the Promise (1978) Read online

  And it was all right to stand up just me, is that it?

  No, I just forgot, for Chrissake. This wasn't exactly my favorite birthday.

  I'm sorry. But she didn't sound as though she remembered why this birthday was different, or as though she really cared. She sounded miffed.

  And that brings up another point, Mother. I'm going to move out and get my own place.

  She looked up, surprised Why?

  Because I'm twenty-five years old. I work for you, Mother. I don't have to live with you, too.

  You don't have' to do anything. She was beginning to wonder about the Avery boy and just what kind of influence he was. This sounded like his idea.

  Mother, let's not get into this now. I have an incredible headache.

  Hangover. She looked at her watch and stood up. I'll see you at the office in half an hour. Don't forget the meeting with the people from Houston. Are you up to it?

  I will be. And Mom ' I'm sorry about the apartment, but I think it's time.

  She looked at him sternly for a moment and then let out a small sigh. Maybe it is, Michael. Maybe it is. Happy birthday, by the way. She bent down to kiss him, and he even smiled despite the terrible ache in his head. I left you a little present on your desk.

  You shouldn't have. There was no present that mattered anymore. Ben had understood that. He had given him nothing.

  Birthdays are birthdays after all, Michael. See you at the office.

  After she left he sat for a long time in the dining room, looking at the view. He knew just the apartment he wanted. Only it was in Boston. But he was going to do his damnedest to find one just like it in New York. In some ways he still hadn't given up the dream. Even though he knew he was crazy to cling to it.

  Chapter 9

  Hi, Sue. Is Mr. Hillyard in? Ben had the look of five o'clock as he arrived at Mike's office door: not quite disheveled, but relieved that the day was almost over. He'd barely had time to sit down all day long, let alone relax.

  He is. Shall I let him know you're here? She smiled at him, and he felt his eyes drawn to the carefully concealed figure. Marion Hillyard did not approve of sexy secretaries, even for her son ' or was it especially for her son? Ben wondered as he shook his head.

  No, thanks. I'll announce myself. He strode past her desk, carrying the files that had been his excuse, and knocked on the heavy oak door. Anybody home? There was no answer so he knocked again. And still got no reply. He turned questioningly to the secretary. You're sure he's in there?

  Positive.

  Okay. Ben tried again and this time a hoarse croak from the other side urged him in. Ben cautiously opened the door and looked around You asleep or something? Michael looked up and grinned at his friend.

  I wish. Look at this mess. He sat surrounded by folders, mock-ups, drawings, designs, reports. It was enough to keep ten men busy for a year. Sit down, Ben.

  Thanks, boss. Ben couldn't resist teasing him.

  Oh, shut up. What's with the files you brought me? He ran a hand through his hair and sat back in the heavy leather desk chair he had grown accustomed to. He had even gotten used to the impersonal prints on the walls. It didn't matter anymore. He didn't give a damn. He never looked at the walls, or his office, or his secretary ' or his life. He looked at the work on his desk and very little else. It had been four months. Please don't tell me you've brought me another set of problems with that damn shopping center in Kansas City. They're driving me nuts.

  And you love it. Tell me, Mike, what was the last movie you saw? Bridge on the River Kwai, or Fantasia? Don't you ever get the hell out of here?

  When I get the chance. Michael looked at some papers as he answered. So what's with the files?

  They're a decoy. I just wanted to come and talk to you.

  And you can't do that without an excuse? Michael grinned up at him. It was like being Kids again, visiting each other's study halls with fake homework to consult on.

  I keep forgetting your mother isn't old Sanders up at St Jude's.

  Thank God. Actually they both knew she was worse, but neither of them could afford to admit it. She detested seeing people float around the halls, as she put it, and she was usually quick to glance at whatever files they were carrying. So what's up, Ben? How were the Hamptons this summer?

  Ben sat very still for a moment, watching him, before he answered. Do you really care?

  About you, or the Hamptons? Michael's smile looked pasted on, and he had the ghostly pallor of December, not September. It was obvious he had gone nowhere all summer. I care a lot about you, Ben.

  But not about yourself. Have you looked in the mirror lately? You'd scare Frankenstein's mother.

  Gee, thanks.

  Don't mention it. Anyway, that's why I'm here.

  On behalf of Frankenstein's mother?

  No, mine. We want you to come up to the Cape this weekend. They do. I do. We all do. And listen, if you say no, I'll come across that desk and drag you out of here. You need to get out of here, damn it. Ben wasn't smiling anymore. He was dead serious, and Mike knew it. But he shook his head.

  I'd love to, Ben. But I can't I've got Kansas City to worry about, and forty-seven thousand problems with it that we just can't seem to solve. You know. You were in that meeting yesterday.

  So were twenty-three other people. Let them handle it. For a weekend at least. Or is your ego such that you can't let anyone else touch your work?

  But they both knew it wasn't that Work had become his drug. It numbed him to everything else. And he had been abusing the job since the day he walked into the office.

  Come on, Mike. Be good to yourself. Just this once.

  I just can't, Ben.

  Goddamn it, man, what do I have to say to you? Look at yourself. Don't you care? You're killing yourself, and for what? His voice roared across the office and hit Michael with an almost physical force as he watched his friend's face convulse with emotion. What the hell's the use, Mite? If you kill yourself, it won't bring her back. You're alive, damn it. Twenty-five years old and alive and wasting your life, driving yourself like your Goddamn mother. Is that what you want? To be like her? To live, eat; sleep, drink, and die this Goddamn business? Is that it for you now? Is that who you are? Well, I don't believe it. I know someone else in that skin of yours, mister, and I love that other person. But you happen to be treating him like a dog, and I won't let you do it. You know what you should be doing? You should be out there, living. You should be out there making it with that good-looking secretary who sits outside your office, or ten other broads you meet at the best parties in town. Get off your ass and get out of your casket, Mike, before

  But Mike cut him off before he could finish. He was leaning halfway across the desk at him, shaking, and even paler than he had been before. Get the hell out of my office, Ben, before I kill you. Get out!! It was the roar of an injured lion, and for a moment the two men stood staring at each other, shaken and frightened by what they had felt and said. I'm sorry. Mike sat down again and dropped his head into his hands. Why don't we just let this go for today? He never looked up at Ben, who walked slowly across the room, squeezed his shoulder, and walked out, closing the door quietly behind him. There was nothing left to say.

  Michael's secretary looked at Ben questioningly as he walked past, but said nothing. She had heard Mike's roar at the very end. The whole floor could have, if they'd been listening. Ben passed Marion in the hall on the way back to his office, but she was busy with something Calloway was showing her and Ben wasn't in the mood for the usual pleasantries. He was sick of her, and what she was letting Mike do to himself. It served her purposes to have him work like that; it was good for the business, for the empire, for the dynasty ' and it made Ben Avery sick.

  He left the office at six thirty that night, and when he looked up from the street, he could still see the lights burning in Mike's office. He knew they would still be lit at eleven or twelve that night. And why not? What the hell did he have to go home to? The empty apa
rtment he had rented three months before? He had found an attractive little apartment on Central Park South, and something about the layout had reminded Ben of Nancy's place in Boston. He was sure Mike had noticed that, too. Maybe that was why he had taken it. But then something had happened. What little life had been left had gone out of him. He had begun this insane work thing, a marathon of madness. So he never bothered to do anything with the apartment. It just sat there, cold and empty and lonely. The only furniture he had put in it were two folding chairs, a bed, and an ugly old lamp which stayed on the floor. The whole place rang with empty echoes; it looked as though the tenant had been evicted that morning. Ben got depressed just thinking about coming home to such a place, and he could imagine what it did to Mike if he even noticed his surroundings anymore, which Ben was beginning to doubt. He had given him three plants for the place in early July, and all of them had been dead by the end of the month. Like the ugly lamp, they just sat there, unloved and forgotten.

  Ben didn't like what was happening, but there was nothing anyone could do. No one except Nancy, and she was dead. Thinking about her still gave Ben an almost physical pang, like the twinge he felt in his ankle and his hip when he got tired. But the breaks had repaired quickly; youth had served him well. He only hoped it did the same for Mike. But Mike's breaks were compound fractures of parts of him that didn't even show. Except in his eyes. Or his face at the end of a day ' or the set of his mouth in an unguarded moment as he sat at his desk and looked into the distance, at the endless stretch of the view.

  Chapter 10

  Well, young lady? Did I keep my promise? Do you have the most spectacular view in town? Peter Gregson sat on the terrace with Nancy, and they exchanged a glowing look. Her face was still heavily bandaged, but her eyes danced through the bandages and her hands were free now. They looked different, but they were lovely as she made a sweeping gesture around her. From where they sat, they could see the entire bay, with the Golden Gate Bridge at their left, Alcatraz to their right, Marin County directly across from them, and from the other side of the terrace, an equally spectacular city view toward the south and east. The wraparound terrace also gave her an equal share of sunrises and sunsets, and boundless pleasure as she sat there all day. The weather had been glorious since she'd gotten the apartment. Peter had found the place for her, as promised.

  You know, I'm getting horribly spoiled.

  You deserve to be. Which reminds me, I brought you something.

  She clapped her hands like a little girl. He always brought her something. A silly thought, a pile of magazines, a stack of books, a funny hat, a beautiful scarf to drape over the bandages, wonderful clattery bracelets to celebrate her new hands. It was a constant flow of gifts, but today's was the largest of all. With a mysterious look of pleasure, he left his seat on the terrace and went inside. The box he brought back was fairly large and looked as though it might be quite heavy. When he dropped it on her lap, she found her guess had been correct.

  What is it, Peter? It feels like a rock. She smiled through the bandages and he laughed.

  Yes, the largest emerald I could find in the dime store.

  Perfect! But the gift was even more perfect than she suspected. The contents of the mysterious box proved to be a very expensive and highly elaborate camera. Peter! My God, what a gift! I can't

  You most certainly can. And I expect to see some serious work done with it.

  They both knew how disturbed she was that she didn't seem to want to paint anymore. And now she no longer had the excuse of bandaged hands. But she couldn't. Something in her stopped every time she even thought of it. The paintings the nurses had brought from her Boston apartment were still enclosed in the large black artist's portfolio shoved to the back of a storage closet. She didn't want to see them, let alone work on them. But a camera might be different. Peter saw the spark in her eyes and prayed that he had opened a new door. She needed new doors. None of the old ones were going to reveal what she wanted them to. It would be better for her to start fresh.

  There is a fabulously complicated instruction booklet, which ten years of medical school never prepared me for. Maybe you can figure it out.

  Hell, yes. She glanced into the thick booklet and sat lost in concentration for a few moments, holding the camera and forgetting her friend, and then waved the booklet absently. It's fantastic, Peter. Look ' this thing over here, if you flick that'

  She was gone, totally enthralled, and Peter sat back with a comfortable smile. It was half an hour later before she noticed him again. She looked up suddenly with delight in her eyes, and they told him how grateful she was. It's the most beautiful gift I've ever had. Except for Michael's blue beads at the fair ' but she forced them quickly from her mind. Peter was used to the sudden clouds which flitted across her eyes as old thoughts came to haunt her. He knew they would leave her in time. Did you bring film?

  Of course. He pulled another, smaller box out of the wrappings and plonked it in her lap. Would I forget film?

  No. You never forget anything. She was quick to load the camera and begin shooting photographs of him, and then of the view, and then a quick series of a bird as it flew past the terrace. They'll probably be awful, but it's a start. He watched her silently for a long time, and then he put an aim around her shoulders and they went inside.

  You know, I have another gift for you today, Nancy.

  A Mercedes. See, I always guess.

  No. This one's serious. He looked down at her with a gentle, cautious smile. I'm going to share a friend with you. A very special lady. For an insane moment, Nancy felt a ripple of jealousy course down her spine, but something in Peter's face told her that she didn't need to feel that way. He sensed her watching him closely, though, as he went on. Her name is Faye Allison, and we went to medical school together. She is, without a doubt, one of the most competent psychiatrists in the West, maybe in the country, and she's a very good friend and a very special person. I think you're going to like her.

  And? Nancy waited, tense but curious.

  And ' I think it might be a good idea for you to see her for a while. You know that. We've talked about it before.

  You don't think I'm adjusting well? She sounded hurt, and put the camera down to look at him more seriously.

  I think you're doing remarkably well, Nancy, but if nothing else, you need another person to talk to. You have Lily and Gretchen and me, and that's it. Don't you want someone else to talk to?

  Yes. Michael. He had been her best friend for so long. But for the moment, Peter was enough. I'm not sure.

  I think you will be once you meet Faye. She is incredibly warm and kind. And she's been very sympathetic to your case from the beginning.

  She knows about me?

  From the first She had been there the night Marion Hillyard and Dr. Wickfield had called, but Nancy didn't need to know that. He and Faye had been lovers on and off for years, more as a matter of companionship and convenience than as a result of any great passion. They were friends most of all She's coining to join us for coffee this afternoon. All right with you?

  But she knew she had little choice. I suppose so. She grew pensive as she settled herself in the living room. She wasn't at all sure she liked this addition to her scene, particularly a woman. She felt an instant sense of competition and distrust.

  Until she met Faye Allison. Nothing Peter had said had prepared her for the warmth she felt from the other woman. She was tall, thin, blonde, and angular, but all the lines of her face were soft. Her eyes were warm and alert; there was an instant Joke, an instant answer, an instant burst of laughter always ready in those eyes. Yet one sensed, too, that she was always ready to be serious and compassionate. Peter left them alone after the first hour, and Nancy was actually glad.

  They talked about a thousand things, and none of them the accident Boston, painting, San Francisco, children, people, medical school. Faye shared chunks of her life with Nancy, and Nancy gave her glimpses of herself that she hadn't given anyon
e for a long time, not since she had first gotten to know Michael. Views of the orphanage, real views, not the amusing ones she gave Peter. The loneliness of it, the questions about who she really was, why she had been left there, what it meant to be totally alone. And then for no reason she could think of, she told Faye about her arrangement with Marion Hillyard. There was no shock, no reproach, there was nothing but warmth and understanding in the way Faye Allison listened, and Nancy found herself sharing feelings which covered years, not just the past four months. But the relief of telling her about Marion Hillyard was enormous.

  I don't know, it sounds so strange to say it, but She hesitated, feeling foolish, and looking childlike as she glanced up at her new friend. But I ' I had never had any kind of family, growing up in the orphanage. The mother superior was the closest I had to a mother, and she was more like a maiden aunt. But despite what I knew about Marion, from Michael, from his friend Ben, just from what I sensed despite all that, I always had these crazy dreams, fantasies, that she would like me, that we would be friends. Her eyes filled with unexpected tears and she looked away.

  Did you think that maybe she'd become your mother?

  Nancy nodded silently and then blinked away the tears with a terse laugh, Isn't that insane?

  Not at all. It was a normal assumption. You were in love with Michael. You have no family of your own. It's normal that you should want to adopt his. Is that why your deal with her hurt so much? But she already knew the answer, as did Nancy.

  Yes. It was proof of just how much she hated me.

  I wouldn't go that far, Nancy. From the look of things, she's done an awful lot for you. She did send you out to Peter for a new face. Not to mention the extremely comfortable lifestyle she had provided during the process.

  As long as I gave up Michael. She was rejecting me, for him and for herself. I knew then that I had never had a chance with her. It was a horrible moment. She sighed, and her voice became more gentle. But I guess I've lost before and survived it.