A Kiss Before Loving

by Mack Reynolds

  “Yes, New Elba,” Bigelow went on doggedly. “So for almost five years now, Shell has stayed on here in Paris making his living as best he could.”

  “A free-loader, a tout — those men said.”

  Bigelow growled something about his two gag men, then went back to his subject. “A guide is the better word. Shell beats himself in self-disgust about his way of making a living, but actually he made a point of giving service. A knowledgeable guide can make a lot of difference in a town like Paris and, in the long run, probably saves you money, even though he does get a percentage. But we’re getting away from the point. The point is that when you wrote you were coming, Shell came to me in despair. I cooked up this whole scheme.”

  “What difference does it make?” Connie shrugged. “You were doing what you thought best, I suppose.”

  “This is the thing,” Bigelow said pointedly. “Shell’s secret has been revealed. He’s no artist. Okay, but he’s still Shell. Why don’t the two of you go back to New Elba and start all over?”

  She looked into his face and, for the first time since he had arrived, her chin trembled, and then her lips. She put her hands up suddenly to cover her face. “Do you think I haven’t considered that?” She was crying.

  Bigelow stood and went over to her, sat next to her on the bed and put his right arm around her shoulders. “Connie, Connie,” he said. “It’ll work out. Shell’s a great guy, beneath everything. One of the best.”

  She blubbered, “But don’t you understand what I’m trying to say? It’s not just this. Not just that he’s been lying for the past four years.”

  He didn’t understand. “But what’s the matter then? Everything’s solved. You can go back to Ohio together.”

  “I don’t love him,” she wailed. “I haven’t since I got here. He’s changed!”

  He stared at her. Oh Lord, what now?

  He patted her soft shoulder awkwardly. “Well … how do you think Shell feels about you?”

  “He doesn’t love me any more, either. I can tell. A woman knows. He made the motions. But … oh, if I hadn’t been such a fool. It’s too late now.”

  He was bewildered again. “What’s too late?”

  “We have to get married.” She turned toward him and put her arms around his neck and let herself collapse completely into tears.

  “But … why?”

  “Because I’m going to have a baby.” Bigelow Warren wasn’t the type whose mouth fell open, but now it did, wide, even as he patted her soothingly.

  “A baby?” he asked foolishly.

  Unashamed in her blurted confession, Connie wailed, “We slept together the other night — the night I first arrived. We both got tight and slept together and now I’m going to have a baby.”

  Bigelow Warren swallowed.

  It was at that split moment that he realized he was in love with Constance Lockwood. Talk about being unsophisticated! Here was a girl who knew so little of the facts of life that she thought love-making inevitably led to conception — almost automatically. He’d never known anyone that naïve, and he liked it.

  He swallowed again and said bluntly, determined to put her mind at ease, “Listen, Connie, you’re not going to have a baby.”

  “Yes, I am!”

  He shook his head. “No, you’re not. I took … precautions.”

  That was too much. She raised her head and shook away tears from her eyes.

  He swallowed again, patted her back and kissed her forehead gently. Oh Lord, the fat was in the fire now.

  He said doggedly, “Now listen a minute. It sounds impossible. Crazy. But, well, I came home that night. Shell was passed out on the couch. And … well … now listen, Connie, I was a bit tight too, understand? I think we were all tight … even you.”

  She was wide-eyed in her incomprehension. The tears had stopped in pure amazement.

  He went on painfully. “There’s no use trying to fancy it up. I heard a voice say, I’m ready, darling and … well … I thought Shell had brought a … streetwalker or somebody up to the suite. And … well … I thought I’d play a trick on him. The room was dark — ” Bigelow swallowed again. He couldn’t go any further.

  As he had progressed, and the eventual truth of what he was building up to became obvious, her face had drained. She said, her voice sounding far away, as though she didn’t know what she said, “I … I thought he seemed awfully big …”

  He didn’t like the way she looked, nor the way her voice sounded. She was on the verge of hysteria. This piled atop what had probably been hours of tears, anguish and worry.

  “Look,” Bigelow said. “Just a minute — ”

  He came to his feet, hurried back to his own suite and picked up the first bottle of spirits that came handy to him. He took up two glasses and hurried back to her.

  She sat, as she had when he had left, on the edge of the bed, and her face was blank.

  “But I … I’m a virgin — I mean … I was. You don’t …”

  He poured a quick dollop of the liquor — it turned out to be the Metaxa — into one of the glasses. “Look, take this, Connie.”

  She said stiffly, “Miss Lockwood. I — ”

  He ignored her, forced the glass into her hand. “Toss that back. Like medicine.”

  He half-forced the glass to her mouth, and she obeyed him, then coughed rackingly. “What … what’s that?” she sputtered.

  “Brandy,” he said, putting the bottle on the floor and sitting next to her again. “Now listen,” he said.

  “No,” she shook her head violently. “I don’t want to listen to you, Mr. Bigelow. I want to leave. I don’t want ever to see — ” Her voice was rising.

  He put his hand over her mouth, as gently as possible. Her eyes popped in indignation, but before she could do anything he got out what he wanted to say.

  “Listen, Connie Lockwood. I love you.”

  Her eyes glared for a moment, but then took on an added element of puzzlement.

  He took his hand away from her mouth.

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” she snapped.

  He said doggedly, “All right, but I’m telling you. I fell in love with you that first time — well, the second time — I saw you. Just like that. The old wheeze — love at first sight, all that sort of thing. And the longer I’ve known you, the more it’s grown. All right, now I’m going to ask you something.”

  “I — ” she managed to croak.

  “Nope. Listen to me. Up until I told you about … about the accident, you liked me, too.”

  Her lips tightened.

  “Didn’t you?”

  She said nothing, tears beginning to well up in her eyes again. Not to flow, as yet, but forming. She looked miserable beyond belief.

  Bigelow Warren reached down and got the bottle. This time he poured two drinks, one for her, one for himself. He put the glass into her hand.

  “Drink that,” he said, his voice less commanding now. “You’ve got to snap out of this shock you’re in. You know, something like an airplane pilot after cracking up his plane.”

  Confound it, that wasn’t the way to put it. She might misconstrue that to mean —

  Bigelow went on quickly, noting that the first drink had evidently loosened her up considerably, probably due to the fact that it had been taken on an empty stomach. He doubted that she’d had breakfast. He said, “We’d built up quite a friendship, until you found out about this.”

  She drank the second drink, almost defiantly. She looked at him. “What difference does it make? Don’t you understand? I’m … I’m ruined.” Her mouth began to tremble.

  “Nonsense,” he snapped. “You’d think you were a Victorian. All this nonsense about becoming pregnant just because you’d been with a man once, and this idea of being ruined. You haven’t had enough of a sex life, young lady. You’ve built up some awfully old-fashioned defenses.”

  Her eyes went down before his accusation.

  She said, her voice low, “I’ll admit I liked you …
especially after I found out that Shell and I no longer had anything between us. I guess it’s one of the reasons I felt so close to you the first time we met — ”

  She flushed. “That is, the second time we met — when we introduced ourselves.”

  “You felt that, too?” he wanted to know. Without thinking, he filled their glasses again, but while she took hers, he left his own untouched. Warren Bigelow felt no need for alcohol.

  “You mean you did?” She was wondering.

  Bigelow looked directly into her eyes. -He said, “I told you a few minutes ago, and I’m telling you again, Connie. I love you.”

  There’s something basic about that simple statement. No pussyfooting around. It puts things on a level. It’s a definite commitment.

  Her eyes went down. She said, before thinking, “Well … well, if it had to happen, I’m glad it was you.” Then she caught herself in horror, and her face flamed as it hadn’t before.

  She tried to cover with indignation. She said accusingly, as though she hadn’t already mentioned the fact, “I … I was a virgin.”

  “I should have known,” he admitted contritely. “Look, Connie, I suppose I should say I’m sorry …”

  “Well, I should think so.”

  “… but I’m not.”

  And at that point emotions snapped and Connie Lockwood was in his arms, straining against him, her mouth on his, both of them turning off reason, muttering endearments, and working toward the fulfillment they sought.

  Only one thought came momentarily to the surface in Bigelow Warren’s mind and then it, too, flushed away on the tide of passion. I can’t be doing this. Not me. Because I’m impotent except when I’m drunk and with a whore.

  Her glorious breasts where in his hands and he paid suitable homage to them. Her white legs were his to touch in admiration, to stroke, to fondle. Her hips were rounded, blended into soft darknesses and then into the narrowness of her waist.

  And all the pent up passion of ten years of virginity were his to reap.

  They were already on the bed. They had no embarrassing distance to go. He removed the nightrobe she wore from her shoulders; the hem of her gown was so high as to make that garment meaningless.

  He mounted her in love and, in full possession of all his faculties, did what he had done a few days before in drunkenness — and appreciated the difference.

  There is a popular fallacy which says the human animal needs to be educated to the act of love, that the successful penetration of woman by man can be accomplished only after the study of books or the accumulation of much experience, that otherwise one or both are unsatisfied.

  That morning it was proved otherwise.

  She moaned in the extreme pleasure his driving maleness brought to her and her every movement was instinctively right to give all she had to give, in the deepness of her woman-body.

  • • •

  He left her sleeping.

  He had come to solve problems — hers and Shell’s. But the problems solved were hers and his. He, Bigelow Warren. He who had never enjoyed a woman before, other than in drunken orgy, was now so deeply entwined in love that the world churned. His supposed impotence was a thing of the far, far past. He was in love. It would mean marriage, a home, kids — the works.

  But there was still Shell.

  Shell, who had so little in life. And here he was, Bigelow Warren, taking one of the last few possessions his friend had. His girl.

  Connie had said that she and Shell had drifted apart, but did Shell feel the same way? Bigelow couldn’t believe it. He was constitutionally unable to understand that any man could do less than adore Connie Lockwood, given the chance. It just didn’t make sense to him that Shell would no longer want her.

  Besides, hadn’t Shell gone into a rage and beat him up the night before on discovering the trick the cartoonist had pulled on him and Connie? Wasn’t that proof that Shell still loved the girl?

  Positions were reversed. Bigelow now went out on the town, trying to locate Shell Halliday.

  He phoned the Lycée Hotel on Rue Casimir DeLavigne and got old Hobbs on the line.

  Shell Halliday? No, he hadn’t been at the Lycée for nearly two weeks. What’s more, he owed Hobbs for a week’s rent. And if he knew what was good for him —

  Bigelow hung up and stared at the phone thoughtfully.

  So far as he knew, Shell was just about broke, and his luggage was still in Bigelow’s suite. That meant he’d have a hard time getting into a hotel. Which probably meant he wasn’t in a hotel. He was out on the town, somewhere.

  The big cartoonist checked his watch. It was already past noon. If Shell had been drinking since the night before, he’d have a considerable edge by this time.

  But where in the devil would he get the money for a binge? Drinking isn’t cheap in Paris even if you stuck to calvados, the French applejack, or marc, the distilled, third or fourth squeezings of wine grapes. It wasn’t cheap even if you stuck to wine, not if you were doing your drinking in bars.

  Bigelow scowled in thought. Shell was probably sponging off somebody. But who? The poor guy would get himself into a frame of mind where he’d wind up jumping off the Eiffel Tower. Bigelow grunted negatively. No, he wouldn’t be able to afford the elevator ride. He’d have to jump into the Seine.

  At any rate, the thing to do was find him.

  He kept the phone going for half an hour, ringing up those haunts where Shell was well known. It was possible that in some of the tourist bistros to which he guided the wide-eyed Bohemian-life seekers, Shell’s credit was good enough to run up a bar bill.

  He struck pay dirt at the Vieux Caveau. The weary clean-up man who answered the phone let him know that Shell Halliday wasn’t there but he had been earlier. In fact, he was the last customer to leave. They’d had to throw him out in order to close.

  Where had he gone?

  Who knew? Except that, by the looks of him, he’d gone somewhere to find another drink.

  Bigelow ran a hefty paw back through his tousled hair. If he couldn’t solve this problem, nobody could. He’d binged around Paris enough times to have been faced with the problem of where to get a drink in the early hours when the clubs were closed down and the ordinary bars not usually opened as yet.

  He got out a street map and pinpointed the Vieux Caveau on Rue Bonaparte, just off St. Germain. Okay, where were the nearest places you could get a drink?

  Not Gordon Payant’s place. It would be closed. Not the Club du Vieux-Colombier, it wouldn’t be open yet. The Deux Magots would be open, and so would the Lipp and Flore, but he knew Shell had no credit at any of these popular hangouts, and besides, they wouldn’t let anyone as swacked as Shell must be, by this time, hang around.

  Bigelow left the suite and headed for the Vieux Caveau. He would just have to start circling around until he found the fellow. Shell wouldn’t be wasting what little money he might have on taxis, so he probably hadn’t got very far.

  Bigelow was right about the St. Germain des Prés cafés. Shell wasn’t in any of them, either at a sidewalk table or inside.

  But he had one break. Manfred, back on duty as a waiter after his night in uniform as the grand duke he once was, had seen Shell not more than an hour ago. Shell had been staggering, Manfred informed the big cartoonist virtuously. He’d wanted to put a few drinks on the cuff.

  “And…?” Bigelow said.

  Manfred shrugged hugely. “The management never extends credit to an intoxicated man.”

  Biggy growled, “I don’t suppose you found it in your own goodness of heart to stand him a couple?”

  Manfred was haughtly. “I am a former member of the nobility, and at present a waiter. I am not, nor have ever been, a philanthropist.”

  “Obviously,” Biggy growled. “You didn’t see what direction Shell headed in, did you?”

  “I think he went down Rue Rennes, but I’m not sure. I’ve never seen Mr. Halliday so intoxicated.”

  Bigelow Warren had never known Shell t
o get so drunk, either. He found him, finally, in the Cielito Lindo, a pseudo-Mexican bistro on Rue des Saints-Préres, not far from the Pont du Carrousel.

  Shell had a group of eight or ten tourists around and a sketch pad on the table before him. He was swaying in his chair, but it didn’t seem to effect the accuracy of his pencil. One by one, he was doing caricatures of the American sightseers.

  Currently, he had a red-faced stereotype across from him. Loud sport jacket, two Leica cameras and an exposure meter around his neck, a checkered cap and blue suède shoes. Shell was finishing off the sketch with practiced sweeps of his pencil and the others were looking over his shoulder at the brutal cartoon and laughing hugely.

  “Oh, Jesus, that’s Harry, all right,” one chortled. “Harry, he’s got you to a tee.”

  Harry said, unhappily, “Well, he had you to a tee a minute ago. Okay, the drinks are on me.”

  “Make mine a double tequila, straight,” Shell ordered, his voice slurred.

  Harry looked down at the sketch. “Hey, that doesn’t look anything like me. I’m not that fat around the collar.”

  The others hooted at him.

  One of the women shrilled, “Do Mabel. Do Mabel next.”

  Mabel, another stereotype, wasn’t having any. “Not me. Not after what he made you look like.”

  Shell tossed the tequila back. “Who’s next?” he slurred. “Do your portrait for a drink.”

  Harry had picked his up. “Portrait?” he said unhappily. “You call this a portrait? Why, back home I’d sue you for libel.”

  The rest roared laughter again. “By Jesus, that’s Harry, okay. Let me have hold of that and I’ll send it to the paper when we get home,” one of the men hooted.

  Bigelow touched Shell on the shoulder. He looked at the others, and with a motion of his head, requested they go off. Somehow, his mien carried an air of command. Still chuckling or hooting at each other, they drifted over to the bar, four or five with their sketches in their hands, others, unflattered, left the caricatures on the table before Shell.

  “Hi, Shell,” Bigelow started.