While Mortals Sleep: Unpublished Short Fiction

  “Who put up the dough?”

  “He wants to be known only as a friend of opera,” said Nicky triumphantly. “Just like the artists in the old days, I’ve got a patron.”

  “First patron of art in history to underwrite a doughnut manufacturer.”

  “That’s not the point!”

  “Nicky,” called Gino from his basement door. “What are you yelling about?”

  Nicky looked at him sadly, ashamed. “I’m in business, Maestro.”

  “You’ve got to suffer to be great,” said Gino.

  Nicky nodded. “I’ll use another name. It wouldn’t do to use the name of Marino.”

  “I should say not,” said Gino.

  “Jeffrey,” said Nicky thoughtfully, “George B. Jeffrey.”

  “Get out there and sell, George,” said Gino.

  While my new life never came in contact with Nicky’s new life, I had only to pick up a paper to see that he was still in business. He had a small ad in almost every issue, and I was amazed by the variety of things he had to say in favor of doughnuts.

  “Maybe we should make a point of going over and buying some,” said Ellen, my wife, at breakfast one morning. “Maybe he’s hurt that we haven’t.”

  “Nothing would hurt him more than if we showed up there,” I said. “He’s humiliated enough, without his old friends looking in on him. The time to visit him is when this is all behind him, when he’s either made a pile or been cleaned out, and is back studying with Gino.”

  That morning, which was about six months after Nicky’d decided to prostitute himself, I was waiting for a bus by a stoplight, and it seemed to me that someone had his car radio turned up annoyingly loud. I looked up from my paper to be surprised by a doughnut six feet high, with four wheels, a windshield, and bumpers.

  Inside sat Nicky, his head back, his white teeth flashing, singing. The mad joy of the song got through to me, even if the melody didn’t. “Nick, boy!” I called.

  The song stopped, and he became glum, sardonic. He waved, and opened the side of the doughnut. “Come on, I’ll give you a lift downtown.”

  “Don’t go out of your way. Your shop’s just down three blocks, isn’t it?”

  “I have business downtown,” he said gloomily.

  I found that inside the doughnut was a jeep, the back of which was filled with racks of doughnuts, iced in many colors. “Mmmmm. Don’t those look good!”

  “All right, rub it in.”

  “They really do look wonderful.”

  “In six more months I sell out, and if anybody ever offers me a doughnut, I’ll break his back.”

  “You sounded happy enough back there by the light.”

  “Laugh, clown, laugh.”

  “Through the tears, eh? Business that bad?”

  “Business! Who wants to talk about business?” said Nicky.

  “How’s music?”

  “Haaaah, music. Gino says the security is helping.”

  “Good boy! So you’re getting security.”

  “A little—some, maybe. Gino wants me to take my money and get out.”

  “But you said you were sticking with it another six months.”

  “Trapped,” he said bitterly. “My partner, the great friend of opera, fixed things so I can’t sell without his permission. Lord! What a babe in the woods I was!”

  “Gosh, that’s too bad. What’s his name?”

  “Lord knows. The bank represents him.”

  “Anyway, sounds like you’re doing fine.”

  “It would sound that way to you,” said Nicky. “You’re the kind of guy that ought to be in this business, not me. You’re the kind that’d love it—watching the competition, figuring new angles, new lines, new come-ons, all that nonsense.” He clapped me on the knee. “Twentieth-century man! Thank your lucky stars you weren’t born with talent.”

  “Nice, all right. Mind my asking what you’re going downtown for?”

  “Oh—one of the milk companies is kind of thinking about delivering our doughnuts in the morning along with milk. They want to see me.”

  “Kind of thinking of doing it?”

  “They’re going to do it,” he said absently.

  “Nicky! You’ll be smothered with cash. You’re a ball of fire in business. A natural!”

  “How insensitive can you be?”

  “Didn’t mean to be offensive. Mind if I have a doughnut?”

  “Take a light green one,” said Nicky.

  “Poisoned?”

  “New flavor we’re trying out.”

  I bit into it. “Boy! Mint. Good, huh?”

  “Really like it?” he asked eagerly.

  “What do you care, artist?”

  “If I’m trapped, I might as well make the best of it.”

  “Well, keep a stiff upper lip. Here’s where I get out.”

  He stopped, but he didn’t look at me when I got out. He was staring at something across the street. “That lying son of a gun,” he murmured, and pulled away.

  Across the street was a restaurant, over which was written in electric lamps, “The Best Cup of Coffee in Town.”

  On my birthday, just after Easter, a package from Nicky arrived. I hadn’t seen him for almost a year, and supposed that his silent partner had let him sell out by now, and that, rich as the devil, he was once more studying full-time with Gino. The doughnuts-delivered-with-milk idea had worked out fine, as nearly as I could tell. I had a standing order with my milkman for a half dozen every three days—with mint icing.

  The package, delivered in the evening, confirmed one part of the supposition, at least—that Nicky was rolling in money.

  “What is it?” said Ellen.

  “Big and heavy enough to be a tricycle,” I said. I removed the gaudy wrappings, and was dazzled by a complete sterling tea service, the sort of thing I could imagine ambassadors giving as wedding presents to princesses.

  “Good heavens!” said Ellen. “What’s that taped to the tray?”

  “A ten-dollar bill and a note.” I read the note aloud: “ ‘Bet you thought you’d never get it back. Thanks. Happy birthday. Nicky.’ ”

  “This is embarrassing,” said Ellen. “What would I do with it? Where could I put it?”

  “We could pay off the mortgage with it.” I shook my head. “Well, hell, this is ridiculous. I’m going to get him to take it back.” Ellen rewrapped the present, and I drove down to Nicky’s apartment with it.

  I almost turned away from his door, thinking he’d moved, when I saw the name on the knocker—“George B. Jeffrey.” And the noises inside were unfamiliar, too: dance music and women’s voices. Nicky hadn’t had much to do with women, except for his mother. The assumption, his assumption, was that women, hundreds of them and all beautiful and talented, would come his way automatically once his career was going full blast. That had been his father’s experience, so it would certainly happen to Nicky, too.

  Then I remembered that George B. Jeffrey was Nicky’s business name, and I knocked. A uniformed maid, carrying a tray of martinis, opened the door. “Yes?”

  Behind her I saw Nicky’s one room. It was now spotless, and elegantly furnished in dark Victorian furniture. The scrapbook was still there on the table, but rebound in expensive-looking plush and leather. And the pictures of his father and the posters still covered the walls, but they were now protected by glass in massive gilt frames. The room looked more like a well-run museum than a studio.

  The sounds of celebration puzzled me, because I couldn’t see anyone in the room behind the maid, and the only rooms opening onto it were the bathroom, the kitchenette, and a closet. “Is Mr. Marino in?” I said.

  “Mr. Jeffrey?” said the maid.

  “Yes—Mr. Jeffrey. I’m a friend of his.”

  The heavy drapes on one side of the room parted, and Nicky appeared, flushed, happy, and I saw that the wall separating Nicky’s old room from the next apartment had been knocked out, and that he now had a suite. The drapes closed behind him, so
that I had only a glimpse of what lay beyond—a room hazy with smoke and laughter, garishly modern. It was like looking into a sunset from the mouth of a cave.

  “Happy birthday, happy birthday,” said Nicky.

  “Celebrating the sale of your business?”

  “Hmmm? Oh—no, not exactly,” he said. As before, my intrusion into his new life seemed to sadden him. “No. Just having some business associates in.” His voice dropped to a confidential whisper. “You have to do a little of this to keep things going smoothly.”

  “Still trapped?”

  “Yep. Son of a gun, he’s really got me. Maybe in six months—”

  “Another deal on?”

  “Just one darn thing after another,” he said dismally. “An outfit from Milwaukee’s trying to open up some shops here, so what can we do but extend our chain? Dog eat dog. But in six months, so help me, George B. Jeffrey’s going to disappear, and Nicky Marino’s going to be reborn.”

  “Georgie, boy, sing us a song,” called a woman from the other room.

  It was plain that Nicky didn’t want me to meet his business associates, that he didn’t want me to go into the other room. But the woman opened the drapes to call to him again, and I got another look at the door. The walls, I saw, were decorated with framed ads, and over the fireplace was a caricature, a doughnut with Nicky’s features, grinning, cocky, happy.

  “Look, Nicky, I came about this tea service. It was a wonderful thing to do, but listen, it’s too much. Really, we—”

  He was restless, seemingly eager to get me out and get back to the party. “No—I want you to have it. You deserve it, or I wouldn’t have given it to you. Back in the old days, the ten dollars you gave me was a king’s ransom.” He started easing me to the door, in friendly fashion, but firmly. “You keep it, and tell Ellen hello from George.”

  “From who?”

  “From Nicky.” I was out in the hall again. He winked, and shut the door.

  I walked slowly down the stairs with the ridiculous bushel of silver still in my arms, and knocked on Gino’s door.

  The old man opened the door a crack, smiled broadly, and welcomed me in.

  “Greetings, Maestro. I thought maybe you’d moved. Your sign isn’t out there anymore.”

  “Yes—I’ve taken it down at last, and retired.”

  “Nicky just threw me out.”

  “Mr. George B. Jeffrey threw you out. Nicky would never do a thing like that. What would you like to drink?” He had an amiable edge on. “I’ve got a good bottle of Irish a former student sent me. He’s a very successful welder now.”

  “Lovely.”

  “Any other time of the year, even Christmas, I enjoy being alone,” said Gino, making my drink. “But in the springtime it gets me, and there’s nothing to do but quietly tie one on.”

  “Live!” cried Nicky outside, to the world in general. Gino and I watched the variegated feet of the doughnut king’s entourage pass by the cellar window.

  “Bears his cross well, don’t you think?” said Gino.

  “Must break your heart to watch it, doesn’t it, Maestro?”

  “It must? Why?”

  “Seeing a promising artist like Nicky getting deeper and deeper into business, farther and farther from singing.”

  “Oh—that. He’s happy, even if he says he isn’t. That’s the important thing.”

  “You sound like a traitor to art, if I ever heard one.”

  Gino poured himself another shot, and, on the way back to his chair, he leaned over and whispered in my ear, “The only way Nicky could ever serve the world of music is as an usher.”

  “Maestro!” I couldn’t believe it. “You said he was the image of his—”

  “He said it. His mother said it. I never did. I never contradicted them, that’s all. That big lie was his whole life. If I’d told him he was no good, he might have killed himself. And we were getting to the point when I was going to have to tell him something.”

  “Then this doughnut business was the luckiest thing that ever happened,” I said wonderingly. “He can go on believing he’s going to be a great singer like his father, and the business keeps him from having to prove it.”

  “So be careful who you call a traitor to art,” said Gino. He lifted his glass in a toast to an imaginary audience. “Last year I gave ten thousand dollars to the Civic Opera Association.”

  “Ten thousand.”

  “Peanuts,” said Gino.

  The din of Nicky’s singing filled the apartment courtyard. He was alone now, having said farewell to his guests.

  “Exit George B. Jeffrey, enter Nicky Marino,” whispered Gino.

  Nicky thrust his head through the doorway. “Spring, men! Earth is being reborn!”

  “How’s business, Nicky?” said Gino.

  “Business! Who cares about business? Six more months, Maestro, and the hell with it.” He winked and left.

  “Ten thousand dollars is peanuts, Gino?” I said.

  “Peanuts,” said Gino grandly. “Peanuts for the half owner of the world’s fastest-growing doughnut chain. Six more months, did he say? In six more months he and doughnuts will probably do as much for opera as his father ever did. Someday, maybe I’ll tell him about it.” He shook his head. “No, no—that would spoil everything, wouldn’t it? No—I guess the whole rest of his life had better be an interlude between the promises his mother made him about himself and the moment when he’ll make them all come true.”

  MONEY TALKS

  Cape Cod was in a cocoon of cooling water and autumn mists. It was seven in the evening. The only lights that shone on Harbor Road came from the dancing flashlight of a watchman in the boatyard, from Ben Nickelson’s grocery store, and from the headlights of a big, black, Cadillac sedan.

  The Cadillac stopped in front of Ben’s store. The well-bred thunder of its engine died. A young woman in a cheap cloth coat got out and went into the store. She was blooming with health and youth and the nip in the air, but very shy. Every step seemed to be an apology.

  Ben’s shaggy head was on his folded arms by the cash register. His ambition had run down. At twenty-seven, Ben was through. He’d lost his store to his creditors.

  Ben raised his head and smiled without hope. “Can I help you, ma’am?”

  Her reply was a whisper.

  “How’s that?” said Ben. “I didn’t hear.”

  “Could you kindly tell me how to get to the Kilraine cottage?” she said.

  “Cottage?” said Ben.

  “That is what they call it, isn’t it?” she said. “That’s what it says on the key tags.”

  “That’s what they call it, all right,” said Ben. “I just never got used to it. Maybe that was a cottage to Joel Kilraine. I never saw what else he had to live in.”

  “Oh dear,” she said. “Is it great big?”

  “Nineteen rooms, a half mile of private beach, tennis courts, a swimming pool,” said Ben. “No stables, though. Maybe that’s why they call it a cottage.”

  She sighed. “I’d hoped it would be a sweet, cozy little thing.”

  “Sorry to disappoint you,” said Ben. “What you do to get there is turn around, and go back the way you came, until you come to a—” He paused. “You don’t know the village at all?”

  “No.”

  “Well, it’s awful hard to describe,” said Ben. “It’s kind of hidden away. I’d better lead you there with my truck.”

  “I don’t want to be any trouble,” she said.

  “I’m closing up in a minute anyway,” said Ben. “Haven’t anything else to do.”

  “I’ll need some groceries first,” she said.

  “My creditors will be very happy,” said Ben. Loneliness and futility swept over him, and he looked the girl up and down. From her hands he learned she was a nail-biter. From her low-heeled, blocky white shoes, he gathered that she was some kind of servant, usually in uniform. He thought she was pretty, but he didn’t like her for being so cowed.

  “Wha
t are you—her housekeeper or something?” said Ben. “She send you up to find out what she’s got here?”

  “Who?” she said.

  “The nurse—the Cinderella girl—the one who got the whole shebang,” said Ben. “The girl with the million-dollar alcohol rubs. What’s her name? Rose? Rose something?”

  “Oh,” she said. She nodded. “That’s what I’m doing.” She looked away from Ben to the shelves behind him. “Let’s see—I’d like a can of beef-noodle soup, a can of tomato … a box of cornflakes … a loaf of bread, a pound of oleo—”

  Ben gathered her groceries on the counter. He put the oleo down hard, slapping the waxed cardboard against the wood.

  The girl jumped.

  “Saaaaay—you’re nervous as a cat,” said Ben. “Rose make you that way? She that kind? Rose wants what she wants when she wants it?”

  “Rose is just a plain, dumpy little nurse, who still doesn’t know what hit her,” she said stiffly. “She’s scared to death.”

  “She’ll get over that quick enough,” said Ben. “They all do. Come next summer, Rose’ll be strutting around here like she’d just invented gunpowder.”

  “I don’t think she’s that kind,” she said. “I certainly hope not.”

  Ben smiled askance. “Just an angel of mercy,” he said. He winked. “By God, for twelve million bucks, I’d have nursed him, wouldn’t you?”

  “Rose had no idea he was going to leave her everything,” she said.

  Ben leaned back against the shelves, pretending to be crucified. “Oh, come now—come, come,” he said.

  “A lonely old man on his deathbed in a big apartment on Park Avenue—hanging on to life, begging for life, begging for somebody to care.” He saw the scene vividly. “Kilraine calls out in the night, and who comes?” Ben smiled demurely. “Rose—the angel of mercy. She fluffs his pillow, rubs his back, tells him everything’s going to be fine, and gives him his sleeping pills. She’s the whole world to him.”

  Ben waggled his finger at the girl. “And you mean to tell me it didn’t pop into Rose’s little head that maybe he might leave her just a little something to remember him by?”

  She dropped her gaze to the floor. “It might have crossed her mind,” she murmured.