Sexus (66 page)

“What's the matter with you—are you mad?”

“You don't love me. I'm not going to marry you.”

“You are too, by God!”

I grab her and pull her back to the edge of the platform. As the next train pulls in I put my arms around her and embrace her.

“You're sure, Val? You're sure you want to marry me?”

I kiss her again. “Come on, cut it out! You know damned well we're going to get married.” We hop in.

Hoboken. A sad, dreary place. A city more foreign to me than Peking or Lhasa. Find the City Hall. Find a couple of bums to act as witnesses.

The ceremony. What's your name? And
your
name? And
his
name? And so on. How long have you known this man? And this man is a friend of yours? Yes sir. Where did you pick him up—in the garbage can? O.K. Sign here. Bang, bang! Raise your right hand!
I solemnly swear,
etc., etc. Married. Five dollars, please. Kiss the bride.
Next, please
. . .

Everybody happy?

I want to spit.

In the train. . . . I take her hand in mine. We're both depressed, humiliated. “I'm sorry, Mona . . . we shouldn't have done it that way.”

“It's all right, Val.” She's very quiet now. As though we had just buried someone.

“But it isn't all right, God damn it. I'm sore. I'm disgusted. That's no way to get married. I'll never . . .”

I checked myself. She looked at me with a startled expression.

“What were you going to say?”

I lied. I said: “I'll never forgive myself for doing it that way.”

I became silent. Her lips were trembling.

“I don't want to go back to the house just yet,” said she.

“Neither do I.”

Silence.

“I'll call up Ulric,” said I. “We'll have dinner with him, yes?”

“Yes,” she said, almost meekly.

We got into a telephone booth together to call up Ulric. I had my arm around her. “Now you're Mrs. Miller,” I said. “How does it feel?”

She began to weep. “Hello, hello? That you, Ulric?”

“No, it's me, Ned.”

Ulric wasn't there—had gone somewhere for the day.

“Listen, Ned, we just got married.”

“Who got married?” he said.

“Mona and I, of course . . . who did you think?”

He was trying to joke about it, as though to say he couldn't be sure whom I would marry.

“Listen, Ned, it's serious. Maybe you've never been married
before. We're depressed. Mona is weeping. I'm on the verge of tears myself. Can we come up there, drop in for a little while? We're lonely. Maybe you'll fix up a little drink, yes?”

Ned was laughing again. Of course we were to come—right away. He was expecting that cunt of his, Marcelle. But that wouldn't matter. He was getting sick of her. She was too good to him. She was fucking the life out of him. Yes, come up right away . . . we'd all drown our sorrows.

“Well, don't worry, Ned'll have some money. We'll make him take us to dinner. I suppose nobody will think to give us a wedding present. That's the hell of getting married in this informal fashion. You know, when Maude and I got married we pawned some of the wedding gifts the next day. Never got them back again either. We wouldn't want a lot of knives and forks sterling, would we?”

“Please don't talk that way, Val.”

“I'm sorry. I guess I'm a bit screwy today. That ceremony let me down. I could have murdered that guy.”

“Val, stop, I beg you!”

“All right, we won't talk about it any more. Let's be gay now, what? Let's laugh . . .”

Ned had a warm smile. I liked Ned. He was weak. Weak and lovable. Selfish underneath. Very selfish. That's why he could never get married. He had talent too, lots of talent, but no genius, no sustaining powers. He was an artist who had never found his medium. His best medium was drink. When he drank he became expansive. In physique he reminded one of John Barrymore in his better days. His role was Don Juan, especially in a Finchley suit with an ascot tie about his throat. Lovely speaking voice. Rich baritone, full of enchanting modulations. Everything he said sounded suave and important, though he never said a word that was worth remembering. But in speaking he seemed to caress you with his tongue; he licked you all over, like a happy dog.

“Well, well,” he said, grinning from ear to ear, and already half-cocked, I could see. “So you went and did it? Well, come on in. Hello Mona, how are you? Congratulations! Marcelle
isn't here yet. I hope she doesn't come. I don't feel so terribly vital today.”

He was still grinning as he sat down in a big throne chair near the easel.

“Ulric will certainly be sorry he missed this,” he said. “Will you have a little Scotch—or do you want gin?”

“Gin.”

“Well, tell me all about it. When did it happen . . . just now? Why didn't you let me know—I would have stood up for you. . . .” He turned to Mona. “You're not pregnant, are you?”

“Jesus, let's talk about something else,” said Mona. “I swear I'll never get married again . . . it's horrible.”

“Listen, Ned, before you get drunk, tell me something . . . how much money have you got on you?”

He fished out six cents. “Oh, that's all right,” he said. “Marcelle will have something.”

“If she comes.”

“Oh, she'll come, don't worry. That's the hell of it. I don't know which is worse—to be broke or to have Marcelle on one's hands.”

“I didn't think she was so bad,” I said.

“No, she isn't really,” said Ned. “She's a darned nice gal. But she's too affectionate. She clings. You see, I'm not made for conjugal bliss. I get weary of the same face, even if it's a Madonna. I'm fickle. And she's constant. She's bolstering me up all the time. I don't want to be bolstered up—not all the time.”

“You don't know what you want,” said Mona. “You don't know when you're well off.”

“I guess you're right,” said Ned. “Ulric's the same way. We're masochists, I guess.” He grinned. He was a little ashamed of using a word like that so readily. It was an intellectual word and Ned had no use for things intellectual.

The doorbell rang. It was Marcelle. I could hear her giving him a smacking kiss.

“You know Henry and Mona, don't you?”

“Why sure I do,” said Marcelle brightly. “I caught you
with your pants down . . . you remember? That seems a long time ago.”

“Listen,” said Ned, “what do you think they did? They got married . . . yeah, just a little while ago . . . in Hoboken.”

“That's wonderful!” said Marcelle. She went up to Mona and kissed her. She kissed me too.

“Don't they look sad?” said Ned.

“No,” said Marcelle, “I don't think they look sad. Why should they?” Ned poured out a drink for her. As he handed it to her he said:

“Have you any money?”

“Of course I have. Why? Do you want some?”

“No, but
they
need a little money. They're broke.”

“I'm so sorry,” said Marcelle. “Of course I have money. What can I give you—ten, twenty? Why certainly. And don't pay it back—it's a wedding present.”

Mona went over to her and took her hand. “That's awfully good of you, Marcelle. Thank you.”

“Then we'll take
you
to dinner,” I said, trying to express my appreciation.

“No, you're not,” said Marcelle. “We're going to make dinner right here. Let's settle down and get comfy. I don't believe in going out to celebrate. . . . Really, I'm very happy. I like to see people get married—and stay married. Maybe I'm old-fashioned, but I believe in love. I want to stay in love all my life.”

“Marcelle,” I said, “where the devil do you hail from?”

“From Utah. Why?”

“I don't know, but I like you. You're refreshing. I like the way you hand the money out too.”

“You're joshing me!”

“No, I'm not. I'm serious. You're a good woman. You're too good for that bum over there. Why don't you marry him? Go on! It would scare the life out of him, but it might do him a lot of good.”

“Do you hear that?” she gurgled, turning to Ned. “Haven't I been telling you that all along? You're lazy, that's what. You don't know what a prize I am.”

At this point Mona had a fit of laughing. She laughed as
though her sides would burst. “I can't help it,” she said. “It's too funny.”

“You're not drunk already, are you?” said Ned.

“No, it's not that,” said I. “She's relaxing. It's just a reaction. We put it off too long, that's what's the matter. Isn't it, Mona?”

Another peal of laughter.

“Besides,” said I, “she's always embarrassed when I borrow money. Isn't that so, Mona?”

There was no answer—just another explosion.

Marcelle went over to her, spoke to her in a low, soothing voice. “You leave her to me,” she said. “You two get drunk. We'll get out and get some food, won't we, Mona?”

“What made her so hysterical?” said Ned, after the two had left.

“Search me,” I said. “She's not used to getting married, I guess.”

“Listen,” said Ned, “what ever made you do it? Wasn't it a little impetuous?”

“You sit down,” I said. “I'm going to talk to you. You're not too drunk to follow me, are you?”

“You're not going to give me a lecture, are you?” he said, looking a little sheepish.

“I'm going to talk turkey to you. Now listen to me. . . . We just got married, didn't we? You think it's a mistake, eh? Let me tell you this. . . . I never did a better thing in my life. I love her. I love her enough to do anything she asks of me. If she asked me to cut your throat . . . if I thought that would make her happy . . . I'd do it.
Why was she laughing so hysterically?
You poor bugger you, I don't know what's the matter with you. You don't
feel
any more. You're just trying to protect yourself. Well, I don't want to protect myself. I want to do foolish things, little things, ordinary things, anything and everything that would make a woman happy. Can you understand that? You, and Ulric too, thought it quite a joke, this love business. Henry would never get married again. Oh no! Just an infatuation. It would wear off after a time. That was how you looked at it. Well, you were wrong. What I feel for her is so damned big I don't know how to
express it. She's out in the street now, Mona. She could be run over by a truck. Anything could happen. I tremble when I think what it would do to me, to hear that something had happened to her. I think I'd become a stark-raving lunatic. I'd kill you right off the bat, that's the first thing I'd do. . . . You don't know what it means to love that way, do you? You think only of the same face for breakfast every day. I think how wonderful her face is, how it changes every minute. I never see her twice the same way. I see only an infinity of adoration. That's a good word for you—
adoration
. I bet you've never used it. Now we're getting somewhere. . . . I adore her. I'll say it again.
I adore her!
Jesus, it's wonderful to say that. I adore her and I prostrate myself at her feet. I worship her. I say my prayers to her. I venerate her. . . . How do you like that? You never thought, when I first brought her up here, that I was going to talk this way someday, did you? Yet I warned you both. I told you something had happened. You laughed. You thought you knew better. Well, you know nothing, neither of you. You don't know who I am or where I came from. You see only what I show you. You never look under my vest. If I laugh you think I'm gay. You don't know that when I laugh so heartily sometimes I'm on the verge of despair. At least it used to be so. Not any more. When I laugh now I'm laughing, not weeping inside and laughing outside. I'm whole again. All one piece. A man in love. A man who got married of his own free will. A man who was never really married before. A man who knew women, but not love. . . . Now I'll sing for you. Or recite, if you like.
What do you want?
Just name it and you'll have it. . . . Listen, when she comes back—and God, just to know that she
will
come back, that she didn't walk out of that door and disappear—when she comes back I want you to be gay . . . I want you to be
naturally gay.
Say nice things to her . . . good things . . . things you mean . . . things you find it hard to say usually. Promise her things. Tell her you'll buy her a wedding gift. Tell her you hope she'll have children. Lie to her, if you must. But make her happy. Don't let her laugh that way again, do you hear me? I don't want to hear her laugh like that . . .
never! You
laugh, you bastard! Play the clown, play the idiot.
But let her believe that you think everything is fine . . . fine and dandy . . . and that it will last forever. . . .”

I paused a moment for breath and took another swallow of gin. Ned was watching me with mouth wide open.

“Go on!” he said. “Keep it up!”

“You like it, do you?”

“It's marvelous,” he said. “Real passion there. I'd give anything to be able to get worked up to that pitch. . . . Go ahead, say anything you want. Don't be afraid of hurting my feelings. I'm nobody . . .”

“For God's sake, don't talk like that—you take the steam out of me. I'm not putting on an act. . . I'm serious.”

“I know you are—that's why I say
go ahead!
People don't talk this way any more . . . leastways not the people I know.”

He rose to his feet, slipped an arm in mine, and gave me that charming klieg-light smile of his. His eyes were big and liquid; the eyelids were like chipped saucers. It was amazing what an illusion of warmth and understanding he could give. I wondered for a moment if I had underestimated him. Nobody should be spurned or rejected who gives even the illusion of feeling. How could I tell what struggles he had made, and was still making perhaps, to rise to the surface? What right had I to judge him—or anybody? If people smile at you, take your arm, give off a glow, it must be that there is something in them which responds. Nobody is altogether dead.