I?”
“Alfred … I’m already in bed. I’m sorry. Really. Perhaps we can talk this weekend at the ranch. Would you like that? You’ll come out, won’t you?”
“Yeah, yeah,” Rinemiller said. “Ranch.” He repeated it again — “ranch” — as if it were an insight into something. It was not until he rang off that he remembered everyone was coming to the ranch for the weekend. It wasn’t a country house rendezvous with Ouida after all.
Still … he was able to tell himself there was some promise in what she’d said. She hadn’t hung up on him, hadn’t said No, Alfred, hell no and go way and quit buggin’ me. She was nice enough on the phone. He tried to remember what it was like when he had kissed her in the hotel room two years before, his hands touching her dressfront and Ouida gasping every time he pulled her hips against his. He lay back in the empty bed now, wondering about the Fieldings. There was record music coming from the front rooms. Fats Domino sang it to him …
Ah’m gonna be uh wheel someday
Ah’m gonna be some bah-dy
Ah’m gonna be uh real gone cat
’N then Ah woan wahn yew …
Willie’s phonograph droned on in the second story loft. Willie sipped wine from a peanut-butter glass and watched the girl, who sat cross-legged, like a small boy, on one of the work tables. She was slim and small-boned, neck and arms like flower stems; yet oddly voluptuous, full-breasted and going heavy in the hips, like a dancer who had never quite taken her work seriously. Her clothes were a puzzle too; she exuded a kind of chic provincialism, and he considered the conflicting images: Cathryn visiting smart little dress shops, looking for something a bit different; Cathryn bending down on her knees in a glum college dormitory, tracing off a fifty-cent dress pattern. He couldn’t determine which it was with her, and now that he’d asked, he was afraid he might have said the wrong thing.
“I had no business,” he said, hesitating, searching for the right words.
“Why not?” she said. “I wish I were a debutante. The truth is, my father’s a traffic cop. He has to renew a note every year at the bank to send me spending money.”
“Still,” Willie said. “I had no business making smart cracks.”
He had taken a good look at her and suggested that she was either very rich or very poor — that she was definitely not middle class.
“I was thinking tonight how long it’s been since I carried on a normal conversation with anyone,” Willie said. “Without talking in the secret code. You know what I mean? I can’t remember the last time I carried on a really dull conversation — I mean commonplace stuff. The weather, neighbors, family. Realism. Paddy Chayefsky. You know?”
She nodded her head. Her sweet laughter filled the big room.
“Anyhow,” he said, “I’m glad you’re not a rich girl.”
“ I’m not glad about it,” Cathryn said. “Why should it please you?”
“It’s easier,” Willie said. “It’s easier on my tender jazz-age psyche: I get a terrible case of the nostalgia in the evenings. I have this thing about girls I like. I’ve got to know all about them — everything. I’ll want to see your yearbook pictures and old love letters and photographs when you were coming to puberty and who it was first kissed you. And whether you were in the senior play. All that stuff. I always want to live it over again with the girl and feel poignant because I wasn’t there. Wasn’t there to see how pretty you were when you were thirteen, for example.”
“I was terrible at thirteen,” Cathryn said.
“It’ll be easier with you,” Willie said. “Not as much fun; I mean not as poignant — no real pathos — but I won’t be agonized about it. With rich girls it’s different. Their young girlhood is about as remote to my experience as playing stickball on the streets of New York. My father was a salesman for the National Biscuit Company. Growing up was bloody dull. So
“Alfred … I’m already in bed. I’m sorry. Really. Perhaps we can talk this weekend at the ranch. Would you like that? You’ll come out, won’t you?”
“Yeah, yeah,” Rinemiller said. “Ranch.” He repeated it again — “ranch” — as if it were an insight into something. It was not until he rang off that he remembered everyone was coming to the ranch for the weekend. It wasn’t a country house rendezvous with Ouida after all.
Still … he was able to tell himself there was some promise in what she’d said. She hadn’t hung up on him, hadn’t said No, Alfred, hell no and go way and quit buggin’ me. She was nice enough on the phone. He tried to remember what it was like when he had kissed her in the hotel room two years before, his hands touching her dressfront and Ouida gasping every time he pulled her hips against his. He lay back in the empty bed now, wondering about the Fieldings. There was record music coming from the front rooms. Fats Domino sang it to him …
Ah’m gonna be uh wheel someday
Ah’m gonna be some bah-dy
Ah’m gonna be uh real gone cat
’N then Ah woan wahn yew …
Willie’s phonograph droned on in the second story loft. Willie sipped wine from a peanut-butter glass and watched the girl, who sat cross-legged, like a small boy, on one of the work tables. She was slim and small-boned, neck and arms like flower stems; yet oddly voluptuous, full-breasted and going heavy in the hips, like a dancer who had never quite taken her work seriously. Her clothes were a puzzle too; she exuded a kind of chic provincialism, and he considered the conflicting images: Cathryn visiting smart little dress shops, looking for something a bit different; Cathryn bending down on her knees in a glum college dormitory, tracing off a fifty-cent dress pattern. He couldn’t determine which it was with her, and now that he’d asked, he was afraid he might have said the wrong thing.
“I had no business,” he said, hesitating, searching for the right words.
“Why not?” she said. “I wish I were a debutante. The truth is, my father’s a traffic cop. He has to renew a note every year at the bank to send me spending money.”
“Still,” Willie said. “I had no business making smart cracks.”
He had taken a good look at her and suggested that she was either very rich or very poor — that she was definitely not middle class.
“I was thinking tonight how long it’s been since I carried on a normal conversation with anyone,” Willie said. “Without talking in the secret code. You know what I mean? I can’t remember the last time I carried on a really dull conversation — I mean commonplace stuff. The weather, neighbors, family. Realism. Paddy Chayefsky. You know?”
She nodded her head. Her sweet laughter filled the big room.
“Anyhow,” he said, “I’m glad you’re not a rich girl.”
“ I’m not glad about it,” Cathryn said. “Why should it please you?”
“It’s easier,” Willie said. “It’s easier on my tender jazz-age psyche: I get a terrible case of the nostalgia in the evenings. I have this thing about girls I like. I’ve got to know all about them — everything. I’ll want to see your yearbook pictures and old love letters and photographs when you were coming to puberty and who it was first kissed you. And whether you were in the senior play. All that stuff. I always want to live it over again with the girl and feel poignant because I wasn’t there. Wasn’t there to see how pretty you were when you were thirteen, for example.”
“I was terrible at thirteen,” Cathryn said.
“It’ll be easier with you,” Willie said. “Not as much fun; I mean not as poignant — no real pathos — but I won’t be agonized about it. With rich girls it’s different. Their young girlhood is about as remote to my experience as playing stickball on the streets of New York. My father was a salesman for the National Biscuit Company. Growing up was bloody dull. So
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