Polly laughed. “You look just like you look on TV. Better. This is the most amazing thing. This is so great.”
“Sit down.” Wren winked at her and patted the place mat across from her. “We’re frightening the nuclear families.”
Polly cast a glance over her shoulder, than sank into the chair. “Sorry,” she said. “I get loud.”
“Yeah,” said Wren. “Me too.” She popped open her compact mirror and began to repair her lipstick. “You on vacation or something?”
Polly didn’t answer for a while, lost in her amazement. “What?” she said at last.
“You on vacation?”
“Oh … yeah. I’m down at Wimminwood. Know what that is?
“Uh … well, a women’s music festival, right?” She’d read about it on the bulletin board at the Cazadero General Store. She’d figured the kid for a lesbian.
“Yeah, that’s right.”
“So what are you doing here? Playing hooky?”
Polly chuckled. “Yeah, more or less.”
“All by yourself?” O.K., she was flirting a little, but what harm could it do?
“No. I’m here with a friend. I mean, here at the restaurant. That blonde lady over there.”
Wren dropped her lipstick into her purse and gazed across the room. Caught in the act of watching them, the blonde looked decidedly uncomfortable. Wren gave her a little smile, which induced even more embarrassment.
“She’s against this,” said Polly.
“Against what?”
“Me coming over here.”
“Why?”
Polly shrugged. “She says it’s tacky.”
“Nah,” said Wren. “I think she’s jealous.”
Polly cast a quick glance at the blonde, then looked back at Wren. “No shit?”
Wren gave her one of her Mona Lisa smiles.
“That would be wonderful,” said Polly.
“What?”
“If she would be jealous. I don’t think she likes me that much.”
“Well …”
“Could I get a lipstick print from you?”
Wren blinked at her.
“I collect them,” said Polly. “It’s a hobby. I already have Diana Ross and Linda Evans and Kathleen Turner.”
“Sure. Fine. What do I do?”
Polly beamed at her.
“I can’t believe this.”
“What do I do?” Wren asked again. “Blot on a napkin?” Her eyes wandered across the room. The blonde woman was staring straight down into the remains of her hamburger. She was obviously mortified.
“Or,” Wren added, “I could pucker up and really smooch on it.” She looked back at Polly and grinned conspiratorially. “Your friend would like that.” Polly giggled.
Wren picked up a napkin and settled on something between a blot and a smooch, giving the results to Polly. “Happy summer,” she said.
“Same to you,” said Polly, shaking Wren’s hand briskly. “Same to you.”
Into the Grove
MICHAEL AND THACK HAD CROSSED THE RIVER without a hitch, drying off and dressing in a dockside room erected for just that purpose. They’d followed the ravine up the forested hillside until they found the footbridge Wren had told them about. It loomed above them, huge and skeletal, like an abandoned railway trestle.
“What now?” whispered Michael.
“We go under it,” Thack replied. “Up that hill.”
“Wait!”
“What?”
“I heard something.”
Thack cocked his head. There were rustling sounds, then the resonant thump of footsteps on the bridge. Michael flattened himself against a support post, pulling Thack back into the shadows. The moon was traitorously bright.
A voice called: “Who goes down there?”
Michael held his breath, glancing at Thack. Wren’s words reverberated in his head. They won’t shoot at you…. It’s just a club…. They won’t shoot at you….
Thack pressed his finger to his lips, clearly intent upon going through with this madness.
The footsteps commenced again, then stopped at mid-bridge. A flashlight beam probed the underbrush only yards away from their hiding place. Michael hugged the post and prayed for release. Or at least leniency.
“Who goes?” yelled the guard.
Michael looked at Thack. Enough was enough.
Thack shook his head emphatically.
The guard stood there for half a minute, then began to walk again. Away from them. Off the bridge and up the hillside.
Thack’s eyes flashed triumphantly. Michael expelled air and whispered: “Let’s get the fuck outa here.”
“What? Swim back?”
“Sure.”
“C’mon. The worst is over.”
“How do you know?” asked Michael. “What if he comes back?”
“Well, we’ve come this far. Don’t be such a pussy.”
“I’m being practical,” said Michael.
Thack gave him a friendly goose. “Then don’t be so practical, Maude.”
They waited another five minutes, then continued up the hillside until the lights of a road led them into the Grove. Men passed them in boozy clumps, singing and jostling, hooting hello as if they, Michael and Thack had been there all along, making merry under the redwoods.
Manhood, it seemed, had been their only requirement, their only badge of identity.
“This is so unreal,” said Michael. “It’s like a hologram or something.”
“Pinocchio,” said Thack.
“What?”
“You know. Those wicked boys on Pleasure Island.”
They were walking through a gorge, apparently, with ferny forests climbing the slopes on either side. The redwoods along the road were as fat around as Fotomats, clustered so tightly in some places that they became walls for outdoor rooms, foyers for the camps that lay behind them.
The camps were wonders to behold. Giant tepees and moss-covered lodges and open-air fireplaces built for the gods. Strings of lanterns meandered up the canyon wall to camps so lofty that they seemed like tree houses.
And everywhere there was music. They heard Brahms for a while, then Cole Porter. Then an unseen pianist began tinkling his way through “Yesterday.”
Thack asked: “There are no women at all?”
“Nope,” said Michael. “They’ve been to court over it.”
“How do they defend it?”
Michael shrugged. “Women make ‘em nervous. They can’t be themselves.”
Thack chuckled and slipped his arm across Michael’s shoulder.
“I wouldn’t do that,” said Michael.
“What?”
“This is the straightest place on earth, Thack.”
“Oh.” Thack removed his arm, looking vaguely wounded. “Plenty of them are doing it.”
“Yeah, but … you know … it’s different.” Michael knew how gutless this sounded, but he was still feeling incredibly paranoid.
A hawk-faced old man was catching his breath against a tree. Thack approached him, somewhat to Michael’s alarm. “Excuse me, sir. We’re kinda lost.” The old man chortled. “New here, eh?”
“Yeah.”
“Where ya wanna go, podnah?”
“Well … Hillbillies, we were told. Booter Manigault’s camp.”
“Ah.” He nodded slowly. “You guests of Booter?”
Thack hesitated ever so slightly, so Michael said: “Right.”
“Good fella, Booter.”
“Yeah, he is,” said Thack.
“The best,” Michael added, perhaps a little too eagerly.
“I tell you what you do,” said the old man. “You keep on down the river road … this road right here …”
“O.K.,” said Thack.
“It’s a few camps down, on the left. You’ll see the sign.”
“Thanks a lot.”
The old man said: “What’d ya do? Pass it and double back?”
“Uh … yeah, I guess we did.”
&
nbsp; “Well, you just keep on down this way. You’re on the right track now.”
“Great,” said Michael.
“On the left,” added the old man. “You can’t miss it.”
“Terrific.”
“Sign’s over the entrance. Big bronze one.”
As they withdrew, both nodding their thanks, Michael wondered why old men take such a long time to give directions. Was it senility or a yearning for company?
Or just the unexpected exhilaration of feeling useful again?
The Hillbillies plaque depicted Pan with his pipes and a naked female spirit rising from the steam of a caldron. “Would you look at that?” said Thack, standing back to admire it. “Pure Art Nouveau.”
Michael, who still felt like an impostor, refrained from a telltale display of aesthetic appreciation.
Thack led the way into an enclosed compound dominated by a two-story redwood chalet. Half a dozen men of varying ages were gathered around a fireplace in the courtyard. One of them stared hard at the newcomers, then sailed in their direction at great speed, wearing a phosphorescent smile.
“Michael, my child!”
It was Father Paddy Starr, the television priest who presided over religious affairs at Mary Ann’s station.
“Oh, hi,” Michael said feebly, panicked at the sight of a familiar face.
“What a lovely surprise!” Father Paddy clamped his chubby hands together. “Have you been here the whole time?”
It was probably an innocent question, but Michael got flustered, anyway. “Well … uh … no, actually. We just got here. We’re guests of Booter Manigault.”
Father Paddy’s brow wrinkled. He began to cluck his tongue and shake his head. “The poor old dear,” he said.
Thack shot Michael a quick glance.
“Has something happened to him?” Michael asked.
“Well,” the cleric replied. “I expect you heard about Jimmy Chappell?”
“No … uh … not really.”
“Oh. Well, Jimmy died last night.”
“I’m sorry. I don’t think I know who …”
“No, of course not. How silly of me. He was one of Booter’s oldest chums.”
“Oh,” said Michael.
Father Paddy heaved a sigh. “I think it’s been hard on him, poor dear.”
“You haven’t seen him, have you?”
“No. I expect he’s gone home.”
“No,” said Thack. “We were supposed to meet him here.”
“Ah … well, then he must be up at Lost Angels. He has friends up there.”
“Lost Angels?”
“C’mon,” said Father Paddy. “I’ll show you.” He turned to Thack and extended his hand, palm down, as if to be kissed. “I’m Father Paddy … since Michael’s forgotten his manners.”
Thack shook the cleric’s hand. “Thack Sweeney,” he said.
“An Irishman! I might have known.”
Thack pointed to the Hillbillies plaque. “What can you tell me about the artist?”
“Not a blessed thing,” said Father Paddy, “but isn’t it adorable?”
As the priest sashayed out, leading the way, Thack spoke to Michael under his breath. “So,” he said. “The straightest place on earth.”
The Escape Plan
BOOTER HEARD FOOTSTEPS AGAIN, THE TENT FLAP opened, to reveal a Negro girl wearing gym shorts and a bright blue T-shirt. “Hi,” she said, with surprising cheerfulness. “I’m Teejay.”
He wasn’t about to swap nicknames with her.
“The water girl,” she added, holding up a canteen.
“You know,” he said, “you can all be arrested for this.”
Kneeling in front of him, she lifted him to a sitting position. “Are your wrists uncomfortable?” she asked.
“What do you think?” he replied.
She examined his bonds for a moment. “I can’t loosen it without taking the whole thing off.”
“Then do it,” he said.
“Sure.” She smiled at him. “And let you bop me on the head.” She lifted the canteen to his lips, tilting it slowly, wiping away the overflow with a blue kerchief.
When she was done, Booter said: “I don’t bop people on the head.”
She tightened the top of the canteen. “Rose says you make instruments of war.”
“I make aluminum honeycomb,” he said.
“She says you went to Bitburg and laid wreaths on Nazi graves.”
“That was a reconciliation gesture. Look … what’s going on here? You can’t just hold me indefinitely. I didn’t do anything.”
The girl used her fingers to comb the hair off his forehead. “We’ve had … some harassment. Rose thinks you’re part of it. She wants to hold a tribunal.”
“A tribunal? What? Here?”
She nodded.
“She’s crazy,” said Booter. “She’s a complete lunatic. If she thinks she can humiliate me …” He collected himself and tried to sound as reasonable as possible. “Look … I don’t have anything against you or anybody here. I’m a man of my word. If you let me go, I promise I won’t lay a finger on you.”
“No,” she said. “You have to.”
“What?”
“We have to make it look that way.”
“Like what?”
“Like you overpowered me. Otherwise I’ll catch hell.”
He grasped her meaning with a rush of relief. “O.K. Fine. However you want to do it.”
Leaning closer, she said: “The best way out is the way you came. Your canoe is still there.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’ve already checked,” she said.
“Are we near the river?”
“Oh, God,” she said. “You don’t know where you are?”
“No. How could I? That … whatshername—”
“O.K.,” she cut in. “There’s a dirt road just outside the tent here. Down a little and to the right. Follow it until you reach the river. Then …” She fell silent suddenly and cast an uneasy glance over her shoulder.
“What’s the matter?” he whispered.
“Nothing,” she said. “I thought I heard something.” She listened a moment longer, then continued: “The canoe is up the river about fifty yards from the point where the road meets the river. Got that?”
“I think so, but …”
“What?”
“Well, I can’t paddle back to … my place. The current’s against me.”
She pondered the problem, then said: “There’s a Baptist camp about a mile downstream. You’ll be safe there.” She knelt behind him and began to tug at the ropes around his wrists. “Just make it damn quick and don’t look at anybody on your way out. This is women-only space.”
“If they see me, though …?”
“You’ll be all right,” she said soothingly. “We’re not all like Rose.”
“Is that right?” came a voice outside the tent.
There was no mistaking it, and no mistaking the sculptured scalp which burst into view through the tent flap.
The girl let go of the ropes and spun around to face her superior. “Rose …”
“This’ll go on my report,” said Rose.
“I was just loosening them,” said the girl.
“I heard what you were doing.”
“Rose, he’s an old man.”
“So was Mengele,” said Rose.
Booter had heard enough. “Listen here, young lady—”
“Don’t you call me that!”
“I’ll call you anything I want!”
“Rose, we can’t legally—”
“Get out, Teejay!”
The girl stood there a moment longer, saying nothing, then muttered under her breath and left.
“Please,” Booter told her, “call the police….”
The shaved woman began rummaging noisily through a pile of gear in the corner of the tent. Booter watched as she ripped open a cardboard box, then tore off lengths of masking tape. She leaned over him a
nd clamped something white and gauzy against his mouth, binding it in place with the tape.
His eyes had begun to water a bit, but he could still discern the label on the box: New Freedom Maxi-pads.
Mrs. Madrigal’s Lament
IT WAS ALMOST NINE O’CLOCK WHEN BRIAN RETURNED TO the cabin on Austin Creek. All he had done was drive, following the coastal highway as far as Elk, then swinging south again in time for dinner in Jenner at the River’s End Restaurant. Having spoken to no one except a waitress and an Exxon attendant, he welcomed the prospect of company.
But Michael and Thack were gone. They weren’t in the cabin and they weren’t by the campfire, and they didn’t have a car. Had they walked into Cazadero for dinner?
He lit a fire and tried to get back into Jitterbug Perfume, but his mind began to wander. On an impulse, he picked up the phone and called Mrs. Madrigal.
“Madrigal here.”
“Hi. It’s Brian.”
“Oh … yes, dear. Are you home?”
“No. We’re still here. Just thought I’d check on things.”
“Oh … well … good.”
“Has Puppy been a problem?”
“Don’t be silly. As a matter of fact … Puppy dear, come say hello to Daddy. Go on. That’s right, it’s Daddy. Say ‘Hello, Daddy.’ ”
“Hello, Daddy,” came a small, familiar voice.
“Hi, Puppy. Have you been good?”
“Yes.”
“I miss you a lot.”
Silence.
“Do you miss Daddy?”
Silence.
“Puppy?”
Mrs. Madrigal came back on the line. “The telephone throws her. She thinks you should be on TV.”
“What do you mean?”
The landlady chuckled. “When Mommy’s away, Mommy’s on TV. So when Daddy’s away … well, it makes sense, doesn’t it?”
“I suppose.”
“She misses you, dear. Take my word for it.”
“Is Mary Ann O.K.?”
“Fine,” she said evenly. “I haven’t seen her that much, but she’s been so busy lately. Did you try to reach her at The Summit?”
“No.”
“Well, she’s at some big gala tonight, but she should be home by ten.”
“O.K.”
“She was lovely on that Hollywood show. Did you get a chance to watch?”
“No.” he said.
“Well, she was … very poised. What’s the name of that show?”
Significant Others Page 19
