The Swans of Fifth Avenue (30 page)

T
ruman read of her death in the
Times.
“Barbara Cushing Paley Dies at 63; Style Pace-Setter in Three Decades; Symbol of Taste.”

When he read it, he had to smile; she would certainly be pleased. For despite her protests, Bobolink had reveled in her image, had worked hard at it, harder than he had ever worked on a book in his life. Every minute of every hour of every day was spent cultivating her style, perpetuating the myth, and he had always admired that about her, even when Jack and others decried it as shallow and pointless.

“You don't understand,” he'd always said, defending her. “She's an artist, like you, like me. She dedicates her life to creating beauty. It just happens that the product is herself instead of a canvas or a sculpture or a poem. What's wrong with that?”

They'd never understood, his artist friends, his fellow authors, the ones he'd met back at the beginning at Yaddo, the dreary, serious souls who couldn't afford lunch at Quo Vadis unless their publishers were paying; his “contemporaries,” as they insisted on being called. But then, they never understood Truman, either. They were jealous, that's all. Envious. Green with it, absolutely emerald.

He knew Babe was dying; hadn't he resigned himself to the fact that they wouldn't reconcile? Hadn't he taken it like a good, stoic little boy? Hadn't he stopped calling, stopped telegraphing, letting her die in peace?

Hadn't he known he wouldn't be invited to the funeral, and had determined to spend that day in quiet reflection in his apartment, surrounded by the things she'd bought him over the years, the antique paperweights for his collection, a painting here, a bibelot there, the Oriental rug in the foyer, the ruby cuff links, the silly, thoughtful little things that amused him, like the scarf printed with tiny little Elvises holding guitars, because Truman had once rolled his eyes and growled, “That boy from Memphis really gets my motor running!”

But when the day arrived, he couldn't get out of bed. He felt crushed by a despair more enormous than his good intentions. He watched those intentions fly right out the window; weightless, fluttering, silly little things, chased away by the rhinoceros that settled on his chest.

So he reached for a drink; the vodka bottle was on the nightstand.

Soon, he'd had enough to enable him to shove that rhinoceros off the bed, throw on some clothes, cover himself in a black opera cloak—and in a corner of a drawer, a flash of color caught his eye. It was the orange flower he'd bought at the market in Jamaica that wonderful, glorious day with her, when the sky was azure, the sun was a luscious golden dream, and everyone was smiling, bright white teeth flashing, the air scented with jasmine and Babe's perfume—what was it again?

Oh, yes. Vent Vert, that grassy, crystalline fragrance.

Truman's hands shook as he picked up the flower, now faded, the edges frayed. He pinned it to the cloak with fat, fumbling fingers; he stuck his forefinger with the pin and sucked the droplet of blood.
Tasteless,
he thought, only mildly curious.
My blood has no taste. I have pickled it beyond its essence.

Then he stumbled out the door, into the elevator, and into the arms of the doorman. He mumbled that he needed a taxi.

“Where to?” inquired the doorman.

“Manhasset.”

“Long Island?”

“Where else?”

The doorman shrugged, picked up a phone, and in five minutes a taxi was at the door. Truman handed the man a wad of cash and croaked, “Christ Episcopal Church in Manhasset.”

The driver pocketed the money and they drove off; once in a while, he looked in his rearview mirror, unsure if his passenger was or was not Truman Capote. The bloated, pink face, the outrageous black hat, black opera cloak, flaming flower—they sure looked like something a fag would wear. But the eyes were obscured by dark round glasses, so he didn't know for sure.

“Hey, are you Truman?” He couldn't stand it; he had to know.

“Yessss,” Truman lisped, exaggeratedly, like a snake hissing. “Yesssss, I ssssure am.”

“Thought so!” And the cabbie left him in silence the entire way, except for when Truman asked him to stop at a liquor store and he said, “Sure thing!” and waited while Truman lurched inside, only to emerge with a bottle of vodka.

“Proceed,” Truman instructed. So they did.

“What's the traffic for?” the cabbie asked, when finally they drew near the church fronting a tree-lined street packed with limousines and Town Cars and cabs. “Is it a wedding?”

“No.” Truman told the cab to stop and wait; then he got out, still grasping the bottle. He looked about, furtively; he seemed to tuck his head into his cloak, like a turtle, and he sank back into the embrace of a wisteria tree. The cabbie rolled down his window; it was hot this July of 1978, and he wondered how Truman could stand the heavy cloak.

Truman, safely hidden, watched as they gathered on the sidewalk in front of the church, embracing, air-kissing, dabbing eyes. There was Diana, the divine Mrs. V, in a fabulous long-sleeved embroidered dress with a dragon-red mandarin collar; there were Betty Bacall, Kay Graham, Kenneth himself, and, of course, all his swans, Slim and Marella and Gloria and Pam and C.Z. Those bitches. Those glorious creatures. Oh, what were they talking about? Were they mourning Babe?

Had they ever mourned him, as he mourned them?

And did they hate him, as he hated them? For being so stupid, so breathtakingly idiotic, as to not understand who he was, after all?

“I
made
you all,” he whispered, the words as tart upon his tongue as his blood had been bland.“You were just
material.
And I fooled you. I fooled you all.”

As he watched them air-kiss and shake their glorious heads—goodness, Gloria's turban was absolutely to die for, he could see the ostrich egg–sized jewel all the way over here!—it was like his ball, all over again, all the same players, only this time, everyone was wearing black. A black ball. And he was blackballed—Truman giggled, and drank more, and his stomach was like a vat of gurgling lava, everything bubbling up and over, and he belched, hiding it behind his hand even though he was across the street and in a bush, and nobody could see him.

And then he saw the casket come out, and Bill was following it, his hands clasped in front of him, his head bowed, and Truman studied him for a moment, silently applauding his performance. The man did look devastated, he'd give him that. He wondered if the bastard would pick up someone at the funeral reception?

But then Truman forgot Bill, and vowed that he never would again think of him, Big Bill, the Great White Father. Instead, he watched the casket, very small, covered in flowers, carried on the shoulders of men he couldn't identify from so far away, presumably Babe's nephews and cousins. The casket was his only focus, and inside it was the very best part of him and he knew it would be buried deep within the ground, and soon it would be autumn, then winter, and snow would fall upon it, covering all traces of the only good thing that had ever happened to him. He heard sounds coming from deep within himself, moans, songs of sadness, broken lullabies, as he rocked back and forth, registering, finally, the loss of love, the shattered romance of it, the tragic ending handed to him by fate and disease.

It wasn't his fault, it wasn't hers. It was simply the universe, deciding to tear them apart, like all great lovers. Romeo and Juliet. Tristan and Isolde.

Truman and Babe.

And it was hell now, knowing that he wasn't invited, wasn't asked to say good-bye, and it was the same old thing, the same well-worn record, played over and over and over, that he wasn't good enough, wasn't man enough, wasn't enough for her, after all. For anybody. Look at him, standing here, crying all by himself, pissing himself, choking on vodka and tears, all alone, again. Still. Forever.

Truman watched as the casket was loaded into the hearse; one of the pallbearers fumbled a bit, didn't let go, and almost found himself dragged into the hearse right along with it. Then the door was closed, the beautiful people slid into their cars—into the backseats, behind their drivers—and the procession left, and Truman still remained, freezing cold despite the sun, a terrifying emptiness in which something cold and brittle rattled around, maybe it was his heart, maybe it was just the glass shards of the last vodka bottle, and he didn't know what to do next; he was Vivien Leigh at the end of
Gone with the Wind,
a tearstained, remorseful bitch.

Oh, Rhett! Where shall I go? What shall I do?

“Rough day, huh, Truman?”

Truman blinked, squinted his eyes; the cabbie was in front of him.

“That's not the line, darlin'.”

“Huh?”

“Never mind.”

“Let's go home, huh, Truman? You don't look so good.”

“Neither do you,” Truman retorted, but it wasn't malicious; he hiccuped, shook with drink and loss and grief, and allowed the cabbie to fold him back into the car.

“Let's go home, chum.”

As the yellow cab turned around in the now-empty street, Truman leaned back, dizzy and suddenly drenched in heat and sweat; he threw off the black cloak, crushing the flower beyond repair. He closed his eyes and slept.

An hour later, he opened them; they were on Fifth Avenue.

“Tell me,” he cooed, rubbing his eyes, “are you single?”

The cabbie's eyes met his in the rearview mirror; there was a flicker of interest that Truman had seen all his life in men of the heterosexual persuasion who suddenly found themselves propositioned by a celebrity.

But then the cabbie flashed an apologetic grin and said, “Nah.”

“Pity,” Truman replied, closing his eyes, resigned to his loneliness now and forevermore.

And then he took another drink. Because that's what Mama would want him to do.

“
I
HALF EXPECTED
T
RUMAN
to show up,” Pamela whispered, and though everyone leaned in to hear, they were not accosted by her bosom, as she had covered it up with black Italian lace for the solemn occasion.

“If he had, Bill would have thrown him out himself.” Gloria sipped the impeccable wine that Babe had chosen for the occasion, her favorite Pouilly-Fumé de Ladoucette.

They were at Kiluna, surrounded by Babe. In every flower, every white-jacketed waiter, every elegantly folded napkin, every soft note of music playing from the outdoor speakers, even the birds chirping, the scent of freesia, lilies, roses everywhere—she was there.

The women were seated together; their husbands surrounded Bill, a silent ring of wealthy and powerful bodyguards, protecting him from something, something none of them could recognize, but there was a threat, nonetheless; they sensed it.

And the threat was female, had they been able to think clearly; already there were anxious women circling, hovering, waiting to have a sympathetic word with the new widower, to assure him they were there for him, would be happy to console him in his grief with a quiet dinner, just the two of them, some evening when he was up to it.

“Babe wouldn't have minded, I don't think, if Truman had been there,” Slim said, and the others gasped in shock. “No, really. Do you know what she said, before she died?”

“Nothing about him, at least not to me. You know, I saw her the day before,” Gloria said icily.

“I saw her the evening before,” Pamela pointed out.

“I was in Palm Beach,” C.Z. said glumly. “But I telephoned that night.”

“Anyway,” Slim interrupted. “She told me that she had betrayed Truman, and not the other way around.”

“No!” All four gasped.

“Yes. She said that he'd thought we loved him, and that if we really had, we'd forgive him anything. That he was trying to test us, to see if we did, after all. And so we failed him.”

“I never said I loved him!” Gloria was aghast, she began to twitch all over. “How dare he? He was amusing, that's all. Amusing, for a while. Talented, yes, of course, once upon a time. But no longer. And—not to speak ill of the dead”—she crossed herself vehemently—“but Babe is—was—an idiot, a softhearted idiot, to think any differently. He betrayed us.
Finis!
”

“You know how I feel about it all,” C.Z. drawled, and everyone else stiffened in preparation, for they did know. “You have only yourselves to blame, not Truman. I think he's a helluva lot of fun—well, not lately, but back then, although he did bring me to that Studio Fifty-four thing, which was exciting, but I wouldn't go back—but the point is, I never told him anything important. Not a thing. I kept it all fun and light with him, and so he had nothing to use. You all should have done the same.”

Slim, observing Gloria's neck begin to tense, her fingers fumble with the cutlery, hissed a warning: “Remember what we're here for, girls. We're here for Babe.
For her.
I shouldn't have brought it up. Never mind.”

Gloria rose from her chair, stretched a little, balancing on the tips of her toes. Something in her knee popped, though, so she sank back down.

“In a way, Babe was the lucky one,” she said, staring into the water glass, sensing the clouds begin to gather, soon to crowd out the sun.

“Oh, Gloria! What could you possibly mean?” Marella shook her head.

“She was only sixty-three. She got out with her beauty still more or less intact.” Gloria smiled ruefully. “She didn't have to grow old. Hellishly old.”

No one said anything, although each glanced at her own hands, then the hands of her friends, and where they once silently compared rings and jewels and bracelets, now they compared veins and wrinkles and dark spots.

“How long do you think Bill will last, before remarrying?” C.Z. nodded toward Bill, surrounded by his friends, his children. He looked dazed; he was eating a plate of Babe's marvelous food, but methodically, not with his usual gusto.