“How are you feeling?” I asked, when we had reached the Manhattan Grill.
“All right.” She slid out of the car. “Why?”
“I just like to keep in touch with you,” I returned, following her into the grill room.
There was a big crowd in the cocktail bar and Eve hung back. Her eyes scanned faces and the two lines above the bridge of her nose were now deep furrows.
I took her elbow in my hand and pushed her gently through the crowd. “It’s all right,” I said. “Don’t get jumpy.”
“I don’t know if it is,” she returned under her breath. “This is too crowded for me.”
We worked our way into the restaurant and when she had settled down on the sofa seat against the wall, she looked happier.
“I’m always like this,” she said, her eyes moving continuously round the room. “I’m sorry, but I do have to be careful.”
“Not always,” I reminded her. “You only go out with me. Your other clients don’t take you out.”
“Sometimes they do,” she said without thinking. “You don’t expect me to stay home every night, do you?”
That was lie number two. First she said three whiskies laid her out when eight whiskies left her cold. Then she had said she never went out with clients and now she said she did. I was beginning to wonder just how much was truth that she told me.
We ordered dinner.
As she was eight drinks ahead of me, I thought I might as well begin to catch up. After a couple of stiff shots, I suddenly decided to tell her who I was. She would have to know sooner or later and there seemed no sense in delaying any longer.
“Let’s get introduced,” I said. “You know my name well.”
There was immediate interest in her eyes. “Do I? Don’t tell me you’re famous.”„
“Do I look famous?”
“Tell me who you are.” She wasn’t the Eve I knew any more. She was human, very curious and a little excited.
“The name,” I said watching her closely, “is Clive Thurston.”
She wasn’t like Harvey Barrow. I could see it meant something to her at once. For a second, a look of disbelief was in her eyes, then she turned to face me. “So that’s why you wanted to know what I thought of “Angels in Stables”,” she exclaimed. “Of course. And I said I didn’t like it.”
“That’s all right,” I said. “I wanted the truth and I got it.”
“I saw your play “Rain Check”. . . Jack took me. I was sitting behind a pillar and only saw half of it.”
“Jack?” I was on to that quickly.
“My husband.”
“Did he like it?”
“Yes . . .” she looked at me half hesitating. “I’d better introduce myself . . . I am Mrs. Pauline Hurst’
“Not Eve?”
“Eve to you please.”
“Yes although I like Pauline. It suits you, but so does Eve.”
After dinner, we drove over to the theatre. The play amused her as I hoped it would. We had several quick drinks during the intermissions. As we were returning from the bar during the last intermission, I felt someone touch my arm. I looked round and found Frank Imgram behind me.
“Do you like it?” he asked, smiling.
I could have strangled him. He was certain to tell Carol that he had seen me.
“It’s good,” I said, nodding at him, “and beautifully acted.”
His eyes were on Eve. “Yes — isn’t it?”
Then the crowd separated us and I struggled back into my seat-
Eve looked at me inquiringly. “Someone you know?”
“Imgram who wrote “The Land is Barren”.”
“Does it matter that he saw me?”
I shook my head. “Why should it?”
She shot me another look and did not say anything. The rest of the act was spoiled for me. I kept thinking of what Carol would say.
We were lucky to be among the first out. I did not see Imgram again. We got into the car and drove down Vine Street
“Want a drink before we go home?” I asked.
“I think so.”
We went into the same little bar and we stayed there for some time. We drank a lot, but Eve did not show it. I was feeling a little drunk and I thought it was time to stop. After all, I was driving.
“One more and then we’ll go. Have a brandy?”
“Why?”
“Just to see if you can take it.”
Her eyes were bright, otherwise she seemed all right. “I can take it,” she said.
I ordered a double brandy.
She looked at me. “Not for you?”
“I’m driving.”
She drank the brandy neat.
We got into the car and I drove slowly to Laurel Canyon Drive.
“You can put the car in the garage,” she said. “There’s room for it.”
She had opened the front door and was waiting for me in the hall. I took my small grip from the Chrysler’s trunk and followed her upstairs.
We entered the bedroom and she clicked on the lights.
“Well, here we are,” she said and I could see she was a little embarrassed. She stood with her chin almost on her shoulder, her eyes looking away from me, her right arm making a protective V over her chest, her left hand cupped tight under her right elbow.
I dropped my grip on the bed and put my hands on her biceps and pressed a little. Her arms were nice, but small. My fingers almost met round them.
We stood like that for a few seconds, then I drew her to me.
For a moment she tried to pull away, then she slowly lowered her arms from in front of her and put them round my shoulders.
CHAPTER TEN
I WOKE feeling hot and stifled. The grey light of the dawn came through the two windows facing me and shrouded the little room with a soft, mysterious light. For a moment, I could not remember where I was, then I saw the glass animals on the chest of drawers and I looked immediately at Eve who was sleeping at my side.
She slept curled up, one arm above her head. Her eyes being closed, youth had descended on her face. I propped myself up on my elbow and watched her, marvelling that she could look so young and child-like. Sleep had smoothed the lines in her face and softened the hard, defiant chin. She looked, in sleep, more elfish than ever, but I knew when her eyes opened this would all go. It was her eyes that gave the clue to her character. They were the windows through which you could see her rebellious spirit and the secret shadows of her life. Even in sleep, she did not rest. Her body jerked and twitched and her mouth moved as if she were talking to herself. She moaned softly and her fingers clenched and unclenched. She slept like a woman who lived entirely on tortured, tightly strung nerves.
I lowered her arms from above her head. She sighed heavily and reaching out, she put her arms round me and gripped me tightly.
“Darling,” she murmured, “don’t leave mc.”
Of course, she was asleep. Of course, she was not speaking to me. Perhaps she was dreaming of her husband or a lover; but I wanted it to be me she was speaking to and I held her close, her head on my shoulder.
Her body suddenly gave a great bound as if her nerves had bunched themselves together like a coiled spring and snapped apart. Then she woke and pushed away from me.
She blinked at me, yawned and flopped back on her pillow. “Hello,” she said. “What time is it?”
I looked at my wrist watch. It was five thirty-five.
“Oh God!” she exclaimed. “Can’t you sleep?”
I again realized how hot and stifling it was in bed. “How many blankets have we got on?” I asked, counting them. There were five and a quilt. I must have been pretty drunk not to have noticed that last night.
“Do you want all these?” I asked her.
She yawned again. “Of course I do. I feel cold in bed.”
“I’ll say you do.” I slid out and began to strip the blankets back.