these slender laughing rubberized women before his eyes, urging, practically forcing upon him their flexible blandishments, and then refused to supply him with any. He had found when he had tried to buy the garment in question at store counters that it came empty of the promised contents. But instead of raging and fuming and getting nowhere he had borne his disappointment quietly and maturely, and had decided, like the sensible man he was, to go systematically in search of the underwear-clad image he so ardently desired, using for his purposes the handy telecommunications network provided by society. A just exchange: they owed it to him.
As she stepped onto the street a new thought came to her. Maybe it was really Peter. Slipping out from his law office into the nearest phone booth to dial the numbers of housewives in Etobicoke. His protest against something or other – surveys? housewives in Etobicoke? vulcanization? – or his only way of striking back at a cruel world that saddled him with crushing legal duties and prevented him from taking her to dinner. And he had got the company name and the knowledge of official interviewing procedures, of course, from her! Perhaps this was his true self, the core of his personality, the central Peter who had been occupying her mind more and more lately. Perhaps this was what lay hidden under the surface, under the other surfaces, that secret identity which in spite of her many guesses and attempts and half-successes she was aware she had still not uncovered: he was really the Underwear Man.
14
The first thing Marian’s eyes encountered as her head emerged periscope-like through the stairwell was a pair of naked legs. They were topped by Ainsley, who was standing half-dressed in the small vestibule, gazing down upon her, the usual blankness of her face tinged almost imperceptibly here and there with shades of surprise and annoyance.
“Hi,” she said. “I thought you were going out for dinner tonight.” She fastened her eyes accusingly upon the small bag of groceries Marian was carrying.
Marian’s legs pushed the rest of her body up the remaining stairs before she answered. “I was, but I’m not. Something came up at Peter’s office.” She went into the kitchen and deposited the paper bag on the table. Ainsley followed her in and sat down on one of the chairs.
“Marian,” she said dramatically, “it has to be tonight!”
“What does?” Marian asked vaguely, putting her carton of milk into the refrigerator. She wasn’t really listening.
“It. Leonard. You know.”
Marian had been so occupied with her own thoughts that it was a moment before she remembered what Ainsley was talking about. “Oh. That,” she said. She took off her coat, reflectively.
She hadn’t been paying close attention to the progress of Ainsley’s campaign (or was it Leonard’s?) over the past two months – she’d wanted to keep her hands clean of the whole thing – but she had been force-fed enough with Ainsley’s own accounts and analyses and complaints to be able to deduce what had been happening; after all, however clean one’s hands, one’s ears were of necessity open. Things hadn’t gone according to schedule. It appeared that Ainsley had overshot the mark. At the first encounter she had made herself into an image of such pink-gingham purity that Len had decided, after her strategic repulse of him that evening, that she would require an extralong and careful siege. Anything too abrupt, too muscular, would frighten her away; she would have to be trapped with gentleness and caution. Consequently he had begun by asking her to lunch several times, and had progressed, at intervals of medium length, to dinners out and finally to foreign films, in one of which he had gone so far as to hold her hand. He had even invited her to his apartment once, for afternoon tea. Ainsley said later with several vigorous oaths that he had been on this occasion a model of propriety. Since by her own admission she didn’t drink, she could not even pretend to permit him to get her drunk. In conversation he treated her as though she was a little girl, patiently explaining things to her and impressing her with stories about the television studio and assuring her that his interest in her was strictly that of a well-wishing older friend until she wanted to scream. And she couldn’t even talk back: it was necessary for her mind to appear as vacant as her face. Her hands were tied. She had constructed her image and now she had to maintain it. To make any advances herself, or to let slip a flicker of anything resembling intelligence, would have been so out of character as to give her dumb-show irrevocably away. So she had been stewing and fussing in private, suffering Len’s overly subtle manoeuvrings with suppressed impatience and watching the all-important calendar days slide uneventfully by.
“If it isn’t tonight,” Ainsley said, “I don’t know what I’ll do. I can’t stand it much longer – I’ll have to get another one. But I’ve wasted so much
“And where…?” Marian asked, beginning to see why Ainsley had been annoyed at her unexpected return.
“Well he’s obviously not going to ask me up to see his camera lenses,” Ainsley said petulantly. “And anyway if I said Yes he’d get suspicious as hell. We’re going out to dinner though, and I thought maybe if I invited him up for coffee afterwards…”
“So you’d rather I went out,” Marian said, her voice heavy with disapproval.
“Well, it would be an awful help. Ordinarily I wouldn’t give a damn if there was a whole camp meeting in the next room, or under the bed for that matter, and I bet he wouldn’t either, but you see, he’ll think I ought to care. I’ve got to let myself be backed slowly into the bedroom. Inch by inch.”
“Yes, I can see that.” Marian sighed. Censure was, at this point, none of her business. “I’m just wondering where I can go.”
Ainsley’s face brightened. Her main objective had been gained; the rest of the details were secondary. “Well, do you think maybe you could just phone up Peter and tell him you’re coming over? He shouldn’t mind, he’s engaged to you.”
Marian considered. Previously, in some area of time she could not at the moment remember clearly, she would have been able to; it wouldn’t have mattered if he had got peeved. But these days, and especially after their conversation in the afternoon, it would not be a good idea. No matter how unobtrusive she made herself with a book in the living room, he would silently accuse her of being overpossessive, or of being jealous and interfering about his work. Even if she explained the real situation. And she didn’t want to do that: though Peter had seen almost nothing of Len since the first evening, having exchanged the free-bachelor image for the mature-fiance one and adjusted his responses and acquaintances accordingly, there would still be a kind of clan loyalty that might cause trouble, if not for Ainsley, at least for her. It would give him ammunition. “I don’t think I’d better,” she said. “He’s working awfully hard.” There was really no place she could go. Clara’s was out. It was getting too cold for sitting in parks or for prolonged walking. She might call one of the office virgins… “I’ll see a movie,” she said at last.
Ainsley smiled with relief. “Fabulous,” she said, and went into her bedroom to finish dressing. She stuck her head out a few minutes later to ask, “Can I use that bottle of scotch if I need it? I’ll say it’s yours but that you won’t mind.”
“Sure, go ahead,” Marian said. The scotch was mutually owned. Ainsley, she knew, would pay her back out of the next bottle. Even if she forgot to, a half-bottle of scotch would be a small enough sacrifice to get the thing decisively over and done with. This vicariously nervewracking delay and shilly-shally had gone on far too long. She remained in the kitchen, leaning against the counter and gazing with pensive interest into the sink, which contained four glasses partly filled with opaque water, a fragment of eggshell, and a pot that had recently been used for cooking macaroni and cheese. She decided not to wash the dishes, but as a token gesture of cleanliness she picked out the eggshell and put it in the garbage. She disliked remnants.
When Ainsley reappeared, in a blouse and jumper outfit set off by earrings in the shape of tiny daisies and an extra good eye-job, Marian said to her, “That movie isn’t going to last all night, you know. I’ll have to come back around twelve-thirty.” Even if she expects me to sleep in the gutter, she thought.
“I imagine the situation will be well under control by then,” Ainsley said with determination. “If it isn’t, neither of us will be there anyway: I’ll have thrown him out of the window. And leaped out myself. But just in case, don’t go charging through any closed doors without knocking.”
Marian’s mind selected the most ominous word.
