Mrs. BaLlett had let him in and, I gathered, cautioned him against making noise, for when I saw him on the landing he was walking on tiptoe.
"Who's sick, Joseph?" he asked with a look back at Mrs. Bartlett, who was softly monitoring the street door. The pneumatic arm that shut it was out of commission.
"The landlady. She's very old."
"Oh-oh! And I rang twice," he said guiltily. I motioned him into the room. He was much disturbed. "Do you think I shouldn't have?"
"Everybody rings the bell. How do you suppose people get in here? Don't worry about it."
Adler was very spruce, in a wide-shouldered coat and a tweed suit, new style, without cuffs. He looked fresh and healthy. His hat with its blunt crown was new also, and very stiff. It had cut a red line into his forehead.
"Sit down, Mike," I said, clearing a chair for him. "You've never been here before, have you."
"No," he said, and he inspected the room, hardly able to conceal his surprise. "I thought you had an apartment."
"Our old apartment? We gave that up long ago."
"I know. But I thought you were living in one of those furnished flats."
"It's snug here."
It's true, the room did not look its best.
Marie had cleaned it, after a fashibn, but the coverlet was wrinkled, the towels on the rack looked as though they had not been changed for weeks, Iva's shoes under the bed showed a crooked line of heels. The day, too, was not altogether favorable. The sky hung low, loose, with blemished clouds that spotted the street from curb to horizon with shadows. And the weather intruded into the room. The walls above the radiator were as dirty as the snow in the yard, and the linen-the dresser scarf and the towels-seemed spun out of the same material as the sky.
"You've been here since last fall, haven't you?" he said. "Since June," I corrected.
"Nearly nine months."
"Is it that long?" he said unbelievingly. "Almost the tenth."
"And there's nothing new?"
"Do I look as if I were concealing something new?" I exclaimed. This startled him. I relented and said, "Noth. ing's been changed."
"You don't have to take my head off because I ask."
"Well, you see, everybody asks the same question. You get tired of answering. I have this routine to do, over and over and over. Questions are fired at me, and I'm supposed to scramble like a retriever, fetching answers. Why? Well, if I don't I won't get a certificate of politeness.
Hell!"
Adler's color changed, so that the dent the hat had made above his eyes showed white.
"You're not very generous, Joseph."
I did not reply. I looked down at the street, the yards, at the masses of snow like dirty suds.
"You've changed a lot. Everybody says so," he went on more calmly.
"Who?"
"Why, people who know you."
"I haven't seen anyone. You mean that business in the krrow."
"No, no: that was only one case."
"I wasn't all wrong in the Arrow."
"You're becoming bad-tempered."
"Good I I am. Now, what do you want me to do? Did you come to tell me that I was bad-tempered?"
"I came to see you."
"That's mighty handsome of you."
In rising anger, he stared at me, his mouth pursing. I began to laugh, and at that he rose and made for the door. I pulled him back.
"Here, don't go, Mike. Don't be a ool.
Sit down. I wasn't laughihg at you. I just happened to think that I'm always hoping a visitor will come. When he does come I insult him."
"I'm glad you see it," hemuttered.
"I do see it. Certainly I see it."
"Why jump on people? Good Lord '@.
"It just turns out that way. As the French say, "c'est plus fort que moi." Does that prove that I'm not happy to see you? Not at all. It's. n really a contradiction. It's natural. Almost a welcome, one might say."
"What a welcome," he said; but he seemed somewhat mollified.
"I see people, so seldom, I've forgotten how to act. I don't want to be bad-tempered. But, on the other hand, the people who accuse me of that haven't exactly been beating the woods in searching parties.
Things have changed, Mike. You're busy and prosperous-best of luck to you.
But we may as well be honest about this."
"Now what's coming?"
"We're temporarily in different classes, and it has an effect on us. Oh, yes, it does. For instance, the way you took in this room, the way you looked around…"
"I don't get what you're driving at," he said in per. plexity.
"You get it. You're not stupid. Don't act like Abt, saying, "I can't follow you." We are in different classes. The very difference in our clothes shows it."
"What a change," he said. "What a difference." He shook his head in regret and reminiscence. "You use'd to be an absolutely reasonable guy."
"I was sociable."
"Now you sound so wild."
The subject would bear no more discussion. "How was your trip?" I asked.
He stayed all afternoon and tried to make an old-time visit of it. But, after such a start, that was impossible. He was hale and businesslike, wanting no further trouble with me. So, haltingly, we covered a variety of subjects-public opinion, the war, our friends, and again the war. Minna Servatius was about to have a baby. I had heard something about that. George Hayza was expecting a naval commission. I had heard about that, also. There was a rumor that Abt was to be sent to Puerto Rico.
Adler said he would find out definitely next week. He was going East.
"You see, Joseph," he said at four o'clock, "there's nothing we'd rather do than come and chat with you as we used to. But that's all gone now. We're busy. You'll be busy yourself, one of these days, busier than you'd ever care to be."
"Yes, things change. C'est la guerre.
C" est la vie. Good old punch lines."
"What a Frenchman you've become."
"Say, do you remember Jeff Forman?"
"I read about him. He got a posthumous medal. Poor Jeff."
"C'ancest la vie."
"That's not funny," said Adler disapprovingly.
"I was just quoting from the last war. I didn't mean to be funny. We can't do anything for Jeff, anyway, by pulling a long face. Can we?"
"I guess not."
And, in this manner, the visit drew to a dose.
"When you're in the East," I said, "look up John Pearl.
He needs a breath of Chicago. You ought to stop in and see him, I think." I added, with a laugh, "You might run into another Chicagoan in New York. Steidler. He hasn't been here for a long time. My guess is he took his brother's money."
"All?"
"His brother wrote a song and wanted Alf to take it to New York for him. He's looking for a publisher."
"If I thought there was a chance of running into Steidler, I wouldn't see Pearl. Why isn't he in the Army?"
"He's leaving the war to us normal bastards, he says."
"You've been seeing him. I wouldn't. He's not your kind. Stay away from him."
"Oh, oh, now! He can't hurt me. Besides, beggars can't be choosers. I'm quoting my niece. Lines addressed to me."
"Really? Amos's girl?"
"Oh, yes," I said. "She's quite grownddup."
And so Myron left, plainly dissatisfied with the results of his call. I went down with him into the street.
We tramped to the corner over the discolored snow.
While we waited to cross to the car stop, Myron offered to lend me money.
"No," I said, and gently moved his hand away.
"We have enough. We get along very well." He put the money back in his purse. "Here comes the Fifty-five car. Better run for it." He gave me a final pat on the shoulder and sprinted across, whipping off his hat as he went, to hail the motorman.
March 3
Dor..- phoned to ask us to dinner next