Having finished his drink by then, he mixed another for himself and one for her and carried them out. She had gone directly to her own room, however, and so he followed her there and rapped on the door with the edge of the glass in his right hand. She asked who it was and invited him in when he told her, but he was obliged, because of the glasses, to ask her to open the door from the inside.
“I thought you might like a drink,” he said.
“Thank you.”
She took the drink and carried it to a table and set it down without tasting it. Carrying his own, he crossed to the bed and sat down on the edge of it. She was really very beautiful, he thought, watching her. She was more beautiful than she had been when he married her, and this was rather remarkable because she was thirty-eight years old now, ten years younger then he. He conceded the beauty and admired it — and was not stirred by it in the least.
“I’ve decided that I’ll drive out to the house,” he said.
“Have you? I thought you planned to stay in town.”
“I did plan to stay, but I’ve changed my mind. Would you like to come along?”
“No. It’s impossible. I have commitments here.”
“Do you object to my going alone?”
“Not at all. Please do just as you like about it.”
He lifted his glass and lowered it and sat for a moment looking down into it. “As a matter of fact,” he said, “I’ve been thinking of going away for a while.”
“Away? Where?”
“I don’t know. Just somewhere for a change. Only for a few days, perhaps a week.”
“I see. Perhaps it would be a good idea if you did go. You’ve been looking rather tired. Are you feeling well?”
“Quite well. I’m neither tired nor ill. Just stale, that’s all.”
“In that case, a change would undoubtedly do you good.”
“Well, I haven’t definitely decided. I’ll let you know, of course, if I do.”
“All right.”
He drank again from his glass, and she stood watching him, obviously waiting for him to leave. She wanted to change her clothes, and she did not want to undress in front of him. In all the years they had been married, she had never undressed in front of him or permitted him to see her naked.
“I would like your judgment on something,” he said.
“My judgment? On what? Not on a business matter, I hope.”
“It is, in a way, as a matter of fact. Something a little out of my line, however. I think your judgment would certainly be of value to me.”
“What is it?”
“It has to do with the local shop in which you bought two original gowns. The shop owned by Aaron Burns, who died recently. You’ll remember that I was there with you when you bought the second gown.”
“Yes, I remember.”
“Do you also remember the young lady who designed the gowns?”
“Yes, I remember. Donna Buchanan. She’s very talented.”
“Do you intend to continue buying gowns from her?”
“Yes, I do. I’m convinced she will build quite a reputation. Why are you so interested?”
“As I said, it’s a matter of business. She wants to borrow money to buy the shop, so she can continue to use it as an outlet for her work.”
“Then loan it to her. She will certainly be successful.”
“As a designer, I have no doubt. But there is more than that to running a successful business.”
“Well, that’s something I know nothing about.”
“It will take at least two hundred thousand dollars. That’s quite a lot of money to invest with no more security than the shop itself.”
“Surely you don’t expect me to advise you regarding your investments.”
“Of course not. All I wanted, really, was your opinion of Miss Buchanan’s ability.”
“I’ve told you that. She is certain, in my judgment, to go a long way.”
“Isn’t it rather unusual for a designer to start in this way? Don’t they usually get a position with a large outfit, or something of the sort?”
“I suppose they do, usually. I suspect that Miss Buchanan is an unusual person.”
“Yes. I suspect that myself.” He drained his glass and stood up. “Well,” he said, “I think I’ll get started for the country.”
“All right. I hope you have a pleasant weekend.” He went over to her and touched his lips to her cheek and went out.
She undressed and lay down on the bed and began to think about the harpist, another talented young woman, whose expenses she was paying at a local conservatory.
3.
Enos Simon walked slowly beneath the pines of Pine Hill. It was four o’clock, and he had survived another day of classes, which was something to be thankful for, but how to survive the day after, or the days after and after and after, was something he could not imagine or even bear to think of. Fortunately, however, it was not necessary to think of it, at least not at the moment, because this was Friday and there were no more classes until Monday. This was something else for which he could, he supposed, be thankful. He walked slowly because he was by no means eager to reach his destination and because he was much more tired than he should have been. But he soon reached the house in which he lived, which was only a short distance from the school, right at the foot of the hill, and inside in his room he stood looking out the window and up the hill in the direction from which he had just come.
He hated the hill and the pines. He would have hated them anyhow, for reasons he would never understand, but he especially hated them because they looked like a hill and pines he had known in another place in another time. The place was not far away, nor the time so very long ago, and from his window there he had looked down the hill instead of up; but otherwise the two views were almost identical. Sometimes he had the feeling, looking out the window and up the hill, that the same doctor who had gone to talk with him there would return to talk with him here. He had not hated the doctor, who tried to be kind and helpful, but neither had he wanted to talk with him, always feeling relieved when he went away. One of the reasons he had not wanted to talk was that he would say things about himself that he afterward regretted saying. When he felt this regret he would go back over the conversation in his mind, trying to recall it precisely — and this was disturbing. Quite a long while after he had left the place — especially at times when he was particularly depressed — he would find himself trying to reconstruct one of these conversations. It was impossible, of course, to do this accurately, and the remembered conversation would be a mosaic of bits gathered from many conversations and imagined words that had never actually been said.
“How are you feeling today?” the doctor asked.
He did not feel like talking and remained silent. He wished the doctor would go away.
“Don’t you feel like talking?” the doctor said. “Do you want me to leave you alone?”
This was, of course, what he did want, but he could not bring himself to say so, for the doctor meant well and was only trying to be kind and helpful.
“It’s just that I don’t feel very well,” he said.
“I’m sorry to hear that. Do you think I might be able to help you? In what way do you feel bad?”
“Well, in a number of ways, actually. It’s rather hard to put your finger on anything specifically. My head aches quite a bit — it’s not exactly an ache, more like it’s sort of stuffed with something. And I ache in other places too, and feel as if I had a fever.”