American Sextet Read online

  He moved his hands up to her shoulder and caressed her ear, moving closer, embracing her.

  "I stuck my neck out for you, Fi." He said it again, this time gripping her shoulders. He bent her backwards and lumbered over her. She could smell the whiskey on his breath.

  "Don't, Tom," she said gently. "Please."

  "I'm entitled."

  She squirmed in his embrace. He pushed himself forward, pinning her with his body.

  "I said no," she shouted.

  Cates was instantly at her side, glaring down at Gribben, who flushed scarlet with embarrassment. He stood up quickly.

  "Spades now." He shook his head. She saw Cates's fists tighten.

  "No," she said, getting up to restrain him.

  "You fucked me, lady," Gribben said, livid with rage. He rushed out of the apartment, slamming the door behind him.

  XII

  A windswept April rain pounded Jason's car. He leaned his head against the edge of the seat and smoked a cigarette. Through the smoke and the droplet-dotted side window, he squinted toward the lights of the apartment. She was with Tate O'Haire. Big Teddy Bear Tate, she called him. He hated the implication of warmth and security.

  All of them now bore her special labels. Templeton was her little toy soldier. Once she had brought a little wooden soldier doll from the store, painted in a shiny blue uniform and a flat pink face with rosy cheeks and round black eyes.

  "Little Eddie," she had giggled, showing it to him. It offended him now, staring blankly from the highest bookshelf in their Capitol Hill apartment.

  She called Arthur the "duck," buying a cheap little Donald Duck charm, an image that belied what Jason knew of him, which was that of a hard, selfish, conniving man. Her perception of all of them seemed distorted by a peculiar prism in which she saw these frenetic, ambitious men merely as mischievous little boys. Could that be what they really were?

  She called her Czech "Checkers," a pseudonym he must have enjoyed, donning alternately red and black bikini shorts in honor of the color chosen. Somehow they made what passed between them into a game of checkers, of sorts.

  "Tonight we do a triple jump," he would tell her, dutifully reported later in a chorus of giggles. Apparently he was able to execute the move as well.

  Senator Hurley was "the whip," hardly an appellation of irony although when she explained it, she became so bent over with laughter she couldn't continue.

  "Whip it out. Whip it in," she mimicked. When she repeated it, he didn't laugh. No. He had discovered that he was definitely enjoying it less, somehow losing control.

  As for "Sally," he could only summon disgust. Sally! How was it possible to weather that impending storm? The man would have to disappear from the planet.

  Enough, he had decided finally. It was time to stop the game, convert the material into commercial forms. The Post, of course, would be the clarion. Webster would watch him, bug-eyed and slack-jawed, as he played the tapes and showed him the various geegaws of proof, the little gifts; the exhibit of Dorothy herself.

  His plan was fully formed now, the marketing effort carefully outlined in his mind. He envisioned a three-part series on successive Sundays in the Post, five thousand words each with appropriate art. That would begin the worldwide drumbeat. Then would come the books, serializations, movies, foreign rights, and collateral material. By then, he was calculating in real dollars, setting prices. A million net is what he wanted for Dorothy. He'd be content with half that amount for himself, part of it to be tucked away in a trust fund for Trey. The rest would be a nest egg for himself, a cushion against any future ass-kissing.

  Perhaps, after the smoke cleared, he and Dorothy would go away. Maybe Ibiza or Sardinia or Corsica. Somehow he had fixated on islands, as if the surrounding water could purify the rest of their lives and keep them safe. He could not envision his future without Dorothy.

  What remained was to confront her with the truth of his intentions, an idea that continued to fill him with dread, especially since an odd element of suspicion had crept into the debriefings. Who was questioning whom?

  "Why do you want to know that?"

  "It's important."

  "But didn't I say it before?"

  "I want to hear it again."

  In the end, she would obey. Then she would come at it again, from a new direction.

  "You don't tell me what they do for you, Jason. I mean, how they help you."

  "Us, baby. Help us."

  "How?"

  "It's very complicated."

  "Sometimes I want to ask them."

  The remark struck him like a blow.

  "Don't you dare," he snapped. "Have you ever mentioned me?"

  "Never."

  "And are you telling me everything?"

  "Everything I can remember."

  "You're not conveniently forgetting?"

  His own suspicion frightened him. Whenever it hit him he would stop the session, embracing her, changing the subject. What frightened him most was the nagging feeling that he was losing control. Could she--had she--grasped all of the implications? All she had to do was follow his directions. He would, of course, assure her of his devoted protection. That would certainly be enough. Or would it? Was there reason to doubt that? Had she changed that much? Developed guile? Lost innocence?

  He hated this nocturnal waiting. He had had quite enough of that, quite enough of seeing her, smiling and happy, bouncing toward the car, as if he were picking her up after an ordinary day's work.

  Tonight, he told her, he was coming in to talk. At that point, he even hated to enter the apartment. It wasn't really his place, just a prop to be discarded after it had served its purpose. Still, he knew she had become attached to it. Had she also become attached to the others? It gnawed at him now. He discovered that through it all he had never quite transcended an underlying jealousy that, until now, had been denied.

  He looked up in time to see the bulky figure of Tate O'Haire slipping out of the front doorway into the rain. Since the downpour was sudden he was caught hatless and without a raincoat. A Teddy Bear? More like a jackal, Jason thought. They were all jackals. The lot of them.

  When he was out of sight, Jason ran across the street and let himself in with his key. She had already tidied up and was in the shower, giving him time to take what he hoped might be a final reflective inventory. The apartment would have to be preserved intact, living evidence, perhaps to be used as a set for a TV documentary. Dorothy would show the viewers around. No, he thought, it was not going to be easy.

  When she came out of the bathroom, she was damp, sweet-smelling.

  "He was so cute. Wanted to stay the night."

  That was another prohibition. Nights were leisure time, his time. She moved to his lap and he smelled her flesh, breathed it, as if it had vaporized. All traces of the others had been scrubbed away. Hadn't she always come to him miraculously renewed, the grime peeled away?

  "I'm afraid we're going to have to say goodbye."

  Having turned it over in his mind for days, he had decided on just those words, a swift body slap. Saying goodbye was her primal fear. He felt her stiffen with panic.

  "Not to me. To them," he corrected, knowing that he had deliberately created the space to save her in the nick of time. Instead of reassuring her, it confused her.

  "To whom?" The frown lines deepened in her forehead and her eyelids flickered nervously.

  "To them." His hand swept the room. "The six wise men." As his contempt for them had grown, he had begun to refer to them as such. "It's all over."

  "Over?"

  "It's the end. We've finished what we set out to do."

  "Finished?"

  "We have enough now."

  "Enough?"

  My God, she was making it difficult.

  "I'm going to make you a million dollars, Dorothy. Would you like that?"

  "A million dollars?" She giggled nervously. "Who wouldn't?"

  "Tell me what you would do with a million dollars." She
contemplated her answer, but he didn't wait. "You know what you could buy? Anything you want."

  "Anything?"

  "A Rolls-Royce. A beautiful house. You could tour the whole world. How would you like to come away with me? To a beautiful island. Just you and me."

  "Gosh," she said. But the frown persisted.

  "That's why we've done all these things, Dorothy. That's why you've talked to me after each time. That's why you made those friends. Now comes the time when it has to end."

  "Is it something I've done, Jason?"

  "In a way," he said, caressing her damp hair, rubbing strands together between his fingers. "Now what we're going to do is write about all your experiences. We're going to tell the whole world."

  He had been watching her face, observing the clean soft skin, the shine in her eyes, where the whites were perfect and glistening, outlined by her thick black lashes.

  "You mean tell other people?" she whispered. Her face suddenly turned ashen.

  "The world," he said gently. "And people are going to pay for it. And pay well. And you're going to wind up with a million dollars."

  "Tell everybody about what I did with them?"

  "It's not meant to harm anyone," he said quickly, the hollowness easily apparent, even to her.

  "All those things I said?" She paused and smiled. "You're kidding me, right Jason? You're not going to tell everybody what I told you."

  "Do you trust me, Dorothy?" It came out abruptly, more like a challenge. Her eyes probed him, still confused.

  "You're my man," she said, barely audible.

  "And don't I always do right by you?"

  She seemed in pain. Why should it hurt so much, he wondered? These men didn't deserve her pity.

  "You just can't tell people," she said softly.

  "It's like show business. Like exhibiting yourself at that bar in Hiram. Nothing more. I'm just going to tell your story. People will eat it up, Dorothy."

  "My story?"

  "You'll be a national celebrity. Everybody will want to talk to you. You'll be famous."

  Why couldn't he just order her, he wondered? Instead he was groveling, pressing for her approval.

  "I can't tell people about the way they do it, about Sally..." She got up and moved away from him.

  "It won't really hurt anybody. Besides, there's something important about it. Don't you see?" He could not believe what he was doing, mouthing moral platitudes as if he were feeding peanuts to some slow-witted elephant. The animal images troubled him. Were they genuine insight, or an illustration of something lacking within himself, a basic sense of humanity. The six wise men were jackals. Webster a fox. Dorothy an elephant. And himself? What was he? A misshapen hyena baying into a moonless sky? He felt disgusted, but he couldn't stop.

  "Don't you see? We'll be making fools of them, showing how their vaunted moral code is a fraud. All their churchgoing self-righteous pontificating about the structure of society, our democracy. It's all bullshit, and we're going to blow the lid off it! So our great leaders fuck in strange and different ways, one step removed from the animals." There it was again. Was this the way self-loathing began, comparing humans to animals, stripped of civilization and evolution? "We'll be telling them that important people are just as human as the rest of us. It'll embarrass them, but it'll also make them reassess themselves."

  It was like throwing darts against a stone target. Nothing penetrated.

  "I can't, Jason."

  Through the obscure softness came the cry of her rebellion. A thousand hosannas, he thought sarcastically. Cause to rejoice. So she had elevated herself from a slab of sexual meat to a deeply compassionate woman. The revelation came like an epiphany. I love this woman, he cried in his heart. And I hate myself for what I must do.

  "People will laugh at them," she said.

  "So what?"

  "I don't laugh at them, Jason. If I did, I know it would hurt them."

  "Dorothy. Do you think that they give one damn about you?"

  "Of course they do. They all love me. They're my friends."

  "Friends? You're kidding me."

  "I respect them and their privacy. They believe that what they tell me is secret."

  He was appalled by her arguments. Couldn't she see?

  "They used you. That's all."

  "They did not," she snapped back angrily.

  He couldn't believe it. Still, it wasn't a complete surprise. It was his secret dread come to life, made real.

  "You said they would do you favors. That's all. I did it because I thought they were helping you."

  "They are. That's the truth."

  Her agitation grew. The color did not return to her cheeks.

  "You lied to me, Jason."

  The accusation was jarring. Hell, he had rescued her from a slag heap. He had the power to make her wealthy.

  "You never told me it would be like this, telling everyone about it." She was shaking her head in obedience to some inner caveat, but there was no mistaking the decisiveness.

  "I don't even know why we're discussing it," he said firmly. "You have no choice. We're going to do it."

  "How can I tell them, Jason?"

  "Tell them?" Was she serious? His laughter was high-pitched, mocking. "You're not going to tell them anything. This is it. We're closing shop." He had that planned well. She would simply quit her job and go underground until he was ready for her to surface. Tomorrow, he decided at just that moment, he would see Webster.

  "Do you mean I'll never see them again?"

  "Christ, Dorothy. You've been playing sex games with six men. Don't you think it's about time you stopped?" He struggled to hold back his fury.

  "But I thought..."

  "That's the problem," he said. "Suddenly you're thinking. What did you think the purpose of all this was? All of this?" His hand swept the air. "It all cost money." He shook his head, as if to edit the new tangent he was following. Money was the least of it.

  "The fact is that it will bring you freedom. Nobody will be able to kick dumb pollack Dorothy around anymore. Do you know what that means? Nobody will ever be able to use you again. Like Jim. Like those men. Like..." He swallowed hard. "Like me." The argument sickened him. Come what may, she would always be dependent, manipulated and misused. It was the only choice she knew how to make.

  "I'm afraid, Dorothy," he said, controlling himself, "that if you don't go along with me on this, I mean be real cooperative, we're finished."

  Her body began to tremble, a paroxysm that he'd never seen before, she was transformed before his eyes. Her ashen complexion turned dead white, the skin tightening over her face. It frightened him and he came forward to embrace her. Her body was cold.

  "I'll never leave you, Dot," he said. "Forgive me for saying that."

  My child, my love, he wanted to say.

  "But it's time you stopped being a toy for others," he said, holding her still, his breath a tiny breeze trying to stir a dying flame. "These men know how to survive. They're shrewd. They'll know how to roll with the punches." Hadn't he convinced himself of that?

  "But why are people so interested?" she said sadly.

  "Why did they want to see you dance naked?"

  "Nobody got hurt. It made them feel good to watch me."

  Was he losing his ability to influence her? Before she didn't need elaborate explanations. But now ... Why couldn't she have tossed them off like turning tricks?

  "Dorothy, it's impossible to be emotionally involved with six men," he said, still holding her, feeling the sweetness of her flesh. She was a miracle, like a divining rod that could seek and find man's pleasure.

  "I truly love you," he said. Sacred words. Had he locked them away for just this occasion? Never once had she told him that. Now he yearned to hear it more than anything he had ever wanted. Say it, he begged in his heart. But she said nothing, seemed lost in thought. He tried to kiss her, but she turned her face away.

  "Must we?" she asked.

  He stroked he
r spun hair, then caressed her face, feeling the moisture of fresh tears. It was the first time he had ever seen her cry.

  "It'll only hurt for a little bit," he whispered. "And I'll be with you no matter what," he added, not sure it mattered any longer.

  Her lack of malice would be an asset, he thought. The public would love her, identify with her ... America's innocent darling. They would look at her as a beautiful fool manipulated by a cynic. Svengali's doll. That, of course, was the real story. The other was simply where the profit was. Writing it was going to be painful as hell.

  "Can I stay here for a little while longer?"

  She got up and moved to another chair.

  He debated for a moment. There was no harm in that.

  "I do love this place. All white and clean." She looked around and caressed the arm of the couch.

  "Fantasy land," he murmured. It was a shock to have discovered that she was capable of another life. More specifically, a life without him.

  "I want to stay here."

  He studied her face, a mask now, no longer as comprehensible as before.

  "I don't," he said, "I hate it here."

  "By myself," she whispered. Again he fought to hold back his anger. You can't take her screaming and protesting into the arena, he reasoned. The entire credibility of the enterprise was at stake. Without her complete cooperation, the thing would disintegrate. He hadn't even considered that possibility.

  "This is ridiculous, Dot." He moved toward her again, lifting her gently. She was as cold and rigid as stone. "Dammit," he muttered, releasing her. Without him, without his protection, his love, she was like a reed in the wind. He sensed that her balance was delicate, her calibrations foreign and mysterious. There was too much at stake to impose his will by force.

  "They're not worth it."

  She had turned her eyes away as if to hide them from him.

  "They're my friends," she whispered, between deep swallows.

  It was the final straw.

  "I'm trying to give you a life," he said, his words spewing out in a great flume of frustration. How dare she do this to him. "You're nothing but a goddamned bitch," he said, his vehemence beyond control. "A goddamned ungrateful bitch!"

  He came back to where she sat and lifted her out of the chair.