«Hello, gracious lady!» The voice was Joe’s, and Alice felt herself grow tense. He walked from the hallway into view; he was in swimming trunks. There was something ugly about Joe’s body; it dwarfed objects around it. «You’re out of ice, so I made a phone call to get some.»
«At this hour?»
«It’s easier than one of us driving.»
«Who’d you call?»
«Rudy at the liquor store.»
«It’s closed.»
Cardone walked towards her, weaving a bit. «I got him at home; he wasn’t in bed… He does little favors for me. I told him to leave a couple of bags on the front porch and charge it to me.»
«That wasn’t necessary. I mean the charging.»
«Every little bit helps.»
«Please.» She walked towards the sofa if for no other reason than to get away from Cardone’s gin-laden breath. He followed her.
«Did you think over what I told you?»
«You’re very generous, but we don’t need any help.»
«Is that what John said?»
«It’s what he would say.»
«Then you haven’t talked to him?»
«No.»
Cardone took her hand gently. She instinctively tried to pull it away, but he held it—firmly, with no trace of hostility, only warmth; but he held it nevertheless. «I may be a little loaded but I want you to take me seriously… I’ve been a lucky man; it hasn’t been hard at all, not really… Frankly, I even feel a little guilty, you know what I mean? I admire Johnny. I think the world of him because he contributes… I don’t contribute much; I just take. I don’t hurt anybody, but I take… You’d make me feel better if you’d let me give … for a change.»
He let her hand go and because she didn’t expect it, her forearm snapped back against her waist. She was momentarily embarrassed. And perplexed. «Why are you so determined to give us something. What brought it up?»
Cardone sat down heavily on the arm of the couch. «You hear things. Rumors, gossip, maybe.»
«About us? About us and money?»
«Sort of.»
«Well, it’s not true. It’s simply not true.»
«Then let’s put it another way. Three years ago when Dick and Ginny and Bernie and Leila went skiing with us at Gstaad, you and Johnny didn’t want to go. Isn’t that right?»
Alice blinked, trying to follow Joe’s logic. «Yes, I remember. We thought we’d rather take the children to Nassau.»
«But now John’s very interested in Switzerland, isn’t that right?» Joe’s body was swaying slightly.
«Not that I know of. He hasn’t told me about it.»
«Then if it’s not Switzerland, maybe it’s Italy. Maybe he’s interested in Sicily; it’s a very interesting place.»
«I simply don’t understand you.»
Cardone got off the arm of the couch and steadied himself. «You and I aren’t so very different, are we? I mean, what credentials we have weren’t exactly handed to us, were they?… We’ve earned them, after our own Goddamn fashion…»
«I think that’s insulting.»
«I’m sorry, I don’t mean to be insulting… I just want to be honest, and honesty starts with where you are … where you were.»
«You’re drunk.»
«I certainly am. I’m drunk and I’m nervous. Lousy combination… You talk to John. You tell him to see me tomorrow or the next day. You tell him not to worry about Switzerland or Italy, all right? You tell him, no matter what, that I’m clean and I like people who contribute but don’t hurt other people… That I’ll pay.»
Cardone took two steps toward Ali and grabbed her left hand. Gently but insistently, he brought it to his lips, eyes closed, and kissed her palm. Ali had seen that type of kiss before; in her childhood she’d seen her father’s fanatical adherents do the same. Then Joe turned and staggered into the hallway.
At the window a shifting of light, a reflection, a change of brightness caught Ali’s eye. She turned her head. What she saw caused her to freeze. Outside on the lawn, no more than six feet from the glass, stood Betty Cardone in a white bathing suit, washed in the blue-green light of the swimming pool.
Betty had seen what had happened between Alice and her husband. Her eyes told Ali that.
Joe’s wife stared through the window and her look was cruel.
The full tones of the young Sinatra filled the warm summer night as the four couples sat around the pool. Individually—it seemed never by twos to John Tanner—one or another would slip into the water and paddle lazily back and forth.
The women talked of schools and children while the men, on the opposite side of the deck, spoke less quietly of the market, politics, an inscrutable economy.
Tanner sat on the base of the diving board near Joe. He’d never seen him so drunk, and he bore watching. If any or all around the deck were part of Omega, Joe was the weakest link. He’d be the first to break.
Small arguments flared up, quickly subsiding. At one point, Joe’s voice was too loud and Betty reacted swiftly but quietly.
«You’re drunk, husband-mine. Watch out.»
«Joe’s all right, Betty,» said Bernie, clapping Cardone’s knee. «It was rotten-hot in New York today, remember?»
«You were in New York, too, Bernie,» answered Ginny Tremayne, stretching her legs over the side of the pool. «Was it really that rotten-hot?»
«Rotten-hot, sweetheart.» It was Dick who spoke across the water to his wife.
Tanner saw Osterman and Tremayne exchange glances. Their unspoken communication referred to Cardone but it was not meant that he, Tanner, should understand or even notice. Then Dick got up and asked who’d like refills.
Only Joe answered yes.
«I’ll get it,» said Tanner.
«Hell, no,» replied Dick. «You watch the ballplayer. I want to call the kid anyway. We told her to be back by one; it’s damn near two. These days you have to check.»
«You’re a mean father,» said Leila.
«So long as I’m not a grandfather.» Tremayne walked across the grass to the kitchen door.
There was silence for several seconds, then the girls took up their relaxed conversation and Bernie lowered himself over the side into the pool.
Joe Cardone and Tanner did not speak.
Several minutes later, Dick came out of the kitchen door carrying two glasses. «Hey, Ginny! Peg was teed off that I woke her up. What do you think of that?»
«I think she was bored with her date.»
Tremayne approached Cardone and handed him his glass. «There you are, fullback.»
«I was a Goddamn halfback. I ran circles around your Goddamn Levi Jackson at the Yale Bowl!»
«Sure. But I talked to Levi. He said they could always get you. All they had to do was yell ‘tomato sauce’ and you went for the sidelines!»
«Pretty Goddamn funny! I murdered that black son of a bitch!»
«He speaks well of you, too,» said Bernie, smiling over the side of the pool.
«And I speak well of you, Bernie! And big Dick, here!» Cardone clumsily got to his feet. «I speak well of all of you!»
«Hey, Joe…» Tanner got off the board.
«Really, Joe, just sit down,» ordered Betty. «You’ll fall over.»
«Da Vinci!»
It was only a name but Cardone shouted it out. And then he shouted it again.
«Da Vinci…» He drew out the sound, making the dialect sharply Italian.
«What does that mean?» asked Tremayne.
«You tell me!» roared Cardone through the tease stillness around the pool.
«He’s crazy,» said Leila.
«He’s positively drunk, if nobody minds my saying so,» added Ginny.
«Since we can’t—at least I can’t—tell you what a Da Vinci is, maybe you’ll explain.» Bernie spoke lightly.