Fury on Sunday (2 page)

Once, when McCarran had shoved Vince so he fell down on the icy wet floor, Harry had stepped quickly through the stinging sprays of water to spin McCarran around and drive his beefy fist into the Irishman’s stomach. Then Harry had leaned over and helped Vince up and pretended to lose balance, pulling Vince’s wet body against him.

Vince re-focused his eyes on the glass held before him. Even breath drained from his thin nostrils.
That’s it
, he heard the whisper in his brain,
control your breath. That shows you’re sane. No matter what happens you’re going to get out of here
.

“Drink up, Vincie boy. Good for you. Puts hair on ’em.”

Vince didn’t take the glass. He knew he should drink to set Harry at ease. Yet he knew he mustn’t touch it. Vaguely he recalled a time when that same dark liquid had stultified his brain and his reflexes.
That was the night of the big party, he remembered, the one Stan threw after the concert at Carnegie. And Jane had taken him into the bedroom with her. No, drink was bad: he mustn’t drink because he had no escape.

“I said drink, Vincie boy.”

Vince shook his head, smiling.

Harry’s face went blank.

“You’re not drinking, boy?” he said flatly.

Vince stared at him. He felt his heartbeat catch suddenly.

Then a cry broke from his thin lips as Harry grabbed him by the hair and jerked back his head. Vince clamped his teeth together before Harry could pour in the whiskey. He could smell the nicotine breath of the big nurse, and the red face blotted the ceiling from sight.

“I said
drink
, you dirty little bastard!”

Vince twisted away with a whine and Harry, strangling on a curse, flung the contents of the glass in his face. Vince gasped and blinked as the whiskey burned in his eyes. Tears sprang from beneath the lids to mingle with the drops of whiskey on his face.

Harry shoved him onto his back.

“Awright, damn it,” he growled, “cut the crap. I know what you are so
cut
it!”

Vince tried to sit up, but the nurse, with one hand, pinned him down by the throat. Vince forgot his plan completely. He started to thrash violently on the bed forgetting everything but the wild need to escape. He clawed at Harry’s eyes and his nails scraped across the hot forehead. Harry cursed and something hard exploded against Vince’s jaw. The sound of Harry’s breathing flooded away and, when he tried to open his eyes, the red face was hazy before him.

“You want to fight, huh?” the words came through a fog. “Don’t you know you ain’t foolin’ me? You ain’t foolin’ Harry for one minute,
Vincie
boy. I know you like it. Don’t you, boy,
don’t
you?”

Vince jerked away from the whiskey-laden breath. He whimpered in fright and a voice crackled in his brain.

Dear boy, do go to the bathroom and wash off your face. You look positively bizarre
.

Harry’s hands started to move over him. The pain in Vince’s jaw made him groan. His struggles began to weaken. Then he shuddered
violently as Harry started to unbutton his shirt. The moan in his throat rose in volume.

“Aah, shut up, boy! You know you like it.” The red face leaned close and the obscene breath covered Vince’s mouth and nostrils.

Vince closed his eyes. All he could think of was three words. They drummed into his brain again and again.

When it’s over, when it’s over, when it’s…

***

He opened his eyes. The sound of bubbly snoring filled his ears. He sat up quickly and slid his bare legs over the side of the bed.

He stood looking down over Harry. On his flesh he still felt the bruises and teethmarks. As he stood there, breathing evenly, his hands moved on his stomach as if they were rubbing off something.

His mouth tightened. Well, it
was
over now and he was one step closer to freedom. His plan had worked. Harry was dead drunk. Vince had seen to that. He’d needed an advantage and now he had it. Smiles and touches had made the male nurse drink all of the whiskey, leaving Vince clear-headed and strong.

Now he reached out as if he meant to start the opening chords of the Rachmaninoff Second. But instead of music he drew an empty whiskey bottle to himself. He stood there motionless over the bed, looking down. Then, with a sharp motion, he broke the bottle in half across the table edge. Harry stirred and mumbled to himself and Vince heard someone screaming in his brain,
If you dare touch his hands, I swear to God I’ll kill you!

Vince leaned over Harry, his eyes glittering in the light of the bedside lamp. He rolled the bottle neck in his fingers. Then, abruptly, the color drained from his face and a trembling pulled back his lips. He tapped Harry on the shoulder.

“Wake up, Saul,” he said.

And, when the sleep-thickened eyes fluttered open for a second, he raised his arm and drove the jagged glass edges straight down into them.

Bob looked up from his work as the kitchen door swung open and Ruth came in carrying a tray with sandwiches and milk. She was wearing her pink quilted robe and her blonde hair was drawn back in a ribbon-knotted horse’s tail. She smiled at him as she moved across the rug.

He put down his blue pencil.

“Honey, you should be in bed,” he scolded her.

“If you can work until one o’clock Sunday morning I can stay up to feed you.”

She set down the tray on the card table over the sheaf of papers he’d been working on.

“There,” she said.

He smiled tiredly and stretched.

“You look cute,” he said.

She leaned over and kissed him on the nose.

“That’s for flattery,” she said.

She got the hassock by the chair and drew it up to the table. Then she sat down on it and smiled up at him. A slight yawn parted her red lips.

“There, you
are
sleepy,” he said. “You should be in bed.”

“You’re sleepy too,” she countered. “Are you in bed?”

“I am the wage earner,” he said. “The bread-winner. The proletariat.”

“Eat.”

He picked up a sandwich and bit into it.

“Mmmm. Good,” he said.

“How’s the work coming?” she asked.

“Oh, pretty good, I guess.”

“Almost finished?”

“Just about,” he answered. He sighed and reached for the glass of milk. He took a sip and put it down.

“I’m sorry we had to miss that dance,” he said.

“Oh, don’t be silly,” she said. “Anyway—I guess I won’t be gallivanting around much any more.”

He grinned and patted her warm cheek.

“Little mother,” he said.

Then he leaned over and kissed her on the mouth.

“I take mustard,” she said.

“How romantic.” He yawned again.

“I bet you say that to all the expectant mothers.”

“Not all.”

“All the girls then.”

“Only those I love,” he said.

“That would be—” she estimated, “Ava Gardner, Lana Turner…”

“Marie Dressler.”

She made a tiny amused sound.

“How about Jane?” she said. “She’s a hot number.”

“She’s an odd number,” he said. “All she has is a body.”

He grinned at her. Her face had fallen a little.

He knew what was bothering her. Ever since Ruth had become pregnant she would keep looking in the mirror, searching for signs that she was getting fat. It bothered her. She always liked to look her best for him.

“Well…” she said.

“Honey, you know you’re the only one.”

“She
is
sort of pretty,” she said.

“Who, Marie Dressler?”

When she didn’t answer he pulled her hair gently.

“Now cut it out,” he said.

She took his right hand and pressed it to her cheek. “I’m sorry,” she said quietly.

“Okay.” He finished the sandwich. “Speaking of that,” he said, wiping his fingers on the napkin, “when is Stan going to wise up?”

She shrugged.

“I don’t know,” she said. “Poor Stan.”

“Well,” he said, “he made his own problem. He knew what she was before he married her.”

“He never should have married her.”

“That is the observation of the week,” he said.

“I guess he still wants her, though.”

“The world is strewn with the remnants of men who wanted what they shouldn’t have had.”

She looked at her hands. “I suppose so,” she said.

“He just ain’t her speed,” he said.

“Oh, he’s not that old.”

“Stan is forty-six and Jane is twenty-five. He’s no Gregory Peck and she’s a good looking woman.”

She shook her head again.

“It’s a shame,” she said.

“Sure it’s a shame. Hey, aren’t you having some of this food?”

“No, I’d just get an upset stomach,” she said, “You know about ladies in my condition.”

He stroked her cheek once and smiled affectionately at her.

“What’ll we call him?” he asked.

“Him. It’s decided already?”

“Sure. A son for the McCalls.”

She sat there smiling to herself.

“Maybe,” she said.

He leaned over and kissed her.

“Love ya,” he whispered in her ear.

Then he straightened up, selected a cookie and bit into it.

“What was we talking about before we smooched?” he said. “Oh, yeah, I remember. Why Stan still hangs on the ropes.”

“I don’t know.”

“He ought to ditch her. She’s going to drive him out of his mind.”

“You think it’s that bad?”

“Sure it is,” he said.

He smiled at the look on her face.

“I know, I know,” he said. “You went to college with her and she’s always been your friend. Well, you can’t live in the past. Let’s face it, she’s a nympho. She’ll sleep with anybody.”

He reconsidered.

“Except maybe her husband,” he amended.

“Oh, she can’t be that bad. I won’t believe it.”

“Honey, anybody that would try to seduce Vince
must
be that bad.”

Ruth looked down at her hands again. She thought about Vince for a moment. Vince, so young and so eager. And so damned.

“Poor Vince,” she said. “It was a pity.”

“I know,” he said, “Well, Vince I can feel sorry for. That father of his.”

He shook his head. Then he smiled cheerfully at her. “Come on, let’s get off the subject. How about a brief discussion on a name for our seven-month-distant heir?”

“Don’t you have to work?”

“Oh, I can finish up in the morning. Right now I want to relax with my wife for a while.”

A look of pleasure crossed her face. He got up and helped her to her feet. They walked over to the couch and she sat down. Then he went over to the record player, put on a record and came back to the couch. As he sat down and put his arm around her the first strains of Ravel’s
Daphnis and Chloe
filled the room.

Ruth cuddled close to him and lay her head against his shoulder.

He reached down and patted her stomach.

“Comfy, Guiseppe?” he asked.

“Is that what we’re going to call him?”

“Sure,” he said. “Guiseppe McCall; that’s a fine name.”

“Guiseppe McCall,” she said. “It has a ring.”

They sat in silence awhile, listening to the music and thinking about their coming child. While she listened and dreamed, Ruth looked up at her husband’s face, at his silky blonde hair, his straight nose, the strong chin line. She wanted to reach up and touch his slight beard. Emphatically, her right hand twitched in her lap and she made an amused sound to herself.

“Hmmm?” he asked.

“Nothing.”

Nothing, she thought, it was a good deal more than nothing. It was rapidly coming to the point where she adored him.

Sometimes she thought that maybe it was the child, maybe it was an instinct for love and protection in a needful time. But then she knew she’d felt this way before she’d become pregnant too; pregnancy had only made it worse. Or better.

She was afraid that sometimes it was too obvious. She dreaded making a pest of herself; men never loved that kind of clinging woman, she was sure. And yet there wasn’t a single detail of him that didn’t fascinate her. She watched him dress, admiring his tall, muscular body, paying minute attention to each motion he made. Each morning she did that until he was dressed. Then she would rush into the kitchen and make breakfast.

She liked to watch him eat, enjoying the relish he gave each meal. She liked to watch him when he worked sometimes after office hours, bringing his briefcase full of papers to set out on the card table. She even liked to watch him shave; that’s how bad it was. Watching him do everything gave her the feeling of absorbing him completely, every detail of him. It gave her a strange yet certain feeling of safety; as if she belonged to him and was protected from all bad things.

She sighed and pressed against him.

“Now what are we going to call him?” Bob asked.

“Who?” she asked.

“Our son.”

“Mary?” she suggested.

“Not tough enough,” he said, “What about George?”

She shook her head. “Uh-uh.”

“Max?”

“Nope.”

“Sam, Tom, Bill, Phil, Jim, Len, Vince—oops, sorry, slip of the tongue.”

She didn’t smile.

“Wonder where he is,” Bob said.

“I don’t know,” she said.

She felt the other feeling now; the one that came whenever something was discussed that seemed to mar their happiness. It was silly to feel that way, she knew, as if she wanted to wear blinders or be like that sundial. What was the statement that went with it?
I record only the sunny hours
. Well, that was really silly. There was a lot of night in the world too.

But, at least, you didn’t have to think and ponder about things that were all over with. There was only one person who could let her past with Vince hurt them and that was her. She mustn’t dwell on the past, as Bob said.

“God, I’ll never forget that afternoon up in the agency,” he said, “It was—crazy.”

“Don’t,” she said.

“All right.” He smiled and kissed her cheek.

They sat listening to music some more. He tried to forget it but the memory of that scene stayed with him. Sometimes he would jolt up from the bed in the middle of the night, reliving it. The thunder storm, working alone in his office after a bad afternoon, and then, to top it all off…