The Vanished

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

I came back to San Francisco the same way I had arrived in Germany: bone-tired.

There had been delays at Heathrow again, and inclement weather on the transatlantic flight, and it was after three when the plane landed at San Francisco International on Wednesday. I had regained the nine hours lost going over, and so it was midnight European time and better than eighteen hours since I had last slept.

It was cold and clear in The City, and that was a pleasant change from the sweeping rain and snow which had blanketed most of Europe. I took the shuttle into the Downtown Terminal, went directly from there to the Argonaut Hotel.

Not quite as genteel as the Royal Gate, it was nonetheless another of those gilt-edged mirrors of old San Francisco; Elaine Kavanaugh had, for one thing, excellent taste. I spoke to a desk clerk who might have been a younger brother of the one at the Royal Gate, found out that Elaine was in her room, and waited while he had me announced. A couple of minutes later he came back with her approval and told me I would find her in 722.

When I came out of the elevator on the seventh floor, she had her door open at the far end of the hall, waiting for me. She wore a yellow sweater and a plaid skirt, and her hair was carelessly combed, her face haggard and etched with desperate hope and infinite weariness. There were purplish half-moons under her eyes, and worry lines on her forehead and at the corners of her unpainted mouth. Her flesh had a loose quality, a kind of mass relaxation of the molecules of her being, and she looked at least as old as I am.

If I tell her what I suspect, I thought, she’ll age even more, she’ll disintegrate right here in front of me. The prospect was an ugly one. During the plane flights I had tried to think of different ways of handling my meeting with her, using half-truths at this or that level, but none of it was particularly appealing. Finally, I had decided to just let it happen spontaneously, que será será, and that still seemed to be the best idea.

She caught my arm and drew me inside, and then shut the door and leaned back against it, looking at me with those desperate eyes. ‘My God, I thought you were never going to come,’ she said. ‘I’ve been waiting and waiting-why didn’t you say something in your wire?’

‘There was nothing immediate to say.’

‘But didn’t you find out something?’

‘I don’t know yet.’

‘What does that mean? Did you or didn’t you?’

‘I’m just not sure.’

‘There must be some reason you decided to come home so quickly, for God’s sake.’

‘There’s a possibility I have to check out,’ I said. ‘Some people your fiance may have gone to see in Northern California.’

‘Where in Northern California?’

‘A town called Roxbury.’

‘Where’s that? I’ve never heard of it.’

‘It’s near Eureka.’

‘Who would Roy know up there?’

‘The family of someone he… met over in Germany.’

‘Why would he go to visit this family?’

‘I didn’t say that he did.’

‘But you think he might have?’

‘There’s the chance.’

‘Who was this someone he met in Germany?’

‘Just a guy,’ I lied automatically, and I felt uncomfortable, I felt lousy about this whole damned thing. I could not look at Elaine. I went to the window across the room and stared out at the city, lighting a cigarette; my cough had gone away again, the way it always did, and I knew I was back fighting to keep myself under a pack a day, same old circus, same old carousel.

She came up behind me, and I could see her reflection in the window glass. I said, ‘Have you been all right?’

‘I’m beginning to understand what people with claustrophobia must feel like.’

‘But you didn’t go out.’

‘No. And no one has bothered me.’

‘Well, I’m glad to hear that.’

‘Look at me,’ she said, and there was some of that desperation in her voice now.

I did not want to look at her, but I turned anyway, slowly, and met her eyes and tried to keep my own blank and gentle. She said, ‘Why won’t you tell me what you found out? About these people Roy might have gone to see?’

‘Because I’m not sure it means anything. I don’t want to get your hopes up.’

‘I have a right to know. You’re working for me, you know.’

‘Listen, Miss Kavanaugh, bear with me a little. I’m not withholding anything important. I just want to have a chance to look into this thing before I talk about it. That’s all.’

‘Does it have something to do with that portrait of Roy?’

‘It might.’

‘Did you find out anything about it in Germany?’

‘Possibly.’

‘What?’

‘I don’t want to talk about it just yet.’

‘Do you have an idea now why it’s important?’

‘No,’ I said truthfully.

‘Or who stole it? Or who made those telephone calls?’

‘No.’

‘Or where Roy is now?’

‘No.’

Her eyes searched my face, the pupils moving, fluttering like restless birds. Finally she pivoted and crossed the room and sank into one of the chairs. She sat with her hands twisted together in an attitude of prayer, staring down at them, not moving. Then, abruptly, her head snapped up and she said, ‘He’s dead, isn’t he?’

‘What?’

‘That’s why you won’t tell me what you learned in Germany. You think he’s dead, for some reason you think he’s dead, and you want to make sure before you tell me. That’s it, isn’t it?’

‘No,’ I said, ‘no, that’s not it.’

She caught her lower lip between her teeth and bit at it until I thought she might draw blood. Her eyes were on her hands again. Silence gathered thickly in the room, and I watched her and tried to think of something to say that wouldn’t sound false and unconvincing-but there seemed to be nothing. I felt like a damned heel, and yet there was no other way to do it without being even more cruel; I had only suspicions, not facts.

She broke the silence after a long moment, and her voice was flat, empty, teetering on the edge of hysteria. ‘Yes, he’s dead, I know he’s dead and you know it too, that has to be it.’

‘Miss Kavanaugh, please-’

‘He’s dead, he died somehow and I’ll never see him again-oh God, oh God, he’s dead, damn you, I know he’s dead, why don’t you tell me, I know he’s dead!’ She began to rock back and forth like a little girl with a doll in her lap, clutching her hands, her mouth quivering.

I went to her, awkwardly, hurriedly, and took her shoulders. ‘Easy now, it’s all right,’ I said, and the words were banal in my own ears. ‘You don’t know he’s dead, I don’t know it, I don’t even think it-’

‘No, he’s dead,’ she said, ‘he’s the only man I ever loved, the only man I was ever with, we were lovers, listen, we were lovers and I don’t care because we loved, we loved, it was beautiful every time, oh my God, I wish I was dead too…’

Her eyes were fixed, catatonic, and bubbles of saliva formed at the corners of her mouth. I slapped her, hard enough to jerk her head around, reddening her cheek. Her mouth went slack, and then her eyes cleared and she blinked at me, focused on me, and the dangerous moment-the potentially suicidal moment-was over. She was all right again, embarrassed, and she put her face in her hands and began to cry, softly, quietly.

I left her and returned to the window, looking out at the city again, at the inanimate testimonials of civilization and all its subtle barbarity. After a time the muffled sobbing sounds ceased behind me, and Elaine said, ‘I’m sorry, I… I didn’t mean to act that way.’

‘You don’t have to apologize,’ I said without turning.

‘I don’t usually lose control of myself like that…’

I faced her then. The crying had been good for her, a kind of catharsis; there was more animation in her face now, color in her cheeks, life in her eyes. ‘You’ve been under a heavy strain, Miss Kavanaugh.’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Yes.’

‘In all honesty, I don’t know or even think that your fiancé is dead. What I found out in Germany may not even have anything to do with his disappearance. It’s just something that I want to look into a little further, and after I have, then I’ll tell you about it. I know it’s rough, but I’m asking you to do this my way; and I promise you that the minute I find out something definite on his whereabouts, I’ll let you know.’

She nodded convulsively. ‘All right,’ she said. ‘I… I trust you.’

I felt even more like a heel. I got another cigarette into my mouth and said, ‘I’ll be leaving for Roxbury first thing tomorrow morning. Do you think you can stand it here another day or two?’

‘Yes.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Yes. I’ll be fine.’ She looked away from me. ‘What I said about Roy and me, well, I mean…’

‘If I heard anything,’ I told her, ‘I’ve already forgotten what it was.’

‘Thank you.’

I suggested, pointlessly, that she try to relax, and said that I would call her from Roxbury sometime the next day. Then I touched her shoulder, lightly, and left her alone again…

I picked up my car at the parking garage across from the Downtown Terminal, and it was almost five-thirty when I drove out into the heavy rush-hour traffic which clogs downtown San Francisco between four and six on weekday afternoons. I thought briefly about going home for a shower and a change of clothes, decided I did not really feel much like looking at the emptiness of my flat, and found myself on Geary Boulevard, heading west toward the ocean.

Saxon’s 19th Avenue Coffee Shop was out that way, on the other side of the Park.

I had not had much time to think about Cheryl the past couple of days, but she had been there in a corner of my mind nonetheless. I wanted to see her tonight, I wanted to talk to her. I had no idea if she was working the day or the night shift; but even with the traffic, I knew I could get to 19th Avenue by six o’clock and that way meet her either coming or going.

I preferred seeing her at Saxon’s to calling or stopping by her home for the simple reason that I did not want to talk to her brother. He was a suspect in the theft of the portrait of Roy Sands, the threatening telephone calls, just as Chuck Hendryx and Rich Gilmartin were suspects. I was also not forgetting about Nick Jackson, even though there did not seem to be any way Jackson could have known that I had the sketch, that I was going to Germany at the behest of Elaine Kavanaugh. The truth was, I had had difficulty envisioning Rosmond as the one responsible-simply because he was Cheryl’s brother, and yet I still did not want to talk to him on this day. If he and Hendryx and Gilmartin thought I was still in Germany, I would feel better about things; it seemed important that I make the trip to Roxbury without any of them knowing I had even returned to the country.

When I reached Saxon’s, it was five before six. I parked around the first corner beyond the coffee shop, illegally, and walked back through a cold, light fog-and Cheryl was just coming out of the front door. She came to a complete standstill when she saw me, and then a small, faintly shy smile gently curved the corners of her mouth.

‘Hi,’ I said.

‘Hi.’

‘Day shift today?’

She nodded, and her fingers were nervous at the buttons of the dark beige coat she wore. Under it was a simple beige wool jersey-she had obviously changed out of whatever uniform she was required to wear at Saxon’s- and her autumn-hued hair was tied with a bright turquoise ribbon well below the neck, so that the soft reddish-gold was like a fan behind her head and like a proud and sleekly curried tail extending down her back. She looked very lovely.

‘When did you get home from Germany?’ she asked.

‘This afternoon.’

‘Did you learn anything more about Roy?’

‘Not much,’ I said. ‘Nothing definite.’ I looked into her eyes, kept on looking into them; they said a lot of things, some of the same things mine were saying to her. ‘I hope you don’t mind my coming out here like this, but I wanted to see you tonight, if only for just a few minutes. I left downtown at five-thirty, and it seemed easier to just drive out here rather than wait until later to call.’

‘No,’ she said, ‘I don’t mind. I’m glad you did.’

I wanted to touch her; instead I kept my hands firmly in the pockets of my coat. ‘Were you going any place special now? Or just home?’

‘Home.’

‘Would you like to have a drink with me? And then dinner? I know it’s kind of short notice, and if you’re busy tonight I’ll understand.’

‘I’m not busy,’ Cheryl said. ‘I hadn’t planned on anything at all this evening. Doug had to go to the Presidio for something today and he probably won’t be back until very late.’

There was a pleasant warmth in the core of my stomach. ‘Shall we go now?’

‘Do you think I ought to change first?’

‘You look fine, Cheryl. You look wonderful.’

We went to the Cossack, on Clement, and had two cocktails in the lounge and then dinner in one of the private booths in the restaurant section: chicken Kiev and sour red cabbage and demitasse cups of bitter Turkish coffee afterward. It was dark and quiet in there. The waiters wore Russian Cossack uniforms replete with scimitars, and hidden speakers gave out with Moussorgsky and Shostakovich and some of the other Russian composers at low volume.

It was fine between us, easy and warm. When I touched her hand with the tips of my fingers once during dinner, she did not stiffen and her eyes reflected in the glow of the candelight a growing trust and a growing need that was exciting and touching and very real.

We talked about many things, impersonal and personal, jumping from this to that as each of us sought to explore the other’s depths, the interests and prejudices and likes and dislikes that each of us had, seeking the common bonds and dwelling on them when we found them. She laughed when I told her about my collection of pulp magazines, and the tenacity with which I had pursued the hobby, but it was not a mocking laugh or a censorious one-as Erika’s had been; it was a pleased, curious laugh, as if she were fascinated by the idea of anyone indulging in that sort of hobby. And then she wanted to know if I thought the idea of a grown woman collecting dolls from foreign lands was silly. No, I didn’t think that was silly at all. Well, she said, she had sixteen dolls in her bedroom, from such countries as Spain and Holland and France and England and Mexico and Germany and Japan, maybe she would show them to me one day if I was interested. Yes, I was interested, and did she want to see some of my pulp magazines?- making a small joke about their being the lure to my apartment instead of etchings. She laughed softly and we went on to something else without any pauses or awkwardness.

We discovered that we both liked hiking in the woods, old movies-Charlie Chan and The Falcon and Bogart and Peter Lorre and Lloyd Nolan-brandy old-fashioneds, football, and good soul jazz. We disliked parking meters, junk mail, the drug culture, peanut butter, and the travesties of war. We touched on religion and politics just long enough to determine that our ideas were similar on one and dissimilar on the other.

We talked and we talked, open and natural, like old friends, like new lovers, and I forgot for a little while about Roy Sands and poor Elaine Kavanaugh and all the ugliness and suspected ugliness that had touched my life in the past week. All at once, then, it was midnight and they were about to close up. We asked each other where the time had gone, the way you do, and I paid the check and then I drove her directly back to 19th Avenue, parking in front of her car a half block from Saxon’s.

We sat there on the darkened street. I said, because it had to be said, ‘Cheryl, will you do me a favor?’

‘Yes, if I can.’

‘Don’t mention that you saw me tonight. To your brother, or to anyone.’

‘Why?’

‘My reasons are complicated and not exactly explainable just now. I’ll tell you about them a little later. Okay?’

‘Well… of course, if it’s what you want.’

‘Thanks, honey.’

She turned her face close to mine at the endearment, and her eyes were pools of deep blackness with the faintest traces of light deep at their centers-and I kissed her. She did not pull away and her lips parted slightly under mine, warm and soft and sweet, and I could feel her shudder with inner emotion as I held her shoulders lightly in my hands. I drew back finally, looking at her, wanting her, needing her, sensing the same feelings inside her own body, but this was not the time, the time was perhaps soon and we both knew that, I think, we both were unable to deny that, but it was not just yet.

‘Thank you,’ she said in a soft, liquid whisper, ‘thank you for a lovely evening.’

‘Are you working Saturday night?’

‘No-the day shift.’

‘Can I see you then? I have to go away again, but I should be back by Saturday.’

‘Yes,’ she said.

She touched my hand and we said good night, and then she was out of the car and walking quickly to her own. I sat watching her until she had driven off, until her taillights had vanished around the corner on 19th Avenue, before starting my own car.

The taste and the touch and the scent of her stayed with me all the way back to my apartment.