terribly amateur; really, he suspected, a combination of both. It would be
interesting to meet this General Swanson. He had never heard of him.
He Jay down on the hotel bed. He would rest for an hour and then shower and
shave and see New York at night for the first time in overthreeyears. See
what the war had done to a Manhattan evening; it had done little or nothing
to the daylight hours, from what he’d seen – only the posters. It would be
good to have a woman tonight. But if it happened, he’d want it to be
comfortable, without struggle or urgency. A happy coincidence would be just
right; a likable, really likable interlude. On the other hand, he wasn’t
about to browse through a telephone directory to create one. Three years
and nine months had passed since he last picked up a telephone in New York
City. During that time he had learned to be wary of the changes taking
place over a matter of days, to say nothing of three years and nine months.
And he recalled pleasantly how the Stateside transfers to the embassy in
Lisbon often spoke of the easy accessibility of the women back home.
Especially in Washington and New York, where the numbers and the absence of
permanency worked in favor of one-night stands. Then he remembered, with a
touch of amused resignation, that these same reports usually spoke of the
irresistible magnetism of an officer’s uniform, especially captain and
over.
He had worn a uniform exactly three times in the past four years: at the
Mayflower Hotel lounge with Ed Pace, the day he arrived in Portugal and the
day he left Portugal.
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He didn’t even own one now.
His telephone rang and it startled him. Only Fairfax and, he assumed, this
brigadier, Swanson, knew where he was. He had called the Montgomery from
the Mitchell Field infirmary and secured the reservation; the major had
said to take seventy-two hours. He needed the rest; no one would bother
him. Now someone was bothering him.
‘HelloT
‘Davidt’ It was a girl’s voice; low, cultivated at the Plaza. ‘David
Spaulding!’
‘Who is thisT He wondered for a second i f his just-released fantasies were
playing tricks on reality.
‘Leslie, darling! Leslie Jenner! My God, it must be nearly five years!,
Spaulding’s n-dnd raced. Leslie Jenner was part of the New York scene but
not the radio world; she was the up-from-college crowd. Meetings under the
clock at the Biltmore; late nights at LaRue; the cotillions – which he’d
been invited to, not so much from social bloodlines as for the fact that he
was the son of the concert Spauldings. Leslie was Miss Porter’s, Finch and
the Junior League.
Only her name had been changed to something else. She had married a boy
from Yale. He didn’t remember the name.
‘Leslie, this is . . . well, Jesus, a surprise. How did you know I was
here?’ Spaulding wasn’t engaging in idle small talk.
‘Nothing happens in New York that I don’t know about! I have eyes and ears
everywhere, darling! A veritable spy network!’
David Spaulding could feel the blood draining from his face; he didn’t like
the girl’s joke. ‘I’m serious, Leslie. . . . Only because I, haven’t called
anyone. Not even Aaron. How did you find out?’
‘If you must know, Cindy Bonner – she was Cindy Tottle, married Paul Bonner
– Cindy was exchanging some dreary Christmas gifts for Paul at Rogers Peet
and she swore she saw you trying on a suit. Well, you know Cindy! Just too
shy for words . . .’
David didn’t know Cindy. He couldn’t even recall thename, much less a face.
Leslie Jenner went on as he thought about that.
1. . . and so she ran to the nearest phone and called me. After all,
darling, we were a major item I’
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If a ‘major item’ described a couple of summer months of weekending at East
Hampton and bedding the daughter of the house, then David had to agree. But
he didn’t subscribe to the definition; it had been damned transient,
discreet and bef9re the girl’s very social marriage.
‘I’d just as soon you kept that information from your husband.
‘Oh, God, you poor lamb! It’s Jenner, darling, not Hawkwood I Didn’t even
keep the name. Damned if I would.’
That was it, thought David. She’d married a man named Hawkwood: Roger or
Ralph; something like that. A football player, or was it tennis?
‘I’m sorry. I didn’t know.
‘Richard and I called it quits simply centuries ago. It was a disaster. The
son of a bitch couldn’t even keep his hands off my best friends! He’s in
London now; air corps, but very hush-hush, I think. I’m sure the English
girls are getting their fill of him . . . and I do mean fill! I know!’
There was a slight stirring in David’s groin. Leslie Jenner was proffering
an invitation.
“Well, they’re allies,’ said Spaulding humorously. ‘But you didn’t tell me,
how did you find me here?’
‘It took exactly four telephone calls, my lamb. I tried the usual:
Commodore, Biltmore and the Waldorf; and then I remembered that your dad
and mum always stopped off at the Montgomery. Very Old World, darling. . .
. I thought, with reservations simply hell, you might have thought of it.’
‘You’d make a good detective, Leslie.’
‘Only when the object of my detecting is worthwhile, lamb. . We did have
fun.’
‘Yes, we did,’ said Spaulding, his thoughts on an entirely different
subject. ‘And we can’t let your memory prowess go to waste. Dinner?’
‘If you hadn’t asked, I would have screamed.’
‘Shall I pick you up at your apartment? What’s the addressr
Leslie hesitated a fraction of a moment. ‘Let’s meet at a restaurant. We’d
never get out of here.’
An invitation, indeed.
David named a small Fifty-first Street cafe he remembered. It was on, Park.
‘At seven thirty? Eight?’
‘Seven thirty’s lovely, but not there, darling. It closed simply
158
years ago. Why not the Gallery? It’s on Forty-sixth. I’ll make reservations;
they know me.’
Tine.’
‘You poor lamb, you’ve been away so long. You don’t know anything. I’ll
take you in tow.’
‘I’d like that. Seven thirty, then.,
‘Can’t wait. And I promise not to cry.’
Spaulding replaced the telephone; he was bewildered – on several levels. To
begin with, a girl didn’t call a former lover after nearly four war years
without asking – especially in these times – where he’d been, how he was;
at least the length of his stay in town. It wasn’t natural, it denied
curiosity in these curiosity-prone days.
Another reason was profoundly disturbing.
The last time his parents had been at the Montgomery was in 1934. And he
had not returned since then. He’d met the girl in 1936; in October of 1936
in New Haven at the Yale Bowl. He remembered distinctly.
Leslie Jenner couldn’t possibly know about the Montgomery Hotel. Not as it
was related to his parents.
She was lying.
159
16
DECEMBER 29,1943
NEW YORK CITY
The Gallery was exactly as David thought it would be: a lot of deep-red
velvet with a generous sprinkling of palms in varying shapes and sizes,
reflecting the soft-yellow pools of light from dozens of wall sconces far
enough above the tables to make the menus unreadable. The clientele was
equally predictable: young, rich, deliberately casual; a profusion of
wrinkled eyebrows and crooked smiles and very bright teeth. The voices rose
and subsided, words running together, the diction glossy.
Leslie Jenner was there when he arrived. She ran into his arms in front of
the cloak room; she held him fiercely, in silence, for several minutes – or
it seemed like minutes to Spaulding; at any rate, too long a time. When she
tilted her head back, the tears had formed rivulets on her cheeks. The
tears were genuine, but there was something – was it the tautness of her
full mouth? the eyes themselves? – something artificial about the girl. Or
was it him? The years away from places like the Gallery and girls like
Leslie Jenner.
In all other respects she was as he remembered her. Perhaps older,
certainly more sensual – the unmistakable look of experience. Her dark
blonde hair was more a light brown now, her wide brown eyes had added
subtlety to her innate provocativeness, her face was a touch lined but
still sculptured, aristocratic. And he could feel her body against his; the
memories were sharpened by it. Lithe, strong, full breasted; a body that
centered
160
on sex. Shaped by it and for it.
‘God, God, God I Oh, David!’ She pressed her Ups against his ear.
They went to their table; she held his hand firmly, releasing it only to
light a cigarette, taking it back again. They talked rapidly. He wasn’t
sure she listened, but she nodded incessantly and wouldn’t take her eyes