A Way to Make It

Martha Hiller Lived in bedford heights, and although her husband Tom made the hour-long train journey into the city every weekday morning, her once-a-month visit required all the frantic preparations of a trek into the African interior. She usually arrived, exhausted, near noon, and after a whirlwind tour of the Fifth Avenue stores, she would meet Wendy Garde in the Hotel Chandler's dining room for lunch. Wendy and her husband Graham still lived in the city, despite the efforts of the Hillers to entice them to greener pastures where their friendship could flourish amid the spreading crabgrass. But Graham was stubborn as pavement; every evening, when Tom left the office of the frozen-food company which employed them both, Graham would grin wickedly and wish Tom a sweatless train trip, free of breakdowns. Then he'd take a cab home.

One Wednesday noon, Martha showed up for her lunch date looking more bedraggled than usual, and the fact that she had foregone the shopping expedition entirely made her weary state all the more perplexing. She didn't reply to Wendy's curious questioning until there was half a gibson under her cinch belt.

"It's sleep," she said. "Not enough of it, I mean. I've been eating phenobarbital like peanuts, and it's all that man Dunston's fault."

"Dunston? You mean Graham's boss?"

"Tom's boss, too," Martha frowned, "and I'm sorry for both of them. Now listen," she said seriously, "the only condition I'll tell you this is absolute secrecy. I'm not fooling about this, Wendy, it means an awful lot that you don't talk about this to anyone. Not even Graham."

Wendy giggled. "You want me to take an oath in blood? How about a bloody mary?"

"Just an oath," Martha said grimly. "Because if one word of this gets back to Tom or anybody in that damned chicken company we might have a couple of unemployed husbands."

Wendy, who had the surprised eyes of a child even when her pretty face was in repose, clasped her hands on the table mat and leaned forward expectantly. Martha had been her senior in the sorority at college and they had long since established a big-sister, little-sister relationship.

"It happened about three weeks ago," Martha said, lighting a cigarette and inhaling deeply. "Two days after that party we all went to at Dunston's apartment. Tom (continued on page 131) Way To Make It (continued from page 63) was out of town, the Fort Worth office I guess, and I was catching up on my weeding. Around 10 o'clock in the morning I get this call, and it's Mr. Fatty Dunston himself. Well, I was dumbfounded, of course, because he knew Tom wasn't there, and why should he call me? It turns out he wanted to know if I could come into the city and have lunch with him, for God's sake. You know me and my trips to the city, Wendy, it's like putting one of those things into orbit. But he said it was about Tom, and pretty important, so what could I do but say yes? Somehow, I managed to get dressed and on the train by 11 o'clock, and I met him at the King Edward restaurant and is that a clip joint, let me tell you. I had a chopped steak no bigger than a golf ball and it cost five dollars.

"Anyway. He was just nice as pie to me, a real gallant, all spiffed up in that outsize $500 suit with his little mustache brushed up like Douglas Fairbanks. He said he was happy I could come into town, and that he had been real taken with me at the party, and certainly envied Tom his good fortune and all that stuff, and he wished he had had a happy marriage instead of that messy divorce, because a happy marriage was more important than money, hah-hah, him ordering coq au vin, nine dollars not even including dessert.

"Then he starts talking about Tom, which is what I wanted to hear. Tom's a very bright young man, he says, doing a superb job, great future. Of course, he says, I've always wanted to meet you, my dear, because a man's wife is the very foundation of his success in a big company like Dunston Foods, and they always like to know the executive's whole family. And now that he's met me, he's more certain than ever that he made a good choice when he picked Tom for a certain assignment he had in mind. My ears picked up on that one, all right, because Tom's been hinting about something big happening in the office. Well, Fatty plays coy around the subject for a while, and it's only when we're having coffee that he finally gets down to crass facts. It seems that Dunston is making a new appointment in the company, a vice-president and general manager's job covering all four branch offices, and Tom is his numberone candidate. It's a real top-level job, second in command to the old man himself, and it pays a whole lot more than Tom brings home now. Naturally, I got excited when I heard about it, because it's just what Tom and I have been hoping for.

"Only one thing wrong with the idea, Dunston says, sort of grinning, and that's why I wanted to talk to you personally before I made any move. I know you and Tom are very devoted to each other, and since you don't have any children or anything, well, it might be sort of rough on you. After all, Tom would have to do an awful lot of traveling between offices, and company policy won't let him bring his wife along, and won't that be difficult for me? I fielded that one all right, and said I certainly wouldn't let that stand in Tom's way. Yes, says Fatty, but won't you be awfully lonesome during those days that Tom is out of town? No, I said, I could always come into town and sponge off my friends (meaning you, of course) so it wasn't anything for him to worry about.

"Well, that didn't satisfy him at all. I don't know, he says, I just don't see how I could do such a thing to a beautiful healthy woman. Get that healthy. It just wouldn't be right, he says, depriving you of your husband's warmth and affection. He was having a brandy now. He already had three martinis to begin with, and he smelled like an accident in a liquor store. Don't you see, my dear, he says, with his fat fingers paddling my waist, I don't like the idea of you all alone up there in the country without male companionship. And what I'd like you to consider, and carefully, please, very carefully, is having someone fill that void when Tom is away, someone close to you both, someone who understands.

"Well, I sure understood by now, and if I had any doubts those chubby fingers of his were making it highly evident. I sort of slithered away from him and practically swallowed my tongue in astonishment. I mean, what do you say to a man like that, anyway? My husband's boss, for God's sake, the ruler of our destiny, if you want to look at it that way. I'm sure it won't be any hardship, he says, and Tom doesn't have to know anything about it, and a nice girl like you needs a little masculine variety in her life anyway, don't you agree? I don't remember much after that, except that the waiter came with the check and my complexion was the color of ketchup, and all I could think about was getting back on that darling train and quivering all the way home. You think about it, he said when we were outside on the street, you think about it real hard, dear, because it means an awful lot to the three of us. And one more thing. You won't mention this to Tom, will you? You know what I mean, dear? Yes, I knew what he meant.

"Well, that's what happened, and you can see why I've been chewing the pillowcases for the past couple of weeks. Of course, I didn't tell Tom. The last thing we need is for Tom to punch him in the nose and blow five years of work. On the other hand, career or not, I couldn't see myself taking Fatty's business proposition. Yet if I didn't ..." Martha shrugged, and finished her second drink.

"My gosh," Wendy said. "So what happened? What did you tell Mr. Dunston?"

"I didn't have to spell it out. About 10 days ago, he called me up again and invited me for another lunch, to talk it over in detail. I said I wasn't interested, not in lunch and not in him. I don't know what will happen now, to Tom, I mean. Maybe nothing. I hope so," Martha said spiritlessly. "God knows, I hope so."

• • •

She met Tom at the station in Bedford Heights at seven that evening, and she could read the depression in his slow, shuffling steps from train to car.

"Bad day?" she said lightly. "Cheer up. I went to the city today and didn't buy a button. Think of all the money we saved."

"Good girl," he mumbled, and kissed her nose.

At home, she made him a drink and watched him sip it. Then he looked up and said:

"Guess what? The old man announced a new appointment today. They've created a new title: v.p. and general manager, in charge of all offices. Big job, big salary. And you know who got it?"

"Who?" Martha said.

"Graham," Tom said. "Can you imagine that? Two years with the company. Maybe he was just as surprised as the rest of us. He's already been packed off to the Fort Worth office for his first assignment. Graham," Tom sighed. "That lucky son of a bitch. I think I'd better have another drink."

"In a minute," Martha said, getting up from the chair, her heart pounding. "I think I ought to call Wendy and congratulate her."

She dialed the number. The phone rang and rang and rang.