She hummed a little more and then she looked over at me with a twisted smile. “All right, but not too long.” I went north, on Sheridan, all the way to Glencoe. She hummed the songs that came in on the radio, and her voice was nice, kind of husky and low but the pitch was good.
There was a breeze coming in from the lake and it had that cool clean sea smell. We went out to where there were trees beside the road and it was nice driving along through the dark, listening to her sing and feeling the breeze on my face. She seemed quiet and relaxed now, and it made her look prettier, almost like a kid, but I liked her the other way better.
Finally she said, “I think we’d better go back. I have to be up early in the morning.”
I didn’t argue with her. I just said, “Okay,” and turned the car around and started back. I drove slow and it was about twelve when I pulled up in front of her apartment on Winthrop avenue. I cut the motor and switched the lights off and the darkness and quiet came crowding into the car.
We didn’t say anything for a while and then I looked over at her. She was looking straight ahead and sitting perfectly still.
“Cigarette?” I said.
She nodded and I gave her one. I lit a match and held it for her and then I lit my own. We just sat there, smoking, and something started building between us in the warm darkness.
“I’ve got to be up early in the morning,” she said, and her voice was too natural. “Seven-thirty.”
“That is early. What time do you have to be down town?”
“By nine.”
“Who do you work for?”
“Tone and Smith. That’s an insurance agency. The main office is in New York.”
“Must be a pretty big outfit.”
“Yes, it is.”
Just words. They didn’t mean anything. We weren’t thinking about anything except the thing we were feeling. My mouth was dry and the cigarette tasted like something to be thrown away. I tossed it out the window.
“Do you live alone here?”
“Yes. It’s just a two-room apartment. I like being alone. I could get a girl to share expenses with me, but I wouldn’t like having someone around in the morning. There’s enough for me to do taking care of myself, without having some girl borrowing my stockings and getting in my way. In the morning I make the orange juice and put the coffee on before I take my shower. Then I have breakfast and dress in time to catch the eight-fifteen bus.” She laughed a little. “It’s like living on a time-table.”
“Do you mind being alone at night?” I said.
She didn’t answer that and we sat there while the silence and tension kept building.
“I’d better go up,” she said finally, but she made no move to get out.
“How about a night cap? Anything to drink upstairs?”
“It’s pretty late. There’s nothing but gin anyway.”
“Gin’s fine.”
“I’ve really got to go.”
“Okay.” I looked at her. “Good night.”
“Good night,” she said. She didn’t move. Then she looked over at me and her eyes were wide and shiny. “You might give me a ring sometime.”
“We’d better leave it at good night,” I said.
We sat there a little while longer and she was waiting for me to say something else, but I kept looking straight ahead.
Finally she said in a low voice, “Are you sure you don’t mind gin?”
That was how it started.
I stayed with her that night and from then on there wasn’t anything else for me—
I sat up on the edge of the bed and snapped the light on again. I was crying then and I was sick and cold and I guess I must have been half crazy, because I picked up the phone and called her number. I had to talk to her, that was all I knew.
I heard the phone buzz a few times and then I heard his voice.
“Hello,” he said.
“Is Alice there?”
“Yeah, she’s here. Who’s this?”
I came to then. I put the receiver back fast and sat there shaking, wondering if he’d recognized my voice. I knew I’d done a crazy thing. What would he think of me calling his wife in the middle of the night? He might go in to her and start yelling about it and she might get hot and start talking.
I laid down and tried to get myself under control. I had to get straightened out before I did something crazy again that would tip him off about what had been going on between Alice and me while he was away.
She told me one night about his temper and how strong he was. If he ever suspected anything he’d go out of his head, I knew.
I’d known him a little bit before I met her. We used to talk about what a funny coincidence that was. We were staying at a little cabin up in northern Wisconsin one night, lying in bed under about six comforters when something she said clicked in my mind.
“Frank Olsen? A guy by that name used to come into my place. Was this husband of yours a big red-head?”
“That’s him. It’s odd that you should know him, isn’t it? He used to play the horses occasionally.”
“Yeah, a two-dollar bettor. How’d you come to marry him?”
“I don’t know. I was twenty then. He had a good job and he was very much in love with me. I was curious, I guess. I was willing to go to a hotel with him, but that shocked him. He wanted it done legally, so we got married.”
“Do you love him now?”
“I never loved him. Oh, Johnny,” she said, and her voice was ragged. She twisted around in my arm and I kissed her, and we forgot all about him, and we never talked about him very much after that night.
My phone buzzed then and I pick it up, feeling suddenly scared.
It was the switchboard operator. “Did you get that number all right, Mr. Ford?”
“I got it,” I said. I knew she’d been listening and she must have thought it funny that I hung up without talking.
“I just wanted to make sure,” she said.
I hung up and went into the bathroom and switched on the light over the mirror. I looked like hell. I knew I ought to shave and take a shower and then go down and get the late race results and see how much money I’d need the next day to cover the bets I’d taken, but I didn’t feel like doing anything.
I turned off the light and went back and flopped on the bed.
The phone rang again a little later. I picked it up and put it to my ear.
“Johnny?”
I rose up on one elbow and my hands were shaking.
“Alice, is that you? Where are you, baby?”
“Yes, it’s me. Johnny, did you call the apartment a little while ago?”
“I had to talk to you, baby. Where are you?”
“I’m at the drug store. I told Frank I was going to get some ice cream. God, Johnny, don’t ever do that again.”
“I’ve got to see you.” My voice was shaking like my hands and I was almost crying. “Do you hear, baby? I got to see you.”
“Oh, Johnny, I want to see you. I can’t stand this much longer. I can’t bear him. I want you. What are we going to do, Johnny?”
“Can you come down now?”
“He’s waiting for me; I can’t. Tomorrow night I’ll tell him I’m staying down to work. I can see you then, but not for long.”
“What time?”
“Right after work. About six.”
“Alice, I love you, baby. When I think of you with him I go crazy. I can’t work, or eat or anything.”
“I love you, Johnny,” she said, but the words were muffled and I could hear her crying.
“Taking it easy, baby. Better get home with the ice cream now, before he gets suspicious. I’ll be waiting for you tomorrow night.”
“I don’t want to go home. I want to be with you, Johnny.”
“Tomorrow night,” I said.
“All right, Johnny.”
She hung up and I went back into the bathroom and snapped on the light, I didn’t look any better than before, but I felt able to do something about it now. I shaved, took a long shower and brushed my teeth a few times. After that I put on clean underwear, a new glen plaid suit and a starched shirt with the kind of long pointed collar I liked. With black-and-white sport shoes and blue, polka-dot tie I looked pretty good. I combed my hair and splashed some after-shave-lotion on my face.