No, I was just wondering. I thought of something else: Has he any relatives outside of his ex-wife and children?
A sister, Alice Wynant, that hasn't been on speaking terms with him forit must be four or five years' now.
I supposed that was the Aunt Alice the Jorgensens had not gone to see Christmas afternoon. Wbat'd they fall out about? I asked.
He gave an interview to one of the papers saying he didn't think the Russian Five Year Plan was necessarily doomed to failure. Actually he didn't make it much stronger than that.
I laughed. They're a
She's even better than he is. She can't remember things. The time her brother had his appendix out, she and Mimi were in a taxi going to see him the first afternoon and they passed a hearse coming from the direction of the hospital. Miss Alice turned pale and grabbed Mimi by the arm and said: 'Oh, dear! If that should be what's-his-name!'
Where does she live?
On Madison Avenue. It's in the phone book. He hesitated. I don't think
I'm not going to bother her. Before I could say anything else his telephone began to ring.
He put the receiver to his ear and said: Hello... . Yes, speaking... . Who? ... Oh, yes... . Muscles tightened around his mouth, and his eyes opened a little wider. Where? He listened some more. Yes, surely. Can I make it? He looked at the watch on his left wrist. Right. See you on the train. He put the telephone down. That was Lieutenant Guild, he told me. Wynant's tried to commit suicide in Allentown, Pennsylvania.
13
Dorothy and Quinn were at the bar when I went into the Palma Club. They did not see me until I came up beside Dorothy and said: Hello, folks. Dorothy had on the same clothes I had last seen her in.
She looked at me and at Quinn and her face flushed. You had to tell him.
The girls in a pet, Quinn said cheerfully. I got that stock for you. You ought to pick up some more and what are you drinking?
Old-fashioned. You're a swell guestducking out without leaving a word behind you.
Dorothy looked at me again. The scratches on her face were pale, the bruise barely showed, and her mouth was no longer swollen. I trusted you, she said. She seemed about to cry.
What do you mean by that?
You know what I mean. Even when you went to dinner at Mamma's I trusted you.
And why not?
Quinn said: She's been in a pet all afternoon. Don't bait her. He put a hand on one of hers. There, there, darling, don't you
Please shut up. She took her hand away from him. You know very well what I mean, she told me. You and Nora both made fun of me to Mamma and
I began to see what had happened. She told you that and you believed it? I laughed. After twenty years you're still a sucker for her lies? I suppose she phoned you after we left: we had a row and didn't stay long.
She hung her head and said, Oh, I am a fool, in a low miserable voice. Then she grabbed me by both arms and said: Listen, let's go over and see Nora now. I've got to square myself with her. I'm such an ass. It'd serve me right if she never
Sure. There's plenty of time. Let's have this drink first.
Quinn said: Brother Charles, I'd like to shake your hand. You've brought sunshine back into the life of our little tot and joy to He emptied his glass. Let's go over and see Nora. The booze there is just as good and costs us less.
Why don't you stay here? she asked him.
He laughed and shook his head. Not me. Maybe you can get Nick to stay here, but I'm going with you. I've put up with your snottiness all afternoon: now I'm going to bask in the sunshine.
Gilbert Wynant was with Nora when we reached the Normandie. He kissed his sister and shook hands with me and, when he had been introduced, Harrison Quinn.
Dorothy immediately began to make long and earnest and none too coherent apologies to Nora.
Nora said: Stop it. There's nothing to forgive. If Nick's told you I was sore or hurt or anything of the sort he's just a Greek liar. Let me take your coat.
Quinn turned on the radio. At the stroke of the gong it was five thirty-one and one quarter, Eastern Standard Time.
Nora told Quinn, Play bar-tender: you know where the stuff is, and followed me into the bathroom. Where'd you find her?
In a speak. What's Gilbert doing here?
He came over to see her, so he said. She didn't go home last night and he thought she was still here. She laughed. He wasn't surprised at not finding her, though. He said she was always wandering off somewhere, she has dromomania, which comes from a mother fixation and is very interesting. He said Stekel claims people who have it usually show kleptomaniac impulses too, and he's left things around to see if she'd steal them, but she never has yet that he knows of.
He's quite a lad. Did he say anything about his father?
No.
Maybe he hadn't heard. Wynant tried to commit suicide down in Allentown. Guild and Macaulay have gone down to see him. I don't know whether to tell the youngsters or not. I wonder if Mimi had a hand in his coming over here.
I wouldn't think so, but if you do
I'm just wondering, I said. Has he been here long?
About an hour. He's a funny kid. He's studying Chinese and writing a book on Knowledge and Beliefnot in Chineseand thinks Jack Oakie's very good.
So do I. Are you tight?
Not very.
When we returned to the living-room, Dorothy and Quinn were dancing to Eadie Was a Lady.
Gilbert put down the magazine he was looking at and politely said he hoped I was recovering from my injury.
I said I was.
I've never been hurt, really hurt, he went on, that I can remember. I've tried hurting myself, of course, but that's not the same thing. It just made me uncomfortable and irritable and sweat a lot.
That's pretty much the same thing, I said.
Really? I thought there'd be morewell, more to it. He moved a little closer to me. It's things like that I don't know. I'm so horribly young I haven't had a chance to Mr. Charles, if you're too busy or don't want to, I hope you'll say so, but I'd appreciate it very much if you'd let me talk to you some time when there aren't a lot of people around to interrupt us. There are so many things I'd like to ask you, things I don't know anybody else could tell me and
I'm not so sure about that, I said, but I'll be glad to try any time you want.
You really don't mind? You're not just being polite?
No, I mean it, only I'm not sure you'll get as much help as you expect. It depends on what you want to know.
Well, things like cannibalism, he said. I don't mean in places like Africa and New Guineain the United States, say. Is there much of it?
Not nowadays. Not that I know of.
Then there was once?
I don't know how much, but it happened now and then before the country was completely settled. Wait a minute: I'll give you a sample. I went over to the bookcase and got the copy of Duke's Celebrated Criminal Cases of America that Nora had picked up in a second-hand-book store, found the place I wanted, and gave it to him. It's only three or four pages.
ALFRED C. PACICER, THE MANEATER, WHO MURDERED
HIS FIVE COMPANIONS IN THE MOUNTAINS OF COLORADO,
ATE THEIR BODIES AND STOLE THEIR MONEY.
In the fall of 1873 a party of twenty daring men left Salt Lake City, Utah, to prospect in the San Juan country. Having heard glowing accounts of the fortunes to be made, they were light-hearted and full of hope as they started on their journey, but as the weeks rolled by and they beheld nothing but barren wastes and snowy mountains, they grew despondent. The further they proceeded, the less inviting appeared the country, and they finally became desperate when it appeared that their only reward would be starvation and death.