Time Travel Omnibus, page 563
Upstairs in the office, Zoe was at the switchboard in the lobby as I came in. She was the best-looking girl in the office, resembling Anita Ekberg, only slimmer—more of a fashion-model type. I whipped out my glasses, put them on, said, “Hi,” smiling at her as I passed, and—what a disappointment! There under that expensive, smart-looking, narrow-waisted, flounced-out dress sat a girl only ounces this side of malnutrition. It was the kind of figure that women, in their pitiful ignorance, envy; no hips, no nothing, except prominent ribs. “You don’t eat enough, Zoe,” I said.
She nodded proudly. “That’s what my roommate says.”
“Well, he’s right.”
“Listen, wise guy,” she began, and I held up a hand placatingly, ducking behind one shoulder, and she smiled, and I walked on.
I kept the glasses on nearly all afternoon, wandering around the office with a sheaf of papers in my hand, and strangely it was Mrs. Humphrey, our middle-aged overweight bookkeeper, that I stared at longest. Last year, I knew, she’d celebrated the twenty-fifth anniversary of her marriage to her husband, Harvey. But there, unmistakably, tattooed on her left hip, was a four-inch-high red heart inside which, in a slanted blue script, was inscribed Ralph, and I wondered if she’d had the fearsome job of hiding it from Harvey for a quarter of a century.
But the biggest surprise of all came just before quitting time. I was managing to do a little actual work by then, and, when my office door opened and someone came in, I raised my eyes slowly, still reading a last few words of the paper in my hand. And there before me in bra and what I believe are called briefs embroidered with forget-me-nots, and I swore I never would, was—well, there is no describing what I saw, and I’m not going to try. It was nothing more or less than the most magnificently beautiful feminine figure the human race has ever known. It may even have been a mutant figure, the very first example of a new height in beauty to which humanity has never previously soared. I couldn’t believe it, I couldn’t tear away my eyes and lift my head until, entranced with those flawless beautifully shaped long legs, something vaguely familiar began tapping at the doors of my flabbergasted memory. The ankles, I saw when I reached them, were strangely bowed out, and then my chin shot up and I was staring open-mouthed at the face above that incredible figure. “Did I startle you or something, Ted? Sorry,” said Frieda, raking back a dank curtain of hair to expose a constellation of half-eyes of various sizes blinking down at me from behind and around those demented glasses.
“That’s all right,” I managed to say. “I’ve been concentrating all afternoon on some figures.” I yanked off my glasses, and sure enough, there stood Frieda as always—in a shapeless sackcloth, which the dictionary says is made of goat’s or camel’s hair, and in her case I didn’t doubt it.
“Forgot to tell you,” she said, “that I found a ladies’ pool hall on Sixth Avenue last month,” and I thanked her, and she left. I couldn’t quite believe what had happened and I clapped my glasses on again and stared after her. But it was true. There, wobbling along on scuffed and run-down heels, went the world’s greatest figure, and I pulled off my glasses, and sat there till quitting time rubbing the corners of my eyes between my thumb and forefinger.
I soon quit wearing my glasses regularly though I kept them in the breast pocket of my coat for emergency use. But the novelty of wearing them all the time wore off quickly; it was like walking around on a beach all day, you got used to it. And I never put them on—the contrast between face and figure was just too much—when Frieda dropped into my office as she took to doing. She’d stop in to tell me about some noon-hour discovery, and I told her about the magic shop and about a jail manufacturer on lower Park Avenue. Usually she’d be eating a Love Nest candy bar, not so much because of the taste, she explained, but because she loved to ask for them.
Coming to work on the Forty-ninth Street crosstown bus one morning about a week later, I sat down next to the optometrist in our building; his shop is in the lobby, he usually stands in the doorway between customers, and we generally nod and speak, so I knew him. We spoke now, then each sat reading our papers till the bus stopped for a light. I looked up to see where we were just as a particularly extravagant example of lush American girlhood was crossing the street, and I whipped out my glasses and clapped them on in a blur of movement; I now had, I felt sure, the fastest draw in the East. “Farsighted?” my optometrist friend asked me, and I said no, these lenses were ground so you could see through thin cloth, such as summer dresses. He chuckled delightedly, and said, “Any lenses that could do that must be magic.” I snatched off the glasses, and stared at him.
“You mean you couldn’t make lenses like that?” I said finally.
“Of course not,” he said with the tolerant little chuckle doctors use for the idiot questions of stupid laymen. The bus was slowing for Park Avenue, and he stood up, asking me if I weren’t going to get off, but I shook my head.
“There’s something I’ve got to do near Sixth Avenue; I just realized,” I said, and rode on across town.
The guy in the magic shop looked up from his Daily News as I walked in, and shook his head. “That salesman was in again but he doesn’t have any stronger glasses; I asked.”
“Never mind, that’s not why I came,” I said. “Tell me; what does this salesman look like? Does he have a thin saturnine face, a little waxed mustache, and strangely hypnotic eyes? Is his hair black and glossy, and high above the temples as though concealing little horns? Does he wear a silk hat and a full dress suit, and is there an odor of brimstone about h—”
“No, you must be thinking of a salesman for some other company. This here salesman is fat. Wears dirty wash pants, a Hawaiian shirt, and a cap. Smokes a cigar that smells a little like brimstone, though.”
I nodded, disappointed, then thought of something. “He was here again, did you say? What’d he leave this time?”
“Some lousy jewelry. Cheap plated brass. I wouldn’t of took it if he didn’t leave it on consignment.”
I shrugged. “Might as well look at it, long as I’m here.”
“Help yourself.” He pulled a cardboard box out of a showcase, shoved it across the counter at me, and went back to the News. Tumbled in the box lay a dozen or so heart-shaped little boxes made of cheap pink plastic. I opened one; a layer of pink imitation felt was glued to a piece of cardboard cut to fit the inside of the box. Lying on the felt was a bracelet of imitation brass chain studded with red glass hearts; it was as gaudy a looking thing as I’d seen in a long time. A badly printed label stuck to the inside of the lid read, genuine Egyptian slave bracelet, and a little gummed tab on the back said 75. I paid the guy—he looked at me pityingly as I did—then hurried out and to the office.
Zoe was at the switchboard, looking—with clothes on—as lovely as ever, and I stopped; there was no one else around. I took out the little pink box, opened it, and showed her the bracelet. “Just bought this,” I said.
She glanced at the bracelet, then up at me. “Bought it? Or did you find it in a box of Crackerjack?”
“Bought it. Try it on; I’d like to see how it looks.”
She frowned but picked up the bracelet, slipped it over her wrist, then held out her arm to inspect the result; it looked terrible. I said, “Zoe, you are now my slave; kiss me, you mad fool!” and she stood up, walked out of her little enclosure, grabbed me around the waist, bent me far back—it was like a reverse scene from a Rudolph Valentino movie—stared into my eyes for a moment, then kissed me. Enormous blue sparks flashed and crackled around the room like St. Elmo’s fire; it was the most wildly abandoned and passionate kiss I’d ever imagined, and I’ve imagined some beauties.
It didn’t stop, either. Behind us the switchboard buzzed, then another buzz began in a slightly different key, then a third. But I didn’t realize it was the switchboard; I thought it was my nerves twanging in ecstasy and my mind and senses threw up their hands and went down for the first, then the second time, and were just going under for the third when I managed to reach out with my little remaining strength and yank the bracelet off her wrist or there’s simply no telling what might have happened. Zoe raised her lovely head, stared down at me for a moment, said, “For heaven’s sakes,” and let me drop to run for her board. I fell flat on my back, banging my head on the floor, and raising a considerable lump. Then I hurried on, fifteen minutes late for work, as Zoe began clearing her board of calls, murmuring, “Sorry!”
In my office I closed the door, sat down at my desk, and with trembling hands began putting the bracelet back into its box. The door opened, and Frieda walked in saying, “Did you know there’s a blacksmith shop down on Twenty-eighth Str—” Then she stopped, her mouth still open, and stood staring down at the bracelet in the pink heart-shaped box. She leaned closer, her hair fell over her face, and with both hands she pulled it aside like Stanley parting the jungle vines. For a moment longer she stared, then said, “Isn’t it beautiful! Oh, Ted, it’s the loveliest thing I’ve ever seen!”
I looked at her quickly but she wasn’t kidding. Her eyes, face, and voice were filled with the kind of yearning the Little Match Girl might feel gazing through the store window at the doll she could never have, and I realized that Frieda was probably the only human being in the civilized world who could think that damn bracelet was beautiful. I knew I could get another at noon, so I said, “You like it? It’s yours, and handed it to her box and all. I was glad I did, because Frieda was entranced. Thanking me again and again, she put it on, then stood revolving her wrist so the bracelet would catch the light till I thought her arm would fall off.
That noon I stood in the magic shop, and I couldn’t believe—my mind wouldn’t accept—what the man was telling me. But he repeated it. “That’s right; a guy bought one right after you left this morning, and half an hour later he came back for the rest. Wanted to buy a gross, but I didn’t have them.”
I could hardly speak. “But . . . can’t you get more?”
He shrugged, turning a page of the News. “I’ll try. I’ll ask the salesman next time he comes around. But he don’t ever seem to have the same thing twice. Tried to get more of those glasses, but couldn’t. Seems like he’s more interested pushing new items than repeats.”
I didn’t eat lunch; I didn’t feel like it. I bought an Almond Joy, but could only eat half. And when, wandering aimlessly around, I passed an embalming school, I didn’t even bother reading the placard in the window.
Back at the office I felt even worse, because in came Frieda to thank me again, holding her arm up so I could admire the bracelet. I sat looking at it and thinking that this was typical of me; here was the only genuine Egyptian slave bracelet, I knew now, that I’d ever get my hands on, and of all the wrists of all the girls in the world I’d somehow managed to get it onto Frieda’s. Looking at it as her wrist twisted and flashed like the revolving red light on top of a cop’s car, I thought of what might have been.
I pictured myself going to Hollywood; I’d have had to travel by bus, eating almost nothing, but I could have managed it, and it would have been worth it. Somehow, I knew, I could have gotten into the studio, found Anita Ekberg, and when she wasn’t looking, slipped the bracelet onto her magnificent wrist, and then—but I couldn’t bear to finish that lovely dream, not with Frieda standing there wearing the bracelet, yakking away about it and smiling down at me from behind and around those insane glasses.
Twice I opened my mouth to tell her that I had to have that bracelet back, that it was a family heirloom and that I’d get her another that was bigger, better, and even gaudier. But I simply could not get the words out; I just couldn’t do it. Could you take a big delicious piece of candy away from a child, telling her you’d get her a better one some other time? It just wasn’t possible to take that bracelet away, yet the thought of a genuine slave bracelet being entirely wasted was more than I could stand. It was too much to bear, and I had a sudden idea.
I took out my glasses, put them on, and then—careful not to lift my eyes too high and catch sight of her face—I slowly looked up at Frieda. The embroidered forget-me-nots were gone today but I hadn’t forgotten; there beside my desk, ankles bowed outward and one wrist steadily revolving, stood the world’s most spectacular figure. And now, by an inspired act of will, keeping my eyes carefully lowered, I pictured Zoe’s lovely face at the upper end of that splendid torso. It was a spectacular combination, and I stood up saying, “Kiss me; you are my slave,” and she did, her arms winding immediately around my neck.
It was great! It was wonderful! And when we finally stopped, Frieda sighed deeply and said, “Do you always put on your glasses to kiss a girl?” I said yeah, and she said, “Then why are your eyes closed?”
“Shut up and kiss me again,” I said and she did and this time it lasted even longer and was tremendous. Just kiss a girl like Zoe some time with your arms around a figure like that, and you’ll know what I mean. It was so great, in fact, that the actual truth of what was happening faded from my mind. In a fit of delirious absentmindedness I languorously opened my eyes, and there only half an inch away and staring into mine were Frieda’s eyes—all of them. I got so dizzy I had to break loose and sit down on the edge of the desk; not because of the split-level eyes in assorted sizes—I was used to them now—but because every single one of them was chock full of love. They were filled with it! They swam with it! And from an enormous distance I heard Frieda saying, “Oh, Ted, darling, you’re wonderful! I love you! Open your eyes!”
I couldn’t; I’d closed them again instantly and they were squeezed tight as though I had soap in them. Then I forced myself; cautiously opening my eyes to a slit I looked again. They were still there in front of me, those four half-eyes each aflame with the light of love, and I slammed my eyelids shut knowing that, although it hardly seemed possible, I’d managed to make things infinitely worse. “I’m crazy about you, Ted!” Frieda was saying. “I’m your slave!” She reached out and pulled of? my glasses saying, “Please open your eyes and kiss me again!”
Bravely, I looked out once more; she was peering tenderly out at me from behind that jungle of hair looking as though she’d just jumped from a plane in a burlap parachute in which she’d become hopelessly tangled. I thought of pretending to faint, when my phone rang and I snatched it up before the first ring had stopped. It was just one of the account men with one of the foolish questions they ask, and which I answered with a word. But I kept the phone at my ear long after he’d hung up, saying, “Yeah,” and “You bet,” over and over again, occasionally looking up at Frieda and shrugging helplessly. Finally she had to leave, giggling and murmuring horrible endearments, and I hung up the phone, covered my face with my hands, and planted my elbows on the desk squarely on the glasses Frieda had put there, smashing both lenses, but I was beyond caring.
Later, splashing cold water on my face in the washroom, I wondered what to do. Here was a girl helplessly in love with me and it was all my fault; maybe I was morally obliged to pretend that I, too—but I knew I couldn’t do that. I went back to my desk, and three times that afternoon Frieda looked in hopefully, lovingly, and I told her that I had a headache. At quitting time I found her waiting at the elevators, and told her my headache was far worse and by this time it was true; it throbbed and pounded, and I stumbled home to a night of hideous dreams.
I don’t know whether Frieda guessed the truth that night; I’m just not sure. But all next morning she didn’t come into my office, though I kept glancing up every time footsteps sounded anywhere near my door. When noon came and she still hadn’t come in, I was suddenly filled with remorse and fear. This was a nice girl, I’d probably hurt her feelings terribly, and—what if she were at the river, in it by now going down for the last time, refusing to struggle? All noon hour I prowled along the river front cursing myself, worrying, and when I got back to the office, and sat down at my desk, and Frieda came in friendly and happy as ever, I jumped up and yelled, “Where were you this noon!?”
She just smiled, and shook her head. “Want some? She said, holding out a wrapped candy bar clutched in her hand like a banana; but printed on the wrapper just above her fist I could see the first word, Love, and the beginning vertical stroke of the next, and since Love Nests aren’t really my favorite, I said no, thanks. But when she peeled off the wrapper, and urged me again, it occurred to me that I could hardly be expected to kiss her with my mouth full of candy, so I took a bite. Surprisingly, it was delicious, and when she offered me some more, I took another. Her eyes gleaming with love, she said, “Finish it,” insisting with a gesture, so I did—chewing slowly, postponing as long as possible what I was afraid would happen next.
It happened. “Kiss me, lover,” Frieda said then, and I looked up at her, my mouth opening to say that my headache was back. But I didn’t say it. My mouth stayed open but I just sat looking at her astounded. It had suddenly occurred to me that if Frieda would simply use a judicious bobby pin or two and unsnarl that knot at the back, her hair would not only stay in place but would become a very handsome pageboy bob. And that if she’d just take off those crazy—I stood up as though in a dream, and did it myself. I pulled off those nutty glasses, and her various half-eyes merged in pairs like the split images in a camera viewfinder coming into focus, and turned into a single set of enormous, beautiful, myopic blue eyes. She couldn’t see me now but I could see her, and her face was absolutely lovely, every bit as beautiful as the accompanying figure which I now found I was holding in my arms. I started to say something about contact lenses but decided that could wait while this could not—and I kissed her long and lingeringly.
