She sighed sharply and deeply and jerked herself up in her chair. Pete glanced at her. She could not have told what he had been saying. She looked at her watch and said brusquely:
“You’d better go or you’ll miss the train.”
“What?” he demanded. “Already?”
“You have only fifteen minutes.”
“I hate to leave this fire. And this chair. And you.”
“I’m afraid there’s no help for it.”
“The hell there ain’t.” He grinned at her. “You haven’t got a bed for me?”
“Of course not. Don’t be silly.”
“Well, here I go.” He didn’t move. “Isn’t there a later train? There must be. God, I hate trains. And the subway; if I knew how to make a bomb I’d blow it up. Particularly do I hate trains at night. You know that. Now if I could sleep here, on that couch for instance, and get up to a good breakfast of eggs and thick bacon, and take a train in the daylight, when you can at least see where you’re going—”
She had got up from her chair. She interrupted decisively, “Come. Really. You’ll miss it.”
He didn’t move. Without lifting his head his eyes went swiftly up her body and down again, and though she didn’t see it she was aware of it. “I’ve another idea,” he said. “Come and sit on my knee — straddle, you know — and I’ll tell you the story about the princess who couldn’t remember what to do with her fingers.”
Lora stood perfectly still, but she knew she couldn’t stay that way; if she stood a moment longer she would begin to tremble and he would see it. Besides, standing there in front of him it would be too easy... just a step, two steps, to him... She sat down in her own chair again, upright, with her backbone stiff...
“I don’t like stories anymore,” she said.
“Don’t tell me.” He grinned at her. “That was the first thing that struck me when I saw you. Not tonight, a month ago it was, when I came out to make sure it was you. I walked out from the village and found a convenient hole in the hedge to look through. Your eldest boy came along and gave me a start — as sure as I live, I thought, there’s one of my cells running around on its own legs. That was before details and dates had been collected; I discovered my mistake later. Then I saw the girl and another boy or two in the back yard, around the corner of the house, and I said to myself, there can no longer be any doubt of it, I’ve absolutely been cuckolded. Then suddenly you appeared around the other corner of the house and there you were, on the terrace, with your hair blowing into your eyes. You had some shears and a basket in your hand and you came across the yard and stopped not far from my hole and began cutting flowers. I almost called to you, but remembered the ethics of my profession just in time. Furthermore, it wasn’t you — that is, it wasn’t the veteran mother of countless children by countless fathers — it was instead a charming and appetizing little girl whose neck I had wanted to wring for twelve years because I had once been ass enough to give her a wristwatch. By the way, it appeared to me that day, from a distance of fifteen feet, that you were wearing it.”
“No.”
“It wasn’t the one you have on.”
“No.”
“I see, your gardening equipment I suppose. One for golfing, one for motoring — didn’t I tell you once your appropriate scene was stucco and roses in Oak Park? Congratulations, you’ve made good. Better, even; the flora are up to standard, and as to two-legged fauna, you’ve more than your share. That being true, why, you ask, do I offer to tell you the story about the princess who couldn’t remember what to do with her fingers? Why do I seek to disrupt an established and smoothly running schedule? Albert the artist, let us say, on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, experiments in rhythm and composition; on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays Lewis the lawyer, man of affairs — shall we suspect here a sacrifice to Mammon? Looking at him, I should say certainly a sacrifice. And on Sundays catch as catch can.”
“That isn’t true,” Lora said. She sat still upright, her hands folded in her lap with the fingers intertwined, her eyes on his face. “I know what you’re doing, you’re trying to make me angry. You used to do that and it used to work. But I don’t get angry anymore, and what you say isn’t true, not a word of it.”
“It was only a guess, I may have the days wrong.”
“I tell you it isn’t true!”
“What isn’t?” He peered at her. “What isn’t true?”
“What you said.” She stopped, shutting her lips tight, then began again, “You know I can’t talk. Listen, Pete. I don’t want to talk. That isn’t true, what you said — it isn’t true with Albert or Lewis or anybody. It never has been, the way it was with you. Now I’m an awful fool, I shouldn’t have talked at all, I shouldn’t be telling you this, but I’ve never felt that way, not once, I’ve never done any of those things, I’ve never wanted to. I think I was crazy, with you. It was so long ago it seems like another person and I can’t believe it, but I must have been crazy. Now... again... I knew it right away this afternoon when I saw you getting out of the car with Lewis...”
She felt herself trembling, and stopped.
“Crazy hell,” Pete said. “Come over here.”
She shook her head. He got up and stood beside her chair for a moment, then reached down and began removing the pins from her hair. A strand fell, then another, while she sat motionless.
“I like it better down,” he said. “What’s the matter with you? Talk about crazy, you’re crazy if what you just said is true. Good god, are you a dried-up nun, to take it out in praying and pinching yourself? Ah, your throat is as smooth and white, your hair still talks to my fingers, and who would dream — let me see, let me see — who would dream that four pairs of lips had dined and breakfasted there?” He chuckled. “Infant lips, mind you — the others shall not be counted now. Just as it should be, precisely a handful, a warm round handful — that is unquestionably an improvement, formerly they were firmer and more discreet — this is better, riper— Oh, much riper and better. You would deny all this? And this, and this? Here — come — what—”
Suddenly and swiftly she slipped out from under his hands and his face, drawing herself down and forward, free of him, and the next instant was on her feet three paces away, facing him. She was breathing quickly, and the hand that was rearranging the front of her dress was visibly trembling.