Unlike Others (11 page)

There's more to publishing than meets the eye of the casual reader, even when the magazine is a little throw-away that's not fisted in
Writers Market
. There are things like gathering material and verifying it, being sure that people's names are spelled right, writing items and fitting them so you have just enough fines and columns and pages, not too few or too many. There's selecting and scaling photos, choosing type faces, writing heads and decks, deciding on margins and department headings and a dozen other things. When the proofs are all cut apart and pasted neatly in place, when the dummy's done, then the gestation period is over. The book is ready to be born.

"It's crazy," Jo said, "real crazy. No matter how many we put out, I get all shook up over every one."

Stan grinned. He held the dummy sheets in the crook of one arm like a baby. His tie was wadded around under one ear, his crest of reddish hair stood up wilder than ever. There was a carbon smear on his upper lip and a blob of rubber cement on the front of his shirt. It was the twenty-sixth of September, time for the Novem
ber
issue to go to press.

He said, grinning, "You don't have to be crazy to be in publishing, but it helps."

"Who wants to be sane?"

"You're a good kid, Jo. I wish you'd try to get along a little better with Betsy."

Jo looked up sharply. "What's the matter with Betsy?"

Stan moved uneasily. "Maybe you're a little sharp with her sometimes. I know, you have to tell her what to do. But try and go easy on the kid, will you?"

"Why, I don't—"

"She thinks you don't like her."

Astonishment went off in Jo like a firecracker. She looked at him, without words for once.

"She's just a kid."

"She's almost as old as I am," Jo said, "and if she expects to hold a job she'll have to learn to work. I've never said a cross word to her, anyway."

Tears came to her eyes. She turned back to her desk and began going through her recent correspondence. Stan stood there a moment, looking at her. He said, "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to get you all riled up," and stepped out into the hall, still clutching the dummy sheets.

The carbon copies didn't make sense. She laid them down, automatically evening the edges, and put a stapler on top so they wouldn't blow in the breeze from the open window. It was a fine late September day, the sky intensely blue over the tops of the many-windowed buildings, with a few plump white clouds drifting. It would be cold and blowy in another six weeks or so, but now the air was soft with late summer. Jo's suit coat hung over the back of her chair, her silver cuff links lay in a glass tray with paper clips and rubber bands. Now she shivered, as though a cold breeze had crept into the room.

Sure, she thought, defensively, I've been telling the kid what to do. I have to. She types all right, but she can't spell worth a damn, and she might as well learn a little something while she's here. How to fit copy and how to do simple editing, at least. Otherwise she's no good to us. If it makes her mad to be told what to do she might as well quit right now. Someone has to train the assistants.

She was defending herself to Stan, even though he'd left the office and couldn't hear a word she was thinking. He knew it all anyway. She made a face.

Because that wasn't why she had been hanging over Betsy's desk, spelling out the details of her job for her. With the others the briefing sessions had been a couple of ten-minute interviews, very cut and dried, at the beginning.

Try to be honest, she told herself. She had in fact been finding tiny flaws in Betsy's Dictaphone transcripts and bringing them to her attention, going into detail on what was expected of an assistant for reasons of her own. Sounding like any picky, fussy old maid, not because she was displeased with Betsy's work or because she hoped that Betsy would become an asset to the magazine some day. Betsy's abilities were those of the average stenographer with a high school diploma and six months of business college, no more and no less. Jo knew she was looking for an excuse to go into Betsy's office and stand near her, look at her and talk to her.

The realization made her feel a little sick.

You've got it bad, she thought scornfully. Where do you think it'll get you? Carrying the torch for a girl who doesn't even know the score. How adolescent can you get?

If I had the sense I was born with I'd fire the kid tomorrow and get somebody else in here, a girl who could do the work—a girl who didn't appeal to me. Also I'd find myself a woman somewhere, without all this eternal love jazz. The boys are right. She had never done much cruising. The night with Linda, the couple of hours with the blonde butch had been the only times in the last couple of years. Like a man going to a whore, she thought.

I'll let the kid alone after this.

She pulled down her sleeves and put in the cuff links, heavy round silver ones with a tiny central stone in each, dark red against dull metal. Jeannine had given them to her and they were precious for that reason, less precious than the self-respect Jeannine had also given her but still a tangible reminder of a good era in her life. She was wearing them a great deal these days, for reassurance. Someone loved me once, someone thought I was important.

She shrugged into her coat and buttoned it, ran a comb through her hair and reddened her lips with only a casual glance in the mirror. She knew how she looked. Anyone who liked her would have to take her as she was. She got up and walked down the hall.

Betsy was at her desk, reading a magazine. She jumped when Jo's shadow fell across the page. "Oh!" she said, like a child caught doing something naughty.

Jo's mouth was dry. She ran her tongue across her lips, tasting the faintly bitter oiliness of fresh lipstick. "Hi," she said in a voice that sounded a little wobbly. "Have you had lunch?"

"Not yet." Betsy looked up at her, putting a hand over her magazine as though she could hide it. With her nose shiny and her fair hair ruffled she looked about sixteen. There was a dimple in her chin.

"How about going out with me? My treat. I didn't take you to lunch when you first came," Jo said, improvising, "so I'd like to now. Okay?"

"Oh, thanks. Gee, I'd like that very much. Only I'm not dressed to go anywhere fancy."

"Neither am I. Nobody dresses for lunch in this town."

"Well, if you think I look all right."

Kid, Jo thought, you look so all right I could scream. She waited while Betsy straightened her seams and smoothed her skirt, then followed her silently out of the office, ignoring Gayle's surprised look.

The Manchester House was dusky even at noon on a brisk fall day, chintz curtains pulled across the windows, candles flickering in ruby hurricane glasses on the small tables. A well-rounded hostess in black led them past the bar where a dozen men were having pre-luncheon drinks (or possibly drinking their lunch, thought Jo, harking back to her ad agency days), and seated them in the far corner. From this point they could see the whole dining room.

Since it was a fairly expensive place there were more men here than women, most of them in pairs, combining business with good fellowship that was probably spurious but that Jo found relaxing. Here and there sat a mixed couple, a man with his secretary or perhaps a business associate who happened to wear shirts. At two tables women sat together, so Betsy would have no reason feel out of place. For herself, it didn't matter; she found the company of men more relaxing and definitely more interesting than that of most women.

"This is a nice place," Betsy said, sounding a little awed.

"At least there's no Muzak. Want a drink?"

"I probably shouldn't on a working day.”

Jo grinned. "Come on, nobody's going to fire you for one drink. They might for two."

"All right, I'll have an old-fashioned."

"One old-fashioned, one Gibson." Jo took the large stiff menu the waitress offered and flipped it open, not caring what she ate, but concerned that Betsy should have a good meal. "Do you like seafood?”

"Not very much," Betsy admitted. "I guess I have ordinary tastes in food. I like steak or hamburger or ham, something like that. I'm not really very hungry."

"Well, I am. You’ll have to eat to keep me company." she took the drink the waitress set in front of her. "How do you like your steak, Betsy? Medium? Can we have coffee with it and after, too?"

"Certainly," the waitress said primly. She moved away. Jo laughed. "This place feels like a cathedral. I keep expecting the menus to turn into prayer books and the drinks to holy water."

"It's a wonderful place." Betsy looked at her wide-eyed above the glass. "It's nice of you to ask me. I don't know how I'm going to pay you back."

"No need to," Jo said absently. The gin was cold and delicious, the first sip a pure pleasure. She gave up all attempts to be tactful and jumped into the subject with both feet. "Stan thinks you probably hate me for pushing you so hard. I don't mean to be a slave driver, I just thought it would be easier for you if you knew how we want things from the beginning. It's a little different from regular office work, you know."

It was no good. She sounded ninety-nine years old and dry as Webster's Unabridged. But Betsy was blushing. The only female I know who still blushes, Jo thought "That's all right," she said in a soft little voice. "I just thought—I thought you didn't like me. I'm pretty dumb sometimes."

"You're not dumb at all." Jo looked intently into her glass, trying to get her voice under control. "I like you very much."

"Well, you've been so good to me I'd hate to think you didn't like me. I never did thank you for taking me in that night."

No, and you never will, Jo answered her silently. Not in any way I want to be thanked. She said, "That's all right."

"I was afraid my aunt would worry, but she didn't say anything. She thinks I'm still a child. You know how relatives are."

"Sure."

Betsy looked at the pineapple stick as though she wanted to fish it out and eat it, but didn't think it would be polite in such a plush place. "Stan asked me to go out with him tomorrow night," she confided. "I don't know if I should or not."

Keep your mouth shut, Jo warned herself. Anything you say is going to be all wrong, so keep your great big mouth shut. She concentrated on her drink, taking it slowly to make it last and knowing that she would want another when this was gone. After all her common-sense thinking, she was still miserable at the thought of those two together.

"I haven't had a date with him since. Maybe he’ll be all right this time."

And maybe not, Jo thought. Maybe he's ready to try again. She didn't claim to be an expert on male psychology, but she did know something about love and ego, and she supposed they operated the same way in men. She remembered how, after her first failure with Karen, she had been afraid to approach the girl for almost two weeks—until need got the better of fright, and a couple of drinks gave her courage. It might be the same way with Stan.

"He knows now I'm not the kind of girl who does things like that."

"I'm sure he does."

The thought of Stan's hands on Betsy—rather clumsy hands, long and thin, with reddish hair on the backs and clean ridged nails—made her a little dizzy. She thought of those hands unhooking the little elastic back band of Betsy's bra, that showed through the thin blouse. Exploring the firm gentle curve of Betsy's long and lovely thighs.

Serves me right, she thought dryly. She had wished often enough that Stan would have a fling with someone warm and willing. He needed a little passion and a little affection in his life, in whatever spare moments he could snatch from his mother.

But not with this girl, she thought in panic, feeling that she must somehow snatch Betsy back from danger. I want this one myself. She said aloud, "How about another drink?" Betsy giggled. "All right, but you won't get any work out of me all afternoon."

"That's all right."

Betsy's attention had been diverted by a little stir near the door. She said, almost in a whisper. "The two that came in. I think that's disgusting." Jo turned to look, and froze. Because the taller of the two women who had just entered the dining room was Linda. She stood poised and lovely, her eyes wide against the dim light, looking around. Jo had never seen her in a skirt, much less a black wool suit with a little fur collar, and a tiny fur cap set on her sleek cropped head, but there was no doubt. Linda's eyes caught hers for a moment. Then she looked away, without smiling or making any sign of recognition, and led her companion to a table on the far side of the room.

The smaller girl needed to be led. She had evidently been drinking, and while she walked well enough, she had the confused look of one who will have trouble later remembering what's happened. She'll be dizzy if she turns suddenly, Jo thought. But the girl sat down without mishap and looked around, frowning as though it were hard to focus. She was young and not bad-looking, but she had the soft and slightly swollen look of a woman who habitually drinks too much and takes no exercise. A lady lush, Jo thought. Another ten years, she’ll be a mess.

It wasn't the girl's face that held Betsy's attention, or the degree of intoxication that made her young face stiffen with disapproval. It was her clothes. She wore tight tapered pants with a fly front, in the popular olive drab shade; a sports shirt a tone lighter; a black suede jacket, argyle socks, and oxfords that might or might not have been bought in the boys' department. Her reddish hair was cut in a ducktail and she wore no makeup at all. A little tardily, Jo realized that this outfit, which might have passed without comment at The Spot, was attracting curious and knowing looks here. She longed to wipe the smiles off the faces of the young executives.

She said, "How do you mean?" And felt her hands and the back of her neck cold, because she knew the answer.

"Those two girls. The one in pants is queer. She'd have to be." Betsy blushed redder than ever. "She ought to be ashamed to come into a place like this."

"They're rather becoming clothes," Jo said, after a moment in which she considered and discarded several other possible answers.