He hesitated, swallowed, and got out, to round the back of the car in no hurry until, approaching the other side of it, he opened her door in a lively manner as though he might have been waiting here to deliver her from a drive with someone neither of them cared for. — That young man, he said briskly now, — the one I brought over? You were going to give him some pointers before he went on, did you… see him? His lesson, I mean…?
— I certainly did not. I was getting my own ready. Do you think there’s nothing to it but standing in front of a camera? Why.
— Why? what…
— Why what! You asked me if I saw his lesson. No. Why. I suppose you’re going to tell me he could have given me some pointers.
— No in fact, I didn’t see it either and I heard, I heard there were some technical difficulties.
Safe ahead, she stopped. — I could have told you that, the minute they see talent or sensitivity they sabotage it with technical difficulties and from talking to that young man if you look at his eyes, you can tell a person by their hands haven’t I said that? And he has more artistic sensitivity look out, if you step on this…
— In one finger, he muttered behind her on the flagstone path, restraining the umbrella.
— Finger. Yes in one finger. You’re doing it again and it’s childish, a child could see through you the way your jealousy sticks out because you’re afraid of everything aren’t you, afraid of life, living, anything that lives and grows…
— Finger, he muttered reaching for the aluminum frame door that bore his initials in the large as it slammed with the sound of a shot.
An elderly dog eyed him from under the table but did not move.
— Hello Dad, he said, and hooked the umbrella to a room divider supporting the old man and several sculptured primitives, all eminently male, that locked that wistful gaze beyond the silent rise and fall of fingers parading the sweeter for being unheard melody up and down the saxophone, propped erect in this mad pursuit of whatever men or gods those were to prompt a halt with — She has a dirty mind.
— Who? diCephalis asked vaguely, his hands now filling with the contents of an inside pocket, a tape measure, an automatic pencil calibrated in centimeters, a notebook thumb indexed with attached pen bearing magnifying glass or, as it turned in his hand, magnifying glass bearing pen, digits, holes, and the legend Do not fold or mutilate borne on a green card, an orange card, on two, three, four white cards, a length of string, a length of twine, a wallet glazed with soiled attentions, a linen counter, a perforation gauge, a letter with a four place number as its return address.
— I wouldn’t let her bring things like that into any house of mine, muttered the old man shifting from one ham to the other beneath the belittling thrust of a primitive insistence particularly African. — Nobody’s built like that. They couldn’t walk around. What…? He looked up, — yes the dog, the dog smells something terrible today, don’t he… and he settled back to the spirit ditty of no tone struggling to escape his fingers on the saxophone erect, as diCephalis started a round of turning off lights. Foyer, hall, bathroom, foyer, closet, side door, snap, snap, snap snap he made his way along stuffing his pockets again with everything but the letter and a newspaper clipping stuck to it, snap, snap, into the bedroom.
— What are you doing?
— We don’t need all these lights on in rooms nobody’s in.
— All these lights, she said to her streaked image in the glass, removing lashes.
— Are you using the typewriter?
— Do I look like I’m using the typewriter?
— Well no, I meant, just these papers…
— Just these papers! Throw them out. It’s just my project summary for the Foundation grant throw it out! What are all those papers you’re dumping there.
— Nothing. A questionnaire I’m filling out.
— Nothing. I’ll bet nothing. For a job? Your name must be as well known in personnel offices as Santy Claus.
— But in this one there’s no name it’s, they use computers. He brandished a flyer carrying a man’s face eradicated by punched holes and numbers. — They use, they call it coded anonymity, where they can make more meaningful evaluations of qualifi…
— What do you need to put your anonymity in code for?
— Respecting the dignity of the private individ…
— Nobody knows who you are anyway. Noral Stop that racket! what in God’s name are they doing, can’t you stop them? And what’s this, right in with my face creams. More papers.
— Oh that, I’ve been looking for that.
— Well this is a good place for it, nobody would steal it here.
— Who would steal it anywhere? It’s for refinancing our mortgage.
— Refinancing? What’s that, you’re borrowing more?
— We have to, we owe…
— We? That last time they hauled the car in? She looked up to catch him in the mirror but he clung to a shoulder strap. — Or the time before, every time. Is that we?
— No I didn’t mean, what I meant, I meant to ask you, do you remember that last towing charge? how much it was?
— Fifty cents? something… ow!
— It couldn’t have been that little, it…
— So maybe it was four fifty, six fifty, I distinctly remember the fifty cents Nora, stop it! What in God’s name are you doing? Nora! Can’t you stop them? Instead of standing in here arguing about fifty cents? This thing you have about money you have a real thing about it. The way you plunge the house into darkness the minute you walk in going around turning off all the lights, turning down the heat every time you pass it, fifty cents! You get a break you’re scared to keep it, like that tax refund for three hundred dollars, and you send it back.
— Daddy! Dad…!
— No, it was three hundred twenty thirty-six and the refund I filed for was only thirty-seven ten so I couldn’t…
— Quick, a penny! Gimme another penny quick!
— I couldn’t keep it, and I couldn’t just…
— Quick!
— What for, Nora?
— Quick. Donny is this machine which I have to put a penny in him to make him go, to make it go.
— What it would have done to their records if I’d cashed it, what kind of machine?
— A jumping machine. Didn’t you hear it? Quick I have to put in another penny before he rims out.
— Wait! Wait a minute, to put in where? What do you mean another penny, where!
— In his mouth, this penny I found on your dresser it… wait! Wait…! What are you… what are you doing to him? Look out, you’ll break him! You’ll… upside down, he’ll… Mama! Mama!… There, see? I told you!
— Well, don’t… don’t step in it! Get a rag. Donny! Come here, don’t touch your mother’s…
— My God! and all over my sari! Let go, let me go! Nora, take him! Can’t one of you take him? The smell will never come out. Don’t just stand there Nora! Get a rag!
— Daddy, I got your penny back. Here…
— A rag I said, don’t wipe it on your dress! And look at my sandals! she got past them, rounded the corner and shook the bathroom door. — Dad! Are you in there? A rude sound responded promptly from within, and here she came again. — All of you! You’re all against me, all of you…!
The side door banged. Somewhere a clock with a broken chime had a try at striking the hour, and Mister diCephalis hurried to the telephone resetting his watch, to dial and stand looking out the window at something his wife had said was a snowball bush hidden openly against others as shapeless as they were nameless she’d said only needed trimming, ignoring the tug at his trouser leg, — See, Donny? Daddy’s not mad, he just wanted his penny back… for the recorded remonstrance he listened to through to the end before lowering his eyes from that hostile spectacle of growth to dial again, and raise them again to his wife out there scrubbing her sari with water from the garden hose squatted like some Gangetic laundress, numbed stare fixed on the remotely male privilege of the hunt as it prospered, here, past frilled ironwork made of aluminum to appear new and new lengths of post and rail treated to appear old, in the form of Bast near a gallop behind prey in a heedless trot more secure, with each step, in the protective drab of black patterned on gray, frayed, knotted, and unshorn in other details, as the intervals between bayberry keeping mown distance from mimosa alerted by Insurance, Chiropodist, This desirable property For Sale, God Answer’s Prayer, gave way to depths of locust long stunted in internecine struggle now grappling with woodbine, and the sidewalk itself finally disappeared under grass at the designated site by God’s grace of an edifice for worship by the people of Primitive Baptist Church on a sign about to be reclaimed by the undergrowth.