Memory (Hard Case Crime)

by Donald E. Westlake

  Helen said, “Sit down, honey. Right over there.”

  Cole’s discomfort was steadily growing. The doorman, the low-ceilinged foyer, the silent elevator, the furnishings of this place, the maid, the heavy cordiality of Helen Arndt...and the square of shiny metal. Sitting down, he said, “I’ve been here before, haven’t I?”

  “Well, of course!” Sitting across from him, she smiled possessively. “Does it all look familiar?”

  “No, but down—”

  The maid came in, with two small glasses of tomato juice. She left again, and Helen raised her glass, saying jokingly, “Cheers.”

  “Oh. Cheers.”

  From then on, throughout the meal, there was little chance to talk. He wanted to ask her about that mobile downstairs, though now he was pretty sure it wasn’t the mobile itself that disturbed him but something else from his past that the mobile was reminiscent of, but he would have to wait till after dinner. The maid was constantly in and out, bringing and taking plates, and Helen was chatting about the current theatrical season, about which Cole knew nothing.

  The meal was delicious, but his discomfort kept him from enjoying it properly. He didn’t like being waited on—he wasn’t in a restaurant now—and whenever he glanced across at Helen her eyes were gleaming at him. The expression in her eyes bore no connection with the idle chatter coming from her mouth.

  There was a complex sort of pastry sculptured with berries for dessert, and when it was finished Helen told the maid, “We’ll have our coffee in the living room.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Come along, Paul.”

  She took his hand again, as she preceded him to the living room. On one side, two long sofas were angled together in a V, with a triangular coffee table between them, and this is where they sat, each on a sofa. The maid brought in a serving tray, holding a rococo coffee pot and sugar bowl and creamer and demitasse cups. Helen poured, and the moment was full of incongruities; the movements and symbols implied tea and yet they were drinking coffee; they implied an attitude of restraint and serenity contradicted by Helen’s feral eyes and loose-fitting Oriental gown. Helen said, “That’s all, Ruth,” and the maid went away for the final time.

  “Now. Tell me about yourself. What have you been doing the last few weeks?”

  “Not very much. I’m collecting unemployment insurance.”

  “And your memory’s just the same as ever. What did Doctor Edgarton say?”

  “I had X-rays a couple of days ago. He said we’d find out after that.”

  “I have utter faith in that man. Just put yourself totally in his hands.”

  “I will.”

  They talked a while longer, but the conversation never became easy and relaxed. Mostly, she asked him questions about his activities; some things he told her and some things he hid. He told her about Nick and the party and the fight, but not about Rita. Even when he was making full answers of her questions, he was slow and hesitant, with little gaps and silence between his words.

  They finished their coffee, and the conversation, faltering to begin with, died away. They sat looking at one another a while, Helen half-smiling, her legs tucked up under her on the sofa, her hands at ease in her lap. Cole was acutely embarrassed; the apartment seemed full of echoing silences. Somewhere, in some cubicle, the maid was still present. All he could think to talk about was the bad weather they’d been having lately, and even silence was better than that.

  It was Helen who finally broke the silence, getting to her feet in a solid and graceless movement, saying, “Would you like to see my view? Come along.”

  He went with her, across the living room to the French doors. She pulled two of them open—the movement was reminiscent of her earlier pouring of the coffee—and stepped out onto a narrow empty terrace. “In the summer I have furniture out here, and plants along there. Look.”

  They stood at the brick railing and Cole looked out at her view. The terrace faced south; he looked over the roofs of a few low buildings, then past and among other tall apartment buildings like this one, and far away there was a red and yellow glow that must be midtown.

  “On a clear day,” she said, laughing, “you can see Central Park, way down to the right there.” She suddenly embraced his arm, pressing herself against him. “Brrr, it’s cold! No time of year for terraces. Come on back in.”

  She released his arm, but took his hand again, and they went back inside. She shut the doors and laughed in a forced and artificial way. “No Eskimo blood in me! Do you remember how to make a highball, dear?”

  “I don’t know, I’m not sure.”

  “Come along. I’ll make the first, and you watch how it’s done.”

  She led him to an anonymous piece of furniture against a side wall. It was mahogany, very broad, about four feet high, with squarish doors on the front. More than anything else, it looked like a TV-radio-phonograph console. But it turned out to be a bar; she opened doors and revealed ranks of bottles, ranks of glasses, and a small refrigerated compartment for ice cubes. “I like ginger ale,” she said, “but you never did. You liked vichy water. So here’s some specially for you. Now. Pay attention, honey, from now on this is your job.”

  He paid attention. She told him what she was doing as she was doing it, and it wasn’t complicated at all. Into a glass she put ice cubes and whiskey and mixer, that was all. Ginger ale for herself, soda water for him. She handed him his glass with a flourish, and they went back to the V of sofas again.

  This time she sat next time him on the same sofa, though a foot or two away. She sipped at her drink, then put it down on the coffee table and said, “You’re awfully quiet, sweetie. Cat got your tongue?”

  Cole was quiet because his embarrassment and discomfort hadn’t lessened at all. They had, in fact, increased, when she’d grabbed his arm out on the terrace. But now he had to say something, so he cleared his throat and said, “I guess I just don’t have anything to talk about.”

  She shook her head, a sad smile on her lips. “I hope you break out of this pretty soon, sweets,” she said. “I’ve got a lot invested in you. I mean, aside from humanitarian considerations, of course.”

  “Invested?” He frowned, not knowing what she meant; did he owe her money?

  “It’s like talking to a babe in the woods. Honey, you’re beginning to make me feel absolutely ancient. The first thing you know, I’ll start mothering you, which would be embarrassing for you and ridiculous for me. I’m not the mother type. Drink your nice drinky, it’ll help you relax.”

  He obediently swallowed some of the highball, and she said, “I’ll tell you what I mean by invested. Most of my clients aren’t wee beginners, you know. At this very moment, I have twelve clients performing on Broadway.” She looked at her watch, and nodded. “Yes, at this very moment. Beginning act three, most of them. And then there’s television, and motion pictures, and God knows what all. My client list is first-rate, honey, believe me.”

  “Then why were you my agent?”

  “That’s what I’m going to tell you. Every once in a while, dear, I take on a newcomer, such as you. It’s a calculated risk, a speculation. If I’m right about you, and you eventually make it very big, you should be more than grateful to me, and it should be very difficult for some other nasty agent to steal you away from me. You see? In the early years, I handle you at a loss, but if you turn out to be a winner, then it all comes back with interest.”

  “I didn’t know that.”

  “I don’t suppose,” she said, “you’ve brought in even a thousand dollars in commissions yet, and I’ve spent at least twice that on you, in phone calls and lunches and God knows what all.”

  He finished his drink and gazed gloomily across the room. “I wish my memory would come back,” he said.

  “Of course you do!” She rested a hand on his arm. “Don’t get feeling bad, honey, I wasn’t trying to depress you. Your memory will come back, don’t you worry.”

  “I wish it would hurry.” />
  “Make us fresh drinks, why don’t you?”

  He made the fresh drinks, remembering how to do it, and irritated at being pleased by remembering, and when he was seated again on the sofa she said, “Have you seen Robin Kirk at all?”

  “Robin Kirk?” He remembered the name vaguely, from somewhere. Nick had mentioned it, or maybe Rita, he wasn’t sure.

  “Your teacher,” she said. “Acting teacher. You haven’t been in his class for a year or more, but I’m sure he’d be glad to see you again. He might even be able to help you.”

  “I’d forgotten about him.”

  “You go see him. I tell you what, I’ll call him tomorrow and tell him about you. All right?”

  “All right, sure.” He smiled for the first time since coming into this apartment: here was something to do. At least one more day when he’d be able to escape the routine, get out of the apartment. He’d go see his old acting teacher, yes.

  She patted his knee. “We’re all rooting for you, honey,” she said. “Doctor Edgarton, and Robin, and me. We’re all in your corner.” She smiled at him and squeezed his knee.

  His pleasure was scattered by confusion; he wasn’t sure what was expected of him. Did she want him to go to bed with her? He’d been avoiding even thinking the thought, because if that was what she wanted he had no idea what to do about it. He didn’t want to go to bed with her, he was sure of that much, but how could he avoid it without getting her mad at him?

  But then she took her hand from his knee, and leaned back on the sofa, and began to talk again. She started to tell him stories about her other clients; clients she had stolen from other agents, clients other agents had stolen from her, clients who had gotten in trouble with Equity or with the law or with each other, clients who had been—like Cole—speculative gambles taken on before their subsequent rise to success, clients who drank too much, clients who played around too much. From time to time she told him to drink up, or to go make fresh drinks, and then on she would go with the stories. There were no uncomfortable pauses now, because she didn’t wait for him to add anything to the conversation, and all he had to do was sit and listen.

  For a while, even just listening was difficult, because with the thought of sex in his mind had come the memory of Edna. He was alone with Helen now just as he had been alone with Edna, the two of them sitting together on a couch in a living room, alone, but other than that there was no similarity between the occasions at all. With Edna he had wanted sex. And would Helen, under any circumstance at all, shyly ask to have the lights turned out?

  Thinking about Edna always irritated him. He felt angry and impatient with himself whenever that girl came back in this mind, and she was forever returning. Sometimes, cleaning the apartment, he would suddenly realize that his fantasies about his past and future had somehow altered into fan- tasies about Edna. Sometimes, seeing a good-looking girl on the street or the subway, he would find himself thinking about Edna, remembering that evening alone with her and the other evenings when he’d walked her home and necked with her a while on her front porch. Everything else from that time was fading and fading; all but Edna. It infuriated him. What did he care about Edna? Nothing. Why should his mind, with so many things of more importance to exert itself over, constantly fill itself with useless imaginings about that girl from the one meaningless period of his life?

  It was his irritation over the presence of Edna in his mind once again, and a desire to wash her away into oblivion, that made him down the highballs faster, and make the fresh ones increasingly strong. And it did, after a while, begin to work; the memories of Edna faded slowly from his mind, and he found that he was concentrating with unusual lucidity on Helen’s stories. He was enjoying the stories, too, and enjoying being here. He was relaxing, after having been so tense for so long, and he couldn’t remember ever having felt so pleasant and so content.

  Helen’s stories, as time went on, began to change slightly, to alter, to become steadily more sexual. Her expression, of face and wording, were becoming...roguish. Her hand was more frequently on his knee.

  He didn’t care. He wasn’t aroused at all, felt no stirrings of desire; his only feeling was contentment. A slight loss of equilibrium when he made the frequent trips for fresh drinks didn’t bother him; he found it funny.

  He was beginning to lose the thread of her conversation. His concentration, which had seemed to get clearer and stronger than ever for a while, had now dwindled away completely. But he laughed whenever she laughed; not merely to be polite, but because he felt like laughing.

  Time seemed to rush by, faster and faster. She told him, at one point, that her twelve clients currently acting on Broadway were all taking their curtain calls right about now. Later—he didn’t know how much later, maybe a few seconds or maybe a few weeks—she cleaned close to him, her shoulder against his arm, and winked at him as she told him her twelve clients were undoubtedly all in their trundle bed by now. “Or somebody’s trundle bed,” she said, and winked again, and squeezed his knee. He laughed, because she was smiling, and because he felt like laughing.

  A while later, a physical problem came along to mar his contentment. He tried to ignore it a while, but it just got worse, so finally he turned his head and whispered, “Bathroom.”

  “Gotta go wee-wee?”

  He nodded solemnly. She nodded to him, and looked judicious, and said, “Come, I’ll show you the way.” She spoke with exaggerated care.

  He had trouble getting to his feet, which struck them both funny. They laughed, leaning on each other, and moved across the living room. Cole murmured to himself, “I’m pretty drunk.” He nodded; he didn’t mind being drunk at all. There was no longer anything to worry about.

  She said, “What? You said something, honey?”

  “I’m drunk.”

  “Lord, so am I.”

  They moved from room to room, Helen switching on lights as they went, till they came to a bedroom, a huge square room dominated by a double bed covered with a purple quilt. She pointed unsteadily at a door beyond the bed. “Right through there. All the comforts of home.”

  “Thank you.” He made a comic bow, and smiled blearily.

  All at once she embraced him, folding her arms around him and kissing him hungrily. He smiled through the kiss, thinking it was funny, and closed his arms around her because he was afraid of losing his balance.

  “Hurry back. You hear?” Her voice was a husky whisper.

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  He made it around the bed and through the door to the bathroom. He found the light switch beside the doorway, clicked it on, and shut the door.

  He was longer than he’d expected to be, because his coordination was bad. The light was very strong in the bathroom, reflecting from coral tiles all around him. As he stood there, he felt the first twinges of a headache, and squinted. But he still wasn’t thinking clearly.

  When he came back to the bedroom, she was supine on the bed, limbs spread out, fast asleep. He stood looking down at her, trying to understand why she was asleep, and trying to decide what he was supposed to do now.

  He should go home, probably. He was very very drunk, and he knew it. And so was she; she’d passed out. So he ought to go home.

  He sat on the side of the bed and leaned over her and mumbled, “Good night, I had a very nice time.”

  She stirred, and smiled, and murmured. Still more asleep than awake, she raised her arms in a slow and fuzzy movement, but the weight of her arms was too much for her; her hands slid down his chest and fell again to her side.

  He felt very friendly toward her, very comfortable. He patted her cheek gently. “A very nice time,” he repeated. Then he got up from the bed.

  His sense of direction was gone. He wandered around the apartment a while, through all the rooms she had lit on their way to the bedroom, and discovered his coat by accident, draped over a chair in a small room containing a television set and several bookcases. He struggled into the coat, and lumbered on, a
nd found the living room, and from there the front door. He rode down in the elevator, and walked along the mirror-lined hallway, stopping halfway to look at himself and grin. He had lipstick smeared across his face. He rubbed at it with his fingers, but didn’t do much good. He gave his reflection an exaggerated shrug, and a salute, and moved on.

  In the foyer, his eyes fell on the mobile, and the square of shiny metal. A sudden rage filled him and he shouted, “Bastard! Rotten bastard!” He ran across the foyer and slapped at the gleaming square, and the mobile rattled and clanged and trembled.

  The doorman came, indignantly, and threw him out.

  24

  Across the street, something had been torn down, just recently, along the whole length of the block. Behind a temporary fence constructed of green and gray doors, tilting drunkenly, black machines and men in yellow helmets moved minutely across a plain of pulverized brick.

  It was Friday, the afternoon after the evening with Helen Arndt, and Cole was on Varick Street in lower Manhattan, a street of warehouse lofts and squat old office buildings. He was on his way to see Robin Kirk, his old acting teacher.

  Helen had called this morning a little after eleven. There had been an artificial brightness to her voice, and she had talked jokingly about how drunk they got together last night, and seemed somehow to be asking questions with direct statements, as though she wanted him to tell her something about last night, but he couldn’t understand what. “We’ll have to get together again soon, honey,” she said. “And this time I guess I better not get quite so drunk. I don’t want to miss anything.” And she laughed, a brittle sound.

  “I’ve got a real headache myself today,” he said, not knowing what else to say.

  They talked—aimlessly, it seemed to Cole—about the evening a while longer, and then she suddenly became brisk, saying, “I called Robin Kirk for you. Remember? I said I would.”

  “My old teacher.”

  “That’s right. Good boy, you remembered. He said you can come by any time at all. This afternoon, if you want.”