“Why, Ronald isn’t home now—”
“I know. It’s you I want to see.”
“Why?”
“I think you know why, don’t you?”
She didn’t answer. She felt herself going all weak inside and the right words wouldn’t come to her.
“Why don’t you come up to my place, Carla? I’d like to see you this afternoon.”
“I... I couldn’t,” she stammered.
“Of course you could. I’m in Room 715 at the Tiffany, and I’ll be waiting for you. I’d really like very much to see you, dear.”
The last word sounded like a caress. She tried desperately to think of a reply, realizing seconds later that he had hung up and she would be talking to an empty phone. Dimly, she replaced the receiver on the hook and tried to concentrate.
Room 715, Hotel Tiffany. The number stayed with her, something numbers rarely did. She was the type of woman who had to look up phone numbers and addresses again and again. But she knew at once that she wouldn’t forget Charles’ address.
Oh, what was wrong with her? She stormed into the bathroom and stared at herself in the mirror, trying to find some hint of her inner turmoil by staring at the mirror image. She simply couldn’t go to Charles, not today.
Suppose Ronald found out? And he would find out, in fact he couldn’t help it if she played around so close to home. She remembered the time when she was a little girl and a man across the street came home early and surprised his wife in bed with a delivery boy. He almost murdered them both, she recalled, beating the boy with his fists hard enough to send him to the hospital and striking his wife all over her face and body.
Ronald wouldn’t do anything like that. Ronald would never be violent with her, but she could imagine the look of sadness and anger that would come over his face, the tone of his voice when he spoke to her. He would divorce her, of course, and she would be right back where she started from, a little Polish blonde from the East Side with nothing to show for her life but a body for men to amuse themselves with.
All the arguments told her to stay home, to let Charles wait in his room forever. But the arguments weren’t enough. Even as she told herself how wrong the course of action would be, she felt her will power weakening rapidly. She returned to her bedroom and changed her clothes again, dressing in a skirt-and-sweater combination that showed off her figure and made her look girlish and desirable, the skirt clinging to her long legs and the sweater showing off her breasts perfectly.
It was good to feel that there was a purpose in dressing. She liked to put on clothes with the knowledge that a man would appreciate them. Oh, why couldn’t she be a stronger person! She needed somebody to make the decisions for her, somebody who could tell her what to do and keep her from situations like this one. Maybe Charles would be strong. Maybe he would tell her to divorce Ronald and marry him, and after they were married she wouldn’t have to go through hell like this again.
The guidance of a genuinely strong man would make a tremendous amount of difference to her. Even talking with Lizzie was a help to her, but someone who could come right out and say: “This is right” and “This is wrong,” that was the real thing she needed.
Maybe she could find it in Charles.
She told Lizzie she would be back for dinner, noting the expression in the girl’s eyes. Did she know? At least Lizzie would never tell Ronald. Of that she was quite certain. Still, it would be much better if no one knew, if she could keep everything to herself. She climbed behind the wheel of the MG and turned the key in the ignition, racing the little car down Delaware Avenue toward the Tiffany.
“Ah!” Charles said. “I hoped you would come see me. Come right in.”
She followed him into the room, impressed by the furnishing of his apartment. The furniture was all quite modernistic without being too extreme, a blend which seemed to indicate a combination of daring and taste. A pair of Modigliani prints “were hung on the far wall in simple black frames. Charles fit the room perfectly, wearing a pair of gray flannel trousers and an elegant plaid smoking jacket. He led her easily to the couch and sat down next to her.
“May I offer you a drink?”
“No,” she began, then changed her mind. “On second thought, that might be a good idea.”
“Martini all right? I have a shaker mixed.”
“That’ll be fine.”
He rose and disappeared from the room, and she waited nervously on the couch. When he returned with the drinks she sipped hers quickly, hardly listening to what he was saying. On the way down she had toyed with the idea of seeing him without letting him make love to her, but now she knew how impossible that would be. She felt too weak to make even token resistance.
She finished her drink and he set the glasses on the coffee-table. “Carla,” he said, turning to her, “I don’t want to waste either time or words. I think you know why I asked you here, and I think I know why you came. I could proceed more slowly, but that would only be a sham.
“You’re a beautiful woman and one of the most thoroughly attractive ones I’ve ever met. I would like to make love to you.”
She began to breath heavily.
“Carla?”
She looked into his eyes, her own eyes going soft and her lips parting automatically. Her breasts rose and fell with her uneven breathing. For a long moment neither of them moved.
Then he took her in his arms.
His lips on hers were a new experience, half full of fire and half full of ice. There was a passion to his kiss that she had never experienced before, a passion blended with the skill and artistry of the lover to whom love was a true art. Every movement of his mouth on hers and his hands on her back sent little fires coursing through her whole being, burning her up with their feverish intensity. She could think of nothing but the overwhelming desire to merge herself with him, to immerse her whole being in the intensity of his love.
“Come this way,” he said. He took her hand and led her from the living-room through a hallway to the bedroom. The covers were drawn back, waiting for her. She stood like a person in a trance while his deft fingers lifted her sweater over her head and dropped her skirt to the floor. Then, almost without touching her, his hands removed the flimsy bra and slipped the panties over her thighs. His hands brushed her body so gently in the act that she barely felt them. Finally, she stood before him naked.
“You’re incredibly beautiful,” he said in a whisper. “I didn’t realize you were this beautiful.”
He kissed her then, running his tongue tenderly over her lower lip. She responded eagerly to his kiss and pressed her body against his. Then he stepped back once again, taking her arm and leading her to the bed.
“Lie down,” he said. “Lie down and don’t move.”
She obeyed his command.
“Now close your eyes.”
The next thing she knew, his lips were travelling all over her, planting little kisses of fire wherever they stopped.
She moaned his name. His mouth found hers and her arms tightened around him, pressing him to her.
Then there was nothing but her body and his and the clean fresh beauty of the world.
Chapter Five
Carla’s hands were shaking slightly as she alighted from the MG and walked to her door. The whole world seemed imperceptibly different. Charles was so skillful, so perfect and sure of every gesture. She felt whole and complete, and at the same time she couldn’t shake of an irrational feeling of guilt over the whole affair. She had made a cuckold of Ronald with a friend of his, and this fact disturbed her so deeply that the fulfillment of the afternoon could not totally counteract the sense of guilt and betrayal.