Chapter 12

GINNY BENNETT said in the darkened bedroom, "What luck, our running into Alice and you. We'd made no other arrangements, and if we hadn't met you two, I would have spent a loveless night."

Exploring her body, Al asked disinterestedly, "Why a loveless night?"

While her husband had gone with Alice to her apartment, Ginny had brought Al to the couple's handsome, sprawling rancher in the neighborhood. She had taken him to bed immediately. They now lay together in casual intimacy, their naked bodies entwined. Once again Al had a sense of unreality-that he had somehow been separated from the world into which he had been born.

Ginny said, "For the simple reason that my very manly husband is losing his powers. I've been his wife-his third-for only two years. We first met because he needed variety to keep from being entirely impotent. And he lives in dread that one day soon he won't be able to make love to any woman."

"That's why the two of you are on this lack?"

"That's why."

"You could get a divorce."

"Why? I don't dislike Clyde-and I've got it made as Mrs. Clyde Bennett. Money, social position-all the rest. I'm not going to throw that away. And after Clyde has been with another woman-I'm often still fresh to him. Or he's regained self-confidence. I don't know all the answers. But this works for us."

"And your running into Alice and me wasn't entirely accidental, was it?"

She made a face. "All right-I'll confess. I sent Alice an SOS. Clyde needed her. And, for his sake, I need you. Now, love me right," and welded her mouth to his.

Al loved her as well as he knew how-and it seemed to do the trick. Ginny responded with feline ferocity. She squirmed, writhed. She arched her body. She clawed at his back, made breathy, hissing sounds. She sank her teeth into his shoulder and chest. She gasped, whimpered, groaned. And when she reached full rapture her throat exploded with sound and her body was wracked with convulsive spasms for long intervals afterward.

When Al felt it was time for him to leave, she said mournfully, "If I did dare free-date, you'd be the guy. Does Alice give you a long leash?"

It was Al's turn to grin. "Only what the rules permit."

He drove Alice's convertible back to town. Dr. Bennett had left the duplex. Alice was again in robe and slippers with a drink in her hand when she admitted him. He greeted her and went to the bar. He poured himself a double whiskey and added a little soda. He was acquiring a taste for the hard stuff as a steady diet.

Taking a swallow of the drink, he reflected he had to find a way to start squeezing some loot out of this situation. Somehow he had to get Alice to want that divorce-and a big settlement or alimony. How was he going to reach that goal? He had not even been able to jar her loose from that anemic jerk, Earl Somers. He had agreed to tonight's partner-swap so readily, without consulting her, partly from lingering resentmerit of her desertion of him during the last two nights-but partly from an instinctive urge to make her jealous.

But Ginny had told him that tonight had been previously planned. So where did that leave him now?

Alice came to sit on one of the four stools at the bar.

She asked, "Well-how did you hit it off with Ginny?"

He decided to try a new tactic. The thought came to him that she might not have made out too well with Clyde.

"We hit it off fine," he said. "That babe is starved for love. I've a hunch she could be free-dated."

Alice gave him a frowning look. "None of that, my friend," she said sharply. "That's not how the game is played."

"You free-date Earl."

"That's different. My husband isn't a member of our little friendship club-and you're not filling in for him. Not yet, anyway. I simply date you as I date Earl. You free-date Ginny-and you'll make trouble for her and yourself."

"I didn't say I was going to, did I?"

"The idea occurred to you, though."

He drank again, then said, "How did you hit it off with the doc?"

Alice gave an eloquent shrug. "So-so. He's not all that he probably used to be. But he's nice." Her amber-flecked brown eyes studied Al intently for a moment. Then: "I think you're going to make it. You're getting over wanting to be just my guy." She laughed. "But don't get too much over it."

He slipped a hand inside her robe, caressed her thighs. "I'm going to be just the way you want me to be. Do I stay tonight-or go?"

She said, "Ginny must have given you a time. You don't care one way or another about me tonight. But you're staying, of course." She finished her drink, set the glass down. "Right now," she said, making it an order.

Al followed her up the stairs. He was beginning to find the weaknesses in the rules this crazy clique followed. After two nights of Earl and a sampling of Clyde, Alice wanted him tonight. Physical fulfillment was still the basic rule of life-all others, whether conventional or unconventional, were simply trimmings. He would show her tonight what a man was.

He took her roughly at first, barely giving himself time to recover from Ginny. Alice protested-then caught up with him almost desperately and he sensed how badly she had needed the change from Clyde. And this time, when it was over, it was she who grew possessive, not wanting him to leave.

And tonight he exercised a different land of dominance from that of their first time together. He teased and tormented her until she grew angry and asked him to leave. Then he took her again and forced fulfillment on her.

When he started to leave she said abruptly, "Don't go-" and he thought he had won at least the first stage of the battle.

He lay down again, asked, "Why not? I'll see you tomorrow, won't I? We can have the whole day to do anything we like."

"I'm invited to the mountains."

He was surprised.

"Are you taking Earl with you?"

"No, I'm not. Nor any man. It's not to be that kind of a day."

"It seems a waste of a Sunday."

Alice laughed. "It does, doesn't it? But it can't be helped. My friends invited me weeks ago. I can't beg off at this late date. But don't despair, lover. We'll double-date with Mike and Greta again Thursday evening."

"What's a guy to do until then?"

"See his wife-or free-date," Alice said. "I don't own you any more than you own me. I'm not going to be possessive toward you. Now, darling, would you mind awfully if I got some sleep?"

The dismissal surprised him. But he accepted it. He realized he was going to need all his patience.

Janice Kirby awoke unwillingly that Sunday morning. She hated to face the day. She lay for a while thinking of how empty the day would be. All her days were empty-she seemed somehow to be drifting through a nightmare she could not control. She was caught in a situation she had not asked for-and one that seemed to have no satisfactory resolution.

She missed Al terribly-and yet did not want him as he was today. Rather, her longing was based on the early days of their marriage and on the vague plans she had then made for both of them-of a normal life, eventually a home with children.

Now her only escape from a shattered reality was her affair with Jay. He continued to be kind, gentle and loving. But he could not give her what Al had taken away.

Two facts came to her mind as the last cobwebby strands of sleep cleared. One, she would not be seeing Jay tonight. Two, she should get in touch with Al.

Not having to see Jay was something of a relief. His making her the object of a tender, worshipful love had to be false. She was-had been from the start of their relationship-a cheating wife. Also, she was too earthy a woman to get permanent pleasure from being treated like a goddess. And she could never feel comfortable with Jay. She simply was not on his level, socially or intellectually-and no true companionship had developed between them. They were simply lovers. Nothing bound them together except their love-making. And in that, Janice felt, he was getting the better of the bargain. He felt no guilt, needed no more from her than their secret hours.

In this moment of self-analysis, she knew she needed more. She needed companionship at her own level-and she still wanted those things she once had assumed marriage would automatically bring her.

Before any resolution of her problems was possible she had to have a showdown with Al.

She called Bill Norris, Al's boss, at his home.

"This is Janice Kirby, Mr. Norris," she said. "As you no doubt know, Al has been living apart from me. I don't know where he is and I've got to get in touch with him. It's very important."

Bill Norris said, "I was sorry when I heard Al had moved out." He gave her a number to call.

"Thanks so much, Mr. Norris."

She delayed calling for a moment, reluctant to humble herself. Finally she dialed the number Bill had given her.

Al sounded as though he had been awakened by the phone. His voice was impatient, gruff.

"Well, what do you know-my better half hasn't forgotten me. What's on your mind, baby?"

"I've got to see you, Al. It's important."

"What is?"

"I'll tell you when you get here," she said. "How soon can you make it?"

He was slow in replying to that. When he did, he said, "I'm not going to make it. You got something to say to me come here and say it." He gave her an address and room number. "Make it three o'clock. I'm not out of bed yet. I've got to shower and shave, then go out for something to eat. See you then, baby."

"Al, I won't go there. I want you to-"

The line was dead. He had hung up on her.

She told herself, swore to herself, that she would not go-would not humiliate herself. At the same time she knew she must. She had no choice. She went at once to her bedroom to dress. Angry though she was-or perhaps because of her anger-she dressed with care. She put on a tight green sheath, white pumps, chose white accessories. The combination became her. She gave herself a careful inspection in the full-length mirror. Jay, she decided, would have said she looked lovely. But she was not going to Jay. She knew an instant of indecision. Would Al like her-or hate the way she looked? Had her association with Jay left a subtle imprint on her that she herself did not recognize?

Then she thought that whether Al liked her or not might not make the slightest difference in the showdown she planned.

She went by taxi and promptly at three o'clock entered the rather shabby lobby of an ancient and third-rate hotel. A couple of elderly men sat in lounge chairs in the lobby. The desk clerk looked up from a racing form and eyed her with curiosity as she crossed to the single elevator, an antique affair with its operator, a colored man, dozing on a stool.

"Third floor, please."

"Yes, ma'am." He, too, eyed her with curiosity as he got up from his stool. "Third floor. Yes, ma'am."

I'll never forgive Al for this, she told herself. Absolutely never. I feel like a tramp, like a two-dollar whore on my way to turn a trick....

The elevator creaked its slow way upward. Then she was walking along the third-floor corridor looking for Al's room number. Then she was reluctant to knock. Why had Al insisted she come here? To humiliate her? To force her to make love to him? If he tried, she would scream bloody murder.

She knocked.

Al opened the door.

"Well, come on in," he said. She went in. The room was no better than the lobby downstairs had led her to expect. A cheap room in a rundown hotel. It held a double bed, a nightstand with the telephone and a lamp, a chest of drawers, a lounge chair, a straight-backed chair at a small desk, a floor lamp, a battered television set. Everything looked old and worn. "Sit down," Al said. "Drink?"

"A small one, thank you," she said. She took the straight-backed chair at the desk. A fifth of whiskey, a plastic container of ice cubes, and two glasses stood on the chest of drawers. He fixed the drinks, came to hand her one.

"Relax," he said. "You look as though you're about to make a run for it. You're safe here. After all, I've never beat up on you. I'm not about to now."

She sat rigidly, feet flat on the floor, legs tightly together, purse on her lap, the drink held in both hands. She watched him sink into the lounge chair. He looked as though he had no cares. Or guilt feelings. She could not even read appraisal in his eyes. Had he found a woman he cared more for?

"Well, what's on your mind, baby?"

"For one thing-the rent, Al. It's due on Wednesday. I can't quite make it. You know that keeping the apartment going is too much for me on my salary. I'm short forty-five dollars. You've got to give it to me. You've just got to."

"How about Bolton? Doesn't he give you a buck now and then? Is he that much of a cheapskate?"

Looking at him levelly, Janice said, "You can call anyone a cheapskate?"

He acted as though he hadn't heard that. "What if I don't have the forty-five bucks?"

"You'll have to get it."

"Where?"

"Borrow it from Bill Norris."

Al looked at her speculatively. He said nothing.

"Will you get it, Al-please?"

"I was just kidding, baby. I've got it." He took a gulp of his drink. "What I don't get is why you need two apartments. What's wrong with that place where you and Bolton shack up?"

"Al, it's your apartment as much as mine. You know we signed a lease on it. Lots of your things are still there. Are we going to split up, Al?"

"I've told you how things are between us. Nothing's changed." He tossed off his drink. 'It's time you learned how easy it is to get a guy to do you a favor. The lesson should stand you in good stead elsewhere, if you know what I mean."

She knew what he meant. He still wanted her to get Jay to give her a big job-for his benefit. The reference to "elsewhere" meant he was ready to break up their marriage-either now or later.

She said, "Al-if we're going to separate permanently-or get a divorce-let's do it now and get it quietly over with."

He laughed at her. "Get it over with? Sure, if you like. Quietly? No. You start divorce proceedings and I'll drag Bolton right into court. I can do even better. Don't say anything-just watch."

She stared at him silently as he took off his coat, then his shirt.