The Polka Dot Nude (22 page)

“Did Lorraine Taylor object?”

“She didn’t know. She was upstairs that day, having a rest. She might have objected after I left, but I wasn’t aware of it. Maybe I
will
use the polka dot nude for a cover. I didn’t agree not to—I just didn’t disagree when Drew laid down the law. What do you think, Brad?”

“The dead deserve some privacy, and if this story gets out, Rosalie will be smeared with it. It’s not much of a part of her life.”

“It does detract from her real accomplishments—her movies.”

“We have some unfinished business to discuss. I’m driving us back to my place, okay?” Brad said. I took it for a rhetorical question, as we were already headed in that direction.

“Mason’s alter ego, you mean? Or should I say O’Malley’s alter ego?”

“Since you’re in a better mood today, I hoped we might make up for lost time last night. Jerome got in the way.”

“Your bleeding eyes look as if you didn’t waste much time last night. Didn’t you call Rosalie Wildewood after all?”

“Jerome fed me a bottle of homemade wine. We talked till three or four. I know all your secrets now, Aud.”

This came as a hard blow. Jerome knows me better than is comfortable. Many an afternoon he psychoanalyzed me in the college coffee shop, explaining why I shouldn’t be jealous of Helen. When Helen got engaged to Garth, he was the one who dragged out all the old clichés about plenty of fish in the sea.

“That nut? He doesn’t know a neurosis from a neutron.”

“He knows a lot about kid sisters, and inferiority complexes.”

I bet he didn’t know how I felt right now, as though my skin had been stripped off, and I stood with my raw nerve endings exposed. My old misgivings stormed over me when we entered the marble hallways, with Zeus towering at the end of it. I sat on the edge of the suede sofa, while Brad disposed of the paintings, before he joined me.

“I can see you’re not exactly crazy about my place. What is it that turns you off?” he asked frankly.

“It’s lovely. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“It’s as nice as I can make it. To tell the truth, I was hoping to bowl you over with it, but you grew a two-inch shell the minute you set foot in the door yesterday. And it’s happening again.” He stared hard, trying to read the answer on my stiffening face.

“I just hadn’t pictured you living in a place like this.” I glanced at the art-strewn walls. “You’re not—I don’t know. You’re just not what I thought you were. You seem like a stranger here.” I was dissatisfied with this trite speech, and so was Brad.

“It took me a while to get used to having money,” he admitted, as his eyes followed mine around the room. “I didn’t always live like this, but I always wanted to. I still do—my visit chez Simcoe convinced me of it. I used to live in a place like that when I was a professor. When my books started to earn a lot of money, I decided to spend it. Why not? I didn’t have anyone to leave it to. I guess you knew my wife and son were fabrications, to give me an excuse to go to Rosalie’s funeral.” My shell began to soften. “Surely I don’t have to apologize for making a success of my career, and enjoying the rewards? Won’t you move up, when you make it?”

“I’ll never make it this big. It’s only trash that sells so well. Trash and sex. I can’t understand how a professor of literature could lower himself,” I challenged. As he defended himself against this charge, I began to doubt his disavowal regarding Mason.

He waved a dismissing hand. “Professors of literature have to eat, too. I happen to like steak and wine. I prefer Central Park West to a walk-up in some dark alley. I also like having my audience numbered in millions, instead of hundreds.
The Art of Eliot
sold nine hundred and seven copies, six hundred in the college where it was put on the curriculum for two years. When I left, the next professor put his book on the syllabus. In my opinion, forcing kids to buy your book is worse cheating than doing an honest journeyman’s job of work and letting the customer make his own free choice. I am what I am, and I like doing what I do. If you can’t accept that . . .“ He hunched his shoulders indifferently, but his eyes still looked concerned. The crease between his brows deepened, giving him an angry air.

“It’s your business if you want a career of literary prostitution,” I said magnanimously.

“As opposed to the sort of literary worship you carry on! Rummaging around in other people’s lives, ferreting out their secrets, making a précis of their diaries and letters.”

“Look who’s talking!” I objected, voice rising several decibels. “At least I have their permission, and I don’t pretend I was there in the room when Rosalie seduced her lovers, panting right along, with the heaving bosoms and shuddering loins. God, what rubbish! You should be ashamed of yourself.”

“I haven’t been hauled into court for obscenity yet. Bosoms
do
heave, Audrey; loins shudder, like it or not. The days of trembling virgins are behind us. If you realized it you might make a decent living yourself, instead of being jealous and spiteful because I have.” Brad’s voice rose above mine in volume.

“I’m not jealous of this furniture-store window. If you’re so insecure you have to bolster your ego with foreign cars and a fancy address, that’s your problem.”

“You’re so insecure you won’t even compete. How do you know you couldn’t win, Audrey? You probably could have kept Garth if you’d let his loins shudder a little. Mind you, I’m glad you didn’t. Losing once doesn’t brand you forever. Garth’s not the only guy in the world—he’s not even the best. You only think so because Helen managed to lure him away from you.”

I lifted my head and sniffed. “I don’t know what Jerome told you, but if you think Garth Schuyler ever meant anything to me, you’re nuts.”

“So how come your hands are clenched into fists? How come in all the time we’ve spent together, you never once mentioned you have a sister?”

“I didn’t mention lots of things!”

“There’s no point sticking your head in the sand.”

I slowly unclenched my fists, but my stomach was still a hard knot of anger—against Helen, for Garth; against Brad, for bringing the subject up; against Jerome, for blabbing my secrets. And most of all, against me, for being me. “I don’t have to listen to this rot.”

“Nobody’s forcing you to stay.”

“Fine, I can take a hint. I’ll go.” I struggled up from the low sofa.

Brad got up and took a step toward me. With one last mutual glare, we parted.
I’m crazy. I must be crazy, walking out on this man,
a small voice whispered, but my pace didn’t slacken as I hurried over the thick carpet. Till I got to the marble hallway, I didn’t realize Brad was following me. The carpet cushioned his footfalls, but they suddenly echoed on the hard surface. And still I didn’t stop, or even slow down. I wanted to get out before I burst into tears.

“You forgot your purse,” he said.

“Thank you.”

He pushed it angrily into my hands. It was the last chance, quite possibly the last time I’d see Brad O’Malley.

Common courtesy, if nothing else, demanded some acknowledgment of his help, and some thanks.

“Thanks for—everything,” I said vaguely. A quick peek at his face showed it was set in harsh lines. “Thanks” sounded woefully inadequate; I didn’t want to leave on such a weak note. Why was I mad anyway? Because he was trying to help, and in the process had unearthed the real me, a bundle of insecurities. He’d discovered my shriveled ego, my smashed heart—the reason I had bowed out of the contest of life, and was content to hide in the woods and write somebody else’s story. Everybody knows you can’t be cured till you acknowledge you’re sick. But I was getting somewhat better. The memory of Garth had faded during the time at Simcoe’s cottage. I had finally met someone who outshone him, and now I’d alienated him, too.

“It’s generous of you not to do the book on Rosalie,” I said. My voice had a ragged, uncertain edge to it.

His harsh face softened almost imperceptibly, but it softened. A faint suggestion of a glow, no more than a glimmer, entered his bleak eyes.

“It’s nothing.”

“Don’t be so modest. It’s very generous.”

“It’s literally nothing,” he insisted.

He meant
virtually
nothing, but this wasn’t the time for a contest of words. “Thanks for nothing then,” I said with a shaky laugh. Even that sounded graceless, and ironic.

A smile so small it was nearly nonexistent flashed across his face, lingering in his eyes. “It’s been fun knowing you, Audrey. I still feel I know you, even if I’ve turned into a stranger. Why did you say that?” he asked softly.

Over his shoulder, Zeus scowled at me. “It must be the company you keep. Picasso, Zeus—those guys.”

“I’m exactly the same person I was at the cottage. I feel the same way,” he said, not defensively, just stating a fact.
“I feel the same way about you,” he added, to make it perfectly clear.

My lower lip moved, but no sound came out. While I stood, hopefully waiting to be rescued, he spoke on. “Audrey, this is ridiculous. Are we really arguing about a set of rooms—about rags and stone and sticks of wood?”

“It’s not that—it’s the whole way of life.” How could I begin to explain my unsuitedness for competing with Hume Mason—was he Hume Mason?— and Rosalie Wildewood, and their glitzy set? He’d only say life wasn’t a competition, but for me it was. Was he clever enough to explain away a life-style?

“You mean the stuff I write,” he said. “I shouldn’t have pretended I was an intellectual heavyweight. I only did it to impress you. Not that you were impressed.”

“Intellectual pretension is one of my dislikes,” I admitted modestly.

“How do you keep track of them all? What
do
you like, anyway?” Anger tinged his voice again, turning me into a block of stone. He gritted his teeth, mentally biting the bullet, and said, “It’s the age thing, isn’t it?”

I blinked in confusion, “What age thing?”

“The fact that I’m an aging man, and you’re still a kid. Oh, I’ve seen you staring at my wrinkles, laughing at me. I didn’t realize the extent of the difference till I saw you and Jerome together. I felt like his father.”

‘This is crazy . . . How old
are
you, anyway?”

“Nearly forty. I turned thirty-nine last month,” he said aggressively, “and I have the arthritis to prove it.”

“Really!” I could hardly believe it. Yet I’d taken him for thirty-six or -seven. Two years didn’t make that much difference. It was his saying “nearly forty” that threw me.

On his face I read regret that he’d confessed, since I hadn’t suspected. “Really. The next one’s the big four-O.”

“Life begins at forty.”

“It’s about time. How old are
you?”
He examined me more minutely than felt comfortable.

“Nearly thirty.”

“That old?”

This was entirely the wrong response. I should have said twenty-eight. “Didn’t Jerome tell you?”

“I was afraid to ask.”

“Now we both know the awful truth. Well, I’d better go."

“No, stay. Ten years isn’t that big a difference.”

“Eleven, actually.”

“Let’s slug it out. This is worth investigating—it isn’t a hopeless case by any means. You’re neurotic and prickly and a sl—not one of the world’s great housekeepers. I’m old, even-tempered, thick-skinned, and obsessively neat. An odd couple, but complementary. And we
do
have a few things in common. At least we’re both in the same business.”

Hope and joy trembled through me, then I opened my mouth and said, “I don’t see why we can’t be friends.” I wanted to kick myself. To make it even worse, I added, “I always liked visiting art galleries, and it’s not as though I’d have to live here, with the gilt frames.” Brad didn’t bat an eye, but a little flash told me he had in mind more than visits, possibly even some sharing of accommodations.

“It’s a big apartment—two bedrooms,” he mentioned, in a voice I couldn’t put a description on. Sort of diffident.

Some demon of self-destruction possessed me. “Plenty of room for your ego to swell.”

His jaw muscle quivered. “You’re doing it again, Audrey.”

I hunched my shoulders and gave a watery, apologetic smile. “Prickly, that’s me. Since you picked Jerome’s brains last night, you must know they called me the porcupine in college.”

“You’ve changed since college. You were more competitive then.”

Changed for the worse, then. “I still am, but more discriminating. I only compete for things that matter to me now.”

“Don’t
I
matter to you?”

He looked angry, but I think he was only trying to hide the hurt of rejection. I’m prickly, but I’m not mean. I really hate hurting people. “Like I said, we can be friends.”

“Good friends, I hope?”

“Bosom pals.”

“My favorite kind.” He smiled hopefully, and reached for me.

I automatically took a step back, and regretted it before my foot hit the floor. He advanced another pace—thank God. We were within touching distance, within close eye-contact distance. I could sense the attraction between us like a palpable thing. He was going to kiss me, and I wasn’t going to try to stop him, not even if I had to get a hammerlock on my tongue. When his hand touched mine, I didn’t draw back. I reached for him. My purse slid to the floor, but we both ignored it. We were too involved with other sensations. He pulled me into a crushing embrace. His lips scorched mine, and his hands began a ballet trying in vain to find an entrance through my one-piece dress. When this failed, he began backing into the apartment. At the edge of the rug, he tripped.

“Any special reason why you’ve suddenly gone into reverse?” I asked. As if I didn’t know the destination. Two bedrooms, he’d said.

“What am I going to do with you?” he asked, eyes steaming.

“Succumb to my heaving bosom?”

He went into park, just at the edge of the rug. “Were you really going to walk out on me?” he asked.

“I planned to throw myself under the first passing car, to cause you eternal remorse.”

“A sadist! I should have known it when you hit me with the hammer.”

“I am what I am.”

“I like what you are,” he growled, and began examining my physique by hand. Up over my hips, reaching for my breasts, where his hands lingered before lowering to the depression of my waist, the curve of hips. “What is this, a modern chastity gown?”