“You gotta stop bothering the women. You bother anyone again, you’re back inside — and you’re in for the whole afternoon.”
That would be fatal, unthinkable, so I turn on the charm. Take out my wallet, ask him to get Carlos, the beach chair fellow, to take over a lounge for the woman who wasn’t Shelley. I can see that now. She wasn’t Shelley at all. “Something for yourself, too,” I say.
“You want to get me fired?” he asks and turns on his heel.
I put away my wallet. I could have about bought this damn beach before Shelley. I still have a very nice waterfront house. I believe I do. Well, I know I do, because thanks to the Florida homestead law, the Phillipses can’t touch the real estate. Nope. And I was smart enough to keep the Sunshine State property out of Linda’s hands, though she went through my northern holdings like a dose of salts. Sure did.
I go back to my place, the chair and umbrella which I rent every day from Carlos, who saves one for me even when he’s busy. Loyalty, right? I switch on my transistor radio — on the earphone in case it “bothers” someone. Two years ago that woman would have been thrilled to meet the Troyman. Troy! I hear you every afternoon! Driving to Jersey! Or Greenwich or Darien, points north and south. Who said women didn’t like me? Maybe the show was a little rough — maybe. I hit the screaming sisterhood pretty hard; no friend of feminism, me. But charm. Everyone said I was charming off-mike.
A bit of static requiring delicate adjustments... There — drive time with my replacement. Why do I listen? Why, why? It’s like a musician hearing someone else on his Strad. Pain, I can tell you. Flat, flat, he’s very flat. Hits even the hot points without flare, without humor. Just another bloviator. I can’t believe they pay him for this rubbish. Me, I could entertain and influence. Could yet. Could.
Can’t. That’s what they said to me. The media honchos in their fine suits, soft earth tones like a lot of Al Gore clones. What the hell were they thinking sartorially? Wish we could, you’re the greatest, a genius of the airwaves. One of them actually called me a genius of the airwaves, like this was going to be news to me, when what was needed was a genius in the boardroom and another helping of guts all around. They lacked intestinal fortitude, friends, unlike my nearest and dearest who possessed a super-abundance of that commodity.
Failure of information. So ironic. But not forever. I’ve about got it worked out and when I find Shelley, which is only a matter of time, I’ll be back. Back on top, three to six drive time, master of the airwaves with the verbal equivalent of carpet bombing, me, Troyman.
The guards are talking to each other behind the glass. No old-fashioned open chairs for these boys and girls. Lazy bastards. I don’t know what they pay them for except to annoy law-abiding citizens. Forget them. Shelley didn’t swim, so I can cross off the girl guards. No Shelley there.
They’re looking down at me, comparing notes. All right, so I’ve talked to a few people. No harm in that. You come to the beach to catch the rays, relax, talk to your fellow men without the mediation of the mike — important, no? I think so, although maybe I need the mike, need mediation, need to be Troyman. A dangerous line of thought to pursue. Get back in the hunt!
And I will. It’s just the little matter of finding Shelley, who was a bad idea from the start; I see that now. Didn’t then, when I was operating on a high of adrenaline and testosterone, all natural, I might add, derived one hundred percent from success, of which I’ve had a lot: careers made and ruined, legislation pushed or derailed, elections won or lost. Thanks to me.
Shelley didn’t seem such a big indulgence in those terms. What was she like? An able researcher, certainly; everyone I hired was. You don’t screw around with your research if you’re in pontification for the long haul. So smart, sure; a lively, pretty girl with long brown hair. First caution ignored. I should have taken warning from Clinton and Condit and gone for a blonde. A curious cultural moment, friends: the taste of powerful men for brunettes.
What else? Knockout figure, long legs, blue eyes with thick dark lashes. I think it was the eyes that got me, those round, innocent eyes; two little beacons of pleasure on either side of a short, freckled nose. And she was such a nice kid, everybody liked her; Margaret, the crew, even Linda, who met her at the annual office party, thawed out a few degrees. Shelley brought out a maternal side in some surprising ladies.
I should have seen that, but she made me feel young again at the mike, as if I was just starting out with fire in all the right places, instead of in the upper digestive tract, courtesy of too much snack food and soda. Just the same, I didn’t mean for us to be serious; I didn’t intend for Shelley to disrupt my life, no way. Not when I’d figured out how life worked, when I had the knowledge, as London cabbies say. That’s their way of indicating they know the city, the roads and byways, the one-way streets, the cul-de-sacs, the motorways and alleys and traffic regulations: the texture of their world.
I picked up stuff like that when I traveled, how people talked, what their vocabulary was, what the jargon sounded like — because ninety percent of everything today is rhetoric, the promotion of manure as lawn food, and boy, was I good at that. The very best.
So what was my knowledge, you ask? Speaking of the personal realm, of course, because my knowledge in the political and social realms was obvious, encyclopedic, exhaustive. I survived years behind the mike on information and wit. But in the bedroom?
Start with Linda, legitimate wife. Second, to be honest, but the first was so long ago and so obscure, we can forget her; I usually do. Linda Donnelly, a woman of chilly decorum, holder of a royal flush of platinum cards, a silver BMW, a sable coat, a Connecticut farm, a Manhattan apartment — formerly my principal residence — and a condo in Naples, Florida. An acquisitive lady, but, like Caesar’s wife, beyond reproach, patient, dignified, ruthless.
How do I know that? How can I be so sure? Look at this. I’ve got evidence right here in this folder which never leaves my side. Copies of phone records, bills, bank statements. What do I see in this paper trail? I see calls to Margaret, my invaluable producer and mistress.
Of course, they knew each other; that’s not the story. At best, it’s an old story. Margaret’s a wonderful producer, a workhorse, shrewd as they come, and calls were not uncommon, not during working hours, because my Linda always had a sense of entitlement. No time was sacred for her, and calls on any number of trivial subjects could be expected as a way of showing the flag and pulling rank.
But these! Do you see these? Evenings. Evening calls. She was suspicious, you say. She was calling to check up on Margaret, on Margaret’s company. No, no, Linda was not so curious, and, here’s the thing. They were calls made when I was home! On her cell phone.
I think I saw her at it once. I was at the farm for the weekend, in the study done up with old barn boards, leather chairs, and sporting prints by the decorator of the moment, a swishy thug named Javier. I’m working up one of the little monologues I’m so famous for, when I look out onto the terrace. Linda’s standing with her cell phone in the dappled evening shade, half hidden by lilies in porcelain tubs like the serpent in the garden. I think I was suspicious even then.
“Who were you calling?” I asked. Casually, sure. No heavy, jealous husband. “I thought we were going to leave the phone off the hook this weekend.”
“Just Javier,” she said. “I want some new drapes.”
She lied about that. I’ve consulted the phone records and credit card bills, and I’ve seen no new drapes, and neither has any of the staff. I’ve checked with them, every single one. She wasn’t calling Javier, the gold plated decorator; she was calling Margaret.