Neither Five Nor Three Read online

  Ettley said quickly, with a touch of pride, “I like his sense of independence. I like the way he wants to make his own name. If he chooses to work on a paper in New York instead of getting his experience on the Clarion, well—I can understand that. I’m not trying to run his life for him. Only, I don’t feel he is happy. Not altogether. Happy with Rona, yes. But in his job? You can’t blame me for wanting to see my only son enjoying a useful happy life, can you?” He tried to smile over this sudden display of sentiment.

  “No,” Peggy said gently, “that’s what we all want to see.” She thought of Bobby, aged five. When Bobby was twenty-five would he resent advice and help? Probably. I did too, she thought guiltily. Ah, well, once Scott was married and had some children to worry about he would begin to understand his father better. She looked at William Ettley, now silent and tight-lipped. “I’ll go and rescue Paul Haydn,” she said, and made her way adeptly through the tight little crowd.

  “Paul!” she said, drawing him away from Mary Fyne and her skiing stories. “Or did you want to stay with the redhead?” she asked him laughingly as they edged their way back towards the window. “Tactless of me. But don’t worry, she’ll be around. She likes strong men with inscrutable faces.”

  “What’s been happening to women’s eyes?” Paul asked.

  “You mean the Eastern touch with black pencil? It makes them alluring, the magazines say. I’m afraid they look to me like the wolf dressed as Grandma... All the better to see you with.”

  “Reminds me of the circus. All they need is some flat whitewash over their faces.”

  “You’ve become a cynic, Paul. Why, once you—”

  “Sure. Once is a long time ago.”

  “Yes,” she said. And she looked at him speculatively. “I’m taking you to meet William Ettley,” she said. “Remember the Clarion?”

  “Why, of course.” He was suddenly pleased. “Is he still the real old-fashioned American liberal?” He was more than pleased. He was excited. And William Ettley, turning to meet the young man (from Mr. Ettley’s point of view, Paul Haydn was very young), felt something of the good will that was offered him. He began talking, quietly, intelligently. And, like Jon Tyson, he knew how to ask questions. Paul answered them straight, admitting frankly when he didn’t actually know about this zone in Germany or that problem of military government. William Ettley liked the way he answered, and his questions became more particular. His interest was now more than that of politeness.

  Peggy Tyson waited for a few minutes, and then managed to slip away. She had to rescue Jon, this time. He always seemed to get stuck with the most predatory bores, generally women who were dashingly unattractive. Once in their clutches, he stayed caught: he was too polite to ease himself away as the other men did. No wonder that Jon disliked cocktail parties. Now he gave Peggy a look of heartfelt thanks as she arrived beside him. “Paul is looking for you, darling,” she said, smiling excusingly to the weirdly dressed woman beside him. If you were to take all the front pictures in the last six copies of Vogue, Peggy thought, and jumble them together, you might possibly arrive at this woman’s idea of what the best-dressed woman could wear. Long earrings, heavily pencilled eyes; a velvet band round her ageing throat caught with a diamond and emerald pin; a nipped-in waistline that resisted hard; stiff taffeta that crinkled and crackled with each movement.

  But the woman didn’t let Jon go so easily. The hat with large clusters of grapes drooping over each ear, emphasising the downward lines of her face, shook with regret and emphasis. “I simply must enrol at Columbia and come to your husband’s lectures,” she said, all of sweet nineteen in her own mind. “He’s such fun, Mrs. Tyson, such fun! I never could be bothered with history at school, but I’m sure he could teach me anything.”

  “No doubt,” Peggy murmured, and left determinedly.

  “In heaven’s name!” Jon said feelingly, once they were at a safe distance. “Where did Rona find that?”

  “You do pick real beauties, Jon. Think of all the people in this room, and you had to choose her.”

  “I didn’t pick her; she just happened,” Jon said, remembering the elderly claw that had laid itself on his arm as he had been talking to a little group of writers. Oh, Dr. Tyson, I’ve been waiting to meet you for so long... He had been turned to stone as if she were the Gorgon itself. No help from any other man, either; they knew when they were well out of it. What made people think that university professors liked being bored?

  “Fantastic hat,” Peggy said. “Did the vintage grapes fascinate you?”

  “All we needed was a wooden tub, and then we could have removed all our shoes and socks,” Jon said gloomily. Then he looked at his Peggy, recovered, and smiled. “Come along, old girl, home for us!”

  “No one seems to be going home—just yet,” Peggy said slowly.

  “No one here has a home to go to. Obviously.” Then he relented, seeing her disappointment, hiding his own. They didn’t get to so many parties nowadays, not with Bobby and Barbara aged five and two respectively.

  “What about a really pretty girl for a change?” Peggy asked, looking in the direction of Mary Fyne’s red hair.

  “I’ve got her,” Jon said quietly.

  Peggy actually blushed, and her eyes laughed.

  Rona’s voice said, “It’s supposed to be against the rules for a husband and wife to flirt in public. But don’t mind me. I like it.” Then her voice became serious. “Poor Jon... Did Thelma catch you? I tried to reach you, then I saw Peggy taking charge. No, don’t look at me like that. She’s totally uninvited. She just—”

  “Happened?” Jon asked.

  “Yes, that’s the word exactly. She arrived with Murray. That’s the round-faced man over in the corner. Talking politics, no doubt.”

  Peggy said, “He’s the man who insisted on telling me about the social significance of the comic strip. Wait until Bobby hears that one! I must say you do pick up some odd friends, Rona.”

  “Oh, he’s just one of Scott’s lame ducks.” Then her voice became worried. “I don’t think Scott has noticed Paul Haydn, yet.”

  “Hasn’t he?” Jon asked with a smile.

  “He’s going in that direction now,” Rona said with relief, as she watched Scott make his way leisurely over toward his father and Paul Haydn. “But what on earth made me ask Paul here?” she added, almost to herself.

  “Don’t worry,” Peggy advised. “A little competition wouldn’t do Scott any harm. He’s much too inclined to think you’re his entire possession.” With that little truth she went off to talk to the television man, and Jon found that Mary Fyne wanted to know if he did much skiing nowadays.

  Rona, still watching anxiously, saw Mr. Ettley leave Paul just as Scott approached them. Mr. Ettley, his back to Scott, hadn’t noticed him. But Scott will never believe that, Rona thought. He felt, and nothing could persuade him otherwise, that his father had never forgiven him for his revolt. And Scott, although he pretended he didn’t care, worried about it. He had a sense of guilt which he would never admit, but it made him—well, not exactly difficult, Rona thought loyally, not exactly difficult but—but a little, just a little unaccountable at times.

  Now, watching Scott’s back stiffen as his father walked over to speak to another group, watching Scott reach Paul Haydn and hesitate, she felt all his unhappiness. Dinner will be awful, she thought in agony; and afterwards, when his father leaves us, I’ll have to face it alone. Then she told herself that even if you were really in love, deeply in love, there was always some measure of unhappiness to balance your happiness whole and unattacked; they lived in a world of their own. But how, she wondered sadly, how do you ever find that kind of world?

  She said, smiling brightly to one of her guests, “Let me freshen this drink? No, I haven’t seen the Ballet Russe this season. How did you like it?”

  * * *

  Scott Ettley watched his father leave Paul Haydn, and his excuse for approaching was gone. Then Haydn, noticing his hesitation, sai
d, “Have a cigarette?”

  “No, thanks.”

  “My name’s Haydn.”

  “I know. Mine is Ettley.”

  “Oh!” Paul looked away from the young man in the grey suit and dark blue tie towards William Ettley.

  “Yes, I’m the son of the Clarion,” Scott said with a bitter smile. “But I don’t work on it.”

  “No?” Paul was surprised by the sense of attack in the short phrase.

  “No.” Scott was looking at Paul Haydn carefully. Imitation Cary Grant, he thought derisively.

  “The Clarion is a paper to be proud of,” Paul said. He was studying young Ettley’s face, in turn. What’s burning into him? he wondered.

  Ettley ignored that. “I hear you’re going back to Trend.

  Paul Haydn lit his cigarette carefully.

  “...taking over Blackworth’s job.”

  “Is that how it sounds?” Paul Haydn watched the intense blue eyes. They might be improved by being blackened. Easy, he told himself, easy now: this is Rona’s party.

  “Yes.” Then Scott noticed the grape-laden hat was coming close, and Thelma’s quick eyes were interested. He forced himself to relax and smile. “I don’t know a thing about Blackworth,” he said, “but I don’t like what is happening to him. It sounds like persecution to me, frankly. Why don’t you ask Murray? He’s been at Trend for the last four years.” He nodded toward the corner of the room, toward the round-faced, heavily built man who was still making speeches.

  “You mean that guy who doesn’t like America?”

  Scott looked puzzled, angry. “You don’t have to wear a uniform to be the only one who likes America.”

  “And you don’t have to go around kicking America in the teeth, either.”

  Scott smiled. “Murray’s been up to his little tricks, I see. He likes to shock people.” He looked at Haydn and his grin broadened. “He seems to have run up a high score tonight.”

  Paul Haydn said grimly, “Sure, I’ve lost my sense of humour. That’s it.”

  Scott, still smiling said, “But what I really came over to tell you was this: when you take over Blackworth’s job on Trend, just keep away from Rona, will you?” There was a savage bite to the last phrase, all the more bitter because of the quiet voice.

  Paul Haydn stared. “Your first name isn’t Scott, by any chance?” He broke into a broad grin and relaxed. “You might have said that in the first place. It would have explained everything.”

  Scott Ettley said nothing. He was standing with a smile on his lips, his eyes cold and hard.

  “Don’t worry,” Paul said, his voice changing once more, “I’ve never stolen another man’s property yet. Goodbye.” He put down his glass and turned away abruptly. He said good night to a magazine writer and a reviewer who had made a date to lunch with him this week, nodded to a couple of friends and promised to see them tomorrow, ignored Murray’s humorous circle, found his cap, and searched for Rona. She was saying goodbye to Jon and Peggy in the hall.

  “You too?” She was polite, a little anxious about something.

  “Yes, I must go. It was a grand party,” he said. “Thanks, Rona.”

  “Come home with us, and we’ll find some dinner,” Peggy said impulsively. “And we’ll waken Bobby and let him see a real live major.”

  “Come along,” Jon said. “We didn’t get much time to talk at the party.” Privately he wondered when he’d get those papers graded tonight. But he smiled at Peggy, thinking she had a heart as big as the Empire State.

  “Not tonight,” Paul said, “but thanks all the same. I’ve been travelling. I think it’s early bed for me.”

  “On your first night home?” asked Mary Fyne in her low voice, as she came into the hall. She took his arm, smiling. “Oh, Paul!” She emphasised his first name.

  I’ve been promoted, he thought. Rona was watching him with a strange little smile.

  “I’m pretty tired,” he said with embarrassment.

  “What you need is a good steak and a bottle of wine.” Mary’s red hair caught the dim light in the hall, her large pencilled eyes glanced at him sideways. “And I cook a very good steak,” she said. “You promised you’d come, you know... Good night, Rona. We’ve had a lovely time.”

  Paul stared, and then remembered to be polite. Jon was watching him with a sympathetic grin.

  Rona said, “Good night, Paul.” Her amused smile deepened.

  All right, he thought savagely, all right. He took Mary’s arm in a firm grip. “Good night,” he called back as they started downstairs.

  Mary Fyne’s pretty face twisted with pain. “Oh!” she said softly, “that hurts.”

  He slackened his grip.

  “You don’t know your own strength, Paul.” She looked at him with that sideways tilt of her head, and she smiled. She leaned on his arm.

  Outside, he dropped her arm and stood irresolute. His anger was leaving him. For a moment, she rested her soft hair against his shoulder. Then she looked up at him, saying, in wide-eyed innocence, “I really do have a steak in the icebox. And I’ve a bottle of wine—at room temperature...” A taxi halted at the corner of Third Avenue. She raised her arm and signalled. It nosed around slowly to where they stood.

  “Look—” he began.

  “Yes, look!” she said laughingly, her hair gleaming bright under the street lamp, her coat falling open to show her neck white against the low-cut black dress. She caught his hand playfully, carried it to her lips, and bit deeply.

  “What the—” he began in fury. She laughed again, drawing him into the cab after her. He glanced up for a moment at the lighted windows above the green window boxes. His mouth tightened and he followed her.

  “Because,” she was saying as she lifted his hand gently and looked at it, “because I like you angry.” She gave her sideways glance, her smile deepened into a laugh. “I like men who get very angry.”

  At the first corner, he leaned over to the driver and said, “Stop here, Joe.” He handed the man a dollar as he opened the door and jumped out.

  “What—” she began, her voice rising.

  “Because I like you angry,” he said. “I like you very angry.” He left them, walking quickly. She called him, but he didn’t look round.

  He went up Lexington and entered the little bar with the neon lights above the door. “Benny’s,” he noticed now.

  The bartender was still polishing glasses. The blonde with the model look was still sitting there with her friend. They glanced at him, but this time they smiled.

  “Getting to be an old habitchewee,” the barman said with a gloomy shake of his head. “What will it be?”

  4

  The party was over. Goodbyes filled the little hall, echoed up the staircase. We had a lovely time. Lovely, lovely time. Rona came slowly back into the living-room, now almost large again in its emptiness. She picked up a battered shrimp from the beige rug, removed an ashtray that had overflowed on to the green and white striped couch, collected half-empty glasses from the top of the little white mantelpiece. The fireplace was filled with stubs and cigarette ash and burnt matches. Only the dark green walls looked clean, she thought, only the walls and the white picture frames and the white and beige curtains now billowing gently as Scott opened both windows wide. She sat down on the red chair right-angled to the hearth. She was holding a couple of dirty glasses in her hand; she hadn’t even the energy left to decide where to put them. Scott didn’t make any move to come to her, to hold her and kiss her. He was still standing at the opened windows.

  From the street, there floated up cheerful goodbyes. Murray’s voice was calling “Taxi! Taxi!” A woman’s voice broke into laughter.

  “Why did he have to bring Thelma?” Rona said wearily. “That over-aged bacchante...” She sighed and then put the wet glasses down on the hearth.

  “Thelma asks him to a lot of her parties,” Scott said.

  “But why repay her at our expense? She gave Jon and several other men a miserable time. Why did
n’t Murray look after her when he brought her here? Why did we ever invite him anyway? Oh, sorry, Scott—I’m just thinking out loud.”

  Scott said slowly, still not looking round, “I’m beginning to think Murray’s a big mistake.”

  “His line is so old! Two years ago, or three, he could manage to get away with it. But not now.”

  “What do you mean?” Scott looked across the room.

  “Just that he wasn’t the least little bit the original talker he likes to imagine he is. He only succeeded in annoying most of our guests.”

  “Because he thinks differently from them? So we must all talk the same way, think the same things?”

  “No, darling!” She rose and came over to him. “I don’t believe two of us in the room echoed any point of view, except in a general way of—well, of believing that right is right and wrong is wrong.”

  “That’s all relative,” Scott said. “Depends on each man’s frame of reference.”

  “I don’t believe that,” she said, “except for the small things in life. You can find them as relative as you like. But in the big things, you’ve got to decide what is right, what is wrong. Or else you’ve no moral judgment, at all. Like Murray. He’s just a parrot, that’s all he is.” She looked at Scott worriedly, unhappily. He seemed to have forgotten that she was there.

  At last he said stiffly, “Sorry if Murray offended you so much. I won’t ask him again.”

  “He made your father flaming mad.”

  “Dad?” Scott’s voice tightened.

  That’s the trouble, Rona thought. Her worry left her, but standing beside Scott, looking across at the lighted windows opposite and the uneven rows of black chimneys sprouting from the flat roofs, she was still more unhappy. She was waiting for Scott to forget all the things that had irritated him tonight, to take her in his arms and kiss her. She said, appeasingly, “Your father was disappointed he couldn’t stay in town. He wants us to have dinner with him next week, instead.”