Naked Came the Stranger (10 page)

"Yeah, but baby," Dexter said, "when I tell her I know you, she
say you her
type."

"Her type?"

"She say she want
you
, baby."

The meaning of this was unmistakable. And, while Arthur in no way
trusted Dexter's recollection of the conversation, he fully trusted
Dexter's instincts. If Dexter believed that Mrs. Gillian Blake wanted
him, well then, in all probability, she did. And if Dexter wigged out
like that over her, he probably sensed that she would be wilder in
bed than a female rhinoceros. Rhinoceros, hmmmm.

"Time for a little bike ride," Arthur said. Dexter blinked,
meaning yes.

Arthur stepped into a pair of white levis, snapped on the big
white helmet, the jacket and the boots. The two of them strolled out
to the garage where Big Momma, Arthur's Harley-Davidson 1200, rested
in all its multi-geared splendor. And fifteen cursing neighbors
later, the machine was idling in the Blake driveway.

It was easy. Dexter banged on the door. Gillian had opened it and
smiled. The smile was her mistake. Dexter lifted her off her feet,
hoisted her over his right shoulder and carried her onto the waiting
motorcycle. Within five minutes they were cruising back to Arthur's
house, Gillian slung across the center of the motorcycle. Gillian had
complained, then pleaded, but her cries were drowned out by Big
Momma. She decided to take it slowly and did everything in her power
not to smile. In a nutty kind of way it was almost romantic. Not
candlelight and champagne romantic, but nutty romantic. Nothing like
this had happened since college, since the time her Medieval
Philosophy professor tried to make love to her under water while a
chilly April moon glittered over College Pond.

When they finally arrived at their destination, Raina opened the
door to meet them. She took one look at Gillian and floated off
– ethereally, she hoped – to the upstairs bedroom, where
she sucked on an LSD-saturated sugar cube and pondered life's
inequities. A little mind expansion was sorely needed. Arthur's total
insensitivity had stretched both her heart and soul to the breaking
point. She was sorry for a moment that she hadn't played Indian for
him – even a second time.

No one had yet spoken to Gillian – at least not directly.
She walked, of her own power, into the living room. She was struck by
the frightened look on the face of the young woman who retreated up
the stairs. When she turned around, Arthur was in the process of
removing his levis. Dexter had wandered into the kitchen to munch his
salami sandwich in peace.

"Was there something you wanted to tell me?" she finally
asked.

"Nope," he said.

"Was there some reason for the ride, for being kidnapped?"

"You can split any time you want," Arthur said. "No one's making
you stay."

Gillian was not frightened. She realized, in a way, that Arthur
had undressed in order to make her feel more… comfortable. She
tried not to look at him, but the lean, young body struck a chord, a
chord of memory rather than desire, and she was happy at least for
that. It had been a long time, she realized, since a boy had held any
interest for her.

"Are the two of you married?" she finally asked.

"No," he said. "Dexter's just a buddy from the army."

"Not Dexter," she said. "I'm talking about the little creature who
just took such an obvious powder."

"That depends on what you mean by married," Arthur said. "We share
the pad. And she uses my name, if that's what you mean."

"I take it, then, it's a common-law marriage."

"Who knows?" he said. "Do you smoke?"

"I've got my own" – she patted the handbag containing a
package of Luckies.

"Crazy," he said. "I could tell you'd swing. Excuse me then while
I light up."

From the manner in which he inhaled the smoke, the exaggerated
swallowing with eyes closed, and from the bittersweet smell of the
exhaled smoke, Gillian realized the boy smoked marijuana. She was
neither shocked nor caught off balance. Charlie, in college, had
smoked marijuana, and the small furnished room in the town of
Annandale was often filled with the same smell. She often thought
that those had been the best times of all. Never mind that in a very
real sense they were all blind; at least they all tried to find some
light.

"You remind me of someone I once knew," she said.

"You remind me of someone I knew in school."

"You don't," he said.

"Don't what?"

"Don't remind me of someone I once knew in school," he said.
"Don't remind me of anyone ever. You're something else. That's why
you're so wiggy."

"He was blind," Gillian went on. "He was a blind piano-playing boy
and he used to sit around like you are, without clothes, and he'd
talk and talk. The things we were going to do, the things we believed
in, the world problems we were going to solve."

"That's cool," he said.

Dexter returned to the living room, munching at a new salami
sandwich. He evinced no surprise at the sight of Arthur completely
stripped except for the motorcycle helmet. He asked where Raina was
and then walked upstairs.

"You let your wife…?" Gillian didn't complete the
question.

"She's got her life," he said. "I got mine. Where shall we
go?"

"Where?" Gillian said.

"Where?"

The question
where
had, in fact, been on Arthur's mind for
the past five minutes. He and Raina had made love in every available
square inch of the house, everywhere from the broom closet to the
refrigerator (a little cramped even with the shelves removed, but
delightfully cool in August) and now, with a new chick, it seemed
only right to find a new spot.

Gillian almost said no. She came perilously close to exiting from
the absurd little drama, but something made her stay. The thought of
destroying a union as ephemeral as this one, this semi-marriage of
Arthur and Raina, seemed more than redundant. There seemed no way to
rationalize coupling with this youthful madman.

Maybe it was his very youth – that frail, pale little boy,
his chest bare of hair, his little-boy face twisted in effort as he
thought of a suitable spot to carry his lover. The incongruity of the
moment. The contrast between Arthur and Rabbi Turnbull. Arthur's
naturalness compared to Turnbull's pomposity. Who'd ever have thought
the rabbi would turn out to be such an ass? The episode had left a
bad taste in her mouth. Perhaps the boy would help purge it.

"Wherever," she said finally.

"I can't think," he, said. "I can't think of a place."

"Well, really, dear," she said, "not here. I'm sure your wife is
very understanding about this, but… not here. Shall we adjourn
to the bedroom?"

The
bedroom
– Arthur was amazed. The bedroom, of
course. Floors, fields, beaches, even once in a sewer – but the
bedroom? The thought had never occurred to him before. The bedroom?
That was even better than a snowbank. This Gillian Blake was
unbelievable, unbelievable!

Walking up to the bedroom with Gillian, Arthur suffered through a
curiously deflating moment or two. It was personal recognition of the
clearly superior imagination of the woman beside him. This was a
woman who had some things to teach him, and he only hoped she would
find him an apt pupil.

Passing by Raina's Meditation Room, they noticed that the door was
open, and they paused to study a curious tableau. Dexter, completely
nude, was stretched out on the Prayer Table, his manhood rising
toward the ceiling. Raina had scattered talcum powder over his entire
body, and the effect was one of salt and pepper. She was at that
moment gently massaging him at his point of greatest attitude with a
bottle of pink Johnson & Johnson baby lotion. Gillian surmised
that it was a religious ceremony, possibly something directly from
the
Kama-Sutra
, and she said nothing irreverent. Arthur, on
the other hand, realized they were playing the Baby Game and was
vaguely disappointed in Raina's lack of innovation since the last
time.

Hand in hand they approached the door of the second bedroom, and
Arthur hardly dared ask again. He didn't have to this time. Gillian
walked straight over to the bed, removed her pink-flowered muumuu and
stretched luxuriously across the bed. Arthur loped across the room
after her.

The
bed!
Of course, the bed. All thoughts he had been
entertaining quickly slipped from him. The ascetic sensations of the
glass-topped cocktail table, the cooling joys of the refrigerator,
the exoticism of the attic trunk – these images passed
immediately from his mind. The bed – comfortable, soft,
capacious – called out to him. Why hadn't he thought of it
himself? How could it have been anywhere else but the bed?

He looked at Gillian, at the slender winding body covered with
tiny blonde hairs, at the full lips parted slightly as they awaited
his throbbing mouth, at the rhythm of her rising breasts. And
suddenly he knew. He knew that hanging from the chandelier with her
poised happily under him – this was not for Gillian. That
leaning over the bed's backboard with toes curled toward Mecca
– that would never satisfy her. That somersaulting into the
mainsprings – that would never do.

There was only one thing left to do. He flopped onto the bed and
climbed atop Gillian, arranging himself in the position that had been
handed down from generation to generation since the beginning of
time.

"Normal," he thought, "normal for the first time."

The word was no longer anathema to him. As he climbed aboard, a
vision came to Arthur Franhop. It was a vision of life – a life
of calm, steady sex, of marriage even, of charming little children
whom he could teach all he knew about sex and drugs, or perpetuating
the race in this natural and noble manner.

As they rocked back and forth – Gillian with dazzling
expertise, Arthur with mounting ecstasy – back and forth, back
and forth to the heights of burning, genuine joy, they failed to
notice Raina as she came into the room, carrying a water balloon,
standing then at the foot of the bed. Back and forth, back and forth,
the sensations were all-encompassing, sweet and natural, and it was
not until the moment of explosion that Gillian looked up and saw the
audience. Raina's face was twisted in anger, contorted in indignation
and her voice rasped when she finally managed to mouth her
hatred.

"Arthur, you are
square!"
she screamed. "You are an
incredible incurable square!"

Billy: It's hard to believe that Pearl Harbor was
that long ago, Gilly.

Gilly: I was a child then, but I'll never forget it. Billy:
Neither will I.

Gilly: And what you wonder about is whether we learned anything
from it. When I say "we," of course, I mean mankind in
general.

Billy: You certainly do wonder. The world seems to be in as
much of a mess as ever.

Gilly: Yes, and not just nations, but people. We just don't
seem to care about one another.

Billy: The whole bit is going on, all right. War, killing,
violence, man's inhumanity to man.

Gilly: Yes.

Billy: Take organized crime. It's become an accepted part of
everyday life.

Gilly: That's so true. The crime seems to be in getting caught,
rather than in doing wrong.

Billy: Take the Cosa Nostra. It's everywhere.

Gilly: I wonder about that, though. You know, whether it's all
true. All that melodramatic stuff about families. Billy: I believe
it. Today's gangsters are organization men hiding behind business
façades.

Gilly: Team men. Billy: Definitely.

Gilly: It's too bad we don't know one we could have on the
show. Wouldn't that be fun?

Billy: If you'll pardon the pun, it might be a blast. Gilly:
Oh, Billy.

Billy: No, you might get a real bang out of it.

Gilly: You're just too much today. Actually, Billy, a genuine
gangster would probably be a very exciting person.

Billy: No doubt, but I think we should leave the gangsters to
the crime committees. Let the government interview them.

Gilly: I suppose so. Anyway, we don't know any
gangsters.

Billy: Don't be too sure. Like I said, they all have
respectable fronts nowadays. For all we know, there might be one
living in our own neighborhood.

Gilly: Mmmmm. Isn't that a marvelous thought? Billy: I thought
it would get you.

Gilly: Mmmmm.

Mario Vella eased the black Bonneville down the
feeder road, mashed down on the accelerator, and spurted onto the
Long Island Expressway. He liked the quick surge of power under his
foot. That's where power should always be, he mused, under your foot,
ready to be squeezed on or off with the slightest pressure.

He lifted his foot and the car slowed down to the legal limit. He
would keep it that way for the next fifty-eight minutes, to the
King's Neck turnoff. From there it was just twenty minutes on 25-A to
the Dunes Motel and Gilly. He hoped she'd be on time. She always had
some kind of excuse. Since the first time two weeks ago, she'd been
arriving progressively later each time. He'd have to clamp down.

It was only 3:30 p.m. and he was out in front of the rush-hour
traffic. His eyes flicked from the speedometer to the speed-limit
sign at the Queens Boulevard exit. He had been commuting to King's
Neck for two years now and he knew the speed limits as well as he
knew the names of his children. But he was a careful man. That was
his value to the Organization; he not only knew the system, he lived
it. And one of the cardinal rules was: Don't break the little laws.
That was for kids, not for professionals.