The Troubled Air Part 27

Archer took a step toward the bathroom, then stopped. He went to the table and sat down opposite Mrs. Pokorny. Her large, gray face, under the foolish, curled pink feathers, looked blind, with the large, heavily pouched eyes closed and folded in under the thick lids. "Before the doctor comes," he said softly, "you and I can do something for Manfred."

Mrs. Pokorny opened her eyes and stared at Archer. "You've done enough for Manfred," she said. "You can go home now."

"He's got his robe on. In the bath," Archer said slowly and clearly, trying to penetrate behind the heavy staring eyes. "We could take that off. And ..." He took the pill bottle and cap out of his pocket and placed them on the table in front of him. "I could throw this away."

"What're you driving at?" Archer could see the thick, coa.r.s.e lines around her mouth setting stubbornly.

"If he was found naked," Archer said, "just as though he were taking a bath ... If there was no sign of the pills. He had high blood pressure. A bad heart. It might very well be that he had an attack-that he died naturally."

"He didn't die naturally," Mrs. Pokorny said. "He killed himself."

"Perhaps," Archer said. "But if we could re-arrange things just a little bit ... There would be some reason for doubt. The newspapers might be kind, the doctor ... It would be better for his memory, for you ..."

"Better for you, you mean," Mrs. Pokorny said flatly and without heat or without expression of any kind. "So that people wouldn't be able to tell the truth-that you and your kind killed him."

"Forgive me for arguing at a time like this," Archer said, ignoring her hatred. "But if we do anything it has to be now, before anyone comes. I'm not going to try to defend myself. But don't be vindictive. Try to act calmly and sensibly. Don't think only of this minute. Try to think of what people are going to remember about your husband ten years from now ..."

"I want people to remember that they killed an artist," Mrs. Pokorny said, closing her eyes again and speaking blindly and without inflection. "An artist who tried to give them a little music in their lives, a man who never harmed anyone, a man who didn't know how to take care of himself any more than a two-year-old child. I want them to remember that he was hounded to death by you and the other Fascists ..."

Oh, G.o.d, Archer thought, even now, even with her husband only thirty minutes dead, doped and drowned fifteen feet down the hall, she still divides the world by slogans and catch-phrases. Looking at the blank, hating, thick woman who had somehow loved the ridiculous, frightened, finished man inside and who somehow (no one would ever understand exactly how any more) had engendered love in him, Archer knew that there was no hope of persuading her to help him. Pokorny dead was going to be sacrificed to her cause as he had been sacrificed, living, to others' causes.

Archer stood up. "What's the name of your doctor?" he asked wearily. "And how do I reach him?"

"His name is Gordon," Mrs. Pokorny said without opening her eyes. "You'll find his number in that address book on the table in the hall."

Archer went into the hall and got the address book. He found the number and entered the bathroom once more. He dialed the number and waited. While he listened to the long, steady ringing on the wire he looked down at Pokorny. The musician rested under water, the bow of his sash neatly and modestly tied, his eyegla.s.ses shining like divers' windows oil the wavery, resting, escaped face.

Kitty was still awake when Archer got home two hours later. She was sitting up in bed, her gla.s.ses on, giving her a studious look in her lacy nightgown that would have struck Archer as humorous and charming at any other time. The bed was covered with bills and slips of paper and canceled checks and Kitty had ink on her fingers from the envelopes she was addressing. Archer felt exhausted. The doctor had questioned him closely and then the police had been suspicious and asked him tricky questions as though they suspected that he had slipped into the house and held Pokorny's head under water while his wife was away. Two reporters had appeared and Archer heard Mrs. Pokorny say clearly and loudly over and over again that they had killed her husband. Archer had been in the bedroom talking to a slow-moving detective who made little marks in a notebook while listening to Archer, so he didn't hear exactly what Mrs. Pokorny had told the reporters, but he thought he heard his name mentioned once or twice and when he finally got out of the house one of the reporters, who smelled from gin and c.o.c.ktail onions, had walked two blocks with him pretending to be solicitous and trying to pump him.

"I don't know anything," Archer had said again and again. "I don't know why he did it. Ask Mrs. Pokorny."

"Mrs. Pokorny has her own theory, Mr. Archer," the reporter said. "She has her views of your place in the picture and I think our readers would like to have your side of it, too. We want to be fair to everybody involved," the reporter said, trying to look fair, upholding the best interests of impartial journalism, trotting alongside Archer because he was walking so fast. "She has some very harsh things to say, Mr. Archer," said the reporter mournfully, "some pretty strong accusations, and I think all parties involved ought to have a chance to speak for themselves before the story is printed."

"I am not involved," Archer said, wondering how far from the truth he was. "I knew him. He worked for me. We were friendly. I happened to drop in. That's all. I am not interested in getting into a debate with Mrs. Pokorny." He waved to a cruising taxi and jumped in, as the reporter leaned into the cab, making it smell like a crowded bar, saying, "Just one short statement of the other side of the case, Mr. Archer. Just one sentence ..."

Archer started pulling the door shut, pressing it against the reporter, and the man fell back, shaking his head in regret at the uncooperativeness of the public in the search for front-page truth.

When he came heavily into the bedroom, Archer could tell from Kitty's first glance that she was disturbed about something, too. He prayed that she would wait until morning. He took off his jacket, threw it down and slumped into a chair, overacting his weariness a little in an attempt to make Kitty hold whatever was bothering her for a better time.

But Kitty was not to be put off. Keeping her head bent and not looking at Archer as she scribbled on an envelope, she said, "I made out a lot of checks. If you'll sign them and put them back in the envelopes, I'll mail them tomorrow morning."

"OK," Archer said, rubbing the top of his head slowly.

"I've been looking through the stubs," Kitty said. "There're some very strange things in this checkbook."

"Are there?"

"I thought you told me we ought to economize."

"Well, so we should. Do you object to that?"

"I agree. I agree completely," Kitty spoke very quickly, running the words together in little spasms. Archer recognized the signs. Kitty was suspicious and preparing to be angry. "I've cut down on a lot of things. I haven't bought any clothes for myself or Jane in months. I changed markets because Cucitti's is five cents more a pound on b.u.t.ter than anybody else."

"That's fine," Archer said warily, not understanding what Kitty was doing. "That must be quite a saving each month. Probably three, four dollars."

"Three, four dollars," Kitty said flatly. "I'm glad to see you're so concerned."

"Please, Kitty ..." Archer stood up and began to take off his tie. "Couldn't we talk about this some other time? I'm awfully tired tonight."

"I don't want to talk about it some other time. I'm doing the bills tonight and I want to talk about this tonight."

Archer went into the closet and hung up his coat and tie. The closet smelled of tobacco and cedarwood and Archer remembered the steamy, close smell of the Pokorny bathroom.

"You don't seem to be worried at all about money these days," Kitty was saying, addressing the closet. "Large-handed would be a nice way of putting it. Debonair."

Archer came out of the closet and looked at himself in the mirror over the bureau. His face looked exhausted, long lines falling away from his mouth, and his eyes looked as though he hadn't slept well in weeks. Irritated with the way he looked, he turned back, leaning against the bureau and facing Kitty. "What's the matter, darling?" he asked gently.

Kitty riffled through the checkbook. "Check number 35," she read. "To Woodrow Burke. Three hundred dollars. Do you remember that?"

Archer sighed. He went over to the chair and sank into it, stretching his legs. "I remember it," he said.

"Do you have to sigh like that?" Kitty asked, her voice high and tense.

"No," Archer said. "Forgive me."

"Why did you give Woodrow Burke three hundred dollars?"

"He asked me for it. He's out of a job. He's broke."

"There're a lot of people who are out of jobs," Kitty said. "Do you plan to give them all three hundred dollars?"

"Oh, Kitty ..."

"Check number 47," Kitty read. "To Alice Weller. One hundred dollars. I suppose she's out of a job, too."

"As a matter of fact, she is."

"As a matter of fact," Kitty repeated. She has a very irritating way of arguing, Archer decided.

"That big, gushing slob of a woman," Kitty said. "And I've been worrying about saving five cents a pound on b.u.t.ter."

Archer stared coldly at Kitty, hating her lack of charity. From time to time, in arguments, this trait came out in Kitty, but only when she was angry, and she was always repentant later for the things she said and Archer made a point of forgetting those ugly disclosures as soon after as he could. "Kitty," Archer said, "this is my business. I don't want to talk about it tonight. I'll tell you about it some other time."

Kitty riffled the checkbook. "Two hundred dollars this morning," she said. "To cash. Have you got the money now?"

"No."

"I suppose you gave that away to somebody who was out of a job, too."

"I did."

"I suppose that's your business, too?"

"Yes," Archer said flatly, "it is."

"Will it be your business when we haven't got a cent to our names, the way it was when we first got to New York," Kitty asked, "or will it be my business, too?"

"Kitty, darling," Archer said wearily, "why don't we go to sleep now? I've had a terrible day and I don't feel like talking any more. Tomorrow ..."

"I want to know what's happening," Kitty said. "You're throwing our money away like a drunken sailor. I know I told you you didn't have to tell me anything-but it's getting unbearable. Every time I talk to you or ask you a question, I can see you figuring out how to avoid talking to me ... I haven't felt I was really married to you for a month. Don't shake your head. It's true," Kitty wailed. "It's true. Don't try to deny it. It's not a marriage any more. You've put me outside. I wish I wasn't going to have this child! I didn't want it! You wanted it, not me, and now look what's happening ..."

Archer got up and went over to the bed. He sat down and put his arms around Kitty. She wasn't crying. She pulled away from him fiercely.

"Listen, Kitty," he said softly, "I gave that two hundred dollars to Manfred Pokorny to try to save his life. Listen carefully, darling. When I went over to his house tonight, he was dead."

Kitty sat absolutely still. Then she turned her head and stared, frozen, at Archer.

"What?" she whispered finally.

"He killed himself. While we were eating dinner. While I was walking across town to see him. I didn't take a taxi because it was such a nice night." Saying it hurt. He had avoided phrasing it for himself before this.

Kitty suddenly put her arms around him and held him, hard. "I'm sorry. Oh, dearest," she whispered, "I'm so sorry."

Archer kissed her cheek. "I don't want to talk about it now," he said. "If you don't mind."

"Of course not." Kitty began to shiver violently. Gently, Archer took her arms down and said, "Get under the covers. You're freezing. Try to sleep."

Kitty nodded, her eyes wide, staring, frightened. She lay back and Archer wrapped the blankets around her. She didn't stop shivering and the silk coverlet rippled over her body. Archer gathered together the scattered bills, the canceled checks, the envelopes with Kitty's child-like scrawl on them, and put them on her desk. Then he went over and kissed her forehead.

"I'm going downstairs for awhile," he said. "Don't worry."

Kitty didn't say anything.

He put out the lights and went out. He descended the steps slowly and went into his study. The whole house seemed sentimentally neat and cosy after the Pokornys' apartment. Chintz, shining bra.s.s student lamps, flowers in bowls, gay, striped draperies, polished wood, none of the garish disorder of the composer's home. If anything tragic happened here, Archer thought, looking around him, it would seem out of place.

On his desk there was the alb.u.m of records of Pokorny's quartet. After Archer had come back from the bank that morning, he had taken it off the shelf, intending to play it, to make up for the sense of guilt he had had when Pokorny had asked him how he liked the piece and he had lied and said that he liked it very much. But the telephone had begun to ring before he could put it on the machine and he hadn't had time to listen to it.

Archer picked up the alb.u.m. The one piece of music of Pokorny's that had been recorded in this country, he remembered. Pokorny's contribution to the culture of America. Three records, on both sides, from a man who was dead at the age of fifty. Suburban Themes, the alb.u.m said. Probably some clever young man at the recording company had suggested the t.i.tle. It didn't sound like Pokorny.

Archer went over to the phonograph and put the records on. He turned the dials down low, so that the sound wouldn't disturb Kitty upstairs. Then he sat down in an easy-chair, facing the machine.

The music was gay, small, clever, full of charming, unpretentious pa.s.sages. You could imagine children dancing to it and grownups smiling a little as they heard it. There was no trouble in the music. It was pure and bubbling, even rather elegant, and the last movement was serene and evening-like, nothing big, no grand sunsets, no clouds in the sky, no fear of the night, just people meeting each other at suburban stations, after the day's work was over, kissing each other placidly, turning on the car headlights and carefully going up small hillside roads to comfortable houses and family dinners. Somewhere in Pokorny there had hidden a lyrical householder who worked in a small garden and went sleepily to bed at ten-thirty, surrounded by children.

The music came to an end. Archer sat for a moment in the silence, broken only by the minute swishing of the circling turntable. Then he got up and put the records on once more and listened again to the dead man's music.

20.

YOU COULD LOOK AROUND THE STUDIO AND SEE WHO WAS GOING TO THE funeral by picking out the dark suits and black ties. Pokorny had, as a last awkward and troublesome gesture, chosen to be buried on a Thursday, in the middle of rehearsal. There was only time for one preliminary reading of the script in the morning, with everyone sitting in a semicircle on collapsible chairs, and the grave color made a wintry pattern among the dresses of the women and the slacks and corduroy jackets of the younger actors. Barbante, Archer noted, Levy, O'Neill, and, surprisingly, Brewer, the engineer, were dressed in honor of the corpse. None of the women was going, Archer saw from their costumes, but, then, none of them had had anything to do with the composer. Vic had on a gray flannel suit with a red tie. Vic hadn't known Pokorny well, but he had spoken to him more often than Brewer, and had frequently told Archer how much he liked Pokorny's music. Archer had taken it for granted that Vic would go to the funeral and he found himself staring at Vic's colorful tie during the reading and concentrating on it to the point of missing a half page of dialogue at a time. At least, Archer thought unreasonably, taking his eyes away from Vic, he might have worn a plain tie today.

When the reading was over, Archer stood up. "There'll be a break now," he said, "until one o'clock, so that anybody who wishes can attend the funeral of Manfred Pokorny, who used to do the music for this show."

The cast stood up soberly, without the customary joking and conversation that ordinarily came at a recess in rehearsal. Everyone looked solemn and reserved, giving Pokorny a polite farewell by speaking in near whispers for a minute or so as they filed out of the studio.

"Clement," Brewer said, "could you wait for me for five minutes? I have to go upstairs. Then I'd like to ride down with you."

Archer nodded. "I'll wait for you here." Brewer went out, looking like a lumberjack dressed for church in his blue suit.

Archer drifted over toward Vic, who was reading a newspaper. "Vic," Archer said, "aren't you coming with us?"

Vic looked up from the paper. "I don't think so," he said. "Funerals lost their charm for me during the war. I don't get any message from cadavers any more." He grinned crookedly up at Archer. "Too much of a good thing, I guess. Make my apologies to the survivors for me."

"Still," Archer said quietly, "I think you ought to go."

"I'm not dressed for the occasion," Vic said, touching his tie.

"We can stop in on the way downtown," said Archer, "and buy you a black tie."

Vic shook his head. "I'll be honest," he said. "I could be dressed like an undertaker and I still wouldn't go."

"Out of respect for Pokorny," Archer said stubbornly. "Out of respect to his friends."

"Respect for what?" Vic asked derisively. "A hundred and sixty pounds of dead meat. And I don't respect Pokorny. He was a gutless little man and he blew up the first time anybody took the trouble to poke him. As for his friends ..." Vic laughed harshly. "They're feeling mournful and guilty and they think going down and sitting for an hour while somebody moons over the corpse is going to give them back that bright, innocent, empty-boweled feeling. Well, I don't feel guilty and I have too many other things to be mournful about. And when I die, I hope somebody has the sense to throw me into a wagon quietly and dump me somewhere with the other garbage." He smiled mirthlessly at Archer. "Getting my message, Jack?" he asked.

"Sure," Archer said, unpleasantly. He started to turn away to talk to Barbante, who was sitting three seats away, his head thrown back, his eyes closed, his short legs stretched out in front of him. Barbante hadn't said a word all morning. As usual, in the morning, he seemed sleepy.

"Did you see this?" Vic carelessly offered Archer the newspaper he was holding. It was a so-called liberal paper that wound back and forth across the Communist Party line on most issues. The paper was folded back to the. page on which the columnists held forth. "This feller," Vic said, tapping a column with his finger, "is taking a bite out of your a.s.s this fine morning."

"What?" Archer took the paper and stared at the column. He saw his name several times scattered throughout the piece, but for the moment he somehow couldn't start to read it.

"J. F. Roberts," Vic said. "He does think pieces for unthinking readers. He doesn't like you this morning at all. You're the vanguard of Fascism, he says; you killed the musician. He's been talking to Mrs. Pokorny, and she seems pretty peevish."

Vic lit a cigarette and watched Archer closely as he read the column. The whole thing was in there. Mrs. Pokorny had obviously not held back anything. The column was written in harsh, newspaper prose and Archer and the Immigration Department shared honors in it for d.o.g.g.i.ng Pokorny to death. Reading it, Archer could not help but feel how righteous the columnist made the piece sound. If it had been anyone but himself, he realized, he would have approved of the column completely. The columnist heaped scorn on the Immigration Department for wishing to exile a man who twenty-seven years ago in a foreign country had flirted with the Communists for only two months. The arguments, Archer realized, were exactly the ones that he himself had used to defend Pokorny. As for Archer, the columnist contemptuously dismissed him as a timid hack so eager to keep his job and do the bidding of his masters that he leaped at their slightest signal and committed artistic murder at a snap of the corporate fingers. The entire article, Archer realized dully, was written in exactly the same exasperated and belligerent tone as the articles in Blueprint on the other side of the question. Style, he thought, is interchangeable on political questions. Political articles these days, he decided, all sound as though they had been dictated by Mrs. Pokorny or an opposed twin.

Archer read slowly. It was difficult to go through the untruths that were impossible to contradict, the facts that were slightly and fatally twisted, the biting epithets that were attached to his name, the reasonable-sounding half-truths that were so false and so d.a.m.ning. Mrs. Pokorny, Archer saw, had also revealed that Archer had tried to persuade her to disguise the fact that Pokorny had killed himself and there was a literal and quite accurate account of his conversation with her about the pills and the robe. G.o.d, Archer thought, she must have a notebook on her at all times. In print this way, with the shadow of the dead man hovering over the page, Archer's action, which he had attempted almost automatically and out of a protective instinct for the composer and his wife, now seemed like the most callous maneuvering and concealment. If it was about anyone else, Archer thought, I'd think he was the most despicable coward in the world.

His hands were shaking when he finished the article. The columnist promised to supply new and equally d.a.m.ning evidence the next day. Suddenly, staring at the page, Archer hated the sight of his name in print. Clement Archer, Clement Archer ... The name had a tainted ring to it after its use ten times in ten paragraphs. Archer blinked, checking himself consciously from blurting out what he felt. He handed the paper back to Vic. He tried to smile. "This fellow," he said, "really lays it on, doesn't he?"

"Great little old circulation builder," Vic said carelessly, taking the paper. "You still going to the funeral?"

Archer hesitated. Everybody at the funeral would probably have read the piece. They would be friends and relatives of the dead man and in the moment of grief and anger almost certainly would share Mrs. Pokorny's estimate of Archer's share in the tragedy. And there would undoubtedly be photographers there from the newspapers to catch the look of guilt on Archer's face as he confronted the widow. I wish I was sick, Archer thought. I wish I was sick in bed with the doctor in the room telling me it would kill me to go out today.