“Why?”
“Because I love you. Because this is ours. Do you know something? I am cheating on him for the first time. But it still isn’t cheating, is it? Will we see each other sometime?”
“Yes.”
“Do you have anybody else?”
“Not right now, but I will. You’re thinking that that will bother you. But it won’t.”
“I feel so strange.”
“I know.”
“So very strange.”
“I know.”
TWENTY-FOUR
Nude, Gretchen stepped onto the bathroom scale. It was new; Peter had bought it for her when she first began to gain weight. She noted now that she had only gained a pound since the last time she weighed herself. She was not sure just how long it had been, but it didn’t seem as though it could have been very long. She was always getting on that scale these days; it was something she found herself doing every time she had her clothes off.
She dressed now, humming softly to herself. This was the perfect afternoon for what she had to do. She had dropped a load of wash at the laundromat when she took Robin to play with some other children. The clothes would be ready to go in the dryer now, and on the way back she could stop at the Raparound for a cup of hot chocolate and a piece of crumb cake. Three tasks would be handled on one trip. She would be concerning herself with the business of maintaining her household, the business of gaining weight, and the business of guarding her flanks.
It was simply a matter of organization, of using time properly. Of course you had to be very intelligent to manage it and you had to possess an iron will. But none of what she was doing would be possible without an iron will.
There were times when it seemed that gaining weight was the hardest part of all. Eating was no problem. Here was where will came into play. The ordinary person ate when he was hungry and confined himself to food he enjoyed eating. But this would not do in her case. She was never hungry; she could never abide the taste of food. So she rose above herself and ate anyway, pretending to enjoy every bite she swallowed. And it was working. She was still thin but she was gaining weight.
But so slowly! Of course it was all part of the plan. They never made it easy for you. If you were overweight, then even a starvation diet brought little weight loss, while the least bit of eating shot your weight up again. If you were underweight, you had to gorge yourself put any weight on your bones, and if you relaxed vigil the pounds melted away before you knew it. It was doubly hard for her because she had to concentrate so hard. The concentration burned off valuable calories, but she didn’t dare relax her concentration for a moment.
Anything was possible if you concentrated. Anything. She could gain weight, she could manage the household, she could cook meals, she could be loving with Robin, and she could be precisely the person Peter wanted her to be. She could stay away from pills and alcohol. She could even stay away from cigarettes but had decided it might be too abrupt for her to quit smoking.
The hardest part was sleeping, but even that could be achieved by concentration. By mind over matter, or was it more accurate to call it mind over mind?
No never mind, she thought. No matter. No mind matter. No matter mind.
She had to choke back a giggle. She was alone, of course, and she might have treated herself to a giggle, but it was vital to maintain discipline. If you did so while alone, it was all the more easy to do so in company.
And how could you ever be absolutely certain you were alone? They could go anywhere; they could take all sorts of forms. You might well be alone but could not be sure of it, so you had to behave all the time as if they were watching. Even in sleep, even when Peter and Robin were themselves asleep.
She couldn’t steal his soul anymore while he slept. It was unsafe. But it was also unnecessary, for she had stolen back her sleep. Not always; there were nights when her most intense concentration would not make sleep come. But she was getting better and better at it, and soon she would have the knack mastered.
She left the building and walked quickly to the laundromat. The sun was glaring down, but all she had to do was tell herself not to feel the heat and it ceased to bother her. Everything was simple when you knew what to do.
She transferred the load of clothes to the dryer, put in three dimes for thirty minutes, and walked back through the heat (which she did not feel) to the Raparound. The fat swarthy waitress was the only one on duty, which suited her plans perfectly. She glanced around, recognized two people whom she knew, and greeted them perfectly—a quick word, a pleasant smile, enough enthusiasm but not too much. Then she took a table by herself, selecting one as far from the couple she knew as possible.
When the waitress came over Gretchen beamed at her. “Why, hello, Anne,” she said. “I’d like a piece of crumb cake and a cup of hot chocolate.”
“Hot chocolate? In this weather?”
“Oh, I don’t mind the heat,” she said. While she waited for her food she smoked a cigarette and considered the cleverness of the girl. Oh, she was clever; she’d been well prepared. Hot chocolate in this weather? Not clever enough, though. Not nearly clever enough.
Her order came quickly, another mark of Anne’s cleverness. “Why, thank you,” Gretchen told her. “Won’t you sit for a moment?”
“Well, I shouldn’t.”
“I’d appreciate it. And I purposely came at a time when you wouldn’t be too busy.”
“You did?”
You did? A neat trap, that one, designed to lead her down conversational detours. But she was good enough at dodging such traps.
“I’ve been wanting to tell you how much I appreciate everything you’ve done for us, Anne.”
“I really didn’t do anything.”
“Of course that little bit of difficulty is over now.”
“Oh, I know, and I’m so pleased for you.”
“For me?”
“Yes, I think it’s wonderful.”
“You perspire a great deal, don’t you, Anne?” The girl colored under her olive skin.
“It’s this heat. I don’t know what I’m gonna do if it keeps up. I almost liked the rain better.”
“Just look at you.” She smiled warmly and matched the smile with the warmth of her voice. “Sweat stains under your arms. Filthy nauseating stains under your arms.
“I—”
“Don’t you use a deodorant?”
“I’m allergic. But I don’t—”
“And your skin is so dark. Are you part nigger, Anne? That would explain a lot of things.”
The girl’s face was a study, mouth hanging open like a ruptured cow. She was on the ropes now. All that was necessary was to keep up the pressure.
“You must have nigger blood, Anne. Your last name is Tedesco, isn’t it? That means ‘German’ in Italian. That’s a very clever ruse. I’m one of the few people likely to see through it. But it’s all so hopeless, isn’t it?” The smile again, and she let the poor stupid thing gape and babble while she took a large bite of crumb cake and washed it down with a sip of hot chocolate. As hard as she was concentrating on Anne, she was still able to get the food down without noticing any taste whatsoever. It was all a matter of concentration and discipline. When you had that, nothing on earth could stop you.
Now the final touch.
“Absolutely hopeless. Peter would never have anything to do with a sweating nigger. They fooled you into thinking so, they’re clever, but you must know better. You don’t have the slightest chance. You see, I know everything.” She squared her shoulders, beaming benevolently in triumph. “And I have the final trump card. If you ever came close to getting Robin, I would kill her. Just kill her. After all, she’s the Devil’s daughter, or didn’t they tell you that?”
She paused, deliberately offering the opportunity for a rejoinder. But Anne wasn’t capable of one. She was utterly defeated.
“So there’s no way you can win. You’d better tell them you don’t want to try anymore. For your own sake. You??
?d better leave my table now before we’re noticed. I’ll go as soon as I’ve finished my cake and coffee. I’ll pay you now. Here’s a dollar. You may keep the change. You see, I don’t hold it against you, Anne. You were misinformed. It’s not really your fault.”
She took just the right amount of time finishing her snack. There was no point in arousing suspicions. And this way her timing would be perfect; she would get back to the laundromat just as the dryer finished its thirty minute cycle.
A wave of pride lifted her. She gave herself a moment to relish it, then pushed it carefully aside. Pride was said to precede a fall, and she had no intention of falling. Ever.
Anne Tedesco did not see Gretchen leave. She had gone directly from Gretchen’s table to the employees’ lavatory and was still there when Gretchen departed. Even so, she barely reached the little room in time. Perspiration gushed from her skin. It seemed as though every pore she owned had opened to its fullest diameter. She was nauseous and almost too dizzy to stay upright. She leaned over the toilet bowl, retching uncontrollably. Nothing came up, nothing would come up, but the nausea took forever to abate.
When she was finally able to leave the lavatory, Danny caught her on her way back through the kitchen. He said, “What the hell took you so long? I thought you … hey, Annie, you all right?”
“No.”
“You look like hell. You want to lie down upstairs?”
“I can’t,” she said. She took off her apron, mopped her face with it, set it on the counter. “I can’t hack it today,” she said. “I’ll be in tomorrow.”
“You go straight home and get in bed. Listen, maybe you better see a doctor.”
“No.”
“Straight home. And don’t worry about tomorrow, you understand?”
But she did not walk home. She walked to the corner and stood there, trying to focus her thoughts. Another wave of nausea struck her as she reviewed what Gretchen had said. It was not just the words. It was the way they combined with that beaming face, that charming voice.
She crossed the street and walked to the theater.
TWENTY-FIVE
When the evening performance ended Peter stayed at the board and looked at his watch. Two minutes, he thought.
But it was less than a minute and a half before Tony Bartholomew burst in on him. Peter focused his gaze on the producer’s white linen ascot and let the words go past him. He caught disjointed phrases: “Worst fucking display … absolute incompetence … abysmal . . throwing actors off-stride … ruin every fucking effect… .”
When Tony stopped for breath, Peter said, “I know just how bad it was, Tony. I know better than you do, and you don’t have to tell me about it.”
“I want an explanation, you insolent son of a bitch?!”
“Well, we all have our hangups, Tony.”
“Who do you think you’re talking to, you little cock-sucker?”
“I gave that up a long time ago.” He almost grinned at the man’s blank stare, but he could no more manage a grin than he could change the flat level deadness of his voice. “It’s a waste of breath giving me hell, Tony. I got enough of it already.”
“Personal problems are one thing—”
“They certainly are. Look, punch me out if you want, I can’t stop you, but don’t yell at me. You can’t fire me.”
“Who said anything about firing you?”
“Because I quit.”
“The hell you quit. The fucking hell you quit. Did you ever hear an expression called ‘The show must go on’? I don’t suppose you did. I don’t suppose—”
“Yeah, I heard it. That’s why I didn’t cut out this afternoon when I wanted to. That expression never made any sense in the first place but I didn’t want to fuck everybody up. Well, a blind chimpanzee would have done the show more good than I did. Good-bye, Tony.”
“Wait a minute!”
“Fuck you.”
“What?”
“I said go fuck yourself. You’re a fatass cocksucker and your mother eats pig prick. You’re a thief and a liar and a disgrace to the theater, Tony. Fuck you. Drop dead.” The words were without meaning to him and he spoke them without venom. They achieved their purpose. Tony Bartholomew fell back as if kicked, and Peter wasted no time in getting past him and out the door. On his way through the parking lot he heard people calling his name but didn’t stop to see who they were. He walked on as if he heard nothing, nothing at all. He just kept walking without paying any attention to where he was going. At one point, as he crossed a street in mid-block, a driver hit his brakes hard and swerved to miss him. He kept walking, heading away from the driver’s curses, walking as if nothing had happened.
It didn’t matter where he went because there was no place to go. There was never any place to go, so it didn’t matter where you went. It hardly mattered whether or not you kept moving, but it was easier than standing still.
When Warren finally found him he was leaning against the cannon with his hands in his pockets and his head tilted up toward the stars.
“How did you happen to know that Tony Bart’s mother eats pig prick? It’s supposed to be a closely guarded secret, and now absolutely everybody knows.”
“Is that what I said?”
“Among other bon mots.”
“I don’t even remember.”
“What really struck home was when you called him a thief and a liar and a disgrace to the performing arts. He’s all those things and knows it, but it still troubles him to have it brought to his attention. I’ve been looking all over hell and gone for you, you know.”
“I guess I’ve been waiting for you to find me.”
“We ought to establish a secret rendezvous spot for just such contingencies. And a less public one than that which you’ve chosen this time. My car’s across the street. We can go to my house or drive around. I’d vote for driving around.”
“Sure.”
“And you can tell Aunt Warren all about it.”
“What good will it do?”
“Bloody little, probably. But you’ve nothing better to do than talk, and I’ve nothing better to do than listen.”
But he didn’t start talking until Warren had driven for half a dozen blocks. He put his head back on the seat and closed his eyes and reeled off everything that Anne had told him.
“You haven’t seen Gretchen since then?”
“No.”
“You’ve just had Anne Tedesco’s word, and she was in a state at the time.”
“She was hysterical, Warren, and I don’t blame her. But she wasn’t crazy.”
“But you didn’t go back to see Gretchen.”
“I couldn’t.”
“I see. And until Anne reported to you, you had no reason to doubt that Gretchen was completely recovered?”
“You sound like a lawyer, Warren.”
“I am trying to sound like a lawyer, Peter, for precisely the reason that lawyers try to sound like lawyers. Answer the question.”
“Now you sound like the judge. When does my lawyer get a chance to object?”
“Please don’t stall.”
“I don’t know if I had reason to doubt or not. But I doubted. From about the third or fourth day on.”
“I never heard you say a thing to that effect.”
“I didn’t dare.” He explained the hints he had put together, the clues that had been enough to convince him, explained too his fear that his suspicions were a form of wish fulfillment. “And what Anne said fit in perfectly. It was just what I would figure her to do, just what she would come up with if the whole thing’s an act.”
“Oh, hell,” Warren said.
“Yeah, that’s what it is, and I got the warmest chair.”
“You know that she has to be committed.”
“How could I commit her when she’s acting sane for the first time in her life?”
“Do you think she could fool a trained psychiatrist?”
“I think she could fool God and Perry Mason.” r />
“That does complicate things. And neither of us are relative, and we can’t produce a psychiatrist who’s familiar with her case. Peter, I’m very concerned.”
“So am I.”
“Let me think for a minute. Christ, I wish she’d hanged herself so I’d be obliged merely to comfort you and disperse a crowd or two. I’m better equipped that sort of thing. No, there’s no question about it. The woman has to be committed. I’m not a psychiatrist, but sometimes I think I ought to have been one. So many lives I could have led. It’s hell being limited to just one of them. Of course you know what’s wrong with her.”
“Yeah, she’s out of her fucking tree.”
“That’s probably as valid as the clinical terminology. She’s a paranoiac schizophrenic with delusions of grandeur, Peterkin, which is idiot talk for a combination of split personality, persecution complex and a tendency to confuse oneself with God.” He inhaled through clenched teeth. “This is not a thumbnail diagnosis. She showed symptoms of all of that months ago, and her little Main Street performance would have drawn that diagnosis from any halfway-bright premed major at Whitewater State.”
“So why is it so much more serious now?”
“Because before she was weak and now she’s strong. She was passive before, and dangerous only to herself. And now she’s active.”
“And dangerous to others?”
“She could be. Sooner or later she’ll almost have to be. Right now she’s busy playing a role and fooling the world. She can’t play it forever. Sooner or later she has to break. In fact she’s broken already. Not in front of you; that was just the mask glimpsed from an angle, that combined with your own sensitivity to the woman. But she certainly broke in front of Anne. Anne hardly knows her at all but knew she was face to face with a maniac.”
“She couldn’t help knowing.”
“Obviously. The point is that Gretchen doesn’t know she took her mask off. She thought she was still in her role and never realized the script didn’t make any sense. The danger is that she’ll slip and know it. Oh, I don’t have the clinical background for this, and anyway not even the best shrinks can agree on anything, let alone just what a person in her condition might do. Or when she might decide to do it.”