Galatea

Chapter XII

In the morning, Val said a power crew was coming, to fix stuff on the road, and that I should stand by to help. He had little to say as I put him in the car, and just stared at the sky, his eyes squinched up small. That wasn’t so good, as I’d have been a fool not to know that one day he had to wake up to what this was, but the job suited me fine. She hadn’t showed for breakfast, and if I could skip the hams, I needn’t see her at all, could even have lunch in Clinton while I tried to think things out. Around nine came the truck, and the job was to clear a cable fouled on a tree, a big oak that Val liked and meant to save if he could. Resetting a pole would do it, so while the boys tightened a guy, I worked the clamp, topside. It took less than an hour, but in the middle of it, what do I see but her? She was all dressed in a suit, a brown one I hadn’t seen, with the same maroon shoes, and a hat and bag to match. From my pole I watched her come out, go back and unstable her car, close the garage, and go rolling off to the city without one look in my direction.

As to what went through my heart, I’m not sure that I know, or even if anything did, as by that time my heart had had about all it was able to take. But I know what went through my head, which was: “If anything’s to be done, you better get at it and do it, as this is your big chance.” Soon as the power crew went, I legged it up to the house, let myself in with my key, and called Bill at Waldorf. I said: “Pal, I thought it over, and now, as I believe, I got stuff to tell you.”

“O.K., shoot.”

“Not on a party line.”

“It’s not no party line.”

“Look, I’m loaded and friendly, but at the same time I must show my power. The disease seems to be catching. I won’t talk on the phone, so—”

“You gaw dayum fool, you—”

“Get up here.”

“On my way, Duke, right now.”

I met him at the door with her sweater and slacks, to bug his eyes, and they bugged. I told him I’d misjudged her when I told him she backslid, and these things would give him the idea. He kept stretching the sweater, as though there must be some trick, and I led him into her bedroom, where he stared at the rest of her clothes, still not able to believe it. I told a little about it, the fight she’d made, my part in it, and Val’s reaction, which of course brought some remarkable cussing. Then I said: “However, that’s not why I called. On that I’ll make it quick. Yesterday, after you left, I had a talk with your sister, and it turned out you were right. About me, and how she feels toward me. I didn’t respond, which made her a little sore. But even allowing for that, she’s one hundred per cent nuts about me.”

“Aw, Chrisalminey!”

“Shall I go on Bill, or not?”

“What you getting at, Duke?”

“Right now, at the start, I’m making you take what I say. Dishing it out at you. Some of those things you said yesterday, they slightly got my goat. It came to me, the squat you’d have done in jail if it hadn’t been for me — right in this very room, when you let heave at Mr. Commissioner, and—”

“I took it back, didn’t I?”

“Not too loud, however.”

“I take it back — is that better?”

“And apologize.”

“Listen, goddam it—”

“I said—”

“I apologize.”

I said take it easy and listen what I told him. I took up the diet again, and explained: “It’s had a peculiar effect. She wants to kick up her heels. Like a heifer, she says. She was a fat girl, a good girl, too long, and now she wants a change. To whoop and holler and laugh, to run and dance and sing. To cut up — especially with me. I’m the guy that showed her how, the one that set her free.”

He cussed at me, but I wouldn’t let up. I said: “I just want you to get it straight, the kind of hand I hold. Right now I’m in her doghouse. As I told you, she made like friendly and I made like scram, quick. But there’s nothing griping her that one good pass won’t fix. You got all this straight, stupid?”

“If you’re after dough, I got none.”

“I’m not after dough.”

“Then what is it?”

“I told you I thought it over, all that you said yesterday, and the proof that I did is I do make like scram. On all but one or two points I think you were right. I think, considering the husband she’s got, the setup here and all, I’m not the guy she should have. You just as well know, I’m just as nuts about her as she is about me — if she is. Just the same, I’ll bow out. On one condition only.”

“Which is?”

“You know that officer, Daniel?”

“The one that took you in?”

“You acquainted with him, Bill?”

“We get along, yes.”

“I want that confession he took.”

“For that you’d blow?”

“Bill, never mind how she feels about me. If you ever repeat what I told you, I’ll make you wish you hadn’t. As to what I feel about her, I couldn’t tell you, see? There aren’t that many words in the language. Spite of that, to get that confession I’ll blow. From that you can get an idea how I feel about jail. It’s a deal. You get that for me, I’m gone.”

He thought for some time, without cussing or anything. Then: “I know this Daniel, Duke. I’ve known him, I’ve done him some favors. Maybe he listens to reason, maybe he hands it over. But suppose I don’t get it, what then?”

“I still blow, but different.”

“How different?”

“I take her.”

He’d been walking around, and now wheeled to hit me. I paid no attention and said: “If that’s what’s waiting for me, this eight-ball Daniel has, if that’s what Val has on me — O.K., that’s it. But before he gets me, I’ve had a fling with his wife. Maybe I’d like to cut up. Don’t make any mistake, Bill. I mean business, and it could happen tonight.”

He did no more wheeling, but sat down to the phone, dialed, got Marlboro, got the county police, got Daniel, and started to talk. It was about me, my summer’s work, and my reform, with nothing said about favors, only what I deserved. Then he listened, for quite some little time, to talk from the other end. Then, very glibby, he said: “Will you, Danny, for me? Will you do that little thing? Believe me the guy’s all right, in spite of his one mistake. He’s got it coming.”

He hung up, squinted down at his feet in a way that reminded me of her, said: “He’s going to look for it. Tonight he’ll try and find it. That, and the gun he took off you... Why would he need all that looking?”

“Doesn’t he know where he put it?”

“Duke, one thing hit me funny. He said he’d been busy as hell, hadn’t thought of it lately, all kind of stuff like that. But in between, he’d say: ‘It was really Val’s idea.’ What do you make out of that?”

“Nothing I like. One damned bit.”

“We better go into this.”

He dialed again, got the Ladyship, asked for a Miss Coulter. When she came on he acted mysterious. He said he represented the “credit company,” and wanted more “information” about “that note you signed, Miss Coulter — just a few questions I have, so—” However, he didn’t finish, as she screamed back very loud, and he cut off. He put the receiver back, said: “That was Danny’s girl, that’s all right except she likes clothes, and got herself into trouble. She gave a note to Val, meaning he made her give it, to cover a shortage she had, then commence paying back. He’s all the hell on restitution, Val is. Well, the way she talked, she’s clear. If she hadn’t been, ’stead of bawling me out that way, she’d have been scared to death and showed it. Only one thing would have made Val give her note up, and that’s something he’d rather have. If your confession was his idea, that’s it and that was the deal. To get her back that note, Daniel sold you out. The reason he’s got to look, and the reason he won’t be able to find it, is that it’s passed to Val.”

“Then Holly and I—”

“Not so fast, Duke. You said it once.”

He dialed again, and then was talking to Marge, down at Waldorf. He caught her up pretty quick, what the thing was about, and then: “Marge, Duke is O.K. He knows it’s time to go, and feels he’s earned the right. He’s done Val’s work all year, so there’s hardly any work left. He’s done all kinds of things for Holly, along the line I told you, but it’s better than we had any idea — simply terrific, I’ve seen her clothes. She’s a normal girl at last, and it’s mainly due to Duke. Besides all that, he’s gone straight himself. He wants out, but what’s hanging it up is this thing Daniel has apparently given to Val. Without that Duke is worried, and I for one don’t blame him. Baby, what can we do? Once again, it’s the bassid against the rest of us, but there must be something to do!”

If he was expecting some nice, friendly advice, that’s not how it turned out. For the second time since we started, a woman was sounding shrill, but this time he couldn’t cut off. He had to sit there and take it, which he did, saying mostly: “I see,” and having no back talk at all. At last he hung up, crossed to the sofa, wiped his brow, and said: “Marge says Holly can get it, if anyone can. If anyone can, Marge said.”

“Yeah, but how?”

“Listen, Duke, if to get it Holly has to love that bassid up, that may be tough, but you should have thought of it when you hijacked the filling station.”

I thought that over, said: “Well, this is not so good, but at least it’s plain. However, I think I told you I’m in the lady’s doghouse. Would Marge speak to her for me?”

“Not as she feels now.”

“Something she holds against me?”

“Duke, you heard me just now, the way I put it to her, explaining your idea about it, and giving her reasons I thought were better than the ones you gave. She didn’t go for it. Fact of the matter, she was shocked. She’s kind of caught on, as I tried to tell you yesterday, that Holly and you are in love. And she calls it love, not nuts or something like that. On top of which she’s got these ever-and-ever approaches to stuff like that. So she’s shocked. She thinks you should stick.”

“Get myself sent up to the Maryland Penitentiary, and then Holly’ll be waiting when I get out — she will like hell. If Marge wants a cure for love, that’s it.”

“I’m telling you what she said.”

“What do you say?”

“I’m for Holly, that’s all.”

“That’s no answer.”

“You got one, tell me.”

I had none or I wouldn’t have called him, but in spite of how I’d been jawing, my face was getting hot, from the way Marge had felt. Because in the first place I thought she had more brains than the rest of us put together. And in the second place there it was, the loyalty I knew she had, not only for Bill, but for everyone that she loved, so she had to be one hundred per cent right. It was some time, after I simmered down, before I got going again, so we just sat there, he on the sofa, I on the love seat, like a couple of buzzards. But then, creeping into my mind, came the realization that a split had taken place in the corner across from mine, that he favored one thing, Marge something else. I said: “In other words, if I measured up to her standards, Marge would be on my side.”

“Too late for that, I’m afraid.”

“Then I’ll stick.”

“Damn it, you promised to go!”

“If you got me that paper, and on that you’ve been no use at all.”

“I found out who has it, di’n I?”

“And in the second place, on anything of this kind, Marge is the one that’s smart. I string with her, regardless of how she feels just at this moment.”

He held his face in his hands, and I think he wanted to cry. In his secret heart, what he hated most of all was that his sister would get mixed up in something, specially something in stripes. But in a minute I bulled on. I said: “Tell Marge I’ll thank her for the opinion she had of me once, and say I’ll try to get it back. Tell her, on sticking, it’s what I want to do, and on love, no one could have any more. Tell her, regardless of pride, what it costs me, or anything else, I’ll proposition her sister-in-law, on my knees if that’s what it takes.”