“You’re on,” Boomer said.
He finished racking them, surprised at his own steadiness. He had not planned to play for that much money. Boomer might run out without giving him a shot. Boomer had gone over to the nearby table and was whispering with his backer, whose face was impassive. Eddie looked at him and immediately knew he would miss soon.
Boomer stepped up to the table, drew back his cue and slammed into the rack of balls. They spread out, but nothing fell in. “Son of a bitch!” he said, this time meaning it.
The balls were wide, and the eight was an inch from the side pocket. After making the others, Eddie could bring the cue ball near it for a simple cross-side bank. First, he would have to cut the seven thin, slip it into the bottom corner, and let his cue ball roll the length of the table to sit down by the three. It wasn’t easy. He glanced up at Boomer, who was standing a few feet from the table.
“Don’t miss,” Boomer said.
Eddie stared at him a moment. “Boomer,” he said, “you’re scared of me.”
He bent down, stroked smoothly, and cut the seven ball in. The cue ball rolled up the table and sat down sweetly behind the three. He shot it in, and then the four ball and the two and the others, finally giving himself position for the bank on the eight ball. He stopped a second to chalk his cue and then bent, stroked, shot. The eight ball struck the cushion smartly, rolled across the table and fell into the pocket.
Boomer got the money from his backer, handed it to Eddie. This time Eddie did not take out his wallet. He folded the bills and pushed them down into his pants pocket while Boomer stood watching. “You’re not quitting, are you?” Eddie said pleasantly. He liked the way his voice sounded.
Boomer shook his head.
“Then rack the balls,” Eddie said.
He got her number from long-distance information and dialed from the phone by his bed. It was a little before one. He had woken up at noon, showered, and ordered coffee from room service.
“Pat told me you were living alone,” she said. Her voice did not sound friendly, but at least she was willing to talk.
“I sure am.”
“Where are you?”
“In the Holiday Inn in Haneyville, North Carolina.”
“What in god’s name are you doing in North Carolina?”
“Playing pool for money.”
“I thought you didn’t do that anymore.”
“Sometimes I even surprise myself.”
“Is that what you called to tell me?”
“I’ll be at Bluegrass Airport at six. If you’ll pick me up, I’ll take you to the Japanese place for dinner.”
“Eddie,” she said, “I don’t know….”
“I know,” he said, looking at the stack of over four thousand dollars he had won from Boomer. “Pick me up at the airport. We ought to be together.”
She was there waiting for him, looking terrific in a black wool sweater and blue jeans, her gray hair freshly washed and fluffy around her face, like a movie star on her day off. He was carrying his cue and nylon bag, and they didn’t kiss. She shook his hand, looking him over. Neither of them spoke. Finally she said, “We don’t know each other very well at all.”
“Like hell we don’t,” he said.
She hadn’t found herself a job yet and was getting tired of looking. She would have given up weeks before and settled for living on alimony if it weren’t that staying in the apartment was driving her crazy. They had a long quiet supper while she told him these things; afterward they went back to her apartment and, for the first time, made love. They were like old friends, old lovers. The week apart and the trip and the money had changed everything for him and they could both feel it. He knew what to do and so did she. They lay on her sofa bed afterward and talked. He would look for a while at the lights of downtown outside her windows, closed now against a September chill, and then turn back to her smooth white body beside him in the bed. They smoked his cigarettes and stubbed them out in a coffee saucer between them.
“You’re playing pool for money again?” she said, breaking the silence.
“It’s been a long time.”
“You mean gambling, don’t you? Not just giving an exhibition.”
“That’s right. Gambling.”
“In England people spoke of billiards sharks. You call them hustlers, I think. Is that what you are?”
He looked at her a moment. “I’m not a pool shark.”
“I’m sorry. What do I call you—a hustler?”
“Call me Eddie and hand me a cigarette.”
She frowned and gave him one. “Whatever you are, you aren’t a professor.”
He took the cigarette and lit it. “I fly to Albuquerque in a month to do an exhibition. Before that I’m going to Memphis to play eight-ball at a roadhouse called Thelma’s. How would you like to come along?”
“You want me to travel with you? Like a gun moll or something?”
“There you go again.”
“As the consort of a pool player.”
“Do you have anything better to do?”
She rolled over and kissed him on the neck. “No, I haven’t,” she said.
“You’d like it if I played tennis.”
“Or bridge?” Arabella, dressed only in pale blue panties, was pulling something big out of the closet. Another painting, apparently, wrapped in brown paper. She laid it flat in the center of the living room and, while Eddie watched from the bed, seated herself cross-legged on the rug and began to remove masking tape from the paper. “Or the French horn?”
“Something like that. Shooting pool sounds like shooting craps.”
“It does?” She got one end of the wrapping free and began slipping the framed picture out of it. Eddie leaned up on his elbow to see it better but could not make it out. Her small breasts as she bent over were wonderful, and so was the curved ridge of her backbone. “What happened to nightgowns?” he asked.
“It’s a warm apartment.” She began folding the paper neatly into a square, pressing the wrinkles out of it. He had already noticed the towels in the bathroom closet, folded and stacked as though displayed in an expensive store. Everything about her apartment was orderly. When she finished, she got up from the floor and carried the paper to the green oriental chest at the far wall and set it neatly in a drawer. From the drawer she took out a hammer and brought it over to the bed. “Here,” she said. “You can drive the nail.”
“Toss it on the bed. I’ll get it in a minute.”
“Come on, Eddie. I want to hang this picture.”
He reached over and got a cigarette. “Not without coffee.”
“I’ll make some instant.”
“Instant coffee leads to divorce.”
“Maybe so,” she said. “I’ll use the Vesuviana. It would be simpler if you’d take tea in the morning.”
“Arabella,” Eddie said, “it would be simpler if the world was flat.”
“I’ll make the coffee.” She tossed the hammer beside him on the bed and went to the stove. “Why should I want you to play tennis, Eddie?”
“It has class.”
She turned to him from the stove with the coffee can in her hand. “I hate that word. My grandmother used it all the time. It was working class or leisure class.”
“That’s not what I meant. You’re an aristocrat.”
“Come on, Eddie,” she said. “It’s my accent. You Americans are all alike when it comes to British accents.”
“I mean the way you look. The way your apartment looks, with the white floor and oil paintings.”