“Yes,” Dragnie replied with icy veracity.
“Sorry. Continue, Nathan.”
The boy peered deeply into the gloom of the unlit seats. He seemed then to catch Dragnie’s eye and, with a small mocking smile of amusement and contempt, returned to his text. “It is I, then, who will now ask you, Principal Sloughninny, and you, Vice-Principal Flabb, the question which all seniors now ask—or should be asking, if their faculties of reason have not been so damaged by the nowhere nature of this institution and their self-respect not sundered by what’s going down in this school’s freaked-out scene. The question is this: Why must the Senior Prom, the theme for which this year is ‘Some Enchanted Evening,’ be held in the gymnasium of this school, and why can it not be held, as everyone wants it to be, in the La Superba Room of Chez Elegance Caterers? The cost of renting the facility can be recouped by the sale of tickets, at a suggested rate of five dollars stag, eight dollars drag. True, admission to the Prom in the gym is free. But no student utilizing his mind, no student exercising his reason, will balk at the patent justness of this nominal fee in exchange for a much cooler set-up.
“Furthermore, regarding the matter of chaperones, we who tremble on the brink of adulthood, we who’ll by term’s end be eligible to serve in the nation’s armed forces, we who for two years now have possessed the legal right to drive a motorized vehicle and have had experience doing so—we insist: we will have no chaperones. We reject their authority. We ask: By what right do they presume to monitor and inhibit our celebration of existence, our rejoicing in the impending milestone of graduation, our frankly erotic fooling around?”
The speech lasted an hour and twenty minutes, during which the young man, calmly and with exquisitely controlled passion, announced his defiance of hall monitors, presented unanswerably his critique of “the legislative sham that is our so-called ‘Student Council,’” and delivered a ringing challenge to the policy of requiring cheerleaders to wear tights both at practices and at interscholastic athletic competitions. By the time he ended with the traditional tracing, toward the audience, of the dollar sign and the exclamation mark, Dragnie had slowly risen to her feet and, her chin held high in open admiration, begun a quiet but pointed round of applause.
The young man descended the three steps from the stage to the auditorium floor and joined her in the aisle. He was taller than she, gaunt and lean and erect in a body that hinted at hidden reserves of productive energy and rationally-managed ardor. His face belied his youth, and seemed to harbor a wisdom and experience beyond his years. His gaze at her was direct and uncowed. “I’m glad you approve, Miss Tagbord.”
They were interrupted by the appearance of another young man. He was dressed in an identical manner to that of the young man who had given the speech, as if the two of them, though distinct individuals, attended the same school—which, as a matter of objective fact, was in fact the fact. “Nice speech, Nathan,” said the other young man.
“Thank you, Eddie,” said the speech maker. “Oh, Miss Tagbord? Allow me to introduce Eddie G. Willikers. He’s on the stage crew here.”
“Gosh,” Eddie Willikers said. “Are you Dragnie Tagbord?”
“I am,” Dragnie replied.
“Not so fast, Eddie!” Nathan said with a hint of mockery. “I saw her first!”
“Yes, you did,” Eddie replied. “Well, nice to have met you, Miss Tagbord. See you later around the school, Nathan.” He walked away in a manner consistent with his own personal choice.
“Your name is Nathan, young man?” she asked.
“Yes, it is,” he replied. “Nathan A. Banden. Will you be attending the commemoration tonight, Miss Tagbord?”
“No,” Dragnie said, electing not to insult his intelligence with an apology, a condescending smile, or any other expression of regret. “I have other plans.”
“That is regrettable.”
“To you, perhaps.”
“Yes… to me. Isn’t that the only one who matters?”
“To you, perhaps.”
“Yes, to me. But don’t I matter to you, too, Miss Tagbord? If only a little?”
“No.”
“Quite right. And yet…”
“Good-bye, Nathan. My compliments on an excellent speech.”
The boy hesitated. Then he said, “Thank you, Miss Tagbord.”
Almost against her will, Dragnie found herself saying, “You’re welcome.”
Looking at each other, they exchanged glances on an equal, voluntary basis. “Am I?” he asked.
“Yes, you’re,” she said. “You’re welcome.” And as she made her way up the slanted floor toward the lobby, she knew, as deeply and as confidently as she had known anything in her life, that it was true.
Chapter 2
Be a Do-er, Not a Viewer
The apartment occupied the penthouse of the Johnsonwood Building, the most indomitably proud and heroic skyscraper in New York, considered in the consensus of top experts to be the greatest building in the world and, therefore, in the universe. From its four immense windows Dragnie and her husband could, and with unfailing regularity, did, look out in all directions at once, in steely indifference and unchallengeable certainty.
Her husband was John Glatt.
That they were not legally married, had never been engaged, had never formally been lavoliered, or ever gone steady, was of no importance. He was her husband because no one else was or possibly could be. And Glatt’s understanding was identical to hers. Openly he professed in the privacy of his mind that she, to him, was his wife no less than he, to her, was her husband, and equally so was he her husband to him, just as she was wife to him to him no less than to her. Consumed with hatred for her by his love for her, he never spoke of it, nor of anything else.
Yet Glatt demonstrated every day his approval of Dragnie: with every cold glance with which he acknowledged her existence each morning, every slit-eyed smirk with which disdained her over cocktails in the evening, every hand-written card he proffered on the anniversary of their first meeting (“I despise you more than ever, dearest.”), and even that one time, when they had engaged in sexual intercourse, when he demonstrated his admiration and respect by brutally degrading her into a humiliated submission as he sneered his contempt and she laughed out loud in silent mockery.
They were husband and wife because they considered themselves to be so in their minds.
They now sat across from one another at the beautiful mahogany table in their elegantly-appointed dining room as the sun slowly set, as it had done for billions of years all over the universe. Pierre, their footman, had just served the night’s meal, a repast of gourmet food possessing the highest deliciousness, impeccably complimented by an excellent wine that John Glatt had decanted, opened, chosen, unpacked, shipped, aged, bottled, fermented, stomped, picked, and planted himself with cool, swift precision.
Glatt’s eyes skimmed the evening newspaper, affording him the opportunity to see the words printed on it and transferring the information they conveyed to his mind. Then his lean, sardonic face lifted from the page. He surveyed the platters of steaming, perfectly-prepared meat, healthful garden vegetables, and taste-tempting side dishes arrayed before him. In a single silent act he shifted his gaze from them to Dragnie until their eyeballs silently beheld one another’s. “You who claim to serve no one,” he said. “You for whom the very idea of granting a favor is a metaphysical chimera, an imaginary creature possessing no reality; you whose sole allegiance is, not to some comforting but fictional construct called ‘society’ but, simply and utterly, to existence; you for whom life itself is rational and self-interested or it is nothing; you who, without shame or boasting, call ‘self-reliance’ what the mass of men call ‘selfishness;’ you who ask nothing of any man for which you will not, at once and without cavil, give some other thing of equal value; you, who know in the deepest recesses of your consciousness that to perform the slightest kindness to others, without the promise of reciprocity in a manner that is meaningful to you on your own terms, is to collude in the enslavement of both them and yourself; you, who ask nothing of the world apart from its consent to leave you to freely pursue your desires in a manner consistent with your own values and morality—will you, not so much in violation of these principles as from an unthreatened position of strength afforded by them, pass the brisket?”