The Troubled Air Part 11

"Lucky man," Frances said. She sat down on the sofa across from him, putting her leg under her. She sipped at the milk. "Heaven," she said.

She has decided, Archer thought, that today she will be girlish and is putting in the proper strokes unerringly.

"Clement, dear," she said, staring at him over the rim of her gla.s.s, "I'm sure you're wondering why I dragged you up here like this."

"Well ..." Archer began.

"I've always been meaning to invite you up," she said swiftly. "You and your wife. For a little party. I'd never invite your daughter." She smiled widely. She had a disturbing habit of licking her lower lip in darting little movements of her tongue. "Not after the other night. Things're bad enough around town as it is without bringing the compet.i.tion to your own fireside. Dom was all over her."

"Was he?" Archer asked, not rea.s.sured.

"You know Dom. He never means any harm-except to women." She grinned and Archer smiled woodenly back at her, confused and wis.h.i.+ng she'd move on to another subject. "He never looked at me once," Frances said. "And we've been friends for a long time. Though to be perfectly truthful, Dom is too fleet of foot for my tastes."

Dimly, Archer remembered that Frances and Barbante had been seen together for a short period. But then Barbante had been seen with almost everybody for a short period. Frances, he knew, had been involved with quite a few men. She was not promiscuous, but she was-well-restless. She fell deeply in love, made no bones about it, displayed her love proudly and publicly, was furiously attached to one man for a time and then suddenly, finding him lacking in one way or another, ditched him without ceremony, usually in public, and went on to the next. At every party she went to there would be several men who watched her warily and a little regretfully from corners, carefully keeping out of her way. She had a rough, ironic tongue and in her trail there were several limp markers where she had left lovers permanently demolished.

"In a better-regulated society," Frances was saying briskly, "you could hire Dom by the night, and send him out in the morning before the maid arrived to see how naughty you'd been."

"Now, Frances," Archer said uncomfortably, "Dom is a friend of mine."

"He's a friend of mine, too," Frances said cheerfully. "I say all these things right in front of him. He loves it. He thinks it's a compliment."

"Frances," Archer said desperately, "you started to say ..."

"Oh, yes." She took another sip of her chocolate milk. "Clement, I'm afraid I have some dreadful news for you. And I wanted to tell you in advance before ..."

The phone rang again. "Oh, d.a.m.n it," Frances said, putting her gla.s.s down. "I'm going to have the number changed." She got up and went to the phone, patting Archer's cheek as she pa.s.sed him. "Motherwell speaking," she said impatiently. "Yes. I see." Her voice became guarded and she glanced involuntarily at Archer. He felt out of place and superfluous, knowing that she wanted privacy for this conversation. He wondered if it would be discreet to go and lock himself in the bathroom for awhile.

"Yes," Frances said. "That's quite clear. Look-where are you? You'd better call me back. In about thirty minutes. Right." She hung up. "Sorry," she said, as she resumed her seat. Archer glanced obliquely at her face, but nothing was revealed there.

"You said you had bad news," he said gently.

"Well," Frances said, "maybe I'm just being egotistic when I say that. Maybe you won't mind at all."

"What is it, Frances?"

"I want to quit the program." She peered at him with her head to one side. The sun caught her cheek and lit up her hair and she looked young and morning-like. "Have I broken your heart?"

Archer sighed. A dozen sensations flooded through him, jumbled and contradictory. He didn't try to sort them out. Now, he thought, is the time for me to be very careful. "Why, Frances?" he asked."

"I've been offered the lead in a play," she said. "The most beautiful part. And Cowley's directing and he's on fire to have me. It's too good to be true." She laughed, again a little out of control. "I even have to go mad at the end of Act Three."

Listening to her laugh, Archer realized why the director had picked her for that particular scene.

"It's the chance I've been waiting for ever since the war," Frances said earnestly. "I couldn't let it pa.s.s, even though it's going to cost me quite a bit of money. I have to give up all my radio jobs, but I think it's worth it."

"When would you have to quit?" Archer asked, guiltily feeling that luck, for this day at least, was running his way.

"Well," Frances said, "rehearsals don't begin for another ten days. But I thought if you'd be a love and said it was all right for me to quit right now, I'd go skiing for a week and get that clear-eyed young look back on my face before rehearsals."

"You don't have a contract," Archer said. "There's nothing to keep you-legally."

"I know," Frances said. "But you've been such a dear, I couldn't bear to leave you in a hole."

"Where're you going skiing?" Archer asked.

"The Laurentians," Frances said. "But only if you say OK."

The suspects, Archer thought, may be found at all the winter resorts, coming downhill at thirty dollars a day.

"Sure, Frances," Archer said. "I wouldn't want to stand in your way." For a moment, Archer was almost ready to leave it at that. Telling her what he had to say seemed almost gratuitously candid. And Frances, as she had proved again, always made out all right. If you were that young, that attractive, that talented, n.o.body had to worry about you finally. And besides, she had a rich family back in Texas or somewhere, to complete her luck. Pokorny was a different matter, Alice Weller ... That's where the truth would be necessary, on those gloomy, unlucky grounds. It was almost silly to insist upon having your bad half hour with a girl like Frances Motherwell. Archer wrestled himself out of his chair, ready to go.

"Good luck, Frances." He extended his hand formally.

She jumped up and came over and kissed him. Even for a sisterly, congratulatory kiss like that, she provocatively threw her body, wiry and soft in the soft sweater, against him. As he kissed her, Archer thought reprovingly, somebody ought to tell her not to do that with older men. He stepped away. Her eyes were s.h.i.+ning, almost as though she were holding back tears, although of course, with a girl like Frances, you never really could tell whether it was talent or emotion, and probably she couldn't either.

"You're the nicest living man," Frances said. "Some day I may fall in love with you."

Archer chuckled falsely, rubbing his bald spot and pretending to be older than he was. "I couldn't stand the strain," he said. He almost left then. He took a step toward the door. Then he stopped. How far could you let expedience push you into cowardice? How would he feel when Frances heard of the accusations against her, and what the agency had planned to do to her? And there was no doubt about it, she would find out. And probably very soon. At the top of a snowy hill in Canada, feeling young and healthy, racing down the slope in her nervous excited way because she had been told that a telegram awaked her below and all news these days was good news ... How would she feel about him then, remembering this afternoon? The nicest living man ... He stopped and turned toward the girl.

"Frances, darling," he said. "Please sit down. I have something to say to you."

"You're not going to change your mind, are you?" There was alarm in her eyes and a flicker of stubbornness.

"No. Now sit down. This is awfully serious."

He watched her seat herself, erect now on the sofa, her hands crossed, looking up at him puzzledly.

"Frances," he said, standing above her, "I hardly know where to begin. I was going to try to see you today even before you called. I want to ask you some questions. You don't have to answer them, because, actually, they're more to help me than to help you ..." He shook his head. "No," he said, "I'll start over again. I'll tell you the facts and then, if you want, you can give me some answers. ..."

"You look so uncomfortable," Frances said. "Maybe you'd be better off if you sat down."

"If you don't mind," Archer said, "I'll stay on my feet." He began to pace slowly back and forth in the room. "Look," he said, "here it is ... Three days ago I had a conference with O'Neill and was told that I had to fire a certain number of people from the program." Archer avoided looking at the girl. "One of the people was you." He stared at the painting on the wall. There seemed to be two or three heads that ran together, with a profusion of eyes and noses, all done in purple and black, with ominous touches of red.

"The reason I was asked to fire you is that you're supposed to be a Communist," Archer said, looking at the painting. "I was told that it would be advisable not to give you the correct reason, but to let you drop quietly."

"You're not doing that," Frances said flatly.

"No. I didn't think I could."

"No," Frances said, "of course not."

Archer turned and faced her. She was thoughtfully finis.h.i.+ng her gla.s.s of milk. For one of the few times in her life, her face was expressionless.

"Did you come up here to tell me I was fired?" Frances asked, putting her gla.s.s down.

"No," Archer said. "I got the office to give me two weeks' grace."

"What for?"

"For my own amus.e.m.e.nt." Archer smiled wryly. "To conduct my own little investigation, I guess."

"Whom are you investigating?"

"Myself, mostly." Archer smiled again. "Anyway, for you, this has become something of an academic question-since you're quitting anyway."

"I don't think it's academic," Frances said coldly. "Not at all academic. Who said I was a Communist?"

"Did you ever hear of a magazine called Blueprint?"

"Yes," Frances said. "A lying, Fascist sheet."

Archer sighed, displeased with the quick slogan. "I don't know," he said mildly. "I rarely read it."

"Take my word for it," Frances said. "And just because a dirty little rag makes an accusation like that, I'm scheduled for the axe?"

"That was the idea," Archer said. "Actually, you won't be hurt. The piece isn't coming out for several weeks-and since you're going into a play, and you won't be on the program any more-they probably won't print anything about you."

"Isn't that a fortunate coincidence," Frances said bitingly, "for everyone? Did they mention anybody else?"

"Yes."

"Who?"

"I'd rather not say. At the moment."

"Are you going to fire them?" Frances demanded.

"I don't know," Archer said, walking back and forth in front of the bookcase. "The office wants to."

"Are the others conveniently going into plays, too?" Frances asked. "Or would that be too much to ask?"

"No." Archer began to be annoyed with the girl, because her tone was accusing him, making a villain out of him. "I don't imagine they are."

"Did you come up here just to tell me I was being thrown out?" Frances demanded. Her voice was harsh and sounded almost masculine now. "You were willing to climb four flights of stairs, with your aging heart, just to pa.s.s the good word onto me?"

"That's a little unfair," Archer said, conscious that the girl was trying to hurt him.

"Then why did you come up here?"

"I wanted to talk to you," he said uncertainly. "I wanted to see what I could do."

"Well," Frances said, "what are you going to do?"

"I don't know yet," Archer said softly. "I thought maybe you could help me."

"I don't think so," Frances said. "You're not angry enough."

"I don't know what you mean by that."

"You're accepting it already."

"Now, Frances ..."

"With regret," she said loudly. The skin over her forehead seemed to be stretched tighter than ever and her face was very hard. "You're a nice man, so you're sorry-a little-but I can see you're ready to do what they ask you to do."

"Well," Archer said, controlling himself, "I think that closes the meeting for today. I'll go now. If you want to talk to me reasonably some time, give me a ring." He started for his coat.

Frances watched him silently for a moment, until he had picked up his coat. "Put it down," she said. "You might as well hear what I have to say." She picked up a cigarette and lit it, with quick, nervous movements, her hands shaking a little, while Archer carefully put his coat back on the chair. Her fingers, he noticed, were stained by nicotine. He walked slowly over to the narrow chair and sat down again, once more feeling his hips being cramped by the hard sides.

"First of all," Frances said, blowing a great deal of smoke straight ahead of her and breaking the match in her fingers, "what do you think about me? Do you think I'm a Communist?"

"Well," Archer said carefully, "I really don't know you very well, do I? Outside the studio, I don't see you more than five six times a year. And ..."

"Don't hedge," Frances said flatly. "You think I'm one, don't you?"

"The truth is, Frances," Archer said, "you do belong to a lot organizations, and you're quite outspoken ..."

"If somehow you were forced to say, one way or another, what you thought," Frances went on, attacking him, "you'd say I was a Communist."

Archer thought for a long moment. "Yes, darling," he said.

"Well," she said, "you're right. I am a Communist."

She stared at Archer. There was a kind of harsh, religious triumph in her face.

"I'm proud of it," Frances said. She doused her cigarette in an ash tray with jabbing, excessive strength. "I'm not ashamed. I'm not ashamed of anything I've ever done."

Archer was not really listening to her. Now I know about her, he thought, she's told me herself. What do I do about it? What do I do about it if later on I am asked about her? What if I'm asked under oath?

"If it didn't help the b.a.s.t.a.r.ds so much," Frances was saying bitterly, "I'd take an advertis.e.m.e.nt tomorrow in the New York Times and announce it to the whole world. What do you think being a Communist means?" she demanded accusingly. "Do you really think I've been plotting to kidnap the President and overthrow the Government? Do you think I've been going around picking out churches to burn down when the great day comes? Do you believe that I've been drawing up plans for the nationalization of women?"

"Now, Frances," Archer said reprovingly.

"I don't know," Frances said. "I don't know what you believe. I don't know what anybody believes these days. The way the newspapers talk, you'd think we're all spending our time putting together atom bombs to blow up the water system next week."

"You know I don't believe that."

"I give you three months," Frances said. "Three more months of being exposed to the poison you take in every day and you'll believe everything they want you to believe."

Archer sighed. She sounds like a placard, he thought, in a May Day parade. In two minutes she's rejected any notion that I might behave with sense or in good faith.

"I don't know what I'll think in three months," he said. "Maybe you ought to wait and see before you make any charges."

"n.o.body's hesitated to make charges about me," she said wildly. Her fingers were jumping as she took another cigarette. "And they're using you. You're their ringer man. You're their respectable front, waving your conscience, going around and doing their dirty work for them, turning people out to starve because they have an opinion or two."

"Wait a minute," Archer said, stung. "You're putting up a big fuss and you're making it sound as though there was a gigantic conspiracy against you. Actually, n.o.body's stopping you from working. You're getting a big part in a play, at a d.a.m.n good salary, no doubt, and if you're any good you'll be a big success in it and make a lot of money ..."

"And if the play flops," Frances interrupted, "and I have to go back to radio? What happens then? And even if I'm a success, and I get smeared, who'll hire me for another play?"