Inadvertently, Lionel had blundered into the director’s compound. He began to back away along the path he had followed but, uncannily, one of the men spotted him in the darkness. He heard his name called. He recognized the man as Walter Drogue. The woman was Drogue’s wife, Patty.
“Lionel,” Drogue called to him. “Bienvenidos! Come over and have a drink.”
Lionel trudged self-consciously toward the patio. At his approach, Patty rose from the edge of the Jacuzzi and hastily draped herself in a burgundy-colored beach robe. The second man in the tub got to his feet and climbed for dry land, making no attempt to cover his nakedness. He was an elderly man, grizzly of chest and scrotum, his frame slack and emaciated. He took a chair and observed Lionel’s approach with black gypsy eyes, watchful and expressionless.
The director stayed where he was in the tub, smiling contentedly. He was deeply tanned. His dark hair, moistly pasted to his forehead like Napoleon’s in a cognac ad, was worn short, shaven about his neck and ears in an almost military fashion.
“Lionel,” Drogue declared, “you and Patty know each other.”
“Of course,” Lionel said. “Good evening.”
“Hi,” Patty said, raising her amber eyes to him.
“This is my father, Walter senior,” Drogue told his guest, indicating the naked old man, who had taken a chair beside Patty Drogue. “He’ll be with us for the next ten days. Dad, this is Lionel Morgen, Lee Verger’s husband.”
Walter Drogue senior was a man from the mists of legend, a contemporary of Walsh and Sturges and Hawkes. The introduction of this celebrated figure did not put Lionel any more at ease. He felt offended by old Drogue’s nakedness. Drogue senior did not offer his hand but instead placed it, all venous and liver-spotted, on his daughter-in-law’s caramel shoulder.
“Well,” Lionel declared, with a fatuous enthusiasm that chafed in his own hearing. “I’m certainly privileged to meet you, Mr. Drogue.”
“Yeah?” old Drogue asked.
“I was just spying out the way, you see. We haven’t been up here in the dark.”
“I’m glad you came,” Walter Drogue the younger said. He had descended to chin level in the whirling green water. “Give us a chance to rap informally. Just ourselves. What would you like to drink?”
Desperate as he was for escape, Lionel decided a drink might be welcome. And indeed there were things for him and Drogue to talk about apart from the general company. The presence of Patty and the old man would have to be endured.
“Well, I won’t say no,” declared Lionel affably. “If I could have a whiskey? A scotch?”
He had hardly spoken when Patty Drogue disengaged herself from the old man’s pawings and hurried into the bungalow.
“So,” Drogue junior said from the depths of his whirlpool, “couldn’t take it, huh?”
Lionel looked down at the immersed director and chose to conclude that he was being good-naturedly teased, as an outsider.
“Actually,” he said, “I’ve been enjoying myself enormously.”
When Patty Drogue came out again, she was carrying a tray heaped with bottles and glasses and shakers filled with ice. Lionel, to demonstrate an easy manner, took up a bottle of unblended scotch and poured himself an undiluted measure.
“That’s good,” the younger Drogue said. “It’s a pretty crazy way to pass whole weeks. Especially if you’re not really playing. As a rule, locations and spouses don’t mix.”
“We’ve been all right,” Lionel said. “I don’t think we’ve been in each other’s way, Lu and I.” He glanced across the pool and saw that both Patty and old Drogue had settled into pool chairs. Apparently no conversations went unwitnessed in this family circle. “And I see you bring Mrs. Drogue.” The whiskey was as smooth as good brandy. Lionel drank rarely but this glass warmed his blood.
Patty Drogue laughed. Her laughter had an unsettling edge, as though he had said something ridiculous.
“That’s true,” Walter said. He too seemed to be suppressing a secret hilarity. “I always bring Mrs. Drogue.”
Lionel assumed an expression of self-assured amusement to show that he could join in the fun.
“South Africa,” young Walter Drogue said, “South Africa’s easier to handle?”
Lionel held his smile.
“You have to understand that my parents live there. My mother got there from Europe in the very nick of time.” He was silent for a moment. “And of course they’re quite anxious to see their grandchildren. At their age they can’t count on too many visits.”
“I didn’t mean to put South Africa down, Lionel,” Walter said. “I mean — why should you carry the weight? You left, didn’t you? To practice here.”
Lionel was growing tense. He finished his drink, and before he had a thing to say about it, Patty Drogue brought him another.
“I left,” he said. “I suppose I could have stayed and joined the Resistance. I mean … friends of mine did. But my parents wanted us all to go. Myself and my sisters.”
“Your parents loom large in the picture, huh?”
“You should talk,” Patty Drogue said casually to her husband.
Walter junior shrugged good-naturedly. The older Drogue watched her with his blank cautious eyes.
“Silence, exile, cunning,” old man Drogue said from the shadows. “And you get to hear the bellyaches of rich Americans. Your parents should be proud of you.”
“Wherefore do we lecture Lionel?” Walter Drogue asked charitably. “We’ve been showing our films to segregated houses out there. We used to do it in our own South. We have plenty to answer for.”
“I realize that Mr. Drogue spent time in prison,” Lionel said, belching on his drink. He was afraid he might appear obsequious. “Perhaps I’m not made of the same stuff.”
“Perhaps,” old Drogue said. “I was indicted. I never did time. Life is made of perhaps. Perhapses.”
“Lay off him,” the younger Drogue said. “He’s not getting paid to take this shit from you. Go pick on a qualified professional.” He turned sympathetically toward Lionel. It seemed to Morgen that a pattern was emerging in which each of the Drogues would seize an opportunity to protect him from the others. Perhaps even the old man would rally to his defense at the next attack. He glanced into the dark corner where old Drogue was lurking; it seemed, after all, unlikely.
“Don’t let him demean you, Lionel. He thinks he invented political commitment. He thinks he invented facing the slammer.”
“Well,” Lionel said, “it’s true enough about me. I’ve had friends go to the slammer for fighting apartheid but I’m quite untouched.”
“You know what the cons say?” old Drogue demanded of them. “They say never trust a man who hasn’t done time.”
“You don’t have to place your trust in me, Mr. Drogue,” Lionel said. “I’ll be on my way in the morning.”
“There were bets down on whether you’d finally leave or stay,” young Drogue told him. “Weren’t there, Pat?”
“Do I have to say how I was betting?” Patty Drogue asked plaintively.
“Bets?” Lionel asked. “I don’t see why anyone was betting. We knew from the start how long I’d be here. I mean, your girls bought my tickets.”
“Yeah, sure,” Drogue said. “But we thought under the gun you’d be more flexible about it.”
“My schedule is not flexible in the least, Walter. I’ve taken all the hospital leave I can manage. I was back and forth to New Orleans a dozen times. It’s taken me a year to organize my appointments in time for this trip.”