The Man in the Tree

Chapter Seventeen

On the Gulf coast outside St. Petersburg there is a chain of islands connected by causeways to each other and to the mainland; the islands form a strip twenty-five miles long and in places no more than a few hundred yards wide: St. Petersburg Beach, Treasure Island, Madeira Beach, Redington Beach, Indian Rocks. The southern end is heavily commercialized, with many luxury hotels and condominiums; then, as you go northward, the tourist cabins on the ocean side become progressively smaller and shabbier, the beach sadder and more desolate.

Margaret Morrow, freshly arrived from Albany, found a tourist cabin, one of six with identical peeling green paint and pink trim, at the upper end of Indian Rocks Beach; the place was called Site O'Sea. The owner and manager was an old woman with frizzy lemon-colored hair who wore muu-muus and carpet slippers, and called Margaret "Dearie." The cabin was a single room with a tiny kitchenette, a sofa bed, and an air conditioner that hummed and dripped all day long. The windows, of narrow glass panes that overlapped each other like the siding on a house, were gummy with salt spray, and the sand drifted in under the doorsill.

It was hard to get used to the strong sunlight, the bright pastel colors like a child's painting, the cleanness of everything. Sand was everywhere, drifted against the sides of houses, scattering in the wind across the highway; it got into your hair, your ears, and, if you were not careful, into your food, but there was no dirt, no grime. On the beach, at certain hours, the gulls and terns gathered in convention -- just standing around, blinking wearily, the gulls and terns in separate groups but side by side, like businessmen waiting for a tour bus. Cormorants sat on the pilings of the groins, spreading their huge wings to dry. The sun on the water was piercingly white, painful to look at even through dark glasses. In the evening skimmers glided over the shallow water, scooping up something with their open beaks; the sun spread vast robes of pink and gold over half the sky, and the wind rattled the dry fronds of the palm trees.

On her second day she bought a newspaper and rode the bus into St. Petersburg. After Albany, the wide streets seemed almost empty. She filled out applications in three employment agencies. On the third day she answered advertisements in the paper and was interviewed, but not hired, by an insurance company, a stock broker, and a home finance agency. The next day was Saturday. She spent the weekend writing postcards, swimming, and walking on the beach. In a grocery bag she collected several pounds of shells and pebbles.

On Monday she applied for a waitress job in a coffee shop in Treasure Island; the manager said he would let her know. Walking back toward the bus stop, she noticed a sign she had not seen before: it was an employment agency, a tiny place tucked in between a drugstore and a real-estate office.

The woman behind the desk was a fortyish blonde in a startling blouse of blue and yellow trapezoids. She looked at Margaret's application without putting down her cigarette. "Well, let's see. You haven't had much business experience, have you?"

"No, but I can type and take shorthand."

"I see you were a teacher before -- why did you give that up?"

"Not cut out for it, I guess."

The woman gave her an indifferent look. "Uh-huh. How good is your shorthand ?"

"Not very, but I can brush up."

"Well, here's a filing job -- you say you don't want that -- filing and bookkeeping. . . . Here's one, secretary, part time, some filing and bookkeeping. Salary open, that means it probably isn't much."

"What sort of place is it?"

"Not a place, it's the man's home. Occupation, investor. Do you have a car?"

"No -- not yet."

"Well, it's back in the boonies, but it says here, 'Will pick up for interview.' "

"I'd like to try it."

"All right." The woman picked up the phone, squinting past the smoke of her cigarette. "Mr. Anderson, please. . . . Well, would you tell him that Mrs. Harrell of Suncoast Employment called. We have an applicant for the secretary job, and she'd like to be picked up for an interview. . . . Just a moment." She covered the phone. "Can you go out there this afternoon?"

"Yes."

"Yes, that will be fine. Her name is Margaret Morrow. Two o'clock?" She lifted an eyebrow at Margaret. "All right, thank you."

She put the phone down. "Somebody will pick you up here at two. The office will be closed until twelve-thirty, but you can come back here any time after that. Whether you get the job or not, please remember to check back and let us know; that's important."

Margaret went back to the coffee shop, had a sandwich and a glass of milk, then browsed in the tourist shops until almost two.

In the waiting room sat a man in a blue flowered shirt. He was partly bald, compactly built, tanned the color of mahogany. There was a cold cigar stub in his mouth. He got up and put on a blue straw hat. "Miss Morrow?"

"Yes."

He looked up at her. "Well, you're tall enough, anyhow. My name is Bill Richards. Come on."

He led her to a dusty blue Lincoln convertible parked at the curb. "I haven't seen one of these in years," she remarked as she got in.

"They just started making them again." Richards pulled out into the street, made a startling U-turn and headed north. "Been here long?" he said around the cigar.

"No, only a week."

"Figures." He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye; his expression did not change, but she thought he was amused. "Get a little sunburn?"

"A little."

"Thought so." His muscular arms were covered with coarse black hair; his fingers were blunt and spatulate, but his nails were clean.

"Mr. Richards, what does Mr. Anderson do?"

"A little of this, a little of that." He gave her a faint smile. "Mr. Anderson," he said, "is a very big man."

They were running across the causeway, the water sparkling white beneath them; then around the curve of the road, past Spanish-looking villas with palm trees, up the gentle rise that passed for a hill in Florida. After a few miles the car slowed, turned to the left onto a macadam road that quickly became white dust, bordered with yucca and palmetto. They turned again, running now between fenced pastures where brown and white cattle grazed; then once more, into a road marked "Private." Up ahead was a real hill covered with trees, a wall, a cluster of rooftops.

They halted in a wide archway closed by a wrought-iron gate. Richards rolled down his window and spoke to a grille in the wall. "Irma, open up." Beyond his head, Margaret could see a lens swiveling to point at them. "Okay," said a metallic voice. The gate swung open, they drove through past flowering bushes, a vast stretch of new lawn with sprinklers playing on it. Where the driveway leveled off, the house was too close to see, but she caught a glimpse of tall stucco walls, wrought-iron balconies.

They swung into the cool shadow of a carport. Richards led her up three steps to an enormously tall door of carved wood; he opened it and ushered her into a huge kitchen where a blond woman was sitting with a telephone in her hand. "I understand that, Mr. Lyons," she was saying, "But Mr. Anderson wants me to tell you that if we can't get better service, we'll have to look for another supplier." She smiled at Margaret and pointed to a chair at the long table.

Richards had disappeared; he came back carrying a cardboard carton full of packages and letters, which he set down on the table, then went out again.

The blond woman put down the phone. She was in her forties, a little plump in a candy-striped blouse and blue shorts; her legs were bare and tanned. "I'm Irma Hartz," she said. "You're Miss Morrow, from the agency?" "Yes."

"Nice to meet you. Want to go to the bathroom or anything before we start?"

"No, I'm fine."

"All right, let's go." When she stood up, Margaret noticed that her brown feet were bare. She led the way across the kitchen. The chair at the far end of the table stood in a curious sunken area, a foot or two lower than the rest of the floor. They passed into a tiled hallway, down a gentle ramp, and emerged into a vast space with a cathedral ceiling; it must have been thirty feet high. There were Oriental rugs on the tile floor; the walls were oyster white. To their left a broad ramp rose to a balcony at the far end of the room. Under the balcony, through sliding glass doors, she glimpsed a colonnade and a garden with a fountain. The room itself was enormous, more like a museum hall than a living room. The middle part of it was sunken, with a wrought-iron railing around it.

She followed Mrs. Hartz down a hall lined with pictures to a room fitted out with filing cabinets, a desk, an electronic typewriter. "Sit down, honey, and let's talk." Mrs. Hartz took a seat behind a second, smaller desk, and peered at her over her glasses. "Your name is Margaret Morrow -- just like it sounds?"

"Yes."

Mrs. Hartz wrote on a yellow pad. "Age?"

"Thirty."

"M arried?"

"No."

"What was your last job?"

"I was a schoolteacher in Albany."

"Albany, New York? Why did you leave?"

Margaret was silent a moment.

"Honey," said Mrs. Hartz, "I don't want to be nosy, but I have to know all this stuff. If you were fired, you can tell me."

"No, I wasn't fired," Margaret said. "Maybe I was burned out. My mother died in February. She was bedridden for seven years. And -- " She stopped and went on again, trying to keep her voice level. "I don't know, the middle school I taught in was consolidated with a high school that wasn't as good, and some of our programs went downhill. It stopped being fun. One day I caught myself hating one of the kids. It scared me, I thought maybe I was cracking up. The only thing I could think of was just to get out of Albany, and I came here because of the sunshine."

Mrs. Hartz wrote something slowly. "O-kay." She got up and came around the desk. "Have you ever used one of these gadgets?" she asked, indicating a dictation machine beside the typewriter.

"No, not that kind."

"It uses a little plastic disk, like this one. You put it in the machine here. Here's the 'on' button, here's reverse -- 'review,' they call it -- here's forward, and this counter keeps track of where you are." She touched a button, and a man's deep voice said, " . . . items number three seventy-five, three eighty-one, five ninety-seven, and please bill to my account." She pressed the "off" button. "Why don't you fool with this awhile till you get the hang of it, and then type the first letter on the disk. There's a foot pedal under here, and letterheads, envelopes, carbon paper, and all that stuff in these drawers. I'll be in the kitchen. You can bring the letter out when you're finished, or if you run into any trouble, you can call me on this intercom -- press number five." She turned and went out.

Margaret sat down, pressed the "review" button, then played the disk from the beginning. "J. R. Veillot Frčres, dear sirs, referring to your catalog dated November 1983, I would like to order items number one fifteen, two seventy, three seventy-five . . . " She stopped the machine; where was the address? She would feel like a fool to call Mrs. Hartz for help so soon, before she had even started.

There was a rotary file on the desk: she looked under 'V,' and found it: Veillot, with an address in New York. She typed the letter rapidly. The letterhead read "G. Anderson," and she put that under the space for his signature. She typed an envelope, looked over the letter and envelope for errors, and carried them back to the kitchen.

Mrs. Hartz was sitting where Margaret had first seen her; behind her, in an alcove, there was an intercom and a television screen. She looked up and smiled. "All done? Let's see." She took the letter and envelope. "Perfect," she said firmly. "Good as I could do. How's your shorthand?"

"Pretty poor."

"Well, let's try it." Mrs. Hartz picked up a stenographic notebook and pencil, handed them to her. "Ready?" She turned a page of the account book before her and began to read. "Two hundred twenty square yards wool carpeting at seventy-three dollars, sixteen thousand and sixty dollars. Four pairs damask drapes . . . " It was a long list. When she was done, Mrs. Hartz put out her hand for the notebook. "Can I see?"

Margaret handed it over: it was a mixture of half-remembered Gregg shorthand, abbreviations, and figures.

"That's a mess," Mrs. Hartz said, "but if you can read it back, what's the difference?" She handed Margaret the notebook again. "See if you can."

"Two hundred twenty square yards wool carpeting," Margaret began, and went through to the end of the list.

"Okay," said Mrs. Hartz. "Let's see if we can find the boss." She reached back to the intercom and pressed a button. "Gene, are you there?"

"Yes," said a voice promptly.

"You want to come in and meet Miss Morrow, or should I bring her out?"

A pause. "Bring her out. I'm too dirty to come in."

"Okay." Mrs. Hartz went to a closet, came back with a pair of sneakers without laces, and put them on. Margaret followed her through the sliding doors at the far end of the living room, across the colonnade to a long building behind the house. The interior was brilliantly lit by the glass panes in the north side of the roof. Down at the far end a bearded man stood at a workbench, cutting something on a jigsaw. Only when he turned off the saw and began walking toward them did she realize that perspective had misled her in that enormous room: the man was grotesquely, impossibly tall.

He picked up a bench casually with one hand as he approached; he put it down in front of them and sat on it. Even then, he loomed over the two women until he bent over to put his elbows on his knees, like a man leaning over to talk to children. That was almost worse, because his leonine head was so big and so close. His skin was deeply tanned, but not as dark as Richards'; bits of wood dust were clinging to his beard and to the bleached hairs of his arms and chest. He looked at Margaret attentively when Mrs. Hartz introduced them, and took her hand in his for a moment; his huge fingers were calloused and warm. His face was heavy-boned, perfectly in proportion except for his eyes, which were no larger than hers. His voice was unexpectedly quiet. "Three or four hours a day," he was saying. "Would that suit you?"

She stammered something.

"Fine, then. Tomorrow?"

"Yes, tomorrow."

Mrs. Hartz led her back through the garden." Didn't Pongo tell you?" she asked.

"What?"

"Pongo -- Bill Richards -- the man who brought you out. Didn't he say anything?"

"He said Mr. Anderson was a very big man."

Mrs. Hartz snorted. "That's Pongo." They crossed the living room again, went through the hall into the kitchen. It was cool here; Margaret sat down gratefully at the table. She looked at the huge Spanish chair at the far end where the floor was sunken. How could she not have understood?

"Second thoughts?" Mrs. Hartz asked, coming over with a cup and a pot of coffee. "This is dark Colombian. Would you rather have something else? Tea, or a Coke?"

"No, this is fine. Thank you."

Mrs. Hartz sat down and put her elbows on the table. "Well, you can have the job if you want it. He likes you."

"How could you tell ?"

"If he didn't, he would've let me know. Then it would be up to me to tell you to leave your number and pretend we'd call you later. Gene won't tell a lie if he can help it, but he doesn't care if I do."

Margaret sipped her coffee, put it down. "Mrs. Hartz -- "

"Irma."

"Irma, would you take this job if you were me?"

"Sure. I'm here, aren't I? Any dumbbell could do the work; I did it myself until last week. But it doesn't hurt to be smart, no matter what you're doing, unless it bores you out of your mind."

"You're no dumbbell. Why only until last week?"

"We were living in the cottages in back, until the big house was finished. Then Gene wanted me to be the housekeeper, and I couldn't do both. Now, take your time, but tell me if you want it. He'll pay you twice what you're worth. What would you say you're worth?"

"Oh -- I don't know. Ten dollars an hour?"

"Okay, twenty then, and he'll pay you for a full week no matter how much you work, so that's eight hundred."

"Eight hundred a week? That's too much!"

"I know it, but he doesn't care. Deal?"

"Okay."

"All right, now. about transportation. You haven't got a car?"

"No."

"Pongo can take you back and forth until you get some wheels of your own. Don't know where he is now, though. I'll try his cottage." She leaned back to the intercom, pushed a button. "Pongo?"

"Yeah."

"You want to run Miss Morrow back into town?"

There was a perceptible pause. "Okay. Five minutes."

"Mrs. Hartz; I can just as well get a taxi -- "

"It would take half an hour to get out here. Where are you living, in town?"

"No, on the beach, at Indian Rocks."

"Well, that's a forty-dollar fare. Relax, Pongo can do it -- he likes to drive."

Margaret was waiting at the kitchen door when the Lincoln pulled up, looking dustier than ever. Pongo grinned at her around his cigar when she got in. "Make out okay?"

"I got the job."

"All right." The gate opened for them and they wheeled onto the long dusty road. "Surprised when you met the boss?"

She smiled. "Yes."

He glanced at her to see her expression. "He's not a bad guy to work for."

"Have you known him long?" she asked.

"Ten years, on Sea Sprite. She's decommissioned now, over in Tampa. Needs new rigging and some work on the engines. We went all over the world in her. Australia, India, Japan, everywhere. He says he's all done cruising now. Maybe he is."

Pongo let her out at the entrance to the cottages and asked what time she wanted to be picked up in the morning.

"Mrs. Hartz said she'd like me to start around ten, but please don't come. Honestly. I'm going to rent a car -- you have so much to do already."

"Aw, that's all right," he said, but she could tell he was pleased.