by Ira Levin
She sat looking at Sandy’s rounded silver paperweight gleaming on the slips of paper. Shook her head as if to clear it.
“So are you satisfied now?” he asked, putting the can down, sitting back, his hand taking hers between them. “Did you find any Satanism out there? Any witchcraft? Did anybody pressure you to do anything horrendous?”
“No...” she said, sitting back. The drum drove faster, louder, from the speaker, through the door. “Is this Hank’s too?” she asked.
“No,” he said, “it’s some French group, I think.”
They sat back, listening.
He switched her hand into his other hand, put his arm around her shoulders. She settled back against him, sighing. Closed her eyes. He kissed her temple. Her cheek. The corner of her mouth.
“Andy . . .”
“One chaste kiss...”
Drum-driven high on a blissful tide, she opened her eyes to herself on the sofa, arms clutching his black-robed back, a hand in his hair as her throat was bitten. Closed her eyes... Held him tightly as he held her, skin against skin, his knees spreading her thighs. A jungle bird screamed; she looked toward the speaker and saw a sign. Froze seeing it.
She saw it straight through the mirrored ceiling—the only patch of blue-sky blue in all the forest green, a rectangle with black letters across its middle.
Below a crumpled red can.
Clinging to the inside of a basket of woven reeds hanging upside down between the bottoms of upside-down doors.
The sign’s letters were reversed and it was a good twenty feet away but she read it in a flash—so distinctive it was, so much in the news and her mind lately— and in the same flash she saw what she hadn’t been seeing all along through the tannis haze and the pastel spots: Yuriko’s pendant, the bracelets, the punch bowl, the cup she had held and sipped from. The sign made everything crystal clear: TIFFANY & Co.
Andy’s head lifted tiger-eyed, horns showing. “I thought you were ready,” he said, the drum beating, the bird screaming.
She shook her head.
He slipped farther down, a leg to the floor; she pushed against his head. “No,” she said. “Andy, I want to be alone, just for a few minutes. Please.”
He rose up on a knee, looking at her, his eyes half-hazeling, the horns sinking in. “Now,” he said.
“Please,” she said.
He drew a breath. Got up from the sofa, closing his robe. “Whatever you say, Miss Garbo.” He looped his belt, cinched it. Smiled hazel-eyed at her, his forehead smooth. “You’re not going to run out on me, are you?”
“No,” she said. “I just have to—adjust my thinking. A couple of minutes. Please.”
He nodded, took a cookie, and went to the door to the stage; opened it—hands were clapping in sync with the drum—and went out, drawing the door closed.
She sat up, closing her robe, and put her feet to the carpet, shook her head, held it. Drew a breath, blew it out. Drew another breath. Shook her head.
Picked up the can, shook it, sipped.
Put it down and picked up the paperweight, hefted the mound of silver, checked its bottom. Put it down.
She got up and went to the wastebasket, closing the robe tighter, tying the belt.
Picked out the flyer caught in the basket’s weave.
A triple fold of slick paper with the black TIFFANY & Co. across its sky-blue face. Inside—she held it farther from Blind Eyes—she was congratulated in italics on her purchase of a Tiffany cigarette lighter, informed that the repair department stood ever ready should service be required, and shown photographs of gold and silver cigarette and cigar cases in the same ribbed pattern.
William smoked cigarettes, Craig smoked cigars.
She went into the men’s dressing room.
William had dressed casually: navy blazer with gold I ANDY button, gray flannels. The gold lighter stood on his shelf, a matching gold cigarette case in one of the blazer’s inside pockets.
Another gold lighter lay on Craig’s shelf, along with a silver cigar case. Out of stock on the gold. What a shame.
Multidialed gold Tiffany watches lay on two of the shelves, one with an instruction booklet beside it.
She went back out. The speaker was quaking with what might have been the sound track of King Kong. She went into the women’s dressing room, holding on to the flyer.
She hurried out of the robe and into her own things, trying not to tremble; put the flyer into her pocket and got out the flashlight.
On the way out she checked Diane’s jewel-crusted gold watch. Cartier. You can’t win ’em all.
She hurried down the black spiral, followed the disc of light down forest-green-vinyl hallway.
17
ON CHRISTMAS day in the morning, she called Joe and told him she’d been up all night and had a bitch of a headache; could they get together later in the day?
He was disappointed but sympathetic. He too had had a bad night. The train back had been stalled for hours; he hadn’t gotten home till after three.
“Ahh,” she said, “what a shame. How did it go?”
A sigh. “I don’t know . . . She comes on very nice but I have the feeling she’s a manipulator, regardless of her orientation, and I still think she’s too old. Did everything go all right at Saint Pat’s?”
She said, “Yes. I’ll call later, okay?”
She called Andy. Got his message.
Called the Number, spoke to the chip.
Sipped coffee at the coffee table, scanning the Times’s front page—the Quebec disaster, sixty-six dead, across the top half; below the fold, boxed side-by-side pieces about preparations for the Lighting parties at the White House and Gracie Mansion.
The phone rang; she picked up.
“Before you say anything—”
“No,” she said, “before you say anything. Get down here. You’ve got ten minutes. And don’t bother bringing Christmas presents.” She hung up.
He made it in under nine. Buzz. But it had to be him, with the do-not-disturb on the knob. “Come in!” she commanded—standing before the Scrabble table and the window’s chiffoned brightness with her arms folded, in the cobalt-blue velour caftan she had worn the night he came to her Waldorf suite—minus the I ANDY button. A workmanlike director had been her mentor at CBS-TV.
Andy looked at her and shook his head, blowing out breath, as he closed the door behind him. He came through the foyer—and spotted the Tiffany flyer and the della Robbia plaque on the coffee table, their blues almost matching, the plaque a shade darker. “Hey now,” he said, going to them—Mr. Clean in new jeans and a snow-white GC sweatshirt, could you believe the gall? Fresh from the shower, hair still damp-dark, no time for the dryer.
“Don’t you think you’re overreacting a bit?” he asked, turning toward her, the whites of his hazels as white as his sweatshirt. Great willpower; like father, like son, no doubt. “Come on,” he said. “I mean, you stopped us before the biggie, didn’t you? And it was us not just me, let’s not play games here—” He drew a breath, smiled at her. “Look, we both sniffed the tannis, we both drank the eggnog ...” He turned his hands out, shrugged.
“From the Tiffany cups,” she said.
He looked puzzled. Pretty convincingly.
She pointed at the flyer.
He went on playing dumb, glancing over at it, looking at her—just a puzzled Jesus wannabe.
“Andy,” she said, “it’s another boutique up there. The bowl, the cups, bracelets, watches, cigarette lighters . . .”
He held his forehead, closed his eyes. Whispered, “Oh for shit’s sake...”
Persuasive. You could almost believe he hadn’t known.
She went over to him and took those snow-white shoulders with both her hands—as tightly as she could, tight enough to make him show surprise that was definitely the real McCoy; he grasped her wrists, staring. She said, “Look me in the eye—with your real eyes, please— and tell me your coven or your gang or your inner circle didn’t kill J
udy.”
They held each other, wrists and shoulders, his eyes tigering.
She looked into the black-slit pupils. “Go ahead,” she said. “ ‘No, Mom, they didn’t do it, it was five other people.’ Go ahead. That’s your line. Say it.”
His tiger eyes stared, his lips pursed.
“Go on,” she said, squeezing his shoulders still tighter, leaning up closer. “Say it and we’ll do the biggie right this minute.” She nodded toward the bedroom.
He pulled her hands from him—“Yes, they did it!”— turned, moved away. “But it wasn’t my idea! I’m not a free agent!” He turned. “I have backers,” he said. “You know that. Did you ever stop to think how much money they’ve poured into the Lighting? Forget the factories, the distribution, think about the commercials and specials and getting them seen by everybody. Everybody!” He came closer to her, his eyes still tiger. “We’re talking about Bantu tribesmen on the Serengeti! Peasants in Outer Mongolia! Places where we had to put in roads to bring in generators to show them the first TV they ever saw! Billions of dollars! Billions!” He drew breath. “They didn’t want to—see it put at risk.”
“Andy,” she said, “things have changed a lot, but since when do the angels run the show? You’re the producer, you’re the star, you’re—”
He barked a laugh. “My angels aren’t angels, Mom!” he said. Swallowed. “They’re businesspeople, altruistic yes, but hardheaded when it comes to protecting an investment. Look, it’s done.” He moved closer to her, his eyes still tiger; she folded her arms. “What can I do?” he asked. “I really was sick in the car, I wasn’t faking that. And nobody told them to do it like that, that was Diane! She’s batty; thirty-five years at the Theatre Guild and all the world’s a stage! She twists Craig around her little finger, he barks and everybody obeys.”
“But you’re the one who told them to do it,” she said. “You made them able to do it, the same way you made Hank able to walk.”
He drew breath. Nodded. “Not the same,” he said, “but similar. Yes. I’m the one who’s responsible. Yes. I had no choice.” He went to the coffee table, took a deep breath, and stood looking down at the flyer and the plaque. Shoved his hands into his pockets.
She stayed with folded arms, watching him. “I’m moving back to the Waldorf,” she said.
He turned, his eyes still tiger. “Oh Mom...” he said.
“I’m not staying here,” she said. “I’ll borrow what I need from a bank till I get ‘Fresh Eyes’ up and running. I’m sure my credit rating is terrific.”
“Then borrow and stay here,” he said.
“No,” she said. “I don’t know what’s going to happen once the investigation starts, I can’t even begin to think about what I’m going to say when they question me, but I want distance between us from here on in, Andy.”
He drew a breath, blew it out, nodded. Lowered his head.
She said, “I don’t want to put the Lighting in jeopardy either, though I’m not as insane on the subject as those non-angels of yours. I don’t want us to have to deal with a lot of awkward questions this week, not when Ireland worked so well and all the numbers are so good.”
He raised his head, looking at her, his eyes beginning to hazel.
“So I’ll wait till next Saturday,” she said. “January first. But I really don’t want to see you, not till—things work themselves out somewhere down the line.”
He stood looking at her with his hazel eyes; she turned to the table and the window.
He said, “Will we—light our candles together?”
She stayed silent a moment. “In the park?” she asked.
“No,” he said. “If we’re there, we’re not at Madison Square Garden and the Abyssinian Baptist Church and everywhere else. And I don’t want to do anything political... I think the best thing is to just stay upstairs, in my place. Joe too; I wouldn’t expect you to come otherwise. We’ll be able to see the whole show down in the Sheep Meadow, bird’s-eye view, and I’ve got this great media room—you must have seen pictures—so we can watch everything on all the networks. It’ll really be the best way to get an overview of the whole happening.”
She turned. Took a breath. Said, “I’ll let you know.”
He nodded. Turned and headed for the foyer.
“Take the della Robbia,” she said.
“Oh Ma...” He turned.
“Take it, Andy,” she said. “They bought it, you didn’t. And I really don’t want it from either of you.”
He went to the coffee table, swept the plaque with one hand into the other; swung it like a paperback at his side, walking to the foyer. Out and gone, pulling the door closed.
She let out breath, unfolded her arms.
She began to top off her coffee, had the spout of the not-real-silver coffeepot tilted nearly to the point of pouring—but took the clean cup from the tray and filled that instead, about three quarters full. Left the coffee black, unsweetened.
Began pacing back and forth between the foyer and the Scrabble table...
Slowly, holding the cup with both hands...
Frowning over it, sipping . . .
Funny, funny-peculiar, the way he had laughed when he said his angels weren’t angels. They certainly weren’t, those plutocrats who opted for murder in a noble cause. Hardly a new mind-set in human history.
Where had GC found enough hardheaded altruists to pour out billions? Were there thousands of million-dollar contributors? Hundreds who gave multimillions? She had never even tried to estimate the total production cost of the Lighting, never mind all of GC’s other projects.
Andy had spoken as if the Lighting were the one and only, the be-all and end-all. Naturally he saw it that way now, under a week away...
She sipped, pacing . . .
Why hadn’t she met any of those major backers? She’d met people who gave thousands annually—at affairs in New York and Ireland, and at Mike Van Buren’s on Thanksgiving day. Rob Patterson’s Christian Consortium, she knew, was a significant contributor, but multimillions? She hadn’t gotten that impression. A few million altogether maybe, over the past three years.
Wouldn’t at least some of the top-level givers have wanted to meet her? Wouldn’t Andy have wanted to oblige them?
Only that elderly Frenchman, René, at the airport, and maybe the man with him; their handshakes and few words had been the full extent of her contact with GC’s non-angelic angels. René had certainly been giving Andy a devil of a time on the phone the morning she’d barged into his office; Andy had sounded well accustomed to placating, or try to placate, the old man...
She stopped in the center of the room.
Stood for a moment. Swallowed.
Closed her eyes, put a hand to her forehead.
Drew a breath and opened her eyes. Turned to the coffee table. Moved to it, bent, put the trembling cup down, pulled the Times around to face her.
Stood looking down at the front page.
Turned, rubbing her forehead. Walked slowly to the Scrabble table. Church bells began bonging.
She stood wincing at snow-bright daylight shining through chiffon. Looked down at the tiles on the table.
Not the Ten.
The rest of the herd, the other ninety-two, lying mostly face-up from her hunt for the outcasts.
She fingertipped a tile, drew it out through others onto the table’s margin of polished wood. Left it there—a B. As in bells bonging Oh lit-tle town of Beth-le-hem . . .
She fingered another tile, drew that one out too, giving the B an I alongside it. And an O . . .
Gimme a C...
Gimme an H . . .
Gimme an E, M, I. . .
She didn’t see the other C. Didn’t keep looking.
She went back to the coffee table, picked up the phone, tapped a number.
Said, “Hi, Joe.”
She said, “A little better. Let’s get together now, okay? Someplace we can talk but not here, I’m sick of this tower. I’ll come there;
I’ve seen pigsties, I won’t faint.”
She sighed. “Where’s that Chinese restaurant? It’ll be empty today.”
She said, “I don’t care about that. The food’s good, isn’t it? Where is it?”
“It’s a dump,” was what he had said. Off Ninth Avenue, a faded twelve-table restaurant with plate-glass windows and frozen ceiling fans, decor by Edward Hopper.
In a side booth, one of the two occupied tables, they toasted the holiday with Chinese beer and got the presents out of the way first. His was a huge, handsomely bound and jacketed book she had found in the hotel’s Rizzoli shop—photographs and blueprints of classic Italian autos, including his Alfa-Romeo.
“Oh this is just beautiful!” he said, turning the heavy pages. “I didn’t even know such a book existed! Bello! Bellisimo!” He leaned across the table and kissed her.
Her present was a small gold I ANDY pin with a ruby heart. Van Cleef & Arpels.
She sighed, said, “You shouldn’t have...” Leaned across the table and kissed him. “I love it, thank you, Joe.” She pinned it to her sweater while he and the waitress gathered the wrappings and he ordered for both of them, not using a menu.
“What’s on your mind?” he asked when the waitress had gone.
“Something really heavy,” she said, “and I don’t want to worry Andy about it.”
“A threat?”
“You could say.” She looked him in the eye. “Judy dropped a few remarks,” she said, “that make me think—now that I know who she was, and now that these things have happened in Hamburg and now Quebec—they make me think her gang might have somehow tampered with the candles. Or a gang in the Far East they had connections with.”
He sat back. Blinked a few times, looked at her. “Tampered with the Lighting candles,” he said.
She nodded. “These might be cases where someone lit one early, or maybe a store or a house burned with candles in it.”
He sat looking at her. “The first two times ever,” he said. “The candles have been around all over the world for months and these are the first two times one got lit or burned.”
