and we are most happy to cooperate. Walter, this gentleman has been given your destination. Is that not so, Monsieur?”
Sweet nodded.
“You must do as he directs. It is already late; there is no need for you to return here tonight. I myself will punch out for you, and I shall expect you tomorrow at the usual time.”
The manager turned on his heel and strode away. The shorter waiter was already gone. For a moment the taller waiter stood looking from her to Sweet. “Would you like me to dispose of the telephone, sir?”
“You might as well. Get your coat too, it’s colder than a welldigger’s ass out there. Then come back.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And Walter, there’ll be a good tip in this when we’re through. Not from them,” Sweet nodded toward the telephone. “From me.”
“That isn’t necessary, sir,” the waiter said. “I’m happy to serve my country.”
When he returned, he was wearing a lumberjack’s red plaid jacket over his waiter’s uniform. He and Sweet shifted the table to one side and managed to get her to her feet. She had kicked off one of her high-heeled shoes. They seated her again, and the waiter found it. He slipped the other from her foot as well and thrust them both into the side pockets of his jacket. “This way will be better, sir, believe me. She’ll balance better and be able to give us more help.”
The restaurant was nearly empty, but it seemed to Sweet that a hundred eyes watched them. He mumbled, “You’ve done this before, have you, Walter?”
“Every so often, sir.” He glanced speculatively at their charge. “Usually the ladies just drink—you know. Two or three more than a lady should. I don’t know if this is going to be easier or harder. Harder, I expect.”
“I think you’re right,” Sweet told him.
“Then there isn’t any use waiting, is there, sir? Let’s get her up again.”
She said, “I can …” Her hips slipped forward; she began to slide from her chair.
“Get her, sir!”
Both men grabbed her arms.
“Up, sir! Get her up!”
“Lay down,” she said loudly. “And a mint. Want a after-dinner mint.”
“You’re going to be fine,” Sweet told her desperately. “You’re not going to be sick. Just stand up and come with us. You can lie down in my car.”
She tried to embrace and comfort her straining belly, but the men’s grip prevented her. They urged her forward as they might have rolled a tun of wine, a vast cask difficult to bring into motion, teetering, difficult to turn or halt. As she moved, the split skirt slid down, slowly escaping her monstrous waistline, hanging precariously for a step or two on the protuberance of her hips. Sweet tried to catch it, but when both his hands no longer supported her, she began to lose the vertical orientation they had achieved by so much labor, and he was compelled to prop her up again. The skirt escaped, sliding to her knees, then to the floor. Inevitably she tripped over it, but her own contribution to her support was so slight it scarcely mattered.
“Her coat’s in the check room,” he told the waiter.
“To hell with her coat,” the waiter said succinctly.
“Mine too. We’ll take her out to the car. Then I’ll come back for our coats.”
“Cold out there.”
“I can take it.”
“Hot,” she said. “Me. Warm. Really.”
“You won’t be for long,” the waiter told her.
Sweet asked, “It hasn’t started snowing again, has it?”
The waiter shook his head, but Sweet, on the opposite side of her, could not see him.
A big man and a slender woman in a sable wrap were coming through the door as they reached the vestibule. For a moment, the newcomers stared in amazement, then the woman collapsed into helpless laughter.
“Shut up,” Sweet told her. “You don’t know what’s happening.”
“Me neither,” Candy said. She belched, breathed the cool air of the vestibule, and immediately felt better. “Why are you so nice to me?”
“I like you,” Sweet said.
“You too.”
The waiter pushed open the door with his foot. A little new snow had fallen; the most recent automobiles had left twining, opalescent tracks in it like the trails of arctic pythons. The cold air felt wonderful. Her face was hot, her belly overwarm as well as overfull. (At last! At last! Full to bursting, dead, solid full, with every scrap of hunger crowded out.) When she stepped out into the snow, her feet felt cool rather than cold.
“You don’t have to hold me,” she said. “I’m okay now.”
Sweet told her, “I’d rather hold you.”
“You’re sweet.” Taking her arm from the waiter, she turned, enfolded Sweet, and kissed him.
“Thank you,” he said when he could speak again. “But we have to go to the car now.”
