The Year's Best Science Fiction & Fantasy 7

IMMEDIATELY YOURS by Robert Beverly Hale

Now this one is not science fiction. It is, very much, “S-F.” Mr. Hale was not concerned with how or why his strange events occurred, or with the logic of the situation — and neither am I.

Rationale here is not just unnecessary; it could have been ruinous. What Mr. Hale has done is to paint an alien viewpoint in an unknown perspective, and do it so graphically that (to return to the earlier metaphor), the resultant rainbow seems the natural way for light to be.

Of course, he has some special advantages. Possibly, this story could only have been written by an author who is both architect (by training) and anatomist (lecturer on, at the Art Students’ League) as well as a painter and poet of some years’ standing, and an editor, writer, and teacher of art. (Among other things, Curator of American Painting and Sculpture at New York’s Metropolitan Museum.)

Let me tell you about a dream I had and what happened afterward, because I think it all adds up.

You see, when this poet turned up a while back telling me he could live upstairs because Mrs. Stettheimer had said he could, there wasn’t much I could do. After all, Mr. Stettheimer had let us have the place free, as long as I painted him one picture a year. And upstairs wasn’t much anyway: it was where they used to keep the hay. There was an old sofa up there full of moths, and we gave him a blanket. He didn’t need a table, he said, because he never wrote anything down, he was extemporaneous. His name was Virgil Cranbrook; he came from Taos and San Francisco.

He wasn’t much trouble in the beginning. Mornings, Olivia used to pound on the ceiling with a mop handle and wake him up. Soon he would open the trap door, call for the stepladder and join us at breakfast. He took mescaline, or peyote, the drug that Huxley wrote about. He’d picked a supply of peyote buds near Taos and carried them around in his pockets. Every now and then he’d slice some with a razor blade, toast them in our toaster, and crumble them into powder. He’d put this powder in a jar of instant coffee, shake it up, and then at breakfast drink a couple of cups. After breakfast he would go upstairs and walk back and forth being extemporaneous.

The trouble was the moths up there couldn’t get used to him. He disturbed them. They’d crawl through the cracks in the ceiling and fly around my studio. Once so many of them got on a wet canvas of mine that they ruined it. I complained to Olivia, so she bought some moth balls and put them around upstairs. She also persuaded Virgil to carry some in his pockets along with the peyote buds.

Let me explain about Olivia. Thelonious Monk was playing at the Jazz Gallery one evening, and I found her next to me in the balcony. She had blank gray eyes, a thin body, and rather fat arms and legs. She wasn’t very attractive, but then I’m afraid I’m not either — and so far I haven’t been very successful. So we worked out an arrangement. She kept house well enough for me, and the nice thing about her was you didn’t know she was around when she was around.

The first thing that made me suspect there was something up between Virgil and Olivia were those whistles. Olivia and Virgil used to like to go to the beach, and one day they came back with a couple of tin whistles they’d found near some empty packages of Cracker Jack. Then they worked up a kind of game in the woods behind my studio — they’d separate from each other and start blowing the whistles. Ultimately they’d find each other and stop blowing. This used to go on while I was painting.

One morning Virgil came down to breakfast as usual, but after breakfast he didn’t go up again; he started declaiming right there — some crazy poem about what sex was like in outer space. Olivia sat on the bed and watched him. She was showing, I thought, a little too much appreciation. For me, this went on too long, so I told him to go upstairs or keep quiet; I wanted to paint. Since he wouldn’t pay any attention, I picked him up and threw him out the door. This wasn’t very hard to do because his co-ordination had been all shaken up by his morning coffee. Nevertheless, I handled him pretty roughly; he lost a couple of moth balls. Olivia looked irritated. I told them they could go out in the woods and blow their damn whistles, then slammed the door on both of them.

Right away they threw this stone, or rock, I guess you might call it, through the studio window. Outside, I heard them start up my car and head down the road.

Virgil’s special brew was still on the table. I mixed up a cup and poured in a lot of sugar. It wasn’t too bad. I drank three cups altogether. Soon I began to feel uneasy and lay down on the bed.

Outside the hole in the studio window, climbing up my rose bush, was a morning-glory vine. The blossoms were a very effective blue. On the floor a square of sunlight was making up into a nice arrangement with the rock they’d thrown through the window. As the sun moved across the floor, it occurred to me that the rock was not an ordinary Long Island rock. Long Island rocks look like Long Island potatoes, but this rock was a deep black, a real ivory black, and it had metallic flecks in it. I got off the bed, though it took a great deal of effort, and picked the rock up. It was terribly heavy for its size and roughly conical in shape— altogether, it had a lot of style. I decided I’d give it to Zogstein. He’d been making some very nice things out of iron lately, with a rock in the middle.

There came a loud knock, so I put the rock on the bed and opened the door. On the doorstep was a tall man carrying an open can of beer in one hand and a live lobster in the other. At first I thought he was an artist, because he hadn’t shaved and his shirt was such a tasteful, faded blue. But he didn’t have that troubled look, he had a general air of assurance; I decided he was a native of the place.

“Morning,” he said. “Got any pictures you want to trade?”

I understood the situation immediately. Jackson Pollock had come to Springs in 1947, and very shortly a number of other Abstract Expressionists, who are now famous, had followed him. Things were not so good in those days, so the grocer had occasionally let them exchange paintings for groceries. Lately, the grocer had been written up in Life magazine as a great collector, and had sold his Pollock for a price that had increased at every telling.

“I’m Lester Barnes, from over at Louse Point,” said the man at my door. “I’m putting up a little mess of drawings. They come cheaper than the big stuff, and I figure, I figure—” He seemed confused, and took a gulp of beer. “I figure that, well…”

“You mean that though they’re sort of small they still carry the personality of the artist?”

“Yep!” exclaimed Mr. Barnes enthusiastically. “That’s just what I mean. Now I’ve just been over to Mike Goldfarb’s. He gave me a drawing for seven lobsters. But I figured that after that panning you got in Art News you might let me have one for three.”

I didn’t like this much.

“All right,” I said.

“Here’s one down.” Mr. Barnes handed me the lobster. “I’ll bring the other two later.” He started down the path, hesitated, and came back. “The one I gave you — maybe you won’t eat him right away.”

“Why not?”

“Well, you see—” He took another gulp of beer and looked down at the ground. “You see, we’ve had him for quite a while. You might call him sort of a household pet. He’s even learned to play marbles with the kids.”

I took the lobster inside and put him down in the square of sunlight. He crawled across the room right away and went under the bed. That was all right, because it left the floor clear for me to do a little painting. I was feeling much better and was beginning to have ideas. Art News had said that my work was too busy, too many things in it. I decided I’d try for a very simple statement. Just two strong forms, one geometrical and one amorphous: And just two colors playing against each other, but strong ones.

I placed a forty-eight-by-fifty canvas on the floor, mixed up some vermilion, and painted in a nice round disc up near the top of the canvas. Then I got a can of ivory black and poured some out in a little pool down near the bottom.

I picked up another brush, wondering what shape I would tease this pool into. But then a really weird thing happened. I noticed that as a shape formed in my mind, the same shape would form on the canvas. I mean I didn’t touch the canvas or anything. The black pool of paint just took on what I was thinking. I worked through a series of shapes and finally hit on a very good one. It had a sort of cosmic quality: a nucleus, with five interrelated drips spiraling around it.

I stepped back. The black form was in a very nice place, the tension was practically perfect. I was pleased and was admiring my work, when I began to get the feeling that somebody was watching me. You know that feeling you sometimes get in a bus or a subway and you look up and sure enough you meet the eyes of a character across the aisle. A detective or something. So I looked up.

On the bed where I had put the rock was a girl. At first I thought she was Olivia. She was the same size, small, that is, had the same immature and somewhat nondescript face, and was wearing, as Olivia always did, a black turtle-neck sweater and blue jeans. But the eyes that were watching me were not Olivia’s. Olivia’s eyes were gray, as I’ve said, and sort of dull. These eyes were a burnt-sienna color. And over there on the dark side of the room they were glowing as if someone had lit a couple of little bonfires behind them.

“Good morning,” I said.

She didn’t answer. She sat there watching me, her elbow on her knee, her pointed chin resting on the palm of a somewhat pudgy hand.

“Do you know,” she said finally, “you’re the first man I’ve ever seen. Ever, that is.”

She shook her head slightly, as if to clear it, and looked at me again.

“How did it happen, sister?” I asked. ‘They had you locked up?”

“In a sense,” she said.

I carried my canvas across the room and set it up against the wall.

“It utterly overwhelms me!” she exclaimed. “I can see that one must exercise fantastic control.”

I looked at my picture to see if it was that good, and shrugged my shoulders modestly.

“I wasn’t talking about your picture,” she said. “I was talking about sex. This is the first time I’ve ever experienced it. You know, where I come from we don’t have any sex. We have something entirely different.”

“And what is that?” I asked.

“Oh, it’s a really grisly performance. It takes eight of us, and it’s run by the Department of Weights and Measures. It’s quite heavy.” She patted the bed. “Do come and sit beside me.”

I said, somewhat nervously, “Perhaps you’d better come over here and sit on this chair.” Since she didn’t move, I added, “As a matter of fact, I’m afraid you’re sitting on a rock.”

“No, I’m not,” she said, a little coldly. “Besides, it wasn’t a rock. It was a meteorite.” A small, reproachful wrinkle appeared on her forehead. She drew up her knees, and in a slow, weary way put her head down on the pillow. “I’m not happy,” she said. “It’s very evident that you don’t like me.” She began to look as if she were going to cry. “I gave a lot of thought to my appearance before I came. I’ve always heard that artists like you, who’d been through the mill, who’d really had it, wanted something quiet around. Something not too exciting. Something they call a studio mouse.”

I began to feel sorry for her. I crossed the room and put my hand on her shoulder.

“Listen, sister,” I explained, “the trouble is, I’ve just had one of what you describe. And I’m not too anxious to get mixed up with another.”

“Oh,” she said, lightening up considerably. “So that’s all it is. Why, that can be taken care of in no time. Do you like my eyes?”

“Yes.”

“Do you like them better this way?” As she spoke her eyes changed from brown to a brilliant blue. The color of the morning-glory in the sun outside.

“Anything else?” she asked.

At first I thought I wasn’t functioning properly. I put my hands over my own eyes and looked at her again. Then I went to the window. The grass was still green, the sky still blue. And across the marshes, across Acabonic Creek, I could see Seymore Harris’ red Jaguar speeding along his private causeway. Colorwise, my eyes were O.K.

“Anything else?” she had asked. Slowly I grasped the significance of her remark. Evidently, all I had to do was to make a suggestion or so, and she would change into my conception of the perfect woman. The trouble was, I’d never done any work with the figure. I’d always painted abstractions (I’d studied with Hans Hofmann). I wasn’t sure I could carry the job through. So I went to the stepladder where Olivia had put some of my books and took down a large volume.

“Have you ever heard of Leonardo da Vinci?” I asked.

“Oh, yes,” she said brightly. “He was one of ours. How did he make out down here?”

“Not at all badly.” I handed her the book. “I’ve always admired his women.”

She leafed through the papers. “They seem,” she said, “they seem to me to be a little old-fashioned. Wouldn’t you like something less passé?” She pointed to a picture of Jacqueline Kennedy that I had tacked up over the sink. “Who’s that over there?” she asked. “Couldn’t I combine a little of that with a little of these?”

“If you like.”

“Then put your hands over your eyes, the way you did a moment ago, and count backward from ten. Very slowly.”

I covered my eyes as she asked and started to count. At eight, I heard the town siren give a wail, there was a fire somewhere. At five, I began to notice a complicated perfume, as if the room were filling up with flowers. And then I heard an automobile horn on the road below. A very expensive horn.

“Now, darling,” she said. “Now…”

She was flawless, absolutely flawless. She was, to be sure, generally Leonardo, though I had the impression that he might have painted her some years after he had died, when things in Italy were more sensuous, more worldly. But her hair was definitely Jacqueline. She had kept her blue eyes.

“Do you approve?” she murmured, smiling and holding out her hands toward me.

She was completely irresistible. I took her in my arms.

“Who,” she asked, “is that utterly fascinating man coming up the path?”

I turned to see.

“It’s Seymore Harris, the dealer,” I answered.

He was striding up the path with all the purpose and vitality that had brought him such success in business. He was very smartly done up, in crushed-raspberry trousers and a well-cut plaid jacket. This was topped off with a handsome beret, the whole costume suggesting that he was a man of two worlds — which indeed he was, for he could move with us and with the others. His strong face was a type that often appeals to women: it was full of charm and animal cunning.

“Look,” I said abruptly. “I’m afraid Mr. Harris has come to discuss a private matter. Would you mind going upstairs?”

“Where’s upstairs?” she asked.

I grabbed the stepladder, shook the books off the steps and set it up under the trap door.

“Come!” I ordered. “Right up here.” And she followed obediently.

Seymore Harris was knocking on the door below. I said to her, “Just make yourself at home on the sofa,” and she sat down. A small cloud of moths arose before her beautiful and bewildered face. I descended the ladder, then slammed the trap door above me.

“Hi, Seymore,” I said.

He was surveying the studio with evident distaste. “God knows how you artists can stand it. This place is in a mess.”

“I’m sorry, Seymour; Olivia’s left me.”

“Hmm,” he muttered. “Hmm,” and sat down on the bed. He lifted his handsome nose and began to sniff appreciatively. “Boy, you must be a fast worker. Fleurs d’Amour. Made by Reynal Frères. The most expensive perfume in the world. Costs eighty-two dollars an ounce.” He gave me a crafty, sympathetic smile. “But don’t think I’m criticizing. I guess everybody knows my weakness. Women!” he snorted. “Women! You know, fella, the only women worth a damn are the ones you meet in dreams.”

“How’s that?”

“No strings attached. No pregnancies, no mothers-in-law, no alimony.”

He glanced at his gold watch. “Listen, I haven’t much time. I have to get to New York before closing. What I came to see you about is this. I’ve just got to find a Jackson Pollock. I’ve got a party that will pay up in the five figures.”

“What’s that got to do with me?”

“Look, son,” he said, “don’t act so innocent. You know and I know that a lot of the artists out here liked Pollock very much, and he liked them. One way or another they got pictures out of him, and now they’ve got them hidden, waiting for higher prices. You’ve been living here for years, and you’ve been to all their houses—”

A moth ball shot between his feet, sped across the room, and came to rest with considerable clatter among the pots under the sink.

“What was that?” said Seymore sharply.

“There’s a lobster under the bed,” I explained. “He used to play marbles with the kids.”

“Look here,” said Seymore, “you been taking that Metrecal, or whatever they call it?”

“You mean mescaline?”

“Whatever they call it,” he said, “lay off. It’s ruined a lot of the boys down here. Tell me, how’s your painting coming along?”

“There’s one over there. I did it this morning.”

“Oh, God!” he moaned. “It’s way behind the Zeitgeist. It’s just a copy of what Harry Glottnik was doing last year. Got any others?”

“There are some piled in the corner.”

He began to look over them rapidly.

“Hmm,” he said. “Hmm… Say fella, you’ve got something here. I mean the one with the butterflies on it.”

“They’re not butterflies, they’re moths.”

“Doesn’t matter,” said Seymore. “It’s saleable.”

He walked across the room and put his hand on my shoulder. “You know, fella, I kind of like you. And frankly, you’ve got a certain talent. It’s dormant, but it’s there. You’ve seen me sell some of these jerks that haven’t got half what you’ve got.” His face crinkled into a persuasive smile. “How about it, fella? Can’t you and I do a little business?”

“What do you mean?”

“Now don’t play stupid. Just tell me which one of the artists out here has a nice Pollock hidden in the attic. Just tell me, and I’ll take you on, and have you hanging in the Modern by Christmas.”

I picked up O’Hara’s book on Pollock off the floor and put my foot on the first step of the ladder.

“O.K., Seymore,” I said. “It’s a deal.”

She was at the far end of the loft, her elbows on the high sill of the little window. She didn’t move when I dropped the trap door. She was deeply absorbed, staring into the far distance. I don’t think she realized I was there until I got directly behind her.

“Darling!” she cried. “I’ve been thinking of you. You can’t imagine what I’ve seen.”

“What have you seen?”

“I think it has something to do with that nice man downstairs. I really do.” She took my face in her hands and looked at me for quite a long while. “I have a wonderful idea,” she said. “Why don’t you and I go over to the sofa and make love?”

I was so startled by this that I let go of O’Hara’s book. Its pointed cover struck her bare foot. She let out a small cry of pain.

“What’s that?” she asked.

“It’s a book full of Pollocks.”

She took her foot in her hand. “What are Pollocks? Animals of some sort?”

“No, no. Jackson Pollock. A great modern artist. Haven’t you heard of him?”

“I don’t think so,” she said. “We’ve sent hardly anyone down here lately. Only Buckminster Fuller.” She held the book up to the window. “Oh! This stuff. We passed through it ages ago. We called it Pre-Negative Realism.”

She bent her head over the pages. Beyond, on my climbing rose bush, there was one white rose left. In the center of it, a brilliant viridian green, was the last of the Japanese beetles.

“You know,” I said, “you can do me a great favor.”

“Why, I’d love to,” she said, with really enormous enthusiasm.

“You’re very amiable.”

“But naturally. I’m descended from the few who were left. So of course we’re amiable. What can I do for you?”

“Do you think you can turn yourself into a Pollock?”

“How large?” she asked.

“About forty-two by forty-eight. Just something that would fit up against the back seat of a Jaguar.”

“Oh, how exciting. You mean I’m going for a ride with that attractive dealer?”

“That’s the general idea,” I said. “He wants very much to hang you in his gallery. But I hope,” and I took her hand, “I hope that as soon as you hear him telephone the man about insurance, you’ll slip out and find your way back here.”

“Of course I will, darling,” she replied. “But how shall I find my way?”

“You take something,” I said, “they call the Long Island Railroad.”

She moved behind me.

“Don’t let go of my hand,” she said. “And don’t look back. Tell me, what do you see? Off in the distance?”

“Why the lighthouse at Montauk.”

“And beyond?”

“A dark fog rolling in.”

“And beyond?”

‘That’s all. What can you see?”

“I see a city, with water flowing through the streets.”

“It could be Mobile, Alabama,” I said. “It was right in the path of a hurricane. On the radio this morning.”

“It could be,” she said, “but I don’t think it is. The houses are of stone that is cut like lace, and the people move as if to music. There are four enormous shapes in the sky.”

“What sort of shapes?”

“Horses,” she said. “And there is a building, somewhat out of taste, that is filled with your pictures.” She was whispering now, her lips were close to my ear.

“There is a really attractive man with a forked beard, and he is handing you a check for a million… a million…”

“A million what?” I cried, and turned to her. But she wasn’t there. A strong smell of fresh paint drifted out the window and instantly disappeared. And then I realized that in my hand I held a Pollock, signed and dated 1949.

I began to feel a little guilty. I wondered if I’d done the right thing in changing her into a mere Pollock; and, I began to realize as I studied it, not a very good one at that. I was just about to politely request the Pollock to change itself back again when there came a loud knocking directly beneath my feet. Seymore, downstairs, had found the handle of the mop; he was getting impatient. I decided I’d go along with him. I set the picture up against the wall opposite the little window in the loft, and examined it critically.

“Frankly,” I said, “your color, it’s not Pollock’s color at all. It’s too sweet. It’s too old-fashioned. It’s School of Paris. And that big drip on the upper right throws the whole thing out of balance. If I were you I would eliminate it completely.”

Evidently her spirit still retained its amiability, for as I spoke a certain American harshness crept into the color and the heavy black drip faded and disappeared.

“That’s excellent!” I said. “Now, you’ve got Pollock’s calligraphic quality all right, but up there on the left you’re all tangled up. Clarify it a little, give it more meaning. That’s right. That’s better. Now. Just one thing more: couldn’t you possibly increase the over-all tension? That’s it. That’s perfect!”

I threw open the trap door and started down the ladder. But I had miscalculated. The picture was too large for the opening. It wouldn’t even go through diagonally.

“Shrink it down to forty-by-forty-six,” I whispered hoarsely.

“Who are you talking to?” asked Seymore. “You got more lobsters up there?”

“You go sit on the bed,” I ordered. “I’m going to bring the picture down with its back toward you. The way you do, for your rich clients.”

I found a place where the light was good, and slowly turned the picture around. Seymore jumped to his feet and whistled loudly.

“Boy!” he cried. “You’ve sure got something there. And the best period, too. Why, you can get up in the five figures for that, maybe more. Even after my commission. You going to Mr. Stettheimer’s party next week?”

“Yes.”

“Well, fella, I’ll have a nice check for you. By the way, what’s the title?” He picked up the picture and examined the back. “Why, yes, here it is. Very faint, in pencil. And in Pollock’s handwriting, too. It’s a funny title.”

“What is the title, Seymore?”

“Immediately Yours.”

“It’s not so funny,” I said.

Toward the end of the week Zogstein, my neighbor, went off to California. He had said I could borrow his jeep whenever I wanted. So the night of Mr. Stettheimer’s party I drove through Springs, past the broken tree where Pollock was killed, over to the Montauk highway. Mr. Stettheimer’s place is way out, opposite the airport. You take a private road through a thick woods, this opens up into an enormous lawn, and across that, on the edge of Georgica Lake, is the house. It’s all glass and about half a block long; it was designed by Philip Johnson or somebody. It was late, and there were lots of cars parked around. They were well beaten up and had a lot of character, the kind the artists like. I recognized most of them. This was a very exclusive party. But Seymore Harris’ red Jaguar was not there.

Mr. Stettheimer greeted me warmly. He was about eighty years old, I guess, but still frisky and alert. He was a banker, I knew, but except for his little gold-rimmed glasses, it was hard to believe. A long Peruvian serape covered his fat little body; beneath it a pair of faded bathing trunks hung down to his withered knees. He dressed that way because he wanted his guests to feel at home, he wanted to be inconspicuous. And actually, the way the artists dressed, he was. He led me through an enormous hall, hung with abstract pictures frame-to-frame, out onto a terrace overlooking the lake.

There were lots of people talking and dancing. Moving among them were a number of caterers in faultless evening dress carrying trays and glasses. The general effect was as if the peasants had revolted and pressed the nobles into service.

“Where’s Olivia?” Mr. Stettheimer asked, and produced an electric hearing machine from under his serape and held it toward me.

I rather hated to tell him, because he’d been so nice to me. “She ran off with Virgil,” I said. ‘The poet who lived upstairs.”

“Oh, dear me,” he said. “I warned Mrs. Stettheimer that something like that might happen. Oh, dear me. You’d better have a drink.”

He led me through the crowd to a table loaded with food and liquor. I held up my glass to Mr. Stettheimer, and he held up his hearing aid.

“What’s new in the art world?” I asked.

“Nothing much,” answered Mr. Stettheimer absently. “Oh, yes, I forgot. In New York last night, a Leonardo was stolen from the Museum.”

“A Leonardo!” I exclaimed. “But I didn’t know there was one in the country.”

“Nobody thought there was,” he said, “until the day before yesterday. Then Seymore Harris brought one to the Museum. I heard all about it at lunch at the Bankers’ Club today from one of the trustees of the Museum. It will be in the papers tomorrow.”

“Did you say Seymore Harris?”

“Why, yes,” said Mr. Stettheimer. “Seymore Harris, the dealer. Oh, dear me, here come some more guests.” He turned very quickly and ran off through the crowd.

“The same as before,” I said to the gentleman behind the table. “But make it double.”

I pushed the people aside and went after Mr. Stettheimer. He was hard to catch; he moved quickly and he was so small I couldn’t see his head among the others. I finally caught up with him in the hall. A large woman with Calder jewelry and a yellow ponytail was talking to him. He had an absent look, so I grabbed his microphone and moved it in my direction.

“How did Seymore Harris ever get a Leonardo?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” said Mr. Stettheimer. “It’s really a mystery. Especially since he only deals in modern pictures. But the Director and the Curator of Paintings at the museum were convinced it was genuine. They knew all about it. One that was lost in the seventeenth century. A woman with blue eyes and dark hair.”

“And you say it was stolen last night?”

“Yes, it was. Last night. They had it locked in what they call Storeroom Thirteen, a place where they have maximum security. And this morning, when they opened up, it was gone.”

“How about insurance?” I asked.

“Oh, I should say… I should say that Seymore could collect…” (Mr. Stettheimer’s face became very serious, more like a banker’s) “up to three million dollars.”

“Why, the dirty crook!” I yelled. But Mr. Stettheimer had run off to greet a new guest.

I wandered out of the hall, through the party, to the balustrade on the edge of the terrace. There wasn’t any moon, but there were more stars than I had ever seen in my life. I finished my drink and put it down on the balustrade. I hadn’t realized that the top of it was curved — my glass immediately fell off into the water below. It filled and sank.

I felt someone plucking at my sleeve. It was a little girl about five years old. She had big dark eyes and a lonely face.

“Lift me up!” she ordered. “I want to find my mother. I want to go home.”

I lifted her up on my shoulder.

“There she is,” she said “She’s dancing with her psychiatrist.”

“Which one?” I asked.

“The one who sent Daddy away.” She looked down at me and studied my face. “Are you an abstract artist?”

“Yes.”

“Abstract art is a dead duck,” she said. “Put me down.”

As she ran off through the legs of the crowd, I turned her “dead duck” remark over in my mind. Canaday had been saying the same thing for quite a while in The New York Times. But now I had heard it directly from a member of the generation that was destined to destroy us. I decided to have another drink.

I crossed the terrace and saw, coming out of the lighted hall, a very spectacular girl. She looked as if she had just stepped out of some dream that Peter Paul Rubens might have had in his most opulent period. She wore a cluster of freshly cut diamonds around her neck, and her gown was a marvelous dark red, a sort of an Ad Reinhardt red, if you know what I mean. She was clinging to the arm of a man who was so well dressed that at first I thought he was one of the caterers, but then I realized he was Seymore Harris. Mr. Stettheimer was with them, standing on the bottom step, holding his microphone high.

“You’ll never make the Breakstone Club,” Seymore was saying to Mr. Stettheimer, “in an outfit like that.”

“I should dress like King Solomon,” beamed Mr. Stettheimer. “Would that make any difference?”

“No,” said Seymore. “Because they wouldn’t take him in either.”

“Not even if he was in the UN?” asked Mr. Stettheimer.

Seymore’s girl laughed gaily and threw her arms around the old man.

“You know, you’re very attractive,” she said, and kissed the top of his head.

Seymore put his hand on my shoulder.

“Hi,” he said. “I want you to meet my new fiancée.” He took her arm. “I want you to meet a friend of mine. I can’t remember his name, but I kind of like him, though not very much.”

She turned her laughing eyes toward me. They became suddenly grave.

“But he’s a ghost!” she cried.

“A ghost?” asked Seymore. “A ghost? He’s not a ghost He’s just an artist.”

“But he looks so thin,” she said. “I don’t believe he’s eaten for a week. I’m sure he needs a woman to take care of him.”

“It’s not a woman he needs,” said Seymore. “What he needs is talent.”

I didn’t like this crack, especially in front of Mr. Stettheimer. I reached out and grabbed Seymore by one of his satin lapels and pulled him toward me.

“Seymore,” I said, “I want my check.”

“What check?”

“The money for the Pollock.”

“What Pollock?”

“You know what Pollock. Give me my check!”

Seymore looked at me coldly. His face was tense and a little nasty.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about”

“You’re a goddam liar!”

Seymore turned to Mr. Stettheimer. “Would you mind,” he said, “if I threw this creep into your lake?”

Both the girl and Mr. Stettheimer stepped in between us. I heard her saying, “Seymore, darling, couldn’t you try to be a little more agreeable?” And at the same time Mr. Stettheimer said, “You boys should talk business at the office, not at my party.” He grabbed my arm, and with extraordinary vitality for his years, hustled me past the bar, through the dancers, out to the steps that led down to the lake. “You stay here,” he ordered, “and pull yourself together. And keep away from Seymore. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Mr. Stettheimer,” I said. “I understand.” After all, he’d always been very nice to me.

The music was getting loud now, the party was moving into high gear. I turned my back on it. Even then, near at hand, I saw the shadows of the dancers jumping in the water. Farther out, the lake was dark and still. A nice place to be in a boat. Then I noticed that there was a boat, hidden in the grasses, its long rope tied to an iron ring on the bottom step.

The knot was complicated, but I solved it. I found the oars, fitted them into the locks, and was about to shove off when I saw against the light the figure of a woman on the steps above me. It wasn’t hard to tell who she was. Silhouettes aren’t cut that way very often.

“How about a ride?” I asked.

She didn’t answer, but she let me take her hand and help her in. I began to row through the grasses, out into the open water. I rowed for quite a while.

“Why didn’t you tell Seymore I was right?” I asked suddenly.

“But how could I?”

“But why couldn’t you?”

“Because you were probably both right!”

“But that’s just not possible,” I said sharply.

I let the boat drift. She sat quietly. The Milky Way was behind her. Its light had gathered in her diamond necklace; a phosphorescent glow fell on her shoulders and her hands. She sighed deeply.

“What’s the trouble?” I asked.

“I’m not for this world,” she said.

“But why not?”

“Because nobody seems to realize that as the ambiance changes, the truth changes.”

I started to row again. The moving figures at Mr. Stettheimer’s party grew smaller and smaller. Pretty soon I couldn’t hear the music. And then I began to hear the pounding of the surf. I realized we were getting near the sand spit that separated the lake from the ocean.

“Let’s go ashore,” I said.

I beached the boat. We climbed out and walked to the high part of the sand. In front of us the ocean waves were breaking heavily; on either side of us there were big dunes. Down the beach, black against the ocean, a man was walking briskly toward us — a member of the Coast Guard on his nightly patrol. We turned back to the boat.

I took her arm in one hand and with the other I pointed out across the lake.

“What can you see?” I asked.

“I can see the Nebula of Andromeda,” she said. “It’s a pity it’s lying on its side. The top view is much more exciting.”

“Oh, I don’t mean way out there. I mean just on the other side of the lake.”

“I can see Mr. Stettheimer’s party. There’s a man, apart from the others, sitting on the balustrade.”

“Can you see what he’s thinking?” I asked.

“Why yes, as a matter of fact, I can. Can you?”

“Yes,” I said. “He’s trying to figure out how much he could get for a Rubens from the Art Institute of Chicago.”

She laughed softly.

“Darling,” she whispered. “Why don’t you and I take a little walk in the dunes?”

“Let me tie up the boat first,” I said.

There was a large piece of driftwood at our feet. I got down on my knees and started to dig in the sand under the driftwood so I could get the rope around it.

“Do you know,” she said suddenly, “there’s a very attractive man in a uniform watching us. He’s just on the top of the rise. Who do you think he is? Do you mind if I go over and talk to him?”

Before I could answer she had gone.