Love Sex Fear Death by Timothy Wyllie

Author:Timothy Wyllie
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Feral House
Published: 2010-07-25T16:00:00+00:00

I recall an early and telling welcome to Manhattan as a couple of us were driving south on Park Avenue in the low 50s. It was lunchtime and traffic was surprisingly light in front of us. As we accelerated away from a traffic light, we heard what we thought was an exhaust pipe backfiring a number of times. A series of rapid pops. We didn’t think much of it until we noticed that everyone on the crowded sidewalk had thrown themselves flat on the ground. What we found impressive was the way every New Yorker on that street knew exactly what to do when bullets were flying.

In Manhattan the junior members squeezed into the small house on East 38th Street. The senior members, including some of the inner circle who weren’t staying up in Mount Chi—the sprawling estate near Pound Ridge that our money obtained for the Omega—were living in a five-story terrace house at 242 East 49th Street.

Turtle Bay is one of the smartest neighborhoods in Manhattan and includes the United Nations complex some blocks south of 49th Street. On Mary Ann’s instructions we rented the house furnished for $2,500 a month—a healthy sum for us to cover each month on top of everything else. The owners were Ruth Gordon, who played a Satanist in Rosemary’s Baby, and her husband Garson Kanin, who were currently based in Hollywood. Their house was filled with their precious mementos and delicate little items, on equally delicate little side tables, which were particularly vulnerable to the wagging tails of happy dogs. A genuine Grandma Moses painting of a snow scene hung over the fireplace in the living room and another room was dedicated to a library. The back of the brownstone overlooked a neatly kept garden, which was separated by low brick walls from the other gardens, that stretched behind the terrace houses between 48th and 49th Streets.

With Anthony Quinn’s house on one side of us and Katharine Hepburn’s on the other, we must have thought we were coming up in the world. I certainly felt special chatting casually over the garden wall with Kate, as we both raked up the leaves in our neighboring gardens.

I had a tiny room to myself, right at the top of the house, with a slanting ceiling and a window overlooking 49th Street. One night I was thrown out of my bed by a massive explosion that rumbled on, echoing through the empty streets, while I struggled to make sense of what was happening. I dressed quickly and ran down into the street. Turning right onto Second Avenue, I saw on the other side of the street that the entire façade of a large building had collapsed. Walking a little closer I joined the small crowd that had gathered to find myself standing next to, and chatting with, Kurt Vonnegut, resplendent in dressing gown, pajamas and fuzzy pink slippers. Given his experience in the Dresden cellar while allied bombers destroyed the city above, Vonnegut could have been excused his terror, doubtless reactivated by what turned out to be a leaking gas main.

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