A Kiss Before Loving Read online

  “Twigs,” Shell said, standing up. “Come on, Biggy, there’s an emergency and I have to talk to you. Fact is, I can use some sobering up myself.”

  The cartoonist wavered to his feet. “If it’s an emergency, old pal of mine, old faithful watchdog, I’m game for anything — even a Finnish bath.”

  • • •

  Finland’s contribution to the bath gives indication why the Finns, back in the late Thirties, were able to hold off the military might of the Soviet Union for long months. This Finn institution, indulged in at least once each day in the year, is only for the strong. None other could survive its rigors. It makes all other national baths, from the Roman and the Turkish to the Japanese, take a back seat. These were child’s play. And it is absolutely guaranteed to soak as much as a couple of weeks of accumulated alcohol from the body of the lushest lush who ever bent an elbow.

  Shell and Bigelow sat on wooden benches in the sauna steam room in the Hôtel Helsinki, off the Boulevard des Capucines. The management had gone to some effort to create the Finnish atmosphere and it took little imagination to believe that outside would be a bleak Northern vista, complete with pines and an ice-cold lake in which to dip after the bath.

  Bigelow, sweat running in rivulets from every pore in his heavy body, growled unhappily, “I can’t imagine anybody paying to have this done to them. Somehow, I always have the idea in my head that the owners of this hell-hole are sadists and ought to pony up for the pleasure of committing this assault on our persons.”

  Shell grinned at him. “The only reason I come here, Biggy, is to watch the horrified look spread over your face when that muscular buffalo of a woman comes in with the birch branch and begins to whale away at you.”

  Biggy glowered at him in indignation. “I suspect it’s a put-up job. They don’t really do this to themselves in Finland.”

  “No,” Shell said. “It’s the real thing. Supposed to speed up the circulation and the cleansing effect of the sauna. Of course, this place is comparatively on the mild side. All they’ve got is a cold swimming pool when we’re finished in here. Up in Finland they run outside and roll in the snow, or chop a hole in the ice and dive into the lake.”

  Bigelow shuddered.

  Later, the steam bath over, the two relaxed in easy chairs in the Helsinki lounge. Although they’d put away approximately half a gallon each of ice water, to counter the dehydrating effect of the ultra-hot steam bath, they both felt the need of a long cold beer and were feeling a self-satisfied martyrdom over refraining.

  The cartoonist growled, “I think that big wench has it in for me. She gave me twice the beating she did you. I think she left marks on my bottom.”

  Shell observed him critically. “I don’t know. It’s just that you look like you need a beating. Any normal woman, with a normal mother’s instinct, would probably like to take a switch to you.”

  “Very funny,” Biggy grumbled. “Okay, so you’ve got me sobered up, a fate worse than debt. Now what? What’s the big crisis?”

  Shell went serious. It suddenly occurred to him that he couldn’t tell his friend the whole story. Bigelow, when drinking, could get himself too confused to be trustworthy. However, the whole truth wasn’t necessary.

  He said, “Look, Biggy, Connie has arrived and … well, we’re engaged. She wants to announce it at the party.”

  “Great,” Biggy said. “That’ll be the climax of the evening. Yep, we’ll announce the engagement.”

  Shell glared at him. “A lot of help you are.”

  “What’s the matter? What’s the big crisis? Nothing has happened. You were sort of semi-engaged to her anyway, weren’t you?”

  “Well, yes. But, look, this is serious. More definite.”

  The big cartoonist shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t see why. The same situation applies. We’ll make arrangements for a telegram to come the day after the party. Big job painting a mural in Senegal. Connie has to go back to the States. Everything is solved. She’ll go on back to Ohio and tell everybody you’re on top of the world in Paris. Engagements can be broken. Later on you’ll break this one by mail.”

  Shell slumped deeper into his chair. He wondered what the other would say if he revealed that Shell had bedded the girl the night before. It some ways, Bigelow was all but puritanical in his outlook. But no, he couldn’t tell even this friend of his. It would accomplish nothing.

  And Bigelow Warren was right. Nothing basic had changed. Connie’s fear of having a baby was probably nonsense. He couldn’t remember if he had taken any precautions or not, but pregnancy usually isn’t as easy as all that. Comparatively few brides conceive on their wedding nights.

  If she was pregnant, then he could start plans from there — maybe go back to New Elba and take his medicine. Certainly he wasn’t heel enough to desert the girl.

  Biggy was saying, “When should we hold the party, Shell?”

  “I told her tomorrow.” He looked at the cartoonist. “If that’s okay with you, Biggy. I still think you’re going far, far beyond the call of duty on this.”

  “Nonsense. I think it’s great. A lot of fun. But we’d better start getting organized. I’ll go on back to the hotel and make arrangements for catering the party. Liquor and everything. You’d better start drumming up some impressive guests. Don’t forget Manfred.” Bigelow came to his feet, preparatory to going.

  “Manfred who?”

  “The waiter at the Flore.”

  Shell stood, too. “Oh, old Manfred. Why shouldn’t I forget that fallen-arched old — ”

  “His full name is Manfred von Nauheim und zur Lüneburg and he’s a grand duke,” Biggy said with dignity. “Used to have his own duchy in the old days. When he’s done up for the occasional party he gets invited to, usuually by somebody he knew in the past, he looks like a Bulgarian rear admiral — very impressive.”

  “Live and learn,” Shell said. “I’ve known Manfred for years. Always complaining about his feet. Okay, he’s in. Has he got a duchess?”

  “He was telling me the last time I was in town. She left him to marry a prince.”

  “A prince, yet!”

  “Well, a Hungarian prince. Has a job as a taxi driver these days.”

  Shell laughed spontaneously. “It just occurs to me that this is going to be some party. I’ll have to invite Jan Luchtvaart. He’s the artiest-looking artist who ever lived. And he can make with more art gobbledygook talk than any other man on earth.”

  “Yep,” Biggy said. “Only shortcoming is that Jan shouldn’t be allowed to paint barns. Well, let’s get going. I’ll head back for the hotel. Oh yeah, don’t forget Dave Shepherd. I saw him around last night, or last week, or whenever it was.”

  “Ummm,” Shell said. “Dave is the most Bohemian-looking — whatever that is — queer in Paris. He looks authentic. If he’s not a real, honest-to-goodness Bohemian, nobody is.”

  Bigelow laughed. His hangover was forgotten and he was beginning to enjoy this. But he had a serious moment before taking leave of Shell.

  “Listen, Shell,” he said. “Don’t let this get you down. It can’t be as important, really, as all that.”

  Shell frowned at him. “Why not? It’s pretty damned important.”

  Biggy shook his head and grinned slyly. “This Connie can’t mean as much as all that to you. If she did you wouldn’t have had that tart up in the room last week, or whenever it was.”

  Tart? Shell was about to ask the big man what he was talking about but gave up the idea. Biggy undoubtedly had his time twisted again and was possibly referring to something that had happened during the last binge he’d been on here in Paris. Shell was beginning to worry seriously about the other’s mental health. At this rate, he’d be taking the cure in some sanitarium before the year was out.

  He said simply, “Okay, Biggy, see you later.”

  • • •

  Back at the George Fifth, Bigelow Warren sternly avoided even looking at his imposing array of bottles on the sideboard and took up
the phone. Even while he was still making arrangements for a lavish supply of food and drink for the following night, a bartender, waiter, and the other needs of the party, there was a tinkling of the bell.

  He said into the phone. “That’ll be it for the time being, Walter. If there’s anything else I think of, I’ll call again.”

  He put the phone down and went to the suite’s entry. There was a girl there and Biggy, his mind on the catering, was blank for a moment.

  He had the damnedest feeling that he’d met her somewhere before, although that seemed unlikely. He couldn’t have forgotten a girl this distinctive. And for a moment she cocked her head to one side, frowning slightly, as though she, too, were trying to establish some connection between them. It was as if something psychic had passed between them — and then was gone.

  She was, he would estimate, somewhere in her mid-twenties. Blond, but not too blond, her crowning glory a gift of nature rather than something bought at the beauty parlor. She was moderately tall and immoderately well endowed with curves, dips and contours. Her face was excellent, open, clean, direct of eye. By all the criteria that counted in Bigelow Warren’s book, she was a beauty. Nor did she have to open her mouth for him to know she was an American. Only the States turned out that healthy feminine type known unkindly as corn-fed Midwestern.

  It came to him suddenly who she was. “You’re Connie,” he exclaimed and smiled broadly.

  “Shelley isn’t here?” she said tentatively.

  He led her back into the living room. “No, not for the moment.” Biggy began the build-up. “I think he’s over at one of the embassies. Belgian or something. The ambassador’s wife is trying to haggle over the price of a painting she’s been wanting to buy for months.”

  “Oh.” Connie frowned at him and then she, too, understood who the other must be. “Why, you’re Mr. Warren.”

  “Biggy,” he said. “Shell’s one of my best friends.” His smile turned wry. “Sometimes I think my only one. Sit down, Connie. We’ll wait for him. Did Shell tell you I was staying here?”

  “Why yes, he did.” Connie settled down on the couch, after depositing her packages on one of the chairs. She was mildly disappointed at Shelley not being home. She’d wanted to show him what she’d bought on her shopping tour. Prices in Paris were considerably lower than she had expected and with the twenty per cent discount given if you bought with American travelers’ checks, she’d outdone herself.

  She looked at the cartoonist. Bigelow Warren, at first glance, didn’t suggest the sharp-witted creator of a youthful cynic like Bobby. He looked too … well … gentle of character, too easygoing, albeit somewhat sad behind his good nature. Bigelow didn’t know it, but he had a surpassing charm for women. He so obviously needed a woman, needed to be taken care of, even babied. Big as he was, he gave the impression of a neglected child. There was a woebegone something about the shaggy cartoonist.

  “How about a drink, Connie?” Bigelow suggested. “Shell has quite a selection here.”

  “A coke, maybe. I had enough last night to last me for a while.” She grinned ruefully and in self-deprecation. “I’m afraid I’m not much of a drinking girl.”

  He went over to the sideboard, got out a tall glass, a bottle of the soft drink and some ice from the thermos container. “That’s a relief, for a change,” he said over his shoulder. He poured her drink, then stared for a long moment at the array of bottles before sighing and taking a coke for himself.

  He brought the drinks back and took a chair across from her. He toasted her. “Well, here’s to you and Shell.”

  She lifted her glass in response, then touched it to her lips. “You know,” she said, “this is my opportunity to check up on that laddybuck of mine. He said you were his best friend.”

  The big cartoonist shifted in his chair. He supposed that was right. Shell didn’t have much in the way of real friends. The poor guy, in spite of his hedonistic way of life, was going through a tough period and Biggy knew it. However, the answer, if there was one, had to be in Shell’s own efforts, it couldn’t come from outside.

  “Yep,” Bigelow said. “We’ve been buddies for the past several years. The first person I look up whenever I get to Paris is Shell.”

  She leaned forward. “Do you really think he’s a great artist, Mr. Warren?”

  He shook his head. “Nope. And you should never ask that question of one artist about another. Every artist thinks everyone else’s work is sheer tripe. And call me either Bigelow, or, better still, Biggy.”

  She laughed easily. She liked this big shaggy friend of Shelley’s. He had a comfortable ease about him.

  “Hmmm,” she said accusingly. “I’m a great admirer of Bobby, but you don’t really think of cartooning as Art, do you?”

  “Yep,” he said definitely. “There is Art and art, of course, but I’ve often wondered why people think that visual art must be in oil before it can be a masterpiece. Why can’t it be a sketch, a watercolor — even, possibly, a cartoon? Why, when people think of great literature, does it have to be a novel, or, if poetry, an epic? Why not a short story, or a simple half-dozen-line verse?”

  She took another sip of the drink she didn’t really want and put the glass down on the cocktail table. She frowned for a moment, staring down at the tip of her shoe, before saying suddenly, “Bigelow, Shelley’s changed a lot.”

  He shifted uncomfortably again. Confound it, he liked this girl and consequently didn’t like the position he found himself in. He had thought it would be fun, and nobody hurt, but it wasn’t proving out. Bigelow Warren wasn’t by nature a liar, and this was possibly beyond the limits of a joke.

  He said slowly, “Connie, everybody changes. The Shell you see here in Paris isn’t the college boy you knew back in Ohio — and never will be again. We haven’t known each other long enough for me to be giving you advice, however, I might suggest that you make haste with care. Be sure you know this new Shell, that you’re not confusing him with the old.”

  She forced a laugh. “My. You don’t sound like the humorist you’re cracked up to be, Bigelow. Either that, or you’re trying to gently break the news that Shelley has taken up smoking opium.”

  He grinned wryly. “It goes both ways, of course. Possibly you’ve changed a great deal, too, in four or five years.”

  She was thoughtful. “Maybe we shouldn’t have allowed ourselves to be separated for so long. I do feel Shelley is different. And perhaps you’re right, perhaps he feels the same about me.”

  “I feel like a wet blanket,” Biggy rumbled, “and you’re probably all keyed up with your first visit to Paris.” He looked at his watch. “See here, it’s time to eat and Shell isn’t back yet. Let’s leave a note for him and take off for some three-star restaurant, say the Tour d’Argent. You’re the first real, alive, healthy American girl without a thick coating of phony sophistication I’ve run into in a coon’s age and I’d like to take advantage of your company. You’d be surprised at the humbug glitter they all manage to put on in New York and here in Paris.”

  “What!” she wailed. “Real, healthy American girl? And me spending long hours of torture and scads of money in the best beauty shops in Cincinnati to acquire my sophisticated look.”

  He laughed, then drawled, “Yep. You might work away at looking like Marlene Dietrich, but beneath it all, little gal, yore just my Sally from down in the Ozarks.”

  She looked at her watch. “Ha,” she said. “You’re probably right, though. It looks as if Shelley is being held up. All right, the Tour d’Argent it is.” She imitated his drawl. “Let’s see if they can do up this little Ohio farm girl some corn bread, succotash and kanip.”

  Biggy closed his eyes and shuddered. “Claude Terrail and his staff pride themselves on being able to please the tastes of every gourmet who ever enters the Tour d’Argent. It’s one of the best three or four restaurants in the world. What in the world is kanip?”

  Connie said spritely, “In Philadelphia they call it scrapple. If
this here city slicker, Claude Terrail, doesn’t know how to make kanip I’ll give him my recipe. You cook the meat offen the head of a hog, comes butchering time, and you mix it with corn-meal mush, Then you take — ”

  “Come on, come on,” Bigelow moaned in mock anguished surrender.

  “I’ll hafta go to my room and get my Sunday, go-to-church bonnet,” Connie told him primly. “It ain’t often I git to eat store-boughten vittles.”

  “Everybody tries to get into the act,” the cartoonist moaned. “Who’s the humorist around here, anyway?”

  She stood up, preparatory to going to her own room for her things. “I’ll be good,” she said.

  Bigelow looked at her in honest appreciation. Offhand, he couldn’t remember ever taking to a girl so quickly. There seemed, even after this short half-hour or so of company, to be a … well, almost intimate relationship between them.

  He scowled at her, grinning at the same time. “There’s no chance we’ve met somewhere before, is there?”

  “Nope,” she said over her shoulder, on the way to the door. She smiled at him. “Worse luck. I like you, Biggy.”

  • • •

  Shell was having no difficulty finding guests for the party. The habitués of the Left Bank seldom have opportunity to loll in such luxury as the Geroge Fifth provided.

  But Shell was being selective. He wanted his artists to look like artists, his poets to sound like poets — seemingly normal characteristics usually lacking. He wanted his titled refugees not only to look the part but dress it, and that was often a snag. Most of the Left Bank aristocracy had long since hocked or sold their finery and uniforms, not to speak of the family jewels.

  He dealt only with those he knew he could trust, and gave each a quick rundown on the situation. He was giving a party for a girl from the States. He wanted to impress her. Lay it on thick.

  They understood. They were of a class that had done the equivalent before — and often — and for less value received than this promised evening of top food and drink in the company of their fellows.