by Robyn Sisman
Lloyd relayed this mysterious request to the barman and bought himself another malt whiskey. The appeal of English beer—a tepid, dark infusion of the leavings at the bottom of your average garbage pail—eluded him.
They sat down together and began talking. The man was in his late forties, smartly but not expensively dressed, a salesman, perhaps, or a middle manager.
“You’re an American, aren’t you?” he said. “I can always spot them.”
“It must be the hair between the eyes.”
The man looked blank for a moment, then gave an uncertain laugh.
“And how about you?” Lloyd went on politely. “Do you live in this neighborhood?”
“Me? No. Too noisy. We’re out Wimbledon way. Nice for the children—grown-up now, of course.”
“So what brings you into town?”
The man gave him a peculiar smile. “I’m at a conference, aren’t I? The wife’s not expecting me back until the small hours.”
“But . . . where’s the conference?” Lloyd was bewildered. “Why aren’t you there?”
“Because they don’t want me anymore. They don’t need people with twenty years’ experience. They have computers now, and young lads out of college with ‘qualifications.’ ” He enunciated the word with scorn.
“You lost your job,” said Lloyd, recognition dawning.
“Three weeks ago last Friday.”
“And you haven’t told your wife?”
“I can’t.” The man put his hand on Lloyd’s sleeve. He brought his needy eyes close. “You see that, don’t you? I’ve been the provider all our married life. She couldn’t cope with it any other way.”
Lloyd shrank away. He couldn’t help it. “But what do you do all day? Where do you go? You can’t just sit in a pub.”
“Couldn’t afford it anyway, could I? No, I’m still turning up at the office. They’ve given me a project—sorting out the filing. I know all the history, you see. Of course, they can’t pay me any longer. I wouldn’t expect that. But it keeps me off the streets.”
Lloyd was appalled. “But that’s—” he began. Then he saw the pain of humiliation in the man’s eyes. How could anyone bear the weight of such an impossible deception? “Of course,” he said. “I understand.”
Five minutes later Lloyd was striding toward the Underground, fleeing from his pathetic companion and a sense of rising panic. I am not like that! he told himself. I am not a sad failure. People do not pity me. A fine rain was falling. Light gleamed on the slick sidewalks from restaurants and bars. Inside, Lloyd saw groups of laughing friends and couples leaning close, and felt so sharp a severance from the rest of the world that he was frightened. He jerked his head away. He mustn’t look. He mustn’t think. It seemed to him that dark, dangerous thoughts lurked in his subconscious like misshapen sea-creatures from the lightless depths. If they came to the surface, who could say what he might have to confront?
Outside the Underground station, a handwritten notice warned passengers of long delays owing to “a body on the line.” Lloyd shivered at the sinister phrase and pulled the collar of his raincoat tightly about his bare neck. He couldn’t afford a taxi. The bus system was unfathomable. He would have to walk.
The lights were out in the apartment when he got back. On the floor outside the bedroom he found a note. Your little friend Ms. Wilding wants you to call “urgently.” I have a migraine. Don’t wake me when you come to bed. Lloyd screwed up the piece of paper, then unscrewed it and peered once more at the neat script. Was Betsy mad at him again? Scowling, he stuffed the note into his pocket and lumbered down to the kitchen. He wasn’t ready to go to bed yet anyway. He needed another whiskey.
Carrying a generous tumblerful to the living room, Lloyd lay down on Ms. Wilding’s crazy couch and settled his head on a mound of cushions. His body felt agreeably weary, his mind fuzzy. There on the wall was old Fred, tap dancing his socks off. Idly Lloyd hummed a few bars of “A Foggy Day in London Town”: great stuff. He wondered whether Suze was getting over the rat boyfriend. Maybe he should find out. According to Jay, Suze didn’t have much luck with men. She’d been strung along for years by some older man who had treated her badly. With a grunt of effort he manhandled the telephone onto his stomach, nearly falling onto the floor in the process. It could be that he was a little drunk.
“Hi,” he said familiarly, as soon as she had answered.
“Is that you, Lloyd? Hooray! Where have you been?”
Lloyd was in mid-yawn. “In a pub,” he said indistinctly.
“Well, get your brain into gear. I have hot news.”
Lloyd listened while she babbled on about getting trapped in Bernie’s office and witnessing some kind of lovefest between Bernie and Sheri from under Bernie’s desk. Extraordinarily, she had tape-recorded their conversation. She sounded high-spirited and purposeful. He smiled and closed his eyes. It was nice listening to her voice.
“You see what this means?” she prompted.
“Sure. Bernie and Sheri are having an affair. Let them, is what I say.” Lloyd waved his arm in the air, spilling some whiskey on her couch. “It’s a free country.”
“For God’s sake, pay attention. You can’t be that drunk. What it means is that something is going on. Something to do with the Passion account—and with you.”
Lloyd took a swig of his drink. “So what? I don’t work for Schneider Fox anymore. Hey—maybe they should rename it Schneider Fux.” He chuckled for some time at his witticism.
“Don’t you care about Passion?” persisted the voice.
“Nope.”
“Or about losing your job?”
“Nope.”
“Or about everyone thinking you’re some kind of crook?”
Lloyd opened his mouth to reply, but no words came. Suddenly he was seventeen again, reading the newspaper headlines his mother had tried to hide from him. His body sagged. He felt utterly defeated. “You sure know how to make a guy feel good,” he said at last.
“I want to do more than that,” came the crisp reply. “I want to help you get your job back.”
Lloyd sat up. “Huh?”
“Don’t you want it back?”
“Oh . . .” Lloyd squirmed. “It’s too late now. Harry and Bernie will never change their minds. Everyone in advertising thinks I’m a criminal. No one believes me.”
“I do.”
Her calm, simple statement took his breath away. She believed him! He felt like a floundering swimmer who had found a foothold on solid rock. “Why?” he asked.
“All sorts of things. Dee Dee and Jay, for starters. Both of them are certain you would never do anything dirty. Then there’s the conversation I heard tonight—weren’t you listening? And don’t forget I’ve been living in your apartment and working in your office for three weeks, and talking to you on the phone. I know I’ve been frightfully dim, but it suddenly dawned on me that the Lloyd Rockwell I was getting to know was totally unlike the person Sheri kept telling me about. Honestly, Lloyd, she’s been systematically running you down ever since I got here.”
Lloyd frowned. “I’m sure you’re wrong there. Sheri’s ambitious, but I can’t believe that she would deliberately set out to sabotage another person’s career.”
Suze’s cynical hoot echoed down the line. “That’s because you’re too nice. You need a nasty, devious mind like mine to appreciate how other people work. Don’t you understand? Sheri wants to be top dog. First she gets rid of you. Then she grabs the agency’s star client. Meanwhile, she’s bonking poor old Bernie’s brains out so that he’ll believe anything she tells him.”
Could this be true? For the first time in days Lloyd allowed his brain to function. He remembered how unconcerned Bernie had been about the collapse of his trip to England; it was Sheri who had seemed upset. And when a new exchange had been miraculously sorted out a few hours later, who had telephoned the good news? Sheri. Then there were all those unreturned calls. He tried to slot more pieces of the puzzle into place, but th
ey didn’t fit. “What about the list of Passion customers I got you to send me? Sheri couldn’t have known about that.”
There was a low moan. “Yes, she did. I told her. That’s when she still had me believing you were some bumbling idiot who was an embarrassment to the agency. And while I’m in confessional mode, I might as well tell you I’ve also accessed all your confidential computer files and given your notes on Passion to Sheri.” Her words came out in a defiant rush. “I’m really sorry, Lloyd.”
Lloyd said nothing. He felt hurt and angry. “A bumbling idiot”: the words stung. He hated the thought of people trawling through his private files. “How could you do that?”
“I don’t know,” she answered miserably.
But over the next few minutes, as she explained her side of the picture—how she had understood that Passion might leave because Lloyd had mishandled the account, how flattered she had been to escape creepy Quincy and accept the temporary role as Sheri’s personal art director—Lloyd began to understand. “Even before you got the chop, Sheri was obsessed with Passion,” Suze went on. “Now it’s become her personal mission: save Passion or die. She’s had us all working overtime for a mega-presentation on Friday.”
“This Friday?” Lloyd felt a sharp stab of exclusion.
“Yes. Ross Bannerman’s coming in person. But tonight, in Bernie’s office, I distinctly heard Sheri say, ‘We’re covered whichever way Ross Bannerman jumps.’ What do you suppose that means?”
“No idea.”
“We’ll figure it out. The point is, I’m on your side now. I’m going to help you fight back. All we have to do is prove you didn’t leak that list, and demonstrate to Passion that you’re the man they want in charge of their advertising.”
Was that all? Lloyd sighed. “The trouble is, everyone thinks—”
“Never mind what they think,” interrupted Suze. “Look, Lloyd, we’re in the advertising business. We can make people think ten impossible things before breakfast. Driving cars is sexy. It really, really matters which washing powder you use. Stuffing your kids with scrambled cow-entrails and chips is fun.” She clicked her tongue impatiently. “This isn’t about what people think, it’s about the truth. You are innocent. You are good at what you do.”
A glorious feeling of sanity rolled over Lloyd. If she believed in him, maybe he could start believing in himself again. “All right,” he said. “Let’s do it. Though frankly I can’t see how.”
“You will,” she said breezily. “Dee Dee says you always come up with something brilliant at the last minute.”
“That’s different. Put me into that boardroom on Friday—” He broke off. “Except that I’m three thousand miles away, and Schneider Fox wouldn’t even let me into the building and I don’t have access to the information I need. Or an art director.”
There was a weighty pause. “Ahem,” said Suze.
Of course. She was a designer—a good one, too, he’d heard. Lloyd felt a trickle of excitement. “You don’t mean that you . . .?”
“Why not? Come on, Lloyd, we have to do it.” Her enthusiasm was exhilarating. “I’m going out now to get this tape copied and couriered over to you,” she went on busily. “Tomorrow I’ll fax you all the stuff I can lay my hands on for the presentation. See what you make of it.”
“Thanks, Suze, I—”
“I’ll ring you the second I get back from work. It will be quite late your time, I’m afraid.”
“That’s OK. Listen—”
“The thing is, I don’t dare ring you from work in case Sheri catches me.” She stopped politely. “Sorry, did you want to say something?”
Lloyd smiled. “Yes, I did. I wanted to say thank you for helping me like this. Even if it all comes to nothing, I appreciate what you’re doing. You’ve given me back my faith in myself. If it wasn’t for you—”
“Pff. Think nothing of it. You helped me with my cooking. You cheered me up. I’m just returning the favor. Actually I want to get back at Sheri for making such a fool of me. Also—” For the first time her fluency faltered. “Well, it’s the right thing to do, isn’t it?” Then she groaned. “Yuk. Do I sound horribly pious? I hope I’m not about to turn into a nun.”
Lloyd gave a shout of laughter. “I think you sound wonderful,” he said.
In the surprised silence that followed he could practically hear the barricades of British reserve going up. “Oh. Well. Jolly good.” Her voice was clipped. “Speak to you tomorrow. Bye.”
After she had gone Lloyd sat quietly for a while, a lingering smile on his face. Then he leaped to his feet. “Come, Watson, the game’s afoot!” he said aloud. Going over to the desk, he moved aside Betsy’s papers and rooted about, looking for some paper and a pen that worked. It must be very late, but his brain was zinging. At length he wrote down:1. Customer list—check
2. Presentation—Friday
3. Harry?
4. Stateside???
His mind sped ahead. Full of optimism, he allowed himself to imagine what it would be like to have his reputation reinstated, to be himself again. Yet one cloud lingered at the edge of this rosy horizon. What was it? Lloyd looked up from the desk and propped his chin on his hand, chasing the source of his disquiet. The revelation, when it came, was shocking. He did not want to marry Betsy.
At once a flood of guilt and anxiety rose to drown the thought. Betsy was loving, vulnerable, dependent. She was good to him—spoiled him, even. He had chosen her, out of all the women in the world. He couldn’t let her down.
But the thought bobbed up again. This time Lloyd examined it squarely. He admitted to himself that Betsy had not given him the support he needed over the Schneider Fox crisis. She shrank from confrontation, just as he did. Together they would make a timid, dull couple, soured by resentments. Reaching into his pocket, Lloyd took out her note and smoothed it open. Don’t wake me when you come to bed. Was this what their life would be like? He remembered Jay’s reaction to the news of his engagement, a flat “Congratulations,” delivered with all the joyousness of a death-knell. A chill settled about him. He was about to marry the wrong woman.
Lloyd stuffed Betsy’s note into the wastebasket. As he did so, a crumpled carton caught his eye. Automatically his brain shifted into gear, professionally assessing the message of its pale colors and self-effacing lettering. What was the product? Body lotion, perhaps, or one of those hair-removing creams women used that stank to high heaven.
Lloyd bent down and turned the carton around so that he could see the label. “Home Pregnancy Test,” he read. The sudden noise inside his head was like the squealing of car tires, just before a crash.
Chapter Twenty-five
That night Suze slept the deep, unbreakable sleep of the virtuous and on waking discovered two surprises. One was the collection of clothes she’d abandoned in the Hamptons, mysteriously delivered overnight in a brand new Louis Vuitton bag. How very Nick. Unzipping it, she found a message: Siouxie sweetheart, please call me—N. There followed four different telephone numbers. Suze put the note aside. Had she mentioned to anyone recently that she hated men? Her second surprise was a long fax from Lloyd, which Suze read with gathering excitement. This was going to be fun.
Fired with energy, she swept into the Schneider Fox building as if she owned it, made a detour past Dino’s workstation and sweet-talked him into “borrowing” some art department equipment, and was already at her desk, head down, by the time Sheri arrived. Suze observed her royal progress down the corridor with grudging admiration. Not by one misplaced hair or the faintest flush to her cheek did Sheri betray her after-hours romp with Bernie. Suze waited a decent interval, then appeared diffidently at Sheri’s open door. “Awfully sorry, Sheri, but I’ve got a doctor’s appointment this afternoon. I’m afraid it may take rather a long time. I’ll work at home tonight to make up.” Encountering Sheri’s outraged stare, Suze lowered her eyes and tried to look bashful. “Gynecological thingy,” she muttered.
“Oh . . . All right. But I wa
nt those spreads finished and ready to put on slide tomorrow.”
“No problem,” sang Suze, retreating briskly. Brilliant. She had just bought herself several hours of extra time. She was going to need them.
Next she found Dee Dee and lured her to the ladies’ for a secret pow-wow. When Dee Dee emerged, there was a determined angle to her chin and the light of battle in her eye.
By lunchtime Suze was seated under a grapevine in the courtyard of a divine little Greek restaurant in the Village. Placing her forearms on the table, she leaned across to Jay, eyes sparkling. “Guess what?” she confided. “Lloyd is innocent!”
“You don’t say?” Jay’s quizzical half-smile made her want to swat him.
“I do say.”
“It must be true, then.”
“Oh, fiddle-dee-dee.” Suze tossed her hair—or tried to. Unfortunately, eight inches or so were missing. “If you can’t be serious, I won’t tell you all.”
Jay raised his eyebrows at her. “Seriously, could I stop you?”
Over the retsina she regaled him with the Sheri/Bernie minidrama, and explained how she was going to redeem herself with Lloyd. “Schneider Fox is crazy to have let him go. I’m sure he’s been set up. Now we’re going to prove it.”
“We?”
“Lloyd and me, of course. He’s already started to work out the most fantastic plan. We’ll both have to be incredibly brave and brilliant, and I expect it will all end in disaster but—”
“But what?”
“I don’t know—but it’s such fun, I suppose. There’s nothing like working really hard on a project with someone who’s absolutely on your wavelength, and you keep egging each other on to more and more wonderful ideas.” She laughed and settled back in her chair. “It’s so funny, the way I imagined him when I started this exchange—a fat American businessman, aged about 112, and dull, dull, dull.” She clutched Jay’s arm in mock panic. “He’s not dull, is he? Swear to me he’s not dull.”
“How could any friend of mine be dull?” Jay looked shocked at the very idea. “I tried to tell you before that you were wrong about Lloyd, but you were so wrapped up in your new boyfriend you wouldn’t listen. How is Mr. White, by the way? Good weekend?”
