The Line Between

The Cat. The cat is doing what? Believe me, it's no good to tell you. You have to see. Emilia, she's old. Old cats get really weird sometimes. Not like this. You have to see, that's all.

You're serious. You're going to put Millamant in a box, a case, and bring her all the way to California, just for me to … When are you coming? I thought Tuesday. I'm due ten days'sick leave…

No. This isn't how you do it. This isn't how you talk about Sam and Emilia and yourself. And Millamant. You've got hold of the wrong end, same as usual. Start from the beginning. For your own sake, tell it, just write it down the way it was, as far as you'll ever know. Start with the answering machine. That much you're sure about, anyway…

The machine was twinkling at me when I came home from the Pacific Rep's last–but–one performance of The Iceman Cometh. I ignored it. You can live with things like computers, answering gadgets, fax machines, even email, but they have to know their place. I hung up my coat, checked the mail, made myself a drink, took it and the newspaper over to the one comfortable chair I've got, sank down in it, drank my usual toast to our lead — who is undoubtedly off playing Hickey in Alaska today, feeding wrong cues to a cast of polar bears — and finally hit the play button.

«Jacob, it's Marianne. In New York.» I only hear from Marianne Hooper at Christmas these days, but we've known each other a long time, in the odd, offhand way of theater people, and there's no mistaking that husky, incredibly world–weary sound — she's been making a fortune doing voice–overs for the last twenty years. There was a pause. Marianne could always get more mileage out of a well–timed pause than Jack Benny. I raised my glass to the answering machine.

«Jacob, I'm so sorry, I hate to be the one to tell you. Sam was found dead in his apartment last night. I'm so sorry.» It didn't mean anything. It bounced off me— it didn't mean anything. Marianne went on. «People at the magazine got worried when he didn't come in to work, didn't answer the phone for two days. They finally broke into the apartment.» The famous anonymous voice was trembling now. «Jacob, I'm so terribly … Jacob, I can't do this anymore, on a machine. Please call me.» She left her number and hung up.

I sat there. I put my drink down, but otherwise I didn't move. I sat very still where I was, and I thought, There's been a mistake. It's his turn to call me on Saturday, I called last week. Marianne's made a mistake. I thought, Oh, Christ, the cat, Millamant — who's feeding Millamant? Those two, back and forth, over and over.

I don't know how late it was when I finally got up and phoned Marianne, but I know I woke her. She said, «I called you last. I called his parents before I could make myself call you.»

«He was just here," I said. «In July, for God's sake. He was fine.» I had to heave the words up one at a time, like prying stones out of a wall. «We went for walks.»

«It was his heart.» Marianne's voice was so toneless and uninflected that she sounded like someone else. «He was in the bathroom — he must have just come home from Lincoln Center — "

«The Schonberg. He was going to review that concert Moses and Aron — "

«He was still wearing his gangster suit, the one he always wore to openings — "

I was with him when he bought that stupid, enviable suit. I said, «The Italian silk thing. I remember.»

Marianne said, «As far as they — the police — as far as anyone can figure, he came home, fed the cat, kicked off his shoes, went into the bathroom and — and died.»

She was crying now, in a hiccupy, totally unprofessional way. «Jacob, they think it was instant. I mean, they don't think he suffered at all.»

I heard myself say, «I never knew he had a heart condition. Secretive little fink, he never told me.»

Marianne managed a kind of laugh. «I don't think he ever told anyone. Even his mother and father didn't know.»

«The cigarettes," I said. «The goddamn cigarettes. He was here last summer, trying to cut down — he said his doctor had scared the hell out of him. I just thought, lung cancer, he's afraid of getting cancer. I never thought about his heart, I'm such an idiot. Oh, God, I have to call them, Mike and Sarah.»

«Not tonight, don't call them tonight.» She'd been getting the voice back under control, but now it went again. «They're in shock; I did it to them, don't you. Wait till morning. Call them in the morning.»

My mouth and throat were so dry they hurt, but I couldn't pick up my drink again. I said, «What's being done? You have to notify people, the police. I don't even know if he had a will. Where's the — where is he now?»

«The police have the body, and the apartment's closed. Sealed — it's what they do when somebody dies without a witness. I don't know what happens next. Jacob, can you please come?»

«Thursday," I said. «Day after tomorrow. I'll catch the redeye right after the last performance.»