The Rebellion of Yale Marratt (34 page)

 

 

Mat grinned. "I'm glad you enjoyed it."

 

 

"Oh, it was Wonderful" Kathie breathed. "So very, very true." Cynthia
looked at Kathie, puzzled. There was a does-she-belong-to-you-Yale
expression in her eyes.

 

 

"What did you find so true about it, Miss Winters?" Mat asked encouragingly.
"You know, it helps me to get all types of reactions."

 

 

"Well," Kathie said, embarrassed at being singled out, "I guess I just
think sex is natural and a lot of fun. Most people are afraid to say so.
They think it's dirty. They hate you for doing what they'd like to do
themselves."

 

 

"As Kathie gets your message, the only thing wrong with the world is
the lack of a good sexual orgy," Yale said crudely.

 

 

"Oh, I do not! I . . . well, I don't know." Kathie stopped, evidently
deciding she couldn't express herself with this group.

 

 

"Well, my message is not exactly urging sexual freedom," Mat explained.
"It's rather that the world ultimately must accept that the only logical
hope for man depends on inspiring him with a deep abiding love for both
the wonder and frailty of man and woman."

 

 

"You could preach that from the rostrum of any church," Yale said.
"Why use a cheap side-show technique . . . finishing it off with a strip
act?" As he said the words he was sorry for them but somehow he couldn't
control his bitterness. He looked at Cynthia. "Of course, you do have
an expert in those matters. Don't you?" he asked sarcastically, staring
at Cynthia who blushed.

 

 

"I'm sorry you feel that it is a cheap technique. The reaction I have
had has been for the most part receptive. The public . . . the little
man or woman in the street, like Kathie here . . . seem to have a basic
understanding of their fundamental needs. In essence I am telling men
that all love, the love of a man for his wife, for his mother or his
father, or for the idea of women in general, is a deep permanent need,
and nothing to fear . . . man should not even fear his transient desire
for the pretty women he sees or his admiration for the sexual components
of the female and vice versa. Of course, the established churches do not
see eye to eye with me. But in glorifying love in all its aspects I can
touch the heart of man and lead him . . . not to some cloudy heaven of
the future -- but to the God that is in his every minute of living."

 

 

"I agree with you," Jake said, emphatically. He patted Mat on the shoulder.
"Why don't you come over to the Beach with us and have a few drinks,
Reverend? We'll have a good religious discussion." He stood up and Yale
got up with him.

 

 

"Oh, you're not going so soon. Please stay a while, Yale," Cynthia
pleaded. Yale wanted to stay, but what could he say to her in front of
Mat, he wondered? What he had to say was too dangerously fraught with
his love for her. And that was hopeless. "Oh, I guess I better go along
with Jake and Kathie," he said. "Maybe, if I don't get shipped out,
I'll drop around tomorrow morning and we'll have a talk. You've got an
interesting idea, Mat. Maybe you'll start a new religion. Too bad the
Army caught up with you. I shouldn't think they'd dare have your ideas
circulating in an Army camp. You could start a civil war."

 

 

Mat laughed. "In the Army I will conform even as you have, Yale."

 

 

Cynthia took Yale's hand. As he returned the pressure of her grasp
he felt the ring she was wearing. She withdrew her hand and held it
against her breast. She looked at him strangely. His glance stopped
on her fingers. She was wearing the ring he had given her at Midhaven
College! The ring with the Yang and Yin symbol. Their engagement ring!
Why . . . why did she still wear it? Did Mat realize it was his ring?
Yale looked at her, astonished. Cynthia turned away, accepting with
doubt in her eyes his promise to see them tomorrow.

 

 

As they walked away from the trailer, Yale was lost in thought. What
had Cynthia been trying to tell him? She had obviously wanted him to see
the ring. Was she saying that she still cared for him? It was crazy. She
was married. Maybe they even had kids. He had been afraid to ask. God,
he thought, why in hell did I ever go back to the trailer? Why am I mixed
up so irrevocably with Cynthia? I thought I had it licked, and now after
five years the past reaches out and grabs me so hard it makes me feel
sick to my stomach.

 

 

"Let's go to Tangy's and tie one on," Pearlstein suggested. He hailed
a taxi. "We've had enough of God tonight. What do you say, kids? It's
on me."

 

 

Yes, Yale thought, I need a drink. Not one but several. Would he go back
tomorrow to try and talk with Cynthia alone? No. Why get involved? It's
dead. It's over. But, he knew if he wasn't shipped out that he would try
to see her. He couldn't help himself.

 

 

Tangy's was crowded. They found a table. Opposite them on a tiny elevated
stage behind the bar a pianist was singing dirty songs with a sneering
voice. Jake ordered drinks which they gulped quickly. But the fourth round
Yale was feeling less distraught. Jake had appropriated a pleasantly
fat woman from the table next to them. Kathie drank her fourth drink
and drummed on the table. Occasionally she joined in on the refrain of
a song like "roll me over in the clover." As she sang she looked at Yale
with an amorous expression.

 

 

"Our lieutenant here," Jake said to his companion, "has a yen, I think,
for a little lady over in Miami."

 

 

"Don't carry a torch, honey," the plump woman said, affably breathing
liquor and a smoky breath in Yale's face; "it'll burn you to a crisp."

 

 

"Did you love that girl?" Kathie demanded.

 

 

"Naw," Yale said drunkenly, wondering for a second why he just didn't
get up and leave. "I love you, Kathie, old kid."

 

 

Jake leaned over and whispered in Yale's ear. "I'm all fixed up with this
tomato. She's staying in a fancy joint up the beach. Here's the key to
my room. You can have it tonight. Leave it at the desk," Yale felt the
key being slid into his uniform pocket. "Thanks," he muttered. "I don't
think so." But he didn't return the key.

 

 

The pianist who had been on an intermission returned to his elevated
platform. "How are all you happy little drinkers?" he asked, leering at
the audience. He sang a song filled with sexual innuendoes. His patent
leather shoes beat an insinuating off-rhythm to his pounding of the piano.

 

 

"Sing the lamb song," someone yelled.

 

 

"Yeah, sing the lamb song!"

 

 

"So you're poor little lambs?" The pianist smirked.

 

 

"Yeah, we're poor little lambs." The crowd was enthusiastic. They tinkled
their glasses with their cocktail sticks. The pianist assumed a choir boy
expression. He struck a few chords and sang.

 

 

"We are poor little lambs who have lost our way, baa, baa, baa."

 

 

The crowd joined him. "We are poor little lambs who have gone astray,
baa, baa, baa."

 

 

"I'm a poor little lamb . . . I'm a poor little lamb . . . Kathie
said sadly. She fastened her lips on Yale. "Wanta make love," she
whispered. "Your friend in the tent thinks it's a good idea. I think
it's a good idea!"

 

 

Yale pushed her away gently. "You get the clap that way."

 

 

"No, honest to God, honest. I'm not a whore. I'm just lonesome as hell.
You don't know what it's like to have been married, and then all of a
sudden -- plop," she banged the table, "you don't have it anymore. You
know somethin'. I've got two kids . . . two nice kids. Who'll ever want
me? You know all I want is to be wanted. No one wants a woman with two
kids except for a quick roll, and 'I'll be seeing you.' You know that?"

 

 

"That's all you'd get from me," Yale said.

 

 

"I know it," Kathie said. "But what else is there?"

 

 

 

 

 

 

2

 

 

Yale opened the door to Pearlstein's room. Kathie stumbled in ahead of
him. She flopped on the bed, grinned at him drunkenly, twisted violently
and then slid slowly off the other side, crashing into the wall.

 

 

Yale picked her up and deposited her back on the bed. He pulled off her
shoes. The maid had turned the sheets down. Although it was warm, Yale
pulled the sheet over her. For a moment he deliberated whether he should
undress her, and then decided against it. She was obviously out cold;
she breathed so heavily that it was close to snoring. Better to leave
her here and go back to his hotel. It had been nearly a year since he
had been with a woman but an inebriated pick-up was not appealing. Last
night she had probably been with someone else. If he stayed, he would
end up feeling sorry for her and for himself.

 

 

He was halfway out the door when she woke up. Where was he going?

 

 

"I thought you needed the sleep."

 

 

Kathie got out of bed. "Aw, please. Stay with me. I'm not a floozy.
A year ago I had a nice little apartment in Miami. I had a husband and a
new baby. I wouldn't have looked at you . . . even if you whistled."

 

 

"So your guy got knocked off," Yale said coldly, "and you started to
peddle your hot ass."

 

 

"A year ago no one would have used such language with me. Am I that cheap
looking?" She sighed. "I guess I am."

 

 

Yale came back and sat on the bed. "I'm sorry, Kathie. I don't know
what in hell has gotten into me. I used to be a nice kid who thought
all girls were made of sugar and spice."

 

 

Kathie grinned. "That's me. Honest, I'm sugar and spice. She turned her
back to him. "Unzip my dress." Yale slid the zipper and released the
catches on her brassiere. He watched her breasts come free. He knelt
beside the bed and kissed them gently. Her fingers tightened in his
hair. "Okay, Kathie, let's play house. Let's cuddle together and tonight
forget that an army is slobbering around in the snow . . . freezing to
death or being pulverized."

 

 

He made love to her gently; thinking, as he caressed her, that this was
the third girl he had made love to in the nearly five years since Cindar
had left him. You couldn't really call that an excessive amount of
love-making for a man of twenty-six. Kathie caught the smile on his
face. She asked him what was funny.

 

 

"Not funny," Yale said. "I'm afraid that I'm not very expert."

 

 

Kathie laughed. She pulled his face down against her cheek.

 

 

"You're fine, honey. Just don't come ahead of me. Please." It was over
in a few minutes. A bit clinical, Yale thought. No vast emotions or
involvement, just a physical release. She lay in his arms, her face
nestled in his neck. He looked at the graceful curve of her shoulders,
the undulation of hip and leg carelessly thrown over his legs, and he felt
an intense sorrow for her frailty and the essential womanliness she would
always have to deny. Why do we lose the breathless wonder of life? Yale
stared at the ceiling and listened to Kathie's relaxed breathing. Even I
indulge in labeling, he thought. By tacking a word on a person or thing,
I pin it down. I can call Kathie a whore, a prostitute, or just a dame
with hot pants. But these words are not Kathie. They corrupt any further
possibility of knowing the essential Kathie. How little we know about
each other, or for that matter, how little we understand the mystery of
our own being! How amazing that we communicate with one another at all!

 

 

 

 

He remembered Marge Latham and the crazy night of Barbara's wedding
when he nosed the Chris-Craft into the boathouse. In the glare from
the floodlights the wedding guests could clearly see Yale and Marge
standing naked in the boat. He remembered the gasp followed by a titter
of laughter from the crowd assembled on the dock. Marge had simply waved
good-naturedly and climbed out of the boat, walking past an astonished
Pat Marratt, who perhaps for the first time in his life didn't know how
to handle a problem.

 

 

She had said to her father, "Close your mouth, Daddy, and don't bother
to take off your tux jacket. It won't cover the bottom half of me."

 

 

Several of the photographers, who had retained their professional grasp,
snapped pictures. The flash of bulbs alerted Al Latham. He roared his
disapproval, and the forty or fifty guests who had come down to see
Pat's Chris-Craft all started to talk at once. Liz wasn't there, but
Doctor Amos Tangle and Mrs. Tangle were. Marie Middleton was there with
a lot of men and women he had vaguely recognized. Yale remembered with
delight their look of shocked disapproval. Thinking back on it, he had
been only dimly aware of what was happening. It was Marge who carried
it off. Walking naked the agonizing distance from the boathouse to the
back kitchen door, followed by a sheepish Yale, and the overtones of
utter amazement of the guests who were still prurient enough to follow
them en masse back to the house, in a predicament that would have made
many women hysterical or wildly tearful, Marge was forcefully prosaic.

 

 

"It was very simple. We were hot. We went for a swim. Our clothes fell off
the deck and got caught in a current. They drifted downstream before we
could rescue them. Now, Mummy, don't get in a tizzy. It's not spoiling
the party. No harm done . . . was there, Yale?" She had giggled and
pointed at him. "Men are so silly looking, aren't they?"