1. Carl Abelle-about 27-six-footer-husky, blond-has left the Valley-try Mohawk Lodge near Speculator, New York.
2. Nancy Abbott-about 22-tall, dark, slender, heavy drinker, good singing voice, believed to have been divorced, perhaps daughter of an architect. Took ski lessons from Abelle at Sun Valley. Believed to be a house guest of
3. Vance and Patty M’Gruder, perhaps of Carmel, married couple in middle twenties, apparently well-off, Vance a sailboat buff, ocean racing etc., have house in Hawaii (?), husband very tanned, short, broad, muscular, going prematurely bald, wife lush fair, very long blonde hair, quarrelsome, strong English accent.
4. Cass-could be first name, last name or nickname. Seemed to have known M’Gruders previously. About thirty. Dark, hairy, handsome, very powerful. Amusing (?). A painter, perhaps. Friend of…
5. Sonny, a little younger than Cass, slender, cold-eyed, flavor of violence, untalkative, occupation unknown, who had brought along…
6. Whippy. About nineteen then. Copper curls, freckles, perhaps a waitress or clerk, scared of Sonny.
7. Two college boys from the east on a summer trip, apparently joined the group at the bar where Abelle ran into Nancy Abbott. Boys about 20 or 21, Harvey a big blond cheery one and Richie a smaller dark nutty one. Cornell.
On the clearest prints of each I had marked the corresponding number from my notes. I could sense Lee’s relief when I put the photographs back into the envelope.
“Who got it all started?” I asked her.
She tightened up again. “Why? What do you mean?”
“I don’t think a camera gets that lucky. Somebody had to set you up. Or maybe the real target was somebody else, and you turned out to be a bonus.”
“It was a long time ago, and I was tight most of the time.”
“Tell me what you can remember of how it got started.”
She got up slowly and went over and rested her fists on a windowsill, staring out, the fox pelt hair softly backlighted. I leaned a shoulder against the wall by the window. She talked. Her voice was small. I could not see much of her profile because of the way the hair swung forward. Round of forehead, soft snub tip of nose. I did not press her. I let her find her own words in her own time.
Her memory was more acute as regards textures than incident. Six men and four gals that first evening and night. Four places to go-two bedrooms, a long couch in the living room, the leathery sunpads on the night terrace. It was a prowling thing then, pursuits and tensions, Lysa Dean a primary target for all but Carl, low lights and ultimate arrangements, and some re-pairings when partners slept.
In phrases and fragments, theatrical sighs and beautifully timed hesitations, she painted the flavor of the hot bright terrace on that first full day of houseparty. Pitchers of Bloody Marys, vodka haze, arrows of white sunlight through squinting eyes, compulsive beat of the music on the portable radio, oil and aromatics of sun lotion, jokes and tipsy laughter.
A game of forfeits, with the rules rigged so that to play was to lose, and to lose was to soon be naked. In half-sleep, mildly and amiably drunk, after the game had ended, she had fended off the increasing insistence of Cass, whining at him irritably when he became too bold.
Finally, propping herself up to drink again, she saw several sound asleep, and saw others who were accepting what she had refused. So, squeezing her eyes hard shut to achieve the illusion of privacy, she had surrendered herself to Cass and her own responses.
She straightened and turned toward me and hooked the fingertips of both hands into my belt, leaned her forehead against my chest. She sighed and said, “Then I guess it stops mattering so much. I don’t know. You just seem to learn how to turn one whole part of your mind right off. It’s all just something that happens. Everybody is in the same boat. So it doesn’t seem to make any difference any more. Nothing does.”
She sighed again. In the cold soft light I could see the scalp, clean and white as bone under the coppery spring of hair. “I don’t know who started it. Patty was bossy. I can remember people getting mad. Whippy cried sometimes. Cass knocked Carl down once, I don’t know why. One of those college kids, the big one, kept getting sick. He couldn’t drink. It’s all so vague, sweetie. If you watched, and you were all turned off, it was just sort of stupid and boring, and if you’d, started to hum a little, you could get into that one or set up something else, or go take a shower, or go make a sandwich, or go build another pitcher of drinks. It just… wasn’t all that important.”
She slid her small hands around my waist, laid her cheek against my chest and held tight. I stroked her hair. She took the deepest breath of all and said, “Listen to me! God, I know it was important. There are some kinds of poisons, I heard you look as if you got over it, but you never really do. I wish somebody could stick a knife in my head and cut out those four days and nights, Trav. A girl thinks about herself a different way, after that. I have this lousy dream ever since. I’ve fallen into this empty white swimming pool and the sides are too high to get out. The pool lights are on so it’s bright as a stage. And there are six ugly snakes in there on the tile, all after me. I can run and dodge fast enough to keep away from them no matter how they try to hem me in. They all look exactly alike. Then I keep calling for help and suddenly I see that the walls are all kind of coming in. It is getting smaller and smaller. Then I know they are going to get me. As the place gets smaller the snakes get bigger, and I scream and wake up, all sweaty and trembling. Just hold me tight, Trav. Please.”
She was trembling and I wondered if it was faked. After several minutes she quieted down and moved away from me, shoved her hair back with the back of her hand and said, with a funny little shy smile, “You don’t want me, do you? I could tell. Just from your hands. Kind of gentle and… fatherly and remote. God, I wouldn’t blame you for not wanting such a public piece.”
“It’s not that.”
“No? You are certainly not one of those, sweetie.”
“No. Well, in all honesty, if that’s what you want, I guess the pictures have something to do with it. A man likes the illusion of exclusive option, even on the most temporary basis, I guess. But with or without pictures, let’s just say I’m not a trophy hunter.”
“What the hell does that mean?”
“Every redblooded American boy should ride a bike no hands and win some merit badges and go to bed with a household name. Some of them don’t get over it, that’s all. I had my celebrity innings, but I’m not a locker room historian. I outgrew my bike too, Lee. It’s a big scene here. Rich silent house and the closed door and your tight pants and that rostrum type bed. And mutual attraction. But it isn’t worth it. It would be like being taught to dance by your elder sister. She would keep trying to lead, and giving irritable little instructions, and counting out loud and spoiling the music. Then she would give you a patronizing pat and say you did just fine.”
For a moment she had the malignant rigidity of a temple demon. Then an urchin grin, seen often in your favorite movie palace, broke it up. “My God, you are a strange one, McGee. You wouldn’t want me as a gift, eh?”
“Not unless and until it could be more than this for us, Lee.”
“You mean like real true love?”
“Affection, understanding, need and respect. You can be sarcastic about that too, if you want. Bed is the simplest thing two people can do. If it goes with a lot of other things, it can be important, and if it goes with nothing else, it isn’t worth the time it takes.”
She strolled over and curled up in a big chair and pondered me, finger laid against the side of her small nose. “The next time around, Mr. McGee, can you arrange to show up in Dayton about fifteen years ago?”