The Hellfire Club

'All the fiction in the world isn't in novels,' he said, marveling.

'This is the same girl who told you she was coming over here this morning, when you suddenly changed your mind and decided to whisk me off to Mark Foil's house. You figured you could fend off the third Mrs Harwich for a day or two. I'm too much of a risk to keep around longer than that, aren't I?'

Harwich was sitting up in bed with his arms around his raised knees, watching her with an expression of mild, half-amused perplexity. He hesitated for a conspicuous beat before speaking, as if assuring himself that she had finished at last. 'Would you like to stop fantasizing and listen to the truth?'

The only thing I don't understand,' she said, 'is why she doesn't sleep in your bedroom. I really don't get that part. Does; she snore like a pig, or are the two of you saving a whole night together in the master's bedroom for after the wedding, like a reward kind of deal?'

Hairwich inhaled deeply, leaned forward, and opened his hands, palm up, the image of beleaguered reason. 'This whole picture you're describing is all made up. It isn't real. Dick Dart knocked you for a loop, remember? As long as you can keep in mind who I am, the real me and not this monster you just invented, I'll be as patient and supportive as I know how. Maybe you can't accept that right now, but it's the God's truth.'

This spoke to all of her old feelings about Dan Harwich, and his reasonableness, his steady, kind, affectionate regard, filled her with doubts. This was Harwich, she reminded herself. Three years ago she had thrown herself at him. Could she blame him for catching her? It was true. She had willingly helped him speed up the wreckage of his first marriage. 'Say more,' she said.

'I don't blame you for feeling strange about Lark. But I was honest about her. I told you I was already seeing her when you came here last time. I can't pretend I've ever been a faithful husband, because I haven't. Okay? I confess. I mess around. I get bored. I need what you have, that… spirit. But honest, this is the truth, I don't have a new bride waiting in the wings.'

'Then whose stuff is that in the bathroom?'

He looked sideways for a moment, considering, then again met her eyes. 'Okay. But bear in mind that I don't really have any reason to explain this or anything else. You see that, don't you?'

'So explain.' Her angry certainty was ebbing away.

'What the hell, Nora, I'm not a monk. During the course of my tedious, self-important life, it has now and then come to my attention that some women really do prefer having their own separate bathroom. So I put some toothbrushes and other stuff in there just in case.'

'You didn't change your mind about taking me no see Mark Foil because your new girlfriend said she was coming over?'

'I don't blame you for letting the past few days make you suspicious of men. And I know it looks bad, my getting into bed with you, but cross my heart, I had no intention of coercing you into having sex. I hope you believe me.'

She sighed. 'Honest to God, Dan, I almost-' The telephone in the bedroom down the hall rang once, twice, and Harwich's face modulated from earnest entreaty to a spasm of irritation and back to a close approximation of innocent indifference before it rang a third time. 'Don't you want to get that?'

'This is more important.'

'It might be the hospital.'

'Trust me, it's just some pest.'

The distant telephone continued to ring: a fifth time, a sixth, a ninth time, a tenth.

'Don't you have an answering machine?'

He held her eyes expressionlessly for a moment or two. 'I turned off the machine on that line.'

'Why would you do that?' Nora watched calculation, annoyance, and something alert and wary appear in his face. 'Why, Dan?'

The telephone stopped ringing.

'I guess it wasn't such a good idea,' he said. 'But hell, nobody's perfect.'

'You bastard.' She felt as though she had been punched in the stomach. 'You slimy, self-serving, lying creep,' The feeling in her stomach intensified. 'You almost had me talked into getting back into bed with you.'

'Do it anyhow. What's the difference? This is about you and me. To hell with anybody else.'

'You still think you have a chance, don't you?'

'Consider this. I was protecting your feelings. Okay, I have a woman friend, I've known her for a couple of months, and she stays here from time to time. I don't know if I'm going to marry her. If I'm not willing to let her destroy our relationship, why should you?'

She looked at him in outright amazement. 'You really are an absolute bastard. Boy, I wonder what you… No, I already know.'

'You know what I think of you? I doubt that very much. But don't waste time brooding about it, just get in your car and go. At this point, I don't see much point in prolonging the situation. Take off. Nice to know you, kind of.'

She considered throwing some heavy object at him but then realized with a sad, final thump of defeat that he was not worth the effort. 'Answer one question for me, will you?'

'If you insist.'

'Why does this woman sleep in here instead of your bedroom? I don't get it?'

'Because of the pillows,' Harwich said. 'If you really want to know.'

'The pillows?'

'She's allergic to down pillows, and they're the only kind I can stand to sleep on. These are foam. I think sleeping on a foam pillow is like having sex with a condom.'

She found she could smile. 'Dan, I don't see much of a future for your third marriage.'

His eyes hardened, and his mouth thinned like a lizard's. 'The truth is, Nora, you were always a little nuts. Being nuts was okay in Vietnam - it probably helped you make it through - but it sure as hell doesn't work anymore.'

'I'm beginning to understand that you have a lot in common with Dick Dart.' She walked down the side of the bed toward the door. Harwich slid an inch or two away, trying to pretend that he was merely finding a more comfortable position. 'On the whole, I prefer Dick Dart. He's a lot more upfront than you are.'

'See what I mean?' he said, smirking, now that he was out of reach.

She opened the door and looked at him as calmly as she could. 'Aren't you a little worried?'

'Why don't you just leave? Do I have to tell you never to come back, or have you figured that out for yourself?'

'That old Ford is parked really close to your car,' she said, and closed the door behind her. She could hear his shouts as she went down the stairs, and they followed her through the kitchen. By the time she had raised the garage door and started the car, he was standing naked in the back door, no more than an absurd figure with a potbelly, stork legs, and graying pubic hair, yelling but too afraid of being seen by his neighbors to come any closer. She backed out without touching the Rolls.63

'D-E-O-D-A-T-O,' Nora spelled.

During the seconds while the telephone reported a dense silence, she regretted the impulse to call the Chancels' manservant. Why had she imagined that Jeffrey would not go immediately to Daisy, or Alden if Alden was home, or even the police? When the need to talk to someone in Westerholm had seized her, enigmatic Jeffrey had seemed the most likely candidate, although for an irrational moment she had imagined consulting Holly Fenn. She still wished she could talk to Fenn, absolute proof, if after Harwich she needed proof, of her rotten taste in protective men. A telephone began to ring, and she realized that she had not considered what she would do if an answering machine picked up. Nora moved the receiver away from her head and heard a metallic voice say 'Hello.' Was this voice Jeffrey's? Nora envisioned a room full of cops in headphones leaning over a tape recorder. She moved the receiver back to her ear, more uncertain than ever.

A male voice, Jeffrey's, repeated the greeting as a question.

She spoke his name.

Silence. Then, 'Nora.' She had never before heard him speak her name without calling her 'Mrs.' Most often, he had never called her anything but 'you.' 'Where are you?'