Флетчер Флора - Park Avenue Tramp

Now, waiting and cursing himself and Farnese, he watched Miss Carling. He didn’t like Miss Carling. The only thing that kept him from hating her was the exhaustion of his hatred in the hating of so many others with priority. He was aware that she loathed him, found him physically revolting, and after the passing of the first feeling of pain and degradation that this reaction always aroused in him, it delighted him that she did. In his mind he became a kind of vulgar and artless Cyrano, exploiting his ugliness to elicit her horror. He kissed the back of her neck and pinched her bottom and whispered obscenities in her ear. He rocked with laughter at her terror and disgust. He would not kill Miss Carling the day he killed Farnese, but he might, for the pleasure of it, make her grovel for her life. The memory of her fear would expunge the memory of her disdain. Afterward he would always hear her pleading for Sweeney’s mercy instead of telling Sweeney arrogantly that he was early and would have to wait.

It was almost time to go in. The clock on the wall above Miss Carling’s severe head showed two minutes before the hour. Well, it was going to be an interesting report, the very best yet, for several pages of the notebook in Sweeney’s coat pocket were filled on both sides with Sweeney’s cramped writing. It would even be worth the waiting, the humiliation and contempt and effluvial disgust, and in the last two minutes of the waiting, Sweeney closed his eyes and anticipated the turbulence, all the more violent for being controlled, that he was going to arouse in the man he served and hated and dreamed of killing. Abortive laughter began and grew. With appreciative malice, as if he were expressing his gratitude, he began to curse Farnese again. Slowly, one by one from his full repertory of obscenities, he selected and pronounced in the barest whisper the appropriate words.

At three precisely, Miss Carling looked across at Sweeney and nodded once sharply to indicate that he could now go in. Sweeney did not see her nod, for his eyes were closed and he was not at the moment faced in her direction, but he had developed a kind of sensitivity to Miss Carling’s movements, feeling what he didn’t see, and he stood up at once and walked across to Farnese’s private door and let himself in. Farnese was sitting behind his desk in his usual posture, his fingers laced in front of him on the desk’s top, his eyes focused on the fingers. He didn’t look up or speak or give any sign whatever that he was aware of Sweeney’s presence, and Sweeney, crossing to the chair, resumed his inaudible obscenities. He sat down heavily and removed his notebook from his coat pocket and waited.

“Make it concise,” Farnese said. “Give me only essentials, please.”

Sweeney took a deep breath, releasing on the breath the last vile word, and began his report. He did not read verbatim from his notes, and this disturbed and angered him, for he took pride in the detail and accuracy of his observations and would have preferred presenting them exactly as he had set them down. He was all the more angered because he knew there was no real necessity for brevity. Farnese was a phony son of a son with nothing to do that needed doing, but he always had to act, nevertheless, as if the time he gave to Sweeney was taken from other matters much more important and pressing. What Sweeney wanted to know was, what the hell was more important and pressing than a prowling nympho wife? Nothing was more important and pressing, that was what, and Sweeney knew it, and Farnese knew it, and both of them knew that the other knew it, and who the hell was fooling who? Well, Bertram Sweeney wasn’t fooled for a minute, that was sure, and it was really funny the way the stinking phony sat there like a God-damn stone, trying to act as if nothing he was hearing made any difference in the long run, and all the time his guts were in an uproar and he was sick to death inside with the rising violence of his fury. Realizing this, Sweeney felt almost compensated for the butchery of his report. His resentment gave way to his silent internal glee.

“Wednesday afternoon,” he said. “I followed subject, Mrs. Farnese, to a restaurant on Fifth Avenue. She was alone. She drove a Jaguar car. I waited until she left the restaurant and then followed her to an apartment building on MacDougal Street. Subsequent investigation disclosed that she went to the apartment of a Mrs. DeWitt, a divorcee. She was there for approximately three hours, after which she again left alone and drove in the Jaguar to the small nightclub in the Village which is known as Duo’s and which I had occasion to mention in my last report. Leaving Duo’s, still alone, she drove to the residence near Washington Square which I also mentioned in my last report in connection with the piano player known as Joe Doyle. She remained in this residence until approximately one o’clock. She then returned home.”

Pausing, he lifted his eyes to the little barometer of Farnese’s passions, the fine line of scar tissue along the lower mandible. The tissue was already livid, but Farnese’s face was in perfect repose. His laced fingers held one another quietly on top of the desk.

“Thursday?” he said.

“Thursday morning,” Sweeney said, “approximately eleven o’clock. Mrs. Farnese left in the Jaguar and drove directly to the residence she had left at one o’clock of the same morning. She went inside and remained there until almost noon, at which time she came out in the company of Joe Doyle. They crossed the East River into Kings County and drove east to Jamaica. Since my area of operation is restricted by your orders to New York City, I turned around there and came back. At regular intervals during the rest of the day, I called the apartment on Park Avenue to see if Mrs. Farnese had returned. The maid said she hadn’t. At nine o’clock that night I went to Duo’s to see if Joe Doyle was there or was expected. He wasn’t there and wasn’t expected. The bartender told me that he was on sick leave and wouldn’t return until Monday. Tonight, that is.”

“I know what day it is,” Farnese said.

“Yes. Of course.” Sweeney’s thick lips formed the shape of a sound that was not part of the report. “From Duo’s I drove to the residence of Joe Doyle. The Jaguar was not parked in front or in the vicinity. I parked across the street and down the block where I could watch the house. It was about a quarter to eleven when they returned. At twelve-thirty Mrs. Farnese left alone and went home.”

Sweeney paused again, awaiting comments, but Farnese had none to make. He unlaced his fingers, flexed them, replaced them.

“That’s enough,” he said.

“What?” Sweeney said.

“I said that’s enough. The rest of your report would be superfluous.”

Sweeney folded his notebook slowly, leaving a fat index finger between the pages as a marker. He felt as if he had been slapped in the face, and his resentment was commensurate.

“I don’t understand,” he said.

“I’m quite easily understood, I believe. I already know how my wife spent the weekend. Do you find it incredible that I should learn something about my wife without your professional assistance? I’ll tell you how I know. I know because my wife has the obvious mind of a perverted child. Her deceptions, even when she elaborates on them, are transparent. Friday she informed me that she was spending the weekend at the Fairfield County house of Samantha Cox. She went there, all right, but not with Miss Cox. She went with this Joe Doyle. Isn’t that true?”

“She sure as hell went to Fairfield County. As you say, with Joe Doyle. I don’t know what particular place in the county they went to, because I left them at the line.”

“I know. Your area of operation is only the City. All right, Sweeney. Your devotion to orders has been sufficiently established. When you’re speaking to me, however, please avoid profanity. I don’t like profanity. I think I’ve told you this before.”