Дэймон Найт - Orbit 7

She was beautiful like this, he thought, her eyes closed in pleasure and her plump, dungaree-encased thighs unaware that the vibration had stopped. God, she loved to ride that bike. He kissed her on an eyelid, darkened either by cosmetics or soot, and hefted a soft breast under her T-shirt. “Amaryllis, this is it. We’re here. Remember Andy Warhol, maybe Andy Warhol will be here tonight.”

Amaryllis moved slowly on the seat and opened her eyes. “Jesus, Harley, that was a good ride. That was a gooood ride.”

“I know,” said Harley fondly, helping her off the bike. Amaryllis was still walking tenderly when the doorman smiled and admitted them.

It was clear immediately that Andy Warhol was not there, at least not yet, though there was a gigantic photograph of him hanging from the ceiling, in which he appeared to be accepting a taco and a Margarita from one of Fuzzy’s topless waitresses. The photo nagged at Harley. He didn’t like to think about it but he had the suspicion it might be doctored; it looked too much like an Esquire cover. But he put that from his mind, as a waitress showed them to a booth. After all, there was the Early American furniture, a nice eclectic touch, he thought, and the Visi-Box which showed underground movies, and the Chem-Sac sound system, and, of course, the waitresses, not a minus 37 in the lot. He noticed a pudgy man in a sharkskin suit and wondered if it might be Lipschits himself. The man was standing in a corner, looking worried, and that did not improve Harley’s mood.

Amaryllis and Harley had really wanted to see Andy Warhol, especially Amaryllis, who had visions of herself as a star, but this hardly seemed the right crowd for it. Tourists occupied a few booths, blushing and elbowing one another when a waitress walked by. A dark man in a turban sat alone near the bar and shot frame after frame with his 35-millimeter camera. Some high-school kids were getting juiced on $2.50 Margaritas near the front door. And a very obviously stoned Negro hummed “Bernie’s Tune” in a booth behind them. Altogether a drag.

Harley tried to soften the blow. “Hey, dig, they’ve got Chem-Sac here,” he said with false enthusiasm. Amaryllis was unmoved. But Harley read from the sampler on the wall anyway, hoping something would cheer her: Chem-Sac is a dramatic innovation in the world of popular as well as serious music. The sound you hear comes from strings of various lengths and tensions being parted by the action of a powerful space-age acid. The musician pours from a vial in each hand on the string or strings of his choice, and the sound of the string parting is amplified by the most sophisticated equipment money can buy. The music is taped and played continuously for your listening pleasure.

“Bullshit,” said Amaryllis, and they sat silently for a while as the various sized and tensioned strings made a variety of boings and pyoings and pings. “The squares are here and you know it,” she said finally. “He’s not coming.”

“Maybe not,” Harley said softly. “You wanta split?”

“I’m too uptight. Let’s have a drink first. Get me a Margarita … and a donut.”

Harley sensed the order was a form of protest and signaled quickly for a waitress. The one who came was Wanda, whom they knew from the days when she and Amaryllis had worked together in the Lace Spittoon as Israeli belly dancers. When the topless craze came, Amaryllis, who had beautiful but almost nippleless breasts, had bitterly gone back to work as a masseuse while Wanda, amply nippled, went topless. They realized with some surprise that she was also bottomless.

“Wanda, what’s happening?” asked Amaryllis, brightening at the prospect of a raid.

“Fuzzy just gave the word to go bottomless,” said Wanda, nervously shielding herself with her order book. “Figures a raid will hypo business until he thinks of something else. It was either that or let some of us go.”

So that was Lipschits he saw, thought Harley with some excitement. It was a name of some consequence in the avant-garde. At least they had seen him.

“But what’s the shyness routine?” asked Amaryllis, who opposed any form of repression.

“This damn appendix scar,” said Wanda. “Fuzzy almost didn’t let me come on with the others, until I convinced him the leather crowd might dig it. I gotta keep it covered from the straights.”

“Like us?” asked Amaryllis, delighted with the irony. They all laughed at this, and Harley flushed with pleasure at seeing his wife happy again.

Wanda brought their order and hurried off to serve a growing crowd. It was amazing how quickly word spread along the freeways. Harley entertained briefly the idea of Warhol coming after all, but didn’t want to raise Amaryllis’ hopes. There were still a lot of tourists around, and another crowd of teenies from the Strip. The turbaned man had a movie camera now and was zooming madly over his untouched tequila. The stoned spade was still behind them, still humming softly to himself Cannonball’s solo on “Milestones” or an occasional June Christy tune. But there was still hope. They ordered again, and again, until Harley began to get jumpy from caffeine and switched to tequila and Amaryllis began to get drunk and switched to coffee. (Wouldn’t do to be gassed if he did come.)

But as the evening wore on, the crowd thinned and hope began to wane. Harley had been afraid to speak for over an hour, not wanting to give Amaryllis a focus for her despair. But when a cop walked in, had a cup of coffee, and walked out, he knew it was over.

“Harley,” she said, “we’ve got to talk about our life.”

“Sure, baby, anything you want.”

“Harley, I’ve been thinking a lot about it, and I think I know what’s wrong. You may not understand it at first, but I think I’m right.”

“What is it, sweetheart?”

“Harley, you’re square.”

He could tell she was serious, and he didn’t know what to say.

“Harley, who did you vote for for governor?”

“Honey, you know—”

“No bullshit now, Harley, did you vote for Reagan?”

“Amaryllis! How could you—”

“Harley, you voted for him. I knew it at the time. When you came out of the booth I could feel—”

“But it was a protest vote,” offered Harley lamely.

“Against who, Harley?”

“Against Jane Wyman. Did you see her in Johnny Belinda? It was—”

“Very funny, Harley, but it won’t work … Harley, something drastic has to happen.”

“Christ, baby, how un square can I be? I mean I slipped that once, but how about the other things? We’ve swapped with half the kinky couples in L.A. county. I even joined that computerized swap club and got you a coded bumper sticker for the bike so the guys who liked what they saw could get in touch. I’ve put up with some weird chicks for your sake, sweetheart.”

“Hugh Hefner says—”

“I know what he says. I read his advice to you along with the other millions of people. And you couldn’t even use initials, for Christ sake. I almost lost my job over that little caper. Really, baby, what else can I do?”

While Harley’s question hung in the air over the booth, the stoned spade, whose name was really Lamont Cranston, turned slowly in his booth, rose to peer over Harley’s shoulder, and said, “Split.”

Lamont’s mother had been greatly impressed with the powers of her son’s radio namesake, and had been in those days unaware of any pejorative connotations attached to Cranston’s alias. Lamont Cranston the younger, seated behind the Modes, rarely used the other name anyway, though he was, as they would learn, a shadowy character.

“What did you say?” asked Amaryllis, somewhat recovered from the shock.