The Trouble With Eden - Lawrence Block [57]
She said, “What did it?”
“Damned if I know.”
“Thinking about me with him? That must of been what did it.”
“Maybe. I don’t know.”
“Well, whatever it was, I’m not complaining. Tell me something and make it the absolute truth.”
“Did this ever happen before? That’s the question, isn’t it? The answer is no, it never did.”
“Once you couldn’t make it with them, you could never make it at all.”
“Right.”
“Then I wonder what it means.”
“Beats me,” he said.
EIGHT
One Sunday Linda met Tanya in the hall. The actress had just closed Bill Donatelli’s door. “He wants to get some painting done,” she said. “He says I distract him.”
“I imagine you do.”
“I wanted him to paint me. He only does abstracts, but I thought I could pose nude and he could look at me while he painted an abstract, and it would give him inspiration. He said it always gave him the wrong kind of inspiration.”
“I didn’t know he ever said that many words all at once.”
“Billie talks to me. He’s very shy with most people, but he talks to me. By the way, I guess you took my advice.”
“What advice was that?”
“About, you know, physical needs.”
She was confused at first, her mind fixing on a conversation she had had with someone recently who had been trying to convince her of the virtues of organic vitamins and a vegetarian diet. Then she remembered Tanya’s theories of sexual requirements. Her advice, as far as Linda could remember, was that she ought to go out and get laid.
She said, “What makes you think I took your advice?”
“Well, I’m not saying it was anything I said that made you change your mind. It was a matter of speaking. You know, to make conversation. Not that I had anything to do with what you’re doing.”
“What am I doing?”
“You’re sleeping with Peter Nicholas.”
“I’m what?”
“Sleeping with—”
“Where did you hear that?”
“You’re not?”
“Of course not. Who told you that?”
“Gee, Linda, don’t bite my head off. Nobody told me anything. It’s just that he’s up here all the time two of you spending so much time together Gretchen the way she is and I put two and together.”
“First you have to know how to add.”
“Linda—”
“Because I know it must be news to you, but it’s possible for a man and a woman to spend time together with, out having sex together. That may come as a shock to you. Two people in a room without so much as a television set and yet they manage to keep their clothes on. Strange as it may seem—”
“Linda, what did I do?”
The girl looked on the point of tears. “I’m sorry, Tanya,” she said.
“I mean I didn’t do anything.”
“I know you didn’t, and I’m sorry. It just threw me. Peter’s the one person I can relax with completely, the one man, because he wants my company but doesn’t want anything more than that.”
“Well, I didn’t know, Linda.”
“I hope you didn’t say anything to anybody.”
“Of course not. Well, except for Billie.”
“I guess the secret’s safe with him, since you’re the only human being he talks to. Not that there’s a secret to be kept safe.”
It was two nights before she saw Peter. She was on the point of mentioning Tanya’s conversation to him and his mood changed her mind. Gretchen had had a bad day and when Gretchen had a bad day, Peter wound up in a bad mood.
Often she thought how unusual was her own special perspective on the situation. No one heard so much about the ups and downs of Gretchen Vann and spent so little time with the woman. She was often invited to stop at their apartment or to accompany them to the Raparound. At first she had tended to accept those invitations, and then she began to find excuses to decline them. She baby-sat for them occasionally, enjoying Robin’s company and happy to do them a favor, but she spent less and less time in Gretchen’s actual company.
The woman made her uncomfortable. She recognized this before she knew why. Gretchen was brittle and unstable, an enervating companion on her best days, but that didn’t explain it. Later she sorted it out. She didn’t like Gretchen’s company because Gretchen disliked her, and ultimately she guessed the reason for