Baby, Would I Lie?

49

Monday in New York, four days after Sara had come back from deepest Missouri. The little apartment on West Eleventh Street was dusty but nice, the neighborhood still full of a variety of good restaurants, work at Trend still interesting — particularly with Jack’s Weekly Galaxy story in this week’s issue all over the newsstands, Jack himself booked onto a whole bunch of public-affairs TV talk shows, solemn discussions on the duties and privileges of the fourth estate. The Prrreessss, don’tcha know.

All day Friday, the Trend switchboard was flooded with calls from Cal, down in Branson, none of which Sara responded to but some of which attracted Jack’s attention by Friday afternoon, when he came out of his office — he had an office — and over to her desk to say, “Cal Denny’s calling you.”

“I know.”

“You aren’t taking his calls.”

“No, I’m not.”

“You’re up to something, Sara.”

“Of course, I am.”

“What?”

Sara smiled at him. Exasperated, Jack said, “I’m your editor!”

“So what?”

“I’m your lover!”

“So what?”

Jack reared back. “Is nothing sacred to you, Sara?”

“One thing,” Sara said.

Interested despite himself, Jack said, “What?”

“The first typewriter I ever had, back in high school. It was a Smith Corona.”

After that, he left her alone.

On the weekend, they went away for a mini-vacation upstate in the Shawangunks, steep rocky hills beloved of weekend mountain climbers. Seated in luxurious comfort in rocking chairs on the wide wood porch of Mohonk Mountain House, high in the Gunks, glasses of lemonade within handy reach, they refreshed their souls by watching the laden climbers schlepp on up the road away from the sparkling lake.

Monday, back in the office, Sara threw away another stack of phone messages from Cal. She also noticed on the wire that the jury down in Branson was still listening to witnesses discuss what should be done about that rapscallion Ray Jones. Then, around four, she left for the day, alone. Jack being off for another television look at journalism. Sara cabbed down to the West Village, did a little shopping at D’Ag, and the phone was ringing when she unlocked her way into the apartment.

It was Cal. “I gotta talk to you, Sara.”

“So now you’ve got my home number.” She’d wondered how long that would take.

“I gotta talk to you.”

“I’m not interested in talking to the dog,” she said cruelly, “but I wouldn’t mind hearing from his master.”

“Aw, Sara.”

She hung up and put away the groceries.

She was watching the six o’clock news, in fact a piece from Florida in which a lot of Weekly Galaxy executives who’d never before been exposed to sunlight stuttered and stammered and took the high road by announcing that every employee implicated in the Branson scandal was being summarily fired, when the phone rang again. “Nice guys,” Sara commented at the TV, shot it dead with the remote, and picked up the phone.

It was Ray, sounding gruffer and rougher and raspier than ever. “Cal tells me I owe you an apology.”

“Oh really? Why?”

“’Cause you’re smarter than we thought you were.”

Sara couldn’t help herself; she laughed. “You are a rascal, aren’t you?”

“Part of my charm.”

“I’d love to write your obit.”

“Hey, wait a minute, now,” he said, sounding honestly startled for once. “Fun’s fun.”

“Ray,” she said, brisk and cold, “is there any other reason for this call?”

Hesitantly, he said, “Well, in a way, yeah.”

“Go ahead.”

“It’d be easier if you could talk to Cal.”

“No way.”

“Sara, you understand, we aren’t alone on this telephone line.”

“That’s all right; we know what we’re talking about.”

He took a deep breath. She could almost hear him squeezing the phone. “What do you want, Sara?” he asked. “You want to mention a number?”

“Two,” she said.

Bewildered silence. “Two? Two what?”

“Two things, Ray. Did you know I went to see you at that fund-raiser for the hospital there?”

“Oh yeah?” He wasn’t very interested. “You went to that?”

“What’s that hospital called again?”

“Skaggs Community.”

“Have you ever actually given them any money, Ray?”

His voice more guarded, Ray said, “Not actual cash money, no. Just my time and efforts and celebrity and like that.”

“You can do better, Ray,” she told him.

“Jesus,” he said, breathing his disbelief and disgust down the phone line. “That’s your favorite charity?”

“No, it’s yours.”

He thought about that. “How much do I love them?”

“You tell me.”

“Ten grand.”

“Cheapskate.”

“Fifty?”

“Piker.”

“Listen, Sara, fifty thousand’s a lot of money.”

“Not for you,” she told him. “If you get out from under this little trouble of yours—”

“Hah!”

“—you’ll have a lot more money to spend than you had, say, a couple weeks ago. They might even name a wing of the hospital after you.”

Really alarmed, he said, “I can’t afford any wing!”

“What can you afford, Ray?”

Another little pause while he calculated. Then he said, “You said two before. How about two?”

“Two what?”

“Hundred grand.”

She nodded, though of course he couldn’t see that, being in a room in a jail in Missouri, a thousand miles away. She said, “Publicly announced?”

“First thing tomorrow morning,” he offered, “if that’s what you want.”

“Thank you, Ray.”

His voice more insinuating, he said, “Nothing for you, personal.”

“Well,” she admitted, “that was the other thing.”

“Uh-huh.”

“What if it should happen,” she asked him, “you should beat this rap?”

“That would be nice,” he said.

“A whole lot of press would want to interview you, wouldn’t they?” she asked. “People magazine and Barbara Walters and all kinds of press.”

Startled, getting it, he said, “You want an exclusive!”

“A thirty-day exclusive.”

“Jesus, Sara, the rest of them, they’ll tear me to shreds!”

“Well, Ray, somebody’s going to anyway, isn’t that true?”

A longer pause this time, before he finally said, in a smaller voice than before, “All right.”

“By the way, Ray,” she said, “I think you ought to know, just in case the jail’s phone-tap system breaks down, I do record all my calls.”

Sullen now, he said, “I won’t try to renege.”

“Of course not.” Having gotten what she wanted, Sara said, “Ray, would you tell Cal for me that I’m coming back to Branson tomorrow, right after your charitable announcement?”

“Call him; he’ll meet your plane. You have his number, don’t you?” he asked without a trace of irony.

“Around here somewhere,” she admitted.

“Nice talking to you,” he said, with an edge to it.

“Come on, Ray,” she said, “don’t be bitter. You’re getting what you want. The original scenario and all.”

With surprise in his voice, he said, “I guess I am, at that.” Then he chuckled, back in a good mood at last, and said, “Okay, Sara. And you’re getting what you want, too, huh?”

“No losers, Ray,” Sara said, pleased with herself. And why not? “Everybody wins.”

She hung up, then sat a while, smiling.

An hour and a half later, Jack came home, in a bad mood, sour and exhausted from having spent a lot of time listening to pundits. “Hi, baby!” Sara cried, and kissed him a good one.

He pulled away, snarling. “What are you so happy about?”

“Good news,” she said, and laughed.