Some Came Running (154 page)

But he did not go to see Edith that night; and in fact, had known all along what he was going to do that night. All afternoon while he worked, excitement at the thought of it had been building up in the back of his mind: He was going out walking. The vague stirrings to get out and see adventure, see life—which he had not felt at all yesterday after he and Agnes talked; nor felt, either, after he had found her gone—had come back in him now as a definite urge. As soon as he got home from work, he mixed himself a big batch of strong manhattans and sat down with them at the dining room table and began to drink, the excitement mounting in him. The very silence and utter aloneness in the house added to his excitement, now that he was sure she was coming back. Why, hell, he could strip off all his clothes and caper about the house like one of them fauns or satyrs or whatever they called them, if he wanted to. Excitedly, he mixed himself another batch of manhattans and sat back down at the table and drank them, savoringly, as the liquor began to hit him more. And finally, at ten or ten-thirty it was, savoring the full three-quarter drunkenness in him, he got up to go out and walk. As a last-minute afterthought, he went into the bedroom and excitedly exchanged his suit and shirt for darker ones and a darker hat. Then he walked out into the hot, quiet August night. Utterly alone. Utterly quiet in his heart, but with his stomach surging excitedly. Who knew what might lurk anywhere? What adventures? What dangers?He did not remember just exactly where he did walk. He merely walked the streets, sauntering along happily, looking at the houses, and wondering to himself what might be going on in all of them? He did not know how long he walked, either. He lost all track of time. But suddenly, he came back to himself to realize that he was walking along the street where Edith lived, and was in fact just a few doors away from her little green-and-white house. More excitedly than ever, he walked on along that way.

When he was in front of the little green house, he stopped on the sidewalk and stood, rocking back and forth from heel to toe. The house was still lighted. There was one light in the living room, and there was a light in the bedroom around on the north side. She was in there then, awake. The living room was unshuttered and he could see into it, but he could not see Edith. Where was she then? in the bedroom? Hell, maybe she had some man in there with her? he thought breathlessly. He knew the layout of this house like the back of his hand; he ought to, he had been in it often enough. Suddenly, after looking both ways up and down the street, Frank stepped off the public sidewalk onto the private grass, and walked noiselessly around to the north bedroom window. It was the first time he had ever approached a house.

But then what the hell? he thought breathlessly, it was practically the same as his own house; he had bought and paid for it, hadn’t he? And the woman living in it was his mistress. Anyway, his ex-mistress; although she didn’t know it yet.

Around to the north side was a little stand of bushes, just at the corner, and he stood at the nearer, western end of them for a few moments, looking at the lighted window. The venetian blinds in it were closed, of course. Damn it. Who did she have in there with her? That damned Alberson boy, maybe? Just then the light in the living room went off, while the light in the bedroom stayed on. Aha! he thought to himself.

After a few moments, and feeling a tense sexual arousal surging, Frank walked quietly up to the still-lighted bedroom window. The bottom of it was just chest high, and he could at this close range see in between the various slats of the blind. Edith was standing across the bed from himself at the window, disrobing herself to go to bed. Breathlessly, Frank watched her as she took off her clothes, until she was in her bra and panties. He could not see below her knees because she was beyond the bed, but Frank didn’t give a damn about that. What he wanted to know was did she have someone with her? In a way, he almost wished she did. Maybe they—he; whoever he was—was in the bathroom? Excitedly, he watched between the slats as Edith slid her bra straps off her shoulders, and turned it around to the back so she could unfasten it. Then she ran her hands down her thighs, shucking her panties down and stepped out of them, and he could see all of her. More excited by her now than he had ever been when he was in the same room with her, Frank drank her all in hungrily. Edith stretched herself once, then she turned, her long back toward him, and went into the bathroom and shut the door.

Leaving his vantage point, Frank slipped quietly around to the west side, the back, of the little house; but the bathroom window was too high for him to see into. He stood looking at it hungrily for a moment, then slipped back the bedroom window. After a moment or two, Edith came back out and matter-of-factly—never realizing what beauty, what loveliness, she possessed—slipped into her pajamas. Frank was sure now there was no one with her. In a way, it was almost too bad. Then she reached for the light switch and flipped it off.

And just as she did so, Frank straightened up and knocked his knee against the side of the house. Almost immediately, the light went back on and Edith, her eyes narrowed, stood looking directly at him. (She couldn’t see him, of course.) Then, swiftly, she came toward the window. Frank ducked down, wanting to laugh, and pressed himself on the ground against the house, his face averted. Above him, the venetian blind clattered as she raised it, and a square of light fell out beyond him into the yard. It stayed that way a moment or two, and then slowly Edith let the blind back down. Quickly, Frank slipped away from the house and back over behind the bushes, excitement pulsing through him, but she did not raise the blind again. After a moment, he stepped back out onto the sidewalk and started walking leisurely away toward town, breathlessly excited, and having to hold his stomach muscles tight to keep from laughing spasmodically.

Only then did it occur to him that Edith might call the police. He turned at the next corner and went two blocks west before he turned back toward town. Coldly, coolly, his brain working with a swift unfrightened sureness such as he seldom knew, he sauntered on along until he came out on West Wernz Avenue and then turned back east toward home.

Only when he was back safely in the house did any fear enter him. But even the fear was itself stimulating and exciting. His hands trembling, he mixed himself still another batch of manhattans, the third, and sat down with them in the dining room, and proceeded to drink them. He had had no dinner, and he remembered his gastritis attacks, so he only finished about half of this third batch of manhattans, though he would dearly have loved to have drunk the rest.

And while he sat and drank, he savored his experience. It was the most completely satisfying sexual experience he had ever had that he could remember. He had more completely
had,
and dominated, this woman tonight than he had ever
had
or dominated her in bed; and yet he had not even touched her. He had merely seen her, naked, nude, unsuspecting. He had
possessed
her, more completely than he had ever possessed any other woman in his entire life, even including his wife, Agnes. And the feeling was exquisite. And even the fear—the fear that he might be
caught
—added to his passion. Looking wistfully at the half-pitcher of manhattans, Frank got up and switched off the lights, and leaving the drinks there, went into his bedroom and undressed.

What would she say, Agnes, if she could see him now? What if she suddenly walked in, right now, and saw him, lying here flopping like a grotesque fish? In his mind, he could almost actually see her standing there. The thought excited him almost beyond physical bearability. The grotesqueness of himself excited him even more. What would she say? What would she think?

Goddam her.

Then he rolled over on his side and went comfortably, satisfiedly, into a deep, sound sleep.

When he woke up next day, it all seemed like a strange, wild dream. Like that time up at Springfield. Most of it he could not even remember, it seemed. But as he came more awake, it all came back, freshly, as exciting as before. But it frightened him. Had it really happened? But there was the remaining half-pitcher of unfinished mahattans to prove it. But God! what if he had been
caught?
But even so, it did not really frighten him, not like the time in Springfield had, because the supreme satisfaction he had experienced this time still remained, overriding any fears. The manhattans he poured down the sink. Then he dressed and went downtown to eat breakfast and go to work. All day long, as he worked, the night before receded more and more until finally he forgot it entirely in the press of business affairs and more important things. But the sense of supreme satisfaction remained with him all day. It was that night, that second night, that he went over to see Edith, and to tell her.

He fortified himself with several manhattans before he went over there. He had called her to let her know he was coming. And after he got there, while they sat around the nice little living room, he refortified himself with more manhattans. He had thought about going to bed with her before he told her; he knew there probably wouldn’t be much chance after. He did not intend to repeat the humiliation that had happened with Geneve Lowe. But, also, he felt it would be a dirty trick to pull; and besides, he was considerably distressed by what he was going to have to tell her. And anyway, he discovered, sitting there with her, that he didn’t have near as much desire to go to bed with her as formerly. Actually, he would have preferred to stand outside the bedroom window and watch her undress without her knowing like he had done last night, to the actual physical act of going to bed with her. Not entirely, though, especially when he thought about how he was going to have to give her up forever. Gee, he hated to have to do it. She was such a nice girl, really. He hunted through his mind in vain for some easy way to bring it up, while they sat and drank.

“I think I had a visitor last night,” Edith told him conversationally. She grinned a little, sheepishly: “A peeping tom.”

“Oh?” Frank said. “Really? Did you see him?”

“No; but after I’d undressed for bed and turned off the light, I heard something bump against the house, right outside the bedroom window. I turned the light back on and went and raised the blinds. But I couldn’t see anybody.”

“Maybe you just imagined it,” Frank said.

“Maybe,” Edith admitted. “But I don’t think so.”

“Who would be a peeping tom in Parkman?” Frank said.

“I don’t know. But it’s embarrassing.”

“Did you call the police?” Frank asked.

“No,” Edith said. “It would look silly. And I figured whoever it was, if it was anybody, was already gone.”

“Probably was,” Frank said; “if there was anybody. Didn’t you have your blinds closed?”

“Yes. That’s what puzzled me. But maybe they could see in between the slats.”

“Well, you want to make sure you got your blinds all the way closed after this,” Frank grinned.

“Yes,” Edith said darkly. “I certainly intend to.”

“But—well, why does it bother you so much?” Frank said. “What if somebody did see you naked; that wouldn’t hurt you.”

“But it’s embarrassing!”

“You don’t care if I see you naked,” Frank grinned.

“That’s different,” Edith said. “God! I hate people like that. Peeping toms.”

“Why?” Frank grinned. “Hell, it wouldn’t bother me if somebody looked in and saw me naked.”

“Yes, but you’re a man. It’s different with a woman. It’s— It’s sort of a personal indignity.”

“What if it had been me?” Frank said, grinning. “Would it have upset you so if it had been me?”

“You!” Edith shrugged, then she frowned puzzledly. “Well, I don’t know. No, I guess not. But it wouldn’t
be
you. You can come inside.”

Frank smiled. “Sure. I just wondered if it would have made any difference if it was me who saw you naked.” Peeping tom, he thought to himself. It made him suddenly secretly excited again. “Well, it was probably all your imagination. I haven’t heard of any peeping toms in Parkman.”

“I suppose not,” Edith said. “But a woman—” she hesitated; “a woman just doesn’t like to have some utter stranger staring at her naked. It’s an indignity. Well,” she said, and smiled, “would you like another drink?”

And looking down at his nearly empty glass, Frank suddenly remembered what he was there for. He cleared his throat.

“Yes,” he said; “yes, I would. Listen, Edith,” he said; “I’ve got something to tell you. Something not very pleasant.”

Edith who had started to get up, stopped, and looked at him, level-eyed, in that way she had. “Oh?” she said. “And what’s that?”

“Let’s have that drink first,” Frank said awkwardly.

“All right,” she said, and got up to mix them. Frank watched her, enjoying her but remembering with a sudden excitation how she had looked last night, nude, through the slats of her venetian blind. He enjoyed that more. He really
had
possessed her, hadn’t he? More than he had ever done in bed. It was the first time in his life, really, that he had ever really possessed a woman, he thought suddenly with a kind of awe.

“All right,” she said when she brought the drinks back. She handed him his and sat back down in her chair and looked him squarely in the eyes. “What is it?”

“Well, I don’t exactly know how to begin,” he said awkwardly.

“Why don’t you just start?” Edith said.

“All right,” he said. “Agnes has left me. She found out about you and me, and she—ahh—confronted me with it, and when I refused to give you up, she took little Walter and went out to her sister’s in Kansas City.”

Edith smiled. “You refused to give me up?”

“I did,” he said. “I tried to explain to her the difference between a wife and a—a girlfriend; but you know Agnes.”

Edith’s smile faded as suddenly as it had come. “You mean different kinds of love?” she said.

“Well, yeh,” Frank said, “sort of.”

Edith looked down at her drink. “And so what are you going to do now?”

“Well, that was what I wanted to talk to you about,” Frank said.