Part 6

Usually Larry felt lost when he came home and didn’t find Bessie, but tonight he was glad there was a meeting of her first aid course at the Red Cross so that he could be alone.

On the way home from the office he had stopped at Rabinowitz’s restaurant on Second Avenue for a plate of borsch. It wasn’t the finest borsch he had ever tasted, but after a day at the Magistrates’ Court, he was glad to eat dinner at Rabinowitz’s. The discord of moving china, scraping chairs and wisecracking waiters seemed almost restful compared with the uproar of the courtroom.

If only there were some way to practice law and stay out of the Magistrates’ Courts. He was tired of the sordid bickering between client and lawyer, lawyer and judge, and lawyer vs. lawyer. Larry was afraid that he might acquire their look of stinking cigars and suits that appeared rusty even when they were new. Professional scum--that was a fair description of what practiced in the lower courts. It usually took as much work for a lawyer to represent a small client as a large corporation, and it almost always meant twice the responsibility. Every claim counted so much more to the client who started with nothing, and whose entire financial status might depend on the outcome of his law suit. A smart lawyer steered around the little cases with their whopping headaches. But Larry had always boasted that he would try _any_ case in any court as a matter of professional pride. Lawyers should feel as great a responsibility as doctors in helping people. That had always been Larry’s belief, but after today he wasn’t as sure of his ground.

The City had slapped a violation on the bakery belonging to his client. A new Building Commissioner at City Hall was plastering a rash of violations on little properties all over town, although they often represented an owner’s sole income and might force the proprietors into bankruptcy. Like Larry’s client.

Poor sucker, he would almost certainly have to let his building go now. When Larry first heard of the case, he thought of turning it down, knowing someone high up in the administration was crusading, and anything he tried to do would be a waste of his time. His hunch had been right. In court this morning, he faced not only the Judge, but six unsolicited reporters and a battery of photographers. The minute Larry opened his mouth, the Magistrate bawled him out, and good-citizenship lecture number forty-one was delivered. What did Larry’s client mean, letting innocent men work in a death trap? Didn’t he know there might be a fire, and people might be killed? Did he want their lives on his conscience? The reporters took it down, every word, and Larry yelled back at the Judge to be certain and make it a good story. In these courts a lawyer practiced with his lungs rather than his brains. The lawyer who could outshout the bench usually won his cases.

But apparently today Larry hadn’t been in good enough voice, or it took more than vocal power. His client was fined one hundred dollars and given a six day jail sentence. The fine was bad enough--Larry knew it meant his client would go into debt--but the jail sentence was a disgrace that would torture his conscience for years.

When the next defendants drew identical penalties, Larry began to smell a rodent. Later, in the corridor, a friendly lawyer from the Corporation Counsel’s office hinted that the Magistrate had acted “on orders.” It was the sort of thing he used to hear about Tammany, Larry cynically recalled, but didn’t expect in an enlightened “reform” administration.

Larry hung around until court recessed and he could corner the Magistrate in his chambers. He had known him for fifteen years, and the Judge, a crude, bloated murderer of the language, always called him “Cons’ler.”

The Magistrate confessed quite frankly that his hands were tied by politics. Just before he had come to court, his instructions were telephoned to him. The Judge’s lumpy shoulders framed a question. With all the reporters hanging around, what could he do? Cons’ler could see for himself. Okay, he’d reduce the sentence. Three days. It was the best he could offer. And if Cons’ler kept his mouth shut about changing the sentence, he’d appreciate the favor.

It left a bad taste in the mouth, like day-old garlic. Larry decided he should have done as Bemrose suggested and put up a fight for the judicial appointment in his district. He would have made a better judge than some of those lousy punks on the bench. Bemrose had hit it on the thumb. He should have raised hell for being passed over by the organization.

Supposing they did give him the appointment, though. He would be tied down to the Magistrates’ Courts for years. He ought to stay away and try to develop a higher type of practice. It was a nice idea, if he knew where to start. Not with some of the clients who came to _him_ for advice.

He reached across his study table for a recent biography of Woodrow Wilson, but decided he couldn’t tackle anything serious. On the way to the kitchen to fix himself a drink, he picked up a current issue of _Time_ and put it on the arm of his easy chair, planning to look through it later.

It wasn’t only the day in that scruffy court which depressed him, Larry decided, sipping his highball. He felt blue because Janice had sailed yesterday. She called him early in the week to say that Larry’s friend, Mr. Diamond, didn’t hold out much hope of getting her a visa. He had been turned down in a similar case by his friend at the State Department. Anyway, she had been thinking over her talk with Larry and felt that maybe she had better stick around and attempt to straighten things out with Bemrose. She had tried to reach him, but his office said he was in Washington. As soon as he came back----

For a day or so Larry speculated optimistically on how a marriage with Janice might round out Bemrose’s rather Spartan professional existence and also give her a reason for taking root in the United States. The day before yesterday, when he had convinced himself that everything would work out with them, she called to say that _Everett’s_ had received clearance for her passport and papers and booked passage for her to sail the same night. There was no possible out. She had tried but hadn’t been able to reach Bemrose. However, Larry better not tell him so. It might only upset him. When she returned, provided he weren’t tied up with any female clients, they might be able to straighten things out.

With reluctance Larry agreed not to say anything, although it was a damnfool promise on the face of it. When he heard from Bemrose, he knew how stupid it was to let her talk him into it. Bemrose was put out because Janice had sailed, and suspicious because she had talked to Larry, not to him. Hadn’t she left a message for him or her address?

Larry lied down the line, handing out the death sentence. The pinched, off-key voice at the other end told him Bemrose was suffering. Larry would have shaken Janice, if she were there, for causing him unnecessary pain. She could have reached him long distance if she had really been interested. Maybe she was just piqued, and that whole performance at his office had been an act.

Lousy. The situation seemed tied in a package marked nonreturnable. Bemrose’s routine must have been to wait until Janice came around. When she hadn’t turned up all these weeks, he apparently had decided to forget his injuries and go to her. Now that she had refused to wait and gone ahead with her own plans, it might make him angry enough to----

All Larry hoped was that Bemrose wouldn’t try to get even on the rebound. He tried to explain to him that Janice’s orders had come suddenly, without _Everett’s_ even bothering to warn her. In the rush of departure, she had probably forgotten to leave a message when she called and found that Arthur was out of town.

What made Larry think she _had_ phoned him, Bemrose wanted to know, pouncing on this information.

Larry eased his way out by saying it was only natural that she should call, no matter whether or not they had been seeing each other. She wouldn’t leave without saying goodbye, he lied, angrier and angrier with Janice as he tried to cover up for her.

It was a dangerous trip and it was wartime, he explained to Bemrose. She wouldn’t just leave. She would try to reach him and say that she was going overseas.

Her safety must have worried Bemrose, too, Larry figured, because he was quick to pooh-pooh her danger. The authorities wouldn’t allow her to travel unless it were safe, he contended. But Larry knew that Bemrose realized no one could be safe in a combat zone.

It was going to be difficult for Bemrose to live with himself for the next few weeks. If he were in love with Janice and had been waiting for her to come round, he must detest himself now because he had waited too long and she was out of reach. He must realize, Larry knew, that a letter, a cable, or a transatlantic phone call could hardly be expected to change the situation. There was too much to explain. Janice Baldwin had let him bluff the hand. While Bemrose held the chips, he had lost.

As Larry considered what must be Bemrose’s mood of hating-himself-and-the-world, he slumped deeper in his chair and the copy of _Time_ fell to the study floor. A man in Bemrose’s situation might turn around and do some damnfool thing to get even. There was nothing new about a man, driven by jealousy, acting irrationally against his own interests.

Larry stood up, contracted his shoulder blades until they almost touched, and shut the window. He felt chilly in spite of the warm May night. He might be catching a spring cold. Whether it was that, or his day downtown, or the pigheadedness of Janice and Bemrose, his spirits were clammy.

On his way to the bathroom for an aspirin he stooped to pick up the magazine. The hollow rooms further depressed his spirits. He began to wish that Bessie’s class were over and she would come home.

Bed looked good to him as he walked through the bedroom and saw the turned-down sheets. He undressed, built his pillows into a wall so that he could read in bed, and made up his mind to turn out the light as soon as his eyes felt heavy. Skimming the foreign news, he turned to _Time’s_ section on national affairs and saw Bemrose’s picture. The story, captioned “Transatlantic Braintruster,” credited him with the basic plan for Lend-Lease. His clear mental blueprint had enabled a government lawyer to draft the Lend-Lease bill in an hour and forty minutes, the story said.

Bemrose, 43, whose recreation is poker, has an agile, trained mind (Columbia Law and Columbia) which makes him a favorite of New York utilitymen and statesofficials.

Tweedy, mustached, no socialite but an Albany truck driver’s son, he wears easily the mantle of his erudite fosterfather and former law partner, Judge Winthrop Haynes.

Bemrose made a softspoken, backdoor entrance to diplomacy through his intimate, Attorney-General Newton. His suave handling of British bigwigs will result in future liaison assignments, it is said.

Larry let the magazine slide off the bed. So that’s what had kept Bemrose too busy to see him these past weeks and too preoccupied to straighten things out with Janice. They had called him pigheaded while he was figuring ways to keep the British on their feet.

Larry dialed Arthur’s number, jubilant at the news and anxious to congratulate him right away. The old closed-mouth. He’d like to punch him for becoming an international figure and keeping it quiet, for doing his heavy thinking solo, and pretending to hand Janice an option on the war. The so-and-so.

A Negro houseman who had worked for Judge Haynes answered. “Sorry, sir, Mr. Bemrose is in Washington tonight. He’s dining at the White House.”

Larry snapped the light and slid under the covers, determined to fall asleep before Bessie came home and asked him what kind of day it had been.

_Chapter 7_

Two doors west of Third Avenue on Eighty-second Street, Larry turned into the walk leading to Bemrose’s house. The muted stone dwellings on this quiet street looked as if they might belong to Boston Symphony subscribers who wore shawl-collared brocade evening wraps to the concerts.

Larry smoothed the flaps of his coat pockets before he rang the bell. He wondered if Bemrose had invited any of the poker crowd to this party, and if it weren’t a stag, why he hadn’t asked him to bring Bessie along.

The door opened, and the houseman reached for Larry’s sun-tanned straw with the paisley band.

“You’ll find them in there, sir,” he said. “There’s _quite_ a gathering. Yes _sir_, quite a gathering.”

After the tiled hallway, the drawing room felt sultry. Larry nibbled through the outer layers of the crowd and saw Lucy McVail, serene in gray chiffon, before the rococo hearth, her skirt fluttering free of her narrow hips. The scalloped brown fireplace seemed pleased to include her in its composition with the worn brocade wall. She stood alone, part of the room but not of the people, an island of tidiness in a disorganized surf. Her remoteness from the others seemed to bind her to the old house. A fluff of gray-blonde hair had damped down on her cheek, Larry noted, and her pale eyes looked out with the innocent speech of a solo flute.

Bemrose hadn’t seen Larry come in. There was time to hang back and enjoy the quiet picture that Lucy made, undisturbed by waves of tension which needled the room. The rest of the guests sounded like an orchestra before a concert, each tuning up on his own without regard for the others.

Above their alcoholic discord Bemrose’s voice rose stridently as he discussed the recent Nazi landing on Crete. “You’ll see. Those bastards will use it as a base. Next thing you know we’ll have air attacks on Egypt----.”

Larry moved into the vacancy around Lucy McVail. He judged by her eyes which shifted slightly, like scraps of cloud gently moving, that she was pleased to see him. He told her that she looked cool in spite of the humid heat, and her pale eyes deepened in tone. A film as ephemeral as her gray gown kept slipping between them, and made it difficult to talk to her at first, but he was soon able to discuss her case and had launched on some theories of his about inheritance law when Bemrose elbowed in, accompanied by a man on the borderline of portliness who looked as though he financed a health club to restrain an opinionated waistline. The man’s rounded face, tomato pink, was crowned by a cap of babyfine white hair, parted at the side and brushed across the forehead like a small boy’s. Bemrose presented him. It was Davis Shore, the utility man, recipient of Bemrose’s recent free-legal-services. Larry backed away before there was a chance to introduce them while Shore, with a false try at democracy, was saying to Lucy as he left, “I used to run into a chap named McVail at the Knickerbocker Club. Any of your people?”

Bemrose called after Larry to get a drink, but he pretended not to hear. He watched Bemrose thread his way back to the door and welcome Judd Harrison, a Washington attorney who had often pooled his Washington influence with Bemrose’s in cases for anti-Administration clients. These clients constituted the profitable Wall Street side of Arthur’s practice. They were the business and financial men who, without his help or Harrison’s, might not have been able to set up appointments with the government agencies that had become vital to the running of their companies.

Judd Harrison was about four feet ten, and Bemrose had to stoop to shake hands with him. He joined Harrison in a champagne cocktail and proposed a toast. Guiding Harrison to a serving table across the room, he said in his low, easy voice, “Come over here and get one of your cigars. I stocked up on them last night. Then I’ll take you over and introduce you to the unlucky girl.”

The significance of Arthur’s remark did not reach Larry immediately. He thought of the newspaper pictures he had seen of Harrison and the oversized cigar with which he was always photographed. He thought of the compensatory device used by undersized men who smoked oversized cigars and chuckled to himself. A second later he realized what Bemrose had said, “the unlucky girl,” and why Shore, Harrison, and the other good client-friends, had been invited to a party on a hot night when the season for entertaining was about over. Larry figured that he had better look around and locate Lucy McVail’s uncle and aunt. They must be here, and if they were, they couldn’t be feeling any too much at home. From a corner near the bookshelves he heard Marge Daugherty’s uncontrolled titter.

Marge had had a few drinks and was animated, intent, and looking up at Ed Daugherty as if she could make him Charles Boyer just by looking at him that way. Ed tried to unlock her glance by directing his eyes everywhere except at her. He smiled with relief when he saw Larry walk toward them.

Larry took Marge’s glass. “This needs attention.” He had it filled with straight Scotch and asked the waiter for another like it. “Now.” He toasted her and finished his whiskey at a gulp. “Tell me how it happened. I’m trying to catch up. Things move fast around here.”

Marge shifted unsteadily to the other foot, and her husband shoved a chair under her. She rolled her eyes at Larry. “Don’t have to tell. You knew all the time.”

“No, I didn’t. Tell me. How long has it been going on?”

“A few weeks. He’s collecting the fee.” Her giggle became an incessant staccato.

“Marge!” Daugherty said. “You’ve had too much to drink.”

“Let her have fun. This doesn’t happen in the family every day. Come on, have another drink with me. How about you?” Larry asked Ed.

“I guess I could use another,” Ed admitted with excessive dignity.

Marge’s giggle had become permanent by the third refill, and Bemrose came over to tend to it. “What’s funny?” he asked, looking critically from Marge to Ed to Larry.

But before Larry had a chance to congratulate him, Judd Harrison had joined the group, bringing with him an argument that must have developed among some guests across the room. “Talk to those guys and try to shut them up before they leave here,” he cautioned Bemrose. “I swear they’re working for Vichy.”

Marge giggled, and Harrison looked at her curiously.

“Mr. and Mrs. Daugherty, my fiancée’s uncle and aunt.” Arthur frowned as he introduced them.

“Drink, Mrs. Daugherty?” Harrison asked. “That’s a beautiful niece you have. I understand they grow them like that in Iowa. Well, take care of her. This fellow will never do her any good. I’ve known him--how many years is it?”

Bemrose steered him away, quiet, competent again, and in command. “Show me who was doing the talking,” he said to Harrison. “I want to keep them away from Charlie Worden. Charlie’s with the State Department, and he’s right over there waiting to be misinformed.”

Bemrose turned and explained to Larry, “We don’t want any pro-Vichy talk to reach him. Charlie has a distasteful infirmity. He lets other people make up his mind, and when he’s had a few drinks----”

“What’s eating that fellow and Arthur?” Ed shrugged.

“They aren’t having fun like us,” Marge said. “We’re having fun, aren’t we?”

But Larry decided he had had enough. He must follow Bemrose and try to talk to him. He must tell him it was wonderful that he was getting married. Uncertainly Larry looked around, careful to avoid the fireplace and Lucy.

“Where the hell did you get that?” A lanky man of around forty with untonicked hair, a yellow tweed suit, and a bright knitted tie, lifted the highball Larry had in his hand. “Just what I need,” he said, putting out a bunch of red knuckles. “Steve Holmes, Kansas.”

“The artist?” Larry asked, standing up tall to him.

“Same.”

“Bemrose has one of yours at his office--wheat fields.”

“That’s it.” Holmes smiled.

A waiter passed a tray, and Holmes lifted off three drinks at a time, handing one to Larry.

“Come along,” Larry said. “I want to hear Bemrose give some fellows a piece of his mind.”

Holmes’ paw clamped Larry in place. “That pretty boy over there got hold of me when I came in.” He nodded toward a bald blond who talked with his hands. “Damned sterile atmosphere. Stick around,” Holmes urged.

Larry realized that except for Lucy McVail and her aunt, the party was a stag. If Bemrose had invited Mrs. Shore-- Larry supposed there was one--she hadn’t accepted. Nor Mrs. Harrison. Nor any other wives. That made it all right about Bessie not being here.

“Where did he find the girl?” Holmes asked bluntly.

“In his office. She’s a client.”

Holmes whistled. “She looks as if she can use some warming up.”

“Come on, I’ll introduce you.”

“No, you tell me.” He kept Larry’s arm immobilized with one hand and tilted his glass with the other. “Does she talk?”

Larry shrugged. “I think so. She listens.”

“Jeezuschris’, why would a guy like Bemrose want to sew himself up----”

Larry smiled at Holmes and blurted out, “There was a swell girl--from Kansas.”

Holmes swooped on Larry, questioning.

“She’s a writer. She doesn’t live in Kansas now. Janice----”

Holmes was doubled up, grabbing his knee. “Don’t tell me he could have had Jan Baldwin,” he moaned.

“Do you know her?” Larry asked, figuring that it wasn’t likely. Bemrose would never have invited a friend of hers.

“Know her?” Holmes bent over. “I’ve been crazy in love with her since I was three years old.”

It was a senseless coincidence, Janice following Bemrose around, managing to get in tonight with this fellow, Holmes. But the party was a disorganized, thrown together affair. Anything could happen.

The man that Holmes had tried to avoid walked toward them, swaying in the artist’s direction. “Oh, hello.” He laughed self-consciously. “From the back I thought you were Stokowski. Did you ever hear about the time Stokie conducted in Los Angeles?”

He was telling his story with the polished enthusiasm of an anecdotist, but this room somehow didn’t seem the setting for anecdotes. It buzzed with the confusing Big Questions that were being asked without any real hope of finding the answers. This fellow was off key with his anecdotes, putting too much of himself into too little, Larry decided.

He hurried Steve Holmes toward the fireplace, and the overplump womanish voice called after them. “You must ring me up for lunch, you really must.”

Davis Shore had remained with Lucy McVail, and they hadn’t progressed beyond the weather, from what Larry could overhear. Shore saw them coming over and sidled away, nodding a thank you.

Larry watched Steve Holmes take Lucy on. Holmes stabbed at her with a few phrases that seemed to hurt him as they came out. Lucy countered with her remote smile. Apparently discouraged, the artist threw a bony shoulder forward and rested uneasily on one foot, his wordless way of saying “Yes, ma’am.”

It might have been the fog of Scotch whiskey that made him overly critical of Lucy, but Larry began to lose patience with her remoteness. She wore the Victorian house becomingly, he decided, because it represented her era. If someone like Professor or Mrs. Storey had been around, they would have spotted the anachronism. Bemrose wouldn’t want them around at this time. He wouldn’t want to defend his choice of Miss McVail. Not that there weren’t many reasons for it. Larry could see that much himself. Bemrose could always feel secure with Lucy McVail and depend on her to be worshipful of him, gentle and selfless and undemanding. Their marriage would be no competitive jockeying for superiority, as with Janice Baldwin. She was a woman with whom to settle down, with whom to be comfortable. Nevertheless these excellent reasons were bound to sound like rationalization, Larry knew, to a man like Professor Storey or to anyone else who could spot a real motive from a secondhand one.