Part 12

Inga stood on the corner and watched Laura walk away from her. “Any time you want that coffee, Laura,” she called. “I’m in the phone book.”

* * * * *

Laura stood in front of the door into her old apartment building for a long while on trembling legs before she turned the knob and walked in.

_What if they’re together?_ she wondered. _They’ll just grab me and wring my neck. God, all those questions Tris used to ask me about Beebo. And it never entered my love-sick head!_

She crossed the little inner court to the second door, opened it, and went to the row of mailboxes to press the buzzer. She found Beebo’s name, with her own crossed out beneath it but no other added. And a weird, wonderful panic grabbed her throat at the thought of Beebo.

She left the buzzer without pressing it and walked up the flight of stairs to stand in front of the door that had once been her own, with Beebo still swimming before her eyes.

She could picture her more and more clearly: wearing pants and going barefoot, tired at the end of the day and maybe a little high; a cigarette in her mouth and a towel tied around her middle while she did dishes or cleaned up the apartment; the smooth skin on her face and the handsome features that used to fire Laura’s imagination and make her tingle; the tired eyes, blue and brilliant and somehow a little sick of it all ... except when they focused on Laura.

Laura remembered how it had been and a sudden flash of physical longing caught her heart and squeezed until she felt her breath come short. She stared at the door, afraid to knock and still hypnotized with curiosity. Her hand was raised, quivering, only inches from the green painted wood.

_Tris will open it_, she thought, _and together they’ll strangle me_. Oddly, she didn’t care. She was too tight to care. She had a vision of herself falling into their arms and succumbing without a struggle. Just letting them have her life, her mixed-up, aimless, leftover life.

She knocked—a quick scared rap, sharp and clear. And then stood there on one foot and the other, half panicky like a grade-schooler nearly ready to wet her pants and flee.

Footsteps. High heels. From the kitchen, Beebo’s voice. “Who the hell could that be? After ten, isn’t it?” _Oh, that voice! That husky voice that used to whisper such things to me that I can never forget._

The door swung open all at once, ushering a flood of light into the hall. Laura looked up slowly ... at Lili! The two of them stared at each other in mutual amazement for a moment. And while they stared, mute, Beebo called again, “Who is it, Lili?”

Lili, her candy-box pretty face overlaid with too much makeup, as usual, broke into a big smile. “It’s Laura!” she exclaimed. “I’ll be goddamned. _Laura!_”

For a tense moment Laura could feel Beebo’s shock across the rooms and through the walls like a physical touch. Then her courage melted—fizzled into nothing like water on a hot skillet, and she turned and ran.

She heard Beebo at the door, before she got out into the court, saying, “Let her go, Lili. If she thinks I’m going to chase her twice—” And that was all Laura got of it. It shot through her heart like a bullet.

Laura reached the door to the street, tore it open, and rushed out. But once there, with the door shut behind her and no sound of pursuing footsteps, she collapsed against the wall and wept. Between sobs, when she could get her breath, she listened ... listened ... for the running feet that would mean Beebo had changed her mind. Laura had to believe, at least for a minute, that Beebo would come after her. Because it was all tied up in her mind with Beebo loving her. If Beebo loved her she’d chase her. It was that simple. And it didn’t matter a damn what Laura might have done to Beebo in the past, or how she might have hurt her.

_Tris!_ she thought. _I’ve got to see her!_ She said this to herself very urgently, but curiously, at the same time, she felt no desire to go and find the lovely tormented dancer. She told herself it would be all fight and misery. But in her heart of hearts she knew that real love would brave that misery now, being so close and so starved for passion.

She stood there for fully fifteen minutes before she was able to pull herself together and walk to Seventh Avenue. She went straight home in a cab.

Laura walked slowly up the stairs to her apartment. It was after eleven now, and Jack would be in bed. She had had too much to drink, but she was sober, a tired, bewildered sort of sobriety that made her want to lie down and weep and rest.

In the morning she would tell it all to Jack. Wonderful Jack. He would coax her back to living, coax her with his wit and his compassion and his incredible patience with her. And she would lie in a welter of dejection and let him work on her until she felt like lifting her head from the pillow and raising the shade from the window and going on with life. It was one of the things she loved him for and needed him for the most—this ability to revive her when she was so low that only death was lower.

Tonight was perhaps not quite that bad. But it was bad enough to have exhausted her. And Tris and Beebo! That had been the cruelest blow; the one she should have foreseen clear as a beacon in a black sea. She shoved a trembling key into the lock and walked into the apartment.

It was warm and well-lighted. It was pretty and it was comfortable. It was home. And Laura felt a sort of gratitude to Jack that needed words. She went to find him. But he wasn’t in the living room, nor in the bedroom.

She stood on the threshold of the bedroom and said, “Jack? Hey, Jack! Where are you?”

“Here,” he said from the kitchen.

“Oh. It’s me. I thought you’d be in bed.” She slipped her coat off while she walked through the living room to find him. “Hi,” she said. He was sitting on a kitchen chair and he answered, “Hi.”

Laura stood in the doorway and looked at him. And he stared back at her, and she knew something was wrong but she didn’t know what. Her long fine hair had come loose when she ran from Beebo and she reached up and pulled it down in a shimmering cascade, watching Jack all the while through narrowed eyes.

“Have fun?” he asked.

“Beebo and Tris ... are ... shacking up.” She threw it at him point-blank. She wanted his sympathy.

Jack put his head back and laughed, that awful bitter laugh she hadn’t heard for months, and she knew with a sudden start of fear and pity that he was drunk. “That makes everything perfect,” he said, still laughing, his eyes wicked and sharp behind the horn rims.

“Jack ...,” she said shakily, coming in to sit beside him and seeing now the whiskey bottle on the table in front of him, two-thirds empty. “Jack, darling.” She took his hands and her eyes were big with alarm.

Jack took his hands back. Not roughly, but as if he simply didn’t want to be touched. Not by Laura, anyway.

“Mother, you are a living doll. If I had known you could keep secrets so well I’d have told you a few,” he said. He spoke, as always when he was drunk, with a slow precision, as if each word were a stepping stone.

“Secrets?” Laura said.

“You are the living picture of guilt, my dear,” he said. “It is written all over your beautiful face.”

Laura put her hands over that face suddenly with a gasp. “Terry!” she sobbed through clenched teeth. “_Terry!_ If I hadn’t gone out he wouldn’t have come.”

“He comes when the mood hits him,” Jack said. “Which is most of the time, most anywhere. It had nothing to do with you going out, my little wifey.”

Laura looked up, her delicate face mottled pink and white and wet from the eyes down. “He wrote—”

“Indeed he did. He told me the whole romantic story.”

“Jack, darling, I only kept it secret because I was afraid you’d—you’d start drinking, or something—I—”

“You hit the nail on the head. I’m indebted to you. Your solicitude is exemplary.” He waved the fast-emptying bottle at her.

“Oh, shut up! Shut up! I _love_ you. I did it because I love you.”

“You opened my mail because you love me?” He continued to drink while he talked ... slowly, but steadily.

“I knew it was from him, Jack. I just had a feeling. The handwriting and everything.”

He laughed ruefully. “Just think what you’ve spared me!” he said. “I can drink in peace now. My wife loves me. Thanks, wife.” He saluted her.

Laura slid off her chair to her knees and put her arms around him, still crying. “Jack, Jack, please forgive me. I’ll do anything, I couldn’t bear to hurt you, I’d die first. Oh, please—”

“You’re forgiven,” he interrupted her. “Why not?” And he kept on laughing. But his pardon was so light, so biting, that she cringed from it. She lifted her face to him, streaming with tears, and he said, smiling at her, “You make a lovely picture, Mother. Sort of Madonna-like. If I could paint you, I’d paint you. Black, I think. From head to toe.”

She put her head down on his knees and said softly, “You’ll never forgive me, will you?”

“I already have.”

“Never,” she whispered, stricken.

“Oh, let’s not get maudlin,” he said. “I admit I would have been grateful for a little forewarning. But after all, it’s a simple question of sex. Maybe I should get rid of mine. That would solve everything.” And his soft, insane chuckling underlined everything he said.

Laura felt terror then. It rose and fell inside her like nausea. Whenever she looked at Jack it surged in her throat. It wasn’t the sweet guilty thrill of coming near Beebo that had cost her such sensual pain earlier in the evening.

“Jack, darling,” she said.

“Yes, Laura darling.” And the sarcasm burned her. But she went on, determined, raising herself back into her chair again with effort.

“Tell me what happened. Tell me everything.”

“Oh, it was dandy,” he said. “You should have been here. Incidentally, he asked about your health.” Laura couldn’t watch him while he talked. She looked at her hands. And all the while he told her about it she kept thinking, _If only I hadn’t gone out tonight. Every time I do something completely selfish I suffer for it. And so does he. Damn Terry! Damn him to hell! He won’t ruin Jack, I won’t let him. This is once he won’t have his way._

* * * * *

It had been so completely unexpected, so startling, that Jack would never forget it or recover from it. Terry was as far removed from his life as if he were dead. And his life, Jack felt, had become a good thing at last. He had Laura to live for, not a wild, irresistible, good-for-nothing boy who wore him out and broke his heart and his bankroll. He had a new stature in the world as a married man, a new security. And the sweet hope of a child someday....

When he heard the bell ring, almost an hour after Laura had gone out, he took it for a neighbor and stood with the front door open while the elevator ascended. But when Terry stepped out, Jack was speechless. He couldn’t believe it, and he would have slammed the door and passed it off as a nightmare if he could have moved a little faster.

But Terry caught him and from then on it was as degrading and overwhelming as it had ever been. Jack put up the best fight he could, but it was little more than a gesture of protest. He was helplessly angry, helplessly infatuated. And all the while Terry prated to him of San Francisco and the Beats and the fog and the styles in clothes and the styles in love-making, Jack kept wondering, _How did he find me?_ And the answer was, had to be, _Laura_. Laura had failed him. Betrayed him. It almost tore him apart.

Terry didn’t leave until nearly eleven, and Jack saw him out, still with the feeling that it hadn’t happened, that it was all an incredible dream. It wasn’t until he got the bottle and began to drink that he believed in it at all. By the time Laura got home he wished the whole damned world to hell, with himself first in line.

* * * * *

“And that’s all,” Jack said. “Naturally, the only thing to do after he left was get drunk.” He had nearly finished the bottle and it was all he could do to get the words out. They left his mouth slowly, discreetly, each one a pearl of over-articulation.

Laura took away what was left—a shot or two at the most—and he didn’t even try to protest. She helped him up and half dragged, half carried him to the bedroom, where she dumped him on his bed. He was unconscious the minute she pushed his head down on the pillow. Laura undressed him, tears running down her face.

“Sleep,” she said. “Sleep and forget it for a while. I’ll make it up to you, darling. All I wanted tonight was to cry on your shoulder. And you can’t even hold yourself up.”

She dragged and shoved and pulled until she got him under the covers. “He won’t get you, Jack,” she whispered. “You’d fight for me if I were in trouble. And I’ll fight for you.”

* * * * *

In the morning, Laura got up, moving softly as a bird on the sand, and left him to himself in the bedroom, still noisily and miserably asleep with a full-blown, brutal hangover brewing under his closed eyes.

She had to make it up to him, redeem herself. And she could only think of one thing. So before noon she called Terry and asked him to dinner.

“Sounds great,” he said in innocent surprise and pleasure. “I was counting on mooching from you,” he admitted, laughing.

When Jack woke up she told him what she had done. She waited until he had had four cups of coffee and eight aspirins and some forced warm milk and raw egg. He said nothing but “No. No! _No!_” to whatever she was trying to get into him. He sat in the kitchen with his head in his hands, and Laura began to fear he was still a little drunk. She had thrown out the rest of the whiskey.

“Where’s the bottle?” he asked her finally, around the middle of the afternoon.

“Gone. I tossed it.”

He nodded painfully, resigned.

“Jack,” she said softly. “Terry’s coming to dinner.”

He lifted his throbbing head to gape at her. “Are you trying to kill me, Mother? Or just drive me nuts?” he said.

“I’m going to save you. Save _us_,” she said passionately. “We’re at the crossroads, Jack. This is the first real crisis we’ve had. We can’t just fall apart. We have too much to save, too much worth saving. We have love, too, and I’m not going to let him hurt you any more.” Somehow in the strength she found to fight Jack’s battle was the strength to fight her own. The downright shock and humiliation of finding that her two ex-lovers were romancing might have thrown her into a full-blown depression. But now she hadn’t time. It was Jack’s turn. She loved him, she was absolutely sure of that. She was not absolutely sure she loved Tris any more. Nor was she sure now that she _didn’t_ love Beebo. Jack was her security, her chosen life; he deserved her loyalty.

But to her chagrin, her noble speech had very little effect on him. He got out of his chair with much agonized effort, making a face, and headed for the coat closet.

“Where are you going?” she asked anxiously, running after him.

“For a bottle.”

“Oh, Jack, no!”

He turned to face her, sliding awkwardly into his coat sleeves. “Do you want me to go through this sober?”

“Darling, you don’t even have to _look_ at him! You can lock yourself in the john and sing hymns if you want to. I just want to talk to him.”

“About the weather?”

“I’ll get him out of here, I swear I will!”

“How? With a can opener? TNT?” He was moving toward the door as he spoke with Laura clinging to his arm and trying to hold him back.

“Darling, trust me!” she begged. She was not at all sure that she could get Terry out again, once he got in, but she had to make Jack calm down. She was frantic to stop him.

“Trust you?” He turned and looked at her uncertainly, his hand on the front door knob, and gave a little snort. “That doesn’t work. I tried it.”

“Oh, you damn, fatuous idiot!” she cried in exasperation, dropping his arm to stamp to the middle of the room and face him from there as if from a podium. “I open _one_ goddam letter—out of love and anxiety—to spare you pain. And the thing backfires. Do you have to crucify yourself? I said I was sorry and I am. I’m sorry. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” she yelled.

“Were you born that way?” he snapped.

“Shut up and listen!” she cried. “Jack, let me make it up to you, let me _try_. You have no right to call yourself my husband if you won’t give me a chance, and I’m telling you right now, Jack Mann, if you won’t I’ll walk out of this house and your life forever.” She paused, flushed and trembling, for breath, while Jack stared at her, surprised, half-convinced, and himself trembling slightly from the hangover.

Finally he went to the arm of the nearest chair and sat down and said, “All right, Wife. Read him the riot act while I sing hymns in the bathroom, if you think it’ll do any good.”

“Oh, Jack.” She ran to him, all pity and tenderness, and kissed his frowning face. He put his head back and ignored her.

Terry arrived at seven, half an hour late, with a huge bouquet of roses for Laura. “For Mrs. Mann,” he said, bowing, and then gave her a quick embrace. “You look great, honey.”

“Thanks,” she said with reserve. “I’ll put them in water.”

“Where’s Jack? Oh, there you are.” Terry made a running jump to the couch where Jack was lying in state, wearing his hangover like a royal robe.

Jack let out all his breath in a wail of anguish when Terry hit him.

“Where did you get the flowers?” Laura asked, coming back in with them arranged in a tall vase.

“Nick’s. On the corner. I had to charge ’em to you, Laur. I hope you don’t mind.” He smiled charmingly. “Your credit’s much better than mine around here.”

Jack laughed softly. “You haven’t changed a bit, have you?” he said to Terry.

Laura sat down and looked at Terry’s bright young face, smiling happily around a mouthful of salted pecans, and wondered if her little trick would work. It had to. But it might not. She felt a little sick, seeing Jack so miserable.

“No drinks?” Terry said, suddenly conscious of the lack of alcohol.

“Milk,” Laura offered.

“Milk punch?” he asked.

“Just bare milk,” Jack drawled.

“What’s the matter with you?” Terry said and laughed at him. “Have a nut.” And he popped one in Jack’s half open mouth. “You aren’t on the wagon, are you?”

“I was,” Jack said. “Till last night.”

“No kidding. God. Amazing. Since when?”

“Since we got married last August. A little before.”

“Laura, how’d you do it?” He grinned at her.

“I didn’t have to,” she said. “The day you walked out of his life all the good things walked in.”

“Including you?” Terry asked.

“Including me,” she shot back.

“Oh.” He smiled ruefully. “I wasn’t _that_ bad, was I?” he asked Jack. He seemed to think it was comfortably funny, like everything else connected with Jack. “Did I drive you to drink, honey?” he said.

“Only on the bad days,” Jack said. “Unfortunately, there weren’t any good days.”

Terry laughed and stuck another nut in Jack’s mouth.

“That’s all,” Jack told him, wincing. “The damn pecans sound like depth charges when I chew.” He stroked his head carefully.

There was a silence while Terry ate, Laura stared at him nervously, and Jack concentrated on his pains. Laura wanted to make Terry uncomfortable, self-conscious. But it was nearly a lost cause.

“What’s for dinner?” he asked suddenly, unaware that he was supposed to notice the silence.

She told him.

“Great,” he said. More silence. Laura was determined to embarrass him, and Jack was too ill to care about conversation. Slowly, Terry began to realize something was amiss. Rather than take the hint he tried to lighten the atmosphere with chatter.

“How do you like the married life, old man?” he asked.

“He liked it fine the day before yesterday,” Laura said crisply. Jack groaned. Terry understood.

He sat up and leaned toward his hostess. “Laura, honey, I don’t want to mess things up for you,” he said. “I just love Jack, too, that’s all. You know that. You always knew it, even before you got married.”

“I know you nearly killed him,” she said quietly.

“No fair exaggerating.”

“No fair, hell. It’s true!” she exclaimed.

“It’s not either!” he said with good-humored indignation, as if they were playing parlor games. “Is it, Jack?”

But Jack, his eyes on Laura now, kept silent.

“Well,” Terry admitted, “I was pretty bitchy sometimes. But so was he. And no matter what, we loved each other. Even at the end, when he kicked me out.”

“If he hadn’t kicked you out that night he might have killed himself with liquor.”

“I don’t believe it.”

Laura threw her hands up, exasperated. “What more do you _want_ from Jack, Terry?” she said. “What do you want from _me_?”

Terry grinned. “Equal time,” he said, nodding at the bedroom.

Jack laughed weakly and Laura got up and stamped her foot. “Terry, Jack loves you. I know that and I’ll have to live with it. But that love is destructive, and I’m asking you now to get out of our lives forever and never come back to hurt us again.” She said it with quiet intensity.

“Before dinner?” he asked.

“Oh, God!” Laura spluttered at the ceiling.

Terry lighted a cigarette for Jack, who had fumbled one from the box on the cocktail table, and told Laura, “I can’t go away forever. Any more than you could desert Beebo forever. I love him. I’m stuck with him.”

“I’ve _left_ Beebo,” she said.

“You’ll go back,” he told her serenely. “It was that kind of affair.”

Laura held on to her self control as her last and dearest possession. She didn’t dare to lose it. “Take me seriously, Terry,” she begged, almost in a whisper. “Please let us live together in peace.”