The Dark Descends Read online

  Still, solitude with an end in sight and solitude without were two different things. It was the latter condition that produced that bugaboo of old wives' tales, the solitary drinker. But what kind of thinking was this? Old wives' tales indeed! If she didn't watch out, she'd be hiding under the bed next.

  She opened the refrigerator door and reached for the glass she had put inside to chill. As her fingers curved around it, there was a soft knock at the door.

  Something crawled down her spine. A convulsive movement of her hand sent the glass over on its side.

  Who on earth— Of course. Bonnie Prince Charlie, or, more formally, C. Bancroft, responding to the note she had left in his mailbox this morning. Anybody else would have to ring the outside doorbell to get into the building. Unless it was the landlord, come to greet his new tenant, which didn't seem likely.

  "One moment," she called out.

  The glass wasn't broken, fortunately. She righted it, then tried to put the pitcher into the refrigerator, but the shelves were too close together. She returned the pitcher to the counter. What to do? If she asked Bancroft in he could hardly miss seeing the pitcher and might take it into his head to fish for an invitation. Circumstances didn't warrant an invitation, but the way people tended to presume when it was a question of neighbors— On the other hand, Bancroft might have a thing about drinking, and letting him view the preparations for— To hell with it. The only solution seemed to be stashing the pitcher away in the cupboard, and damned if she was going to stoop to that. They would hold the powwow out in the hall.

  Stepping outside, Joyce released the door too soon and had to jerk an elbow back to prevent a slam. Most ungraceful, but then she might just as easily have fallen flat on her face. For C. Bancroft was a woman. If indeed this was C. Bancroft.

  Doubt was immediately dispelled. "I—got—your—note." the woman said. Her voice was thin and high-pitched, like a little girl's, and she took short breaths between words. "I'm Charlotte Bancroft," she added, the words flowing normally.

  "How do you do?"

  "How do you do?" Joyce returned. Just like a parrot.

  What next? No clue from Charlotte Bancroft, who was clearly waiting. For what? She was the one who had sought the interview; surely she had a reason. Perhaps she was shy.

  Joyce ventured a faint smile, Encouragement. Also to keep herself from showing pity, an emotion this woman would evoke as a matter of course. She stood six feet if she stood an inch, and if she wasn't as thin as a broomstick she wasn't much thicker. The right clothes might have helped, but hers—a gray tweed suit of a cut long outmoded, with padded hips, and a long circular skirt that sagged at the hem; stiletto-heeled brown pumps with pointed toes—were all wrong. Getup for a costume party was the thought that came to mind, only to be driven out by the certainty that a costume party or any other kind of party would be out of bounds for anyone so devoid of attractions as this. Poor creature.

  And yet the woman wasn't really ugly. Her face was too thin, and her mouse-colored, baby-fine hair had been tormented into frizzy curls by a God-awful permanent, but her features were acceptable enough. The pale-blue eyes, wide awake and observant, not dull and glazed as eyes that shade of blue often were, could have been a definite asset, with strategic use of makeup, the features that weren't so good—" the narrow nose with a rather insipid upward tilt, the thin, pursed lips, the slightly receding chin, the overly long neck—could have been—

  "I—stopped by to—to apologize," Charlotte Bancroft said.

  Joyce abandoned her mental inventory. Who did she think she was—Elizabeth Arden? "That isn't really necessary."

  "Oh, but it is. I kept you awake." The thin lips parted in a smile, baring protruding out-sized upper front teeth—a rabbit's teeth. A pointed pink tongue darted out from under them, moistened the upper lip, moistened the lower lip, retreated. "That's what your note said. That my radio kept you awake."

  "Well, as a matter of fact, it woke me up. Out of a sound sleep. You had the volume turned up so high that—"

  "I'm very, very sorry. I can't tell you how sorry I am. I know the radio bothers people sometimes. You're not the first to complain about it. But you see, listening to it relaxes me so I can get to sleep. Sometimes I drop tight off while it's playing." There was a plaintive note in Charlotte Bancroft's voice; her head inclined forward on its long stalk of neck. "You do see, don't you?"

  "Of course. But if you could just lower—"

  "I knew you'd understand. I could tell that the minute I looked at you. But I mustn't be unreasonable." A profound sigh, suggesting that additional burdens were being heaped upon shoulders already bearing too many. "I guess I'll just have to do without the radio from now on."

  "There's no need to deprive yourself entirely. I'm not all that sensitive to noise. If you keep the volume at a moderate—"

  "Oh, thank you." Breathless. The expression in the blue eyes was pure spaniel-receiving-bone. "I'11 make a real effort to keep it low. I promise. I realize people have to sleep at— What time was it that I woke you?"

  "Four o'clock."

  "That late? Really?" The blue eyes widened; became almost round. "I'm so very sorry. I can't tell you how sorry I am for waking you up like that. After you had all that company, too. You must have been all tuckered out. And you probably had to get up bright and early to go to work, didn't you?"

  "Well, I—"

  "Oh, but that's a personal question. Mustn't ask personal questions." A guilty little giggle, and Charlotte Bancroft brought a finger up to seal her lips, brought it down. "I do hope I haven't offended you." Once again her head inclined forward: the movement suggested nothing so much as preparation for the descent of the blade.

  Absurd. But Joyce felt her flesh shrink with revulsion. "Not at all," she said, with too much fervor.

  "I'm so glad." The rabbit's teeth were bared in a timorous smile. "I'll make a real effort to keep the radio low. That's a promise."

  "Thank you, Miss Bancroft."

  "Word of honor. Cross my heart and hope to die." Charlotte Bancroft made a quick half turn that sent her circular skirt billowing. "Nice meeting you, Mrs. Chandler."

  Impossible to echo that civility—the words stuck in Joyce's throat. "Good evening," she said austerely, turned, pushed her door open, put a foot over the threshold.

  "Oh, Mrs. Chandler—"

  Joyce looked back to see Charlotte Bancroft facing her again, head inclined forward, blue eyes, wide with curiosity, peering through the open door. "Yes, Miss Bancroft?"

  The pointed tongue darted out, moistened the upper lip, moistened the lower lip, retreated. "If I should happen to forget and get too loud again, you'll be sure to let me know, won't you?"

  "Certainly."

  "I'm so glad. Bye-bye, Mrs. Chandler." Another half turn, another billow of skirt, and Charlotte Bancroft strode to the stairs and began to ascend. Her heels were loud on the treads.

  Joyce went back into her apartment, closed and locked the door, put up the chain, then stood with her back against the wall, listening to the clatter recede. She felt drained. It had been an unpleasant encounter, no two ways about it. Disquieting as well, though she couldn't quite put her finger on why. The woman had certainly been civil enough. No trace of the defensiveness people often displayed when requested to curtail what they regarded as their rights. No indication that she found the request for quiet out of line. Rather, she had seemed eager to bend over backward to be obliging. Overly eager, in fact. Was that the trouble?

  A door slammed, and now the clatter was right above Joyce's head. She felt goose flesh rise on her arms. Why? She wasn't the nervous type, and nothing about the encounter warranted such a reaction.

  Or did it? Something about the woman had been profoundly disturbing, something quite apart from the aura of born victim she exuded like body odor, so that one felt guilt pangs for not stretching out a hand to pat her on the head.

  An element of calculation in the parade of abjectness? Was that it? No, it was som
ething less abstract. Something more definite, more—

  Joyce had it now: the remark about her having had company the night before. So Charlotte Bancroft had known that someone had moved in below her when she turned up the volume of her radio to a level that had, by her own admission, provoked complaints from people in the past. How did that fit in with her eagerness to oblige? And what did she mean about "happening" to forget and get too loud again? How could she "happen" to forget? Surely she could not blast off the way she had blasted off last night without being aware that—

  To hell with it. Why look for trouble? The woman had promised to lower the volume of her radio, and that was that. Very likely her blasting off last night had been prompted by nothing more complicated than a desire to see how much she could get away with. As for the alleged forgetfulness, well, it was possible she kept the radio so loud in the first place because she was hard of hearing. God knew the thought of a handicap came readily to mind in connection with a specimen like Charlotte Bancroft.

  Unfair, of course. Just because the poor soul looked like something kids torment on Halloween, it was hardly necessary to ascribe to her all the world's disabilities and peculiarities. She didn't have to be hard of hearing or addicted to talking to herself or perishing with loneliness or burning up with curiosity about other people. The sooner the old wives' tales about women living alone getting funny in their ways were forgotten, the better. After all, she herself would be living a solitary existence from now on, and damned if she could see herself developing any kinks because of it. But of course the cases weren't really analogous. She had been bedded and wedded, while poor old Charlotte Bancroft looked the sort who—

  Wedded. How had Charlotte Bancroft known it was Mrs. Chandler? There was no ring to tell her so. Had she made some inquiries about her new neighbor? Well, what if she had? Where there was such proximity, curiosity was only normal. Hadn't Joyce made some inquiries herself?. And heard the praises of Charlie Bancroft, that prince among men, that model of respectability? That agent had to be credited with being a good mailbox reader. And with batting five hundred in the dark as well—he had certainly got the respectability right.

  Joyce started to laugh, but mirth died in her throat as she caught sight of the crystal pitcher. The liquid within looked as pure and transparent as spring water: all the ice had melted.

  Stage Two

  Mondays were always the worst. After two days off, Joyce found it difficult to settle into the big glass cube, where the furniture had a today's-purchase-tomorrow's-throwaway flimsiness and the carpet was so charged with electricity that everyone kept a bobby pin handy to poke at the metal desks and chair frames and doorknobs, thus absorbing the shock of contact. And of course it hardly improved matters that the cube was placed right spang in the middle of the typesetting room with the desks facing outward: one had the sense of being a goldfish every time the typesetters hit a slack and lined up around the cube with their faces pressed against the glass. The other five copy-readers didn't seem to mind being gawked at, but then they were fresh out of college, young enough to get a bang out of any kind of masculine attention. One thing they did mind, as Joyce did, was being under the eye of Margaret Weston, the supervisor of the copy room, whose desk faced inward and commanded a full view of her underlings. Though Margaret, to do her justice, made no show of watching or, indeed, of supervising—delivering rebukes, when rebukes had to be delivered, quietly and in terms of "doing better" or "not letting Yardstick down."

  Invariably, a Monday launched a new week with a plethora of crises. Today was no exception. First thing in the morning, there was a scene with a typist who had forgotten to sign the chart, taped to the glass behind Margaret's chair, that kept track of who had which piece of copy at what time. Despite the low-pitched, almost soothing cadences of Margaret's reprimand, the typist burst into tears and fled from the office.

  That chart of Margaret's was a royal pain in the ass, no question about it, but then much of the routine at Yardstick was a royal pain in the ass. Doubtless the elaborate system of classifying and delegating tasks was efficient, and doubtless it had served the magazine well over the years. Still, it did get pretty trying, having to take any editorial matter other than spelling, punctuation, and word divisions for the printer through channels—then so simple a matter as the essential change from the indefinite article to the definite with which Joyce had been forced to concern herself on one memorable occasion, waiting for two hours outside the office of the editor whose signature had been necessary to sanction the change. Most of the time, mercifully, nothing caused a ripple in the copy room routine of transferring editorial changes to printer's copy or proofs and dealing with such stylistic points as elimination of the last serial comma (Yardstick took a dim view of the last serial comma, frequently making that known in the style sheets circulated among the staff writers, who never seemed to remember).

  None of hers to wonder why, certainly. But, since it was Monday, she did wonder, and bitch inwardly, and hope that a Somewhat overactive spleen would be the limit of the day's hex as far as she was concerned. Fond hope. Only moments after the typist's outburst, Joyce picked up a new piece of copy, an article on basketball, and knew she was in for it. The trouble came in the third sentence of the second paragraph: "He gets away with a jump shot faster than most people can bat an eyelash." The word "with" had been inserted in pencil somewhere along the line by a punctilious editor—wrongly inserted, as was obvious to anyone with a rudimentary knowledge of basketball terminology. Which rudimentary knowledge Joyce Chandler happened to have. Lucky, lucky Joyce Chandler.

  Margaret, the first line of appeal, possessed a smattering of information on a staggering variety of subjects. It was possible to hope that basketball might be one of them. But, after Margaret had put up her eyeshade and pushed back the cuffs of her man-tailored white shirt, as she always did when tackling a serious problem, her long, narrow, rather equine face became gloomy, and the hope died. Scowling, Margaret listened to the explanation of how "gets away" a shot in basketball meant "releases" and had nothing to do with pulling a fast one, remarked that it was over her head, in the slightly resentful tones she reserved for that admission, and underlined and initialed the offending sentence in red—the color signifying the need for appeal to the chief copy editor himself.

  Chief copy editors are busy men, and the copy, along with an explanatory note, had to be deposited with a secretary in return for a receipt and a promise that the chief copy editor would get to the matter "right away." "Right away" was not until the afternoon coffee break, from which Joyce returned to find a summons to an immediate audience lying on her desk. She almost groaned aloud, but tried to comfort herself with the thought that meeting the great man could be regarded in the light of an opportunity. Of sorts.

  The chief copy editor didn't look much like a great man; he looked, if truth be told, like a balding, scrawny runt of a man, one of the seven dwarfs set down amid furnishings designed for Papa Bear. For a good five minutes after Joyce had complied with his barked "Come in!" he kept his head bowed over the papers on his massive mahogany desk. When he did look up, it was to glower at her with a ferocity that might have intimidated Attila the Hun.

  "Now look here, Ms. Chandler, who do you think you are? Just who do you think you are?" A peremptory hand waved her to a chair; might just as well have pushed her into it. "I don't go in for politesse, as anybody around here can tell you. You don't have to react as if I'm lowering the boom on you. I'm not. I understand you haven't been with us long, so I'll clue you in. I asked you who the hell you think you are because I think you've taken too much upon yourself, complaining about that sentence. Sure, 'faster than most people can bat an eyelash' is a cliché. You know it. I know it. But people who read articles on sports don't give a damn about— Don't interrupt!"

  "But—"

  "Let me finish and then you can have your say. Okay? Now I know all you people in the copy room are on the qui vive. We like having bright people i
n the copy room and we expect to have our lapses pointed out to us. But there are limits."

  He went on to define those limits in a harangue, lengthy and impassioned, that made her grind her teeth. When at last he had finished, she ran off a string of obscenities mentally and informed him, in a voice she could barely keep under control, that her complaint concerned not clich6s but incorrect terminology and that her note explained fully. So it did, he conceded, glancing at it (evidently for the first time), and apologized, not a whit abashed. He initialed the copy in black and instructed her, in a tone that was almost civil, to take the matter up with the sports editor.

  Easier said than done. Tracking down the sports editor required the rest of the afternoon, and it wasn't till after working hours that she ran him to ground in one of his haunts, a bar around the corner from Madison Square Garden. More time was expended in overcoming his resistance (fortified to a great extent by alcohol) to the idea of discussing anything connected with the office. Once she got through to him, though, he was most appreciative of what he termed "a damn good catch" (words of praise that practically brought tears to her eyes) and insisted on standing her to "a damn good martini." It was a damn good martini. So was the second. When she went back to the office to deliver the copy, corrected and initialed in green, she had a nice glow on.

  But glows have a way of fading. Discovering that she didn't have the correct change for the bus, or the subway token that would have served instead, Joyce elected to walk home. At first it seemed like a good idea, but by the time she reached the West Twenties she was tired; by the time she reached Greenwich Village she was well-nigh exhausted. As she passed an Italian restaurant with a peppermint-striped awning over the entrance, her stomach rumbled. She glanced at her watch. Nine-thirty and then some; no wonder her insides were clamoring. The handwritten menu taped to the window beside the entrance contained no surprises. She went in.