The Loves of Harry Dancer

by Lawrence Sanders

  They lie in the darkness. Holding each other.

  “Call the paramedics,” he says. “Tell them to bring stimulants and oxygen. Oh, Sal…That was too much.”

  “No,” she says. “Not enough. Let’s do it again.”

  “In about five years. I should be recovered by then.”

  “I told you that you’d like it in the darkness.”

  “I did. You were disembodied. Weird sensation. Where did you learn these tricks?”

  She doesn’t reply. But snuggles closer. Hugging him.

  “I want to do everything for you,” she says. “Everything.”

  “You just did.”

  “No, not that. I mean I want to be the kind of woman you want me to be.”

  “You are, darling.”

  “And you love me? In your way?”

  “I do.”

  “Say it.”

  “I love you, Sal. In my way.”

  “That’s all right then,” she says. Contented. “Don’t ever stop.”

  34

  At the debriefing, Briscoe is furious. “Why didn’t you turn on the lights? The cameras got nothing.”

  Sally Abaddon has prepared for this. “Look, this is a very conservative man. A real square. He wanted the lights off. What am I supposed to do—argue with him?”

  “Well, what did you do?”

  “We went to bed, he got his jollies, and left. You saw him go, didn’t you?”

  “Did he ball you?” Shelby Yama asks. “Or did you ball him?”

  “He made love to me. That’s the way he likes it.”

  “Well, what did he say?” Briscoe demands.

  “The two of you were whispering so much the mikes hardly picked up a word.”

  “Mostly he kept saying, ‘I love you, I love you, I love you.’”

  “That’s great,” Yama enthuses. “It’s going according to the script. We better start thinking about closing the deal and signing him on.”

  “No,” Briscoe says, “not yet. I want this guy so befuddled he doesn’t know which way is up. Have you tried the drugs?”

  “I tried,” Sally lies. “He’s not interested. I told you—a very conventional man. Especially sex-wise. Kinky stuff turns him off.”

  “Your job is to turn him on,” Briscoe says. “This thing is taking too much time. He should be signed, sealed, and delivered by now.”

  “I don’t want to spook him,” Sally says. “You’ll have to let me do it my way.”

  Briscoe is not convinced. Abaddon continues to worry him. He senses weakness there. If she becomes unmoored, the Dancer case could be a debacle for the Department.

  He meets with the Director and Ted Charon, head of Internal Security. At Briscoe’s request, case officer Shelby Yama is not asked to attend.

  “I tell you Abaddon is becoming unglued,” Briscoe argues.

  “You mentioned these suspicions before,” the Director says. “But you have no hard evidence?”

  “No, sir. Just a lot of little things. Feelings. Impressions. I believe she’s thinking of going over.”

  “That would be a disaster,” the Director says. “After all our work. The funds expended. Any ideas, Ted?”

  “We could test her,” Charon says. “Bring in an agent provocateur. Briscoe, does Sally have any close women friends?”

  “Not that I know of.”

  “Well, I’ve got a woman in my section who specializes in assignments like this. Her name’s Angela Bliss. Isn’t that a great name for a Department operative? Anyway, she works out of Chicago. I don’t believe she’s ever served with Abaddon, but we can ask Cleveland to check the records and make sure.”

  “You want to sic this Angela Bliss onto Sally?” the Director asks. “Get close to her and try to find out it she’s thinking of turning?”

  “Not exactly, sir. Angela plays a more active role than that. She deliberately tries to switch the agent. A devil’s advocate, so to speak.”

  “Briscoe,” the Director says, “what do you think?”

  “Let’s do it. I haven’t been able to come up with anything better.”

  “All right. But hold off, Ted, until I get a go-ahead from the Chairman. He has to approve all transfers of personnel from one region to another.”

  “This Angela Bliss,” Briscoe says to Charon, “is she good at her job?”

  “The best,” he says.

  35

  Shoofly agents of the Corporation (Martin Frey) and the Department (Angela Bliss) arrive in Fort Lauderdale on the same day. Both are briefed, given their assignments. It is understood that Frey will report to Tommy Salvo, head of Counterintelligence in Washington. Bliss will report to Ted Charon in Southeast Region headquarters.

  Frey rents a small apartment in the beachfront complex where Evelyn Heimdall lives. Tony Glitner drives him to the tennis club in Boca. Points out Evelyn, taking a lesson from the pro.

  “There’s your target,” he tells Frey.

  The agent stares. “All right, I’ve got her. Does she swim in the ocean or use that pool at the apartment house?”

  “Usually the pool.”

  “Fine! I’ll try to make contact there.”

  Glitner starts to say something, then stops. He doesn’t like what they’re doing to Evelyn. But recognizes the need.

  An hour later, Martin Frey is lying on a padded redwood lounge on the lawn surrounding the apartment house pool. He is wearing shiny black briefs. Body of a swimmer. Wide shoulders, long muscles. Olive-skinned. Jetty hair combed straight back from smooth brow. He could have Indian blood—or south Italian. Fierceness there.

  He is in and out of the water several times. Easily doing fifty laps in the short pool. Pulls himself out with an effortless heave of arms and shoulders. Shakes his long black hair like a dog. Combs it back with his fingers.

  There is one middle-aged couple. An older man by himself. Two nymphets come by for a quick dunk. Splashing and giggling. Then run down to the beach. Frey watches tanned legs flashing in the sunlight.

  He is about to give up for the day. But Evelyn Heimdall comes out of the back door. She is wearing a white lace coverup, gladiator sandals. Carrying a yellow beach bag. Frey lies back, clasps hands on his chest. Watches her through half-closed eyes.

  She takes a lounge at the other end of the pool. Spreads a big towel on the pad. Takes off sandals, coverup. Wearing a yellow string bikini. She begins to oil herself. There is something about the way she does it. Caressing, Frey decides.

  He stands, surface dives, begins to glide back and forth in an easy crawl. As he makes his turn at her end of the pool, he notes that she is watching him as she anoints her legs with oil.

  He comes out of the water. Shakes himself. Dries off. He looks about uncertainly. Then he walks toward her, bouncing lightly. She is wearing sunglasses now, tinted lens turned to him.

  “I beg your pardon,” he says. Dazzling smile. White teeth gleaming against dark skin. “I’m new here. Could you tell me if there’s anyplace I can get a cold drink?”

  “I’m afraid not,” Evelyn Heimdall says. “You must bring your own. But no bottles or glasses allowed in the pool area. That means cans and plastic cups.”

  “Oh,” he says, “next time I’ll know. Thank you.”

  “You swim beautifully,” she says.

  It’s that easy.

  36

  Angela Bliss has no greater trouble, in almost identical circumstances. Briscoe rents a room for her in Sally Abaddon’s motel. Helps her move in. Gives her the number of Sally’s suite.

  “You can’t miss her,” he says. “Tall blonde. Big all over. Long hair. You’ve seen her ID photo?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then you’ll have no problem. She usually works on her tan every afternoon. You can watch the pool area from your bedroom window.”

  “Good enough,” Bliss says. “I’ll take it from here.”

  She bolts the door after he leaves. Undresses, dons a conservative white maillot. She puts on reading glasses
, goes over Sally Abaddon’s dossier again. Woman sounds straight—but you never know.

  Angela Bliss is thin, bony. A board, without discernible bosom or hips. Russet hair in a boy’s cut. Eyes a milky blue. Knife nose and hard lips. Everything about her is sharp, cleaving. Her only vanity is her hands: long, supple, beautifully shaped. Nails are painted bloodred.

  She goes into the bedroom several times to peer out the window. Finally she sees Sally Abaddon spreading a towel on a plastic web chair. It is placed in the sun, near a metal table with a wide beach umbrella. Abaddon is wearing a flesh-colored diaper suit. Nothing between her legs but a narrow strip. She looks naked.

  Bliss inspects the pool area. There are two other umbrella tables, both occupied. She puts on a voile coverup, sandals, wide-brimmed hat. Hangs a canvas beach bag from her shoulder.

  Steps outside her living room door. Walks around to the pool. Abaddon is smoothing lotion onto her shoulders and arms. Bliss glances about, then walks hesitatingly up to the target.

  “I beg your pardon,” she says. Timid smile. “I wonder if I might share your table.”

  “Help yourself,” Sally says. Laughs. “I can only sit in one chair at a time.”

  “Thank you.” Angela Bliss says. “What a beautiful, beautiful tan you have.”

  “I spend a lot of time on it.”

  “I’m so pale. But I’m determined to get some color. Just to prove to the folks back home that I’ve been in Florida. Will you tell me what suntan lotion to use?”

  “Be glad to.”

  “My name is Angela,” Bliss says. “What’s yours?”

  37

  The Chairman, seated in his thronelike chair in the Department’s Cleveland War Room, reads through the latest intelligence on current actions. It is the daily computer printout. A final summary gives the previous day’s score: fourteen successes, twelve failures. Too close for comfort, the Chairman decides.

  He turns back to the Harry Dancer campaign. Its complexity fascinates him. He is happy to see the Internal Security agent has made contact with Sally Abaddon. That should effectively thwart the possibility of betrayal by that lady.

  But he’s bemused by the report of the Department’s agent assigned to observe the activities of Evelyn Heimdall. Apparently she has made a new friend. Young man. Handsome. The agent has observed them together on several occasions. Talking. Laughing. Swimming. Walking the beach. The man’s name is Martin Frey.

  In the Chairman’s world, things rarely happen by chance. He summons the floor supervisor, requests an Intelligence rummage on Martin Frey. He waits patiently. About twenty minutes later, a printout is brought. He scans it swiftly. Frey is a Corporation agent attached to Counterintelligence.

  The Chairman pulls at his rubbery lower lip. Deliberating. It is possible, of course, that Heimdall knows who Frey is, and the Counterintelligence agent has been assigned to her as backup or bodyguard. But the Chairman doesn’t think so.

  He believes the Corporation is worried about Heimdall’s loyalty. Martin Frey has been assigned to test her. The same reason Angela Bliss was sicced onto Sally Abaddon. The Department and the Corporation are making similar operational moves. Their secret war demands it.

  The Corporation’s Chief of Operations has come to the same conclusion. Anthony Glitner reports that Willoughby, assigned to cover Sally Abaddon, says that the Department’s agent has a new friend. A woman living in her motel. Name: Angela Bliss. Physical description is given.

  The Chief runs the name through the computer. Within minutes he has the answer: Angela Bliss is an agent provocateur. Working in the Department’s Internal Security Section. Home base: Chicago. So the Department is as concerned about its field agent as the Corporation is about theirs.

  Chairman and Chief ponder their next moves. In this struggle, inaction is tantamount to defeat. Both men believe their basic strategies are sound, but tactics must be revised to take into account the presence and activities of the new players.

  Each begins to plot how he might best take advantage of the other’s weakness. And, as not infrequently happens in the world of espionage and counterespionage, unwittingly the primary purpose of the campaign takes second place to the stimulation and intellectual challenge of opposing game plans.

  38

  Harry Dancer is going through a curious metamorphosis. His intimacy with Evelyn Heimdall and Sally Abaddon, instead of dimming recollections of his deceased wife, has sharpened memories. They have moved into the present tense.

  Sylvia and he bed together several times before she proposes. He accepts. They spend an inebriated evening planning the wedding (small) and the honeymoon (grand). Suddenly Harry stops grinning, sobers, stares at her.

  “Syl,” he says, “I’m scared.”

  “Why so?”

  “Marriage is new. You know? Something different. Something I’ve never done before.”

  “I haven’t either, but I’m not scared. You want to back out so soon?”

  “Oh no. No. Syl, do you think it will change things?”

  “What things?”

  “Between us.”

  She considers that. “Probably,” she decides. “So far it’s all been fun and games—right? Now a preacher says a few words, and we sign a contract. Sure, things will change between us. Got to. But I think we can hack it. Don’t you?”

  “I’m going to give it the old college try. I swear to God I am.”

  “Me, too. You’re right, Harry; it’s not going to be easy. We’ve both lived alone a long, long time. Adjustments…”

  He nods. “A lot of little things. Toothpaste tubes squeezed in the middle or the end. Toilet paper coming off the roll over or under. Dishes in the sink. Stupid things. Not important. Not worth fighting about. We’ll be able to laugh them all away. What bothers me is our love for each other. Will that fade when we’re married? We’ve never been together for more than, oh, maybe twenty-four hours. What happens when we live in the same house? Together—until death do us part?”

  “Don’t look for trouble,” she advises. “We’re not a couple of teenagers. We’ve both been around. It’ll be give and take, won’t it? The way I see it, Harry, we’ll both be making a sacrifice. Giving up a piece of ourselves. But in return we get a third entity. There will be you, me, and our marriage. With work and a little bit o’ luck, the marriage will become more important to us than our own selves.”

  “That’s a happy thought,” he says. Taking her into his arms. “You’re going to be good for me, Syl; I just know it.”

  “I’m going to love you to death,” she says. “You’ll see.”

  The wedding ceremony is decorous and moving. Dancer is shocked at Sylvia’s beauty. It is not only the shimmering white gown, the veil. It is her luminescence. She is a stranger to him. Ethereal. He kisses a wraith, fearing she may dissolve.

  The reception at the club is a rowdy lark. All that booze. Suggestive jokes. Nudges and smirks. They move through it all. Smiling, smiling. Then, hand in hand, duck out the back door. Drive to the Lauderdale airport. In time to catch their flight to LaGuardia.

  “Congratulations!” the stewardess says.

  “Who told you?” Sylvia demands.

  “No one. You just have that look.”

  When she moves away, Sylvia asks him: “What look is that?”

  “Stupefied,” he says.

  They have a suite high up in the New York Hilton. Harry has arranged for flowers and champagne. He doesn’t neglect to carry her over the threshold.

  “Instant hernia,” he says.

  They stand at the window, clasping each other’s waist. Look down at the glittering city.

  “Want it?” Harry says. “It’s yours.”

  “Nah,” she says. “Too small. I want you.”

  “I’d like you to know that I realize this is your wedding night, and I promise to be ever so tender and gentle and understanding.”

  “Go fuck yourself,” she says.

  They go out for dinner at a stea
k joint on the East Side. Take a carriage ride through Central Park. Stop at the Oak Bar at the Plaza for a brandy stinger. Then cab back to the hotel.

  “I’m wiped out,” Sylvia says. “It’s been a long day.”

  “Oh-ho. First night, and you’ve got a headache.”

  She laughs. “I could have convulsions, and I wouldn’t miss this. How often does a girl get shtupped on her wedding night?”

  Still dressed, they come close. He tries to tell her how he felt when he saw her floating down the aisle to him.

  “I knew then,” he says, “knew it, that we were doing absolutely the right thing. We can’t miss, babe.”

  “I love you, Harry.”

  “I love you, Sylvia.”

  They shower together. First time they had ever done that.

  “Hey,” she says, “how long has this been going on? It’s great.”

  “I invented it,” he tells her. “Syl, if I can’t get it up tonight, I’m going right out the window.”

  “Don’t give it a second thought,” she says. Then adds: “Just concentrate on the first.”

  She is right: it had been a long day. With a heavy emotional charge. They lie naked in each other’s arms. Talking, talking. The wedding. Reception. How guests looked. What they said. And did you see…? And did you hear…?

  Suddenly—blackout. They are both asleep. Clinging. Dancer wakes first. Groggy. It takes a half-minute before he remembers who he is, where he is, who this woman is, what he has done. He glances at their travel clock. Almost four-thirty in the morning. He slides carefully out of bed. When he returns from the bathroom, she is awake.

  “Wasn’t that great?” he asks her. “Wasn’t that the most marvelous lovemaking you’ve ever had?”

  “Beast,” she says. Reaching for him with bare arms.

  It is an idyll. Lighthearted and without care. They come together in joy. Nuzzling.

  “Gosh, Mommy,” she says, “now I’ve got someone to play with. This is keen.”

  Her body is tanned. Hard. Muscle under satin. He touches her with wonder. Realizing she is suddenly new to him.

  “Sweetheart…“he says.