Brass Bed (15 page)

“As a matter of fact, I have. My interest in this celebration is increasing, and I’m prepared to make an investment in it.”

“Good for you. It gives me pleasure to see you exhibit this fine spirit. How substantial an investment are you prepared to make?”

“I regret that it must be limited, but I am willing to go as high as twenty-five dollars if necessary.”

“Quite acceptable, old boy. The returns on an investment of that amount should be quite solid, especially if you are willing to drink simple highballs instead of fancier concoctions.” He spoke with fastidious enunciation.

“It’s agreed, then, that we will purchase a little loose living in the amount of twenty-five dollars apiece in celebration of being temporarily out of employment. Where shall we start?”

“I don’t want to dictate the program, so I suggest that we go down to Nick’s for a steak and come to an agreement at our leisure.”

“That’s a good idea, and I go along with it. As a matter of fact, the mention of steak reminds me that I’m hungry. My appetite, in spite of recent disasters, has picked up considerably the last few days. It’s because of the rain and cool air, I think.”

“I’ve noticed the same improvement in my own appetite, and you are almost certainly correct in your diagnosis. Rain and cool air will invariably work wonders,” Harvey said very solemnly.

We finished the last two cans of beer and went downstairs and stood on the sidewalk looking at our cars parked at the curb.

“We must decide which car we are going to take,” Harvey said.

“Which one would be less likely to break down, do you think?”

“I don’t want to malign your car, old boy, but mine has recently had a ring job and new spark plugs. Does yours have anything that would entitle it to equal consideration?”

“No, it doesn’t,” I said, perhaps a little thickly. “I concede that your car must be considered the more reliable.”

“That’s extremely honest of you, old boy. Fair’s fair, and I can always count on you to recognize it, and my car is the one we will go in.”

WE DROVE
to Nick’s and went inside and sat at one of the tables with red-checked cloths. Nick waved and nodded and smiled, and Irene came over to the table with her nice, large movement and looked down at us with an expansive display of remarkable teeth.

“Hello, you two,” she said.

I said hello, and so did Harvey.

“How’s George?” Harvey added.

“George is fine. Fine and faithful.”

“Is that so? It makes me sad to hear it. I was hoping that you had embarked on separate careers of infidelity.”

“No, we keep the faith. In spite of temptation, we adhere to our vows.”

“In that case, I don’t suppose you would be interested in participating in a ripsnorting celebration?”

“With whom and why?”

“With Felix and me, because school is out and we are happily unemployed. We have allotted ourselves twenty-five dollars worth of frivolity apiece, and we would be happy to cut you in for a full third without monetary remuneration.”

“What kind of remuneration would be expected?”

“That is something we could work out together at the proper time.”

She patted Harvey on the head and showed her remarkable teeth.

“Oh, you are a temptation to me. You are a constant temptation.”

“Is it agreed, then, that you will go?”

“No, it is not agreed. I must decline your very kind invitation with thanks,” Irene said.

“Do you understand that we are going away tomorrow? Are you perfectly aware that it will be a full month before you will see us again?”

Irene sighed. “My heart is heavy with the knowledge, but I must still decline the invitation.”

“That being so, you may offer my regards to George and bring me a filet with mushrooms.”

“I’ll have a filet too,” I said.

“Filets yet,” she said. “We really are celebrating, aren’t we?”

“And a baked potato with sour cream sauce,” Harvey said.

“As for me,” I said, “I will have butter on my potato instead of sour cream.”

“And beer to begin,” she said. “Naturally you will have beer.”

“Naturally,” Harvey said.

She moved largely and nicely away, and Harvey watched her and sighed.

“That George,” he said. “He is a great nuisance.”

“He certainly is,” I said.

“I can’t understand it. It seems to me to go against the laws of nature.”

“Perhaps it is more a matter of the laws of economics.”

“I see what you mean, and you have surely made a pertinent point. These days, a brick layer has all the advantages over a mathematics teacher.”

“Especially a brick layer with an Olds Ninety-Eight convertible.”

“That’s true. It is almost impossible to compete with an Olds Ninety-Eight.”

“It is certainly difficult, anyhow. An Olds Ninety-Eight is only slightly less formidable than a Cadillac.”

“May I take that remark to be a specific reference?”

“As a friend and good companion, you may.”

“Thanks, old boy. I only wanted to ask if you have seen Jolly since the recent lamentable episode at the river.”

“I have seen her, and I have talked with her on the telephone.”

“Is that all? I thought that the pair of you would now, perhaps, make a little better time.”

“You were mistaken. We are not making any time at all.”

“Really? I’m astonished and puzzled. Would you care to explain why it is that you’re making no time?”

“I have just decided that it would not be a good thing, that’s all.”

“Well, I can only say that it seems a damned peculiar time to make such a decision. Just when the way has been cleared for you and everything, I mean.”

“However peculiar it may seem, that’s what I have decided.”

“Look here, old boy. You aren’t letting this thing mess you up, are you? You know what I mean. Guilt feelings and all that? Some idea of giving her up to pay for your sins or something?”

“Not at all.”

“Are you sure? If it’s something like that, I happen to know a damn good psychiatrist over at medical center who could straighten you out in jig time.”

“It’s nothing of the sort, I tell you. I’m perfectly all right.”

“I’m very fond of you, you know, and I wouldn’t want to see you develop one of these nasty mental things that people are always coming up with for one reason or another.”

“Thank you, Harvey, but it is unnecessary for you to worry about it at all.”

We drank some beer, and Irene brought the steaks and things. The steaks were thick and of large size and covered with an excellent mushroom sauce. In placing Harvey’s plate in front of him, it was necessary for Irene to reach across his shoulder, and he turned his head to look at the closest part of her.

Irene left, and we ate. We also talked about the possible advantages of going to Sylvester’s.

Harvey said, “I can’t think of anyplace where we could be relieved of fifty clams with more dispatch than at Sylvester’s.”

“True. Sylvester has made a fine art of cutting throats. However, there will be compensation. Gloria Finch is singing at Sylvester’s this week, and I have it from an eye-and-ear witness that she is always well oiled for the late shows, at which times she gets dirty and frequently removes an article or two of clothing. This is all the more interesting because an article or two is all she wears to start with, and never more than three. Do you think we could stretch our clams to the late shows?”

“Well, teachers are of necessity about as good at stretching clams as it is possible to be. If we can’t do it, it can’t be done.”

“You have expressed yourself tersely, lucidly and with truth, and it is a pleasure to be in your company. Shall we go to Sylvester’s? It is now seven-thirty, and it will take us a good half hour to get downtown.”

“In your car, it may even take longer.”

“That’s true. I admit that even with a ring job and new spark plugs, my car is capable of no more than an adequate performance.”

“It was rude of me to mention it.” I waved a finger at him.

“Not at all. Truth is truth, and adequate is adequate. I understand that you meant no offense, and none is taken.”

We got up and went over to the cash register and paid for our steaks and said goodbye to Nick. He said he was sad to see us go and would be looking forward to our return. Irene was busy waiting on a man and two women at a table and did not see us leave.

“Tell Irene goodbye for us,” Harvey said. “Tell her it was much easier this way.”

Nick laughed at the little joke and held his sides.

“Much easier,” Harvey said.

We went out to Harvey’s car and got in, and it performed adequately and got us downtown to Sylvester’s in forty minutes. It was getting dark, and the lights were on, all the neons and fluorescents and incandescents, and there wasn’t really much to what we were doing or intended doing, but there was a kind of excitement in it nevertheless.

T
AVING HAD
two of them,” Harvey said, “I am prepared to say that the drinks are adequate.”

“At a clam per,” I said, “they can afford to be adequate.”

“That’s true,” Harvey agreed. “There is no question that we are paying dearly for reputation and atmosphere, to say nothing of the possible improvisations of Gloria Finch.”

“Diddle Gloria Finch,” I said.

“Well,” Harvey said, “I’ve heard that it can be done, but it would undoubtedly cost more than the fifty clams we have agreed to spend between us.”

We sat at the bar, which was a very fancy bar with extremely efficient bartenders, and all around us was a lot of glass and leather and stuff that may have been made of bronze, and there was a kind of period effect to it all, lush and regal and sort of modified Victorian or something, and the report was that Sylvester was a guy who prided himself on not going too far over on the modern side. This distaste for the modern did not extend, however, to modern prices, and Sylvester’s was a poor place to go looking for a two-bit beer or a four-bit shot, and in fact you would have grown old and gray and eventually quite dead before you ever found them.

There had not been many patrons there when we first came, but we had nursed the two drinks over a considerable period of time, which is only good economics at a clam per, and people had kept coming in and dispersing along the bar and among the tables, and now there were quite a few of them. There was a small orchestra that played smoothly and softly and without distinction, and a number of the men patrons danced with an equal number of women patrons on a small dance floor that required minimum movement and maximum contact. I watched the dancing patrons in the mirror behind the bar, and I began remembering the poem I had recited to Jolly and Fran and Sid at Jolly’s house, the one about the medieval university student who had gone down among the maidens and the dancing feet, but there was a gaiety and abandon in the poem that was lacking in the present reality, and all in all the comparison was unfortunate and did little or nothing to support the spirit of celebration. I ordered third drinks for Harvey and me and kept watching what went on in the glass, and there all of a sudden, was Fran getting closer and closer.

“There’s Fran,” I said.

“Where?” Harvey said.

“In the glass behind the bar.”

He looked and found her and nodded.

“You’re right,” he said. “It’s certainly Fran. Do you think she’s seen us?”

“I do.”

“Would you say that she is merely approaching the bar, or would you say that she is approaching us specifically and the bar incidentally?”

“Us specifically.”

“That’s what I thought myself,” he said. “What a shame that I’ve shaved off my whiskers.”

We continued to watch her, and she got up to us and put one arm around Harvey’s neck and the other one around mine.

“Hello, you guys,” she said.

“Greetings,” I said.

“And salutations,” Harvey said.

She turned her head one way and kissed Harvey on the right cheek, and then turned it the other way and kissed me on the left cheek.

“It’s impossible for me to say how happy I am to see you,” she said.

“We are happy to see you too,” Harvey said. “At least I’m happy, and I’m sure I speak truthfully for Felix also. Is it true that you are happy to see Fran again, Felix?”

“I’m happy and delighted,” I said.

“Well,” she said, “I must say that you guys seem very gay.”

“We are,” I said. “We resolved to be gay, and that’s what we are.”

“In fact,” Harvey said, “we are celebrating the temporary termination of bondage.”

“Bondage?” Fran said. “Are you out on bail or something?”

“Not at all.” Harvey spoke with dignity and drained the glass that had contained his third drink. “What I mean is, school is out, and this is a happy occasion that is generally celebrated one way or another by all concerned. When I was a kid, I used to celebrate it by taking off my shoes. Now I celebrate it in the company of a true friend by submitting my throat to Sylvester’s painless butchery.”

Fran snorted, “Well, come and submit it across the room. Jolly’s waiting for us there.”

“Do you mean that you and Jolly are here at Sylvester’s by yourselves?” I asked her.

“Of course not, Felix. It wouldn’t be proper for Jolly and me to come here unescorted, and moreover Sylvester wouldn’t permit it. Sid has come with us, and I can’t understand, anyhow, why you have to be so curious. The point is, you are invited to come and sit with us at our table, and I am here to deliver the invitation.”

“We accept with pleasure,” Harvey said.

“Speaking for myself,” I said, “I decline with regret.”

“Well, that makes no sense whatever,” Fran said. “If you decline with regret, why decline at all?”

“It may have slipped your mind,” I said, “that Jolly has only recently buried a husband, and it is my opinion that a new widow is no asset to a celebration.”

“But you are absolutely mistaken,” she said. “As you surely remember, Kirby never contributed much to a party, and things are likely to go much better and livelier without him.”

“That’s not the point.”

“Isn’t it? Perhaps you would be good enough to tell me what the point is.”