Tom was pleased. Thurlow didn’t seem to suspect Frank. “And Lily? What’s she like?”
“She’s another world. She was an actress when John met her.— Why’re you asking?”
“Because I suppose I’ll meet her,” Tom said, smiling. “Has she a favorite between the two boys?”
Thurlow smiled, relieved at an easy question. “You must think I know the family pretty well. I don’t know them that well.”
There Tom let the matter rest. They had exited at Porte de la Chapelle from the périphérique and entered the boring stretch of fifteen kilometers toward the horror called Charles de Gaulle Airport, nearly as offensive to Tom’s eye as Beaubourg, but at least inside Beaubourg there were beautiful things to look at.
“How do you spend your time, Mr. Ripley?” Thurlow asked. “Someone told me you haven’t a usual job. You know, an office—”
That was an easy question for Tom, because he had answered it many a time. There was gardening, he was studying the harpsichord, Tom said, he liked reading French and German, and he was always trying to improve himself in those languages. He could feel Thurlow regarding him as if he were a man from Mars, possibly also regarding him with distaste. Tom didn’t mind at all. He had weathered worse than Thurlow. He knew Thurlow thought he was a borderline crook, with the luck to have married a well-to-do Frenchwoman. A gigolo, perhaps, a sponger, loafer, and parasite. Tom kept a bland expression on his face, since he might need Thurlow’s help in the days ahead, even Thurlow’s allegiance. Had Thurlow ever fought as hard for anything, Tom wondered, as he had to protect the Derwatt name—the Derwatt forgeries, really, but of course the earlier half of the paintings were not forgeries. Had Thurlow slain one or two Mafiosi, as had Tom? Or was it more correct now to call them “organized criminals,” those sadistic pimps and blackmailers?
“And Susie?” Tom began again pleasantly. “I suppose you’ve met her?”
“Susie? Oh, Susie the housekeeper. Sure. She’s been there for ages. Getting on in years, but they don’t want to—to retire her.”
At the airport, they could not find any luggage carts, so they hauled everything by hand to the check-in at TWA. Suddenly two or three photographers crouched with cameras on both sides of the queue. Tom lowered his head, and saw Frank cover his face calmly with one hand. Thurlow shook his head sympathetically at Tom. One journalist addressed Frank in French-accented English:
“You enjoy your holiday in Germany, Monsieur Pierson?—Have you something to say about France?— Why—why did you try to hide?”
His camera hung big and black in front of him from a cord around his neck, and Tom had an impulse to seize it and break it over his head, but the man swung it up and snapped Frank, just as Frank turned his back on him.
After the check-in, Thurlow sprang to the fore in a manner that Tom admired, shouldering aside the press—four or five by now—like a football linesman as they made directly for Satellite Number Five escalator and the passport control that would give them a barrier.
“I am going to sit next to my friend,” Frank said firmly to the stewardess when they were all aboard the plane. Frank meant Tom.
Tom let Frank handle it, and one man was willing to change his seat, so Tom and Frank were side by side in a row that held six. Tom had the aisle seat. It was not Concorde, and Tom did not relish the thought of the next seven hours. A bit strange Thurlow had not bought first class, Tom thought.
“What did you and Thurlow talk about?” Frank asked.
“Nothing important. He was asking how I spent my time.” Tom chuckled. “And you and Johnny?”
“Also nothing important,” Frank replied rather curtly, but Tom knew the boy by now and didn’t mind.
Tom hoped that Frank and Johnny had not talked about Teresa, because Johnny seemed to have no sympathy for the department of lost loves. Tom had brought three books to read, which he had in a plaid carryall. There were the inevitable, indefatigable small children—all three of them American—who started running up and down the aisle, though Tom had thought he and Frank might escape their racket, being seated at least eighteen rows away from the kids’ presumable base. Tom tried reading, snoozing, thinking—though it was not always good to try to think. Inspiration, good or productive ideas seldom came that way. Tom woke up from a semi-doze with the word “Showmanship!” strongly in his ears or in his brain, and sat up, blinked at the technicolor Western now in progress on the screen in the middle of the plane, silent to him, because he had declined earphones. Showmanship how? What was he supposed to do at the Piersons’?
Tom picked up a book again. When one of the odious four-year-olds ran for the umpteenth time up the aisle toward him, babbling nonsense, Tom stretched back and put a foot out slightly into the aisle. The little monster fell on its belly with, seconds afterward, a wail like that of a wronged banshee. Tom feigned sleep. A bored stewardess came from somewhere to set the little thing upright. Tom saw a satisfied smirk from a man seated across the aisle from him. Tom was not alone. The child was steered back to its place forward, no doubt to recover pour mieux sauter, as the French said, in which case Tom thought he might leave the pleasure of tripping it to another passenger.
When they got to New York, it was early afternoon. Tom craned to look out the window, thrilled as always by the Manhattan skyscrapers made hazy as an Impressionist painting now by fluffy white and yellow clouds. Beautiful and admirable! Nowhere in the world did so many buildings stretch so high in such a tiny area! Then they were down with a dull thud, moving like cogs again, passports, luggage, frisking. And then the rosy-cheeked man whom Frank identified to Tom as Eugene, the chauffeur. Eugene, rather short and balding, looked happy to see Frank.
“Frank! How are you?” Eugene seemed friendly and at the same time polite and correct. He had an English accent, and wore ordinary clothes with shirt and tie. “And Mr. Thurlow. Greetings!— And Johnny!”
“Hello, Eugene,” Thurlow said. “And this is Tom Ripley.”
Tom and Eugene exchanged a “How do you do?” then Eugene continued, “Mrs. Pierson had to go to Kennebunkport early this morning. Susie wasn’t feeling well. Mrs. Pierson said either to come to the apartment and stay the night, or we can take a copter from the heliport.”
They were all standing in bright sunshine, luggage on the pavement, hand luggage still in hand, at least Tom’s was.
“Who’s at the apartment?” Johnny asked.
“No one just now, sir. Flora’s on vacation,” said Eugene. “We’ve rather closed the apartment, in fact. Mrs. Pierson said she might come down midweek, if Susie—”
“Let’s go to the apartment,” Thurlow interrupted. “It’s on the way, anyway. All right with you, Johnny? I’d like to phone the office. I might have to drop in there today.”
“Sure, it’s okay. I also want to look at my mail,” said Johnny. “What’s the matter with Susie, Eugene?”
“Not quite sure, sir. Sounded as if she might’ve had a slight heart attack. I know they sent for the doctor. This was at noon today. Your mother telephoned. I drove down yesterday with her and we stayed the night at the apartment. She wanted to meet you in New York.” Eugene smiled. “I’ll just go get the car. Back in two minutes.”
Tom wondered if it was Susie’s first heart attack. Flora, Tom supposed, was one of the servants. Eugene returned, driving a large black Daimler-Benz, and they all got in. There was even room for their luggage. Frank sat in front with Eugene.
“Everything’s okay, Eugene?” Johnny asked. “My mother?”
“Oh, yes, sir, I think so. She’s been worried about Frank—of course.” Eugene drove stiffly and efficiently, reminding Tom of a Rolls-Royce brochure he had once read, informing drivers that they should never rest an elbow on the windowsill, because it looked sloppy.
Johnny lit a cigarette and pushed something in the beige leather upholstery which caused an ashtray to appear. Frank was silent.
Third Avenue now. Lexington. Manhattan looked like a honeycomb compared
to Paris, little cells everywhere, buzzing with activity, human insects crawling in and out, carrying things, loading, walking, bumping into one another. In front of an apartment house with an awning that extended to the curb, the car came to a quiet stop, and a smiling doorman in a gray uniform opened the door of the car, after a touch of his fingers to his cap.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Pierson,” the doorman said.
Johnny greeted him by name. Glass doors, and then they rode up in an elevator, while the suitcases went up in another elevator.
“Anybody got the key?” asked Thurlow.
“I have,” Johnny said with an air of pride, and pulled a key ring from his pocket.
Eugene was putting the car away somewhere.
The apartment was marked 12A. They went into a spacious foyer. Some of the chairs in the big living room bore white protective covers, the ones nearest the windows, though the windows now had their venetian blinds down and closed, so that one needed electric light to see properly. Johnny took care of both—smiling as if he were happy to be home, if this were home—slid the blind cords so that more light came in, then turned on a standing lamp. Tom saw Frank lingering in the hall, looking through a stack of some dozen letters. The boy’s face remained tense, a bit frowning. Nothing from Teresa, Tom thought. But the boy’s step into the living room was almost a saunter. He looked at Tom and said:
“Well, well, Tom—this is it. Or part of it. Our home.”
Tom gave a polite smile, because Frank wanted that. Tom strolled toward a mediocre oil above the fireplace—did the fireplace work?—of a woman Tom supposed was Frank’s mother: blonde, pretty, made-up, posed with hands not in lap but stretched out, as were the arms, along the back of a pale green sofa. She wore a black sleeveless dress with an orange-red flower in her belt. The mouth was gently smiling, but so worked over by the painter, Tom did not look for reality or character in it. What had John Pierson had to pay for this mess? Thurlow was on the telephone in the foyer, speaking perhaps to his office. Tom was not interested in what he might have to say. Now Tom saw Johnny in the hall looking at the letters, pocketing two, opening a third. Johnny looked cheerful.
In the living room two large brown leather sofas—Tom could just see the bottom part of the side of one under the white sheet—made a right angle, and there was a grand piano with a music score propped up. Tom moved closer to see what the music was, but two photographs atop the piano distracted him. One was of a dark-haired man holding a baby of perhaps two, the baby laughing and blond: Johnny, Tom supposed, and the man was John Pierson, looking hardly forty, smiling with friendly dark eyes in which Tom thought he saw a resemblance to Frank’s. The second picture of John looked equally attractive, John in white shirt with no tie, wearing no glasses, in the act of taking a pipe from his smiling mouth as a wraith of smoke drifted up. It was difficult to imagine John the elder a tyrant or even a tough businessman from these pictures. The sheet music on the piano had “Sweet Lorraine” written in scrolly letters on its cover. Did Lily play? Tom had always liked “Sweet Lorraine.”
Eugene arrived, and Thurlow came in just then from another room, carrying what looked like a scotch and soda. Eugene at once asked Tom if he would like some refreshment, tea or a drink, and Tom declined. Then Thurlow and Eugene discussed the next move. Thurlow was for taking a helicopter, and Eugene said of course that could be done, and were they all going? Tom looked at Frank, and would not have been surprised if Frank had said he preferred to stay in New York and with Tom, but Frank said:
“All right, yes. We’ll all go.”
Then Eugene made a telephone call.
Frank beckoned Tom into a hall. “Would you like to see my room?” The boy opened the second door on the right in the hall. Again venetian blinds had been drawn, but Frank pulled a cord so that they admitted light.
Tom saw a long trestle-based table, books neatly set in a row at the back against the wall, stacked spiral-backed school notebooks, and two pictures of the girl he recognized as Teresa. In one picture she was by herself with a tiara, a lei of flowers, white dress, pink lips smiling a mischievous smile, eyes bright. The belle of the ball that night, Tom supposed. The other picture, also in color, was smaller: Frank and Teresa standing in what looked like Washington Square, Frank holding her hand, Teresa in bell-bottomed beige jeans and blue denim shirt, with a little sack of something—peanuts maybe—in one hand. Frank looked handsome and happy, like a boy who was sure of his girl.
“My favorite picture,” said Frank. “Makes me look older. That was just—maybe two weeks before I went to Europe.”
Meaning about a week before he killed his father. Tom again had the disturbing, very strange doubt: had Frank killed his father? Or was it a fantasy? Adolescents did have fantasies and hung on to them. And might Frank? Frank had an intensity of a kind that Johnny showed not at all. It was going to take ages for Frank to recover from Teresa, for instance, and by ages Tom thought of perhaps two years. On the other hand, to fantasize about killing his father, and to have told Tom about it, would have been a way of calling attention to himself, and Frank was not the type to do that.
“What’re you thinking about?” Frank asked. “Teresa?”
“Are you telling me the truth about your father?” Tom asked softly.
Frank’s mouth became suddenly firm in a way that Tom knew well. “Why would I ever lie to you?” Then he shrugged as if ashamed of being so serious. “Let’s go out.”
He just might lie, Tom thought, because he believed more in fantasy than in reality. “Your brother doesn’t suspect at all?”
“My brother—he asked me and I said I didn’t—push—” Frank broke off. “Johnny believed me. I think he wouldn’t even want to believe the truth if I told him.”
Tom nodded, and also nodded toward the door of the room. Before he went out, Tom glanced at the hi-fi and the handsome three-tiered case of records near the door. Then Tom went back and pulled the venetian blinds’ cord the way it had been. The rug was dark purple, as was the cover of the bed. Tom found the color pleasing.
They all went down and got two taxis, and headed for the Midtown Heliport on West Thirtieth Street. Tom had heard of the heliport, but never been here. The Piersons had their own helicopter, with room for a dozen people, it seemed, though Tom didn’t count the seats. There was leg room, a bar, an electronic kitchen.
“I don’t know these people,” Frank said to Tom, referring to the pilot and the steward who was taking drink and food orders. “They’re employed by the heliport.”
Tom ordered a beer and a cheese sandwich on rye. It was now just after five, and the trip was going to take about three hours, someone had said. Thurlow sat beside Eugene in seats nearer the pilot. Tom looked out of his window and watched New York drop below them.
Chop-chop-chop, as the comic strips said. Mountains of buildings sank below, as if being sucked downward, reminding Tom of a film being turned in reverse. Frank sat across the aisle from Tom. There was no one behind them. Now the steward and the pilot up front were telling jokes, or so it seemed from their laughter. On their left, an orange sun hung above the horizon.
Frank sank himself in another book, one he had taken from his room. Tom tried to snooze. It seemed the best thing to do, in view of the fact they all might be up late tonight. For Tom, Frank, and Thurlow, also Johnny, it was about two in the morning. Thurlow was already asleep, Tom saw.
A different pitch of the motor’s buzz awakened Tom. They were descending.
“We’re landing on the back lawn,” Frank said to Tom.
It was almost dark. Now Tom saw a big white house, impressive yet somehow friendly with its yellowish lights glowing under two porch roofs on two sides. And maybe mother would be standing on one porch, Tom thought, as if welcoming a son who came trudging home with a handkerchief of possessions on a stick over his shoulder. Tom realized that he was curious about the Pierson establishment here, not their only house, of course, but an important one. The sea lay on their right, an
d Tom could see a couple of lights out there, of buoys or of small craft. And there, suddenly, was Lily Pierson—Mama—on the porch, waving! She appeared to be wearing black slacks and blouse, in the semi-darkness Tom couldn’t tell, but her fair hair showed in the porch’s light. Beside her stood a thicker figure, a woman wearing mostly white.
The helicopter touched ground. They descended steps that had been flipped out.
“Franky! Welcome home!” called his mother.
The woman beside her was a black, smiling also, coming forward to help with the luggage which Eugene and the steward were taking from a side hatch.
“Hello, Mom,” said Frank. He put his arm nervously or a bit tensely around his mother’s shoulder, and did not quite kiss her cheek.
Tom watched from a distance, as he was still on the lawn. The boy was shy, but he did not dislike his mother, Tom thought.
“This is Evangelina,” Lily Pierson was saying to Frank, indicating the black woman walking toward them with somebody’s suitcase now. “My son Frank—and Johnny,” she said to Evangelina. “And how are you, Ralph?”
“Very fine, thank you. This is—”
Frank interrupted Thurlow. “Mom, this is Tom Ripley.”
“I’m so happy to meet you, Mr. Ripley!” Lily Pierson’s made-up eyes gave Tom a searching inspection, though her smile looked friendly enough.
They were ushered into the house, assured by Lily that they could leave their jackets and raincoats in the hall or anywhere. And had they had anything to eat, or were they exhausted? Evangelina had prepared a cold supper, if anyone wished to partake. Lily’s voice did not sound nervous, only hospitable. Her accent combined New York and California, Tom thought.