“I tried hard, very hard, to make up to him for all the humiliation. He tried hard, too. It was just …” Again her voice faded on the night air.
She was being remarkably objective about her late husband, I thought. Almost clinically detached.
“He was a good boy, really, a nice, quiet, ambitious young man. I know you think he wanted only to go back to camp and tell the others he wasn’t a virgin anymore.”
“Kids that haven’t had any sex are a target for crude humor in the barracks.” I thought about my own case. No one had ever guessed the truth about me. “Unless they’re sophisticated enough to fake it.”
“But you’re not being fair to him.” Her voice was rising. “He wouldn’t have … unless he thought I wanted …”
“Sure, you wanted affection, Andrea, we all do.”
“The night’s so beautiful that you won’t even argue with me … Yes, I wanted affection desperately. That doesn’t justify …”
“This God you want me to believe in, does He demand justification for everything?”
“If I had been a little stronger that night”—her voice was bitter—”he would still be alive, with all his life ahead of him.”
“How do you figure that?” I demanded. “How were you responsible for him being on the Indianapolis? You’re worse than I am.”
“But I—” She stopped short, a revelation cut off. A damning revelation?
She swallowed a big gulp of cognac. “I could become an alcoholic very easily.”
“I don’t think so.”
“Not with this stuff, it’s too expensive. Cheap wine, maybe.”
“Your tastes are too good for cheap wine.”
She stumbled from her chair again.
“You think I’m dramatizing myself again?”
“Now you are not reading my mind!”
“I think I’d better go to bed now.” She yawned. “You made me drink too much and now you’re confusing me.” She walked toward the French door and the balcony. “It’s pretty out here, like the whole sky is on fire with love.”
“Be sure you shake out your shoes in the morning. Scorpions can get in them at night. I don’t want to have to bring you to a hospital on the way to Phoenix.”
“Scorpions!”
“Little brown bugs with claws and poisonous stings in their tail. The venom won’t kill you, but it will make you real sick.”
“I don’t care.” She swayed at the French door. “Good night, Commander.”
She strolled uncertainly toward the bathroom.
Now what was all that about? I wondered as I pondered the silence of the desert night. There’s a lot she isn’t telling me.
I should phone home and do my journal. And get some sleep. I was drowsy, it had been a long day—heat, high emotions, a hard drive, too much to drink. And I didn’t have a nap either.
Well, at least the sexual challenge had been surmounted. No lovemaking tonight.
Wearily I walked into the parlor and asked the hotel operator to put through a call to Chicago.
Only Packy was at home.
“Mom said you were going to bring a gorgeous babe home from Arizona for the Harvest Festival,” he began with characteristic verve. “That I gotta see.”
“What she probably said was that if I found one, I would try to bring her home.”
“Yeah. Probably. I like my version better. Well?”
“Well what?”
“Have you found one?”
“How can you be a seminarian and have women on your mind so much?”
“That has nothing to do with it. So you have found her?”
“Why should I bother looking? Mother and Joanne have a whole list of names prepared for me.”
“All with down payments made on furniture. That what you want?”
“You know better than that.”
“This dream woman a blonde?”
“Redhead. Dark red, like a crisp halo.”
“No kidding … am I gonna meet her?”
“It doesn’t have any future, Packy.”
“That’s what they all say. Tell her that she will marry into a family with a superb clerical brother-in-law.”
“I’m sure she’ll fall in love instantly with my description of you.”
“I bet.”
When I hung up, I marveled at Packy’s ability to worm any secret out of me. You’ll note he didn’t ask whether I’d taken her to bed yet. That was not discretion on his part—Packy in those days was unaware of both the word “discretion” and the reality behind it.
Later, when the lines between dream and reality, between sanity and insanity had blurred, I could have asked Packy about the call. It might have established a bench mark. At that point, eleven o’clock Chicago time, July 23, 1946, did Jeremiah Thomas Keenan, late of the United States Navy, sometime commander of VF 39, sound reasonably sane and in as close touch with the hard edge of reality as he ever did.
But I forgot about the phone call until I read through my journal months later.
I turned on the reading lamp next to my chair, picked up the looseleaf notebook that served as my journal, and began to write.
I heard a terrible scream from the bathroom. Scorpion?
I rushed across the room, crashed through the door, and discovered my crisp-haloed redhead, modestly wrapped in a huge white towel, standing on the scale and pointing in terrified horror.
“A scorpion?”
“Five pounds! That terrible thing says I’ve gained five pounds. It’s lying, isn’t it?”
Bare feet, skin and hair wet from the shower, no makeup—she looked ten years old.
“You scared me,” I said reproachfully.
“That scares me.”
“You’ve been eating and drinking a lot these last two days.”
“Five pounds!”
How delightfully an adolescent girl. What was this nonsense about her being dead? She was as alive as I was.
“You’ve just had dinner. By tomorrow morning, three of those pounds will be gone. And you can lose another by taking off that towel.”
Automatically her fingers went to the top of the towel. Then she comprehended. “I will not!”
“It would have assured pleasant dreams for me, but let me show you.” I dragged her off the scale and stepped on it myself. “See, a hundred and ninety-eight in my stocking feet. Right?”
She nodded dubiously, her hands clutching the top of her impromptu sarong. Come to think of it, she looked a little older than ten.
“Now, since you are not about to lend me that towel you are clinging to like you are Dorothy Lamour, I’ll borrow this other one—which I note you have already soaked—wrap it around my admittedly less attractive frame and prove that it adds a pound to my weight. A hundred and ninety-nine, right?”
She peered at the scale. “Right, but you’re heavier than I am, so it counts for more for me.…”
“When the scale hits a hundred and twelve, we’ll begin to consider a starvation diet.”
“You’re making fun of me.”
“Who, me?” I propelled her toward the door on her side of the bathroom. “Now go to bed.”
“Yes, Commander.” She yawned.
Reassured that the child was completely human, I returned to my journal. Carefully I detailed the adventures and emotions of the day, my account slanted in the direction of making everything seem rational, ordinary, unexciting.
I suppose I was whistling in the dark.
However, the last paragraph I wrote that night is not one of which I am proud.
The girl is perfectly ordinary. My romantic imagination tries periodically to cover her with a sheen of mystery. She eats too much and drinks too much and will probably be quite disgustingly fat by the time she’s twenty-five. Her temperament is volatile, her mood erratic, her decisions impulsive. She is not without some native shrewdness and her tastes in literature are surprisingly good, though I’m not sure she understands what she reads. But she is uneduc
ated and doubtless will remain so. She’s a mildly diverting companion for a ride through the desert on a hot day, but I will be happy to deliver her to the Arizona Biltmore tomorrow afternoon. If necessary, I will tell her that I have changed my plans and instead of the Superstitious Mountains, as she persists on calling them, I am headed for the Grand Canyon—which, come to think of it, is not a bad idea. In any event, she will be out of my life by supper tomorrow night. What a relief that will be.
Afraid that I would have to make love with her?
Hell, yes. But I had passed that test by then, had I not? She was in bed and asleep, as I would be in a few minutes, after my shower.
When I showed that passage to my wife, she shrugged her shoulders. “You’re being tough on yourself again. How do you distinguish between fear and natural delicacy. You are a very delicate man, can’t help it. That’s not bad.
“That poor little child was lonely,” she continued. “She was trying to seduce you, and you were a prime target for seduction. What else did you think was going to happen?”
What indeed?
In the bathroom, I noted a pair of nylon stockings, two net panties, a garter belt and a bra hanging neatly—as neatly as such garments can—on a towel bar. The provident woman prepares for the morrow.
So she had not worn a bra at supper. And I had been too unperceptive to notice.
No, I was not much of a threat.
Packy would believe none of this should I ever tell him. But he would find it harder to believe that I got myself into this situation in the first place, than he would that I had ignored the possibilities and opportunities inherent in the situation.
Who cared what a younger brother thought?
I turned off the shower, wrapped the less-wet of the two bath towels around my waist, and turned off the light. There was no bar of light on the bathroom floor from her room.
Lights off and presumably asleep.
So, quite satisfied with myself, I dropped off to what started as a night of peaceful dreams.
CHAPTER 11
LIGHTNING CUT A SHARP GASH ACROSS THE SKY, ILLUMINING Rusty’s face and at the same time slicing it as in a swipe of a mighty saber. Then the darkness returned; another roar of thunder hit my ears. Lightning crackled again, followed by an instant roar of thunder—getting close, another typhoon maybe. I was shivering from cold, biting rain. More lightning, Rusty’s face was now permanently etched on the pale sky, blood oozing from the jagged cut that ran from his left temple down to his right jaw. Despite his pain he was laughing at me, delighting in my damnation.
I knew I was asleep, that this was another dream, but some of it wasn’t a dream. I strove desperately to fight my way out of the swamp of nightmare. Lightning sizzled again, thunder exploded simultaneously, I was drenched in icy water, the kamikaze plowed into our ship, it exploded in a mushroom ball, I jumped into the ocean, felt myself being dragged remorselessly toward the ocean floor and crashed into an honor guard from the Yamoto in their dress blues, ceremonial swords poised to strike me.
As I tried to scramble to my feet and run from them, they plunged their weapons into me. I watched in horror as my blood turned the water purple.
Then I woke up, naked, drenched, shivering, exhausted, on my bed. Where was I? What had happened?
I reached for the blanket and pulled it up over me. Why was I sleeping without any clothes or bed cover in the middle of winter?
Where were we? Headed for Hong Kong? That’s where the other typhoon hit us.
Slowly I calmed down, took stock of the room: the French windows with their thin draperies flapping in the breeze, the shape of my foldaway bed, the full moon in the western sky, ducking behind clouds, the thick, rich smell of soil after a heavy rain.
I was in Arizona; Superior, Arizona. In the Picketpost House. It had been hot when I went to bed, so I’d left the windows open, the ceiling fans on, and my shorts off. I must have kicked away the sheets when I was asleep. So the rainstorm, later today than usual, had caught me by surprise, chilled and drenched me.
Nothing abnormal.
Andrea King?
I listened in the darkness. No sound from the other room in the suite. She must be sleeping.
I was conscious then of great sexual hunger.
So what else is new?
“Yes,” said the intelligence officer, whose job was to provide situation evaluations and not moral opinions, “but have you ever been presented with such a golden opportunity?”
“Go away,” I told him. “I’m trustworthy.”
“Barely,” he replied and went away as instructed.
I struggled out of bed, staggered to the windows, and closed them. Damn climate, too hot or too cold. The storm clouds were disappearing and the moon was reasserting its dominance; white light, allegedly representing forgiveness, was glistening in pools of water on our balcony.
Had Andrea closed her windows? Was she shivering too?
Well, I told myself as I crawled back under my sheet, that’s her problem.
I settled down, commanded my muscles and nerves to relax, and hoped fervently—since I had eschewed praying for things—that I could fall back to sleep.
I had dozed off when I heard her scream.
It was not like the cry of protest over the insult from the bathroom scale, but a terrified wail, a woman being raped, tortured, murdered.
Scream after scream after scream, each more pitiable than its predecessor.
Pilots, man your planes!
I charged through the bathroom in one quick leap and banged open the door of the master bedroom.
Andrea sat, bolt upright, in the middle of the vast bridal bed, her eyes closed, her hands clasped on her chest, her eyes jammed shut, her face contorted in horror.
“No, Andrew,” she shrieked. “Please, no!”
I glanced quickly around the room, illumined in the silver light of the moon. No one there. Only a nightmare.
Who the hell was Andrew?
I hesitated. Maybe I was dreaming. Or maybe I wanted to hear the screams. Was this not some sort of cliché? Let her scream herself into wakefulness.
Our suite was the only one open on the top floor. But her screams were loud enough to be heard throughout the hotel. They’d think I was murdering my bride.
“Dear God, Andrew, don’t! I’m sorry! I tried my best! Don’t!”
Who was Andrew? Her husband was John. Her father? Her uncle?
She screamed again, so pathetically this time, as if she were resigned to death, that I didn’t care who he was. I loved her.
I vaulted onto the immense bed and gathered her into my arms. “It’s all right, Andrea, it’s all right. It’s only a dream. Wake up, no one will hurt you. It’s all right.”
She was wearing an old-fashioned white nightgown, long and elaborately lacy, simultaneously chaste and inviting. A wedding nightgown? The only one she owned? A substitute for the white wedding dress she was probably denied?
She was sobbing hysterically now, still mostly asleep and clinging to me for dear life.
“It’s all right, kid, only a bad dream. You’re safe and sound with old trustworthy Jerry Keenan in Superior, Arizona. Nothing to worry about.”
She saw me then for the first time and, despite her hysteria and the horror that had assaulted her, she managed a quick impish grin. “Barely.”
Slowly the rigid little body in my arms relaxed and became limp in my protecting embrace. “Terrible silly dream.”
“What was it about?”
“I don’t remember. They were coming for me.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.” She snuggled closer. “The demons who are waiting for me, I suppose.”
“Who?”
“The demons,” she insisted, as though I were being dense. “You know, the ones who watch me till it’s time. It will be soon now. They’re becoming impatient.”
“What are you talking about, Andrea?” I held her even closer. “No one is waiting for you. I
t’s only me.”
She shook her head as though clearing it of foolishness. “I’m sorry, Jerry, I guess I’m still half asleep.”
“It’s all right now. Nothing more to worry about.”
“Nothing more to worry about.” She laid her head on my shoulder. “The commander will take care of me. Forever and forever.”
“Amen.”
“Praying?”
“ ‘To whom it may concern.’ Or maybe ‘Occupant.’ ”
She laughed at me, tenderly, appealingly, lovingly.
I don’t quite know when in those grotesque few minutes protectiveness turned into desire, indeed desire so implacable that there was no longer a possibility, no longer a thought of resisting it. But by the time she laughed, I had passed the point of no return. The CIC in my brain signed off with a message that sounded like, “You’re on your own, buddy.”
Indeed I was.
I began to kiss her.
“More kissing? Aren’t you bored with it by now?” She shifted in my arms, preparing to absorb affection as well as protection. Her body gave no hint of either resistance or reluctance. “I can’t be that interesting?”
“I haven’t yet begun to kiss you, Andrea,” I murmured into her hair. “There’s so much more of you that I haven’t touched yet.”
“Hmm …” she murmured contentedly. “I hope I don’t disappoint you.”
“Fat chance.”
“Don’t say ‘fat’ after that mean old scale lying to me.”
I slipped the gown off her right shoulder and down her arm, exposing at long last one of her breasts. As I had expected, it was perfect: high, firm, exquisitely shaped.
She swallowed hard, leaned her head against my side, but carefully, so as not to interfere with my work.
There was no hurry, we had all the hours of night and day ahead of us. She had just emerged from horror; the journey to pleasure must be infinitely soothing, smooth, tender. For the moment all that mattered was the proper treatment of this astonishing and delicate breast.
I caressed it, fondled it, kissed it, nibbled it. I brought its pale nipple to rigid fullness. I licked the nipple, took it between my teeth, drew on it as if I were a nursing babe. Then I repeated the whole charming process time after time, always with the utmost care that every touch be tender and light. Passionate violence would come later, far down the road.
The Search for Maggie Ward Page 12
