Read Online Closing Time by Joseph Heller - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Joseph Heller
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for art studios with contract assignments, or, with clear conscience, accepted what he needed from Yossarian, disbelieving a day must dawn when he would no longer find these freelance assignments at hand and that Yossarian might not always choose to safeguard him from eventual financial tragedy.
All in all, Yossarian decided, it was a typically modern, poorly adjusted, new-age family in which no one but the mother truly liked all the others or saw good reason to; and each, he suspected, was, like himself, at least secretly and intermittently sad and regretful.
His family life was perfect, he liked to lament. Like Thomas Mann's Gustav Aschenbach, he had none.
He was still under surveillance. He could not tell by how many. By the end of the week there was even an Orthodox Jew pacing back and forth outside his building on the other side of the avenue, and a call on his answering machine from the nurse Melissa MacIntosh, whom he had all but forgotten, with the information that she'd been rotated to the evening shift for a while, in case he'd been planning to take her to dinner-and to Paris and Florence too for lingerie, she reminded with a caustic snicker-and with the incredible news that the Belgian patient was still alive but in pain and that his temperature was down almost to normal.
Yossarian would have bet his life that the Belgian would already be dead.
Of all those tailing him, he could account for only a few-the ones retained by the lawyer for his estranged wife and those retained by the estranged, impulsive husband of a woman he'd lain with half-drunkenly once not long before, a mother of adolescents, and thought halfheartedly he might wish to lie with some more, if ever he was graced with the urge to lie with a woman again, who had detectives shadow every man she knew in his craze to obtain evidence of fornication to balance the evidence of fornication she had earlier obtained against him.
The idea of the others festered, and after another few spells of aggravated embitterment, Yossarian took the bull by the horns and telephoned the office.
"Anything new?" he began, to Milo's son.
"Not as far as I know."
"Are you telling me the truth?"
"To the best of my ability."
"You're not holding anything back?"
"Not as far as I can tell."
"Would you tell me if you were?"
"I would tell you if I could."
"When your father calls in today, M2," he said to Milo Minder-binder II, "tell him I need the name of a good private detective. It's for something personal."
"He's already phoned," said Milo junior. "He recommends a man named Jerry Gaffney at the Gaffney Agency. Under no circumstances mention that my father suggested him."
"He told you that already?" Yossarian was enchanted. "How did he know I was going to ask?"
"That's impossible for me to say."
"How are you feeling, M2?"
"It's hard to be sure."
"I mean in general. Have you been back to the bus terminal to look at those TV monitors?"
"I need to clock them some more. I want to go again."
"I can arrange that again."
"Will Michael come with me?"
"If you pay him for the day. Are things all right?"
"Wouldn't I want to tell you if they were?"
"But would you tell me?"
"That would depend."
"On what?"
"If I could tell you the truth."
"Would you tell me the truth?"
"Do I know what it is?"
"Could you tell me a lie?"
"Only if I knew the truth."
"You're being honest with me."
"My father wants that."
"Mr. Minderbinder mentioned you were going to call," said the sanguine, soft-spoken voice belonging to the man named Jerry Gaffney when Yossarian telephoned him.
"That's funny," said Yossarian. "Which one?"
"Mr. Minderbinder senior."
"That's very funny then," said Yossarian in a harder manner. "Because Minderbinder senior insisted I not mention his name to you when I phoned."
"It was a test to see if you could keep things secret."
"You gave me no chance to pass it."
"I trust my clients, and I want all of them to know they can always trust Jerry Gaffney.
All in all, Yossarian decided, it was a typically modern, poorly adjusted, new-age family in which no one but the mother truly liked all the others or saw good reason to; and each, he suspected, was, like himself, at least secretly and intermittently sad and regretful.
His family life was perfect, he liked to lament. Like Thomas Mann's Gustav Aschenbach, he had none.
He was still under surveillance. He could not tell by how many. By the end of the week there was even an Orthodox Jew pacing back and forth outside his building on the other side of the avenue, and a call on his answering machine from the nurse Melissa MacIntosh, whom he had all but forgotten, with the information that she'd been rotated to the evening shift for a while, in case he'd been planning to take her to dinner-and to Paris and Florence too for lingerie, she reminded with a caustic snicker-and with the incredible news that the Belgian patient was still alive but in pain and that his temperature was down almost to normal.
Yossarian would have bet his life that the Belgian would already be dead.
Of all those tailing him, he could account for only a few-the ones retained by the lawyer for his estranged wife and those retained by the estranged, impulsive husband of a woman he'd lain with half-drunkenly once not long before, a mother of adolescents, and thought halfheartedly he might wish to lie with some more, if ever he was graced with the urge to lie with a woman again, who had detectives shadow every man she knew in his craze to obtain evidence of fornication to balance the evidence of fornication she had earlier obtained against him.
The idea of the others festered, and after another few spells of aggravated embitterment, Yossarian took the bull by the horns and telephoned the office.
"Anything new?" he began, to Milo's son.
"Not as far as I know."
"Are you telling me the truth?"
"To the best of my ability."
"You're not holding anything back?"
"Not as far as I can tell."
"Would you tell me if you were?"
"I would tell you if I could."
"When your father calls in today, M2," he said to Milo Minder-binder II, "tell him I need the name of a good private detective. It's for something personal."
"He's already phoned," said Milo junior. "He recommends a man named Jerry Gaffney at the Gaffney Agency. Under no circumstances mention that my father suggested him."
"He told you that already?" Yossarian was enchanted. "How did he know I was going to ask?"
"That's impossible for me to say."
"How are you feeling, M2?"
"It's hard to be sure."
"I mean in general. Have you been back to the bus terminal to look at those TV monitors?"
"I need to clock them some more. I want to go again."
"I can arrange that again."
"Will Michael come with me?"
"If you pay him for the day. Are things all right?"
"Wouldn't I want to tell you if they were?"
"But would you tell me?"
"That would depend."
"On what?"
"If I could tell you the truth."
"Would you tell me the truth?"
"Do I know what it is?"
"Could you tell me a lie?"
"Only if I knew the truth."
"You're being honest with me."
"My father wants that."
"Mr. Minderbinder mentioned you were going to call," said the sanguine, soft-spoken voice belonging to the man named Jerry Gaffney when Yossarian telephoned him.
"That's funny," said Yossarian. "Which one?"
"Mr. Minderbinder senior."
"That's very funny then," said Yossarian in a harder manner. "Because Minderbinder senior insisted I not mention his name to you when I phoned."
"It was a test to see if you could keep things secret."
"You gave me no chance to pass it."
"I trust my clients, and I want all of them to know they can always trust Jerry Gaffney.
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