“Oh, no, thanks, Mr. Sigelman, I’ve been dancing and dancing.”
“Horace. We might as well be informal. Something tells me we might be seeing a little more of you.” He gave her a heavy slow roguish grin. “That Noel, he’s one hell of a guy, isn’t he? I swear I think he’s the most brilliant person I’ve ever met. Monica about worships the ground he walks on. Though we never see him. I’ve always said if he ever married some nice down-to-earth girl, who’d steady him up, you know, why he’d be famous in short order. He’s an awful wild man. You know, the kind other fellows envy, until they stop to think about it. I don’t envy him any more. I used to, in a way. But I don’t now, he’s seemed sort of sad the last few years, lonely, you know, and not getting much of anywhere.”
Monica said when they returned, “It’s all set, Margie. He’s going to bring you out for the day to our place as soon as the weather gets better. My brood’ll climb all over you, and drip ice cream on your dress, and it’ll be fun.”
“Wonderful.”
Noel said, “Providing Margie’s still talking to me.”
The sister took her hand and suddenly kissed her. “ ’Bye, dear, you’re sweet. Pay no attention to me, I’m a sentimental drunk. Take me home, Norace. Horace—listen to me—‘Norace.’ ” She reached up, pulled her brother’s head forward and kissed him swiftly on the cheek. “Goodbye, you scoundrel. Follow Billy’s example, real soon.”
“Gad,” Noel said, looking after her, “she’s ossified. Ordinarily she’d as soon give me an arm as a kiss.”
“Well, I don’t like to kiss my brother, either, it’s silly. No wonder you’re so fond of her, she’s charming.”
“Who said I was fond of her? She’s a bore, a suburban slattern with a house boiling with kids.”
“You told me so yourself, at camp. You also said Horace was a lump of pig fat. I think you’re wrong there. He’s very likable.”
“Did I call Horace that? That’s rather neat. Weren’t we going outside?”
Some of the couches in the mirrored corridor were screened by fake palms in green tubs, and on these there were couples talking earnestly, holding hands, kissing. “Here, you see?” Noel said. “The pairing-off process is well advanced already. A pity Max, the doctor, didn’t show up. You two are star-crossed lovers. Why, to miss such an opportunity—”
Marjorie said, “I must have no sense of humor, after all. I don’t think Max, the doctor, is funny any more.”
“You’re getting sensitive.”
“Well, it’s the drop of water on the stone, you know.”
“I erase that joke from my repertoire. You will never hear it again.”
“Thank heaven.”
“I’ll miss Max, though. I was getting fond of him.”
They were strolling past the ladies’ lounge. Phil Boehm leaned against the wall beside the door, his hair rumpled, a droopy-eyed grin on his face. Marjorie said, “Hi. Is Roz all right?”
“Guess so, guess so. Li’l sick, she says.”
“Shall I go in and help?”
“No, no, no. Four gals with her now.”
Marjorie said as they walked away, “Maybe you can tell me why the married ones cut up so horribly at these things.”
“Good Lord, is that a question? To forget, of course,” Noel said. “To forget their own high hopes, and their sad mornings after. To forget the budgets that don’t balance, the friends with bigger cars, the baby’s sore throats, the sleepless nights, the bloody miscarriages, the procession of quitting maids, the flatness of routine sex, the neurotic mother-in-law poisoning their lives—”
“You make marriage sound like a nightmare.”
“Do I? I don’t mean to. No, time passes and the path narrows and narrows, and after a while there’s nothing to do but marry. But marrying doesn’t help, you’ve just got to do it anyway, and after you’re married life just goes on being a series of decreasingly pleasant choices. And you wonder why the married ones get drunk—”
“Well, I’ll say this, a girl would be absolutely crazy to marry a man who thinks the way you do.”
He turned on her, and his look was so scornful that she started back a little. “Aren’t we past those devious female noises yet? You’d marry me in two seconds if I asked you.”
“You’re the most unbearably conceited man I’ve ever met.”
“Listen, Marjorie, you’ve been lying awake nights thinking of me. Those rings under your eyes! You look awful.”
“You fiend, of course I’ve been thinking of you! Haven’t you been making love to me for a year?”
“Well, why the devil didn’t you telephone me then?”
“Telephone you? You said you’d call me.”
His laugh was a short bitter burst. “Christ, that was really it, wasn’t it? Margie, ever hear of the French king who roasted to death rather than move his chair back from the fireplace with his own hands? You’ve got him beat hands down. The heavens can fall, but Shirley’s protocol must be observed, isn’t that the idea?”
She faced him. “You said you were starting work and might be busy for a while. You know you did. The way you left it, no girl with any self-respect would have called a devil like you. It would have been nagging, crawling—”
“You’re all wrong. Girls call up devils like me every day in the week, Margie, girls with all kinds of pride and self-respect. Why, the land rings from coast to coast with such calls. Only they never call for a date, don’t you see? They call about a book they meant to borrow, or because they heard you were sick, or they dialled the wrong number by mistake, or some old thing like that. Naturally.” He put his arm around her waist. They were at the end of the corridor, looking out of the window at a crimson sunset over the bluish downtown buildings. He said after a moment, “I’m sorry. I should have called you, I know. But it was better not to. I’ve been in a foul mood, and still am, and that’s the truth. Going straight, keeping nine-to-five hours—the old Adam dies hard, Margie. And of course, in my lowest moments it’s always you I blame. However—” He kissed her temple lightly. “Come, one dance and then I must leave you.”
“Where are you going?”
“I have a date.”
“Anybody I know?”
He grinned. “Janice Gray.” He grinned wider at the fall of her countenance. “Listen, she’s a lonesome old bat. She’s the mistress of a sweater manufacturer who’s on his way home from Europe to meet her, and she’s dying of boredom. She doesn’t know anybody in New York. She’s not bashful, she phones me all the time. She doesn’t like me at all, but I’m sort of a neutral presentable dancing partner. She pays all the checks, so I’m not wasting my hard-earned funds.”
Marjorie said angrily, “No doubt you’re standing in for the sportswear manufacturer in bed, too.”
He looked her in the eye. “No.”
“No?”
“No. She isn’t interested, and anyway, she’s inches deep in makeup. It would be like trying to make love to a greased pig.”
With a nervous giggle Marjorie said, “That’s some way to talk about a movie star. You’re lying to make me feel good.”
In the ballroom the musicians had stopped playing. Noel said, “Well, guess I’ll pay my disrespects.” He went up to the exhausted Sundheimers, with Marjorie on his arm, and urbanely congratulated them. Marjorie Sundheimer looked a little frightened, shaking his hand. He slapped Billy on the back. “My boy, read your Genesis again. The younger ones aren’t supposed to marry first.”
Judge Ehrmann said heavily, “You’d better read your Genesis again, Saul. That applied only to the daughters.”
“Well, all the same,” Noel said to Marjorie Sundheimer, “don’t be surprised if you wake up on your wedding morn and find yourself married to me. It’s an old Biblical custom.”
Marjorie Sundheimer said, “I’m afraid I’d never stop running.”
The judge laughed hoarsely.
“So long, Mother,” Noel said. He bent and kissed her pink wrinkled cheek
.
“Are you going already? You just came.” She accompanied them out to the elevator, saying to Noel, “Why don’t you come up to dinner, say next Friday, and bring your little friend here, Marjorie? It’s been so long—”
Noel said, “Why, I barely know this girl.”
“Stop your nonsense.” As the elevator door slid open, Marjorie suddenly said, “Mister, this is your last date with Janice Gray.”
“Who says so?”
“I do.”
“Goodbye, girls. Have a nice chat, now.”
At midnight Marjorie telephoned Noel. There was no answer. She sat in bed reading her novel until one, and called again. No answer. She dropped the book and thought about the engagement party. She was still appalled at the wretched incident that had ended the afternoon. One of Noel’s former girls, married for five years, the mother of two children, had staggered up to her and, with distorted features and thick speech, had begun gabbling disconnectedly about Noel. Completely out of control, the woman had shrugged off her husband’s embarrassed efforts to stop her, and her voice had become louder and her smile queerer. Sandy at last had hurried Marjorie out of the room, with the woman shouting after her, “Come back, come back! There’s lots more you’d better know about Saul Ehrmann—”
When the minute hand stood at exactly two, she called his apartment again.
“Hello?” He sounded sleepy.
“Hello. It’s Shirley.”
“Holy smoke!” His voice rose with pleasure. “Calling a man at two in the morning—”
“I know. I’m totally depraved. You’ve ruined me.”
“Well, it’s nice to hear from you, ruined or not—”
“I hope I’m not disturbing you. Is Janice Gray there?”
“Oh, don’t be a jackass. I dropped her at the Waldorf an hour ago. How about coming down here? We’ll neck.”
“Not a chance.”
“Well, then, come down here and fight me off.”
“No. I had enough trouble fighting off Susan Hoffen this afternoon.”
“Oh my Lord.” His voice grew cautious. “Don’t tell me—was she drunk?”
“She was mighty strange. All about how nice you are and how pretty I am, on and on, with her hand gripping my arm, and her eyes popping. It gave me the creeps.”
“Susan can give you the creeps, all right. She hates her husband, and she takes it out on the world.”
“Just one of the broken blossoms along your path, Mr. Airman.”
“Oh, sure. They litter the West Side. Only Susan victimized me, as it happens. Turned around and got married because we’d had a fight, and left me stunned for months. Now it’s all my fault, obviously, and will be till she dies.”
“Obviously. And you’re still brokenhearted about her. Or is it Betty Frank, or Irene Goren, or Ruth Mendelsohn, or Marilyn Lubin? You ought to write a book.”
He laughed. “Well, what can I do for you?”
“Not a thing.”
“You called me.”
“I know. Just because you made such a silly fuss about it. Also, I want to borrow a book.”
“Now you’re talking. What book?”
“Oh, I don’t know, any book. Plato’s Republic.”
“That’s a honey. Hell of a trick ending. I’ll give it to you when I see you again.”
“Fine. When will that be?”
“Marjorie Morgenstern, are you asking me for a date?”
“Sure, why not?”
“Well, bless my soul. Let’s have a date right now. I’ll get dressed and come get you.”
She chuckled. “Noel, don’t be insane.”
“Why not? Damn it, the only good hour is the present one. We’ll have hamburgers, and ride back and forth all night on the ferry, like Edna Millay says—”
“I’m no Edna Millay, mister. And I’m in bed, and my face is all cold cream, and my hair is a mess, and I wouldn’t get up and eat hamburgers with Clark Gable.”
“You definitely lack romance,” he said in a disappointed tone. “Come on, our future may hinge on this. In fact it does. Have a hamburger with me, and I’ll marry you.”
“Not even for that.”
“Well, all right. I’m not sensitive. How about lunch tomorrow? Sardi’s at one?”
“Sure.”
“Gad, you’ve actually called me for a date, do you realize that? Shirley is dead. Long live Marjorie! I swear there’s hope. Good night, my darling.”
Chapter 25. MURIEL
Noel cheered up strikingly after that. They called each other several times a day. It was a rare week in which they did not meet at least half a dozen times for lunch, cocktails, or dinner. They saw all the best shows and movies, went to the best concerts, and ate at the best restaurants; for Noel now had a continuing plentiful supply of money from his Paramount job. It seemed to Marjorie that she was discovering New York City. Her college set had stayed rigidly in a zigzag path through the town, traversing a few hotel bars, night clubs, and eating-places which they considered smart. The rest of downtown New York had been an unmapped jungle of boredom, left to the inferior animals called older people. Now Marjorie, moving toward her twenty-first birthday, and imperceptibly becoming one of those older people, saw that the collegians’ tastes had been as naïve, in their way, as those of small-town visitors. Her brief explorations with Marsha had been limited by lack of money. But Noel suffered from no such lack; and he loved New York.
Equally with the expensive fairyland between Fifty-ninth Street and Forty-second Street—which he knew from river to river like a guide—he loved all the sights and sounds and smells, wherever they were, provided only that they were poignant and sharp. They would go in one night from the Club Ferrara, from costly food and wine, murmuring music, and the aura of celebrities and beautifully dressed women, to the stinking fish market at the foot of Fulton Street, where, under the glare of big electric bulbs, bright fish lay in bloody heaps, and trucks ground, and hairy men in ragged sweaters cursed and yelled. Or they would ride a ferry for a nickel, hugging each other to keep warm in the icy river breeze, watching the jagged line of black skyscrapers slide past in the moonlight; and they would laugh at the sluggish roll of the boat, the foul oil-and-garbage whiffs from the river; then they would go to a big night club for out-of-towners, a vulgar whirl of colored feathers and naked kicking legs and bad food and wine, where thirty dollars would melt in an hour. Noel had an insatiable enthusiasm for this rounding. When Marjorie was ready to drop, he would have some eager inspiration. “God, this is such wonderful fun, Margie. Let’s keep going. The night’s young.”
“Noel, you maniac, it’s after four. I can’t put one leg in front of another. And my eyes, they’re absolutely red. Take me home. Harlem, indeed, at this hour!” But she would laugh.
“What the devil, Marge, I have to be in an office at nine. You don’t. I tell you this joint only gets going at four, and this Ken Watt and his Kilowatts make the greatest jazz in the United States. Benny Goodman’s a fraud next to them.”
“Well, for one drink. Then we go home. Promise?”
“Of course—Taxi! Ah, Margie, money’s the only thing.”
She often slept till noon. She read Variety and Billboard regularly, and spent a lot of time at the Broadway drugstore where young actors and actresses gathered. She was pursued quite a bit by the actors, especially when her indifference to them became noticed. But their good profiles, large eyes, long hair, and knowing manners were wasted on her. There was only one male human in the world, and his name was Noel Airman. Indefatigably she made the rounds of the producers’ offices, when she wasn’t with Noel; and indefatigably, like all the other young actresses, she was turned away by yawning office boys. But she was not discouraged. Life bubbled with promise.
Marjorie’s parents were extraordinarily tolerant of the life she was leading. There were no questions, no objections, not even worried hints or looks. She surmised after a while that they had been talking with the Ehrmanns, and that both se
ts of parents had decided to keep hands off and pray for a happy outcome. Mr. Morgenstern, while continuing to exhibit fretful gloom, seemed resigned; when he met Noel he tried hard to be pleasantly paternal.
It was the most intoxicating time in Marjorie’s life; sweeter and gayer even than her first weeks with Noel at South Wind, because now there was nothing surprising or scaring about him. Above all, the gradual pressing out to the limits of sex, which had so excited and terrorized her before, was absent. They joked about it. Noel said he didn’t mind, and he really seemed not to care. “You’re growing up,” he said once. “That’s fine. It was you who were doing all that, really, you know. I was a helpless bystander.” And when she hooted, he said earnestly. “It’s true. And it’s true most of the time, for that matter, with nearly every couple. Of course the guy makes the first pass. It’s the code. It’s like tipping his hat, or holding the door open. The girl takes it from there, and sets exactly the pace she pleases, but exactly, unless she’s been dumb enough to get involved with some gutter brute. Why, hell’s bells, that’s what you’re doing right now. I’ve kissed you good night forty times lately. Why hasn’t it gone into one of our old necking sessions? Simply because you haven’t started swarming over me like an octopus.”
Marjorie tried to look annoyed; but she couldn’t help it, she burst out laughing. They were riding around the park in a hansom cab on a frigid sunny March afternoon, their cheeks red and frostbitten, their hands warmly clinging under a huge mangy fur lap robe. Noel was hatless, and his hair was rumpled by the wind. He looked like a boy. His joy of life was infectious. One glance of his laughing brilliant blue eyes could make Marjorie as dizzy and happy as if she were on a roller coaster.
That was the day he persuaded her to eat a lobster. They went from the hansom cab to the Plaza and drank martinis, and all at once it was dinnertime, although they hadn’t planned to dine together. He said, “We’re both going to have broiled lobster, with a very delicate white burgundy. It’s the only thing, when two people are feeling so good and so foolish.”
“Oh no, Noel—not lobster, sorry—”