The Loving Couple Page 11

  Reluctantly Mr. Norbert Bessamer returned. Even more reluctantly he put up at the hideous home of his youth. As Uncle Norbert had always hated Milwaukee for being boisterous and krautish and totally lacking in chic, so did he hate the Bessamer house and his brother Rupert. One look at Lillian had sent him scuttling to his room with a sick headache. Lillian was just what Rupert and the house deserved, Uncle Norbert decided. And the midday meal with a pitcher of Bessamer's Best at each place put Uncle Norbert quite out of sorts. It was only the sight of young Besame, curtseying fairylike to him in her drab school uniform that restored Uncle Norbert to anything like geniality.

  For both uncle and niece the meeting was epic. Save for his mother and an old terrier bitch named Frieda, Uncle Norbert had never experienced the slightest vestige of affection for anything female until he caught sight of this gravely exquisite little creature standing before him. Nor had the child ever seen anything quite like Uncle Norbert with his slight lisp, his fluttering white hands, his big chalcedony ring (said once to have belonged to Queen Christina), his foreign airs and graces. Besame listened to her uncle in wonderment as they foregathered in the ponderous dining room at six for a heavy, bready, beery dinner. Uncle Norbert announced that he never dined before eight—bedtime in Besame's world. Uncle Norbert spoke of the stunning creations of Faberge. Lillian said she didn't like those French dressmakers nearly as well as the Hollywood designers who ran up clothes for movie stars. Uncle Norbert's eyes shot to the ceiling and right back down again, as the ceiling was decorated with a frieze of nymphs, cherubs, satyrs, grapes and hops. He had forgotten that detail.

  Then more hopefully Uncle Norbert switched the subject to Bach. Lillian said that she felt it was too dark and heavy. Uncle Norbert raised his suspiciously symmetrical brows and said, "Dark and heavy, my dear? Bach?" Lillian said "Yer darn tootin'. Give me Bessamer's Pale Lager any time." Rupert agreed. Uncle Norbert asked to be excused. Enchanted, Besame followed him from the table.

  For the rest of the visit—and a visit which, to everyone's surprise, was extended to a full week—Uncle Norbert and Besame were inseparable. To Besame, Uncle Norbert was a debonair and cultivated man of the world, a perfect court chamberlain to the fairy princess. She prayed for him to take her away from her horrid mother, this dreadful town and into a life of chic urbanity. And to Uncle Norbert, Besame was an elegant and adorable fairy princess, a perfect subject for a worldly Pygmalion. He prayed to take her away from her horrid mother, this dreadful town and into a life of chic urbanity.

  But Uncle Norbert bided his time and played his cards carefully. From a handful of old Milwaukee acquaintances—two gentlemen who sold antiques and a talented young man who kept a rather expensive hat shop—Uncle Norbert learned exactly how the land lay. It was just as he had expected. Because of Lillian, Besame was spurned by the local Society. Still Uncle Norbert was smart enough not to pounce immediately. An old hand at the seduction of the innocent, he knew the difference between courtship and rape. Casually he took to sending pretty presents to pretty little Besame from pretty little shops in Paris and Rome. He began remembering his brother's birthday, his name day, his anniversary. He found garish gifts for Lillian, which delighted her even though Norbert did talk like her hairdresser. Uncle Norbert resumed an interest, in absentia, in the brewery and indulged in a cordial correspondence with Rupert. Even Rupert had to concede that Norbert wasn't all bad.

  Gradually Norbert moved a bit closer infield. How nice for little Besame to have a cultural weekend of Shakespeare, Chopin and Marshall Field's when Uncle Norbert "just happened to be" in Chicago. How nice for little Besame to get away from the slush and sleet of Milwaukee for a week on the sands of St. Simon's with Uncle Norbert, what with the child so thin and so pale and travel so broadening. How nice for little Besame to spend a fortnight in California with Uncle Norbert when he was there "on business"—maybe even meet some of the stars.

  Little by little Uncle Norbert had them all in the palm of his hand. He took his time. He was discreet. Never once did he let the girl see his flicker of interest in the fair young man who sold them Besame's little amethyst locket, in the slim waiter who served them inflammable food at the Pump Room, in the muscular male dancers at the ballet. By the time Besame was twelve, Uncle Norbert was choosing her meals, her clothes and her reading. At thirteen, her room in Milwaukee was done over with furniture and plans sent from Italy by Uncle Norbert. When Besame was fourteen, Uncle Norbert knew that it was time to strike.

  Norbert was very much the older brother in his letter, six times rewritten, to Rupert—friendly, firm and forthright. Lillian was a dear with a heart of gold, Norbert wrote, and undoubtedly a sterling mother etc. etc. But Rupert must realize that Milwaukee would never accept Lillian or grant Besame her rightful place etc. etc. And surely Rupert also saw that Besame was a girl of exceptional beauty, talent, intelligence etc. etc. Wouldn't Rupert consider sending Besame off to a really first rate New England boarding school where the girl would have a chance to meet other girls of etc. etc. As ever, your affectionate etc. etc. etc.

  Rupert spent a troubled night. The next morning he looked at his daughter who was almost a total stranger to him and who was very, very beautiful. Then he looked at his wife who had become far too familiar to him and who was not. Reluctantly he decided that Norbert was right. The following fall Besame was entered in Miss Spaulding's School, well up in Connecticut, but not too far for Uncle Norbert to keep an eye on her.

  With his Galatea close at hand for most of each year, Uncle Norbert was in a ferment of joy, but again the situation had to be handled with care. No one knew better than Uncle Norbert the double cross that had to be borne at a smart Eastern school when one had both Milwaukee and beer as background. He was Machiavellian about preventing Lillian's projected visit to the campus. He bought Besame's way into Miss Spaulding's School with blandishments, stealth, and cold cash, starting with Miss Spaulding herself, who was also mad about Bach and enthralled to receive an original Bach score and an old harpsichord to play it on with the compliments of Mr. Norbert P. (for Pilsner) Bessamer.

  He made surprise raids in a hired limousine to take Besame and her classmates off for treats at the local inn. And how could Miss Spaulding object? Such a lovely man, Mr. Bessamer! He planned edifying weekends in New York for Besame and two or three of her little friends, intellectual with trips to the Met and the Frick, but fun, too, with an evening of virtuous musical comedy, a pale lipstick and a creme de menthe apiece to make the girls feel grown up and terribly sophisticated.

  It all worked like a charm. Uncle Norbert was delighted to see Besame become the most popular girl in her class. Uncle Norbert was delighted to see Besame receive invitations to visit in Aiken and Tuxedo and Southampton and Watch Hill with four of the very nicest girls from Miss Spaulding's. He purred with pleasure.

  But there was just one thing that Uncle Norbert did not see—could not have seen, considering his own ambiguous nature. Besame liked boys and boys liked Besame. Of course Uncle Norbert liked boys, too, but he would not have been delighted to see Besame in the woods at Aiken, in the canoe at Tuxedo, on the beach at Southampton or in the guest room at Watch Hill with the very nice older brothers of the very nicest girls from Miss Spaulding's. Standing serene in her appropriate pumps, young Besame was as soignée a subdebutante as only Uncle Norbert could have produced, but lying down, young Besame was as sensual a slut as only Lillian could have produced.

  And what of the fairy princess herself? At sixteen Besame was a belle and a beauty; a creature of smoldering moods, given to carefully concealed hatreds and dark introspection of what she believed to be her true personality—that of a passionate goddess surrounded by fools and clods.

  Alone in her dormitory bed, Besame tried occasionally to list in alphabetical order all the people she hated. The task was too great for her. She hated the girls at Miss Spaulding's because they were such asses—almost as asinine as Miss Spaulding herself. It amused Besame to see how easily
they could all be bamboozled, how endearing she could make herself to them, how they mistook her play-acting for "qualities of true leadership " There wasn't a one of them she couldn't twist around her little finger and the easier they twisted, the more Besame loathed them.

  She had been cautiously sleeping around for almost two years and she detested the boys whom she had allowed to seduce her. Seduce? That was a laugh! It was Besame's policy to lead them on, to tease them until they were in a lather of doggish desire before she submitted—if she submitted. She rarely enjoyed the act of love, but she adored the sense of power it gave her. When the whole thing was finished, when the boy lay gasping beside her, then Besame would drive her final thrust into the young man's most vulnerable spot. If he had been callow and inept, Besame would analyze his shortcomings with a cool candor that could drive him to tears. If he had been anywhere adequate, Besame would insist that he repeat his gala performance instantly and then vilify him when he mumbled that he could not.

  Nor did her sadism end with the postlude. When the boys wrote love letters to her afterwards—and all but one of them did—Besame saved them carefully and sold them back just after each swain had announced more honorable intentions with some far nicer girl. For the one who was a poor correspondent, Besame had an even more diabolical torture. She drove him to penury, pawnshops and potential suicide by announcing that he was the sire of a totally fictitious foetus and that she had to have five hundred dollars immediately.

  Besame had little use for the piddling amounts of money she wrung out of her youthful lovers. It was just the sense of power and principle of the thing that seemed important, plus the fact that once Besame had finished with them, she felt positive that her lovers were too defeated ever to mention her name in polite or impolite society and that her flawless reputation was still secure. The very paradox entertained her hugely and gave her even more pleasure in hating.

  And away from home, among America's elite, Besame discovered that she hated her mother even more for being a tawdry tart, her father for being a bourgeois brewer and Uncle Norbert for being the biggest fool, the consummate ass in the world. And still she kept on charming, twisting them all around her finger. The more they worshipped her, the more she despised them.

  Now Uncle Norbert, in his pursuit of Besame, had by no means abandoned his original interests. And for some time his abnormal appetites, meager as they were, had been more than satisfied by the presence of a young man from Virginia whom Uncle Norbert referred to variously as "my companion" or "my secretary" or "honeybunch," depending on the company. To Mr. Norbert Bessamer, Besame was a real live doll whom he could dress and give tea and carry about and show off, nothing more. The young man filled a more pressing need. With these two exquisite young people, beautifully clothed, groomed, tutored and kept well apart, Mr. Bessamer was in seventh heaven.

  But the temptation to show off his two creations at once was too strong. When Besame was sixteen and when Mr. Bessamer's companion was twenty, Mr. Bessamer arranged a week's holiday in New York. No coupling since that of Adam and Eve was ever more cataclysmic.

  Randolph Carter Lee, as the young man called himself, had all the lazy, handsome charm of the Virginia gentleman he was not. He found serving Mr. Bessamer something of a bore, but far preferable to working in the bath house whence Mr. Bessamer had lured him. Randy's life as companion was secure, comfortable and not too onerous and he had always found opportunities for a quick roll with whichever waitress or chambermaid was available during Mr. Bessamer's absences from the apartment. But the arrival of Miss Besame Bessamer for the week of spring vacation put Randy in a turmoil. If Randy had ever spotted a sure thing—and Randy had spotted many—Besame was it.

  And Besame scented something unusual about Randy. Of course she had suspected for some time that all was not strictly kosher with Uncle Norbert, but she'd never discovered who the other man—or men—happened to be. This domestic set-up intrigued her and she gave her bottomless capacity for destruction full sway by flirting outrageously with Uncle Norbert's young man.

  As for Mr. Bessamer, he was in ecstasy. Here were his two adorable, beautiful darlings; his achievements, for all the world to see.

  Quivering with pride, he showed them all over New York. It was just too delicious having people stare at his stunning young couple as they entered restaurants, smoked during intermissions at theatres, danced together at smart nightclubs. Mr. Bessamer's ecstasy lasted for almost the whole week until the night he simply had to attend a meeting. Leaving the two people he loved the most decorously playing backgammon among his collection of Faberge Easter eggs and cigarette cases, he bid them a gay farewell and announced that he'd be home early.

  No sooner had she heard the elevator door close behind Uncle Norbert than Besame gave Randy a burning dark gaze. What fun, she thought, to play with this one. Lead him on. Maybe even get him to make a pass, if such a thing was possible with that kind of man, and then tell Uncle Norbert. Maybe she could even . . .

  Besame had no more time to think. A second later she felt Randy's mouth crushing down on hers, felt his hand surely and steadily pulling down the zipper at the back of her dress; felt the hand warm against her tingling flesh as he expertly loosened her brassiere. Before Besame could collect her wits sufficiently to speak, she found herself on Uncle Norbert's bed—not in it, if you please, but on it—with Randy's hands, his lips, his teeth exploring her whole trembling body. Nothing like this had ever happened to her before in all of her carefully calculated life. She was oblivious of time, of sound, of light—and only vaguely, hungrily conscious of Randy's body pressing against, and into, hers.

  Unfortunately she was soon made eternally aware of light, sound and time. There was a brilliant flash of Mr. Bessamer's Murano chandelier. Then she heard a gasp, a shriek, a scream, a thud and a ghastly gurgling. The coroner established the time as nine-thirty-one. Mr. Norbert P. Bessamer had died of natural causes—a heart attack.

  Everything that happened after that was a nightmare—the feverish dressing, lugging the still-warm body up to the soiled bed, Randy's calm call to Uncle Norbert's physician and then, on the following morning, the arrival of Besame's father.

  Rupert Bessamer was, as Besame had always thought, a bourgeois kraut with no sensitivity, hammy hands and a roll of fat over his collar. But Besame had never reckoned with the brain pan above the roll of fat. Her father took one look at Uncle Norbert's corpse, one look at Uncle Norbert's apartment, one look at Uncle Norbert's Randy and one look at Besame. Within ten minutes Besame had an ugly red welt across one cheek and her father had the wholly unabridged story. The following day Randy had decamped to parts unknown and Besame, chaperoned by a warty old German woman, was on her way to a prison of a school in Switzerland. Bessamer Beer could get through red tape faster than it could get through the human system.

  Naturally Besame won out in the end, for that is the fate of any fairy princess. Save for a paltry five thousand dollars for "my faithful companion, Randolph Carter Lee," the whole of Uncle Norbert's estate went to "my beloved niece, Besame Bessamer of Milwaukee, Wisconsin." Her father, much to Besame's delight, died immediately afterwards, leaving, much to Besame's chagrin, everything to Lillian. A year later Besame was free of her Swiss school, but saddled with her mother, grotesque in jets and black chiffon, smoking black-tipped cigarettes and talking incessantly about "my husband, the late Mr. Bessamer," while flirting with Manfred Popescu, a man rich enough to make Besame's father look like a pauper. Of course Besame could have had Mr. Popescu herself, but she was too snobbish and too dispirited to make the effort. That awful night with Randolph Carter Lee had blighted her whole schedule. Besame, utterly shattered, stood through Lillian's marriage to Mr. Popescu without being able to think of anything more than what the bulk of their two estates might amount to.

  Now, more decorous than ever before, her own boss with her own money, Besame was quietly at it again, venting her hatred on all comers. There had been no one sensational; a young acto
r or two, a script writer, the assistant cameraman on the Pulse Beat show, her osteopath, a sculptor with a beard, the husband of her roommate from Miss Spaulding's—nothing to write home about. But at least she was out destroying people. She had almost forgotten the incident with Randy Lee—six years back, as it was. As far as Besame was concerned, everybody who knew anything about that night was dead; dead and buried.

  But tonight, not ten minutes ago, she had come face to face with the magnificent mug of Randolph Carter Lee. Besame could have died—almost as willingly as she could have murdered Randolph Carter Lee.

  She thought that she'd seen Randy on the dance floor. Besame wasn't quite sure—she had a fleeting impression of Randy dancing with a terribly pretty young woman who was wearing a beautiful hat and a beautiful dress and probably keeping Randy. Besame hadn't been certain that it was Randy she saw. (Besame never liked to concede that any man she had tangled with could possibly still be going about to the better places, well dressed and well fed. A slow, lingering death or an ignominious end in the Foreign Legion fitted in better with Besame's malign fantasies.) But then, no sooner had they sat down at the table, no sooner had the man she was with excused himself than there was old Randy, as close to her at that. True, Randy had seemed just as surprised as Besame had, but Besame knew Randy too well even to hope that he wasn't up to some deviltry. Hadn't he tried to blackmail the Bessamer family when Uncle Norbert died? And now that Besame was on her way to becoming an established actress—possibly even a star—how like Randy to come back and make trouble.

  Besame had gone up to the Powder Room to arrange her face and collect her wits and it was there that she became positive that Randy had been talking. For, staring at Besame in the mirror was the pretty little thing who had been dancing with Randy. So he'd told all. No question about it. Randolph Carter Lee, Virginia gentleman, catamite and seducer, had just been waiting until Besame grew into something big enough to be worth fleecing.