Eagle Eye by Hortense Calisher Page A

for mousehole.” Handed Claes back his joint. “That place in Soho, with a—with a suit of armor takes your hat.”
    “R-right,” Claes said. “What a lovely idea.”
    “We had a place with a suit of armor, once, remember Buddy? Central Park West.”
    He and Buddy exchanged smiles. In the foyer, like a truant from the lobby, sent to guard them with its pike. One of the cousins, asking its price, had scolded, “Maeve, you could have a mink coat for that.” His mother’s report of this had become family-famous between the three of them, Buddy teasing for years. At the time Bunty hadn’t understood why. Suspecting his mother didn’t either, quite. “Imagine,” she’d said that night at dinner. “Imagine anybody wanting a mink coat. When you could have a suit of armor.”
    Maeve, just returning, slipped under Bunty’s arm. The way she smiled, she understood it now. “The armor? Wish we still had it. I could put it in the terrarium.”
    “Why?” Keep it going, if you can’t cheer.
    “She’d like to put everything in there,” Buddy said. “Last week that little safe with the jewelry. Thought it would be a swell place for it. And this week, another load of plants.”
    They’d bought the jewel-safe, an imposing many-drawered affair, in the gift shop, their first trip on the Michelangelo—the most expensive item there. Since then Buddy put something into it any anniversary handy; it must be crammed. Mostly with the diamonds she was indifferent to—“I always feel I’m only boarding them.” There was also the pale Ceylon ruby she’d told the cousins was a tourmaline, more gold junk she never wore, and the small pearls which were her emblem. She had them on now, hung with the opal she did love, and called her bad-luck-piece.
    Was it crazy to keep that stuff out there? Or smart? Claes puffed irritated smoke at her, from a straight cigarette. “I told you. That drome is built for a lifetime—all right, all right. But to a certain stress.”
    “You said we could even dance in it.”
    “So you can—I’ve built twenty-five of them. They respond to motion in the usual way. And take any reasonable bearing weight. But they have an overload point like anyplace.” He turned to Bunty, flashing teeth. “Like those waterbeds in your old brownstones here, too dangerous, don’t you agree?” And to Buddy. “This is the first attached to poured concrete. Give me the key, Maeve, will you. I’d better check.”
    She unhitched a dainty one, fitted somehow on her belt.
    They watched him unlock. The doorcurve couldn’t be distinguished from the rest. Copied from Bucky Fuller, he would guess. Beautifully executed. “Why lock it?”
    “Doughty pries in there and lifts a leg,” his father said. “Part of the floor’s earth.”
    New dog, then. “Must be some dog.”
    They could see a vague outline of Claes inside, bending and touching. Funny how anything inside there looked as if it were struggling to get out.
    Claes came back, handing Maeve the key. “Looks all right, I must say. New plants look groggy, better feed them. See you did take out the Chinese porcelains. Bulls and lions your mother had in there, Bunty. And a Kwan Yin. Terrible example of one. Like a diplomat in drag.”
    “I miss her company.” Maeve touched her own hair. “She’s in a nearby closet, though. And the safe, Buddy. I took out that.”
    “Where’d you put it?”
    “Sent it to the office. Care of Blum.”
    “To Blum? What did you do that for?”
    “Not to her, Buddy. Care of. Isn’t that what secretaries are for?”
    His mother had a style now, he saw, wincing. The temporary-starvation style that girls got when they went thin.
    “Well, ta-ta all,” Claes sighed. “God, I do beautiful work. You see the piece on it in Art News —‘L’art nouveau nouveau ’? Sure you don’t want to back me, Mr. Bronstein? I’d love to be a Limited. Or even an Inc.”
    “No thanks, Claes, I told you. This way it stays art. That