I watch her face as she listens. She looks over at me, and there is for an instant the evasive look of the guilty child, and she hitches herself sideways on the couch, pulling her legs up, facing away from me.
I listen. I am an international spy, cleverly putting together the small secretive comments she makes as she listens.
“I didn’t want that you should... Okay, okay, so you did... Sure, I knew. I mean if you got the picture, I couldn’t hardly miss it... You’re kidding!... What made you think he’d go for it?... Oh Christ, so I’m a movie star already... No, dear. I’ll tell you one thing. Promises don’t mean a hell of a lot... If it’s for real, why the hell not? What could I lose?... Yeah. The ticket is good for thirty days or something. I can’t get Joe now, but I could get him early in the morning before he leaves... When would all this... Well, you are some great little arranger, aren’t you, honey?... I know where it is... If you wouldn’t mind, yes, I’ll see you there... Of course, I’m nervous! What do you think?... Vel? Thanks, honey. From the bottom of my heart. What?... No, I mean whether it works out or doesn’t, thanks for the try... Sure... See you.”
She hangs up and sits very still, looking into a comer of the room and nibbling at the edge of a thumbnail.
“What’s up?”
“Maybe I’ll take the bus tomorrow instead.”
“Who’s Velma?”
“A girl. She used to work at the place I used to work. I ran into her last week and told her my sad, sad story. Then she was in the place the night before last, my last night working. I’m meeting her later on today.”
“Why?”
“She’s got a friend that maybe can loan me the money to send Joe.”
“A man?”
“You shouldn’t ask so many questions, Marty.”
“And when she came in the other night she had the man with her?”
“Look. It’s my problem, right? You couldn’t do anything about it. So you don’t get to ask questions about how I take care of it.”
I am standing directly in front of her and she is looking up at me, her eyes wide and startled. Suddenly she stands up into my arms. I hold her. She trembles and makes a single coughing sob.
“Tell me!”
“No. I’m not going to tell you, Martin.”
“Please. Please.”
She turns out of my arms and moves away, turns toward me, fists on her hips. “What you want most in the world is to have me stay right here. I think maybe I can. I sort of love you. You know that. Not like before. If you don’t ask me about anything, I think it will be okay if you come here. You could get some kind of a job, maybe. It wouldn’t have to be so much. You could stay here with me, even. I could sort of... take care of you. If it all works out. But don’t ask me about things, okay? Not ever. Not where I’ve been or what I’ve done. Okay, Martin? Okay, honey?”
I know it is the same day but I am not sure how much later it is, and I do not know why I have walked over to Tenth Avenue to Speedy Parcel. Somewhere in my mind I know why I am there, but I cannot remember the reason.
I go in and go back through the gate, all of it a familiar part of my life, and back to the little office in the far comer. The door is open, and Floss is behind her old oak desk. Eight years of working this account, coming in once a month, kidding around with Floss and with Mr. Baum. She is in her fifties, with blue hair and a round, wrinkled little face, and a deep voice. She says funny, bitter things.
“Jesus Christ! Marty! Sit down before you fall down. You look terrible. Marty, I heard they fired you. Honest, I couldn’ta felt worse about anything. You find a job yet?”
“Not yet.”
“You want a job, you gotta first shave, get a haircut, put a clean shirt on, and get that suit pressed. Cleaned and pressed.”
“I guess I haven’t been looking too hard, Floss.”
She stares at me with concern in her eyes. “What did you hit yourself with, Marty? Booze, pot, horses, broads? For the last five six months you worked us, you weren’t worth a shit. You know that, huh?”
“I know. I sort of lost control of things.”
“You want a job?”
“I guess so.”
“You guess so! Meanwhile you live off your portfolio, huh? You close the country estate and fire the servants, huh? Listen, if you mend a fence here, there’s a chance. Remember how always you and Mr. Baum used to kid around every time, about who was getting balder and fatter? About getting half rates on haircuts? Then you came in like five months ago and he comes in and gives you the needle and you looked up at him like you never seen him before in your life and you told him you were busy and behind schedule. Marty, that really pissed him off. What you could do, you get yourself cleaned up good and come in and apologize, and try kidding a little bit. Careful, until you see how he takes it, and then ask him if there’s anything here. Because there is, in dispatching and route control. You could pick it up in a week. The guy we got to replace Kramer, in a lifetime he couldn’t learn how. Marty, this is for old times’ sake. Don’t try it unless you got yourself straightened out. Unless you got rid of whatever turned you into a slob.”
“Twenty-five hundred dollars, Floss.”
“What? What does that mean? You stole it? Marty, God help you, that’d cook any chance here, because people got to be bonded. You know that.”
I feel impatient with her. “No. I’ve got to get twenty-five hundred dollars. It’s very important.”
“You’ve lost me somewhere, Marty.”
I know why I have come to see her. There was never less than five thousand cash on hand in all the eight years I serviced the account. “Not any more than that. Just twenty-five hundred even.”
“Are you asking for a loan, for God’s sake?”
There is a spindle on her desk. I see my hand go out slowly and pick it up and I see my other hand pull the papers off the spindle. The round hardwood base fits against the heel of my hand. The spindle sticks out between my middle and ring finger, six inches long and sharp.
In a husky whisper she says, “Marty! No, honey. No.”
“Bring the cash box out of the safe like always, Floss.”
She sits straight and folds her hands and puts them on the edge of the desk. I look at her throat because I cannot look at her eyes. “Marty, I know you. You are a nice guy, Marty. I can loan you maybe thirty dollars out of my purse. You want to stick me with that thing, go ahead. Do me the favor, please. Because if I am so wrong about somebody I know so long, then I do not care to hang around this cruddy world. If you can do it, we’re both dead. Come on, Marty. It doesn’t take much guts to stick an old lady.”
I have been holding the base so tightly my fingers hurt. I watch my hands as they put it back on the desk and pick up the papers and put them back on the spindle where they belong.
As I am walking out I hear her saying, “Marty? Marty?” I know she is following me. After I am on the street I do not hear her anymore.
I am back at the apartment. Andrea is not there. I try the door, and she forgot to make sure it locked. It is dark. I turn all the lights on, every one there is.
The corners of the mirror in the bathroom are still misted. There are still droplets on the inside of the yellow curtain. There are humid scents of her, of perfume, sprays, lotions.
I sit on the dressing table bench and I can see myself in the mirror. Swarthy stranger with a black shadow of stubble, mild brown eyes, receding hairline, a torso city-soft under the clothing. Tie pulled down, the knot greasy. Ring of black around the collar of the soiled white shirt. Under the clothing are varicosities, a chronic chest rash, recurring problems with piles, a tendency toward high blood pressure, an increasing shortness of breath these past couple of years.