Never Love a Stranger (41 page)

I remembered breakfast with the folks: the smell of the rolls slightly warm from the bakery after I had just brought them in—the way my aunt would smile at me. I remembered high school and the kids laughing as we crossed the big yard going home. I remembered so many things, and all of a sudden I began to feel old and tired.

I went back to bed and stretched out. My tiredness left me, and I was wide awake again. I tossed and thought about Marianne, and about how she would sense that I couldn’t sleep and come into my bed and lie down beside me and we would talk and I would feel her warmth near me and I would become quiet and begin to relax and she would fall asleep and carelessly throw one long white leg over mine and then I would begin to fall asleep.

But Marianne wasn’t here and I couldn’t sleep. I could see her standing in the doorway saying good-bye. I could hear her voice, low and husky and controlled. What was it she had said? I tried to remember. And then I heard it and saw her say it, the shadow of the door half falling on her face.

“There’s something of Gerro in you—and something of me and all the other people you have ever known. But mostly there is you….”

But what about me? I had never turned to look inside myself. What about me? Of all the people I knew, I knew myself least of all. Why did I do things? What did I want? Why was I content to drift, never really searching for an answer to myself? I wondered. What did I want? Money? Love? Friends? Respect? I searched through my mind for the answer, but none was forthcoming.

I had read a lot while I lived with Marianne. She had quite a few books, and I had devoured them—some good, some bad—but the answer wasn’t in them. What did people think about me? What was there in me that they liked? Why did they take me into their homes and hearts when I had so little to give in return?

I missed Marianne. During the day I had slept. I had been exhausted. But now, with the night, came a new, a peculiar feeling of loneliness. I longed to go to the phone, pick it up, dial her number, and hear her low, soft voice answer: “Hello, darling.”

“Hello, darling!” But I couldn’t do that. You can never go back. That was something I learned a long time ago. You can never go back—never! At last I fell asleep. Marianne, Marianne, even my sleep was filled with you! My night was warm and alive with you. Would you ever let me go?

I woke up. The sun, streaming through the window, had hit my face. At first I threw my arm over my face, reluctant to get up and face the reality of the day. But bit by bit I came alive. I could feel the thoughts coming, stronger and stronger. This is tomorrow. This is today—your day. Get up. You’ve got to face it.

I went down the hall to the shower, and then came back to the room and dressed. I handed in my key at the desk as I left. This was too expensive a place for me with my pocket. Two dollars a day was too much. I would have to go back to the Mills Hotel. It was more my speed.

I bought a morning Times and glanced through the want ads. I didn’t know what kind of a job I wanted, but there wasn’t anything likely in the papers. I took a trip up to Sixth Avenue to the agencies, but no luck there. I wasn’t worried. I felt sure I’d get a break. This was tomorrow and it was mine.

Two months later it was still tomorrow. But I was beginning to wonder if it was mine. I was beginning to wonder if I would ever have the tomorrow I had promised myself. It was early March and still bitter cold. My new heavy, warm coat had long since gone the way of my watch and everything else I could hock. I hadn’t eaten a square meal in weeks. I had stood in bread lines, soup lines, work lines—all kinds of lines—but I hadn’t worked, not even a day.

Last night I had slept in a hallway; I was chased early in the morning, when I was cold and damp and chilled and miserable, by the super as he came to clean. I could still hear his hearty, full-voiced threats muttered in some guttural, foreign-sounding English. He stood there waving his broom at me. “You bums!” he had shouted. I scurried from the hall like a thief. I had only been stealing a night’s rest—a little peace.

I was hungry. I was cold. Automatically I reached for a cigarette, but I didn’t have any. I walked along the kerb looking for a butt. At last I snagged one. A man came walking down the street. He looked like he’d be good for a little tap. I watched him come towards me and then walk past me while I stood there motionless, frozen to the spot. After he had gone I was bitter with myself. Why didn’t I tap him? There’s nothing to it. All you have to say is: “Mister?” with a little whining sound in it. You didn’t have to say any more; they knew the rest. But I couldn’t bring myself to do it—not any more. There was something inside of me that seemed to stop me. I couldn’t do it. The man turned the corner. I walked on.

Fool! I kept saying over and over to myself. Fool! Fool! Aren’t you ever going to learn? Stop kidding yourself. You’re nothing special, no more than anyone else. Beg. Plead. Whine. Grovel. That’s the way to do it. That’s the way to get along.

Go back to Marianne—Marianne. She’ll take you back. You’ll be comfortable again. Warm and full of food and a woman. God what a woman would feel like just now! I began to laugh. Which would you rather have, I asked myself, a woman or a steak? I laughed again. My mouth watered as I could smell a steak sizzling as real as that lamp-post ahead.

I stopped in front of that door again and pulled the bell. I wondered what I could say to her. “Marianne, I’m hungry and tired and cold. Please let me in. Please take me back. I won’t go away again—not any more. Please, Marianne, please.”

What if she would say: “No! Go away!” But she couldn’t. She was mine. Didn’t she say so? After an age, the door opened.

“No; Miss Renoir doesn’t live here any more. She went home to Haiti last month. I’m sorry.”

The door closed. I stood there staring at it and then walked out. I crossed the street and began to walk uptown. I felt tall—terribly tall—like that time I had been tight, only taller. I laughed, thinking I was so big now I could look into second-storey windows as I walked by, and surprise the people. My head began to float through the air, and pretty soon it was pushing its way through the clouds. But the clouds were damp and dark and I couldn’t see and it was only a matter of minutes before I stumbled and began falling. And then it was night—New Year’s Eve—and I was strong and a million stars were out, all of them winking and blinking only at me. This was tomorrow—my tomorrow!

Chapter Fifteen

T
HEY
put me in a bed in a long, grey room with about forty other beds in it. The doctor came around in the evening and looked me over. The nurse was with him. He stood at the side of the bed and looked down at me. “How do you feel now?” he asked.

“Better,” I answered.

“This not eating is a bad business,” he said with a wry attempt at humour. He wasn’t telling me anything. I didn’t answer.

He turned to the nurse. “Better send for the registrar. We’ll keep him here for a day or two.” He turned to me and spoke again. “Take it easy for a while. Is there anything else you want?”

“Smokes?” I asked, afraid it might be too much to ask for.

He fished down into his pocket, dragged up a half-used package of Camels, and tossed them on the bed with some matches. “Keep them. But don’t let the nurse catch you. And don’t burn the place down,” he shrugged his shoulders expressively and looked around the room, “even if it looks like it should be.”

He walked off and the nurse followed him. He looked like a nice young kid. I was sorry I didn’t think to thank him for the smokes. I waited until they left the ward before I lit a cigarette, and then leaned back puffing it slowly. Cigarettes from a package have a better flavour than those you snag from the street.

The cigarette burned down, and I put it out in a plate on a stand next to the bed. I leaned back against the pillows and enjoyed their comfort. It was amazing how good you can feel with a full belly and a soft bed and the tender, acrid smoke of a cigarette still in your nostrils. I shut my eyes.

A voice beside the bed spoke softly, “Are you awake?”

I opened them quickly. A girl was sitting near my bed, a pad and pencil in her hand. “Yes,” I answered.

“I’m Miss Cabell,” she said. “I didn’t want to bother you if you were asleep, but we have to fill out these forms.”

“It’s O.K.,” I answered. “Go ahead.” There was something familiar about her. She wore

a brownish salt-and-pepper suit, very mannishly tailored, white blouse, and large horn- rimmed glasses.

“Your name, please?” she asked, and added apologetically: “There wasn’t anything in your clothes to tell us.”

“Kane,” I answered, still slowly trying to place her, “Francis Kane.” She wrote the name down. “Address, please?”

“None.”

“No home address?”

“No,” I said. “Make it New York City.” I was beginning to feel a little irritated. There was something about this girl. I knew her, and it was one of those things that stood right at the edge of your mind and you couldn’t get it out.

“Age?” she asked, not looking up from the pad. “Twenty-three.”

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I meant when were you born? What date?” “June 21st, 1912.”

She said, almost to herself: “Sex, male; colour, white; eyes, brown.” She looked up at me, “Complexion, dark; hair, grey-black.” She stopped. “You seem to have such grey hair.”

I answered shortly: “I worry a lot.”

“Oh!” she said, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be impertinent.” “It’s all right,” I said. “Forget it.”

She continued, “Your height?” “Five nine.”

“Weight?”

“One forty when I weighed myself last,” I answered.

She looked at me and smiled. The smile did it. It was a familiar smile—Marty. I knew her now—Marty and Ruth—Ruth Cabell. I hoped she didn’t remember me. I didn’t want anyone to see me like this.

“That must have been a while ago. We’d better make it one fifteen.” “As you like,” I said, trying to keep the excitement out of my voice. “Where do you work?” she asked.

“I don’t,” I answered. “I’m unemployed.” “What kind of work do you do?”

“Any kind,” I said, “that is, any kind I can get.” “Where were you born?”

“New York.”

“High school or any education?”

I almost dived into that. If I’d have said Washington High, she would have had me spotted.

“No,” I answered. “Sure?” she asked.

I noticed she wasn’t writing this down. There was a little glint of excitement in her eyes. “I should be,” I said.

She got up and walked to the foot of the bed and looked right into my face. I looked back at her. “Francis Kane,” she said to herself, reflectively. “Frank Kane. Frankie, Frankie, don’t you remember? I’m Ruth, Marty’s sister.”

Remember? How could I forget? Poker-faced, I replied, “I’m sorry, miss, you’ve got me mixed up with somebody else.”

“No, I haven’t,” she said half angrily, walking up the side of the bed to me. This was more like the old Ruth that I knew, that little show of temper. “You’re Francis Kane, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” I admitted, shaking my head.

“Then I’m right. I must be right.” She took off her glasses. “Look, you went to George Washington High School with my brother. You were in the orphanage—St. Thérèse. You

must remember.”

“I’m sorry,” I said. “You’re mistaken. I never went to any of those places. I don’t know your brother.”

“But your name is Francis Kane. You must be,” she insisted.

“Miss,” I said, trying to act patiently resigned, “the name’s not an unusual one. There must be quite a few of them.” I tried another tack: “Besides, what did this guy look like? Not much like me, I’ll bet.”

She looked at me for a few seconds before she answered. Then a little doubt crept into her voice. “No,” she answered, “not much like you, but that was eight years ago.”

“See?” I said, a slight note of triumph in my voice.

“No,” she said, “I don’t. I don’t see at all. You must have forgotten. You were sick. You could forget, you know. It’s happened before.”

“A man doesn’t forget his friends,” I said, “no matter how long it’s been since he’s seen them.”

She sat down again. “But maybe you have a touch of——” she hesitated at the word. “Amnesia?” I filled in for her and then laughed. “No, I don’t think so.”

“I can’t be wrong,” she insisted. She tried a new tack: “Remember Julie? She used to work for us. You gave my brother boxing lessons. And Jerry Cowan? Janet Lindell? Your aunt and uncle, Bertha and Morris Cain? Don’t those names mean anything to you at all?”

I shook my head and closed my eyes. Those names meant the world to me—a world of perfection and love. I opened my eyes again and shook my head from side to side. “No,” I said, “I never heard of them before.” I let my head sink back against the pillow.

She leaned forward, suddenly solicitous. “You’re tired. I’ve upset you. And you’re a little pale. I don’t want to upset you. I want to help you. Please try to remember. Remember there was Julie and then Janet, and I was a little jealous of them—a little jealous of you, of all the people that liked you and why they liked you. I didn’t know why. Maybe because it was that I liked you so much myself—more than I knew, more than I admitted myself. I used to pick on you and insult you. And one day in the hall of the school you kissed me. You said we’d be friends, remember?”

She turned her head away a little and continued to speak, “When you kissed me, I suddenly knew how I had felt about you —how I had always felt about you and I was ashamed of all the things, the nasty things, I had said to you. You must remember. You couldn’t forget.”

I laughed a little and injected a little sarcasm into my voice. “If I had ever kissed you, I wouldn’t forget very easily.”

Her cheeks began to grow red. She sat there angry with herself for blushing. I could see it. After a few seconds she controlled herself and turned back to me and spoke in an impersonal tone of voice again. “I’m sorry,” she said, “I could be wrong. I didn’t mean to offend you. I was only trying to help.”

“I know,” I answered softly, “and I appreciate it. I’m a little bit sorry I’m not the guy you’re looking for.”