Panama by Thomas McGuane Page B

room, and closed the door behind him. He was dressed rather simply: a grimy pair of Fruit of the Loom underdrawers. When he opened the door, I caught a glimpse of his secretary rolled up in a sleeping bag and idly returning the empties to a six-pack carton.
    Roxy was in the living room, legs crossed at her writing desk, looking smart in an off-pink Chanel suit. This set piece of normalcy was not going to take me in.
    â€œSit down, Chet, I’ll be with you in a moment.”
    â€œTake your time.”
    â€œBills, obligations, God.”
    â€œWhat’s Counselor Peavey doing running around in his underwear?”
    â€œJust got up. What’s seven times nine?”
    â€œSixty-three. Was that his secretary in the sleeping bag?”
    â€œSometimes she’s a secretary. She’s kind of a late riser. Works late. If that little gal gets wind of the Equal Rights Amendment, Peavey’ll have his hands full. —I thought so! The aqueduct commission has robbed me to the tune of two dollars and nineteen cents. Did you see Ruiz when you came in?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œWell, he’s selling my grapefruits. I’m going to skin that chiseler.”
    We could hear Peavey making not-quite-human noises through the door to the Florida room.
    â€œWhat’s he charging?” Roxy asked.
    â€œWho?”
    â€œRuiz. For the grapefruits.”
    â€œGod, Roxy, I’ve never seen him selling your grapefruits.”
    Mary walked through the room with a thin row of bubbles on her lips.
    â€œWhat’s the matter with her?” I asked.
    â€œGet that fly,” shouted Roxy.
    â€œRoxy, what fly?”
    â€œWhat fly? The fly walking through my addition practically into your face.”
    â€œI want to give you away.”
    â€œI think your father should do that.”
    â€œBut I’m having a party at the Casa Marina,” I said.
    â€œWho’s the orchestra?”
    â€œJorge Cruz.”
    â€œThat’s very nice. Jorge is very good indeed. Plays some attractive sambas—” Roxy got to her feet and began to samba. I could see her starting to get peculiar and I returned her to her chair.
    â€œDon’t start shoving me around,” she snarled. “Not with my obligations you don’t.”
    â€œI just wanted you to sit and talk to me for a moment.”
    â€œI’ve got a thieving gardener, a stack of bills like that, and a drunken attorney with an outside line consorting in my Florida room with some women’s libber in a sleeping bag.”
    â€œWell, why are you marrying him!”
    Peavey peeked out of the door.
    â€œWho asked for your two cents?” he demanded.
    â€œI just I…”
    â€œNixon.”
    He withdrew.
    *   *   *
    The usual pattern of mayhem in the morning paper was altered in the edition of The Key West Citizen I bought to forget the situation at Roxy’s (where I had got no reply to my offer to give away my stepmother, in matrimony). A young couple living on Big Coppitt, having fun with morphine and Quaaludes, beat up their three-year-old son and threw him through the window; the little boy took seventeen hours to die. Page 2: “Hints for Shell Collectors.”
    I walked to my place with tinned dog food, stepped into the patio, and said, “Deirdre” to my dog. I had named her, after seven years. I held out my arms and she leapt about, running on her hind legs. “Deirdre,” I said, “Deirdre, Deirdre, Deirdre.” And for a moment, page one’s hint that the human race was in line for a fiery death, vanished.
    I looked out at the ocean, past the ruined pier where nothing was visible except Don smoking in the shadows. I called out, “Aren’t you hot in that suit?” and opened a can of dog food. Weird guy, Don; he smokes Virginia Slims and carries his car and office keys hanging on a split ring from the belt loop of his gleaming suit. I have to study him as a