of Lemuel in the daytime, and the truth was that Mrs. Fenster was one too many members of my household already.
“He’ll stay for the time being. Till I can get something else arranged.”
Her impertinence was as unusual as the concern she showed the boy, who most days annoyed her more than he did me, and I was so surprised I acquiesced. She set about preparing a makeshift bed for him in the studio on the canapé. He stared at the bed, transfixed, nodding slightly as sheexplained to him the overnight rules of the house, rules she was making up as she did so, as none of them applied to me or her. He was still contemplating the bed with a long strand of drool hanging from his lower lip and a dullness to his eye when I left them.
T HE STRAINS OF the afternoon’s unassisted labors called for release. My back and shoulders were as stiff and sore as if I had spent the day hammering railroad spikes, and my anger and frustration, with no legitimate target but a half-crippled idiot, were ready to overflow. I stepped out onto the street with no precise idea of where I would end the evening, but when I chose a direction it was toward the stables on the street behind. I knew what it would take to restore my peace of mind, at least for the night.
A S I HAD on several previous occasions stepping up to Priscilla’s front door, I spied one of her neighbors scowling through her front parlor window at me. She was young and rather pretty, and on several occasions I had seen her with children of varying ages. Her expression was so vituperative I laughed out loud, and if not for the pane of glass between us she might have spat at me. She looked like she did it often enough to be good at it, and might have hit me even at that distance.
When the door opened Priscilla eyed me with only slightly more friendliness than her neighbor. It was well past the hour at which she stopped accepting unannounced callers, but I hoped she might break her rule this once. “Look what the wind blew over,” she said.
“I wondered if you might be free to dine with me,” I said.
“I’ve already eaten, like any normal person has by this hour. Why don’t you come in, anyhow.”
As we lay there a while later, she said, “Someone told me you and Ralph dined together. So you needn’t worry about concealing it.”
For a moment I wondered if her informant was the waiter, but he had overheard the entire exchange, and if he were betraying confidences he surely wouldn’t have stopped there. “That’s true,” I said, feeling a little glum and disloyal for not revealing to her the nature of my conversation with Banbury. The opportunities open to a woman her age weren’t many or attractive, and the odds of finding another patron as generous as Banbury were slim, regardless of her beauty or the advanced level of her intimate skills; youth was generally the chief attribute a rich old buzzard wanted hanging from his arm, even when its possessor was only halfway to pretty. Priscilla had been a dressmaker back in Iowa, though, and I supposed she might still make a living at that somewhere.
“I hope you weren’t negotiating for my favors without my participation,” she said, rolling slightly toward me to afforda better view of her lovely sex, its labia dark and glistening, a microscopically thin strand of semen suspended delicately across the hairy canopy just above it. The faint odor of recent copulation intoxicated me at that moment like morphine; there wasn’t much I would have refused her then, and I hoped she wouldn’t press for too many details. “We talked about you only in context of your grace and beauty.”
She laughed and was quiet for a moment as she rolled back against the mattress and rolled toward me, noting my gaze fixed on l’origine du monde . “And how are you faring, Mr. Sadlaw, generally?”
“I’m too busy lately, having as I do only half an assistant.” I described to her the circumstances of Lemuel’s injury, to her anger and
“He’ll stay for the time being. Till I can get something else arranged.”
Her impertinence was as unusual as the concern she showed the boy, who most days annoyed her more than he did me, and I was so surprised I acquiesced. She set about preparing a makeshift bed for him in the studio on the canapé. He stared at the bed, transfixed, nodding slightly as sheexplained to him the overnight rules of the house, rules she was making up as she did so, as none of them applied to me or her. He was still contemplating the bed with a long strand of drool hanging from his lower lip and a dullness to his eye when I left them.
T HE STRAINS OF the afternoon’s unassisted labors called for release. My back and shoulders were as stiff and sore as if I had spent the day hammering railroad spikes, and my anger and frustration, with no legitimate target but a half-crippled idiot, were ready to overflow. I stepped out onto the street with no precise idea of where I would end the evening, but when I chose a direction it was toward the stables on the street behind. I knew what it would take to restore my peace of mind, at least for the night.
A S I HAD on several previous occasions stepping up to Priscilla’s front door, I spied one of her neighbors scowling through her front parlor window at me. She was young and rather pretty, and on several occasions I had seen her with children of varying ages. Her expression was so vituperative I laughed out loud, and if not for the pane of glass between us she might have spat at me. She looked like she did it often enough to be good at it, and might have hit me even at that distance.
When the door opened Priscilla eyed me with only slightly more friendliness than her neighbor. It was well past the hour at which she stopped accepting unannounced callers, but I hoped she might break her rule this once. “Look what the wind blew over,” she said.
“I wondered if you might be free to dine with me,” I said.
“I’ve already eaten, like any normal person has by this hour. Why don’t you come in, anyhow.”
As we lay there a while later, she said, “Someone told me you and Ralph dined together. So you needn’t worry about concealing it.”
For a moment I wondered if her informant was the waiter, but he had overheard the entire exchange, and if he were betraying confidences he surely wouldn’t have stopped there. “That’s true,” I said, feeling a little glum and disloyal for not revealing to her the nature of my conversation with Banbury. The opportunities open to a woman her age weren’t many or attractive, and the odds of finding another patron as generous as Banbury were slim, regardless of her beauty or the advanced level of her intimate skills; youth was generally the chief attribute a rich old buzzard wanted hanging from his arm, even when its possessor was only halfway to pretty. Priscilla had been a dressmaker back in Iowa, though, and I supposed she might still make a living at that somewhere.
“I hope you weren’t negotiating for my favors without my participation,” she said, rolling slightly toward me to afforda better view of her lovely sex, its labia dark and glistening, a microscopically thin strand of semen suspended delicately across the hairy canopy just above it. The faint odor of recent copulation intoxicated me at that moment like morphine; there wasn’t much I would have refused her then, and I hoped she wouldn’t press for too many details. “We talked about you only in context of your grace and beauty.”
She laughed and was quiet for a moment as she rolled back against the mattress and rolled toward me, noting my gaze fixed on l’origine du monde . “And how are you faring, Mr. Sadlaw, generally?”
“I’m too busy lately, having as I do only half an assistant.” I described to her the circumstances of Lemuel’s injury, to her anger and
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