say she doesn’t care what size bed she gets, queen, double or single: she won’t sleep well on it anyway. When he moved out of town and came in for a weekend on some business or just to see her and slept in the old boys’ room in her apartment, he’d hear her late at night or very early morning flushing the toilet, chopping or slicing vegetables on a cutting board, prowling about the house with her slippers flopping and sometimes past his door with a glass tinkling, could smell cigarette smoke, sometimes hear the TV going, hear her hacking loudly or trying to cough up phlegm or blowing a clot out of her nose, smell bread or cookies baking, coffee brewing, a stew starting which she’d jar and give him to take home because she doesn’t eat red meat, twice heard her typing, forgot to ask what but he thinks a letter because after one of those times she asked him to mail one for her when he goes out. Later those mornings he’d say she seemed to have slept badly last night and she’d usually say ‘I slept better than I have since the last time you stayed over. I don’t know why, since I’m no longer afraid of a break-in after all those locks and bars and alarms and steel doors I had installed, but my mind feels much easier with you here.’ Sometimes he’s said ‘I hate to bring this up again but maybe you’d always sleep well if you didn’t drink and smoke and have coffee so late at night.’ ‘What drinking?’ and one time he mentioned the glass tinkling and she said ‘That tinkling was from an inch of drink I put back in the refrigerator yesterday and added some ice to this morning and which will probably be, because you’re staying another night, the first of the only two I’ll have all day.’ One time she said ‘Leave me alone, stop hounding me about it, for what other pleasures do I get? If I lived this long with them in pretty good health, I’m not about to die because of them, and if I suddenly did, what of it? I’m already eight years older than your father was when he died at a respectable age and some twenty years older than my parents ever got and which I never thought I’d be.’ ‘When I was a girl,’ she said recently, ‘I was spilling over with self-respect. I dressed beautifully, did my nails, we had a girl for this but to get it done the way I liked I ironed my own clothes, bathed with a special rough soap to clean out my pores, washed my hair every night even though I had to boil water to do it, combed and brushed my hair till it shone, held it with tortoiseshell barrettes I saved up months for to get, was always chipper and alert in the morning, sharpest one at home and in class, would often run to school just to get out of breath because it felt so good, could beat up some of the bigger boys when they got too cheeky with me, played ball so well and ran so fast that I was called, in spite of my good looks and feminine clothes, a tomboy, ran errands for money after school till around dusk and between each of them studied my schoolbooks. Later on I found I wasn’t a day person anymore though I certainly kept up my appearance and wardrobe. Now with old age everything’s gone to pot. I could care less what I look like. I forget to eat and don’t bother with makeup or wear nice clothes and do little with my hair, though the beauty parlor I went to for forty years is still right around the corner. I’m a mess and I should do something to correct it. Maybe now that you’re here for the weekend I will. You’ve always let me know when I’ve let myself go and I’m grateful for it.’ ‘You haven’t, and when have I let you know that much? You still look good — your skin and the way you carry yourself and the texture and nice gray color of your hair, and unlike most old people your nose hasn’t grown too long and in fact has stayed thin. What I wonder about is why you wear torn stained housecoats around the house and slippers and socks that are falling apart when you must have new ones or the money to buy them.’ ‘Because I can’t sleep and so always wear the easiest clothes to slip off just in case I suddenly feel like getting into bed, and also that I’ve become a slob. But keep harping on me about this and also what you’re not saying about my hair and face and I’ll change.’ When he lived in the city and she invited him for dinner, he’d sometimes ring her bell, get no answer, let himself in with keys, call out for her, go to her bedroom door to see if she was asleep or sick. Sometimes he’d leave a note that he was here and left and other times he’d sit in the kitchen for an hour or two sipping scotch and listening to a classical music station if it had good music while reading one of her newspapers or the book he always carried with him when he went out, then would leave a note saying he waited for her, she must have slept badly last night so he was glad she was able to nap for so long, hope it isn’t that she’s coming down with something, he took some salad and cheese and bread so don’t worry — he ate plenty and had a drink too and he’ll call her tomorrow around noon. A few times he’d hear her clopping in her slippers from her bedroom, then she’d come into the kitchen in her bathrobe, say she was sorry but she’d only put her head down to rest a few minutes, she wasn’t hungry but he should go ahead and have something, and she’d turn on the ovens and burners to warm up the food. He’d eat just enough to satisfy her and eventually convince her to have a slice of toast and cheese and glass of milk or some cottage cheese or yogurt before she had a drink. ‘When I was young I talked and talked and talked,’ she once said. ‘Some people thought it a problem. When I got older I just talked and talked. By your age I was listening more than talking, and now I have nothing to say.’ When he sat with her at one of these dinners or took her out to eat, after they talked about the food or the restaurant table and her health and she asked and he briefly told her how his work and other things were going, they didn’t talk much unless he thought up things to ask her, a lot of which he’d asked before and so often knew the answers: what she did the last couple of weeks, whom she’s seen and spoken to recently, anything interesting or unusual that might have happened to her lately, what’s the book she’s reading about? she go to any recent movies or see anything she liked on TV? anything particularly excite or disturb her in the papers? what about that woman with the strange Indian name who eagerly testified against her mother who’s a judge? what about that beast who beat his child into a coma and then instead of helping her smoked cocaine after? how’d she get along when Dad was in prison? was it tough going back to full-time work after so long? any friends or relatives cut her off once that mess started? any of the women she danced with on stage or in movies become celebrated actresses or dancers or known in any way? who were some of the more famous headliners in the show? she have anything to do with them offstage? ever see Gershwin? she remember her first impression when she heard Stravinsky or Bartok or even Mahler? she ever try to return to the stage after her father pulled her off? did he actually drag her off during a performance or rehearsal or just told her not to go to the theater again? she have any interest in the election? she ever have any interest in politics? who was the president she admired most? What’s she think of this new information that Roosevelt didn’t do enough to save the European Jews? other than the fellow she’s mentioned a lot were there other men she was in love or infatuated with or could possibly have married before she met Dad? he fool around a lot or was that all just gossip? how would they have split up the kids or time with them if they had divorced? how close did it get and how often? what was it like living for a while with someone she didn’t like? either of them take it out on the kids? did she ever think of living with a man when she was unmarried? what stopped her and would it stop her if she were a young woman today? did her father fool around? what was it like living by gaslight? her eyes get tired reading or playing the violin or was the light as bright as in the average-lit room today? how’d firemen reach the top floors of six-story and seven-story walkups then? were the Lower East Side streets as teeming as it’s been said? she feel safe alone on them at night? can she recall a woman or girl getting raped on the street or in a park or anywhere then by a stranger? what kind of violence did she witness then outside her apartment? were there still many horses on the streets? she get interested in the book he gave her last week? if she has a choice does she prefer what’s been called a good biography or a great fiction? her parents have a radio or telephone when she was a girl? did radios play classical music then or just what did they have on them? she go to concerts or poetry readings or art galleries and museums when she was in her early twenties or even in her teens? what she think then of Picasso and Braque and Matisse and artists like that? she read or see or was aware of any of the literary magazines? Pound, Eliot, Stevens? when she first hear of