The Casanova Embrace (31 page)

Frederika, rubbing the hurt place on her cheek, looked
through the slats of the blinds, waiting for Eddie to appear on the street
below. The spot where the woman had stood before was empty and, except for the
passing of an occasional car, the street was deserted. Then he appeared,
walking swiftly.

A flash of movement caught her attention. It was the woman,
crossing the street with the sure step of a cat in the jungle. Rushing back
from the window, she ran to her bed and slipped under the blanket. She is
coming now, she knew, feeling her vulnerability, her nakedness.

Earlier she had been brave, talking of killing. Now her
courage had passed out of her like liquid from an overturned bottle and she lay
in the bed, sure of doom, welcoming the possibility as her only alternative to
Eddie. She waited, listening, knowing in her soul that the woman would soon be
here, in this room. But her mind still could not grasp the woman's motive. She
is a relative of someone killed in the plane wreck. The idea calmed her
momentarily. That was a motive she could understand. Punishment was on its way,
deserved, avenging. But the calm was brief. Whoever she was, she was the enemy,
the enemy of Eduardo, her Eddie. He had struck her. It should have been a knife
in her heart.

She buried her face in the pillows, screamed into it with
all her strength, felt the muffled sound bounce back into her head.

Despite the inevitability of the woman's impending
presence, the buzzer startled her. Coming first in short bursts, it changed
quickly to an unending wail. Finally she rose from the bed. Opening the door,
she stood aside as the woman came into the room.

Like a filmed dance in slow motion, the woman emerged in
Frederika's consciousness, half-developed, an unfinished photograph. In the
gray light, her face appeared dead white, with eyes like pinpoints of light,
like a pumpkin head, backlit by a candle. The odd imagery solidified
Frederika's fear and paralyzed her sense of motion. The woman focused on her,
as if the gaze could strip her flesh from her bones, and she huddled deeper in
the blanket she had wrapped around herself. Then she saw the pinpoints of light
deflect, leave her face, and dart around her apartment, inquiring. The woman's
hands were thrust deep in the pockets of her coat, and as she turned back
toward her, Frederika could see the sneering, tightly pressed lips, the
uplifted nose suggesting an imperial opinion, as if, she, Frederika, were a piece
of obscene garbage floating on the scum of some stagnant backwater.

"He was here," the woman said. It came as a hiss,
like the sound of a trapped rattlesnake. They stood facing each other. The
woman's voice seemed almost comforting in the charged air, suggesting a
humanness that belied the image in Frederika's mind.

"He was here," the woman repeated. The ends of
her nostrils quivered. Had she actually caught Eddie's scent? She looked at the
coverless bed, the wrinkled sheets, the indented pillows, the obvious evidence
of passion. The strange woman was taller than Frederika, her hair clipped short
like a boy's. Her fear diminishing, Frederika could study her now. She was,
after all, only a woman.

"Who are you?" she asked, ashamed of her previous
fear, sensing the beginnings of indignation. She shivered and tightened the
blanket around herself. The tall woman seemed tentative, vulnerable, as if she
had walked into a den of lions and could not quite decide how to cope with the
situation.

"I demand to know why he was here," the woman
said. Her tight lips still sneered, but the thinning darkness was swiftly
chasing her mystique. Frederika watched her. She stood stiffly, holding her
body as if it was incapable of any other configuration, devoid of suppleness.

"Who are you talking about?" Frederika demanded.

"You know." It was as if an obscenity hung on her
tongue, and she had not the courage to utter it. Frederika remained
deliberately silent, her mind reacting now, observing. This is not what it
seems, at all, she thought.

"Eduardo Allesandro Palmero," the woman said. The
name was spoken with odd formality. It reached her as the name of a stranger.
Not her Eddie. She could deny the knowledge of his existence, she thought. It
was her first reaction. But the sound of his name seemed to place him in a new
dimension, sparking her curiosity now. There is another woman searching for
Eddie. It came to her as if she had been suddenly doused with icy water. There
was another woman. It was her turn to hate now. She wanted to be cruel.

"He has just left my bed," she said, watching the
words, like bullets, find their mark. The woman's lips quivered and her eyelids
fluttered. A nerve palpitated in her cheek. She was losing control. Was she his
wife? Frederika turned from her with contempt and moved toward the bed. She
flung the blanket from her body, flaunting her nakedness, turning briefly to
show her the fullness of her body, its richly turned curves, her womannesss.
She felt an odd sense of pride and victory as she propped up the pillows and
slid slowly into the bed, her arms crossed behind her head, her jaw pointed
upward. She could now feel the woman's helplessness.

"And who the hell are you?" she asked, feeling
the venom pass through the air. Again she knew that the tall woman felt the
impact, although she could sense the gathering of her pride. Watching her,
Frederika was goaded to muster more cruelty. This woman must suffer, she
decided.

"He is my lover," she said, superior now,
watching the tall woman lose her ominous aura. The woman's hands fluttered
behind her for a moment, as if seeking support. Finally, she groped toward a
chair and sat down. The light, thickening between the slats of the blinds,
etched the lines of exhaustion on the woman's face. Her shoulders hunched
forward as if she hadn't the strength to hold them up.

"Are you his wife?" Frederika asked. She was
surprised at her lack of compassion. This pitiful woman is nothing to me, she
told herself. She would not have been worth the killing, Frederika decided.

The woman shook her head and turned, averting Frederika's
eyes. She is feeling my cruelty, she thought proudly, wanting to hurt more, to
strike harder blows.

"You are absurd," Frederika said, enjoying her
malevolence.

"I know," the woman said. Is she part of Eddie's
operation, Frederika wondered. She was hardly the vaunted enemy, this laughable
creature. Perhaps she is an unrequited lover, Frederika thought, feeling a
first brief tug of pity. Smiling thinly, she recalled how Eddie's powerful
sexuality could move her, and she felt puffed up with the full breath of her
superiority as a woman. The person before her was hardly female, a man almost,
and older by far than herself. She was a hag. Frederika resisted the temptation
to throw off the covers and spread her legs in front of the woman. Let me show
you where Eduardo Allesandro Palmero has been. She giggled silently, reveling
in the sudden image of his hard erection inserted in her.

"What are you?" Frederika asked, the contempt
blatant. She had wanted to say "who," but felt better implying a less
than human designation. "You've got one fucking nerve," she cried.
The woman was staring at her with a fixed glazed look, and it suddenly occurred
to Frederika that she might be unbalanced. She remembered her vigil, the
preposterous obsessive idea of it, and she cursed herself for feeling the least
iota of fear. Then why had Eddie suddenly become upset?

"Come on. Let's have it?" Frederika said, goading
the woman. "Eduardo Palmero is my lover, my confidant, my friend."
She became suddenly cautious. Surely, this was not a rival. But the idea, now
loosed, disturbed her.

"What is he to you?" she asked, clicking her
tongue.

"I can understand your arrogance," the woman said
quietly. The words were subdued and controlled. She was recovering her poise.
Frederika felt a certain alertness, an anticipation of something unknown,
unwanted. She had been expecting the woman to burst into tears, an
acknowledgment of total surrender, defeat.

"What does that mean?" she croaked. Her voice had
caught, indicating the return of terror, a new fear. She wondered if the woman
had sensed it. Confirmation was quick. The woman stiffened again.

"We seem to be sharing the same commodity," the
woman said softly. What does she mean? Frederika thought. She rose in the bed
and sat up, pulling the blanket around the upper part of her body.

"You really must be sick, you know," Frederika
said. She shook her head and looked at the woman. "And I'll bet you really
believe it."

"Did you think you were the only one?" the woman
asked. Her voice was clear now, decisive. She had regained her poise.

"Frankly, I don't think it's any of your
business," Frederika said. Did she really want to hear more? He had not
told her that much about himself. But was it necessary? Considering what had
passed between them? What she felt she knew about him? The mental barricades
were falling now, all the careful efforts at self-protection. But surely not
this woman. She was older, old. Weird. No, she decided. She is making it up,
imagining it.

"Tell me," the tall woman said, her lips firm
now, the edges moving upward in the direction of a smile. "What have you
done for him?"

"Done?"

"What has he made you do?"

"I do nothing against my will." The words had
spilled out and she knew that she had left herself vulnerable. "You are
quite sad, you know," Frederika said, attempting to retrieve her
advantage, but it felt hollow, and she knew that the strange woman had sensed
it.

"I would do anything for him. Anything he asked."
Frederika was surprised at her own militancy. And her defensiveness.

"Anything?"

"Why are you asking these things?" Frederika
asked, feigning indignance.

"What is he to you?"

Silence hung in the room. Frederika felt the tension
between them now, the odd sharing, and the commonality. It was hate, palpable,
material, a thing that could be touched. She had never felt such an emotion,
not with the same intensity that engulfed her now. The woman is physically
repulsive, she decided, comparing herself, the knowledge of her own youth, to
the faded woman sitting before her. She could detect the beginning of the
wizening process, the body's accumulated wreckage. But she was embarrassed,
because she felt Eddie slipping from her, the image of him changing rapidly,
even as she sat here. She did not want to hear the woman's response. It was
better that she left, that it was ended between them. We share nothing, she
decided. I am having a nightmare.

"Everything," the woman answered at last, her
voice strong, emphatic. "Eduardo is everything. He is my life." The
words came without emotion, controlled.

"That is impossible," Frederika said. "A
woman senses things about her lover." She looked at the woman again, as if
to confirm her previous thoughts about her. "No, it is impossible. You are
doing this purposely. It's a goddamned lie."

The tall woman shrugged. She conceded no victory and
Frederika's own sense of superior knowledge was quickly draining from her, the
stopper removed, water running from an unclogged sink.

"I'm just as confused as you are," the woman
said.

Frederika watched her. "I could kill you," she
said suddenly, the hatred filling her, overflowing. "I could kill you and
it wouldn't affect me one bit. Last week I helped kill a planeload of people
and it ate my heart out. But I could stick a knife in your belly right now, and
it wouldn't mean a damned thing to me, not a damned thing."

It was an admission and she knew it. The thought of Eddie
sharing his body with this woman disgusted her. "And what did he make you
do?" she said bitterly.

"He made me do nothing," the woman said. Then
hesitantly, but proudly, she said, "I gave him money."

Of course, Frederika thought. How else could she have had
him? She had to pay for him. "That is obvious."

"Just as obvious as you." The woman's strength
had returned now. She stood up again, rising to her full height, less stiff now
but still imperious. Perhaps it was the fact of her standing over Frederika
that reinforced the impression. Frederika was looking up, annoyed at the
circumstances.

"He used you," Frederika said malignantly.
"You should not have taken him seriously. If you gave him money, it is
because he needed it for his work, his cause. If you took it seriously I feel
sorry for you."

"I feel sorry for both of us," the woman said
quietly.

"You needn't waste your pity on me. I am his
woman."

"We are both his women."

"You?"

"Yes."

"That is absurd." It is absurd, she told herself
again, but she could feel the tentativeness of her self-assurance. Who is
Eddie? Are we really talking about the same man? A glimmer of hope rose, then
faded as quickly as it came.

"What do you know about Eduardo?" the woman
asked.

"I know what I want to know."

"Yes, I understand," the woman said. "The
question is: Is it important to know? I thought so. And look where that has
brought us."

Frederika imagined she could feel the woman shifting gears,
searching for a new path through this underbrush of confusion. She is seeking
sisterhood with me, she thought, resisting it. I will not be part of it, she
vowed. She wants to use me to share him. The insight bemused her. Never!

"It has brought us nowhere," Frederika said.
"It is all in your head. Perhaps you have been used. But then, Eddie is
involved in dangerous work. It is important work." She hesitated, aiming
the barb. She wanted it to stick deeply into the woman's flesh. "You had
no right to go beyond." Beyond what? Her mind filled with a grotesque
image of Eddie and this woman in copulation, a quivering greedy woman with
hanging, aging skin, and Eddie, eyes tight, pressed against her ugliness,
offering his beautiful body on the altar of sacrifice. But the image lacked
integrity. The woman before her was thin, the skin on her face tight, her
movements lithe. Her hands bespoke a certain elegance, long graceful fingers
gloved in incredibly white alabaster skin. Her neck was not crenellated. The
age was around the eyes, sad with wisdom.