PART TWO

1

India and Paul Tate were movie crazy, and we originally met at one of the few theaters in town that showed films in English. Hitchcock's Strangers on a Train was being revived, and I had done quite a bit of homework preparing for it. I had read Patricia Highsmith's Thomas Ripley books before I tackled the novel on which the movie was based. Then I read MacShane's biography of Raymond Chandler with the long section in it on the making of the classic.

In fact, I was finishing the biography while I sat in the theater lobby waiting for the show to begin. Some people sat down next to me. In a few seconds I realized they were speaking English.

"Come on, Paul, don't be a dodo. It's Raymond Chandler."

"Nunnally Johnson."

"Paul –"

"India, who was right about the Lubitsch film? Huh?"

"Stop dangling that dumb movie in my face. So what if you were right once in your life? P.S., who was right yesterday about Fielder Cook directing A Big Hand for the Little Lady?"

Normally that kind of argument between a couple is tacky and loud, but the tone of their voices assured you they were not really arguing; no lurking anger or bared fangs anywhere.

"Excuse me? Uh, do you speak English?"

I turned and nodded and saw India Tate for the first time. It was summer; she had on a lemon-yellow T-shirt and new dark blue jeans. Her smile was a challenge.

I nodded, inwardly delighted to be talking to such an attractive woman.

"Great. Do you know who wrote this movie? I don't mean the book, I mean the screenplay. I'm having a fight with my husband here about it." She shot her thumb in his direction as if she were hitchhiking.

"Well, I've just read a whole chapter on it in this book. It says Chandler wrote it and Hitchcock directed, but then they ended up hating each other when it was done." I tried to phrase it so both of them would feel that they had won the argument.

It didn't work. She turned to her husband and stuck her tongue out at him for a split second. He smiled and, reaching over her lap, offered me his hand. "You don't have to pay any attention to her. I'm Paul Tate, and the tongue here is my wife, India." He shook hands the way you should – strong and very much there.

"How do you do? I'm Joseph Lennox."

"You see, Paul? I knew I was right! I knew you were Joseph Lennox. I remember seeing your picture in Wiener magazine. That's why I made us sit here."

"Recognized for the first time in my life!"

I fell in love with her on the spot. I was already halfway gone once I'd seen her face and that wonderful yellow T-shirt, but then her knowing who I was . . .

"Joseph Lennox. God, we saw The Voice of Our Shadow two times on Broadway and then once up in Massachusetts in summer stock. Paul even bought the O. Henry collection with 'Wooden Pajamas' in it."

Nervous now and unhappy that the recognition was due to the play, I fumbled with the Chandler biography and dropped it on the floor. India and I simultaneously bent over to pick it up, and I caught a faint scent of lemon and some kind of good sweet soap.

The usher walked by and said we could go in. Getting up, we made quick plans to go out for coffee afterward. Right away I noticed they moved ahead of me and sat in the first row. Who would want to sit there? Very little of the movie made sense to me because I spent most of my time either looking at the backs of their heads or wondering who these interesting people were.

"Are summers here always this humid, Joe? It feels as if a big dog is breathing on me. I wish we were back at my mother's apartment in New York."

"India, every time we're there in the summer you complain about the heat."

"Sure, Paul, but at least that's New York heat. There's a big difference."

She said no more. He looked at me and rolled his eyes. We were sitting at an outside table in front of the Cafй Landtmann. A red and white tram clacked by, and the colored fountains across the street in Rathaus Park shot their streams up through the thick night.

"It does get pretty hot here now. That's why all the Viennese go to their country houses in August."

She looked at me and shook her head. "It's nuts. Look, I don't know anything about this place yet, but isn't tourism supposed to be Austria's main source of income? Most tourists travel in August, right? So they get to Vienna and the whole joint is closed up for vacation. Tighter than anything in Italy or France, huh, Paul?"

We had been there half an hour. Already I'd noticed India did most of the talking, unless she egged Paul on to tell a particular anecdote or story. But they both listened carefully when the other spoke. I felt a hollow rush of jealousy when I noticed their complete mutual interest.

Some time later I asked Paul, who turned out to be a delightfully garrulous person away from his wife, why he clammed up when he was around her.

"I guess because she's so wonderfully strange, Joe. Don't you think? I mean, we've been married for years, and yet she still amazes me with all of the weird things she says! Usually I can't wait to hear what's going to come next. It's always been like that."

When there was a lull in the conversation that first night and everything was quiet, I asked how they had met.

"You tell him, Paul. I want to watch this tram go by."

We all watched it go by. After a few seconds, Paul sat forward and put his big hands on his knees.

"When I was in the Navy I went out and bought this screwy Hawaiian shirt when my ship docked in Honolulu. It was the most hideous piece of clothing that ever existed. Yellow with blue coconut trees and green monkeys."

"You stop lying, Paul! You loved every scrawny little palm tree on that shirt and you know it. I thought you were going to cry when it fell apart." She reached across the table and brushed her fingertips over his cheek. I looked away, embarrassed and jealous of her casual tenderness.

"Yes, I guess I did, but it's hard to admit it now."

"Yeah? Well, shut up, because you looked great in it! He really did, Joe. He was standing on this street corner in the middle of San Francisco waiting for a trolley. He looked like an ad for Bacardi rum. I walked up to him and told him he was the only guy I'd ever seen who actually looked good in one of those goony shirts."

"You didn't say I looked good, India – you said I looked too good. You made it sound as if I was one of those creeps who read science fiction novels and carry five million keys on their belt loop."

"Oh, sure, but I said that later – after we went out for the drink."

Paul turned to me and nodded. "That's right. The first thing she said was I looked good. We stood on the corner for a while and talked about Hawaii. She'd never been there and wanted to know if poi really tasted like wallpaper paste. I ended up asking her if she'd like to go someplace for a drink. She said yes and that was that. Bingo."

"What do you mean, 'that was that'? 'That was that,' except for the fact I didn't see you again for two years. 'Bingo,' my foot!"

Paul shrugged at her correction. It was unimportant to him. No one said anything, and the only sounds were cars passing on the Ringstrasse.

"See, Joe, I gave him my address and telephone number, right? But he never called, the rat. Ah, what did I care? I just wrote him off as some little twit in his ugly Hawaiian shirt and didn't think about him again until he called me two years later when I was living in Los Angeles."

"Two years? How come you waited two years, Paul?" I wouldn't have waited two seconds to claim India Tate.

"Hmm. I thought she was okay and all, but nothing to go nuts about."

"Thanks, mac!"

"You're welcome. I was still in the Navy and my boat put into San Francisco for Thanksgiving. We were given a couple of days' liberty. I thought it would be fun to call her up. She wasn't living in her old digs anymore, but I was able to trace her through a roommate to Los Angeles."