As it turned out, Alexander did become a steady member of the household, he remained completely frightened of the dark, and the time came when Amy and I received and accepted another invitation to play bridge with the Champions.
We delayed talking about it until the evening before we were to go out, and she waited until I had to broach the subject of a sitter. I hid behind my newspaper, casting occasional glances toward the television news that Amy was watching and, when a deodorant commercial winked on, I spoke.
“I suppose you've done something about the problem of Alexander for tomorrow night.” My voice sounded strange, like I was asking Dad if I could borrow the car for the very first time.
“Not yet,” she murmured, apparently engrossed in the young woman on the screen who couldn't find a guy to throw the blocks to her because of her underarm problem.
“It's getting late. You know how they're often tied up if you wait until the last minute.”
“I was waiting for you to call her,” Amy replied, still watching as our heroine sprayed a generous dose of Slam-O under each arm.
“Who? Me?”
“You, of course, and Trudy Pipp, that's who.” Her eyes flicked away from the TV drama even as guys came pouring out of the woodwork to carry the sweet-smelling girl to the altar in triumph.
I was sputtering like a firecracker with a damp fuse. “I… I don't understand.”
“It's simple. We need a sitter and Trudy Pipp seems dependable… and available. You got along so well with her the last time it's only logical that you should be the one to convince her to return.”
“I'm getting fed up with your innuendoes,” I sputtered, half rising from my chair. But it had been a tough day at the office and I settled back again. “You're continually suggesting that Trudy-Miss Pipp — and I share some dark secret. You'd think I'd been keeping her behind your back to listen to you.”
“For 'keeping' read 'making out,'“ she retorted.
“You're guessing,” I snapped back. “God, but you're turning into a jealous woman at twenty-five. Maybe I ought to send you back for a new model.”
“Something ten years younger and much more blonde, like our famous baby-sitter?”
“Get somebody else to sit, if you want.” I lighted a cigarette, using two matches as my words blew out the first. “Get a boy, somebody you think is safe from my ravaging sex organs.”
She looked directly into my face, frowning. “Don't you think I've tried? There's no one available. Lord, I even considered taking Alexander along, but Alice wouldn't hear of it. She and her precious Oriental rug in the front room. So it's got to be Trudy or we stay home. You make the call. She won't turn you down.”
I muttered about it for several minutes but at last I believed her. We were in trouble and Trudy was our last hope. Stubbing out my cigarette, I went to the telephone and looked up Charlotte Pipp's number.
It wasn't Trudy who answered, but it was an interesting voice, all the same.
“Mrs. Pipp?” I asked. “This is Don Brady, one of your neighbors.”
“Ah,” the throaty voice replied. “My niece told me all about you… and Mrs. Brady, of course. And, just for the record, I'm Miss Pipp. I took my name back when my last husband walked out on me.”
“Oh. I'm sorry.”
“I'm not. However, Trudy's in the tub at the moment.” She laughed as though trying to hide some secret and I pictured that teen-age torpedo of a body clothed in suds and nothing else. My snake began to stir between my legs. “Is there any message?”
“Uh, my wife and I are looking for a sitter for tomorrow night. Do you think…?”
“For that dog Trudy told me about?” She gave a whisky laugh that was right off the barroom floor. “That's the most precious thing I've ever heard. You must let me meet a dog who's afraid of the dark.”
“My pleasure, Mrs.-Miss Pipp.”
“Now, you want to know if Trudy's available. Just a moment, I'll consult through the bathroom door.”
The receiver rattled in my ear as she dropped it on something hard and I waited, humming a little tune of the Forties and drumming my fingers against the door jamb. She was back in a minute.
“Hello, Mr. Brady? She says she can make it but there's a problem. It's her little brother, Buddy. I'm going out tomorrow night, too, and he doesn't want to stay here alone. Would it be all right if he comes along with her? I promise he won't eat much, even though he's shooting up like a weed.”
I thought about the price of groceries, but what the hell. “Of course he can come along. I hope it's not too much of an inconvenience to you, since you're going out.”
“If you saw the fellow I'm going out with, you'd know nothing's an inconvenience if I can spend an evening with him,” she replied, laughing somewhere down in her throat so that what came out was pure merry sex. I had an urge to meet Trudy's Aunt Charlotte. Boy Scout training had taught me to be kind to old ladies and I'm certain we could find a street I could help her across.
“Very well,” I said, very correct in my accountant's voice. “Eight tomorrow night will be fine, and we'll expect two for dinner… er, for sitting.”
She laughed again and I felt like saying something inviting or off-color over the phone, but I didn't want to get into trouble because they say they can trace calls fast these days. “You'll only be paying for one, naturally,” she concluded.
As I hung up I wasn't so sure. After the way the girl had torn into the foodstuffs that night, I figured with a little brother to help they'd outstrip the work of the great locust attack in North Dakota in 1933.
There was a lot of nervousness around the house as we cleaned up and dressed for the bridge game. I was content to wear shirt and slacks, but Amy got into something new and sleeveless, looking exciting as all get out. I told her so, but she wasn't impressed.
“Cool it, Tarzan. The sitter will be ringing the bell at any minute.”
I came up behind her and slipped my hands under her arms, coming up to cup her breasts. “Ah, just like fresh oranges.”
“Last time they were grapefruit.” She pretended to sob. “You don't love me any more.”
“There's one way to find out,” I breathed, panting like Rin-Tin-Tin.
The bell sounded and all bets were off as we went to the door together. Amy was glancing at me from the corner of her eye, not about to let me establish any further rapport with Trudy without her being around to catch the action.
There was a surprise on our doorstep. I'd forgotten that the brother was coming but there he was, a gangling adolescent standing beside his pint-sized sister, a somewhat silly smirk on his disarming face.
Trudy greeted us both and then waved at her brother. “This is Buddy. He thinks it's swell that you're going to let him sit with me while I sit with Alexander.” A heavy bark came from immediately behind my buttocks as the dog heard his name spoken. By now he'd moved into the house and, indeed, he'd been given liberty to roam about as he pleased.
We bade the sitters enter and they came inside, the highpockets brother looking about like a new kid on the block. He had to be over six feet but I was willing to bet he was younger than his sister. He had blond wavy hair that curled around his neck and ears, a long angelic face that was only slightly marred by acne, and a long, thin body that was apparently without a chest. When he said hello his voice broke just like Henry Aldrich's on the old radio show. All in all, he was a handsome lad who would someday grow up to be a center on the high school basketball team and then, after he'd filled out, he'd be a varsity flanker back.
It occurred to me that if his sex organ had stretched in relation to the rest of his body he would be hung like Man O' War. Casually, I turned to Amy to observe her reaction. It was something to see.
She was working her jaw like a gaffed halibut, her eyes wide, her hands rolling themselves into, a ball and then peeling apart, time after time. She had paled and was, apparently, lost in a mild form of shock, unable to get control of her senses. Her saucer eyes were fixed on Buddy Pipp as though she were a mouse and he were the moon, made of solid green cheese.
“Amy?” I said her name gently.
She didn't move and, strangely enough, neither did Buddy. He stared back, almost as intently as my wife, although I suspected his interest was mixed with politeness while Amy's was pure fascination.
Talk about the eyes-across-a-crowded-room syndrome. Those two had it and I felt something tighten my stomach as Trudy glanced toward me, her Mona Lisa smile switched on. She knew what I was thinking and she was right. Oh-oh, I thought, this could be the start of something big, as the popular standard goes.
