Doris leaned over to tuck a piece of yellow something into a handbag that had been opened.
“Here’s Mr. Anderson, Doris,” said Mrs. Humphries.
Doris turned with a jump and ran up to him and threw her arms round his neck and kissed him on the cheek. “You darling to come down.” Then she introduced him to a redfaced young Englishman in an English plaid overcoat who was carrying a big bag of golfclubs. “I know you’ll like each other.”
“Is this your first visit to this country?” asked Charley.
“Quite the contrary,” said the Englishman, showing his yellow teeth in a smile. “I was born in Wyoming.”
It was chilly on the wharf. Mrs. Humphries went to sit in the heated waitingroom. When the young man with the golfsticks went off to attend to his own bags, Doris said, “How do you like George Duquesne? He was born here and brought up in England. His mother comes from people in the Doomsday Book. I went to stay with them at the most beautiful old abbey… I had the time of my life in England. I think George is a duck. The Duquesnes have copper interests. They are almost like the Guggenheims except of course they are not Jewish… Why, Charley, I believe you’re jealous… Silly… George and I are just like brother and sister, really… It’s not like you and me at all, but he’s such fun.”
It took the Humphries family a couple of hours to get through the customs. They had a great many bags and Doris had to pay duty on some dresses. When Mrs. Humphries found she was to drive uptown in an open car with the top down she looked black indeed, the fact that it was a snakylooking Packard didn’t seem to help. “Why, it’s a regular rubberneck wagon,” said Doris. “Mother, this is fun… Charley’ll point out all the tall buildings.” Mrs. Humphries was grumbling as, surrounded by handbaggage, she settled into the back seat, “Your dear father, Doris, never liked to see a lady riding in an open cab, much less in an open machine.”
When he’d taken them uptown Charley didn’t go back to the plant. He spent the rest of the day till closing at the Askews’ apartment on the telephone talking to Benton’s office. Since the listing of Standard Airparts there’d been a big drop in Askew-Merritt. He was hocking everything and waiting for it to hit bottom before buying. Every now and then he’d call up Benton and say, “What do you think, Nat?”
Nat still had no tips late that afternoon, so Charley spun a coin to decide; it came heads. He called up the office and told them to start buying at the opening figure next day. Then he changed his clothes and cleared out before Grace brought the little girls home from school; he hardly spoke to the Askews these days. He was fed up out at the plant and he knew Joe thought he was a slacker.
When he changed his wallet from one jacket to the other he opened it and counted his cash. He had four centuries and some chickenfeed. The bills were crisp and new, straight from the bank. He brought them up to his nose to sniff the new sweet sharp smell of the ink. Before he knew what he’d done he’d kissed them. He laughed out loud and put the bills back in his wallet. Jesus, he was feeling good. His new blue suit fitted nicely. His shoes were shined. He had clean socks on. His belly felt hard under his belt. He was whistling as he waited for the elevator.
Over at Doris’s there was George Duquesne saying how ripping the new buildings looked on Fifth Avenue. “Oh, Charley, wait till you taste one of George’s alexanders, they’re ripping,” said Doris. “He learned to make them out in Constant after the war… You see he was in the British army… Charley was one of our star aces, George.”
Charley took George and Doris to dinner at the Plaza and to a show and to a nightclub. All the time he was feeding highpower liquor into George in the hope he’d pass out, but all George did was get redder and redder in the face and quieter and quieter, and he hadn’t had much to say right at the beginning. It was three o’clock and Charley was sleepy and pretty tight himself before he could deliver George at the St. Regis where he was staying. “Now what shall we do?” “But, darling, I’ve got to go home.” “I haven’t had a chance to talk to you… Jeez, I haven’t even had a chance to give you a proper hug since you landed.” They ended up going to the Columbus Circle Childs and eating scrambled eggs and bacon.
Doris was saying there ought to be beautiful places where people in love could go where they could find privacy and bed in beautiful surroundings. Charley said he knew plenty of places but they weren’t so beautiful. “I’d go, Charley, honestly, if I wasn’t afraid it would be sordid and spoil everything.” Charley squeezed her hand hard. “I wouldn’t have the right to ask you, kid, not till we was married.” As they walked up the street to where he’d parked his car she let her head drop on his shoulder. “Do you want me, Charley?” she said in a little tiny voice. “I want you too… but I’ve got to go home or Mother’ll be making a scene in the morning.”
Next Saturday afternoon Charley spent looking for a walkup furnished apartment. He rented a livingroom kitchenette and bath all done in grey from a hennahaired artist lady in flowing batiks who said she was going to Capri for six months of sheer beauty, and called up an agency for a Japanese houseboy to take care of it. Next day at breakfast he told the Askews he was moving.
Joe didn’t say anything at first, but after he’d drunk the last of his cup of coffee he got up frowning and walked a couple of times across the livingroom. Then he went to the window saying quietly, “Come here, Charley, I’ve got something to show you.” He put a hand on Charley’s arm… “Look here, kid, it isn’t on account of me being so sour all the time, is it? You know I’m worried about the damn business… seems to me we’re getting in over our heads… but you know Grace and I both think the world of you… I’ve just felt that you were putting in too much time on the stockmarket… I don’t suppose it’s any of my damn business… Anyway us fellows from the old outfit, we’ve got to stick together.”
“Sure, Joe, sure… Honestly, the reason I want this damn apartment has nothin’ to do with that… You’re a married man with kids and don’t need to worry about that sort of thing… but me, I got woman trouble.”
Joe burst out laughing. “The old continental sonofagun, but for crying out loud, why don’t you get married?”
“God damn it, that’s what I want to do,” said Charley. He laughed and so did Joe.
“Well, what’s the big joke?” said Grace from behind the coffeeurn. Charley nodded his head towards the little girls. “Smokin’room stories,” he said. “Oh, I think you’re mean,” said Grace.
One snowy afternoon before Christmas, a couple of weeks after Charley had moved into his apartment, he got back to town early and met Doris at the Biltmore. She said, “Let’s go somewhere for a drink,” and he said he had drinks all laid out and she ought to come up to see the funny little sandwiches Taki made all in different colors. She asked if the Jap was there now. He grinned and shook his head. It only took the taxi a couple of minutes to get them around to the con verted brownstone house. “Why, isn’t this cozy?” Doris panted a little breathless from the stairs as she threw open her furcoat. “Now I feel really wicked.” “But it’s not like it was some guy you didn’t know,” said Charley, “or weren’t fond of.” She let him kiss her. Then she took off her coat and hat and dropped down beside him on the windowseat warm from the steamheat.
“Nobody knows the address, nobody knows the phonenumber,” said Charley. When he put his arm around her thin shoulders and pulled her to him she gave in to him with a little funny shudder and let him pull her on his knee. They kissed for a long time and then she wriggled loose and said, “Charley darling, you invited me here for a drink.”