itself and doesn't mean it. Time magazine takes it seriously and does mean it.'
'It's fun.'
'And you are becoming less of a man.'
He was still high, too high to argue. Off he rollicked, in train with Charisma and Fu.
Rachel locked herself in the bathroom with a portable radio and bawled for a while. Somebody was singing the old standard about how you always hurt the one you love, the one you shouldn't hurt at all. Indeed, thought Rachel, but does Benny even love me? I love him. I think. There's no reason why I should. She kept crying.
So near one in the morning she was at the Spoon with her hair hanging straight, dressed in black, no makeup except for mascara in sad raccoon-rings round her eyes, looking like all those other women and girls: camp followers.
'Benny,' she said, 'I'm sorry.' And later:
'You don't have to try not to hurt me. Only come home, with me, to bed . . .' And much later, at her apartment, facing the wall, 'You don't even have to be a man. Only pretend to love me.'
None of which made Profane feel any better. But it didn't stop him going to the Spoon.
One night at the Forked Yew, he and Stencil got juiced. 'Stencil is leaving the country,' Stencil said. He apparently wanted to talk.
'I wish I was leaving the country.'
Young Stencil, old Machiavel. Soon he had Profane talking about his women problems.
'I don't know what Paola wants. You know her better. Do you know what she wants?'
An embarrassing question for Stencil. He dodged:
'Aren't you two - how shall one say.'
'No,' Profane said. 'No, no.'
But Stencil was there again, next evening. 'Truth of it is,' he admitted, 'Stencil can't handle her. But you can.'
'Don't talk,' said Profane. 'Drink.'
Hours later they were both out of their heads. 'You wouldn't consider coming along with them,' Stencil wondered.
'I have been there once. Why should I want to go back.'
'But didn't Valletta - somehow - get to you? Make you feel anything?'
'I went down to the Gut and got drunk like everybody else. I was too drunk to feel anything.'
Which eased Stencil. He was scared to death of Valletta. He'd feel better with Profane, anybody else, along on this jaunt (a) to take care of Paola, (b) so he wouldn't be alone.
Shame, said his conscience. Old Sidney went in there with the cards stacked against him. Alone.
And look what he got, thought Stencil, a little wry, a little shaky.
On the offensive: 'Where do you belong, Profane?'
'Wherever I am.'
'Deracinated. Which of them is not. Which of this Crew couldn't pick up tomorrow and go off to Malta, go off to the moon. Ask them why and they'll answer why not.'
'I could not care less about Valletta.' But hadn't there been something after all about the bombed-out buildings, buff-colored rubble, excitement of Kingsway? What had Paola called the island: a cradle of life.
'I have always wanted to be buried at sea,' said Profane.
Had Stencil seen the coupling in that associative train he would have gathered heart of grace, surely. But Paola and he had never spoken of Profane. Who, after all, was Profane?
Until now. They decided to rollick off to a party on Jefferson Street.
Next day was Saturday. Early morning found Stencil rushing around to his contacts, informing them all of a third tentative passage.
The third passage, meanwhile, was horribly hung over. His Girl was having more than second thoughts.
'Why do you go to the Spoon, Benny.'
'Why not?'
She edged up on one elbow. 'That's the first time you've said that.'
'You break your cherry on something every day.'
Without thinking: 'What about love? When are you going to end your virgin status there, Ben?'
In reply Profane fell out of bed, crawled to the bathroom and hung over the toilet, thinking about barfing. Rachel clasped hands in front of one breast, like a concert soprano. 'My man.' Profane decided instead to make noises at himself in the mirror.
She came up behind him, hair all down and straggly for the night, and set her cheek against his back as Paola had on the Newport News ferry last winter. Profane inspected his teeth.
