“I never pout,” I said. “It's stupid. If you don't get what you want the first time around it simply means your technique is all wrong, so you change techniques.”
She laughed again and hung up.
When I stepped into her apartment a few minutes later, it hit me all over again. By God, I thought, she's beautiful, truly beautiful!
I hope you like scotch,” she said. “It's all I have.”
“Scotch will do.”
She was all wrapped up in a pale blue quilted house coat, looking about fifteen years younger than she actually was. She sat on the tweedy couch with her legs folded back, and there was a closed book in her hand and she was smiling.
“Make yourself at home,” she said, and then unfolded slowly, lazily, stood up and walked to the kitchen. There was no doubt about it, she was the most beautiful girl I had ever known or seen.
She came out of the kitchen with two drinks in old fashioned glasses.
She laughed and handed me my drink. The book was put back in its place on the bookshelf, and Pat sat beside me on the couch. We sipped our drinks. I didn't care for scotch, but I drank it, trying not to stare at her, reminding myself not to grab.
And I didn't grab. I liked it this way, just the way we were. I liked to hear her talk; I liked just being with her and looking at her. Christ, I thought, I didn't realize how exhausted I really am! This day had drained me completely, emotionally and physically, and all I wanted to do was sit still and let my muscles sag and look at Pat and think of nothing. Nothing important, anyway—such as that letter, or Calvart lying out there in a ditch on the brickyard road.
Then Pat stopped talking and looked at me. “Is there something wrong?” I said.
“No, I was just wondering about you. When you came in you looked so... vigorous. Now you look a hundred years old.”
“Thank you, ma'am, for those kind words.”
“You know what I mean,” she said. “You look as though you had been fighting the entire world single-handed.”
“Baby, I don't suppose you'll ever know just how good a guess you just made. But it's nothing, really. I'm just beat, that's all.”
She let it drop. Not one woman in ten million would have let it drop there, but Pat did. She merely shrugged, and then began talking about the scotch that we were drinking and how long she had had it. I lay back on the couch and smiled at her, and I wanted her more than I had ever wanted any woman in my life, but I didn't touch her, I didn't as much as lift a finger. When she was ready she would let me know.
I turned my thoughts inward as she talked, and I thought what a hell of a pair we could make, Pat and I. Soon I would move out of the lousy apartment building and take her with me, and I would rent the biggest damn suite in the best hotel in Lake City, and we'd start living the way people like us ought to live.
But first she had to come to me. She had to say, “Please take me with you,” and then I would take her. All I needed was patience.
She was a queer one, though. She didn't ask questions —not many, anyway. She seemed to have no ambition. She had loved Alex Burton, but she seemed to have forgotten him completely—but, then, it was hard to tell about a woman like her, what she was thinking, what she really wanted. That coat, for instance. She had been as giddy as a bobby-soxer when I had given it to her, but now she seemed to have forgotten that, too.
I don't know just how long I sat there, thinking of nothing in particular, and of everything in general. I thought of all my yesterdays as they might have been; all my tomorrows as I, with my own two hands, my brain and my guts, would make them. Several minutes must have passed before I realized that I was listening to nothing but silence.
I looked at Pat and she suddenly smiled. “You are tired, aren't you? I don't believe you heard a word I've been saying.”
“Was it important?”
She laughed softly. “What kind of a question is that? A lady's words are always important. To herself, at least.” Then she reached out a hand and touched my hair. I liked that very much. “Perhaps,” she said, “you should go to bed and get some sleep.”
“I like it here, just the two of us.”
“All right. But you must promise to keep up your end of the conversation.”
I grinned at her. “That sounds reasonable, shall we discuss religion, politics, or the weather?”
“What's wrong with O'Connor as a subject of conversation. Do you realize that I know absolutely nothing about you, except that you once worked your way through some college or other?”
It was my turn to laugh. “That's a sore spot with me. I just don't like work, I guess.”
“... What do you like, Mr. O'Connor.”
That name kept throwing me. I couldn't get used to it— and, too, it reminded me of Dorris Venci who had given the name to me, and thinking of Dorris reminded me of that letter that I had to intercept, and it all got to be a vicious circle, or a net that had fallen around me, and I wondered if I would ever truly get completely out of it.
“What do I like?” I said. “Well, I like you, I think.”
“Now there is a left-handed sort of compliment, if I ever heard one!”
“I didn't mean it to be.”
“Anyway,” she said, “you must like other things. Money, perhaps.”
“Money... of course I like the things that can be done with money, but I don't have much respect for it as such. Money is the easiest thing in the world to come by, if you know the secret and practice it.”
“Well, I am sure that a great many people would love to have the secret. Would you mind telling me what it is?”
“It's all right there in that book,” I said, “the one you were reading. Nietzche proved with crushing finality that the only civilization capable of enduring is one in which the strong are not penalized for taking from the weak. This particular civilization in which we are living calls it robbery, extortion, piracy, and a lot of other things.”
She leaned her head to one side, smiling quizzically. “And do you approve of these particular methods of obtaining money?”
“Let us just say that as a philosophy, Nietzsche's can be a very tough one to logically argue down. However, I wasn't going to bring up this subject, was I?”
“You didn't bring it up, I did, and I find it very interesting.” he wasn't smiling now, she looked extremely sober. Like a little girl who had just been told that some day she must die. Once again she touched my hair, and I felt the soothing effect of her hand. There was a satisfaction and pleasure in having her reach out, of her own accord, and touch me. This is the way it would be when the time came... only more so. “Tell me,” she said, “what else do you believe?”
“What else do I believe? Well, I believe in strength. And I believe that man should believe in himself.”
“You must be terribly bright,” she said, in a lighter vein now, smiling. “You must have read a horrible lot of books in order to have developed so many positive opinions.”
“As a matter of fact,” I said, “you are right. I have read a great many books, during recent years especially. And I have an intelligence quotient of one hundred and forty-nine, which isn't bad when you consider that one hundred and forty-five is usually considered a genius rating.”
She laughed suddenly, with surprising merriment. “Coming from anyone else,” she said, “such a statement would tag the guy as an insufferable braggart.”
“I wasn't bragging, I was merely stating a fact.”
“I know,” she said, “and that is one of the things about you that amazes me.”
“However,” I said, “I don't believe that a man of ability should underrate himself.”