He stroked his beard. “Interesting,” he said. “As a man, I’m less apt to pick up on that sort of thing. What else have you doped out about him?”
“Oh, it’s not fair to play detective like this,” she said, smiling. “But other things seem fairly obvious.”
“For example?”
“The usual latent homosexuality. Narcissism. And his emphasis on communal roots — I’d guess he lacks roots himself and has never gotten over the fact. Of course that would have to be the case or he wouldn’t have wound up in Bucks County.”
“You don’t think he has roots here? It seems to me he’s been here forever.”
“Not deep roots. Transplants never do, do they?”
“Interesting,” he said. He took his pipe apart and blew through the stem. “And yet you read his books.”
“They’re interesting. He’s interesting, as far as that goes, even if he’s not admirable.”
“Uh-huh. Anything else you don’t like about him?”
“Definitely.”
“Such as?”
Now she did look away from him. “His beard needs trimming,” she said, “and the patch is coming off the left sleeve of his jacket.”
When she dared to look up at him he had turned slightly to the left and was looking at the juncture of ceiling and wall. Without looking at her he said, “I’ll bet you’ve handed out a lot of coronaries in your young life.”
“You did ask for it, you know.”
“Indeed I did. But you certainly pushed enough of the right buttons. I can’t tell you how relieved I am it was a put-on, not that that will keep me from brooding for weeks about what you said.”
“Oh, I was just being a little rotten, that’s all.”
“That’s what I’ll tell myself. When did you—”
“Yesterday.”
“Before or after I left?”
“After, I’m afraid. While you were here all I knew about you was that you were the most godawful pest so far this week. Then something made me turn the book over. Why don’t you wear your glasses for photographs?”
“I think people should be able to see eyes. If they’re going to see an author at all.”
“What about his chin?”
“No one ever called the chin the window of the soul. What do you do when you’re not making people wish they were dead?”
“Nothing much. I hope it wasn’t that cruel.”
“Crueler than you could have known. Incidentally, one of us hasn’t been introduced.”
“It’s Linda Robshaw.”
He swooped to kiss her hand. “Mrs. Robshaw, the pleasure is mine.”
“It’s Miss Robshaw. As you already know, because otherwise you would have kissed a ring.”
“I feel increasingly transparent. When do you finish work here? Which is a euphemism for when can I buy you a drink?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Or coffee. Or a sandwich, or an ice-cream cone, or a — what? A ping-pong ball? A subway token? An autographed photo of Mrs. Warren G. Harding? You need merely ask.”
She laughed aloud.
“Well?”
“I don’t think so,” she said.
“There’s no Mrs. Markarian, you know. There was, but she has a different last name now.”
“I know.”
“I have no wife, no criminal record, and no significant bad habits. I could submit character references.”
“No, it’s not that.”
“You’re involved in something.”
“It would be easy to say yes to that, wouldn’t it? Something, perhaps, but not someone, which I suppose is what you meant.” He nodded. “I’m not. I was, and now I’m not, and I’m getting over it.”
“I see.”
“Do you? I’m not sure I do myself. I’m getting more than the person I used to be involved with. It seems to be a time-consuming process. Just now I’m not ready for anything complicated.”
“Not even something as uncomplicated as a cup of coffee?”
“I think we both know it would amount to more than a cup of coffee.”
“It would, wouldn’t it?”
“Yes.”
He filled his pipe and lit it. This took a great deal of time, in the course of which she found herself constantly looking at him and then glancing nervously away. When the pipe was going well he took it from his mouth and held it at arm’s length, fixing his eyes on it.
“Fair enough,” he said. “Yesterday was my day for being a pest, and I try not to do that more than once a week. We’ll probably run into each other from time to time.”
“Yes, we probably will.”
“You threw me as wide a curve this afternoon as I’ve ever seen. Naturally I’m going to want a couple of swings at it.”
“I’m not trying to strike you out.”
“I’m not aiming to strike out. I’ll see you. Enjoy the book. The ending’s a little weak, but then so at the moment is the author. ’Bye.”
Friday night she recapitulated both conversations with Markarian for Peter. Her report was virtually verbatim. She sat on the floor of her room and shared a bottle of wine with him and told him everything in great detail.
“I think you made an impression,” he said.
“More than I planned.”
“You couldn’t have expected him to take all that in stride.”
“I hadn’t planned on giving him all that to begin with. I got carried away.”
“So did he, from the sound of it. Has he been back since?”
“No. Not yet.”
“Which does or doesn’t please you?”
“Both.”
“That’s cool. I’m beginning to develop a taste for wine.”
“So am I.”
He had brought her the wine an hour ago on his return from the theater. Earlier he had asked if she would sit with Robin. Gretchen had gone to Philadelphia to have something complicated done to her teeth. She had been born in Philadelphia, he explained, and like many people she never got over it She still went to a Philadelphia dentist. He had booked her for Friday afternoon and Saturday morning, and there was an aunt with whom she would stay.
“Or she won’t stay with her aunt and isn’t going to the dentist, and I’ll tell you something.”
“You don’t fucking care.”
“I don’t fucking care is right. It’s good if she’s seeing the dentist because it’s a good sign if she takes an interest in that sort of thing, but all I do fucking care is that she’s off my back for a night. Robin already had dinner. All she needs is someone to keep her company and laugh at her jokes.”
“I always laugh at Robin’s jokes.”
“That’s just one of the reasons I love you. I’ll see you when I see you.”
He saw her at eleven thirty, by which time Robin had been laughed and played with and bathed and cuddled and tucked into bed. He knocked lightly on the door and when she opened it he presented the bottle of wine. “Valpolicella,” she read. “How lovely.”
“Is that how you pronounce it?”
“It’s how I pronounce it. For me? I suppose you know you didn’t have to.”
“I know, and it’s only for you if you insist. I was thinking of it as for us.”
“This is the real stuff, isn’t it? That means a cork. I think I know where the corkscrew is. She’s out cold, one of us can check her every once in a while and she’ll be fine.”
He locked the door and they went up to her room and opened the wine. They were both light-headed and buoyant. He said he never got a cork out of a wine bottle without breaking it and she asked if he generally broke the cork or the bottle and he said nobody loved a smartass. He opened the bottle perfectly and they sat on the floor and passed it back and forth while she told, about her encounters with Hugh Markarian.