Small World (27 page)

It took Roger fifteen minutes to sneak into the bedroom to retrieve the minimizer from the closet and then to rummage the kitchen for some grub, zap it, and return to the Doll’s White House. She was dozing by then, slumped over the table, still hiccuping irregularly in her sleep.

It was necessary to remove a wall, actually less noisy than trying to open one of the windows. He did it as if he were a surgeon :utting something nasty out of someone’s brain. Moving slowly
2
nd smoothly, he piled an assortment of miniaturized fruits and

• egetables, a chunk of cheese, a loaf of bread, and a six pack of Heineken neatly on the table. He could feel her small heat near his hands. It made him want badly to touch her, comfort her. But he resisted, feeling she would only be frightened. Some other time.

To wake her, he rattled the wall just a little putting it back in place. She jerked convulsively, coming out of her doze, and he saw saliva glistening on her hands where she had drooled as she slept. He was sure from her dazed expression that she had not seen the wall out of place.

She might not have noticed if he’d left it out. Stock still, she stared at the food on the table. Then, with a deep pleased sigh, she reached out for the banana. He suppressed a chuckle when she sniffed it carefully. He wished he’d been around to see her try the fake fruit. Lucy’s unknowing revenge, and it made him marvel at how the world went round. Good thing the stuff hadn’t been the kind made out of pins, but surely she would have noticed. She must have been pretty hungry to go for the dough fruit.

A good appetite, he told himself, was a good sign. She crammed the banana into her mouth in a very unladylike way. She looked around at him, with her big wide unblinking eyes, and shoved the last bit of banana into her mouth with her fist. Just like the monkeys at the zoo. She dropped the peel on the table and looked away from him, back to the business at hand.

A tiny hand went directly for the beer. Roger grinned. Best thing for her, full of good stuff. He watched her upend the green bottle and gulp a nice mouthful. It made him a little thirsty to watch. Not too fast, he wanted to tell her, savor it. She seemed to hear him without his ever saying it. She looked at the tiny tw'ist-off cap in her hand as if she had never seen one before and dropped it on the table. One more good swig and she wiped the back of her hand across her mouth and put down the bottle, in favor of a bite of the cheese.

The Eye watched her and she watched it, out of the corner of her eye. It was not Dolly Hardesty’s eye; this one was brown and seemed, perhaps because it
had
fed her, rather kind.

The weakness was passing off. She was starting to feel the food, not just filling the hole in her middle, but in the steadying of her trembling muscles, the diminishing of her headache. It all tasted like manna from heaven. She did savor the tastes, deliberately slowing the rate of her consumption.

She finished off the first bottle of beer with a round, satisfying burp. It brought up the mingled flavors of the Heineken, banana, bread, and a creamy Danish cheese she had always liked. The combination was no less wonderful the second time around. Tipping back her chair, she surveyed the remains of her feast.

After some consideration, she decided that one end of the centerpiece would do for a three-sided tray. With the rimless side held against her body, she could safely transport the rest of the food and drink back to her bedroom. A head of Boston lettuce tried to get away, rolling off the heap. She propped it into place, and moved slowly out of the room, bearing her tray pregnantly before her. It was immensely satisfying to climb back into bed and picnic on more beer, bread, and Havarti cheese. By the time she had upended the second bottle, she found the whole situation amusing. She belched loudly and giggled.

The Eye that watched her followed her passage back to bed. It peeked in at the bedroom window while she wallowed in the sudden, incredible luxury of a full stomach. She ignored it. It was much more fun to slip into a tipsy doze. If she dreamed of a liquid brown sun in a land of bread and cheese and strange, doughy bananas, she had forgotten by morning.

Roger watched until she had fallen asleep. Passed out. He couldn’t help grinning. The dollhouse was still lit up as if for some state entertainment. He hit the main switch. It hit him all at once that he was dead on his feet. He had forgotten, watching his teeny tiny woman, that it was very late and Dolly, sleeping while he looked after Leyna, would not allow him to sleep in. She had a busy day all planned for him. With a faint surge of resentment nsing in his heart, he crept off to his own bed..

Tne next day began badly. Ruta bitched to Dolly that she didn’t

• now how she was supposed to cook when her vital supplies were pilfered in the night. Dolly jumped on Roger before he had so much as a sip of his coffee, accusing him of breaking his diet. Wearily, he showed her the state of the State Dining Room, its

alls still smeared, the fruit like Ichabod Crane’s pumpkin in -hatters, and the evidence in Leyna’s bedroom that the food had gone into her, not Roger.

Beer!’ exclaimed Dolly. ‘You gave her beer?’

She had to find something to pick at, if he was innocent of the r?rst sin of which she had accused him.

It’s full of carbohydrates and good stuff,’ Roger defended himself.

She looks like she passed out to me.’

Roger took a peek in the window. Leyna was sprawled across the bed, snoring gently. There was a distinct aroma of stale beer in the room.

You have to take better care of her,’ he muttered.

"Me? I didn't give her the beer.’

No, I mean she’s really thin. She’s got to be fed up. get some 159

weight back on her. And her clothes. She still needs some clothes.’

‘I’ll give her the jogging outfit. I haven’t got anything else just now.’

‘How about dolls’ clothes?’

Dolly’s eyes narrowed as she thought rapidly. ‘I’ll check into it.’

Roger stared down into his coffee cup. Black and bitter and about as filling as a gust of wind.

‘Okay,’ he sighed. ‘I’m going to the gym.’

Maybe he could sneak out and find a jelly doughnut somewhere. He didn’t mind the workouts. While his body was occupied, he found he thought better. It was a curious phenomenon to him. He’d like to look up the scientific literature and find out what was going on inside himself. Something to do with the old alpha waves, no doubt, but that would be the obvious, surface development. Something had to trigger those brain waves.

That morning’s workout he devoted to thinking about Leyna. He was more and more convinced that she should be left alone to make the best adjustment to her new life. She should do for herself, to give her something to do. And the shocks would be, ah, minimized. But he was too out of breath to laugh at his own witticism. Yeah, the walls should stay in place; their hands should stay out of the Doll’s White House. It disturbed her to be watched, therefore their watching must be unobstrusive.

Obvious solution: Zap television cameras and install them. Dolly would wince at the expense because he would have to use the best color cameras, not the cheap black-and-white boxes banks used for security. It was something they should have done right away.

Maybe he was getting soft, but the kicks were mostly gone from the act of stealing. He had Dolly, at least some of her, some of the time. And he had his teeny tiny woman and his minimizer. That ought to be enough for any sane man.

Dolly lit a cigarette impatiently. She couldn’t believe Roger’s reaction. Take a man’s advice seriously and get it blown back in your face every time, like so much cigarette ash.

Roger fingered the dolls’ clothes she’d purchased, and giggled. Slipping an index finger and a pinkie into the sleeves of one dress, he bent the two middle digits down below the necklace for decolletage and danced his new puppet across the coffee table.

When he picked up a pair of trousers and started to push his fingers into the legs, Dolly snatched them away.

‘Jesus Christ,’ she hissed at him.

‘I was just fooling,’ he apologized.

He looked at his fingers as if they had grabbed a strange tit without asking him first.

Dolly folded the little garments and returned them to their box. ‘Got a letter from my mother,’ Roger announced.

'That’s nice.’

Dolly wasn’t very interested in Roger’s mother. One glance at the picture Roger carried in his wallet had made it clear she should save her energy.

From his breast pocket, Roger retrieved a much folded sheet of paper and smoothed it nervously on his knee.

‘I really think I should go home and see her,’ he told Dolly earnestly.

‘Oh wonderful.’ Dolly sat down and crushed out her cigarette. 'Is she sick, or something?’

‘Well, no. But I think I should make a quick trip back home and

Dolly’s eyebrows rose skeptically.

‘Me too,’ she muttered.

Roger sighed and passed the sheet of paper to her. Taking it a :tie reluctantly, she grimaced at the scent of violets and shook it : nce, as if to bring it to order or shake off an insect.

It was written in a fine, spidery scrawl; she read;

Dear Roger,

How is my baby doing in the Big Bad City? I couldn’t help it after you called last night I just cried. You’d think I would be used to being an old lady all by myself now. But when you went away to college, you came home every weekend and I never felt like you were really, really gone. But nevermind me. 1 am just an old woman all by myself with no husband and no chicks to cluck over.

I am okay, except for slow bowels and I asked Dr. Silverstein about that, arid he said I have to expect some change with age. I have a new girl to train in the office and she is so stupid but what do you expect. All she is interested in is her hair and her boyfriend. I guess I can remember what that was like, old fossil that I am, and probably I was foolish to pass up my chances to get married again after your daddy passed to the Other Side but I felt my boy needed me and I had to think of you first. Thanks for the scarf with the Big Apple on it. It goes real good with my pink pantsuit and I feel like a regular world traveler when I wear it. The girls at the office ask me did I get it in New York visiting you and I say, 'No, I haven’t been there yet but I expect Roger will ask me anytime now. as soon as he’s settled.’

Well, I won’t take up any more of your valuable time, hon. I like the postcards you send but I sure would like a nice long letter or another call, or better yet, to see you at the door when I get home from work some night. Supper’s a dull business without my boy cracking jokes to me. I just sit in front of the news and can't get my meal down for the terrible things going on. Then I just sit around watching the shows until bedtime with not a soul to pass the time of day with. Probably you’re out on the town with some cute girl, eating in fancy restaurants, and going to shows. I hope you don’t overspend your pay. Foolish living always catches up with a person, hon; you may think me an old foggy, but lots of girls are not very nice, especially in a place like New York, full of homosexuals and other wicked people.

Well, I am going to try to get some sleep tonight for a change (a woman just three years older than I am over on Ocean View Drive was murdered in her sleep by a burglar or pervert or someone last Thursday night; she was a retired schoolteacher and a spinster and all by herself). Maybe I will have the beans to tackle some of the chores around here tomorrow. The Screen door is awful loose. If I can’t fix it, I’ll have to hire someone and I’m afraid it’s going to be terribly expensive. I don't guess on my income I can afford a Mexican gardener yet.

Spare a thought for your mom, baby. She’s thinking of you all the time.

Love,

Mom

Dolly finished the letter with a fine bloom of red in her cheeks. She folded it up and thrust it back at Roger.

‘Does she always write like that?’

‘That’s the longest she’s ever written.’ He put the letter carefully back into his breast pocket. ‘She’s not used to me being away, not for this length of time. She’s dependent on me.’

‘Do you think it’s wise to give in to this kind of blatant emotional manipulation?’

Roger’s chin set stubbornly. ‘I think I should go home and calm her down a little.’

‘Do you?’ Dolly stood up and stalked to the window to stare angrily at an oblivious Manhattan. ‘Well, I wouldn’t want your mother to get all upset and trembly.'

This was genuinely distressing to Roger. He had dared hope for some understanding from Dolly. It had not been an easy choice, torn as he was between his concern for Leyna, his need for Dolly, and guilt over his mother.

He made excuses. ‘I should close up my workshop there. There’s stuff I could use here, and it isn’t safe to leave it behind.’

The hint of finality in his plans soothed Dolly.

‘You’re going to work here?’

If you could find me a corner, that would be tremendous.’

‘I want you to. You won’t stay away long, will you?’

She had only to look at him to make Roger waver.

A week, no more,’ he promised.

She smiled and leaned against him, ‘Just don’t go off and forget me like an umbrella or something.’