Evening in Byzantium (41 page)

“I loved working for you. I was lucky. It was better than any marriage I’ve seen around.”

Craig laughed. “That doesn’t say very much, does it?”

“It says a lot to me,” she said. “The lease for the office is up for renewal this month. Shall I tell them we’re not signing?” She waited for his response, pulling at the blood-red fingernails.

“We’ve had a nice long run, Belinda,” he said softly, “haven’t we?”

“Yes, we have,” she said. “A nice long run.”

“Tell them we’re not renewing,” he said.

“They won’t be surprised,” she said.

“Belinda,” he said, “come here and give me a kiss.”

She kissed him, decorously, on the cheek. He couldn’t embrace her because of the tube in his arm. “Belinda,” he said as she stood up straight again, “who’s going to write out the checks for me to sign now?”

“You can write them out yourself,” she said. “You’re a big, grown man. Just don’t write out too many.”

“I’ll try not to,” he said.

“If I stay here one more minute,” she said, “I’m going to bawl.” She fled from the room.

He lay back in the bed staring at the ceiling. There goes twenty-three years, he thought. Add to that the twenty-one years of his wife. The sentences having been served concurrently.

Not a bad day’s work.

He was asleep when Constance came into the room. He dreamt that a woman whom he couldn’t quite identify was kissing him. When he opened his eyes, he saw Constance standing near him staring gravely down at him.

“Hello,” he said.

“If you want to sleep,” she said, “I’ll just sit here and watch you.”

“I don’t want to sleep.” She was on his good side, the one without the tube, so he could stretch out his hand and take hers. Her hand was cool and firm. She smiled down at him. “You really ought to leave your hair long,” she said. “It’s very becoming.”

“Another week,” he said, “and I’ll be able to play at the next Woodstock Festival.” He would have to try to maintain the light tone. Constance wasn’t his wife or Belinda Ewen. They had to avoid hurting each other or reminding each other of different moments they had spent together.

She drew up a chair and sat next to the bed. She was wearing a black dress. It didn’t look funereal on her. She looked serene and beautiful, the hair brushed back from her broad, fine forehead.

“Spell Meyrague,” he said. Then he was sorry he had said it. It had just come out automatically.

But she laughed, and it was all right. “Obviously you’re getting better.”

“Rapidly,” he said.

“Rapidly. I was afraid I wasn’t going to get the chance to see you. I have to go back to Paris tomorrow,” she said.

“Oh.”

There was silence for a moment. “What are you going to do when you get out of here?” she asked.

“I have to take it easy for a while,” he said.

“I know. It’s too bad about the picture.”

“Not so bad. It’s served its purpose. Or most of its purpose.”

“Are you coming back to Paris?”

“When are you leaving Paris?” he asked.

“I’m supposed to leave in two weeks.”

“I guess I’m not coming back to Paris.”

She was silent for a little bit. “They’ve rented a house for me in San Francisco,” she said. “You can see the bay, they tell me. There’s a big room at the top of the house where a man could work. You wouldn’t hear the kids yelling. Or hardly.”

He smiled.

“Does that sound like a bribe?” She answered herself. “I suppose it does.” She laughed, then became serious. “Have you thought about what you’re going to do after you get out of here, where you’re going to go?”

“Not really.”

“Not San Francisco?”

“I think I’m a little old for San Francisco,” he said gently. He knew it really wasn’t the city he was thinking of, and she knew it, too. “But I’ll visit.”

“I’ll be there,” she said. “For a while, anyway.” The warning was clear, but there was nothing to do about it. “Sweep the town by storm,” he said.

“I’ll try to take your advice.” She was grave again. “It’s too bad,” she said. “Our times didn’t really coincide. Anyway, when you run out of hotel rooms, think of Constance.” She reached out and stroked his forehead. Her touch was pleasant, but there were no sexual stirrings in him. The ailing body devoted all its time to its ailment. Illness was the supreme egotism.

“I’ve been doing something that I abhor these last few days,” she said, taking her hand away. “I’ve been adding up love. Who loves whom the most. My accounts came out cock-eyed. I love you more than you love me. That’s the first time it ever happened to me. Well, I suppose it had to happen once.”

“I don’t know” he began.

“I know,” she said harshly. “I know.”

“I haven’t added up any accounts,” he said.

“You don’t have to,” she said. “Oh, that reminds me—I met your pretty young friend from Cannes. Dr. Gibson introduced us one night. We became very chummy. We had lunch together several times. She’s very bright. And very tough. Enviably tough.”

“I don’t know her that well,” he said. Surprisingly, it was the truth. He didn’t know whether Gail was tough or not.

“She knew all about me, of course.”

“Not from me,” he said.

“No, I’m sure not,” Constance said, smiling. “She’s going back to London, did you know?”

“No. I haven’t seen her.”

“Poor Jesse,” Constance said ironically, “all the working ladies are running out on him. In the future I suggest you stick to one town and pick on women of leisure.”

“I don’t like women of leisure,” he said.

“Neither do I,” Constance said. “Here—” She rummaged in her bag and brought out a slip of paper. He recognized Gail’s handwriting. “I promised her I’d give you her telephone number if I saw you before she did. She’s in Philadelphia, staying with her father to save money. She’s flat broke, she told me.”

He took the slip of paper. There was an address, a telephone number. No message. He put the slip of paper on the bedside table.

Constance stood up. “Your nurse told me not to tire you,” she said.

“Will I see you again?”

“Not in New York,” she said. She began pulling on her gloves. “You can’t keep gloves clean more than an hour in this city.” She brushed the back of one glove with an annoyed gesture. “I won’t pretend I enjoyed New York this trip. A kiss for good-by.” She leaned over and kissed him on the mouth. “You’re not going to die, darling, are you?” she whispered.

“No,” he said. “I don’t think so.”

“I couldn’t bear it if you did,” she said. Then stood erect and smiled. “I’ll send you a card from the Golden Gate,” she said, and was gone.

She was the best girl he had ever known, and she was gone.

He didn’t call the Philadelphia number until the next morning. A man who answered the phone and who said he was Miss McKinnon’s father asked him who was calling. When Craig gave him his name, Mr. McKinnon’s voice grew icy, and he seemed to be delighted to be able to tell Craig that Miss McKinnon had left the day before for London.

Fair enough, Craig thought. He himself would have been no more polite with Ian Wadleigh.

A week later they let him out of the hospital. His temperature had been normal for three days in a row. The evening before he was discharged Dr. Gibson had a long talk with him. Or what passed for a long talk with Dr. Gibson. “You’re a lucky man, Mr. Craig,” Dr. Gibson had said. He sat there, a spare, ascetic old man who did a half-hour of exercise every morning and swallowed ten yeast tablets a day, laying down the law. “A lot of people wouldn’t have pulled through the way you did. Now, you’ve got to be careful. Very, very careful. Stick to the diet. And no alcohol. Not even a sip of wine for a year. Maybe forever.” Dr. Gibson was a fanatic teetotaler, and Craig thought he detected a steely pleasure in Gibson’s voice as he said this. “And forget about working for six months. And you seem to be a man who leads a complicated life—most complicated, I would say.” It was the first time that Dr. Gibson had suggested that he had drawn any conclusions from the list of people who had come to visit his patient. “If I were forced to make one single diagnosis of what produced your attack, Mr. Craig,” the doctor said, “I would hazard the guess that it was not a functional accident or malformation, or some hereditary weakness. You understand what I mean, I’m sure, Mr. Craig.”

“I do.”

“Uncomplicate yourself, Mr. Craig,” Dr. Gibson said. “Uncomplicate yourself. And eat yeast.”

Eating yeast, Craig thought, as Dr. Gibson stalked out, eating yeast would be easy.

He shook hands with Miss Balissano at the hospital door and stepped out into the street. He had told Miss Balissano that he would have somebody pick up his things. He walked out into the sunshine slowly, blinking, his clothes hanging loose around his body. It was a clear, warm day. He hadn’t let anyone, not even Belinda, know that today was to be the day. Superstition. Even as he went out the door, he was afraid that Miss Balissano would come running after him and say that a terrible mistake had been made and that he was to be rushed back into bed and the tube stuck once more into his arm.

But nobody came after him. He walked aimlessly on the sunny side of the street. The people he passed seemed beautiful. The girls were lithe and walked with their heads up, half-smiling as though they were remembering innocent but intense pleasures of the night before. The young men, bearded and unbearded, walked with a purpose, looked everyone in the eye. The little children were clean and laughing, dressed in anemone colors, and darted past him with immortal energy. The old men were neat and sprightly, philosophic about death in the sunshine.

He had made no hotel reservation. He was alone, alive, walking, each step stronger than the one before it, alone, with no address, drifting down a street in his native city, and no one in the whole world knew where he was; no friend, enemy, lover, daughter, business associate, lawyer, banker, certified public accountant, knew where he was going, had any claims on him, could reach him or touch him. For this moment, at least, he had made a space for himself.

He passed a shop in which typewriters were on display. He stopped and examined the window. The machines were clean, intricate, useful. He went into the shop. A soft-spoken clerk showed him various models. He thought of his friend the matador making a selection of swords in the shop in Madrid. He told the clerk he would be back and leave his order.

He left the shop, the future, comfortable clatter of the machine he would eventually buy tapping in his ear.

He found himself on Third Avenue. He was in front of a saloon he had once frequented. He looked at his watch. Eleven-thirty. Time for a drink. He went in. The saloon was almost empty. Two men talking at the other end of the bar. Male voices.

The bartender came up. The bartender was powerful, pink and fat in his apron, and had an old fighter’s broken nose, scarred eyebrows. The bartender was beautiful. “A Scotch and soda,” Craig said. He watched with great interest as the bartender poured the whisky into a jigger, splashed it over ice, opened a bottle of soda. He poured the soda himself, carefully, enjoying the cold feel of the bottle in his hand. He stood looking thoughtfully at his drink for a full minute. Then he drank, with truant joy.

From the other end of the bar a man’s voice said loudly, “Then I told her—you know what I told her—‘Fuck off!’ I told her.”

Craig smiled. Still alive, he took another sip of his drink. He didn’t remember when a drink had ever tasted as good.

Irwin Shaw (1913–1984) was an award-winning American novelist, playwright, screenwriter, and short story writer. His novel
The Young Lions
(1948) is considered a classic of World War II fiction. From the early pages of the
New Yorker
to the bestseller lists, Shaw earned a reputation as a leading literary voice of his generation.

Shaw was born Irwin Shamforoff in the Bronx, New York, on February 27, 1913. His parents, Will and Rose, were Russian Jewish immigrants and his father struggled as a haberdasher. The family moved to Brooklyn and barely survived the Depression. After graduating from high school at the age of sixteen, Shaw worked his way through Brooklyn College, where he started as quarterback on the school’s scrappy football team.

“Discovered” by a college teacher (who later got him his first assignment, writing for the
Dick Tracy
radio serials), Shaw became a household name at the age of twenty-two thanks to his first produced play,
Bury the Dead
. This 1935 Broadway hit—still regularly produced around the world—is a bugle call against profit-driven barbarity. Offered a job as a Hollywood staff scriptwriter, Shaw then contributed to numerous Golden Era films such as
The Big Game
(1936) and
The Talk of the Town
(1942). While continuing to write memorable stories for the
New Yorker
, he also penned
The Gentle People
(1939), a play that was adapted for film four different times.

World War II altered the course of Shaw’s career. Refusing a commission, he enlisted in the army, and was shipped off to North Africa as a private in a photography unit in 1943. After the North African campaign, he served in London during the preparations for the invasion of Normandy. After D-Day, Shaw and his unit followed the front lines and documented many of the most important moments of the war, including the liberations of Paris and the Dachau concentration camp.

The Young Lions
(1948), his epic novel, follows three soldiers—two Americans and one German—across North Africa, Europe, and into Germany. Along with James Jones’s
From Here to Eternity
, Joseph Heller’s
Catch-22
, Norman Mailer’s
The Naked and the Dead
, and
The Caine Mutiny
by Herman Wouk,
The Young Lions
stands as one of the great American novels of World War II. In 1958, it was made into a film starring Marlon Brando and Montgomery Clift.

In 1951, wrongly suspected of Communist sympathies, Shaw moved to Europe with his wife and six-month-old son. In Paris, he was neighbors with journalist Art Buchwald and friends with the great French writers, photographers, actors, and moviemakers of his generation, including Joseph Kessel, Robert Capa, Simone Signoret, and Louis Malle. In Rome, Shaw gave author William Styron his wedding lunch, doctored screenplays, walked with director Federico Fellini on the Via Veneto, and got the idea for his novel
Two Weeks in Another Town
(1960).