The Love Machine (40 page)

Robin laughed. “The idea would never occur to me.”

“But why? Your mother will leave you so much money—why should you work so hard at just a job?”

“I don’t work that hard. Maybe we do rush a lot, but we also don’t expect to be supported by women. Lovers or mothers.”

Robin watched, but the implication missed its mark. Sergio’s expression never changed.

“Will you work on this news job all your life?” The question was asked with sincere interest.

“Nope. One day I’ll take off and write a book.”

Sergio’s eyes lit up. “I read all the time. Kitty is helping me much with education. I had so little. I am reading Wells’s
Outline of History
now. Do you write like Mr. Wells?”

“I’m writing like me—which is the only way, good or bad. Trouble is, I sandwich it in during odd hours.”

“I think you should give up this job and come and live with us. You could write here and we would all be very happy together. Please, Robin, it would make Kitty happy, and I would like it much.”

Robin smiled. “I’m too big for a roommate, friend.”

“Oh, you would have your own room. We would block off a suite for you. And on vacation you could go skiing with me. Please, Robin!”

“Sergio, the last time anyone looked at me like that we went
to bed for three days. Only difference was, it was a girl. Now cut it.”

“It shows?”

“You’re damn right it shows.”

“Does it bother you?”

“If you want me to stay—cut it.”

Sergio sighed. “I understand. It’s just that you are—everything that I would dream to find in a man. I cannot help it, any more than a girl could help it if she saw you. Yet if a girl stared at you this way, you would not hate her. I stare at you from the heart. I cannot help the way my emotions go. But do not worry.” He held out his hand. “Shake, Robin. We’ll be friends.”

Robin was surprised at Sergio’s firm grasp. “That’s a deal.” He put down his glass and started up the stairs. “Oh, by the way, where do you sleep, chum?”

“Down the hall. In an adjoining room to your mother.”

Robin’s grin was slow. Sergio’s eyes were serious. “She has a heart condition. I think I should be within calling distance.”

“Good night, Sergio—you’ve outdistanced me.”

Sergio smiled and walked toward the fireplace. “I’ll put out the fire. The servants arrive at seven. I left a thermos of hot coffee on your night table on the chance you might awake earlier.”

Robin laughed as he started up the steps. “I’m glad there’s only one of you, Sergio. If there were many more you might put girls out of business.”

Kitty spent the next few days immersed in elaborate preparations for Christmas. Food had to be purchased, wines, Christmas ornaments, a tree. Each day she gave Robin and Sergio a list and sent them off like two children. Robin relaxed and entered into the spirit of it all. Sergio drove and knew all the right shops. Often they were forced to stop and have a long lunch while they waited for the shops to reopen. Robin found himself enjoying the leisurely pace. He even drank wine. He had fallen into an easy relationship with Sergio. The boy was gentle and kind. He began to feel a paternal affection toward him.

Sergio asked eager questions about the States. He was interested in New York, Chicago, but it was Hollywood that seemed to hypnotize him. He had devoured fan magazines. The beach houses and lavish estates amazed him. “In Rome, maybe three or four people live so magnificently. In Hollywood,
everyone
has their own swimming pool. That would be a wonderful life. Here I have no chance for the cinema, so many young men look like me—but in Hollywood I would be different.”

“Can you act?” Robin asked.

“Do you have to act for pictures?” The eyes were innocent. “I hear it is made in little pieces, and the director tells you what to do.”

“Well, there’s a little more than that to it. Why not study drama? Kitty wouldn’t mind.”

Sergio shrugged. “It is just a dream. I am happy being with Kitty. And these last few days, Robin, they have been the happiest of my life.”

The day before Christmas, Sergio dragged him to a jewelry shop on the Via Sistina. The owner of the shop, a fat balding man, quivered with excitement when he saw Sergio.

“Sergio, you have come back,” the man said.

“I want to see the mirror,” Sergio said coldly.

“Oh yes, you bad boy. I told you it was yours if you wanted it.” He reached in a case and brought out a beautiful little Florentine gold mirror. Sergio stared at it with admiration.

“What in hell is it?” Robin asked. He was growing uncomfortable. The owner of the shop was staring at Sergio hungrily, yet Sergio seemed impervious to the man’s attention.

“Kitty admired it,” Sergio said. “She saw it a month ago. It’s a mirror for her purse. I tried to save, but I only have half the money.”

“Sergio”—the man’s voice was oozing oil—“I told you, pay what you can. The rest will be a gift from me.”

Sergio ignored him. He pulled out some crumpled lire. “Robin, I need—well, twenty American dollars more would do it. Can it be a present from both of us to Kitty?”

Robin nodded. He handed the owner the money, and with a shrug of disappointment the fat man disappeared to wrap the gift.
Robin walked around the store staring at the various cases of jewelry on display. Sergio followed. “He has very beautiful things—he is a collector.”

“Seems like jewelry isn’t the only thing he collects.”

Sergio’s eyes drooped mournfully. “He is famous for his presents to young boys.”

Robin laughed. “Sergio, the way he looked at you—you’ve got it made. Hold out for marriage.”

“I never met him until I came to find the price of the mirror. He offered it to me for nothing if I …”

“Why not, Sergy? He’s not much older than Kitty.”

“I would have to sleep with him.”

“Well?”

“I only sleep with someone who attracts me.”

Robin walked away. The boy was giving homosexuality a crazy kind of dignity. Sergio followed him. “That is true, Robin. I have had only a few friends. There has been no one since my last friend became ill.”

“And how soon will you leave Kitty for another friend?”

“I will not leave her. It is not easy for me. The men that I could love, they love women. I will not take up with any man just because he is homosexual. I would rather be with Kitty.”

“Stay with her, Sergio. I promise you, if and when Kitty goes, I’ll see that you get an allowance for life.”

Sergio shrugged. “Money is not everything to me.” He paused. “But would you buy me a Christmas present so I can remember you?”

They were standing near a tray of diamond-studded men’s wristwatches. A glint of suspicion came to Robin’s eyes. “Okay, chum, what is it that catches those big brown eyes?”

“Over here.” Sergio led Robin to a case that held some gold slave bracelets. “I have always wanted one of these.”

Robin suppressed a smile. The bracelets were about eighteen dollars. He waved his hand. “Take your pick.” The boy was childlike in his enthusiasm. He finally selected the least expensive one. Plain gold links with a nameplate.

“Can I have my name put on the front? There is extra cost for that.”

Robin smiled. “Go the whole route. Put on whatever you like.” Sergio actually clapped his hands. He lapsed into excited Italian with the owner of the shop. Robin browsed through the store. Suddenly his attention was caught by a black-enameled panther with green jeweled eyes staring up from the case.

He beckoned the salesman. “How much is that?”

“Four thousand.”

“Lire?” Robin asked.

“Dollars.”

“For that!”

The young salesman immediately placed it on a piece of white velvet. “It is the most beautiful pin in Rome. It comes from India. A maharaja had it made. It is three hundred years old. The emeralds in the eyes are priceless. You would not have to pay duty as it is an antique.”

He stared at the panther. The jeweled eyes were the exact color of … He turned away. Then with a quick change of heart, he told the man to wrap it up. Hell—why not? He sure owed Maggie something after that night. As he wrote the traveler’s check it occurred to him he had never spent this kind of money for anything. Yet oddly enough he felt exhilarated. He put the box in his pocket. Then he went to collect Sergio, who refused to go until he got a written guarantee that the engraving on the bracelet would be ready at closing time that day.

Robin couldn’t remember a nicer Christmas Eve. The fireplace was crackling, the tree reached to the ceiling—they even popped corn to string on the tree. At midnight they opened the gifts. Kitty had given both Robin and Sergio diamond cuff links. Robin was embarrassed and touched at the small gold St. Christopher medal Sergio gave to him. “It has been blessed,” Sergio explained, “you travel so much.” Kitty was delighted with her gift. She toasted them both with champagne and throughout the evening Sergio kept staring at the shiny new bracelet on his wrist.

The following day the villa overflowed with guests. Robin drank a lot and wound up in an apartment facing the Borghese gardens with a beautiful Yugoslavian girl whose husband was in
Spain on business. They spent the following afternoon making love. He returned to Kitty’s
palazzo
exhausted, but very content.

The week passed quickly.

Sergio drove him to the airport. “Call me if she doesn’t feel right. And, Sergio, make her get checkups. She won’t tell you when she’s not feeling well—she doesn’t want to act like an old woman—but call the doctor if there’s the slightest suspicion.”

“Trust me, Robin.” They were walking to the gate. Robin’s luggage had been checked, the flight had been announced. “And, Robin—perhaps you should see a doctor, too.”

“Hell, I’m strong as a horse.”

“I mean another kind.”

Robin stopped suddenly. “What are you getting at?”

“Something is bothering you. Two nights in a row you shouted in your sleep. Last night I ran to your room—”

“What did I say?”

“You were thrashing about in the bed, asleep, but with a hurt sad expression on your face. You were hugging the pillow and shouting, ‘Don’t leave me! Please!’”

“Too much vodka,” Robin said. Then he shook hands and boarded the plane. But he thought about it on the trip home. He thought about it when he showed the pin at customs and had to pay an enormous tax—if he ever saw that son of a bitch on the Via Sistina again who had said
no duty!
And he kept thinking about it on the taxi ride home. The whole thing didn’t add up. At the height of his affair with Amanda he had never bought her such an expensive present. And here he was with a four-thousand-dollar trinket for a girl he couldn’t even get it up for unless he was drunk. Maybe it was guilt, but four thousand bucks plus duty was a hell of a high price to pay for one night. A night he couldn’t even remember.

TWENTY-ONE

H
E WENT INTO IMMEDIATE ACTION
the moment he returned to New York. He notified the legal department to draw up a contract for Andy Parino. He mailed it to him with a short note stating his offer to join the network in New York. He also mailed the panther pin to Maggie with a note saying, “A belated Merry Christmas—Robin.” Three days later Andy phoned and eagerly accepted the offer.

“Sure you won’t miss anything down there?” Robin asked.

“Hell, no. It’s all washed up with Maggie and me anyhow.”

“I’m sorry.”

“No, it just wasn’t in the cards. She’s—well, she’s too complicated for me. Right now she’s rehearsing like crazy—some Hollywood agent is coming to catch her in a play. I want a girl who puts me ahead of Eugene O’Neill.”

“Fine. I’ll assign you to Network News—you’ll still work with Jim Bolt. And you can start sitting in on my
In Depth
taping sessions to get the feel of it. In a month or so, I’ll let you try one. By next season I hope to turn it over to you and go on to something new.”

“I’ve been running all your tapes and studying them. I don’t know whether it’s going to be that easy to step in your shoes.”

“Do your own thing—and they’ll buy it.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence. I’ll sure try my damnedest!”

By the end of the week, Robin had caught up with all his back work, and scheduled a taping for
In Depth
. He looked at his appointment pad—the afternoon was free. He unlocked his desk drawer and took out his manuscript. It seemed years since he had
looked at it. Well—tonight he’d take it home and work on it, and lay off the vodka. He hadn’t been to the Lancer Bar since he returned.

His secretary came in with a package. He had to sign for it. He scribbled his signature and stared at the brown-paper wrapping. It was heavily stamped and insured. He opened it and found the Italian leather box with the black panther pin. There was a typewritten note: “I only accept gifts from friends.”