Hutch had seen it too, though, so Rosemary went with Joan Jellico, who confided during dinner at the Bijou that she and Dick were separating, no longer having anything in common except their address. The news upset Rosemary. For days Guy had been distant and preoccupied, wrapped in something he would neither put aside nor share. Had Joan and Dick’s estrangement begun in the same way? She grew angry at Joan, who was wearing too much make-up and applauding too loudly in the small theater. No wonder she and Dick could find nothing in common; she was loud and vulgar, he was reserved, sensitive; they should never have married in the first place.
When Rosemary came home Guy was coming out of the shower, more vivacious and there than he had been all week. Rosemary’s spirits leaped. The show had been even better than she expected, she told him, and bad news, Joan and Dick were separating. They really were birds of completely different feathers though, weren’t they? How had the Wait Until Dark scene gone? Great. He had it down cold.
“Damn that tannis root,” Rosemary said. The whole bedroom smelled of it. The bitter prickly odor had even found its way into the bathroom. She got a piece of aluminum foil from the kitchen and wound the charm in a tight triple wrapping, twisting the ends to seal them.
“It’ll probably lose its strength in a few days,” Guy said.
“It better,” Rosemary said, spraying the air with a deodorant bomb. “If it doesn’t, I’m going to throw it away and tell Minnie I lost it;”
They made love-Guy was wild and driving-and later, through the wall, Rosemary heard a party in progress at Minnie and Roman’s; the same flat unmusical singing she had heard the last time, almost like religious chanting, and the same flute or clarinet weaving in and around and underneath it.
Guy kept his keyed-up vivacity all through Sunday, building shelves and shoe racks in the bedroom closets and inviting a bunch of Luther people over for Moo Goo Gai Woodhouse; and on Monday he painted the shelves and shoe racks and stained a bench Rosemary had found in a thrift shop, canceling his session with Dominick and keeping his ear stretched for the phone, which he caught every time before the first ring was finished. At three in the afternoon it rang again, and Rosemary, trying out a different arrangement of the living room chairs, heard him say, “Oh God, no. Oh, the poor guy.”
She went to the bedroom door.
“Oh God,” Guy said.
He was sitting on the bed, the phone in one hand and a can of Red Devil paint remover in the other. He didn’t look at her. “And they don’t have any idea what’s causing it?” he said. “My God, that’s awful, just awful.” He listened, and straightened as he sat. “Yes, I am,” he said. And then, “Yes, I would. I’d hate to get it this way, but I-“ He listened again. “Well, you’d have to speak to Allan about that end of it,” he said-Allan Stone, his agent “but I’m sure there won’t be any problem, Mr. Weiss, not as far as we’re concerned.”
He had it. The Something Big. Rosemary held her breath, waiting.
“Thank you, Mr. Weiss,” Guy said. “And will you let me know if there’s any news? Thanks.”
He hung up and shut his eyes. He sat motionless, his hand staying on the phone. He was pale and dummylike, a Pop Art wax statue with real clothes and props, real phone, real can of paint remover.
“Guy?” Rosemary said.
He opened his eyes and looked at her.
“What is it?” she asked.
He blinked and came alive. “Donald Baumgart,” he said. “He’s gone blind. He woke up yesterday and-he can’t see.”
“Oh no,” Rosemary said.
“He tried to hang himself this morning. He’s in Bellevue now, under sedation.”
They looked painfully at each other.
“I’ve got the part,” Guy said. “It’s a hell of a way to get it.” He looked at the paint remover in his hand and put it on the night table. “Listen,” he said, “I’ve got to get out and walk around.” He stood up. “I’m sorry. I’ve got to get outside and absorb this.”
“I understand, go ahead,” Rosemary said, standing back from the doorway.
He went as he was, down the hall and out the door, letting it swing closed after him with its own soft slam.
She went into the living room, thinking of poor Donald Baumgart and lucky Guy; lucky she-and-Guy, with the good part that would get attention even if the show folded, would lead to other parts, to movies maybe, to a house in Los Angeles, a spice garden, three children two years apart. Poor Donald Baumgart with his clumsy name that he didn’t change. He must have been good, to have won out over Guy, and there he was in Bellevue, blind and wanting to kill himself, under sedation.
Kneeling on a window seat, Rosemary looked out the side of its bay and watched the house’s entrance far below, waiting to see Guy come out. When would rehearsals begin? she wondered. She would go out of town with him, of course; what fun it would be! Boston? Philadelphia? Washington would be exciting. She had never been there. While Guy was rehearsing afternoons, she could sightseer and evenings, after the performance, everyone would meet in a restaurant or club to gossip and exchange rumors . . .
She waited and watched but he didn’t come out. He must have used the Fifty-fifth Street door.
Now, when he should have been happy, he was dour and troubled, sitting with nothing moving except his cigarette hand and his eyes. His eyes followed her around the apartment; tensely, as if she were dangerous. “What’s wrong?” she asked a dozen times.
“Nothing,” he said. “Don’t you have your sculpture class today?”
“I haven’t gone in two months.”
“Why don’t you go?”
She went; tore away old plasticine, reset the armature, and began anew, doing a new model among new students. “Where’ve you been?” the instructor asked. He had eyeglasses and an Adam’s apple and made miniatures of her torso without watching his hands.
“In Zanzibar,” she said.
“Zanzibar is no more,” he said, smiling nervously. “It’s Tanzania.”
One afternoon she went down to Macy’s and Gimbels, and when she came home there were roses in the kitchen, roses in the living room, and Guy coming out of the bedroom with one rose and a forgive-me smile, like a reading he had once done for her of Chance Wayne in Sweet Bird.
“I’ve been a living turd,” he said. “It’s from sitting around hoping that Baumgart won’t regain his sight, which is what I’ve been doing, rat that I am.”
“That’s natural,” she said. “You’re bound to feel two ways about-“
“Listen,” he said, pushing the rose to her nose, “even if this thing falls through, even if I’m Charley Cresta Blanca for the rest of my days, I’m going to stop giving you the short end of the stick.”
“You haven’t-“
“Yes I have. I’ve been so busy tearing my hair out over my career that I haven’t given Thought One to yours. Let’s have a baby, okay? Let’s have three, one at a time.”
She looked at him.
“A baby,” he said. “You know. Goo, goo? Diapers? Waa, waa?”
“Do you mean it?” she asked.
“Sure I mean it,” he said. “I even figured out the right time to start. Next Monday and Tuesday. Red circles on the calendar, please.”
“You really mean it, Guy?” she asked, tears in her eyes.
“No, I’m kidding,” he said. “Sure I mean it. Look, Rosemary, for God’s sake don’t cry, all right? Please. It’s going to upset me very much if you cry, so stop right now, all right?”
“All right,” she said. “I won’t cry.”
“I really went rose-nutty, didn’t I?” he said, looking around brightly. “There’s a bunch in the bedroom too.”