“Do you plan on seeing him again?” he asks.
“Not if you don’t want me to.”
“Never mind what I want!” he shouts. “What the fuck do you want?”
“I want you.”
“Then why...?”
“I want only you.”
“Then...”
“I want you to love me.”
“Kate, why don’t we just...?”
“Don’t say it!”
“I think we should just...”
“Don’t say it!”
She is staring at him now, looking small and vulnerable and tired and pale in the blue jeans and white cotton shirt and adorable gray fedora, hands folded in her lap, green eyes wide and beseeching. He does not want her to cry again, he does not believe he can bear it if she starts crying again. She sits there on the very edge of dissolution, the tears standing in her eyes but not spilling over, and in a barely audible voice, she says, “Don’t leave me, David.”
He stands watching her.
“Please,” she says. “I beg of you.”
He takes a step toward her.
“Love me,” she says. “Just keep loving me.”
He calls Stanley Beckerman at a little before eleven.
“Boy, thank God,” Stanley says. “I thought you weren’t coming.”
“There was a lot of traffic,” David says. “The rain.”
“The sun was shining in Hatteras,” Stanley says.
“The Vineyard, too.”
“Any trouble getting away?” Stanley asks, lowering his voice though David suspects he is alone in his office. Or perhaps his little nineteen-year-old bimbo has already joined him. Perhaps she is already sitting on his couch like Sharon Stone, legs wide open, no panties.
“No trouble at all,” David says.
Stanley believes that he alone is the one who needs protection and cover in the days ahead, and David doesn’t plan to disabuse him of the notion. Therefore, the responsibility of working out a series of fictitious lectures and whatnot has fallen to Stanley as presumed solitary philanderer and liar in this four-day subterfuge. David has given Helen only the scant information Stanley provided in his one invitational call to Menemsha two weeks ago. Now he listens carefully, eager to protect his own ass, but playing to the hilt the role of Stanley’s beard.
“I’d like to fax this to you, hmm?” Stanley says. “Do you have a fax in your office?”
“No,” David says.
“Well, can I leave it with your doorman then?”
“Where?”
“The office, the apartment, wherever.”
“The office would be better,” David says.
“I’ll drop it off later. Meanwhile, can we go over it on the phone?”
“Yes, let’s.”
“I really don’t want any contradictions here, Dave. This is too important for either of us to be saying something the other one contradicts. What’d you tell Helen?”
“That Syd Markland...”
“With a ‘y,’ right?”
“Yes.”
“Syd with a ‘y.’”
“Yes, had put together the program and invited all the guests.”
“Yes.”
“That’s the name you gave me...”
“Yes, he doesn’t exist.”
“Good.”
“Did you say the APA was sponsoring it?”
“Yes.”
“Good. That’s what I told Gerry. Did she question any of this? Helen?”
“No.”
“Good. What I’ve tried to do, Dave, is set up a practically morning-to-night round of talks, meetings, panel discussions... I’m sorry to do this to you, I know you’ll just be killing time here in the city...”
“I have work to do, don’t worry.”
“I truly appreciate this, Dave.”
“Don’t mention it.”
“I just want to seem busy and involved all day long, hmm?” Stanley says. “That’s why I’d like you to look over the schedule carefully, so in case Helen asks where you’re going to be on such and such a night...”
“She probably will.”
“Why?” Stanley asks at once. “She doesn’t suspect anything, does she?”
“No, no.”
“You didn’t tell her about me and Cindy, did you?”
“Of course not.”
“Then why would she want to know where you’re going to be? Gerry never asks where I’m going to be.”
“It’s the sort of information we normally exchange,” David says.
“Why? Doesn’t she trust you?”
“Yes, she trusts me.”
“Well, Gerry certainly trusts me. Which is why she never asks.”
“Then why’d you work out such a complicated schedule?”
“In case she asks. Besides, it isn’t complicated.”
“You said panels, meetings, lectures...”
“Yes, but scattered throughout the day, hmm? It isn’t complicated. Besides, I didn’t leave her a copy of it. But in case she asks what’s happening tonight, for example, I can tell her I’ll... where the hell is it? Here. Dr. Gianfranco Donato from Milan will be giving a talk on Learning and Motor Skill Disorders.”
“Okay.”
“At the Lotos Club.”
“Okay.”
“Five East Sixty-sixth.”
“Got it.”
“You don’t have to write this down, I’ll be dropping the schedule off. Are you at the office now?”
“No.”
“Where are you?”
“In a coffee shop. A phone booth in a coffee shop.”
“Shall I bring it to you there?”
“No, just drop it at the office. I’ll pick it up later.”
“Are you sure? Suppose Helen calls you ten minutes from now?”
“Stanley...”
“All right, all right. But you can’t blame me for wanting to be careful, Dave. You have nothing to lose here. I realize the favor you’re doing, but even so, please try to understand my caution, hmm?”
“I understand completely.”
“When will you be at the office?”
“I’m not sure.”
“I’m just afraid you’ll talk to Helen before you get the schedule, and you won’t know where the hell we’re supposed to be all day.”
“I won’t be talking to Helen until later tonight.”
“How do you know?”
“Because that’s what we arranged.”
“Doesn’t she trust you?”
“Stanley, we’ve been over that.”
“I mean, calling on schedule, that sounds like a woman who doesn’t trust you.” His voice lowers. “Cindy’s with me now,” he says. “You should see her.”
“Stanley, I have to go now.”
“No, wait. Wait! Let me read this to you. At least, this afternoon’s meetings and tonight’s schedule. In case you talk to her.”
“I won’t be...”
“In case, okay? In fact, you’d better write it down, after all. Have you got a pencil?”
David sighs.
“All the lectures are at the Lotos Club,” Stanley says, “but I’ve put the panels and meetings at different places, in case anyone tries to get to us. By the way, I’d appreciate it if you didn’t give all of this to Helen. I mean, if she asks, you can tell her where you’ll be at any given point in time, but I wouldn’t volunteer the entire schedule.”
“I wouldn’t do that, anyway.”
“That’s in case she talks to Gerry. Though I can’t see why they’d be talking in the next few days, can you?”
“No, I can’t imagine that happening.”