Don't Rely on Gemini (18 page)

When he finally did think of it, Liddy was just about to tell him about her new husband. It was near seven—past the dinner hour—and he had to spring up in the middle of what she was saying and run out to the phone booth by the newsstand.

He got as far as, “I won't be home tonight,” when Dru interrupted and told him that that was just fine with her and hung up.

He was so enraged by her refusal to allow him to explain that he almost didn't recognize his own father when he collided with him near a divan in the lobby.

Frank Gamble grinned and said, “Well, where's my blushing bride, son?”

“Sweetie, I don't want to upset you, but there are responsibilities one simply has to undertake. A doctor has to warn and advise, and steel himself against the consequences, and so does a lawyer.”

“Mrs. Muckermann,” said Dru, pushing Tiffany away from her chicken sandwich, “you're not a doctor, you're not a lawyer.”

“But I have a profession which necessitates both diagnosis and counsel,” said Mrs. Muckermann. “ ‘Knowledge,' as John Milton once wrote, ‘by favour sent, Down from the empyrean to forewarn, Us timely.' Druscilla, dear, this is a critical time in Archie's chart. Venus is squaring Saturn, and with all the other bad aspects, the violence brewing and the building of evil forces, I can't imagine that the country is very peaceful for you, that you're happy out there.”

Dru slapped the Siamese on the behind finally. The cat hissed at her and fled under the table. Dru leaned back on the couch, nestling the telephone between her neck and her shoulder, as she munched on her chicken sandwich. She said, “I'm sorry it wasn't more peaceful last Saturday, Mrs. Muckermann.

We'd had a lot of champagne, and we were being silly; we didn't mean to hurt your feelings.”

“You didn't hurt my feelings, Archie hurt them. And Archie can't help himself. When Venus squares Saturn, there's no attempt to spare
anyone's
feelings. I'm sure you've been on the receiving end of his fiery little impulses to be cruel, too.”

Dru swallowed the bite of the sandwich and took a swig of Fresca. “Well, for Pete's sake, tell us what to do about it, then,” she said. “A doctor would, a lawyer would.”

“And I would, too,” said Mrs. Muckermann, “normally. But Archie won't cooperate.”

“Then tell me. I'll go to work on him.”

“He should use his Jupiter, Druscilla. Jupiter can save him.” “Save him from what?”

“Paranoia, hypocrisy, and an icy detachment at intervals which Venus squaring Saturn invariably calls forth. Fury-Saturn again, and a conscienceless attitude brought about by our old friend Mercury.”

Dru said, “Aren't we asking a lot of Jupiter?”

“Jupiter can handle a lot. Anyone with Pisces to rule can handle a lot, and Jupiter rules both Pisces and Sagittarius, remember.”

“Mrs. Muckermann,” Dru said tiredly, “can you just tell me, please, some practical suggestions? I don't understand it when you're philosophizing. How does Archie get Jupiter to work for him?”

“Jupiter operates in the liver and intestines, some say the arms, too … but my advice is for Archie to go easy with alcohol. Too much of it always insults the liver and intestines.”

And Anna Muckermann, last Saturday night, Dru thought to herself.

“What else?”

“Thursday's Jupiter's day—that's why I called today. This could be a crucial day, sweetie. Jove, Jeudi, Thor's day, Thursday—regardless of the language, it's Jupiter's day. There'll be expansion today. That's Jupiter's keyword. Expansion. It could be good, but if one isn't wary, sweetie, it could be bad. It could lead to gambling, dissipation, extravagance, risk-taking. Do you see?”

“I'll pass the word along.”

“Negatively, Jupiter will exaggerate difficulties, and then can't do the job at hand, but positively—“

“Yes, yes? Did I hear you say the word ‘positively'?” said Dru.

“Positively,” said Mrs. Muckermann with a sudden lilt to her tone, “Jupiter will expand and multiply.”

Dru groaned inwardly. Full circle again to Lane Bryant.

• • •

In the daytime, none of it bothered her as much. At night, all of it did, for there was something eerie about nighttime in the country after being so long in the city. The night no longer belonged to buses which snorted down Third Avenue, and college boys who came trooping out of Joe King's loaded on beer and lustily singing “Banging Away on Lulu"; there were no late-late show sounds from the neighbors next door, no police or ambulance sirens … nothing but katy-did and katy-didn't, crickets squeaking and frogs chortling, an occasional foghorn from the river, and overhead all the stars. The goddamn stars … Dru could remember back to her salad days when the only bad thing that ever came to mind when she glanced up at the stars was the idea of one falling … someone dying. Now they seemed as malefic as they might be had China or Russia managed to man them all with nuclear missiles.

Tiffany was back, winding in and out of Dru's legs, and she gave in and took the chicken out of the other half of the sandwich, feeding it to the cat while she purred and let her crossed eyes droop half-closed in ecstasy.

“So lay off the robins now,” Dru told her. “Live and let live, Tiffany.”

Archie had left a list of books he wanted her to borrow from the Nyack library, and after Dru finished another chapter of
More Work for the Undertaker
by Margaret Allingham, she slipped on a dress, pushed Tiffany out of the Cages' Buick, and headed toward town.

She parked up near the Pickwick Book Store where she killed half an hour deciding whether to buy
David Smith by David Smith
or face the fact Archie and she couldn't afford twenty-two ninety-five for a book, despite the fact he was their favorite sculptor; she settled ultimately for a paperback Gothic by Mary Stewart.

Then to the five-and-ten to look for a button to match the one Archie had lost from his tan cardigan, and next door to to the Sweete Shoppe for a hot chocolate sundae with peanuts on top.

“ ‘Madam Will You Talk?' ”

“What?” She turned around and found Neal Dana reading aloud the title of her Mary Stewart.

“The ice cream looks good,” he said. “May I join you?”

“Sure. Welcome to your first meeting of the We're Fat And We Like It That Way club.”

He laughed and swung his long leg over the counter stool. “I never get any ice cream at home. Margaret's a member of We're
Not
Fat and We'll Keep It That Way.” He smiled down at Dru. “Fat's better. It's like what someone said about money. I've been poor and I've been rich, and rich is better.”

“You
don't have to count calories.”

“You don't, either,” he said, and Dru wished he hadn't happened along because it reminded her she wasn't wearing a girdle, and she had to sit with her stomach sucked in now.

She said, “Neal, I want to tell you again how sorry Archie and I are about what happened to poor Sinister.”

“It wasn't anyone's fault,” he said. “I don't know how Tiffany opened the cage.”

“Oh, I do. She could open the Chase Manhattan vault if she thought there was a bird inside. Archie put a bell on her collar Monday morning, and Monday afternoon we looked out to see her heading across the lawn in her best hunter's crouch, three-legged, holding the bell with her right front paw.”

Neal laughed again, ordered a butterscotch sundae, and lit a True. “Is Archie home pounding the typewriter?”

“He had to go into New York to see an editor … Hey, Neal, don't you see the Doubleday people this week?”

“That's all off.”

“What?”

“I'm not ready anyway.” “Did they call it off?”

He gave her a noncommittal shrug. “I never should have gotten involved in the thing. That would be fun for Margaret, wouldn't it? I'd come home every night and lock myself in my study.”

“I don't
believe
this!” said Dru. “Archie loses his show on Monday, and now you've lost your book!”

“The ‘astro-twins' lose again.”

“Are you
ready
for this?” Dru said.

“I didn't exactly lose it,” said Neal.

Dru didn't believe him.

“I wasn't thinking of Margaret,” he said.

Dru decided the subject embarrassed him, and in a hurry to steer away from it she went back to Sinister.

“Archie and I would like to get Margaret a new bird.”

“No. She isn't really a bird-lover. It was just Sinister.”

“I'm sorry.”

“I know.”

“I was so upset I tried to call you the minute I found him. You didn't answer.”

He said, “I didn't sleep. We had so much coffee. I knew Tiffany'd killed him when I saw her take him into the woods.” He shrugged. “I felt like company so I went down to Sbordone's for a beer.”

“You did?” Archie hadn't said anything about Neal showing up at Sbordone's. “What time, Neal?”

“I don't know exactly. Right after Tiffany headed for the woods.”

“It was four o'clock when she brought Sinister home.”

“Oh, she got him
long
before that. But it's quite a distance from our house to the Cages'. She probably took her time, too. You know how cats play with birds.”

“What was it, around three?”

“Around midnight. I left shortly after for Sbordone's.” “Oh.”

“I stayed until closing. Some old movie was on the TV in the bar.”

“And you had company?” “Hmmm?” He frowned at her.

“You said you felt like company, so you went to Sbordone's.” “Yeah. There were a few of the regulars.” But not Archie, that was obvious.

Then where was Archie for those three or four hours? At that time of night, when there was almost no traffic, it was possible to reach New York in thirty minutes. Dru didn't feel like finishing the rest of her sundae. Neal said, “Why all the concern?”

“Oh, nothing … A little marital spat that'll probably end up in a court of law,” she said ironically.

“Did Archie go to Sbordone's Saturday night, too? There were some people drinking in the other room.”

“Archie drinks at a bar.”

“Maybe we just missed each other.”

“I don't know.”

“You don't have to worry about Archie.” “Famous last words.” “Do you?”

“I don't know what I have to worry about any more, or who. It's gotten so I even worry about Saturn, and Venus squaring Saturn, and never rely on Gemini, and all the rest of Mrs. Muckermann's reassuring wisdom.”

Neal said, “Dru?”

“What?”

“This is going to sound paranoiac, but I was thinking something this morning … Is there any possibility,
remote
possibility, that Archie and Margaret might have met somewhere?”

“Huh?”

“I
just thought maybe there was a slight possibility they had.”

“No, Neal.” “They could have.”
“No,
Neal.”

“Why are you so adamant about it? They could have.”

“They didn't.
That
I know. I kid you not.”

“I wasn't trying to make anything out of it.”

“Neither Archie nor I have ever met Margaret. I spoke to her on the phone. That's it.”

He said, “You see, I've been so self-absorbed. So caught up in my own sails. Margaret was left to …” His voice trailed off and he didn't finish. The waitress placed the butterscotch sundae in front of him.

“You'd both like Margaret,” he said after he had a spoonful of the ice cream. “She's a wonderful person.”

“I'm sure she is, Neal. But believe me, Archie never even heard of her before I told him about her letter.”

“Maybe you're protesting too much.”

“I'm protesting a lot, because I know that the mind plays funny tricks when you're upset.” “I guess so.”

“I've had nights when I've decided Archie was playing around with every woman who lives on our floor and offering to take the garbage down to the incinerator just so he could pinch them good night.”

Neal tried to laugh. “Margaret isn't the type who plays around,” he said.

Dru didn't say anything; what do you say to that?

Neal said, “The mind does play tricks, you're right … No, Margaret is a woman with real integrity.”

Dru looked away from him and rolled her eyes back in her head.

“She cares about things. The voting age, and learning Italian, and …” Again he didn't finish.

Then he finally said, “And she loves good music.”

Dru borrowed one of his cigarettes and smoked it while she listened to him eulogize Margaret Dana. She only half-heard the eulogy; her thoughts were still back at Sbordone's … or New York—she was no longer certain about anything.

• • •

Neal had a three-thirty appointment with the welfare bureau concerning a patient at Rock-Or whose family needed assistance, and he walked Dru down to the library on his way.

The card catalogue showed that the library had the books Archie wanted on Burgess and Maclean, Laurel and Hardy, and Lewis and Clark; Dru copied the numbers on a piece of note paper and headed for the open stacks. She was vaguely aware of a woman sharing the stacks with her, but as she searched for 707.30, Dru was preoccupied by the first really guilty feelings she had suffered since she had talked Archie into keeping the letters and the diary belonging to Margaret Dana. Whatever she wasn't able to figure out about the mystery attached to Neal's wife—Archie seeing her the other night, all of it—she was able to perceive that Neal obviously didn't know the facts and was tortured by conflicting judgments of her: she was a saint he was unworthy of; she was an indiscriminate trollop who had dallied with everyone imaginable, including Archie …
Paranoia, which Venus squaring Saturn invariably calls forth;
Neal himself had used the word “paranoiac.”