‘Nowhere special,’ says Lise waving aside the triviality. ‘It’s written on the passport. My name’s Lise.’ She takes her arms out of the sleeves of her striped cotton coat and lets it fall behind her over the back of the chair. ‘Mr Fiedke left everything to me and nothing to his sister,’ says the old lady, ‘but my nephew gets everything when I’m gone. I would have liked to be a fly on the wall when she heard.’
The waiter comes with their coffee and sandwiches, moving the book while he sets them down. Lise props it up again when he has gone. She looks around at the other tables and at the people standing up at the bar, sipping coffee or fruit-juice. She says, ‘I have to meet a friend, but he doesn’t seem to be here.’
‘My dear, I don’t want to detain you or take you out of your way.
‘Not at all. Don’t think of it.’
‘It was very kind of you to come along with me,’ says Mrs Fiedke, ‘as it’s so confusing in a strange place. Very kind indeed.’
‘Why shouldn’t I be kind?’ Lise says, smiling at her with a sudden gentleness.
‘Well, I’ll be all right just here after we’ve finished our snack. I’ll just take a look round and do a bit of shopping. I won’t keep you, my dear.’
‘You can come shopping with me,’ Lise says, very genially. ‘Mrs Fiedke, it’s a pleasure.’
‘How very kind you are!’
‘One should always be kind,’ Lise says, ‘in case it might be the last chance. One might be killed crossing the street, or even on the pavement, any time, you never know. So we should always be kind.’ She cuts her sandwich daintily and puts a piece in her mouth.
Mrs Fiedke says, ‘That’s a very, very beautiful thought. But you mustn’t think of accidents. I can assure you, I’m terrified of traffic.’
‘So am I. Terrified.’
‘Do you drive an automobile?’ says the old lady.
‘I do, but I’m afraid of traffic. You never know what crackpot’s going to be at the wheel of another car.’
‘These days,’ says Mrs Fiedke.
‘There’s a department store not far from here,’ Lise says. ‘Want to come?’
They eat their sandwich and drink their coffee. Lise then orders a rainbow ice while Mrs Fiedke considers one way or another whether she really wants anything more, and eventually declines.
‘Strange voices,’ says the old lady looking round. ‘Look at the noise.’
‘Well, if you know the language.’
‘Can you speak the language?’
‘A bit. I can speak four.’
Mrs Fiedke marvels benevolently while Lise bashfully plays with crumbs on the tablecloth. The waiter brings the rainbow ice and while Lise lifts the spoon to start Mrs Fiedke says, ‘It matches with your outfit.’
Lise laughs at this, longer than Mrs Fiedke had evidently expected. ‘Beautiful colours,’ Mrs Fiedke offers, as one might offer a cough-sweet. Lise sits before the brightly streaked ice-cream with her spoon in her hand and laughs on. Mrs Fiedke looks frightened, and more frightened as the voices of the bar stop to watch the laughing one; Mrs Fiedke shrinks into her old age, her face dry and wrinkled, her eyes gone into a far retreat, not knowing what to do. Lise stops suddenly and says, ‘That was funny.’
The man behind the bar, having started coming over to their table to investigate a potential disorder, stops and turns back, muttering something. A few young men round the bar start up a mimic laugh-laugh-laugh but are stopped by the barman.
‘When I went to buy this dress,’ Lise says to Mrs Fiedke, ‘do you know what they offered me first? A stainless dress. Can you believe it? A dress that won’t hold the stain if you drop coffee or ice-cream on it. Some new synthetic fabric. As if I would want a dress that doesn’t show the stains!’
Mrs Fiedke, whose eager spirit is slowly returning from wherever it had been to take cover from Lise’s laughter, looks at Lise’s dress and says, ‘Doesn’t hold the stains? Very useful for travelling.’
‘Not this dress,’ Lise says, working her way through the rainbow ice; ‘it was another dress. I didn’t buy it, though. Very poor taste, I thought.’ She has finished her ice. Again the two women fumble in their purses and at the same time Lise gives an expert’s glance at the two small tickets, marked with the price, that have been left on the table. Lise edges one of them aside. ‘That one’s for the ice,’ she says, ‘and we share the other.’
‘The torment of it,’ Lise says. ‘Not knowing exactly where and when he’s going to turn up.
She moves ahead of Mrs Fiedke up the escalator to the third floor of a department store. It is ten minutes past four by the big clock, and they have had to wait more than half an hour for it to open, both of them having forgotten about the southern shopping hours, and in this interval have walked round the block looking so earnestly for Lise’s friend that Mrs Fiedke has at some point lost the signs of her initial bewilderment when this friend has been mentioned, and now shows only the traces of enthusiastic cooperation in the search. As they were waiting for the store to open, having passed the large iron-grated shutters again and again in their ambles round the block, Mrs Fiedke started to scan the passers-by.
‘Would that be him, do you think? He looks very gaily dressed like yourself.’
‘No, that’s not him.’
‘It’s quite a problem, with all this choice. What about this one? No this one, I mean, crossing in front of that car? Would he be too fat?’
‘No, it isn’t him.’
‘It’s very difficult, my dear, if you don’t know the cast of person. ‘‘He could be driving a car,’ Lise had said when
