William F. Buckley Jr. (35 page)

What was going on?

Three volleys of “official New York” police had come to question her, she told him. “The third was the District Attorney. He told me it made good sense to be completely quiet about me and Huxley and Hyde Park. I told him of course. “I’m not about to circulate stuff that might publicly incriminate Danny. I mean, unless he’s guilty. Obviously,” Barbara Horowitz’s voice trailed off just a little,”—obviously he isn’t.

“I said all the right things, but I did remind the D.A. that I am a professional reporter, and have professional duties too. He clucked an understanding cluck. The D.A. rewarded me by telling me that they were grilling Cutter Malone about the Hyde Park Capital Fund. Danny was with Cutter the whole day, Tuesday, on a hotel-inspection tour of some kind up in Massachusetts, so at least we know they weren’t personally involved. Beats me. How’s it going at your end?”

Henry found it hard not to share with her the stages of hell he had visited. But not yet, not yet. So he answered the finite question. “Very interesting, Simenon. Great talker. Great reader. Not much on imagination, though. I’ll be seeing him again this afternoon, and writing out my notes tonight.” Henry was eager to end the conversation, eager to get back to his work. To thinking. But he needed to say one thing. “Barbara, it would be great if, somehow, you could make contact with Caroline. Just—I don’t need to tell you what to say—at least say this, that I called, wanted to know about her, told you how much I love her, that kind of thing.” And then, abruptly, Henry said, “Call me back if you have any news.”

Barbara did call again, late in the evening, Henry’s time. Henry was alone in his hotel room, typing his notes and translating passages from a book of essays by Simenon and putting off a final moment of self-examination.

“Henny, soon after lunch the D.A. sent somebody to take a long deposition from me about Max. Then the D.A. came back to see me, said the French had been asked to track down Danny in Paris, but he had checked out of the Ritz Hotel. They weren’t saying anything more to me, but a minute ago I had a call from Caroline—yes, I had already called her, as you asked.… She
had just put down the phone with Mrs. Cutter Malone, you remember who
he
is?… Yes, well, Cutter Malone has been arrested, his wife said.”

“On what charges?”

“Grand larceny. They want a hundred thousand dollars in bail, Caroline said, and Mrs. Malone asked if she had any
idea
where in France they could locate Danny because, she said to Caroline, Danny undoubtedly could clear up the whole business.”

Henry didn’t want to prolong the discussion. He told Barbara he’d have to call her back because a cable from
Time
had just been handed to him by a bellboy.

He needed to think
—Henry was perspiring when he put down the telephone receiver. And the instant he took his hand off it, the telephone rang. Henry jumped, as if he had set off an alarm. He reached for the receiver before the second ring.

His voice was hoarse. “Yes.”

“Henry! This is Danny! I promised I’d call you if I came around. Well, I did. And I’m having a whale of a time at the Casino Royale. That’s exactly twenty minutes away from your hotel. You got to come join me! Like old times. We’ll have a late supper. Pick me up at the casino or just go to my suite, 7G—I told the concierge to let you in if you showed up—and call me at the casino from the suite. They’ll know who I am, you bet. By the time you get there they’ll be after me to lend
them
some money, the way I’m doing! What you say?”

Henry found himself saying, “Sure. Sure, Danny, I’ll be around as soon as I can get there.” And then a quick thought. “About midnight. I need a couple of hours.”

W
HEN HE FIRST spotted Danny from behind, leaning over the roulette table, Henry was startled. Danny was wearing a tuxedo, even though formal clothes were no longer required by the casino. He looked suddenly like the young man Henry had known fifteen years before, radiant with energy and poise and life lust. Henry’s eyes peeled Danny’s clothes off, and he stared now at the dorsal side of the ardent collegian smothering his million-dollar whore. Another photograph flashed in Henry’s mind, of Paul Hébert, his head lying in his own blood. His gaze wheeled to the casino bar, with its shaded mirrors, gilt, velvet and sconces. There was the bartender with his red jacket. It must have been on that very spot that Paul Hébert had approached Danny and made the deal. And over there, at the table
where Danny was now playing, it must have been there that the beautiful blonde had raked in her winnings while Danny was dissipating all the money he had.

He thought then of Barbara’s description of the young graduate student from the University of Chicago. “A really nice guy, lovely guy, a scholar who digs like a good reporter and who has bright and funny ideas—serious, a little bit of romance there, he liked to sit at FDR’s desk—”

Henry began to walk toward Danny, who had just ordered a drink brought in from the bar. As Henry got closer, Danny began to gain weight. As he turned to lay down a bet, his chin looked a little paunchy, his hair a little sparse, with streaks of gray.

Henry stepped back.

No, not here. Danny had not seen him yet. He was intent on winning with the turn of the wheel.

Henry backed away, crossed the street and at the Negresco Hotel identified himself as the friend Mr. O’Hara was expecting. He was shown into Danny’s suite. There was plenty of time. It was not yet midnight. He placed a phone call to New York, and then another.

A half hour later a hotel porter approached the American in the evening clothes playing at the roulette wheel. He was given, on a silver tray, an envelope. Danny read it. It was Henry. Danny must join him for that late dinner, already ordered to the suite at the hotel.

Danny had been winning. He could not leave that very second, not until that lovely little silver ball that was circling about the big wheel came to a stop. And yes! It dropped on the Red, which Danny was betting. If it had been so fifteen years ago there’d have been no need for Pauline. On the other hand, that was a stupid thought! He wouldn’t have traded the memory of the night—and morning!—and afternoon with Pauline for, for—a diamond necklace! Danny thought this very funny, as he emptied the glass of champagne. By the law of averages, Henry wouldn’t have to wait very long before the ball dropped into a Black pocket. Like—now. So he lost the final bet.

He had won a mere twenty-seven hundred dollars. But after all, he had spent almost three hours. Divided into twenty-seven, nine hundred dollars an hour; Danny was worth at least that! I mean, ask old Giuseppe, Giuseppe, yousa’ think Danny Badboy no worth nine hundred dollars per hour?

That’s right, Giuseppe, you bet your … Danny collected the money from the cashier, dropped a hundred-dollar note into the slot for the croupier (“
Merci, monsieur, merci du part des employés
”) and accepted a quick glass of champagne for the road. After all, he smiled inwardly, he had to go all the way across the street to the hotel for dinner. He gulped it down.

He bowed deferentially to his game companions. “
Bonsoir, messieurs, dames
,” he said, smiling, content.

D
ANNY POUNDED on the door of 7A even though it was unlocked. He jostled the handle boisterously, up and down, up and down, settling finally for a thump-thump that thrust the door open.

“Hey there, Henry! How are you, brother!
J’espère que tout va bien!
Hey. Let’s have a little gloom-chaser, what you say? Champagne, maybe? I mean, before we start eating—?”

Danny looked about the room. He had expected to see a dinner table set, with the usual Hotel Negresco apéritifs: olives, breadsticks, butter, a little paté. And where were the candles and flowers and the glimmering cutlery?

There was nothing. The suite was as he had left it. Just Henry, seated behind the coffee table with the telephone on it. Like a
fucking judge, Danny half-muttered: Henry with his steno pad. Had Henry emerged from the womb with a steno pad? Danny thought it amusing to imagine this. He guessed that the waiters must be on their way.

“Sit down, Danny.” Henry motioned to the couch opposite.

Danny plopped down. “Dinner not here yet, I can see. You got some champagne coming?”

Henry looked down at his pad. For twenty-four hours he had trained his mind on what he had to do and he knew now the meaning of the metaphor about sweating blood.

There was no levity in his voice. He began to speak—yes, Danny reckoned quickly, even as a judge might speak. The tone of voice was unsparing.

“At four this afternoon, Danny, Cutter Malone cracked; he told the D.A. he hadn’t traveled with you at all on Tuesday, except from the Greenwich Library to the Pickwick Arms Hotel bar and then to the railroad station. He told the D.A. you had gone to Poughkeepsie to handle the problem of the Chicago graduate student. Malone told the D.A. that when you met him, you told him there wasn’t anything more to worry about.”

Danny didn’t move. He simply changed color.

“An hour ago, the court issued a warrant for your arrest. The charge: murder and grand larceny.

“At three this afternoon, local time, I signed an affidavit. Here, in Nice. It says that we drove together to Boulevard Carnot in Cannes on September 6, 1949, that we overpowered the late Paul Hébert in his apartment; that we left him handcuffed and gagged; that as we were about to drive off, you left the car. That you told me you needed to go back to the apartment to retrieve your sunglasses; that you returned about five minutes later. That you were carrying your .22 Colt in your pocket.

“The police have located one Pauline Déboulard. She is prepared to identify the man she gave Paul Hébert’s address to on September 5, 1949. The police files already have a picture of a person she was sleeping with, retrieved from the kitchen/studio of Paul Hébert the day of the crime. A negative you and I overlooked.

“The affidavit I have signed is not in the possession of Inspector Gilbert, the police investigator I’ve been dealing with. He has merely read it. I told him I would turn it over to the police only if he agreed to give me as much time as I wanted to talk with you here, tonight.

“That’s the time I’m using up now. The police are stationed at both entrances to the hotel.”

Henry paused. His exercise had deeply wearied him. He looked up from his notes, a heavy sadness etched into his face. He looked into Danny’s eyes.

Danny’s fingers clutched at the cushion he sat on. His mouth moved, but at first nothing was heard. Finally his jaw tightened. He spit out the words.

“You’re a fucking coward, asshole.”

“I figured you’d bring that up.”

“
Bring that up!
It will hit the
hot wires
, what you did at Arno. You bet, asshole. ‘
Time
Correspondent Henry Chafee/Revealed Coward Under Fire 1944.’ Cover story there? Asshole?”

“Danny. If you want to think about what to do … you can. As long as you want. They won’t come up to take you.”

“Think about
what?
Think about
what
, Henry?”

Henry paused. And then, “Do you really want to go back to New York?”

Suddenly, Danny understood. He looked slowly about the suite. His eyes rested on the little balcony.

“We’re what, eight floors up?”

“Yes. Counting the lobby floor.”

“That would do it, wouldn’t it?”

“Yes.”

Danny looked down at his cummerbund, hooked his thumb into it, and snapped it. A smile broke out.

“I could use a drink.”

Henry walked over to the chest, opened the top drawer, removed a bottle of white wine and a second bottle, champagne. Both had been decorked. He brought out a glass, put it down on the night table by the couch where Danny sat, the two bottles alongside.

“Which do you want?”

Danny pointed with one finger to the champagne.

Henry filled the glass and went back to his chair. Danny reached over for it, raised it to his lips, held it, then, slowly, brought it down again, untouched. He put it back on the table. And spoke now with a strange calm.

“I do see your point, Henry. And I’m, well, sorry about the stuff just now, what I said.… Wasn’t your fault, the Poughkeepsie thing. Though
this
”—he raised his voice slightly, circling his pointed finger vaguely, to suggest policemen surrounding the hotel—“
this
has to be your fucking fault; can’t imagine how, after fifteen years,
the frog police
ran into Pauline, et cetera, et cetera, without you. God knows what put
you
on the trail.

“I think I got to tell you something, Henry. When I plugged that little pimp-gigolo-pornographer—
whatever
you want to call him—I didn’t have one, not
un seule moment
of remorse. Hell, quite the opposite. I remember saying to myself when I held the pistol over his snotty nose: I’ve shot a lot nicer guys than”—the tone changed suddenly, back in the direction it had been—“
I
shot, Henry. You weren’t so good at shooting, were you, Henry? You were too busy in the hospital, being taken care of like a war hero. The only person
you
ever shot was—”

Danny began a ribald laugh. “Yourself!
Henry Chafee!
Decorated for it! Nice touch that, wasn’t it, Henry? You didn’t like it much when I did that. But after all, it was your old buddy who set you up! Just being a little bit
mischievous
—so he gets you a medal for shooting yourself after you refuse to shoot the Nazis. Refuse to act like a man. Like a—”

Danny was distracted. He opened and closed his eyes. He was trying to focus them. He slowed the tempo of his talk.

“No,” he said deliberatively, “I didn’t give a shit about plugging that little bastard. But maybe I am just … just what, Henry? Ah, I am a
sinner!
Your sister—
dear
Caroline. I do love her, in a way. But I have a feeling every time she pours me a gin and tonic she is praying the tonic will
exorcise
me.