by Unknown
“Well! I want an answer! Will you marry me?”
Laughing and crying, she had answered, “Yes, yes, yes, yes—”
“Hold it!” John ordered. “While you’re talking, I can be flying. See you tomorrow.”
Tomorrow . . .
Rain at Idlewild—hard, slanting, and completely unnoticed as John bounded off the plane like a school boy. There was much to be done before the cable from Paris announced the divorce had been granted, and one of the many things concerned a change in office procedure. Loren discovered it one morning when she found her old office cleaned out, and, investigating, a new name on the door of the office next to John’s.
LOREN BANION
VICE-PRESIDENT
“Only a little premature,” he explained. “You might as well get used to the name.”
“It’s not the name—it’s the title!” Loren exclaimed.
“Why not the title? You’ve been doing the job for years; I’ve only belatedly given you the status. Belatedly,” he repeated, “this, too.” It was then that he gave her the ring, almost shyly. “Oh, Loren, why does it take so long to learn to distinguish the real from the phoney? You are real, aren’t you, Loren? You’re not one of those scheming females.”
“Oh, but I am,” Loren insisted. “I’ve been deliberately getting under your nose for years.”
John had laughed. Under his nose meant only one thing at the moment. He kissed her, quickly.
“That I like. That I’ll buy any day. That’s not what I meant. I meant that you’re not one of the phonies—the honky-tonk phonies. All out front and nothing to live with. I want to grow old with you, Loren. You’re the only—” He hesitated, groping for a word, “—the only pure woman I’ve ever known.”
It was terrible how grave John’s face had become. Loren drew away.
“Please—no pedestals,” she protested. “It’s so cold up there!”
“It’s not cold here!”
He had taken her in his arms, then, and he was right. It was warm; it was a place to rest at last. But then his arms tightened, and his fingers dug into her arms until she wanted to cry out. It was the first shadow of fear to come.
“You’re real,” he said. “You have to be real. I couldn’t stand being fooled again!”
“I couldn’t stand being fooled again!”
Loren stared at the telephone on the table. It was silent; but John’s words were ringing in her mind. She glanced at the clock. Sleep was impossible, but nothing could be unusual tonight, and within ten minutes after Loren Banion concluded her dictation, she always turned off the lamp. The darkness came—complete at first, and then a finger of moonlight from the open window probed across the carpet. Below, the silver sound of a girl’s laughter was quickly muffled in sudden remembrance of the hour.
The hour. The hour was only ten minutes spent. The long hour before four . . .
• • •
The honeymoon had been in Miami and off-Miami waters. John was a fisherman—unsuccessful but incorrigible. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday without a catch. It was no wonder Sam McGregor, an Atlanta account they had discovered vacationing at their hotel, had insisted on an hour of solace at the Flotsam and Jetsam on the beach. It was a shanty-type bar—one of the high bracket shanties—where the drinks were long and the shadows cool. Loren was too happy to see details in the Grotto-like shadows; but someone had seen clearly. Very clearly. It was an informal place for customers in shorts and bathing suits, and the only entertainment rippled from the busy fingers of a pianist in T shirt and dungarees who wheeled his diminutive instrument from booth to booth. He wasn’t meant to be heard or noticed, and only rarely tipped; and Loren wasn’t really aware of him at all until, above John’s and Sam’s ribbing laughter, a tinkling sound became a melody. She looked up. The small piano was no more than three feet away, and behind it sat a man she had never expected to see again.
“Don’t sit under the apple tree with anyone else but me, . . .”
He played not too well; but he did enjoy his work. His smile seemed to indicate that he enjoyed it very much. His smile . . .
“Loren—are you all right?”
John’s voice brought Loren back from the faraway place Loren’s mind had gone reeling.
“You look shook up, honey. Don’t tell me that you got seasick today. Honestly, Sam, this woman can take more punishment . . .”
When John’s voice stopped, he couldn’t have known too much then. That was impossible. But he seemed to sense that the piano player had something to do with Loren being disturbed. He pulled a bill out of his pocket and placed it on top of the piano.
“How about hoisting anchor, sailor?” he said. “I’m afraid we’re not very musical in this booth.”
The piano player’s smile broadened and one hand closed over the bill. “Anything you say, Mr. Banion. I only thought it would be nice to salute the newlyweds.”
“You know me?” John asked.
“Why, everybody knows you, Mr. Banion. Didn’t you see your picture in the paper the day you flew down? Nice catch, Mr. Banion.” And then, with another smile for Loren. “Nice catch, Mrs. Banion. A very nice catch.”
The piano rolled on, picking up something with a calypso beat. The incident had taken only a moment, but having sensed that something was amiss, Sam had said brightly—
“Enterprising chap. They don’t miss a trick down here. How about another round?”
Loren stood up. “You two—yes,” she said. “No more for me. I’m going back to the hotel.”
“Loren—why? What’s wrong?”
John must not ask that question; he must not look that concerned. She laughed her gayest and confessed—
“I’m afraid you’ll have to stop bragging about me, John. I did get seasick this afternoon, and now I’m almost hung on one drink. No—not hung enough for you to break this up. You stay on with Sam. I’m going to get some air.”
Air, wind, and a long walk along the beach—nothing erased Ted Lockard. He should be dead. Men died in a war. They stopped answering letters, and they never came back. One assumed they had died. But not Ted. Ted was alive and his smooth voice, so thrilling to a girl, had an oily quality maturity could identify. There were men who lived off their charms, even as did some women.
“A nice catch, Mrs. Banion. A very nice catch.”
Loren wasn’t intoxicated, but she was sick. A girl had written wild, foolish letters, and Ted Lockard probably kept all of his love letters the way some men kept hunting trophies—or securities. He would try to reach her some way—she knew that. And she was vulnerable; not because of a youthful human failure, but because of John’s conception of her. She had to be perfect in order to compensate his pride, for having been so deceived by Celeste.
Luck was with her. That night, a wire from Mexico City sending John south. Loren returned to New York. But it was only a reprieve.
Celeste returned from Europe just before Christmas, sans bullfighter and sans cash. There were telephone calls and wires, all ignored, and then, one day Celeste came to the office. John saw her. Loren wasn’t aware of the meeting until it was over. John had asked her to go down to the docks and see Signor Manfredi’s shipment through customs. The Signor’s shipping department had only a vague idea of the transoceanic hazards for breakable materials. It was a task usually delegated to an employee of lesser status; but Loren thought nothing of it until she returned in time to pass Celeste in the outer office.
Celeste was icily majestic.
“Congratulations, Mrs. Banion,” she said. “John looks in the pink. You always were a good manager.”
Not too much—just enough. Celeste could make a prayer sound insulting.
Inside, Loren found John not at all in the pink. He was remote and grave.
“What was Celeste doing here?” she demanded.
“She came to wis
h us a Merry Christmas,” John said bitterly.
Loren glanced down. John’s checkbook was still on his desk.
“John—you gave her money!”
He didn’t answer.
“Why? Hasn’t she cost you enough? You don’t owe her a thing!”
“Loyalty,” John said.
His voice was strange.
“What?” Loren demanded.
“It’s a word,” John explained. “Just a word.”
Then, suddenly, he turned toward her and grasped her shoulders with both hands, holding so tightly that she remembered what had happened the day he gave her the ring. For just an instant, she was actually afraid; and then he smiled sadly and let her go.
“Forget Celeste,” he said. “It’s a holiday season. I felt charitable.”
Loren didn’t. She left John abruptly and hurried back to the front office. Celeste was nowhere in sight. Katy sat at her desk, typing letters. She looked up as Loren spoke—
“Mrs. Ban—” she began, and then corrected herself. “The former Mrs. Banion—where did she go?”
“Out,” Katy said.
Katy, sweet, wholesome, naive. What did she expect to learn from Katy? She strode across the reception room and entered the hall, arriving just in time to glimpse Celeste as she was being assisted into the elevator by an attentive man. They turned and faced her, and just before the doors closed Loren got a frontal view of Celeste’s new adornment. Ted looked very handsome, and he smiled.
Merry Christmas, Loren. Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Santa had come early. It was the beginning of a long wait, of not knowing what Ted might have told Celeste, or what Celeste might have told John, or when Ted would make his move. John said nothing. Her own tension was the only change between them. After a time, she began to think she was suffering from nothing but the ancient feminine penchant for borrowing guilt.
Then, in the middle of January, John took the night plane to Cleveland.
“You could leave in the morning and still make that meeting in time,” Loren protested.
John was adamant.
“I like to fly at night. It’s smoother and I sleep all the way.”
“Then I’ll work on the correspondence.”
“You work too hard, Loren. Why don’t you let Katy do that?”
“John—please. I know these people. I’ve been handling your correspondence with them since dear Katy was taking her first typing lessons and getting used to having teeth without braces. Don’t you know that I’m jealous of my work?”
“I should know,” John said. “I’m jealous, too—of you. But I don’t have to worry, do I?” His fingers stroked her cheek lightly. “No, I don’t have to worry—not about Loren.”
Loren, who lived on a pedestal where the life expectancy was so short.
She had worked that night until almost three, showered, and gone to bed. Sleep came immediately after work. She had to fight her way out of it when the telephone rang. Groping for the instrument, she noticed the illuminated face of the clock. It was exactly four. Nobody ever called anyone at four o’clock in the morning unless something terrible had happened.
“John—?”
She waited, suddenly fully awake and afraid. There was no answer. And then it began, so brightly, so spritely—one full chorus of a piano rendition of an old war-time melody.
“Don’t sit under the apple tree with anyone else but me . . .”
That was all.
• • •
The clock had always been silent. There was no reason for it to tick so loudly now. Loren stirred restlessly against the pillows. Aside from the clock, there was no other sound. Silence from the deck below. Cherry had closed up shop for the night. The moonlight brought objects on the table out of darkness. Loren’s fingers found a cigarette, lighted it, and then she sat back smoking and remembering . . .
She never told John about the four o’clock call. It was Ted’s signature, obviously; but what did he have in mind? For days and nights after that call she waited for his next move. Nothing happened. John returned from Cleveland to find her thinner and tense.
“Working too hard,” he scolded. “Loren, I won’t allow this to go on! Katy’s going to take on at least a small part of your work.”
She wanted to tell him about the call; but she couldn’t tell a part without revealing the whole.
“Then reveal the whole, Loren. John is a sane, adult human being. He’ll laugh about it and send Ted packing.”
“Do you remember the McGregors?” John asked suddenly. “Miami—our honeymoon?”
Loren remembered. Her mind had just been in the same vicinity.
“I met Sam in Cleveland. He’s broken—literally broken. His wife has gone to Reno, and Sam’s shot. I’ve seen that man fight his way through tight spots that would have staggered Superman; but this has got him. You women don’t know what you can do to a man.”
“Reno?” Loren echoed. “Why?”
John’s face hardened. “The usual reason. Sam’s a busy man. Little time to play Casanova. They don’t have bullfighters in Atlanta; but they do have Casanovas. You would think a woman could tell the difference between love and flattery, wouldn’t you? But no, it seems they all have the same weakness.” And then the bitterness ebbed out of John’s voice. “Except one,” he added.
She told him nothing.
She continued to wait; but there was no word from Ted. Early in February, John flew to Denver on the night plane. Loren worked on correspondence until three and then retired; but she couldn’t sleep. A vague uneasiness gnawed at her mind until four o’clock when the telephone rang and the uneasiness ceased to be vague.
The call was just as it had been before. No words at all—just that same gay piano serenade . . .
For the next few months, John’s trips were frequent. It was the busy time of the year. On the first night of his next departure, she didn’t try to sleep. At four o’clock, the telephone rang.
“. . . don’t sit under the apple tree with anyone else but me.”
She tried having the call traced. It was useless. The caller was too clever. Clever, but purposeless. Aside from starting her nerves on a process of disintegration, the calls were inane. Ted was too practical minded to torture without a purpose. It was the kind of sadistic trick she might expect of a jealous rival.
“Celeste!”
• • •
At one minute past four, on a morning when John was flying to Omaha, Loren placed the telephone back in the cradle convinced that she’d hit upon the source of her troubles. Ted was more clever than she’d imagined. He’d gone to John Banion’s ex-wife, rather than his present wife. He’d told her his story, and now Celeste was trying to break up John’s marriage by torturing his wife into a breakdown. At one minute past four A.M., immediately following the fourth of the maddening calls, the scheme seemed obvious to Loren. Wear her down, weaken her, unnerve her, and then— She wasn’t quite sure what Celeste meant to do then; but there was no reason to wait and see. Two could play this game!
Loren’s mind became quite clear. She began to analyze. The calls came only on the first night of John’s trips. Reason: had John been at home, he might have intercepted the calls. Furthermore, there was never any way of knowing how long he would be gone. The only way of avoiding him was to make the call immediately after his departure. This meant Celeste had access to John’s plans.
On the following day, Loren spoke to Katy.
“Do you remember the day the former Mrs. Banion had an interview with Mr. Banion?” she asked.
Katy considered her answer only a moment.
“Yes, I do, Mrs. Banion.”
“Did she come in alone?”
This time, Katy considered a bit longer.
“I don’t think I remember—yes, I do. A man came with her. He waited in the recepti
on room.”
Ted, obviously.
“Have you seen him since?”
“No, Mrs. Banion.”
But there were other girls in the office—young, impressionable. Ideal bait for Ted’s charms.
“Katy, I want you to do something for me. Talk to the girls, casually, of course, and try to learn if any of them has a new, dreamy boyfriend.”
Katy laughed.
“According to what I pick up in the lounge, most of them have a new, dreamy boyfriend every week.”
“That’s not what I mean! I mean one certain boyfriend.”
She was making a mess of it. A casual inquiry was becoming an inquisition; but there was still one thing she must know.
“And Katy, on the day when the former Mrs. Banion had the interview with Mr. Banion, did you, by any chance, overhear anything that was said?”
“Overhear, Mrs. Banion?”
There was such a thing as being too naive, and Loren’s patience had worn thin.
“Accidentally or otherwise,” she snapped. “Oh, don’t look so wounded. I had your job once, and I was ambitious and human. I listened; I spied. I know what goes on in an office. This is important to me, Katy. I’ll make it worth your while if you can tell me anything—anything at all.”
It was a foolish, weak, female thing to do, and Loren regretted her words as soon as they were spoken. Had Katy been shocked, it wouldn’t have been so bad; but it was all Loren could do to suppress the desire to slap the hint of a smile she saw on Katy’s face.
You’re cracking up, Loren. You’re losing control.
She held on tight, and Katy’s smile faded.
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Banion. I didn’t hear anything. But if I do hear anything, I’ll let you know.”
Loren went back to her office shaken at her own self-betrayal. Celeste was succeeding. Whatever her diabolical plan, she was succeeding. Never had she spoken to an employee as she had spoken to Katy. Never . . .
When John returned from Omaha, he found Loren confined to her bed.
“It’s nothing,” she insisted. “I think I had a touch of flu.”
