He said it aloud, as he descended the half-dark stairs—“the vision is pure”—remembered his pipe and tobacco and went back for them, descended again with the pipe in his hand. Toppan’s door was unlocked, he stepped in, switched on the light, his forefinger automatically finding the ebony button in the dark, then for a moment he stood unmoving in the silent room. The bedroom door, in the far right-hand corner, was closed, the green window shade had been pulled down, except for three inches at the bottom, where the night-dark showed, a sheet of music had fallen from the piano and lay open on the bench, a brown felt hat dangled from one corner of the mantel. Taking three steps forward, to the middle of the gray carpet, he listened: he could hear the deep and regular breathing. Toppan had not waked: lay there at his mercy. To read the diary now, with Toppan in the next room—
And there it was, on top of the desk.
It had been closed on a pen, tonight’s entry was still fresh.
He turned the pages.
“May 2. The great Jasper has certainly stirred them up, and no mistake. Saw all of them — Sandbach, Gerta, Mrs. Taber, her husband, and that analyst chap, also a little fellow from Chicago, at the C Bookshop this afternoon, and what they wouldn’t do to him if they could! Sandbach and Mrs. T. in particular. They had a long discussion of the episode at Tremont Temple — I must say I couldn’t help laughing, for Jasper seems to have done a first-rate theatrical job of it: apparently just walked in and dismissed them. Not so bad! Goodness knows there is something rather fine about it, even if one doesn’t feel moved to emulation. Gerta, however, I noticed, didn’t have anything to say: what does she know? I had an impulse to talk with her, but of course, in the circumstances — I decided it could wait, perhaps she doesn’t know what I know, or guess, and there’s plenty of time. Mrs. T. says what he needs is a good spanking, that he’s spoiled. Sandbach rather surprised me by suggesting that he’s definitely insane. The analyst just said ‘Oh, no, perhaps a little paranoid,’ wanted to know what his relations were with his father. Gerta could have told him, of course, and so could I, but neither of us said anything. As a matter of fact, I’m not sure that would account for much, though I daresay an analyst would do him a lot of good. I never knew any one so cut off as he is — but then, you’ve got to admit that he seems entirely and horribly self-sufficient. It seems impossible to get at him, much less to hurt him. Walked back with Gerta, and she asked me in, but I didn’t go.… Squash with Hempel—
“May 3. Law Society—
“May 4, 5, 6, 7—
“May 8.… and had a curious encounter with Sandbach and Gerta outside the Fogg Museum. They looked as if they’d been quarreling, anyway something was up, they were walking along very slowly ahead of me, and just before I caught up with them they turned and came toward me. Their voices were raised a little, they had that fixed and angry look, didn’t see me at first, and then were both embarrassed. Very self-conscious meeting. I thought Gerta looked extremely pale. I asked them to tea, and Gerta came up, S pretending (?) that he had to get back to town to go over a talk he is giving at the Burroughs Foundation. Sounded like an alibi. Gerta was unusually quiet, subdued, didn’t say anything about J till after we had had tea, then asked me if I had seen much of him lately. I said quite truthfully that I hadn’t. She said she hadn’t either, and just wondered whether he was ‘all right’—wanted then to know whether I had seen him at all. As a matter of fact it hadn’t occurred to me before, but when I stopped to think of it, I had been pretty busy, and I don’t believe I have seen him, even a glimpse of him, for over a week. She thought this was a little queer, and asked me if I didn’t agree: as before, I could see she wanted to discuss the question of his sanity, in fact she got as far as saying she was worried about him, but I pooh-poohed it, reminded her that he had always been like that, going in for temporary disappearances and so forth. I don’t think I convinced her, but then I didn’t try very much, for I was uneasy about perhaps getting in too deep. She’s frightfully in love with him. I have a feeling Sandbach is jealous, and that the row was connected with it: of course S has been hanging around her for a hell of a while. She was a little hurt with me, I could see, managed to suggest something like ‘well, if you don’t want to talk I can’t make you’ but just the same was very nice about it, as she always is. A damned fine person, I admire her reticence, why in God’s name must she throw herself away on that incomparable egoist! It certainly is odd that neither of us has seen Jasper all week: I wonder if by any chance he’s gone to work on that fantastic Coffin idea: and I wonder what the analyst would make of that! Lordy, but wouldn’t he get his teeth into it.
“May 9.—Could it possibly be J I saw in a Buick on Concord Avenue? If he’s bought a car, that would account for a great deal — it’ll be a load off Gerta’s mind, anyway. Asked Jack, the janitor, if he knew anything about Jasper’s getting a car but he said d-d-d-didn’t know, M-m-m-mister Ammen hadn’t been around much. What next?”
What next?
Replacing the fountain pen in the loose-leaf diary, he went to the bedroom door, opened it quickly, looked around the edge of it and saw the dark shape on the bed in the corner, waited for it to stir. As it did not move, he said:
— Hi. Are you awake?
Kicking the door so that it swung open widely to the wall, the light falling across the brass bedrail, he returned and unlocked the inlaid tantalus by the piano. He took out the bottle of Haig, and while he was stooping to see if there were any glasses he heard Toppan’s voice, a little curt, behind him.
— Oh, it’s you.
Not turning, he said:
— Yes. I couldn’t sleep.
— What time is it — isn’t it a little late?
— Not three yet. Haven’t you got any glasses?
— You want a drink?
— I want a drink and I want to talk to you.
Toppan’s blue eyes seemed larger than usual, without his spectacles, his red hair stood up straight in a sort of point, he looked gnome-like. He was in pajamas.
— All right. Wait.
He got the glasses, and his dressing-gown, came back a little sheepishly, it was obvious that he was angry but wasn’t going to say so. He put the glasses on the piano-bench, ran his hands through his hair.
— Help yourself, Ammen. I won’t join you.
— You’re angry, aren’t you?
— Not at all.
— But it doesn’t matter — I want your advice.
— Advice? about what.
— That story I was telling you about. The question is — how much can I trust you — how discreet are you?
Toppan, putting on his spectacles, with very carefully raised hands, sat down in the mission rocking chair and smiled uneasily, ingratiatingly. He looked slightly silly, his transparency was too obvious, he had that almost offensive emotional nakedness which often goes with red hair; but also he was intelligent, he must be watched and controlled. He said, looking up obliquely through his spectacles:
— Ask and it shall be given unto you.
— Don’t be an ass. The point is this. For ten days I’ve been watching a man — I won’t mention his name, or say where he lives — just as I planned, it’s a complete stranger, the — as you might say—corpus vile of my experiment. For the sake of convenience, we’ll call him Kazis.
— It’s a good name.
— All right. I’ve learned a lot about him. I know where he lives, what he does, that he is probably married, somewhat hard up. I know a lot of his habits. Technically, too, as you would say yourself — I’m thinking, of course, of your observation of that osteopath in Brookline — it’s been interesting. But now I’ve come to a sort of impasse, don’t know quite what to do next: you can give me some advice.