Girl on the Best Seller List (16 page)

“It’s his office address,” said the switchboard operator. “Check on it anyway.”

The doctor left through the revolving door. “Just your luck,” the switchboard operator said. “You get to wrestle with some nut on a hot afternoon in May.” “Catatonics are usually quiet.” “Yeah?”

“Real vegetables. The ones that sit around on the wards in the same position.”

“Ready to pick up: one vegetable,” said the switchboard operator as he dialed.

“Besides, I’d rather be out on a call then sitting around here.”

“Was’ the matter, lover, don’t you thee I think you’re thwell?” the switchboard operator laughed. Then he said, “Hello, Dr. Mannerheim? This is the Cayuta Re — What?”

He listened a moment, and then he put down the phone in its cradle. “Well!” he said.

“What’s the matter?”

“He flew the coop,” said the switchboard operator. “The catalonic took off on the doctor.”

“Great! I’ll bet Mannerheim’s steamed.”

“Real steamed, buddy-boy,” said the switchboard operator. “Very very steamed! Well, so,” he fished under the counter for
Life
Magazine, “should it work my blood pressure up because there’s another nut loose? So long as I love my mother, isn’t that right, nurse?”

S
TANLEY SECORA
could not find Min Stewart for the doctor. He looked for her in the drug store, but she was not there; no one knew where she was. Twice he telephoned her from the drug store. After each call, he retrieved the dime in the coin-return slot and used it to try Gloria Wealdon’s number.

When eventually he decided to go directly to the Weal-dons’, he had in mind no thought of protecting her from Louie Stewart. Despite all he had heard in the doctor’s office, he felt that Louie was in good hands, that soon the funny-farm would come and get him and lock him up.

His decision to go to the Wealdons’ was the same impulsive sort of bravado which had stayed him in all the strange-sounding towns of the war, back when he was a hero, young, and such a crazy fighter (“You dumb Polack,” they used to say, laughing with him, clapping their hands across his back. “You dumb, death-happy Polack!”) in Santa Maria Infante, San Pietro, Monte Cerri, Monte Branchi, Gaeta, Cisterna — in all of them.

To Stanley Secora the truth of loving was touching. What you could not touch, you could not love; and when you fell in love, you wanted to touch and you wanted to perform intercourse (Stanley always phrased it that way, because all he knew about the “act” — another of his phrases — he had read in volumns on sexology). That was love. That was what he wanted when he got to Gloria Wealdon’s, and that was why he was going there now: to get what he wanted.

Yet he did not appear to be stalking a victim; he was not striding toward his destination with his shoulders squared and his jaw set; he was nearly rubber-kneed with the weakness that flooded through him, and he was trembling. Over and over, as he went down Alden Avenue toward the blue house at the end of the street, he had to stop and wipe off his glasses, because they were steaming, and he was afraid.

• • •

In the war, he
had
been brave. He had done crazy, wild, unbelievably courageous things, but then as now he had been terrified. Once he had been ordered to stay in an area where a number of men had been killed by a mortar shell (he could remember that, after the order had been given, a buddy had said, “You’re expendable, Secora. In other words you’re expendable” — but Stanley had not known what the word meant). He had sat out the watches alone in the dark and in the day, and he had not been afraid until there was the smell. That smell. He had heard that bodies left dead had a horrible odor, and that was it; and once or twice he had looked at them lying around him there, and he had found out something else about dead bodies that no one had ever told him, that he had never heard anywhere. Some of them bloated. He saw one bloated in the sun one morning just after he woke up. It had bust its buttons and had turned blue, and its skin was peeling. Its name was Private Carlton Phillips, and it had gone to Harvard, and that’s what everyone had called him, “Harvard,” and after Stanley had seen him, he had run away from where he had been ordered to stay. But for a long time after that day, that year, he could still remember the smell and the sight of the buttons popping in the sun on the corpse’s uniform.

So he knew fear. That was why his courage had to be so wild and crazy, because he knew the size of his fear, and that it was awfully big.

Today, going after love, Stanley could not visualize or even think of how love would be accomplished. Whenever he tried to do that, he either thought of those line illustrations from chapter six on positions for intercourse in his sexology book, or he thought of the character Will from
Population 12,360
— Will with the perspiration running down his well-tanned back and the grass in the cuffs of his white pants, and Gina, the heroine, saying, “Rip off my clothes and make me naked.” Stanley knew that if anyone ever said that to him, he would faint with embarrassment.

Today, going after Love, Stanley was unsure of himself, more so than ever because of that morning; but it was this very feeling of being unsure that made him determined to do it. He had to.

• • •

When he arrived at the Wealdons’, the first thing he noticed was that her car was in the garage. She was home.

He wiped off his glasses a fourth time since being on the street, and then walked to the front door and pushed the bell.

He said, “Mrs. Wealdon?” No answer.

He pushed the doorbell again.

“Mrs. Wealdon, please? Are you home?”

He stood there shuffling his feet, listening to the silence, and though he rang again and again, he was convinced she was not inside. He glanced at his watch. It was two-forty. He knew that Milo’s track meet would be on now and that he would be there at the high school. Mrs. Wealdon was probably just somewhere in the neighborhood.

When he tried the front screen door, it was locked.

Stanley went around to the back door, the one off the garage. He opened it very carefully, and shut it gently behind him without making any noise. He tiptoed across to a kitchen chair and sat down. He took off both his shoes and placed them neatly under the chair. He loosened his tie, and as he did this the idea came to him to take his shirt off. Like Will, in the book.

He had no course of action planned exactly. He unbuttoned his shirt and hung it over the back of the chair. He pulled his belt in another notch, and then wished he could take off his glasses, but he was quite blind without them.

He decided the best idea would be to wait for her in the living room, in the semi-darkness. He could sit in one of the armchairs, and when she came in he could just get up and say, “Hi, there.” In his hand he could have a piece of the candy he had made her, and he could say, “Like a sweet?”

When he heard the car stop in front of the house, he ducked behind a curtain and looked out.

It was Freddy Fulton and Min Stewart was with him.

He decided not to move, but simply to stay there while they rang the doorbell and discovered she was not home. And then another car arrived. Stanley saw Jay Mannerheim behind the wheel.

Instantly, he was afraid. Mannerheim always frightened him a little. He wondered why the doctor was here. To find Min Stewart, of course — but what then? And he thought of the way Jay Mannerheim always used the telephone. He thought of the unlocked door in the kitchen, of his shoes there, and his shirt. As quickly as he could, Stanley ran back and pushed the trigger-lock shut. He took his shirt and his shoes and as he darted back toward the living room with them, his socks slid on the slippery linoleum and he fell. His glasses flew from his ears and were swept across the floor…. Where.

He tried to feel for them with his hands, but it was no good. A part of the bandage on his hand came unraveled, and he tried to tuck the stray piece back inside. It would not stay. He was on all fours when he heard the sharp ding-dong — the front bell.

Min Stewart said, “He doesn’t drive. It’s fortunate that he does not know how to drive or he might have taken one of the cars and beat us here.”

“He could have just as easily gotten a ride,” said Freddy Fulton.

“I don’t think either of you understand Louie’s condition,” said Jay Mannerheim. “I’m not too worried about him where Gloria Wealdon’s concerned.”

“What does not
too
worried about him mean, Jay?” said Min.

The doorbell rang sharply.

Stanley lay flat now. He could not tell how much of him could be seen if someone were to look in the front screen door. He thought he remembered that it was not possible to see beyond the entrance way from the front porch, but without his glasses he could only rely on his memory — and had he remembered right?

“It means that I think we’re being alarmists,” said Jay. “He wouldn’t go after Gloria. It’s too obvious.”

Stanley began to slide on his belly toward the living room, dragging his shoes and shirt. He had to get out of sight; that was the first thing. He had to be somewhere else if Mannerheim were to come around to the back door and look in. At least he had been able to lock it; that was luck.

“What if I just run down and check and see if Virginia’s home?” Freddy Fulton said.

“Mrs. Wealdon obviously isn’t in,” said Mannerheim. “I think we’d better get on the ball and start looking for Louie.”

Someone pushed the doorbell again. “Her car is in, Jay.”

“I know, Min, but she could be anyplace.” “And so could Louie, Jay.” “Well, he’s not here.”

“How do we know? And how do we know he’s not on his way here?”

“We don’t, of course, Min.” Another ring of the doorbell. “But I doubt it.”

“I ought to call Fern and see if Virginia’s back,” said Freddy.

“Couldn’t we use
her
phone, Jay?” Min Stewart.

“You mean just walk in?”

The sound of the screen door being tried.

“It is an emergency, Jay.”

“Yes, and I could call Fern from here instead of having to go there. If Virginia isn’t there, I’m going to Elbridge.”

Min Stewart said, “I think that’s wise. I think you’ll find her there.”

“Where?” said Mannerheim. “Who?”

“No one,” Min Stewart said. “Just Virginia. Frederick’s upset about her.”

“Well, this door is locked. I suppose I could try the back door, but I don’t feel right about it.”

“Try, Jay. Louie may even have gone to the drug store. I just think we could accomplish so much if we simply had access to a telephone.”

“All right, I’ll go around back.”

Stanley Secora came to what felt like a step leading off the living room. He felt it with his hands; it was the pair of steps leading up to the rest of the house. He remembered now. He eased himself up, pulling more of his bandage loose. He was afraid Mannerheim would force his way in now; he had to find a place to hide — a place away from the living room.

“Don’t say anything to Jay about Elbridge,” said Freddy Fulton at the front door.

Min said, “I am one of the few females in Cayuta who finds the idea of Jay Mannerheim’s being my confessor completely repulsive.”

Freddy Fulton laughed. Then he said, “Oh God, I’m worried, Min.”

“We’re both worried, Frederick. I can’t help thinking Jay could somehow have prevented Louie’s running off that way. And I’m absolutely positive that he must have provoked Louie. Louie never runs away … not unless — ”

“Unless what?”

“Unless he really has been driven too far, as I suspected. Then he’ll be here, you can be sure of that. He’ll come to this house
after
her.”

“Min, we’re both worked up. We’ve got to just keep calm.”

“Do you think Virginia would harm anyone?” “No. I’m almost certain she wouldn’t. She’s not like that.”

“You’ve put her through a great deal, Frederick, for a little girl.”

“I know … but she just wouldn’t do anything violent.”

From the back door came another chime and then Jay Mannerheim’s voice: “Gloria Wealdon? Hel-lo? Anyone home?”

At the front door, Min Stewart said quietly, “You believe your child is incapable of violence, and I’m so sure that mine is thoroughly capable of it. It will be interesting — ”

“Interesting?” Freddy Fulton said in a sick tone. “Oh, God, I just wish she was here. I wish she was where I knew she was safe.”

“You mean Gloria Wealdon?”

“No, Virginia.”

“But Gloria Wealdon’s safety is more important at this moment, when you think about it,” said Min Stewart.

Stanley was easing himself over the top step and sliding on his belly down the hall, when he heard Mannerheim shout to those at the front of the house.

“Okay, I’ll try some windows. The door is locked.”

• • •

Stanley felt along the walls until he came to a room. It would be the bedroom, the master bedroom; he could remember doing the windows — it was the first room on the hall. He crawled inside, bumping his head against a chair. He dropped his shirt and struggled with his shoes to get them on. He put his shirt on too, and then remembered that he had left his tie behind, probably on the kitchen table. He felt even more afraid; it did not occur to him that it was not very likely that Mannerheim would know a tie of his from a tie of Milo’s. He only thought of his tie there, and Mannerheim’s seeing it; or of a sudden crunching sound, as Mannerheim’s foot came down on his glasses, somewhere on the kitchen floor. Anyone, almost anyone in Cayuta, New York, would know Stanley Secora’s glasses on sight. They were the thickest in Kantogee County. He was positive of that. That was another souvenir from the war, the one he displayed most prominently of all.

• • •

Then he heard Jay Mannerheim’s voice inside, on the lower level. He was walking toward the front door.

“She’ll probably turn us in as housebreakers,” said Jay. “I believe she’d do it. Look, I’m going to alert the police about Louie, Min.”