I wanted to scream from disappointment. “You’re going to let him go?” I demanded.
“He’s fully paid up now, Mrs. Medford,” Mr. Christopher said. “We have no way to hold him.”
At the mention of my name, I saw Lacey’s face blanch. He bolted the rest of the way to the door and clutched at the knob. I leapt after him, but he got it open before I could lay a hand on him. I saw my last chance escaping.
Then he stopped dead, and so did I, my heart hammering.
“Hello,” said Tom, blocking the way. He was still in his full regalia, but not for long. With one hand he took off the glasses and with the other he whipped off the wig. “Where do you think you’re going?”
“Get out of my way!”
“Try and make me, Jim.”
Lacey tried to push past him. But Tom pushed back, and it was no contest, Tom’s strength against Lacey’s, the younger man against the older. And then, then at last, came a flash of blue, as the Maryland officers appeared behind Tom in the doorway. “I’ll take that,” said Deputy Harrison, making a grab for the dispatch case and getting it. “You’ll get it back, of course, any of it that’s legal, but as of now we have to impound it. You’re under arrest, Jim, for skipping bail. I’m sorry.”
Lacey put his hands up. “O.K.,” he answered. “O.K.”
“That all you got to say?” This from the woman, Flo, still seated where she’d landed earlier.
“What else is there to say?”
“If this is the Mrs. Medford you told me about, the one who stood your bail, you could at least speak to her, and say how sorry you are.”
Then Lacey faced me, quite solemnly. “Mrs. Medford,” he began, “I assure you, I give you my word, I’d have seen to it that you wouldn’t forfeit the bail you pledged for me. All I wanted was time to prepare my case, and once it was ready I’d have been back, long before you’d have been required to-”
“Jim, you’re a goddam liar,” Tom told him, coldly furious.
Deputy Harrison cut in: “You’ll get your chance to settle it in court. Come on-let’s go.”
He jerked his head at two of his men, and they hustled Lacey out.
“What about me?” Flo asked.
“There a warrant out for your arrest?” Deputy Harrison asked.
“Not on your life.”
“… You owe any income taxes?” Mr. Christopher said.
“I’d have to have income first.”
“Well, then, you’re free to go,” Deputy Harrison said. “Might want to think over your choice in men next time, but that’s free advice and worth as much as you paid for it.”
She stood up, half nodded to me in a sort of sisterly solidarity, then walked out the door. I thought of my promise to Mrs. Lacey, to keep her out of the story, but figured I could trust Flo’s sense of selfpreservation to steer her away from any newspapermen with cameras that might have gotten tipped and be waiting upstairs.
“Thanks so much,” I told the two IRS men, who returned their thanks. Then I let Tom take my arm and lead me out. I suddenly felt weak, and frightened of the stairs. He let me lean against the wall and then in a minute put his arm around me to help me. We took it six stairs at a time, with a little rest in between. Then we were up, walking out in the parking lot, and at last reached my car. “I’m O.K. now,” I said, though my heart was still racing. “I think.”
“O.K.’s not the word for what you are. You’re a goddam wonder.”
I looked in his eyes. “Give me a five-minute start, and then when you get to the motel, come on up to my room, without ringing or anything. That is, if you want to come up-?”
“What do you think?”
My head was clear enough driving back, and when I parked and went up to the suite, I knew what I meant to do. I slipped into the bedroom and took off every last stitch. Then I pulled down the corners on one of the beds and folded them over to leave most of the undersheet clear. Then I went into the sitting room, sat down, and looked out. When the buzzer sounded I opened the peephole, and when I made sure it was Tom, opened. “So pretty out there,” I said, waving at the windows with their view of the airport. “Or-would you rather we went in here?”
I led the way to the bedroom, lay down on the bed, and pulled the covers over me, but only to the waist. He stood looking down at me and I closed my eyes. When I opened them his clothes were on the chair. Then he was slipping in beside me and taking me in his arms.
19
When it was over I felt as though drugged, and lay limp, letting him hold me close. Then my head cleared a little, and I realized it wasn’t only the sense of relief, that I wouldn’t lose the house after finally getting it out from under its mortgage, or my feeling of gratitude to Tom, or, leave us face it, the ordinary pleasure of good, honest love, but also the months and months of deprivation. So it wasn’t too terribly long before my mouth found his once more, and we had what he called a “retake,” whispering as though it was a naughty word. It was almost the only talking we did. Then I lay close again, he whispered the word again, and found my mouth with his mouth. It went on all afternoon, till at last we had to get up and eat. For that we had to dress. Then we put the table out in the hall and went to bed again. But this time, whether from stomachs full of food, or plain, utter exhaustion, we were barely able to finish. When I opened my eyes a clock was striking three.
I could feel him warm beside me, but his breathing told me he was asleep, as I had been. I lay there, clear-headed for the first time since I left the airport. Then thoughts began to come, and the first one of all was: I wanted this man as I’d never wanted anything in my life but my little boy-wanted to lie beside him forever. But the next thought that came to me was of the grass in front of that mansion, so soft, so green, so smooth, and how my little darling would look, rolling and romping in it, and crowing from sheer joy. I lay there a long time, while the clock struck the half hour, and then struck four o’clock. Suddenly, not knowing I was going to, I slipped out of bed and began pawing around in the dark. I found the clothes I had taken off, put them on and eased open the bureau drawers. I found the nightie I’d worn the night before, my toilet set, and spare underwear. I took my coat from the closet and took everything to the sitting room. There, with motel pen and on motel stationery, I wrote Tom a note, saying “Love, thanks, and goodbye.” It seemed a little flat, but at least was what I had to say. I slipped out and the clerk looked up in surprise, from the book he was reading, but checked me out: seventy-five dollars for the suite, twenty-two dollars for food, forty cents for some phone call I couldn’t remember making.
I picked up my suitcase, put on my coat, walked out to the car, and drove off into the dawn-of another life.
20
That night, I was back in the Garden of Roses, and five minutes after I got there, it was as though I’d never been away. Bianca at first acted insulted, but when I mentioned “money, Bianca-too much to lose just by turning my back,” she eased off ever so little, and then life went on as before. Liz said: “Baby, have I missed you-but never mind that. The main thing is, you’re back. And how’s our Tom …?”
“He’s fine,” I told her, betraying not a hint of emotion. “He helped me quite well in a matter we were both concerned in.”
“An overnight matter, as I understand it-some three nights running. I knew the boy had it in him! Now, spill, Joan, and don’t leave anything out.”
It was hard, as I would have loved to tell it all, but I answered, “Nothing to spill, I’m afraid, Liz. It was a legal matter, and it’s done.”
“A legal matter?”
“… And it’s done.”
An hour later, after business had got started, she was beside me saying sidelong: “Couple of big shots, Joan, here in the corner booth — they want to know if I have a pal, and would we like to see them later, after we close for the night. They already have rooms in a motel, and what they’re flashing at me is hundred-dollar bills. So if it’s true that you and Tom aren’t an item…” I told her, “Another time, Liz-tonight I have to catch up on my sleep.”