one.
I was screaming hysterically myself. I felt like I’d suddenly gone insane.
I saw Jean racing for the door. She was standing fumbling with the lock when the big one caught her. I hit him four or five times with a chair. I kicked him and threw myself at him when the chair finally broke. Jean darted out the door. I slammed the door hard as Jean started running down the corridor. I stood with my back to it kicking and swinging while he tried to drag me away. When he finally got the door open Jean had disappeared.
Now, suddenly, I was over my insanity.
I watched him come back into the room and very quietly lock the door.
I was sick with terror.
The little one had picked himself up off the floor. His face was still contorted with pain. The two of them moved in on me. I started to scream, but the fist stopped the sound in my throat.
It happened very fast and I’m not sure exactly what they did. They kept me conscious for a good part of it. I remember lying on the floor being kicked. That’s the last I remembered. Being kicked.
I must have been hit in the stomach, too, because I was covered with bruises and I had vomited.
I was unconscious for several hours.
And after I came to, it was another hour before I could get off the floor and to the telephone.
Chapter Four
I described the two men to the police as well as I could. I described everything that had happened. But I did not mention Jean Dahl. And I did not mention the Anstruther book.
The police were under the impression that the place had been ransacked by hoodlums under the influence of dope. “They get coked up,” the detective said, “and they don’t know what they’re doing.”
He was under the impression that the two men had been searching my apartment for narcotics and had become enraged at not finding any. I allowed them to keep that impression.
They wanted to take me to Bellevue for an examination but I talked them out of that. My own doctor had arrived by then, and about five in the morning I checked into a hotel. I didn’t do anything about straightening up the wreckage in my place. I just moved out.
I was all right after a couple of days in bed. But it was almost a week before my face no longer scared little children.
I did not go in to the office for the rest of the week. My first public appearance was Walter Heinemann’s cocktail party Friday night.
There had been a small item about the “robbery,” as it was called in several of the papers, and an enormous basket of fruit, a large bouquet of flowers, and six bottles of champagne arrived at the hotel the second day. Walter’s card was attached to the gifts.
There was also an invitation to his cocktail party, and a note suggesting that the whole thing was the work of disgruntled authors, unhappy about their advertising allotments.
As I said, I went to Walter’s party.
It would be hard to tell you much about Walter Heinemann. The only thing I can tell you is that he gave parties. Big parties.
That was his profession. He was a professional host.
And his cocktail parties were an important part of the book publishing business.
His parties made it possible for people who were interested in doing business with each other to meet on neutral territory. For instance, I know for a fact that Tim Wales’ last book was sold to Hollywood over cocktails at Walter’s.
Everyone came to Walter’s. People from the publishing houses. Picture people. Radio people. Television people. Actors of a certain standing. And pretty girls in incredible numbers.
Walter gave a cocktail party at least once a month. They began at six and ended when the last guest had gone home.
Walter’s house on upper Fifth Avenue was a perfect setting. It was a tremendous, old-fashioned town house, with libraries, picture galleries, billiard rooms, and even a gymnasium.
I want to be careful not to make Walter Heinemann sound like the great Gatsby. There was nothing in the least sinister or mysterious about him.
He was a skinny, bald, smiling little man who gave marvelous parties. He himself did not hover in the background, an untasted drink in his hand, looking inscrutable.
He was usually in the middle of things, organizing parlor games and putting on women’s hats. Far from being sinister, he was inclined to giggle and he made everyone write something in his guest book.
I left the hotel Friday evening, still shaky but feeling better, and arrived at Walter’s party a few minutes after six.
Two serving bars and a tremendous buffet had been set up in the second floor dining room. Although it was still very early there were at least a hundred people there already, and I knew that the last few guests would wind up having eggs benedict and champagne as they watched the sunrise from Walter’s roof.
I picked my way across the dining room to the serving bar. While doing so, I rubbed shoulders with an internationally famous motion picture actress, recognized a young man whose humorous book about his war experiences had earned him half a million dollars before he was twenty-one-a fact that had so astonished and bewildered him that he had not drawn a sober breath since-and I had bowed politely to an attractive young woman with a double martini in each hand whose divorce I had read about in Miss Dennison’s copy of the Daily News that morning.
A white-coated barman gave me a martini with a twist of lemon peel, and during my second sip I heard Walter’s high-pitched giggle at my shoulder.
“Richard! How are you? How good of you to drag your poor, pain-racked body so far uptown!”
“I’m whole again, Walter,” I said. “I want to thank you for the flowers and champagne. It was very kind and thoughtful of you.”
“Don’t speak of it,” Walter said. “You know me well enough to know that I am neither kind nor thoughtful.” He was holding a glass of champagne in his hand and his bald head was damp with sweat. He took my hand, giggled nervously again and said, “Richard, I confess I had an ulterior motive. There’s something I want from you.”
“What’s that, Walter?”
“You’ll hear about it in good time,” Walter said. “Good God, I do believe Myrna is drinking two double martinis at once. Mark my words, she’ll try to take off all her clothes again in a very few minutes.”
I had something I wanted to ask Walter. I wanted to ask him if he had ever made the acquaintance of a big agent named Max Shriber. But I never got a chance to do so.
I suddenly became aware of the fact that Jean Dahl was standing across the room.
I waved to her but she didn’t see me. I tried to edge past Walter. “Excuse me,” I said. “I’ve got to see someone for a minute.”
As I watched her, she seemed to sway a little. “I’ll see you in a little while, Walter,” I said. I began walking slowly across the smoky room. Jean Dahl was walking rapidly out of the dining room toward the hall.
I followed her, moving as fast as possible now, snaking my way against the stream of new arrivals.
I caught up with her at the end of the corridor. I took her arm and she looked up blankly. Her eyes were glassy and she was pale under her healthy coat of tan.
“Hey,” I said, “I’d like to talk to you.”
She tried to jerk away from me, and lost her balance. She would have fallen if I hadn’t caught her.
“Lady,” I said, “you don’t look so good. Maybe you better rest for a while.”
I looked around, spotted the elevator, and guided her to it. “I’m going to park you on a bed someplace,” I said, “and then we’re going to talk.”
Jean Dahl muttered something unintelligible.
I pushed a button and the elevator began to rise. We rode up to the third floor.
