Love's Lovely Counterfeit

  June let Ben in with civility rather than hospitality. She wore a bottle green dress, with bracelet, comb, and cigarette holder of the coral that she seemed so fond of. Now that the school-teacherishness had been somewhat dissolved in cocktails, tears, and a conviction of sin, she was really a striking-looking woman, and it didn't hurt the general effect that she was mainly ankles and eyes. Uneasily she took a look at the dancers, said she guessed he knew everyone there. By this he knew that she didn't want to introduce him around. He nodded coolly, said he certainly knew everyone he wanted to know. She said drinks were being served in the alcove, that the waiters would take care of him. He said thanks, and started to edge his way around the floor.

  His path was blocked, almost at once, by a dumpy little woman in light blue, who looked first at him and then at June in a timid, uncertain way. June hesitated, then said, "Oh, this is my mother. Mamma, Mr. Grace."

  "I'm very glad to know you, Mrs. Lyons."

  "What was the name?"

  "Grace, but just call me Ben."

  "I don't hear very well. I thought at first she said Jansen. I'm just crazy to meet him. I hear he's such a wonderful man."

  "Mamma, I told you he's not coming."

  "I said, I didn't rightfully hear."

  "Mrs. Lyons, a drink?"

  "Yes, thanks."

  Again Ben started past the dancers, this time guiding Mrs. Lyons by the arm, and again his way was blocked, by a slender, willowy girl with light hair in a peach-colored evening dress. She glanced with a smile at Mrs. Lyons, stepped lightly aside. Mrs. Lyons said, "And this is my other daughter. Dorothy, I want you to meet Mr. Grace, Mr. Ben—"

  But Dorothy was gone, slipping between dancers with quick, sure ease, never once getting bumped. Ben, the former broken-field runner, watched fascinated. However, his brow puckered with puzzlement as he turned back to the mother, for he was sure Dorothy had heard.

  Mrs. Lyons, once he camped down with her near the potted plants that flanked the alcove, turned out to be more of a trial than he had bargained for. For one thing, she was slightly deaf. For another thing, she was a little tight. For still another thing, she seemed to be under the impression that she was attending a function of high society, and to be elaborately nervous as to the niceties of her conduct. He tried to get her talking about June, of whom she seemed very proud, but she kept returning to the subject, titivating her imagination by wondering if she was properly dressed, if she was downing her drink in an elegant manner, if she should find dancing partners for a stag line that seemed to be forming near the punch bowl. First by one trick, then another trick, he managed to keep her under control. June seemed appreciative, for her frostiness eased a little, and she came over now and then, stood beside him, caught his hand, and squeezed it.

  It was when she was drifting away, after one of these visits, that she stopped stock still and stared. The buzzer had sounded a waiter had opened the door, and Mayor Jansen was entering the room.

  There was a murmur, then the Looney Lolligaggers broke off their tune and launched into "O Sapphire Gem of Glory," the Lake City municipal anthem. Mr. Jansen smiled, bowed, and allowed his hat and coat to be taken from him. He had not put on evening clothes, no doubt because his dark gray suit gave suitable emphasis to the mourning band that was sewed prominently on his sleeve. Otherwise he had changed, in ways too subtle for the naked eye, from the archetype of a Swedish dairyman into the archetype of an American Mayor. He was handsome, oily, and absurd. He had a word, a bow, and a smirk for everybody. When the anthem finished, he shook hands with June, then with her at his elbow made the circuit of the room.

  When he got to Ben, he said: "Hello, please to meet you, nice party June geev us, hey, yes?" But when he got to Mrs. Lyons, he bowed low, kissed her hand, and said: "Ah, Mamma, Mamma, I been looking forwert dees meeting so much."

  He said quite a little more, and she interrupted with little answers, trying to get started, but before she could do so June had him by the elbow again, leading him away, introducing him to people on the other side of the palms. Mrs. Lyons watched hungrily, then caught the expression "Mr. Mayor," as somebody bellowed it from the alcove. Horror-stricken, she turned to Ben. "Is that what you call him? Oh, I called him Mayor. I—"

  "It's O.K. Anything."

  "But I've got to apologize—"

  "He's getting paid for it! What difference does it make? It's a free country, go up and call him Olaf and he's got to take it."

  "Call him Olaf—why?"

  "It's his name."

  She settled back, shedding boozy tears and watching while His Honor passed a group of men, then happily squared off to face six women, all of them young, all of them reasonably pretty. Suddenly she wriggled in her chair, making ready to get up. "Hey, where you going?"

  "There's something I completely forgot."

  "Yeah, and what's that?"

  "Mr. Grace, I have to congratulate him."

  "Oh, he got elected six months ago."

  "No, no, I mean on his engagement. To June."

  "His—where did you hear that?"

  "Oh, she didn't tell me. She wouldn't give me the satisfaction. She thinks I'm dumb, she always treats me as if I didn't have good sense. His secretary told me. She was over here, the day before Christmas, bringing the flowers he sent, and—she told me. Let go of me. I've got to congratulate him. I—"

  Ben, however, didn't let go of her. He held her firmly by the wrist until she subsided into another trickle of tears. Then he wig-wagged June. Busy with her important guest, she looked away. The next time he caught her eye his face was a thundercloud and in a moment she came over. "June, which is her deaf ear?"

  "She can't hear you now. What is it?"

  "You better get her out of here."

  "What's the trouble?"

  "She wants to congratulate him. On the engagement."

  "What are you doing, being funny?"

  "If so, why?"

  "How would she know about—the engagement?"

  "His secretary, darling."

  June's eyes dilated until they seemed like big black pools, then she took her mother by the arm. Mrs. Lyons was quite amiable about it, and permitted herself to be led, as long as she was under the impression that she was being taken over to Mr. Jansen. When she saw she was headed for the door, however, she began to balk, and June had a ticklish time. Guests turned their backs, so as not to see the pathetic figure in blue, gesticulating foolishly toward the Mayor, and the Looney Lolligaggers suddenly started the "Maine Stein Song." This was played through, however, before June got Mrs. Lyons through the door.

  Ben lit a cigarette of relief, and smoked for a few moments alone. Then he became aware of the figure that was standing on the other side of the palms. Dorothy, in her peach-colored dress, stared out at the room. It was the first time he had really had a look at this girl who had started such a chain of circumstances in his life, and he looked with lively interest. It was all the more lively, since he was totally unable to connect this face with all he knew about its owner. It was, in anybody's contest, an extremely beautiful face. It was perfectly chiseled, in profile, at least, its slightly droopy lines reminding him of pictures he had seen of ancient sculpture. There was some exquisite invitation about the mouth: it pursed a little, with an expression of expectancy. The skin was soft, with just a brush of bloom on it. What he could see of the figure was lovely too, not too tall, but slender, soft, willowy. He had decided that there must be some mistake when their glances met, and he saw the kleptomaniac.

  Her eye had a bright, dancing light in it.

  He squashed his cigarette, looked at the palms of his hands. They had pips of moisture on them. He had the dizzy, half-nauseated feeling of a man who has been rocked to the depths by a woman, and knows it. He got up, crossed in front of her, went into the alcove for a drink. When he had downed a hooker of rye he looked and she was still there. He started to cross in front of her again, and instead stood looking at her. He was to one side of her
, and a little behind, only a few inches away. Soon he knew that she knew he was there. After a bellowing silence he heard himself say: "You're bad."

  "I didn't speak to you."

  "I said you're bad."

  "Leave me alone. You belong to her."

  "Says who?"

  "I hear her call up everybody, to invite them here. When she came to you, I knew you were hers. Why do you talk to me? I haven't said a thing to you."

  She leaned against the wall. Her head tilted up and she closed her eyes. His heart was pounding now. He knew he was courting danger, knew he should drift away, and all he could do about it was begin to talk rapidly, so he could finish before June got back: "You can break away from this party. You can if you want to. I'm going to break away. And I'll be on the sixteenth floor, in Number sixteen twenty-eight. You go up in the elevator, that's all. You slip away from the party and go right up in the elevator. You don't even need a coat."

  Her eyes opened. She stared straight ahead of her, and for a long time she said nothing. Then she licked her lips. "You're bad, too."

  "We're both bad."

  Through the stillness of early morning, so profound that even the faint whine of elevator cables was audible, came the sound of hammering fists: a woman in green, with a great coral comb in her hair, was beating on the door of 1628. She took off one slipper, beat with the heel of that. Across the hall, a door opened and a middle-aged man in pajamas asked whether she realized that he was trying to sleep. She began to cry, and as the man closed the door, staggered hippety-hop back to the elevator, where she put on her shoe. Then she pressed the button. In a moment or two the door opened; one would have said the car was there waiting for her. She stepped in, trying to control her sobs.

  Inside 1628, a man and woman looked at each other by the eerie light of a radio dial. Superficially, they were handsome: he tall, fair, big-shouldered in his evening clothes; she young, slim, lovely with her trick of throwing back her head and staring at some shadowy beyond. And yet, at closer inspection, they weren't handsome at all, or big, or lovely. There was something ferret-like about them both, something small in their faces, something wild, something a little wanton. They seemed, in some vague way, to be aware of this, and to realize that it was the reason for the intense, almost exalted delight that they took in each other, so that they touched each other eagerly, and stood close, inhaling each other's breath. Presently she said: "She's gone."

  "Sounds like it."

  "I've got to go, Ben."

  "Oh nuts, sit down, stay a while."

  "I've got to go, so she won't know. I've go to get back into my room so I can pretend it was all some kind of a mistake. I—don't want her to suffer. She's suffered enough from me."

  "...I don't want her to know either."

  "Then—good night, Ben."

  "Listen, did you hear what I said? I don't want her to know either. She—she's important to me. That cluck, that Swede, is stuck on her, and through her I can make him do what I want done."

  "I know, I guessed all that."

  "Look, you got to get this straight. She does it because—"

  "She's in love with you, of course."

  "And what do you say now?"

  "You know what I say."

  She hid her face in his coat, clung to him, dug her fingers into his arm. Obviously, they had got to a point where the word love, if either of them had uttered it, would have been somewhat inadequate. Insanity would have been better, and there was some suggestion of it as she raised her face to his. "I know, it means money. And so long as you give her her share, I don't care. I don't see how any of it could be helped. Don't worry. She won't know."

  "You sure? How you going to work it?"

  "I don't know...That's the funny thing, about what makes you bad. You can go through walls, Ben. Through walls. Once I went through a whole locker room and took four handbags and got out and I wasn't even seen. You know how I did it?"

  "No."

  "You never will."

  He caught her in his arms, and for a few moments they seemed to have melted together. Then he released her, and she floated toward the door. "Don't worry, Ben."

  She was gone, and he put away the highball tray he had put out for Lefty, emptied the ashtrays, set the room to rights. In the bedroom the phone rang. "Ben?"

  "Yes?"

  "June."

  "Oh, hello."

  "I'm terribly sorry, Ben."

  "About what?"

  "Didn't you hear anything?"

  "I've been asleep."

  "Thank heaven...I did something terribly silly. On account of Dorothy. I—thought she was with you."

  "With—me?"

  "You don't have to snap my head off. I admitted it was silly. You can imagine what a ninny I felt when she popped out of the door a few minutes ago in her pajamas and all, and it was perfectly obvious she'd been asleep for hours."

  "Well, it's all news to me."

  "You might tell me it was a nice party."

  "One thing at a time. I'm still asleep."

  "Well?"

  "Sure, it was swell."

  "Good night, Ben."

  "Good night."

  He really was asleep the next time the phone rang, and he answered in a tone that was to remind June that enough was enough. But it wasn't June. It was Lefty. "Well, what do you want?"

  "They got Caspar."

  "You mean they rubbed him out? Who did?"

  "They got him. In Mexico. They're bringing him back."

  "...Who's bringing him back?"

  "The U.S. government. For income tax violation."

  "How do you know? Say, what is this, anyway? What time is it? And what's the big idea calling me up at this time of morning anyhow?"

  "It's five-thirty A.M., and I been passing the time with Joe Cantrell and he just had Mexico City on the long distance wire. They're flying him back today. They've left for the airport already, the planes take off at six-thirty, he'll be in Los Angeles tonight, and Lake City tomorrow. Here's where it gets good, Ben: for income tax violation, they may give him bail."

  "O.K., so he gets bail."

  "Just thought I'd let you know."

  Chapter 10

  Ben saw quite a little of Dorothy the next two or three days. He gave her a key to his apartment, and would find her waiting when he came in. She was insistent, however, that they find some other place to meet. "She knows, Ben. I fooled her the other night, but now she knows. We'll have to go somewhere else. I can't bear the idea of hurting her."

  But Ben's mind was on other things, particularly on the newspapers, which were reporting minutely the movements of Mr. Caspar. They carried his arrival at Mexicali, at Los Angeles, at St. Louis. At this point reporters from the Lake City papers met his plane, and rode with him on the Prairie Central to the local airport, interviewing him on the way, and giving copious space to his remarks. The general sense of them was that he had been crossed, but that he believed in being a good sport and taking it until his turn came again. At the big pictures of him, wearing the charro hat with bells on the brim that he had bought in Mexico City, Ben waxed thoughtful, and read the caption carefully, to make sure they had really been taken at the Post Office Building, in connection with the rites of booking, fingerprinting, and incarceration.

  That night, with Mr. Cantrell, the new and highly praised Chief of Police, he visited his attorney, Mr. Yates, the former partner of Mr. Bleeker the city prosecutor. He and Mr. Cantrell arrived first, and tramped the halls of the Coolidge Building for some time before Mr. Yates pattered up, opened his office, and motioned to them. Inside, he turned on the desk light and began his report. "Well, I just left Ollie Bleeker, and we spent most of the afternoon on it, and I think now I can tell you how it's going to break. Hovey Dunne, the United States Attorney, wasn't there, but we had it out with him over the telephone and I'm sure we know what he's going to do."

  Mr. Cantrell fidgeted. "O.K., get to it."

  "Caspar hasn't got a chance. In
the first place, they've got him on so many violations of the tax law that barring slip-ups he'll be ten years serving his time."

  "It's slip-ups we're worrying about."

  "Chief, there can't be any slip-ups, really. The only conceivable one is that they would make a deal. The Federal people, I mean. That some sort of deal would be made for payment of those taxes, whereby they'd agree not to prosecute. But where does that get him? Your warrant is on file over there, and before they release him they've got to turn him over to you. Then he goes on trial for murder. This was a simple case of who caught him first, the city police or the Feds. Well, they've got him, that's all."

  "Why don't they turn him over to us?"

  "With their own charges untried?"

  "Our charge is a capital offense."

  "What difference does it make?"

  "Plenty of difference, Yates. O.K., he serves ten years. He goes to Alcatraz, and he serves ten years. What then?"

  "Then the State tries him for murder."

  "And convicts him, I suppose. A fat chance! After ten years, you couldn't convict Hitler of murder. The witnesses have skipped, or died, or been seen, and besides the jury thinks if he served ten years he's been punished enough. The way you fixed it, after ten years he's out and it's bad."

  "I didn't fix it."

  "I'll say you didn't."

  "He could be acquitted of murder, even now."

  "O.K., then I got another murder. I got a million of them, and if the jury still won't say murder, I got a little larceny and maybe a couple of mayhems and assaults with deadly weapons. Then, if he's still acquitted, we got the Federal stuff to fall back on. But—get this, Yates—on murder he could burn. I don't say would, I only say could. But he'd have a good outside chance, and if that crook ever squatted hot, that would be doing something for the country."

  "And you, I imagine."

  "That's right."

  "Not, I'm happy to say, for me."

  "Yeah, even you."

  As Mr. Yates looked up in surprise, Mr. Cantrell gave a short, harsh laugh. "You're right on the payroll of Ben's little outfit, his cute association that stole its machines from Caspar, and if you think Solly's going to be careful about it, and check it all up, to make sure you were told and all, why, you're flattering him quite a lot. He's not that conscientious. You're on the spot, right now."