“Do you want details? About the scrapes?”
From the way he said it, I knew I didn’t. “No, I don’t mink so,” I said. “What about Volpinex?”
“The attorney?” he asked uselessly. “He only represents one of the sisters, of course.”
“I know.”
“The one with the Z, your girl friend.”
“I know, Ralph. Give.”
“Well,” he said, “he’s a bona fide member of the New York Bar.”
“I thought he might be,” I said, “but I need something even worse. Is he a crook? A pervert? A member of the Progressive Labor party? A government spokesman?”
“Afraid not,” he said. “He’s a junior partner in the firm of Leek, Conchell & McPoo, and they think very highly of him.”
“They’re wrong.”
“Nevertheless. He was married once, but—”
“She divorced him? Extreme cruelty?”
“She died,” he said. “Automobile accident, while they were on vacation in Maine.”
“He killed her.”
“Ha ha ha,” Ralph said.
“He did, Ralph.”
Ralph said, “Art, be careful with silly things like that. You can say them to me, but some people have no sense of humor.”
“That’s hard for me to believe, Ralph.”
“A remark like that, meant all in fun, could nevertheless be construed as libel.”
I hadn’t meant it all in fun, but what was the point dragging on the conversation? I said, “Ralph, do you have anything negative about the son of a bitch at all, that I could use?”
“Sorry, Art,” he said. “He may be as big a crook as you think, but if so he’s covered his tracks.”
“He would,” I said. “He’s a smart crook.”
“They’re the toughest to get something on,” Ralph said seriously.
“You may have something there,” I said. “Well, I do appreciate everything you’ve done for me, Ralph.”
“What are friends for?” he asked, reasonably enough. “Oh, by the way, Candy told me to be sure to pass along her very best wishes on your impending marriage.”
“She did, did she? That’s sweet of her.”
“She’s a good old girl,” he said complacently, and then we said our good-byes and we both hung up, and I sat back to contemplate for a while the look that must have been in Candy’s eyes, the little crooked smile on her feline lips, when she’d sent to me through Ralph those best wishes.
Some time in the future, when I had all this twin business sorted out, I really had to take a pass through Candy’s life just once more. For old time’s sake.
AT QUARTER PAST THREE, I began my rehearsals.
I’d sent Gloria home early, I had the mirror positioned just inside the inner office door, and I stood in the doorway in front of it practicing my moves. Half-blind with my lenses out and my glasses held at waist-level in my right hand, I told my reflection, “I’ll think it over and we’ll talk tomorrow.” Then I stepped back, pulling the door shut toward me with my left hand while my right hand came up in a single robotlike gesture that slipped my glasses onto my face and continued up to tousle my hair backward from Art’s hair-forward style to Bart’s hair-back appearance.
Last night, before inserting myself in my sleeping bag here, I’d made another Bart-from-Los-Angeles phone call to Betty, telling her I was coming back to town today. She wanted to meet me at the airport, of course, but I explained I was still troubled about the rift with Art, and mat I wanted to take care of that before I saw her or did anything else. “I’ll take a cab in from Kennedy,” I’d told her, “and go see Art at the office. Why don’t you meet me there?” We set the time at four o’clock.
And by three forty-five I was ready. At first my little Balinesian dance had been stiff and uncoordinated, but practice had made it perfect, and now my movements were smooth and assured. The mirror was angled right, the door was open just so, everything was ready. All I needed was my audience.
Nerves. Opening night jitters. I left the office, walked down past the freight elevator and back up the hall, down to the elevator and back to my office, fidgeting, scratching, constantly checking the time. Was Betty the kind who would show up early, or late? Would I still be able to do my glasses-and-hair gesture with this new aching stiffness across my shoulders? Would I be able to coordinate the movements of two hands, two feet, and one mouth while twitching like a sandpiper?
Every once in a while, the freight elevator would grind into motion. I would dash back to my office, stand just inside the door, try to calm my heart and my breathing, and listen to the groans and complaints as the elevator puffed its way upward.
To a different floor.
Ten minutes to four, five minutes to four, three minutes to four.
I stood by the elevator as it went downward after yet another false alarm. The stairs were next to it, with the door propped open in violation of the fire laws. I’d told Betty to take the freight elevator, but would she come up the stairs instead? I cocked an ear, trying to hear approaching footsteps.
Whinninninninninrdnne. The elevator was coming up again. This time pretending disdain, I strolled casually back to my office and was barely out of sight when the damn thing greeked to a stop at this floor.
I’m on! I shut the outer door, crossed the office to the inner door, stood facing the doorway and the mirror. My lips and mouth were dry, and I worked at producing a little saliva, so I’d be able to speak. With my left hand on the doorknob and my right hand clutching the glasses, I looked into the mirror, past my own reflection at the corridor door. Silently I rehearsed my line: “I’ll think it over and we’ll talk tomorrow. I’ll think it over and we’ll talk tomorrow. I’ll think it—”
The corridor door opened. Betty walked in.
Now, let me tell you what Betty saw. She entered the room, and she saw Bart with his back to her in the doorway opposite, in conversation with Art. She could clearly see Art’s face, spectacleless and with hair brushed forward, beyond Bart’s right shoulder. She saw Art’s lips move, and she heard Art say, “I’ll think it over and we’ll talk tomorrow.” Then, as it seemed to her, Art pushed the door closed in Bart’s face, forcing Bart back a step. Bart moved back, turning, lifting his hand to his head in a distraught manner, and finished turning to blink through his spectacles, lower his hand again from his brushed-back hair, and say, “Betty!”
“Darling!” Betty responded, combining the joy of reunion very delicately with a sudden concern. She hurried across the room to me, saying, “Was there trouble?”
I’d previously decided my best manner at this juncture would be a slight vagueness, a distraction caused by a combination of jet lag and the argument with Art. It was a happy decision, as it turned out, because a numb befuddlement was about all I was capable of at that moment. The mirror, Artless, was just the other side of that door. An entire Artless room, in fact, was just the other side of that door. How on earth could I have hoped to get away with such a juvenile stunt? “Trouble?” I echoed. “Trouble?”
“I saw Art just now,” she said, gesturing toward that rather special door, “and he—”
“You did? You saw him, eh?”
“Of course. And it didn’t look to me as though you two were getting along.”
A great flamingo-wing smile spread across my face. I couldn’t help it, I just couldn’t help it. “Quite the contrary,” I said. By God, it had worked! “I think,” I said, “I think everything’s going to be all right.”
“But he was—I saw him—”
“I know you did, my love,” I said, and gave her a great big kiss. I didn’t even care that she wasn’t faithful to me. “Don’t worry about Art,” I told her, “that’s just his manner. He can’t come down off a mad all at once. Believe me, I know him, things are fine now. I’ll call him tomorrow and we’ll be buddies again.”
“If you say so,” she said.
“Listen, let’s get out of here,” I said. “Give h
im a chance to sulk and get it over with.”
She frowned in the general direction of the closed door. Was she thinking of going in there, arguing with Art on my behalf? No. She shook her head and said, “Well, you know him better than I do.”
I might have disputed that, but I didn’t Instead, I held the door for her, we left the office, and we rode the interminable freight elevator down down down.
As we were leaving the building, Candy was going in. She looked grim, and she brushed by us with hardly a glance. I admit I was startled, but I don’t think anything showed.
Oh, but what if she’d arrived first? What if she’d been the one to get out of the elevator and open the office door to see the twin charade? What if Betty had walked in Second, to find one brother, one mirror, and one strange woman, instead of the well-rehearsed playlet about Art and Bart? A close call, that.
Carlos and the Lincoln were out front. Betty and I got in, and as we started away it seemed to me that from the corner of my eye I saw Candy appear again in the building entrance, staring, perhaps frowning, toward our car. But I didn’t look back.
LIZ CAME TO THE OFFICE Wednesday morning. Gloria tried to announce her, but Liz barged on in and said, “Okay, I’m here. Let’s go get married.” Gloria did a discreet double take, and withdrew.
Slowly I looked up. “No,” I said.
This was two days after Betty had seen Art and Bart both at the same time, and I’d spent the intervening hours assessing my situation and coming to some firm conclusions. Such as that I definitely was not going to marry Liz.
Bart had been born on August fifth, twenty-three days ago, during my initial conversation with this bitch, and from then on I’d had practically no time to myself. August was damn near over by now, and I hadn’t even seen it. I’d started a con for the hell of it, and then I’d spent the next three weeks scrambling around like a cat in a full bathtub, going going going every second.
All of which had now come to a screeching halt. After Monday’s mirror routine, Betty and I had spent a pleasant evening together on the town (on her), and a pleasant night together in her apartment (ditto), with the lights firmly off so she wouldn’t recognize any of Art’s bruises on Bart’s body. Then on Tuesday morning I’d kissed her good-bye and gone off to be reunited with my loving brother. And for the first time in weeks, I was faced with an entire day to myself, a day in which I was neither Art with Liz nor Bart with Betty, a day without schemes, phone calls, split-second timing, near misses, or jerry-built explanations.
Tuesday, August twenty-seventh; a date to resound in history. Maybe I could get some Central American republic to name an avenida after it. El Bulevar de la Paz del Agosto 27.
What a day. I basked in my solitude in the inner office, I took Gloria to lunch and paid her share, I returned a call from my sister Doris and was both sympathetic and understanding, I sent off partial payment checks to three of my illustrators, and I wrote another card: “The front of the card, with no illustration, says, ‘Things ain’t been the same since you went away.’ The entire inside, left and right panels, is covered with a drawing of an old house bursting with a huge party: Roman candles over the roof, half-naked girls hanging out windows, a beer truck on the lawn with a hose extending in through a window, etc. etc.”
Etc.
And through it all, that whole long peaceful riverboat of a day, I considered my alternatives. Now was the time to decide once and for all what it was I wanted, and what I didn’t want.
What I didn’t want. I didn’t want anyone to catch on to the twin gimmick. I didn’t want to lose my entree to the Kerner money. I didn’t want to go to jail, or to be hounded by a rich family with a grudge. I also didn’t want friend Volpinex to do any more cute stunts with squash balls, nor with karate moves, nor anything else.
What I did want. Money. Every creature comfort I could think of, and others as they occurred to me. An Alfa Romeo. Unlimited air travel. Stables out back. Another Alfa Romeo. A separate room just for my clothing, and more clothing than would fit in it. Soft women on hard beds. Winters in Palm Springs or Palm Beach or Palma; I’m not picky. Summers in air conditioning. Nights under the stars, under the sheets, under the influence, and under the protection of money. Money. A Jaguar, a Rolls-Royce, and another Alfa Romeo. And money.
All of which seemed clear enough. I should marry a Kerner sister and live happily ever after. One Kerner sister. Marry one Kerner sister, stop the twin game at once, kick sand over my trail, and go whistling off into contentment and joy.
Greed, that’s my big problem. I’d had this worked out once before, even with the details of unloading Folksy Cards and mothballing Art, creating disruptive arguments to explain his disappearance while Bart wallowed in the luxury of his married state, whirl without end, amen. And then Liz had come along, with the siren song of that bloody contract, two grand a month, money and freedom, and I just couldn’t stop myself. I’d signed, I’d signed, and I’d been moving with the speed of a Gilbert and Sullivan chorus line ever since.
So it was time to stop. I’d had two days to tie myself to the mast; sing, damn you, nobody gets me. And when Liz came stalking in, arrogant and sure of herself, to say, “Let’s go get married,” my answer was an immediate and irrevocable, “No.”
“Bullshit,” she said. She dropped into the other chair, crossed her ankles, gave me a jaundiced look, and said, “How much?”
“No much,” I told her. “The deal’s off.”
“We have a contract.”
“Which doesn’t go into effect until the marriage ceremony.”
A frown line formed vertically between her brows. “I don’t have time for crap, Art,” she said. “We made a deal. You can’t hold me up for more money, I won’t give it to you.”
“And I wouldn’t take it,” I said. “I’m through, Liz. I don’t like you and I won’t marry you.”
The frown grew more intense, and then softened a bit. In a different tone she said, “I pushed you too hard, huh?”
“You and Volpinex,” I agreed. “That’s part of it.”
“What’s the rest?”
“You’re using me. This marriage business is just a dodge.”
“You’re just a Dodge yourself,” she said, and grinned at me.
“You know what I’m talking about.”
“The tax problem? I told you that right from the beginning, why get upset about it now? Sam isn’t your real uncle, you know.”
“Not the three million,” I said. “The lawsuit.”
A sudden stillness settled on her face and body. Carefully she said “Lawsuit?”
“Between you and your sister. That’s the main thing it’s all about; this tax evasion thing is just secondary.”
“Who told you about the lawsuit?”
“What does it matter? I won’t be used that way.”
She leaped to her feet, and in a very cold way she was blazing. “I want to know who told you about the lawsuit. Was it Ernie?”
“I wish I could say yes,” I told her. “I’d love to see you two at each other’s throat. But if I lied to you he’d wriggle out of it somehow.”
“He’s smarter than you are,” she said. “Who told you? Not Betty.”
“Bart told me.”
“Bart!” She looked around, and I saw her registering the fact that my famous brother wasn’t here. Except in a way: haggard-eyed, he looked at me from the depths of Froelich’s mirror, tucked in a far corner of the room. “How would he know?” Liz demanded. “And where is he, anyway?”
Ignoring the second question, I answered the first: “Betty told him.”
“Don’t be silly. Why would Betty talk to your brother about something like that?”
“Because they’re married,” I said.
That was my first bombshell, and it was wonderful to watch the bicycles and fence parts and human bodies whooommm up into the air when it hit. Liz actually staggered back, hit the chair she’d been sitting in before, and dropped into it again. Bull
’s eye.
By God, this time I was going to do it. Spread trouble and strife, cut Art loose from the rest of them, and disappear.
“Why that little—” Liz was whispering, mostly to herself. “That little bitch,” she whispered, and then gradually focused on me again and said, “Are you sure of that?”
“Absolutely. Some couple from Far Hills stood up for them. They were married in New Jersey.”
“How long ago?”
“Last week some time.”
“That bitch,” Liz repeated, and glowered past me at the wall. Bloody thoughts moved behind her eyes, like a jungle at night.
“You people are too much for me,” I said. “Maybe Bart can put up with it, but from now on I’m.…” And my voice trailed away, because I’d attracted Liz’s attention again. Her brooding gaze shifted to me, and she said, “We can be in Connecticut in less than two hours. We’ve had our blood tests more than four days, and there’s no waiting period there after you get the license.”
“You’re not listening, Liz,” I said. “The deal’s off. I think you people stink, and I don’t want anything to do with you.”
“You don’t have to have anything to do with me,” she said. She was hard and urgent and brisk. “We’re talking about a strictly business proposition, you don’t ever have to lay eyes on me again after today, but today we’re going to get married.”
“Absolutely not.”
“You want more money, isn’t that it? What’s your price now?”
“No price,” I said. Certain flutterings were taking place in my brain, but I ignored them. “I’m not trying to get a better deal, I’m telling you it’s no deal.”
“But why? It’s strictly business, a marriage in name only, you never have to see me again. Once this legal business is settled, you can get a divorce, an annulment, if you want.”
“No.”
“What, is there some supermarket cashier you’re crazy for? If you want another woman, that’s no—”
“There’s no other woman. I just don’t want the deal.” I leaned forward across the desk, spreading my hands, saying, “Come on, Liz, the woods are full of bachelors. Two thousand dollars a month and options on your bed—with terms like that you could enlist an army.”
Two Much! Page 14
