I went out into the hall and answered it, and a voice said, “Is that you, Gid?” and it was a voice you would instantly know if you had ever heard it before, which I had, and the last time I’d heard it, after seven years, was that very afternoon in the Kiowa Room. I had been trying not to think of Beth, and I had been doing pretty well at it, all in all, especially when Sid had been around as a distraction, but now Sid was gone, lost temporarily to Rose Pogue and Zoroaster, and Beth’s unforgettable voice had just spoken softly into my ear over a long wire, and for a moment it was just like back there before the lean years, and I had the same sharp, poignant feeling that I used to have then.
What had Beth said? Hadn’t she asked if it was me? “Yes,” I said, “it is.”
“I’m so glad you’re home, darling. What are you doing?”
“I’m drinking gimlets and listening to Death and Transfiguration.”
“Still drinking gimlets?”
“Not still. Again. I took time out to drink a bottle of white Burgundy.”
“Aren’t you afraid of becoming drunk?”
“Not at all. It’s possible and even probable that drunk is what I’ll become, but I’m not in the least afraid of it. In fact, I’m cultivating it.”
“What did you say you were listening to?”
“Death and Transfiguration.”
“Is that the name of a song?”
“A tone poem. By Richard Strauss.”
“Is that what I hear in the background?”
“Quite likely.”
“It sounds very gloomy, I must say.”
“If it didn’t sound gloomy, I wouldn’t be playing it.”
“Darling, are you unhappy?”
“I am. I’m full of gin and sorrow.”
“That’s too bad. I’m sorry.”
“Be sorry about the sorrow, if you please, but not about the gin.”
“I believe you are already drunk.”
“That’s a shrewd diagnosis, honey. You may be right.”
“Is Sid there?”
“No, Sid is not here. Sid’s gone. Sid is off discussing Zoroaster with Rose Pogue.”
“Really? A thing like that can go on forever with Rose.”
“True. Rose is an exceptionally gregarious intellectual type. Windy is what she is.”
“Are you all alone?”
“Yes. All alone by the telephone. That’s from a song by Irving Berlin, who is a composer somewhat inferior to Strauss.”
“I’m all alone too, darling. Couldn’t we get together?”
“We could, indeed, but I don’t think it would be wise.”
“We could be very discreet about it.”
“Discretion is fine in theory, but in this town difficult in practice. Surely you remember that.”
“Oh, come on, darling. Don’t be such a coward. Don’t you want to see me again?”
“Yes, I do, and I’ll not deny it. I might even want to kiss you a few times and tell you the proper good-by that I’ve never had the chance to tell you.”
“Darling, I wish you would. I must go away again tomorrow, and I’ve been thinking about it ever since you left me this afternoon, and I simply can’t bear to think any more about going without seeing you again first. Please come.”
“Come where?”
“Well, I’m staying at the hotel, of course, but I don’t think you’d better come here. Do you remember Dreamer’s Park?”
“Certainly. How can you ask? We stopped there now and again in the past to do a little necking in the old bandstand.”
“That’s exactly the place, darling. Wouldn’t it be exciting to meet in the old bandstand again? Like old times. I’ll meet you there if you’ll come. Will you?”
“Yes, I will.”
“In half an hour?”
“I’ll have to walk. It may take a little longer.”
“As soon as possible, darling. Please hurry.”
She hung up, and I did too, and if you are thinking that I was a damn fool, I won’t argue the point, but I would like to say at least that circumstances were extenuating, and everything, as you can see, was still working just right to come out all wrong in an afternoon and an evening and a night that were filled with the nostalgia and idiocy of going and gone. In my opinion, so far as I was involved, that damn Rose Pogue and Zoroaster were as much to blame as anyone else.
Death and Transfiguration was out of the largo and into the allegro. I went over to the player and turned the reject dial, and the arm lifted, and the music stopped. Carrying the glass my gimlet had been in, I returned to the kitchen and found a little gimlet left that it seemed a shame to waste, and so I poured what was left into my glass and drank it. While I was drinking it, I closed and locked the back door, and after it was drunk I turned out the light and went out of the house the front way, and all this time I was trying to do just the opposite of what I had been trying to do all evening earlier. I was trying to think only of Beth and not at all of Sid, instead of Sid only and not at all of Beth, but this did not work perfectly, of course, or even very well, for Sid is not the kind of person you can just quit thinking of in an instant, even for someone like Beth.
Nevertheless, I kept trying, because I knew that Sid would not exactly approve of what I was doing, not, in fact, by a damn sight, and the truth was, I didn’t exactly approve of what I was doing myself, although I wanted
