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She left the phonebooth and returned to the MG, driving away from the curb and south on Delaware. Tonight driving didn’t seem to provide the relaxation it usually gave her but it was certainly better than staying at home. She cursed Charles and Ronald and Danny, the harsh words making her feel better in a small way. But it didn’t work; her hands were still clenched too tightly on the steering wheel and there was still an odd constriction in her throat.

Maybe a drink would help. Maybe a whole batch of drinks, one right after the other, would turn the trick. She sure as hell needed something before she went out of her mind.

She searched for a bar, driving methodically down Delaware and across Chippewa and down Pearl and combing the whole downtown area systematically. It was important to find just the right sort of place — one that was decent enough to let her feel comfortable, but at the same time brassy enough so that none of Ronald’s friends was likely to drop in.

Almost half an hour passed before she found the bar, a blue-awninged tavern called The Blue Gate. After leaving the MG in a parking lot across the street, she walked into the bar and took a table at the rear.

It was a pleasant bar. The bartender’s apron was clean and white and the men at the bar wore suits and ties for the most part. The music on the jukebox was quiet, listenable stuff — soft modern jazz and singers like Sinatra and Anita O’Day. She dropped a quarter in the juke, picking records haphazardly and returning to her table.

The waiter came, a tall thin man in a dark green uniform. She ordered a manhattan and drummed her fingers nervously on the marble-patterned table-top while she waited for the drink. She took a cigarette from her pack and tapped it rhythmically on the table, then placed it between her lips and scratched a match into flame. When the drink arrived she stubbed the cigarette out in the heavy terracotta ashtray and took a long sip of the drink.

It tasted good. Carla wasn’t much of a drinker, and the taste of most drinks wasn’t enough of an enticement to get her in the habit of a drink before dinner every day, as was the custom with most of Ronald’s friends. But a drink did let her relax, and that was her primary interest tonight. She polished off the remainder of the manhattan in one swallow and signalled the waiter for another.

The second manhattan was even better than the first. Carla drank it methodically, not wanting to waste time nursing it. Drinking to her was like everything else. It was to be done as quickly and neatly and efficiently as possible. The second drink went the way of the first, and a third followed in rapid succession.

She felt better after the third drink. The music from the jukebox was cool and crystalline, and it seemed to be coming at her through a filter. Her head grew deliciously light and there was a pleasantly numb sensation in her cheek, the first sign that the alcohol was taking effect.

She ordered a fourth drink and closed her eyes while she waited for it.

Pictures swam through her mind — pictures of faces. Ronald and Charles and Danny paraded past in military formation, smiling at her and kissing her and laughing. She laughed back, happy and light inside. Everything was going to be fine.

She took a sip of the fourth manhattan.

I am Mrs. Carla Macon, she thought. And that makes me pretty important, pretty damned important. And everything’s going to be just fine.

She didn’t notice the man until he was seated across from her with his eyes staring into hers. When she did see him, it seemed perfectly natural to her that he should be there. She needed a man, and here was a man coming to talk to her. The fact that she had never seen him before in her life didn’t seem strange at all.

“Hi,” he said. “How are ya, Baby?”

“Hi,” she replied. “I think I’m drunk.”

“You think right.” She noticed that his jacket had padding in the shoulders, and his tie was too loud. There was a shifty quality in his gaze, and it combined with his dress and his pinched-in look to make him resemble the villain in a bad western.

“You’re a pretty girl.”

“Thank you,” she said. She felt his knee pressing hers under the table. At first she started to draw away; then she returned the pressure and smiled across the table at him. He probably wasn’t a particularly nice man, she decided, but he was here and it was a nice night and she was a little bit drunk so it didn’t make too much difference.

“I figure a pretty girl like you shouldn’t be drinking alone,” he was saying, and at the same time his hand was encircling her knee and fondling it gently. He went on talking, giving her a rather old-fashioned line, but she didn’t mind the clumsiness of his approach. His hand slid up from her knee and rested on her thigh, rubbing the firm flesh gently as he spoke. She smiled again and dropped her hand on his, helping him to caress her thigh.

The music on the jukebox seemed to be coming from miles and miles away. Gently she lifted his hand and pulled up her skirt, replacing his hand on her bare thigh. He took a sharp breath and his fingers kneaded the tender flesh of the inside of her thigh. His hand was remarkably soft, almost like a woman’s, and she pressed her thighs tight together, squeezing the hand between them. It felt so good to have a man want her, to feel the desire flowing across the table. She smiled at him again and ran her tongue between her lips quickly.

His hand moved up between her warm thighs, exciting her. His touch combined with the effect of the four manhattans to send a little shiver of hunger through her body. She knew that it was going to happen: she would leave the bar with him and go somewhere and they would make love. The anticipation of the act increased her excitement.

“Let’s get out of here,” he murmured, his fingers still busy with her legs. “Let’s go somewhere.”

“Where?”

“My place.”

She nodded, spreading her thighs so that he could remove his hand. Her skin tingled where his hand had rested and the skin seemed burned from the contact. She stood up and picked up her purse while he paid the waiter for her drinks. Then he took her arm in his and walked her out of the bar.

She didn’t notice anything outside. She didn’t note whether the stars or moon were out or what time it was or anything. All her being was concentrated on the man beside her and the act soon to come. He led her around the block to a small third-rate hotel on Pearl Street, held the door open for her, and followed her inside. She stood awkwardly, her eyes taking in the shabby furnishings and the worn rug on the floor while he signed the register and passed money to the sleepy clerk.

There was no elevator. They walked up one flight of stairs with his arm clutched possessively around her waist, his fingers pressing her gently rounded belly. Her thighs rubbed together as she climbed the stairs and made her more anxious than ever to be in a room with him.

To hell with Charles, she thought angrily. To hell with him and Ronald and Danny and all of them. To hell with love and the whole nonsense of it. There was no such thing as love. Love was an itch, and if you scratched the itch everything was all right. That was all there was to it.

They were in the room suddenly and the door was closed behind them. The man turned to her, a smile on his thin and bloodless lips. She returned the smile and opened her arms to him, and he stepped inside them and brought his mouth to hers. She kissed him, her tongue darting between the thin lips and her body grinding.

“Baby,” he murmured huskily. He lowered her to the bed and the springs groaned as they sank back onto it. The bed sagged in the middle. A lone light-bulb hung from the ceiling, shining in her eyes and swinging lazily from side to side.

He was fumbling with her clothing and she helped him. His hands found her breasts and held them greedily, the tips of his fingers pressing into her milky white flesh and hurting her.