The Hellfire Club

entry.

Alden said, 'My son can let himself out of the house.' She froze in midstep.

'Good-bye, Maria,' Nora said, but Maria was too terrified to speak.40

They came out of the house into abrupt night. Davey went down a step and looked back at the door. 'Maybe we should go back in.'

'What for? He gave his speech.'

'I guess you're right. He's too angry.'

'Phooey. He's happier than he has been in years. He thinks he's got you right where he wants you.'

Davey shook his head and went down the rest of the stairs, fumbling in his pocket. 'Would you drive? I feel kind of scrambled.'

Nora took the keys. By the time she got into the driver's seat and moved it forward, he was leaning back with his eyes closed, his body so limp it seemed lifeless. 'Come on,' she said. 'He'll never go through with it. All you have to do is call his bluff.'

'He doesn't bluff.'

Nora started the car and drove toward the distant gate in a cocoon of darkness. After a moment she turned on the headlights. 'Do you think he's really willing to cut you out of his life forever?'

'I don't know,' Davey moaned.

'Of course he isn't,' Nora said. 'He's trying to bully you. This time, you can't let him get away with it.' She turned onto Mount Avenue, accelerated, and the car shot forward like a nervous horse.

'What are you talking about?'

Usually an excellent, even a bold driver, Nora made a small adjustment to the wheel, and the Audi twitched sideways over the broken yellow line. She steered back into the proper lane and deliberately relaxed her hands. 'The last thing in the world he wants is to lose you. That's what this: is all about.'

Davey moaned again, whether at his plight or her handling of his car she could not tell. 'He's going to do everything he said.'

'So what? After a couple of weeks he'll come nosing around to see how you're doing. If you don't have a new job, he'll give you your old one back. If you accept, he'll offer you a higher salary or a better position.'

'Suppose he doesn't. Suppose it isn't a strategy.'

An odd sense of familiarity as strong as deja vu took possession of Nora. Hadn't she been reading a book in which a character presented an ultimatum much like Alden's? What scene, what book? Then it came to her: Alden had reminded her of Archibald Poison forcing Adelbert and Clementine to provide him with a grandson.

'Don't have an answer, do you?'

'What?'

'What happens if he really means it?'

'Every publishing house in New York would take you on. Some of them would hire you just to spite Alden. In fact She grinned sideways at Davey, who had flattened both hands on top of his head. 'Screw the week. Call the people you know at other houses. Take the best offer you get, then go into your father's office and resign. He'll go nuts.'

'No, he won't,' Davey said. 'Why would anybody give me a job? I edit crossword puzzle books. I send out form letter; on behalf of the Hugo Driver Society. Besides, you don't know what's going on in publishing. Nobody quits anymore. It's not like the eighties, when people hopped around all over the place.'

'Davey, you don't need this crap. Make some calls and see what happens.'

They drove the rest of the way home in silence.

In the dark, Nora felt her way to the light switch and realized that Davey was still in the Audi. She spoke his name. He slowly left the car. When Nora opened the back door, he began moving zombielike to the front of the garage.

'It's going to be all right,' she said, struggling to maintain her optimism. She closed the door behind them and saw him glance at the family room. 'Come on upstairs,' she said.

He dragged himself toward the stairs. Nora followed him into the kitchen, turning on lights as Davey advanced before her. 'Let me make something for you,' she said.

'Who can eat?'

Nora watched him take the bottle of kummel from the shelf, select a lowball glass, and fill it to within an inch of the rim. He sat down opposite her and began revolving the glass on the table. At last he looked up at her.

'You're letting this get to you too much.'

'There's one big difference between us, Nora. He's not your father.'

'Thank God,' Nora said, perhaps unwisely. 'My father would never have treated you like that.'

'I forgot, the great Matt Curlew was perfect. According to you, my father is the scum of the earth.'

'I never said that,' Nora protested. 'I hate the way he treats you, and this ultimatum is the perfect example. He's using Daisy's tantrum to drive us apart.'

'Gee, thanks. In case I don't understand what my father is doing, you have to explain it three or four times.' He took a gulp of his drink, and a delicate shade of pink rose into his cheeks.

'Oh, Davey, maybe I've been talking too much, but he made me incredibly angry. And you were so silent.'

'You keep forgetting he's my father. This guy you say has mistreated me all my life sent me to the best schools in America - something the sacred Matt Curlew never did for you - he gave me a job and pays me a lot more money than I deserve, he runs an important company - another thing Matt Curlew didn't do - and in case you forgot, see this table? He paid for it. He paid for everything in this house, including the light bulbs and the toilet paper. I think he deserves some gratitude, not to mention respect.'

'In other words, he owns you.'

'He doesn't own me, he loves me. Even though I don't like some of the stuff he does, you can't order me to hate him.'

'I don't want you to hate him,' Nora lied. 'But I love you, too, and I'd like you to get out from under his thumb.' Davey lifted his glass and drank. 'In a way he was right. You have to decide which one you want more, him or me. But if you choose him, you lose me for good, and if you choose me, you'll get him back in about a second.'

'I'm married to you, not my father,' he said.

'Thank God, I was beginning to get worried.'

'But I don't want to lose either one of you. I think you're nuts to imagine that he'll change his mind.'

'He won't change his mind, he'll just wait for another chance.'

'How can you be so sure? If he cans me and I can't find another job, we're going to run out of money in about three months. Then what? Welfare? A cardboard box?'

'He'd never let that happen. You know he'd-'

'If I do get a job with another publisher, do you know what my salary would be? About a third of what I'm making now. We move out of here, okay, but all we could afford would be some dinky rathole of an apartment.'

'Who says you have to work in publishing? The world is full of jobs.'

'Don't you read the newspapers? Okay, maybe I could get a job as a clerk but then we'd get half of a rathole.'

'I can get a job,' Nora said. 'That way we get the whole rathole.'

'God, it's like being married to Pollyanna.'

'But you will make the calls, won't you?'

Davey pursed his lips and gave the refrigerator a considering glance. 'Actually, there might be another way.'

'What other way?'

'I could tell him that I'll move back into the house if he lets you stay here as long as you want. I think he'd go for it.'

'We'd have lawyers all over us before you stopped talking. Good old Dart, Morris would build a wall between us six feet thick. How does that help us?'