“Sure,” I said. “They’re on the bathroom rug. You can pick them up yourself.” I accompanied her to the bathroom, where she knelt down and began to gather up her papers, cosmetics, wallet, and assorted possessions. “What did you do,” I asked, “call FAP to tell them the plan didn’t work?”
Vivian stuffed her possessions back into her purse, straightened up, returned to the bedroom silently to put on her shoes, walked down the hall to the living room, where she slid into her coat, and then, all her things gathered together, including her hash pipe, she opened the front door of the house and walked up the driveway to her parked car.
I went with her. The night was warm and pleasant. I felt good indeed; I had parried another police trap.
“I’ll see you again, Phil,” Vivian said.
“No, you won’t,” I said, opening her car door for her. “I have no wish to see you again. In bed or out of it.”
“You’ll see me again,” Vivian said, getting in and starting up the motor.
I said, “You have nothing on me; I don’t have to see you.”
“Ask me what I did while you were taking your shower.”
I looked down at her as she sat calmly behind the wheel of her car. “You did—”
“I hid it where you’ll never find it,” Vivian said; she began rapidly rolling up her window.
“Hid what?” I grabbed at the window, but it continued to roll up; I grabbed at the door handle, but she had locked it.
“Cocaine,” Vivian said. Her window closed, she shifted into gear, the car suddenly roared off into the street and made a sharp right turn, its tires squealing. I stood impotently watching her go.
Bull, I said to myself. Another crock, like her being underage. But—how could I be sure? I had been in the shower at least fifteen minutes. Vivian Kaplan had had fifteen unobstructed free minutes to hide anything she wanted around my house—to hide stuff, to pry, to read, to see where things were . . . anything she cared to do. Possibly, I thought, the whole going to bed with me had been only a ploy—designed to tie me up by distraction, so that I lost sight of the real issue. And what was the real issue? The fact that an admitted government agent, wearing an armband, openly identified as such, had obtained from me fifteen minutes of absolute privilege to come and go in my house, alone. She had been legally there. I had invited her over. And this, after my pal the friendly cop had warned me.
There is no use warning me, I said to myself with savage, helpless wrath. I am too fucking stupid. The warning is wasted; I just keep on truckin’ anyhow. I invite them over; then I lock myself up in the shower for fifteen minutes, giving them the run of the house. She could have planted a gun and dope as well; there I go, down the tubes, forever. Victim of a police trick carried off to perfection, in that I did most of the work myself.
And suppose it’s another lie. Suppose she didn’t hide any coke. Quantities of coke are minute; I could look for days, weeks, and never find it, and if there isn’t any I could drive myself nuts, work myself into a paranoid psychotic frenzy and not find it—not find it and never know if it was an inch away or if it never existed. Meanwhile, every second of the night and day, waiting for the cops to come in on a tip and bust me—tear open a wall and find the coke right away: a ten-year sentence.
Suddenly chilled, I thought, Maybe her phone call was the tip. The tip the police were waiting for; not that the drugs are there, but that the drugs had been placed there successfully, that when they break in and examine the house they will find something.
Then my days—my hours—are numbered, I thought. There is no use searching. Better just to sit. Just walk back into the house and sit.
I did so. I closed the front door and seated myself on the couch; presently I got up to turn on the FM. Again I sat down. I listened to a performance of the Beethoven Emperor Concerto, sitting, listening, waiting, listening not to the familiar music but for the sounds of approaching cars. It was a hell of an experience. Time stretched out immeasurably. I had to go into the kitchen, finally, to look at the stove clock in order to obtain any idea of how late it was. One hour, two hours, passed. No one came: no cars, no pounding on the door, no pump shotguns and men in uniform. Just the radio playing and the house empty except for me.
I felt my forehead; it was hot and sweaty. Going into the bathroom I got the thermometer, shook it down, and took my temperature. It was 102 degrees: a fever from fear and tension. My body made ill by the stress it was under, unfair and unjust stress, but very real. She was smart to shoot right out of here, I said to myself. After she told me that, whether it was true or not. Jammed down the gas pedal and laid rubber. If she shows up here again I’ll murder her. She knows it; she’ll stay away.
If I get out of this safe and alive, I said to myself, I will write a book about this. Somehow I will figure out a way to work it into a novel. So other people will know. Vivian Kaplan will go down in history for what she is, for what she does. That is my promise to myself, to keep myself going.
Never walk over a writer, I said to myself, unless you’re positive he can’t rise up behind you. If you’re going to burn him, make sure he’s dead. Because if he’s alive, he will talk: talk in written form, on the
