(1961) The Chapman Report (30 page)

“I think so.”

“I was discreet. I’d go downtown and find someone in the movie or in a bar or go shopping in the next city. I know you like statistics. I’ll try to give you a few. For five years, after the first year, there was a man every-no, let me put it right-the first few years, I wouldn’t do it more than once a month.”

“With the same partner or different partners?”

“Different ones, of course-always-they never even knew my name. I couldn’t risk getting involved. But it kept getting worse. Pretty soon I had nothing else on my mind. I thought I’d go insane. It became two, and then three a month. Finally, every week. Once someone-a friend’s wife-saw me in another city with a man and that scared me witless, and then I was away so much-well, my husband became suspicious. No, that’s not right. He trusted me. He became curious. So, for a while, I determined to stop going out. But I couldn’t stay home. Just sit waiting for him. I was out of my mind. So when I got really desperate, I’d try strangers in the neighborhood. It wasn’t easy. And it made me jumpy. Anyway, there was a school kid-not a kid exactly-he was twenty, and whenever I ran into him, I could see he was wild about me. Always staring at my bust. Well, I liked him a little, and he looked virile, and I began thinking that if I could get to trust him and have him when I needed him, maybe that would be enough and safer all around. One night, I knew my husband would be working-he had some hush-hush spare-time job-so I went out and found the boy and invited him over for the evening. Well, my husband went out about seven, and this boy showed up right after-he’d been watching from the street-and I remember, it was one of my bad nights. I simply couldn’t wait. The minute he came in, I told him that I wasn’t interested in conversation or tea or necking. I wish you could have seen his face, poor baby. He was afraid to use the house, so I took him out on the back lawn, and we just lay on the grass. It was wet and mad and wonderful. He was a good boy. I came when he did, and we just stayed there like two beat animals, and then, suddenly, someone turned on the back-yard lights, and it was my husband. The kid ran off, and there I was. I wanted my husband to beat me, to kill me. I was so ashamed. But he just stood there crying. That was the worst part. I tried to get him to kill me. I told him about some of the others, not all, just some. And all he did was cry. Then he walked out, and I never saw him again. So I came to California and got the divorce-my old man was living here, but his wife’s a bitch, and I couldn’t stay with them. I had some money from my mother, so I bought a house in The Briars. I figured here I’d meet a decent guy. I sure did, and how. I met plenty. All married. You want to know my record for the last three years? Twice a week, maybe. I’m able to keep it down to that by drinking. You’d be surprised how it helps. I mean, if you drink enough. Anyway-” she halted, breathless a moment, and squinted at the screen, wondering what he was thinking-“I don’t care what you think,” she said. “You want the truth. I’m not ashamed. We’re all built differently. I bet you think I’m an old bag. Well, I’m not. Get rid of that lousy screen, and you’ll see. Men think it shows on women, but it doesn’t. Anyway, it’s healthy if it’s natural, and it’s natural for me. Of course-” she halted again and decided that she wanted his good opinion-“I guess you’ll want to know for your survey that I’ve reformed. I haven’t done it once in three weeks. That’s the truth, too. And it wasn’t so hard to do, either. Like smoking. I once stopped for a month. You get withdrawal pains, sure, but if you make up your mind, you can do anything. You believe that, don’t you?”

“Yes, I do.” Paul’s voice was low.

“I’m going to get a job. I’ve made up my mind. I have an appointment right after I leave here. That’ll keep me busy until I get married. If I just find the right man-I mean, somebody who matches me-I’ll be all right; you’ll see.”

“I sincerely hope so.”

She fell back against the chair and closed her eyes, and finally she opened them. She felt better all around. “Well, you’ve got to admit, I’ve fattened up the batting average for The Briars… . Any more questions?”

There was still the last of Tuesday’s daylight left, and Naomi’s frame of mind since departing the Association building was one of unnatural excitement. The experience had been curiously stimulating and it had, in a way she did not understand, sanctioned her past conduct. Celibacy and continence seemed the lesser virtues.

Once she arrived at the boulevard stop light and turned west, Naomi knew that she would not keep the eight-o’clock appointment with Kathleen Ballard. Filled with high resolve at noon, she had telephoned Kathleen, and after exchanging gossip about mutual friends and recounting a Dr. Chapman joke that was current, she had asked to see Kathleen. Naomi had frankly told Kathleen that she wanted a favor of her-that is, if Kathleen was still on good terms with J. Ronald Metzgar of Radcone. Kathleen had said that she was, and hoped that she could be of help. They agreed to meet at Kathleen’s house immediately after dinner.

Naomi made one brief stop. She parked in the lot beside Dr. Schultz’s Twenty-Four-Hour Pet Hospital and asked the night attendant to release Colonel, her five-year-old cocker spaniel. Naomi had acquired Colonel as a pup, because he was the only cocker she had ever seen who did not have sad eyes. Several months before, she had put him up at the pet hospital because feeding him, cleaning him, walking him, had become too much of a chore. But today she wanted him back. While the attendant went to fetch Colonel, Naomi scribbled a check. When Colonel was brought forward, tail wagging uncontrollably at the sight of her, she felt ashamed at having neglected him so long.

With Colonel on the seat beside her, lapping gratefully at her free hand, Naomi drove hastily home. She left the car in the garage, led Colonel into the house, and gave him some milk. While he was occupied, she hastened to the bathroom, freshened her make-up, returned to the kitchen, poured a double Scotch, and, not bothering with ice, she drank it down grimacing, and then felt warm and eager again.

She found the red leash, hooked it to Colonel’s collar, and started for the front door with him.

“I’m going to take you for a walk, poopsie,” she said.

Outside, it was dark at last, and the street lights were on. Wrapping the leash around her hand, she held Colonel in restraint as she crossed the lawn to the street. There were no sidewalks in The Briars, despite the annual petitions from parents with children, and Naomi walked close to the curbing, past the hedges of her nearest neighbor, and continued down the block.

Approaching the fifth house from her own, the Agajanian house, she slowed. The plan that had formulated in her mind, during the latter portion of the interview, was that she would stroll past the Agajanian house, and that Wash Dillon would be outside and see her, or that he would see her and come outside. And if that didn’t happen on the way going, she would stop on the way back and ring the doorbell. If Wash answered, she would say that she wanted to see him after dinner. He would understand and find a way. If Mrs. Dillon answered, or more likely one of the Agajanians, she would say that she was a neighbor and that she wished Mr. Dillon to appraise the value of a rare record collection she had taken on approval.

She had arrived before the white colonial. Beyond the row of birch trees, she could see that the lights were on. Someone was at home. She looked about the front lawn. No one was in sight. Lest

somebody detect her from the window, she continued her stroll with Colonel. Nearing the driveway, she heard the pat-pat-pat of a feather ball on the cement. In the illumination of the garage lights, a skinny boy was dribbling a basketball and trying to hit the hoop attached to the top of the garage.

This was Wash Dillon’s son, she remembered, and his name was Johnny. She wondered what she should do, but then there seemed no choice. She must see Wash tonight. “Johnny,” she called. He turned, startled. “It’s Mrs. Shields.”

He came toward her curiously, and then he recognized her. “Oh, hello.”

“Is your father home?” “Naw. He left us last night.” ‘What do you mean?”

“He took all his things. He had a fight with Ma and hit her. I don’t think he’s coming back.” “Where is he?”

“I don’t know. ‘Course, he’s still at Jorrocks’ Jollities. That’s Mr. Agajanian’s nightclub.” “I know… . Well, I’m sorry, Johnny.”

“Makes no diff. He’s never home anyway. Sa-ay, that’s a nice dog.” “Yes. Good night, Johnny.” “Good night, Miss.”

There was no point in going further. Naomi tugged at the leash and started back.

In the kitchen again, she pulled off her coat, threw it on a dinette chair, and opened the cupboard. There were still three cans of dog food. She opened one, emptied it into a deep dish, lured Colonel into the service porch, and then closed the kitchen door on him. He would eat and sleep. The question was-would she?

The electric clock on the oven said seven twenty-two. She wasn’t hungry, except for Wash. She knew that there was still time to have something and drive over to Kathleen’s. But she had no desire to see Kathleen or talk about a job. Dammit, she didn’t want some dreary old job. She wanted a home with someone in it-someone. The bottle of Scotch, half filled, was beside the sink, and there was the glass. She had to think things out. She poured three shots, until the amber liquid almost came to the top of the glass, and she drank. She leaned back against the sink and drank steadily. The fluid invaded her limbs and chest and encircled her groin. The feeling was not of warmth but of heat.

She evoked the image of Wash Dillon as she had seen him the day before yesterday, standing at the front door with the post card. It was not his shaggy hair, or death head with the face all pocked, or insolent smile, or great length of body, that she saw, but instead a towering phallus that moved at her through the mesh of door screen.

She wondered, Do other women have such obscene visions? They must. Purity was the civilized Lie. Behind it, hid Desire and Lust. In his lecture, Dr. Chapman had said that there was nothing unique any woman could tell him, that most women did everything, thought everything, only never admitted it to anyone except to him, and that nothing you felt was truly unique. Was that what he had said exactly? She could not remember now.

She finished the drink and tipped the bottle toward the glass again. Her hand was unsteady and some of the liquor splashed on the sink. Holding the filled glass, she felt the searing flame across her body. The pain of the fiery torture must be quenched. For a single second, she considered trying to reach the nightclub and seek out Wash. But then the searing flame was gone, and in its wake lay a charred wasteland of agony.

She stared at the blurred glass in her hand and knew that no human being, not Wash, not anyone, could halt the agony or save what had already been devastated. There was only one course left, one measure that would end this malady that had invaded flesh and spirit. She set the glass on the sink and staggered out of the kitchen. In her passage to the bedroom, she tried to snap on the hall light but missed the switch, and finally had to return to get the light on. Blindly, she felt her way in the darkened bedroom.

With a jerky motion, she drew the drapes together. The final privacy, she thought. She moved to the foot of the bed and methodically disrobed. The clothes, she had decided, were part of the pain, and now she wanted nothing on her skin. She kicked off her shoes. She pulled the sweater upward over her head and cast it aside. She fumbled behind, managed to unhook her nylon lace brassiere, slid the straps down her arms, and dropped it. She un-zippered her skirt and let it fall, and then removed the garter belt.

Groping for the edge of the bed, she found it, and sat, and quickly rolled off her stockings.

Finally, she was naked, and now she knew that it had not been the clothes at all that were part of the pain, but her skin, her excruciating, blazing skin. Rising, she was not sorry she had undressed. After all, after all, she had come into the world this way, and this was fitting.

She found the bathroom, and the light switch, and the medicine chest. Bottles and small boxes spilled before her hand, until she had the white container so desperately needed. Uncapping it, she shook a heap of sleeping tablets into her palm. Her desire for Nirvana, the nothingness where hurt and sorrow and guilt and regret were banished, exceeded any desire she had ever felt for a man. By twos and threes, she threw the pills into her mouth and then remembered that she required water. The glass, the water. She swallowed, swallowed. Wash it down, Wash it, Wash.

Oh, Wash. His was a better hell, a better dying.

Instantly, she wanted life to bargain with, and trade for dying.

Not yet corpsehood.

Her arm floated to the medicine chest door. Inside it, long ago, she had pasted the chart labeled Counterdoses as the practical ally in supporting a woman’s prerogative. Overdose sleeping medicines … two tablespoons Epsom salt in two glasses of water … emetic soap and warm water … Epsom … soap … Wash, wait, please, please wait …

Once, later, she awakened. The luminous dial of the bedside clock told her it was after midnight. The hot agony had fled, and her skin was cool. She reached toward the pillow, finding the top of the spread and blanket, and tore them free. With one last effort, she climbed beneath the blanket, conscious for a moment of the softness and snugness, and then she was asleep again.

It was after midnight when Paul Radford said good night to Dr. Chapman and made his way to the room he shared with Horace Van Duesen in the Villa Neapolis.

He was surprised to find the big lamp on, and Horace in pajamas, propped up in bed, reading a paperback novel.

“I thought you’d be dead to the world by now,” said Paul.

“I slept all day. I’m trying to get myself tired.”

Paul pulled off his tie and unbuttoned his shirt. “Boy, I am bushed.”

“Where were you?”

“There was a seminar at a place called the Wilshire Ebell, out toward the city. Some of the university people and a couple of analysts on the husband’s role in modem marriage. Dr. Chapman had promised to be there a long time ago, and he wanted me along for the drive. The interviews ran late, and we had to eat on the run. What a day.”