Intimate Victims (17 page)

He walked back out to the end of the hall and looked again through the curtains. No car. He walked back. He sat down and watched an old movie with Jane Withers in it. Of the $15,000, he had ten left — $9,899.03. He brought his hands up and sank his face into his palms. Of course, he would miss her for a little while, that was only natural. It was funny that he had not really missed Margaret once. He had been stunned with loneliness in the beginning, before he had settled in at 702, but never once had he thought of Margaret’s hand on him to soothe him, nor her voice saying anything to comfort him. He had expected that he would miss her. He didn’t — he looked at his watch again, and now he was beginning to perspire. She had often come in much later than twelve when she was with him; Banjo probably had her at some moldy old student hangout drinking beer. Battle always hated going to the student places with her. He always felt miscast, and then, in turn, downcast — it was just never any good when they were out together.

At ten after one he heard the car. He had left his door ajar, and he heard the squeal of brakes as the car stopped short in front of 702. Battle got up and went down the hall rapidly, opened the door, and went directly to the side of the car where Bunny sat.

“Why, Ray? What are you …”

“You’d better come inside,” he said. “It’s important.”

“The children?”

“Yes, the children,” said Battle crazily. His heart was pounding, and as Banjo started to get out his side, Battle pushed him back in. He barked. “This isn’t for you, Scott. You’d better get home.”

“What is it?”

“We don’t have time!” Battle shouted. Bunny was running ahead, and somehow, Battle had convinced the guitar-player. Almost dutifully he saluted Battle with a grave expression, and drove off looking very worried. Battle ran in the house, up the stairs to the second landing, where he caught her.

“What is it?” her eyes were terrified. “Let me get to them …"

“The children are all right,” he said. “I was lying.” “You what?”

“I was lying,” he said. “I wanted you to come inside!”

“Why — you — damn, damn you, Ray, goddam …”

He clamped his hand over her mouth. He said, “Shut up and listen to me. I want to marry you.”

She stopped struggling. He dropped his hand. “I want to marry you,” he said. “I have a job in Canada. An important one. We’ll take Chrissy and Carla, and go to Toronto. You can have your Triumph with the bunny on it and any other damn thing you want.”

“Ray!” Her face began to take the shape it did before she began crying in that terrible way.

“Jesus, don’t cry,” he said. “Don’t make that horrible noise!”

“You want to marry me? Oh, Ray!” She grabbed him around the neck with such strength he thought she would topple him over and down the flight of stairs. She began to cry, trying not to, but there it was. In between those monstrous sounds she was burping, “I l-l-love you, Ray. I really and honestly l-love you.”

“I love you too,” he said.

“Th-thank you.”

“I can’t be without you,” he said. He heard Professor Bullard’s door open behind him; he could feel the old man’s eyes on the back of his neck.

“Oh, Ray, why didn’t you tell me before this?” she was sobbing.

Bullard said, “I had a thing to say, but I will fit it in with some better time. King John. Act III.” He shut his door. “Will you marry me, Bunny?” said Battle. “Oh, natch! Natch!”

“Come down to my place,” said Battle. “We’ve got a lot to talk about.”

“Let me check the kids first and change. Then I’ll be down.” “Hurry!” he said.

He took the stairs by twos, laughing. Why not? He would work it all out! Other men had begun again, and he could. Raymond Battle, and family. He would trust her, tell her everything and trust her; why not? Oh God, she would throw it up at him at every turn, he knew that. He gave his door a smart push with his shoe and sailed in, swinging his arms happily. It was enough for a start. $9,899.03. Plenty. He ran into the kitchen and got out the bottle of bourbon from under the sink. He set out two glasses on a tray and broke ice in the refrigerator. He felt wildly happy, grinning with it and rushing about the small kitchen. “I love you, I love you, I love you!” he said aloud, and he slapped his hands together, laughing. He carried the tray into the living room, and set it grandly on the coffee table, rushed back to the kitchen to look for cheese and crackers. “I love you, I adore you, I’m mad about you,” he said. He giggled and saluted his reflection in the mirror. “Here’s to Raymond Battle,” he said.

At the gentle rapping on his door, he flew across and flung it open.

“Sursum corda!” Harvey Plangman said.

H
ARVEY
P
LANGMAN
stepped inside. He set down a small pigskin suitcase.

He smiled at Battle. “Was für gute Nachstisch konnen Sie mir geben, nicht dick machende?” he said.

Battle simply stared at him.

“That means: what good non-fattening dessert do you recommend? Oh, I’m very good at German these days. I was going to drop out of my class, because I wasn’t meeting any friends in it, but then,” he pulled off his suede gloves and unbuttoned his sports coat, “I decided that if I didn’t go to my German class, I wouldn’t have any contact with anyone. Not a soul. Are you lonesome too, Mr. B.?” He flopped into the easy chair before the television set. “Ich bin am Ende,” he said, “It means, I’m lost. How about you, Mr. B.?”

Battle leaned against the door, listening for Bunny’s steps. He said, “What are you doing here?”

“I came to visit. A little surprise, hmm?”

“I have to go upstairs a moment, Plangman.”

“At this hour? I thought you’d be all tucked in, y’know.”

“Well, normally, but one of the tenants needs — a light bulb.” Battle ran into the kitchen and produced one from the cabinet. “I’m going to take this upstairs and give it to the tenant. I’ll be right back.”

“I’ll be waiting, sir.”

Battle met Bunny, just as she was leaving 3. She was wearing a thin blue nightie with a bathrobe thrown over it, and fur slippers. She was giggling, and she caught onto him and danced him once around in the hallway, while he pulled to be free. She was giggling and jabbering, “I told Mother we’re getting married, Ray, and guess what! Banjo called, worried ‘natch about what’d happened, and I just hung up on him, just dropped the …"

He shook her, unable to control his impatience, and his fear. “Something’s happened,” he said. “You can’t come downstairs now, Bunny. Someone’s come from out-of-town, a business colleague. I’ll explain tomorrow, but …”

“Business colleague?” she said. “Since when?”

“I told you about the Canadian job. I can’t see you tonight, that’s all! Go back inside, and we’ll have breakfast tomorrow. I’ll come up early.”

“Ray, I got all yummied up in my new …” She was opening her robe to show him, and he took her hands roughly and pulled the robe closed.

“There isn’t time, Bunny! Here, take this thing,” thrusting the light bulb at her. “I’ll explain it all tomorrow.”

“Are you off your rocker, Ray?”

“Will you please do what I tell you to?”

“Do you still want to marry me?”

“Yes!” He was nearly shouting. “Please go back inside!”

“All right, Ray,” she said. She was very peeved, the red color coming to her neck. She turned around and shut the door without another word. Battle ran back downstairs. In the living room, Plangman had poured himself a drink.

“You sure you weren’t expecting me, Mr. B.?”

“You know I wasn’t.”

“A tray with two glasses all set up — I’m disappointed. I thought perhaps we were operating on the same wave length, and you had some sort of psychic knowledge I was on my way here.”

“What do you want, Plangman?”

“So many things, really.” He lit a cigarette, exhaled and leaned back in the chair, smiling crookedly at Battle. “You know,” he said, “I’m not surprised any more at the amount you stole from King & Clary. I used to think $100,000 was a fantastic amount, but it’s really chicken feed, isn’t it? Money goes very quickly, doesn’t it?”

“You’re broke. That’s it.”

“I have one thousand dollars cash, right to the button, Mr. B. But that’s broke by your standards, isn’t it?” “Where did the money go?”

“Ha! Ha! Don’t you see the irony of your asking
me
that? Weren’t you the one who claimed you had nothing to show for all you stole? You didn’t spend it on liquor, gambling, other women — none of that. It just went, wouldn’t you say? Well, so did mine go, sir. I spent it trying to buy my way in, I suppose you’d say. You’re probably laughing at me, hmmm? It’s obvious by now, isn’t it, that you were right? I couldn’t buy my way in.”

“I’m not laughing. I’m sorry to hear it.” “You’re sorry I’m back, aren’t you? That’s what you’re sorry about.”

“I won’t deny it.”

“No, I wouldn’t if I were you either. You’ve been fairly level with me; outwardly, at any rate. I liked you, you know. You never irritated me the way your kind usually does. I suppose it was because I had you in a very vulnerable position, and you had no choice but to cooperate with me — but I genuinely liked you, Bowser. Only once did you behave the way your kind does. Do you remember when that was?”

Battle sighed and poured himself a drink.

Plangman sipped his own drink and said, “Back at the Black Bass, during our first interview. I said I was going to buy a Garbieri Canterbury belt, and you smirked. Remember?”

“No,” said Battle. “I don’t.”

“Oh, yes, you smirked. Never mind though, I’m used to it. Adair Trowbridge pulled the same thing on me. By the by, Lois is marrying him, or at least they’re engaged. My personal theory is that they’ll have a very long engagement. I don’t think Trowbridge can even get it up, and I think Hayden Cutler knows it, and that’s why he likes Trowbridge. But that’s another story. Apropos de rien, how come your parents named you Robert? Isn’t that a rather insipid name? I mean, it must have looked insipid in your wedding announcement in
The Times,
with all the rest of your kind having those tra la la names: Adair, Foster, Haines, Justin, Searle. Robert is such a pukey name, don’t you think?” He was pulling off his jacket, and arranging it over the back of the armchair. “Robert — tch! tch! Anyway, Adair Trowbridge smirked at me too. Some days after their engagement was published in
The Times,
I called on him. He raises ferns, by the by — you know the type? He’s just as precious as a silver butter warmer from Tiffany. ‘Plangman,’ he says to me, ‘you’re something of a nuisance.’ And he smirked, you know the type?”

“I’m afraid not,” said Battle.

“He’s your kind. I don’t mean that you’re like him, because in my opinion he’s a limp-wrist, but he’s of your class, Bowser. I mean, he’s one of your gang, you know. Part of the old crowd. Superior. So screwing tra la la above it all, wouldn’t you say? I mean, I’m just a worm or something to your kind. Oh, you know I’m out there somewhere in the dirt — and on those nasty rainy days when we worms are all hanging about on the sidewalks, you have to step over us — but for the most part, you don’t have to have much to do with us worms, wouldn’t you say?”

“I’m sorry things didn’t work out, Plangman. I won’t say I told you so.”

“Are you really sorry, Bowser?”

“Sorry enough. What are your plans?”

“We’ll get to that in good time. I’m an admitted failure, sir. I’ve been humiliated by some of the finest people in the East. Hayden Cutler threatened to call the police if I phoned again. Has anything like that happened to you, sir?”

“No, I can’t say it has.”

“I didn’t think so. Your kind makes out, no matter what. Apropos de rien, Monsieur, your wife is vacationing in Nassau with your mother-in-law. Been there for weeks! You see how it goes, Mr. B? Nothing really affects your kind. You embezzle $100,000 and go scot free, and they hop off to Nassau, hmm? Would you say that was fair?”

Battle stuffed his pipe and struck a match to it, letting Plangman rave on.

“But perhaps you’ve been lonesome, hmm, Bowser?”

“Perhaps. Yes.”

“Have you? No one to talk to and all that?” “Sort of lonesome, yes.”

“Of course, you were free to come and go. By the way, you look very well. I can’t even tell you’re wearing the lenses. You don’t look at all like Bowser.” He poured himself more bourbon, stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray. “Even if you did look like Bowser, you still wouldn’t have much trouble. There hasn’t been anything in the newspapers for months. Not anything! I mean, it’s just as though you never existed — never stole $100,000, never disappeared into thin air — just never existed.”

“The police are working on it, Plangman. Don’t worry. I’ll get it soon enough. Is that what you want?”

“I just want to know why your kind has everything so soft, Bowser? Why would you say that is?”

“I don’t think it is. There’s a matter of initiative … But there’s no point to our discussing it. We’ll never agree.”

“Ah, initiative — that marvelous juice bubbling away inside of your kind. Know-how, hmm? Initiative. Are you born with it?”

“What exactly do you want, Plangman?”

“I’d like initiative. I just don’t know how to go about getting it. I never did. I’m not very good at initiative — not the way you are. I mean, figure it out. I don’t have the initiative to get a job at King & Clary, or any place like that. Now, it stands to reason that if I don’t have the initiative for that, then with or without initiative, I could never embezzle $100,000. I could get chicken-feed out of some cash register, or I could risk my life holding up a bank, maybe, but it’s the rich who get richer. I wonder who said that? I’d bet my last thousand it was a rich man.”

“What do you want, Plangman? Why did you come here?”

“You had plenty of initiative since I set you up here. Right?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, you have a woman, don’t you? I hear she’s my age. A pretty redheaded widow, ah, Bowser? My mother, by the by, is the worst gossip in the state of Missouri. A pretty redheaded widow, hmmm? And my God, Bowser, she lives right upstairs. Now that’s initiative! So is running out of here with a light bulb, so you could warn her not to come down. Ha! Ha! Oh, Bowser, I really honest-to-God envy your kind. Even in hell you’d know all the right people, wouldn’t you? Don’t you just know your kind has probably found a way to make hell cooler for themselves? A redheaded widow right upstairs. I want to met her, Bowser. That’s one thing I want, since you ask.”

“And what else?”

“You see, Mr. Battle-Bowser, my friend, I’ve been alone a lot lately. Oh, not by choice — not my choice, anyway, but everyone else’s. You’d think I had leprosy. I’m not kidding. Wait — let me tell you this. The other night in the St. Regis, I tried to strike up a conversation with this couple. Now, I mean a simple, goddam social conversation. Nothing in it for me! Well, sir, they moved. Picked up their drinks and moved. Has that ever happened to you, sir?”

“They probably thought you were — oh — horning in, or something, Plangman. You just don’t walk up and talk to people.”

“Don’t give me that, sir. You could. I know you could. It’s just me. Me and people like me. Worms. I’ve been thinking a lot about it lately. I moved you know — no, you didn’t know. I was going to write. My sublet was up, so I moved to a hotel. It’s a little friendlier, y’know? Going up and down in the elevator with lots of people — and the bar downstairs and all. People learn your name in a hotel too. “Want a shot?” He poured himself and Battle some whisky. “So I moved to the Dorset, Bowser. I went to the P.O. to file a change-of-address card, and it dawned on me that I’d never filed one at the Columbia P.O. Oh, I know you’ve been very good about forwarding what little mail a worm gets, but I got to thinking, sir. It isn’t a good Idea to have you forwarding my mail. It sort of establishes an intimacy between us, in the eyes of other people. Your handwriting on the letters and all. I got to thinking it might be used to establish the fact I’m an accessory to your little crime, and with my luck, sir, wouldn’t it be like them to get me and not you? I mean, suppose something happened to you — you could drop dead or something — I’d still be an accessory. By the by, I want all my letters back.”

“I didn’t save them.”

“I’ll look around good to be sure.”

“Don’t worry. I don’t want our intimacy established either, in the eyes of other people.”

“Because I’m not good enough, hmmm?”

Battle sighed and didn’t answer.

“To get back to my little story, sir,” said Plangman, sipping the bourbon, lighting another cigarette. “You can imagine my surprise when the Columbia P.O. forwarded a letter from Toronto. It was a form letter, Bowser, thanking me for my cooperation in sending information on Raymond Battle, and requesting me to suggest his salary range … want another shot of your bourbon? You look as though you could use a stiff one along about now.”

“No, thanks. So now you know that too.”

“Yes, now I know that too. Oh, I admire you for it. I’ve always admired you people. I suppose that’s the story of my life, wouldn’t you say?”

“And what do you plan to do about it?”

“I haven’t decided. Oh, money’s part of it, naturally. I figure that you have at least $30,000 to $40,000 on you. I was going to get to that eventually, but since I got this strange letter in the mail, I realized I had to speed up things a bit.”

“There’s nowhere near that sum, Plangman. You’re just dreaming if …"

Plangman waved away Battle’s words. “We won’t talk about it now. I’d like to meet your woman, Bowser. Does she know anything?” “No.”

“Good. She doesn’t know who you really are, hmmm?” “No.”

“Just you and I know — good. Can’t we ask her down for a drink?”

“It’s nearly two in the morning, Plangman.”

“That late, is it? Well … Oh, you don’t have to worry, I won’t expose you. There wouldn’t be any point in it. I just want to see her. It always intrigues me the way you people operate. Is she pretty? Never mind, Mither wrote that she was. And my age about, hmmm?”

“About.”

“So I’ll just visit with you for a few days,” said Plangman, “and we’ll see what we’ll see. I ought to call Mother and say hello. She stays up quite late. We’re not really very close, but we go through the motions, you see. Even she prefers your kind. Did you ever go over to the House?”

“No.”

“Oh, it’s very grand — very grand.” He poured himself another shot. “I’m hungry, Bowser,” he said. “How about a sandwich, hmmm?”

“A sandwich,” Battle agreed, sighing. He got up and walked into the kitchen.

From the other room, Plangman was carrying on. “I was getting bored in New York anyway. I would have come back eventually. Do you know I might change my name? I might. Legally. I was thinking I might change my name and have my face fixed. It’s my chin, in particular. Plastic surgeons can do amazing things these days … Are you listening, Bowser?”