The Collected Short Stories of Conrad Aiken

THE BACHELOR SUPPER

I.

“You’ve got to be well oiled,” Kit had said. “If you’re well oiled, it’s all right. You come over to my place before it, and we’ll shake up a couple of good potent cocktails, and then you won’t mind it.… Good God, why do you take it so seriously? It’s all in a lifetime!”

No doubt. So was everything, perhaps. But why did it have to be? Why was it a part of the social scheme of things? It seemed to be compulsory—everyone was agreed about that. They all did it. Loo had had one—so had Bill—Everett had got out of his only because he was in Cuba, and hadn’t been able to come home in time for anything but the wedding itself. There seemed to be no escaping it. In fact, it seemed to be a sort of social appendage to the wedding, indispensable preliminary. And the cost!… He had been staggered. A party of twenty, many of whom he would just as soon not have invited, but who—as his mother had said—had to be asked.

And why indeed did he take it so seriously?

He asked himself the foolish question as he took a last look at his necktie and the parting in his hair. It seemed to be—it seemed to be—well, a kind of smirch on the whole thing. A deliberate sort of mud-slinging. What must the girls think of it? What would Loo’s wife think of it, if by any chance she could have known what had gone on at Loo’s bachelor supper? or how it ended, and where? What had Evelyn thought, when she heard next day that Bill had been picked up in a gutter by a taxi-driver, minus most of his clothes? Of course, most of these girls nowadays were pretty “hard-boiled.” But what would Gay think, if the same thing were to happen to him?

He winced at the idea, as if it had been something physical. He knew what she would think. He knew what he would think himself. The next meeting between them would be more painful than he could bear. She would be subdued, silent, hurt, forgiving; she would say nothing about it; neither would he; but there it would be, a kind of ominous shadow. They would be embarrassed and silent; they would talk about other things, but with a horrible sense of not talking about the thing that most mattered to them.… And it might well be that the delicate balance between them would never again be quite as fine as it had been before.

Perhaps there was something wrong with him. Perhaps, as Kit had kept saying, it was simply that he wasn’t mature about it. What did it matter? Men and women were profoundly different about these things—much better to face this fact and make the most of it or the best of it. Was there no romanticism in men? none at all?—or at any rate in the average man? Or was it true that in men the romanticism could exist side by side with this extraordinary “something else”? This queer, bare, hideous propagative instinct, which of course must have a sort of “tribe” sanction?

Frowning, he went slowly down the stairs and out to his car, which he had left in the drive at the side of the house. Fortunately, nobody was about. Mother was playing bridge at the golf club, Father hadn’t come home yet from town. He drove slowly down the Avenue, took an extra turn round the Square, for no particular reason, and then got out and went into the apartment house in which Kit lived.

Kit had the cocktails all ready. Bacardi, and lots of it.

“These will put you right,” Kit said. He gave the frosted shaker an extra rattle, and poured the frothed and pinkish liquid into two green glasses. “Here’s to everything, God included. Bottoms up. Here’s to Gay and Tom and all the little Gays and Toms.”

“Fortune.”

Kit smacked his lips.

“Pretty good, if I do say so myself. Why in hell, Tom, do you have to get into such a funk about it? They’re all good eggs, you know. They won’t hurt you. It’ll be a good party, if you take it right. Here, have another. There are three apiece.”

Feeling the glow in his belly, Tom walked to the window and looked down at the street. A balloon man was passing, with his bobbing cluster of multicolored bubbles. A small fox terrier circled the balloon man rapidly and suspiciously, then sped westward with an air of urgent destiny. A lot of sparrows were chattering in a tree.

“I suppose,” he said, without turning, “I’m a sentimentalist. And of course I’m also, as you know, unsocial. To begin with, I hate, really hate, the god-awful publicity of the wedding ceremony; it’s practically like going to bed in the middle of Boston Common. Does it seem decent to you? It certainly doesn’t to me.… And as for this damned bachelor supper—that’s worse and more of it. Do you know what I suspect?”

Kit shook the cocktail shaker again, listening to the rattle of ice with his head amusedly on one side.

“No. Don’t tell me you’ve gone paranoid under the strain, and suspect us all of some deep plot against you!… You take life too hard.”

“You bet I do.”

“Well, don’t.… But tell me what you suspect.”

They looked at each other, smiling. The light curtains blew inward from the window on a warm current of air, and the room seemed suddenly to fill with the voices of the sparrows. The sound was multitudinous, idiotic, like life itself. But how was one to say it? Or how was one to be sure that it wouldn’t simply be laughed at?

He looked aside, feeling almost guilty at the doubt—guilty and helpless; as if the constellation of his thought were as incommunicable and unanalyzable as that absurd chorus of little voices; as if one were to try to present, atom by separate atom, an ocean, or the world. Would Kit, with two cocktails fuming in his brain, grasp this idea, or all that depended on it?

“Oh, I don’t know,” he murmured, with conscious inadequacy. And then, a feeling of obligation overcoming him, a fear of hurting Kit’s feelings, “It’s like this.… You know some of those African tribes have a peculiar marriage custom. You know what it is?…”

“I can’t say I do.”

“Every man-jack in the tribe lies with the bride—before the husband is allowed to have her. I daresay you’ve heard of it. What’s the idea behind it? It’s not very pretty.… A sort of communal business: as if the tribe were itself taking possession of the woman by defiling her; humbling the bridegroom and putting him in his place. It certainly ought to cure him of any fine romantic notions about love, and blast out of him any notion of exclusive proprietorship in his woman! Oughtn’t it? Assuming that African tribes have any romantic notions!… Just imagine what the bridegroom must feel about it.”

“I very much doubt if he feels a damned thing.”

“Maybe not, if he’s completely tribal-minded. But suppose he’s a little bit of an individualist—and after all, it’s exactly through such preliminary outcroppings of individualism that civilization has developed—and wants to indulge in his own unique reactions to the world or God or whatever you want to call it, in his own way, without any pawings and meddlings and bellowings from the herd. Suppose he has his own little vision of beauty, if you like, and doesn’t want it spat upon by the village fathers. He has this little secret something-or-other in his heart or soul, and it’s damned precious to him. What’s he going to feel about it then?”

Kit frowned, holding the palm of his hand against the top of the shaker. He was standing in a characteristic attitude, with one foot crossed over the other. His face was flushed, and he looked puzzled.

“You’re getting a little deep,” he said. “And yet I see what you mean. Sure, I see what you mean. It would be kind of nasty.… Have another?”

Tom held out his glass; Kit smiled and poured.

“Nasty is the word. And that’s what a bachelor supper is.”

“Don’t kid me!”

“No kidding. I mean it.”

Kit began to laugh—as if on the assumption that the whole thing was perhaps a rather amusing extravaganza—but then apparently thought better of it. He put the cocktail shaker on the mantelpiece beside a gilt-porcelain snuff-box. Then he rubbed his hand across his forehead.

“I had a couple of these before you came,” he said. “So I’m ahead of you. Life is damned funny.”

“The hell you say.”

“For God’s sake, Tom, you don’t mean you take all that seriously? Snap out of it. What the devil does it matter? Sometimes I really think you’re psychopathic.”

“Don’t make me tired. I thought you were intelligent enough to understand it. Or sensitive enough to feel it. My mistake.”

He moved to the table, to put down his glass, and felt his first step waver slightly. His second was firmer, and he felt that his wavering had been quite unobserved. Kit was in no state to observe. The curtains lifted inward again, undulating, and something in his mind lifted and undulated in the same fashion. It was April, and such things were suitable. It would have been a nice evening for a walk or drive with Gay. To Concord or Lexington. Past that little knoll where the peach trees were always first in bloom.… Odd, how difficult, not to say impossible, it had been to discuss all this with Kit. And it had been the same way with Gay. He had thought of telling her about it—his shrinking from the supper—his feeling of contamination in the very idea of it—he had even begun to choose the phrases for it; but then, all of a sudden, he had become tongue-tied. Even in the talking about it something precious would be lost. The whole affair was so delicately balanced, so emotionally precarious.…

“Look here,” said Kit suddenly. “I’m not such a fool as you seem to think. Do you know what? I believe I understand this damned thing perfectly. Perfectly. Now you listen to me.”

He came to the window beside Tom, and took Tom’s arm, swaying a little and smiling affectionately. With two fingers he lifted the spectacles on the bridge of his nose, and settled them again, his blue eyes remaining fixed on Tom’s.

“It’s like this. But I think we need one more before I can say it. Shall we have one more? Yes, let’s have one more.”

He flourished the shaker perfunctorily, poured from it, and came back with the two glasses.

“Now listen,” he said, wagging a finger. “It’s very, very simple, and it’s like this, and you being what you are, it’s all for the best in the best of all possible or potential worlds. In the first place—pardon me if I seem a little confused—it’s a very nice world, and it passes in the twinkling of an eye, and we’re gone, and so it doesn’t matter a hell of a lot, anyway. Here we are, all of a sudden, looking out of a window and listening to a couple of hundred sparrows—don’t they make the damnedest row you ever heard in your life?—and then all of a sudden here we aren’t. So I don’t see any good reason for getting into a stew about it. You can’t fool me—nobody looks after the sparrow when it falls. If it chooses to have a nervous breakdown over some wormy trifle, nobody is going to start a revolt of the angels for that, believe me; and nobody is going to be any the better or worse for it fifteen minutes later. And you may not know it, but you’re a sparrow. You’re a sentimental sparrow, my boy! You’ve got some fine notion of a romantic vision about love, and Gay, and God, and ideals, and I don’t know what-all; you’re in that kind of a pink emotional state when you can’t, simply can’t, look the facts in their dirty little faces. And that’s where we come in, my boy. It’s our job to wallop you where your ideals are tenderest. And why? Do you know why?…”

“I can’t say I do!”

“Well then, I’ll tell you. We’re doing it to save you from discovering too late that you’ve been nourishing a beautiful creampuff of an illusion. Along we come with the big stick, and belt you over the head for too much star-gazing; just in time to save you from falling into the ditch.… Selah.… Now doesn’t that sound to you like common sense?”

“Not a bit. But go ahead.”

“That’s all … that’s the whole story. All we do is tell you that Gay is a human being; that you’re both of you just plain godforsaken animals; and that the sooner you realize it, and begin living on that plane, the better chance you’ve got of not making a hash of your life.… It’s very simple. I’m surprised I didn’t think of it before. Just the same, I think I’m pretty intelligent!”

“Remarkably.”

“With which”—Kit said, grinning—“I suppose we’d better get going. It’s six-thirty already. I ordered two dozen cheap wine glasses, by the way—the sort you can smash without going bankrupt. That’s the part I always enjoy. Smashing the glasses. Now what do you suppose that symbol means? It looks kind of suspicious to me. If some fool analyst got hold of it—!”

He put his hat jauntily on the back of his head.

“Come on, idealist, and we’ll join the tribe.”

II.

The drive to the club had temporarily cleared Tom’s head. But when Kit pushed him into the private dining room, which was hot, and full of cigarette smoke, and already crowded with the assembled guests, he suddenly felt giddy again. A shout went up, he was at once surrounded by a howling mob of backslappers, the singers of “Mademoiselle from Armentières” broke away from the piano and charged him en masse, a potted palm tree was upset, and for no reason at all he found himself laughing, as if the gayety of the irresponsible crowd had abruptly infected him. He was pushed into his place at the head of the table, corks began popping, Kit was making a speech standing on a chair, and the waiters, somewhat flustered, were hurrying from glass to glass with napkined bottles.

“Gentlemen,” shouted Kit, “we are here assembled for a biological purpose! We are here assembled—”

“Sit down, sit down!”

“We are here assembled—”

“Can it!”

“The glasses are all filled!”

“Propose the toast!”

“Gentlemen, I am here assembled for that very purpose, if only you wouldn’t interrupt me.” He reached down for his glass. “Gentlemen, I propose a toast to the blushing bride! Everybody up.”

The twenty men rose, simultaneously tilted the goblets of champagne, after holding them obliquely toward their host; for a fraction of a moment were silent as they drank; and then, with terrific yells, flung the empty glasses at the fireplace. For an instant, Tom couldn’t remember whether he too was supposed to drink and smash his glass; then he did so, noticing that it hit the top of an andiron. The whole floor, before the fireplace, was covered with broken glass. Several goblets had gone wild—one had struck above the mantel, another had hit the piano, another had landed in a Morris chair, without breaking. And instantly, as if this wreckage were the signal for a fury of sound, there was a renewal of yells and singing. A waiter began sweeping up the glass, while others brought new glasss and more bottles. In no time at all, the oysters and soup were dispatched, claret succeeded champagne, and whisky succeeded claret; Roger Day was completely drunk, as usual, and crowned himself with a melon. Kit had left the room, looking very white; and the stories had begun. At first comparatively unobjectionable, they became rapidly more Rabelaisian; shouts of delight greeted them; the table was banged; at one particular sally Roger Day smashed a plate on the floor. A series of limericks were sung, each bawdier than the last. “O Johnny come up to me—O Johnny come up to me—!”

After an hour of this, and of steady drinking, Tom began to feel tired of laughing. He also began to feel a deep undercurrent of anger and hostility in his soul; he drank more Burgundy, half listened to the filthy stories, and then abruptly pushed his chair a little back from the table, toward a cool current of damp air which was coming from the open window behind him. What time was it? It was beginning to thunder—the thought of a cool thunderstorm was refreshing. If only he could sneak out—! The lights swam a little above him—he looked up, to see if he could detect them in the act of moving.

“Coffee, sir?”

“Thank you. Some coffee—”

The coffee cup seemed far away—he reached toward it uncertainly. “Mademoiselle from Armentières” was begun again, then “Down in the Lehigh Valley,” then “Colombo.” Then several songs were sung at once in different parts of the room—the party was becoming disorganized. He felt as if a valve had closed in his ears; everything was curiously muffled. These flushed faces and wide-open mouths had nothing to do with him. A few of the guests were leaving early. Good riddance.

“How are you, old man?”

It was Kit, still very pale, leaning over him unsteadily, his eyes bright.

“Rotten,” he said. “I think it’s rotten.”

“Why don’t you try the Roman feather? It’s two doors down on the left.”

“Go to hell.”

“All right. Go to hell yourself!”

A flash of green light flickered over the ceiling, over the glasses, making everything seem artificial, and was followed by a terrific peal of thunder. A ragged chorus of cheers. There was a moment’s silence, then the men began stumbling to their feet.

“That was thunder,” said Kit. “I know thunder when I hear it!”

“Who’s for a party, before it begins to rain?” said Roger Day. “I can call up Helen. Don’t all speak at once. There’s only room for six.”

He staggered to the window and looked out intently, holding the curtains aside with his two hands.

“It’s raining already,” he said. Then he shouted, “Look! There’s a fire! Say, kids, there’s a fire over there! Let’s go! What do you say!”

“Where? Let me see!”

There was a stampede to the window, followed by a terrific exodus into the hall. Everyone at once. Somebody was lying on the floor, moaning. Kit grabbed Tom by the arm and tried to pull him along.

“Come on,” he said.

“No. Let me alone. Get out. I’m going by myself and I’m going alone.”

“You’re drunk.”

“You’re drunk yourself. Let go my arm, Kit!”

“Don’t be a fool. You can’t drive in that state! This’ll give you a chance to get out of it.… Come on! Get up!”

Tom permitted himself to be pulled to his feet.

“You’re a bunch of lousy dirty little crabs,” he said. “All of you.”

“Shut up.”

Kit dragged him along the hall, found his hat and jammed it on his head for him, and then pushed him out into the street.

“You wait here,” he said. “Give me the key to the car.”

He took the key and ran off into the darkness. The rain was beginning to quicken. Tom watched the huge drops falling on the circle of illuminated sidewalk under a lamp. They were as big as pansies. He leaned down to watch them. Spat—spat—spat—they fell; and one or two plopped on his hat. A car drove off, and then another, their headlights hollowing bright swarms of raindrops out of the night. From the second car, a head was thrust forth and yelled, “Hurry up, Tom, you fool!”

“Go to hell!” he shouted back.

Let them all go to hell, the damned fools. He started to walk in the opposite direction from that which Kit had taken. There was another lightning flash. The rain began to fall harder. A good thing if he just walked away, and didn’t go back. But where would he go? He couldn’t go home like this—and there was nowhere else. What about the party at Helen’s? He had heard all about Helen from Kit. A “telephone” place. Kit had been there several times; he liked Helen, also a girl from St. Louis who had been there, a married girl who came up to Boston now and then for a “holiday.”… Or he might go to a movie, and sleep it off. Or the fire?… He looked up, and saw that the whole sky was red in the direction of the South Station, a wide glare against the clouds.… Kit suddenly seized him by the arm.

“Here! Where do you think you’re going?”

“Let me go, you damned fool!”

“The devil I will.… You get into that car.”

“Will you let me go?”

“No.”

He felt Kit’s hand closing hard about his wrist. Kit’s face was thrust near to his own, white and intense. A giddy wave of hate suddenly overwhelmed him; he struck the white face hard with his open hand, hard as he could, and felt the light spectacles smash. Kit staggered backward, lifted both hands to his eyes, bent his head over in a curious way, and stood perfectly still. Tom took a step toward him.

“Kit!”

“What in God’s name did you do that for!”

“Are you hurt? Let me see.”

Kit removed his hands, slowly, detaching the broken spectacles, and lifted his face. Blood was streaming down his left cheek from a gash below the eye.

“My God, Kit, I’m sorry! Is your eye hurt?”

“No.… Just a little flesh cut, I think.… Does it look bad? Try a handkerchief on it.”

They moved together into the ring of light under a street-lamp, and Tom began dabbing the wound with his handkerchief. Thank God—it wasn’t as bad as he had thought.

“It’s about half an inch,” he said. “I don’t think it’s very deep. You’d better hold the handkerchief against it.… Where’s the car?”

They walked slowly to the car and got in, Tom taking the wheel. For a moment they sat still, listening to the rain on the roof. It was raining harder than ever, a steady drumming. Kit lay back and shut his eyes, still breathing rather quickly. Then he began to laugh.

“What damned fools we are,” he said. “What idiots! Do you think you’re sober enough to drive?”

Tom suddenly put his hand on Kit’s shoulder.

“Kit, old man, I’m horribly sorry.… Do you know why it was?”

“Sure I know why it was!”

“Well—you’re a good egg.”

He began to laugh himself, a little hysterically, and then abruptly stopped, feeling that in another moment he would be crying.

“That’s no good,” he said, his voice breaking slightly. “Let’s go! I’m going to spend the night on your sofa.”

He touched the starter, switched on the windshield wiper, and the car began to move.… What an astonishing business—what an astonishing business. Thank God, it was finished.… And then he thought of Gay; and at once a queer deep feeling of exultation came over him, as if everything were again for the best, in the best of all possible worlds.