeared to the left. Ralph moved on a little in the direction of Minetta Lane and stopped again. Nothing could have torn him away. He knew where Elsie was, at this moment, she was not thirty yards from him!
Ralph waited.
Then he felt another jolt, not so great as the former, as Elsie opened the front door and came out, carrying the suitcase, and over her other arm a coat. She put the case down in order to shut the front door, twice, as if it did not close properly, then picked the case up and walked. Ralph stood close by a house wall and looked toward Minetta Lane and Macdougal, not wanting her to see him now, dreading the possibility of her seeing him and visibly hurrying, fleeing from him. She turned in Minetta Lane toward Macdougal, and Ralph, on the other side of the street, waited, not sure if she had glimpsed him or not, and then he followed her.
At Macdougal, Elsie turned right, with an air of looking for a taxi. She kept walking downtown and reached the Bleecker Street crossing, where a taxi stopped for her. If Ralph had seen another taxi, he would have grabbed it, gladly have paid extra for taking God along, but there wasn’t a taxi in sight. Elsie’s taxi moved downtown on Macdougal, and Ralph got across Bleecker and followed for half a block until the taxi disappeared. She must live in this direction, and she had gone back to Minetta Street to pick up some things she had forgotten. From now on, Ralph would not bother with Minetta Street, he decided, but look downtown.
Ralph Linderman’s concern for Elsie—he never gave his feelings a name—had been stimulated by the Minetta Street sighting of her, but in the days afterward his sense of deprivation and isolation from her grew more acute. Where in that mess of SoHo, even perhaps the East Village, should he begin to look for her? If she had taken her last belongings from Minetta Street, she wouldn’t be coming back. He might see her going to or coming out of the Sutherlands’ Grove Street house, of course, but he would have to follow her all the way home to learn where she lived now, and with whom, and that was what interested Ralph. Once he had thought he had seen Elsie coming out of the Sutherland house, wearing a hat, which was why he had not been sure, and high heels, as she sometimes did, and a nice new coat. It had crossed Ralph’s mind that she was having sexual relations with Sutherland, and that he was paying her something. On that day, the figure in question, Elsie or not, had walked quickly westward on Grove. Ralph had been on Bleecker, carrying groceries and with God on the leash. He had not followed the girl.
Ralph turned a dangerous and desperate idea over in his mind for two days, and at last came to a decision: he would telephone John Sutherland and ask about Elsie, maybe even ask where she lived, but certainly inquire about her health. No one by any stretch of the imagination could believe that he meant Elsie any harm, or if any misguided person believed that, time and the facts would prove him wrong. When he telephoned at 11 one morning, Ralph was braced for either Sutherland or his wife.
John Sutherland answered.
“This is Ralph Linderman. How are you, Mr Sutherland?”
“All right, thanks. And yourself?”
“Well, thank you. I’m calling you about Elsie. I wonder if you know if she’s all right?”
“Far as I know,” replied Sutherland.
“Because I haven’t seen her around lately.—You’ve seen her not so long ago?”
“Mm-m—couple of weeks ago, I think. She’s fine.”
“Where is she living now?”
“She’s moved—I can’t tell you where, sir, because I just don’t know.”
“You don’t have to call me ‘sir’,” said Ralph with a chuckle. “South of the Village somewhere?”
“I really don’t know.”
“I’ve seen her coming and going from your house. Don’t you know if she lives downtown from here, for instance?”
“No, I don’t. She’s moved a couple of times.”
Ralph did not believe him. “She’s got a job?”
“Yes. Doing nicely. Modeling now.”
“For painters? Artists?” Ralph at once saw her naked. “In artists’ studios?” he asked, frowning.
“No, no. For photographers. Fashion. Very high-class stuff. Got to say goodbye now. Got some people here today.”
That was that. Well. Photographers, taking pictures of Elsie in nice clothes. Maybe in clothes. Were they any better a batch than artists for whom she would pose nude? It was still her face, her body they were interested in, wasn’t it? Of course it made money. Vulgarity always did.
22
Jack had just got back to his worktable, when the telephone rang again. Linderman had thought of something else.
“Hello?”
“Hello, Jack. Louis here.”
“Oh, Louis! You just missed Nat by about ten minutes,” Jack said. Louis and no one else sometimes called Natalia Nat.
“Well, I thought that. The thing is, I’m really calling you. I wondered if I could come by.”
Jack was surprised. “Now?”
“Yes. I’m at Saks. I’ll take a taxi. I wanted to talk with you. Unless of course you’re busy.”
“I’m not that busy. Sure, Louis.”
“See you. Quick as pos.” He hung up.
Most unusual, Jack thought. Jack glanced over the living-room, as if orderliness mattered, which it didn’t. He went back to his workroom. This afternoon at 4, he was due to show his latest twenty drawings, five of which would be quite new to Trews, in Trews’ office at Dartmoor, Aegis. Today, thirteenth of March, would be a winding up, a finish day, Jack hoped.
The doorbell rang, and Jack buzzed Louis in.
“Brought you this,” Louis said as he came in, extending a Saks Fifth Avenue shopping bag to Jack.
This was the Saks “white box” of mixed chocolates, Louis explained, and he said everybody loved them.
“Thanks very much, Louis.” Jack opened the box and offered it to Louis, who declined.
“I won’t take much of your time, Jack,” Louis said earnestly, standing in the middle of the living-room. He had removed his overcoat. The crown of his bald head shone, his large brown eyes blinked. “It’s just that I—somehow—wanted to see you alone for a few minutes. You know? I don’t think we’ve ever seen each other alone.” Louis laughed suddenly.
“Maybe not. No.—Want a coffee or anything?”
“No, thank you, Jack. May I sit down?” He sat on the sofa.
Jack took the green armchair, as he usually did.
“I want to tell you—how much I appreciate your wife. She is—something special. Unique!” Louis spoke slowly. “If I’d been in any position to do so, I’d have married her.”
Jack slumped in the armchair and laced his fingers over his chest. “She probably would have refused to marry you, because it would’ve been too perfect.”
“Exactly! Ha-ha! That’s Natalia to a T!—By the way, don’t tell her I came to see you this morning, would you? She might think it odd. Well, it is!” Louis laughed briefly, showing big square teeth in his narrow face. “Nobody knows. Don’t tell anybody. It’s our secret,” Louis drawled with feigned boredom. “I don’t have to tell you Natalia’s the most priceless thing in my life. Even more than Bob, I think. Different way, of course, but still.” Louis laughed in a soft way that was like Natalia’s laugh sometimes. “You’ve no reason to be jealous and you never were, never s
howed it, anyway.”
“I never was jealous. Cross my heart.” He watched Louis gazing at him, Louis with his long hands one upon the other on crossed legs. “Except that—you may understand Natalia better than I do.”
Elegantly Louis waved this idea away, and gazed toward the windows for a few seconds. “Another thing that’s important to say today is that I’m glad Natalia married you. A person like you. Well, you. You’re the only person I can think of or imagine that she could stand.”
“Thank you.—I mean, I’m glad to hear it.”
“She also thinks you’re sexy,” Louis said solemnly. “But not in a pushy way, you know. You’re her sex-object and that’s important, but of course she’d never say it in so many words.”
Jack pressed his palms against his face for an instant. “Well, well.”
“I’d love to smoke, unless it bothers you.—Thanks. I shouldn’t, but I do. The hell with it.” Louis took Natalia’s jade lighter from the coffee table and lit up, the gold-rimmed lighter that Natalia seldom took out of the house, because she was afraid of leaving it somewhere. Louis handled it and looked at it as if he knew it well. “And what’s the news of our little friend Elsie?”
“Elsie? Going great guns. She called us up last night. Making money hand over fist, I think.”
“Isn’t that just great? Isn’t she an angel—like something that fell from heaven! Oh, I’d like to see her five years from now, when she’ll be the ripe old age of twenty-five! Ah-hah-hah-hah!” Louis laughed wholeheartedly.
Jack had suspected, now he knew, that this was Louis’ goodbye visit. Jack cleared his throat and said, “Elsie borrowed a couple of books from us. Saves her buying them for her class.”
“Oh, yes, her school. What books?”
“A Scott Fitzgerald and a Saul Bellow.”
“The Victim, I hope. Or Mr Sammler’s Planet. But The Victim—that’s the essence of Saul Bellow with its paranoia, you know? A masterpiece. Don’t you think?”
Louis talked on about Bellow, how good he was, and Jack’s mind wandered a little, as his ear picked up phrases like “good and proper” or “on the tiles” (in regard to Elsie), that reminded him of Natalia’s speech, reminded him that Natalia had known Louis so much longer than she had known him. One of Louis’ rather large feet in a well-polished black shoe dangled from a slender ankle. A funny life-work he had, Jack thought, selling houses and apartments, doing up shabby houses, waiting calmly at home, or so Jack imagined, until the telephone rang, and Louis suddenly made a tidy sum.
“Elsie might be in danger how?” Jack asked, in response to something Louis had said. “I sort of like her new girlfriend.”
“Marion? Oh, so do I. They’ve been over to our place a couple of times. No, when I said danger, I meant this sudden success. It can change a person’s—character, almost, since Elsie’s so young. But maybe it won’t hers after all. She’s awfully direct—simple, blunt, even. Don’t you think?” Louis looked at Jack. “She’d say goodbye to Marion in a flash, if she got a little tired of her.—Hope she doesn’t soon. Elsie’s full of ambition, and just now it’s modeling, fine, and she doesn’t need a course in literature and English grammar for that, but she’s preparing for her next step.”
“And what’s that, do you think?”
Louis looked at the ceiling. “Television acting? Film? Wouldn’t surprise me.—Oh, Jack! Anything new about the old fellow who was following Elsie?”
“No. He’s lost her, thank goodness, since she moved down to Greene. He did call me just before you did today.”
“Really? Called you here? What did he want?”
“Elsie’s address.” Jack gave a laugh. “I said I didn’t know, because she’d moved. The trouble is, he’s seen Elsie coming here a couple of times. Or he knows Natalia knows her. He spies, you know.”
Louis looked thoughtful. “Unmarried, isn’t he? Lives alone?”
“Yes. He’s been married, he told me. His wife left him years ago.”
“I don’t know what’s worse, a solitary creep or a married creep. You know, these rapist-murderers who always take so long to get caught, they turn out to be married men with a couple of kids and a steady job. Then of course there’s the so creepy, nobody would marry them, and they hate women anyway.”
“You never saw this old guy, did you, Louis?”
“No, but Natalia described him. She’s seen him on the street. This type hangs on. He’s probably dying to rape Elsie, but he couldn’t. So he’ll attack her or something.”
Jack smiled uncomfortably. “I really can’t imagine that,” Jack said, realizing that he wasn’t sure, however, because he didn’t understand Linderman completely. “He thinks—I know this much—he thinks women are born seducers, and make-up and high heels are for leading men astray. Temptresses, he calls women.”
“That’s a classic,” Louis said in an impatient and worried tone.
“Well—since he’s lost Elsie’s whereabouts, I’m hoping he latches on to someone else soon.”
“Yes.” Louis stood up. “Jack, my dear, I must blow. I thank you very much for letting me crash in. And I haven’t even asked you how the yak book’s going.”
“Okay, thanks. I have the final—um—showing of my stuff this afternoon. I’m taking the last drawings in to the art editor, I mean.”
“My good wishes go with you.”
“A quick nip, Louis?” Jack asked as Natalia might have done. “A stirrup-cup?”
“A Fernet-Branca,” Louis said with a broad smile. “Natalia would like that. A thimbleful, please, Jack.”
Jack poured it.
“Not you?”
Jack poured a small Jack Daniel’s, so he could lift a glass with Louis. “Cheers!”
“Cheers!”
As Louis was putting on his overcoat, he noticed Jack’s exercise rings that hung from the hall ceiling. “You still working out?”
“When I feel like it.”
Louis was smiling again. “Can I see you do something?”
Jack was not in the mood, but he took a deep breath, seized the rings and stuck his feet high in the air, flipped down and backward, forward and up again, weight on his hands, so his head was near the ceiling, but not so near as his feet had been.
“Marvelous. Oh, lovely,” Louis said softly, with admiration. “Bless you, Jack. Goodbye and thanks again.”
The door closed.
23
Jack did tell Natalia about Louis Wannfeld’s surprise visit, since he wanted to and saw no good reason why he shouldn’t, but Natalia was at once so on edge that Jack wished he hadn’t told her. This was on a Friday evening, and Natalia remarked that she was glad that tomorrow was Saturday and she could beg off going to the gallery, because on Saturdays came the public, not the buyers, and Isabel would not mind too much.
“It means he’s going to die soon. Or he thinks he is,” Natalia said to Jack.
“Does he know—about how long?”
“No. I’m sure less than a year. Maybe a lot less. He’s on a strict diet now and can’t drink a drop.”
Jack had noticed that Louis was thinner.
“Let’s take the car and go somewhere tomorrow,” Natalia said. “I think I’ll go mad if I stay here.”
Jack was a bit disappointed, because he had wanted a weekend at home. Trews had liked his drawings. Jack had wanted to laze around the house, make line drawings of Amelia as she played, or slept, or stood in front of him talking to him. He had a thick, blank-paged book half full now of Amelia since she had been a baby. He found that people laughed more at his drawings and were certainly more interested in them than in photographs he might have taken of the child.
By ii the next morning, they were off in the Toyota, with Amelia in the back seat, and pajamas and toothbrushes for all of them in a duffel, in case they stayed the night somewhere. Natalia drove. She was a good driver, with quick reflexes, but she professed to hate driving. In the mood she was in now, driving would get rid of her nervous ener
gy, Jack knew, which was all to the good.
“How’s Elsie?” Jack knew that Natalia had called her up that morning, and talked quite a while.
Natalia smiled suddenly, close-lipped, looking straight ahead through the windshield. “Worried about her income tax now! I said, ‘Sweetie, if that’s all the worry you’ve got!’”
Elsie didn’t know how to fill out her form, because she had never paid an income tax before, Natalia said, but Marion was going to help her.
Up the Garden State Parkway they went in the cold spring afternoon. They bought a cake somewhere, telephoned, and invited themselves to tea at the house of a cousin of Natalia’s mother who lived in Saddle River. Jack had met her once before. This was a change of atmosphere, and a fulfilment of duty, even if unasked, which lifted Natalia’s spirits a little. After that, Jack drove, and they stopped for the night at a motel of Amelia’s choice. The decor was awful, but had amusement value. Natalia had brought her bottle of Glenfiddich. The motel people put a cot up in the room for Amelia.
When they got home Sunday afternoon, the telephone was ringing. Jack was nearest to it.
“Where’ve you been?” asked Louis’ voice.
Natalia took the telephone, talked for ages, and at last reported to Jack that Louis had invited them to a party next Saturday night. It was a come-as-you-are party, and Natalia said she had asked him if he meant opposite-sex clothes, and Louis had said no, just old clothes or whatever one liked. Lots of people were coming, it seemed.
On the following Saturday evening, Louis Wannfeld opened the door to Natalia and Jack, wearing a long black garment that glistened with tiny gold lights like stars twinkling in a night sky. He wore sandals. “I’m a mandarin tonight,” said Louis. “And you?”