Read Online Reflections in a Golden Eye by Carson Mccullers - Free Book Online

had been the last concert they had heard, and consequently from
     Anacleto's point of view it was the best. She herself did not care for crowded concert
     halls and would have preferred to spend the money on phonograph records but it was good
     to get away from the post occasionally, and these trips were the joy of Anacleto's life.
     For one thing they stayed the night in a hotel, which was an enormous delight to him.
    'Do you think if I beat your pillows you would be more comfortable?' Anacleto asked.
    And the dinner the night of that last concert! Anacleto sailed proudly after her into the
     hotel dining room wearing his orange velvet jacket When it was his turn to order, he held
     the menu up to his face and then completely closed his eyes. To the astonishment of the
     colored waiter he ordered in French. And although she had wanted to burst out laughing,
     she controlled herself and translated after him with the best gravity she could assume
     as though she were a sort of duenna or lady in waiting to him. Because of his limited
     French this dinner of his was rather peculiar. He had got it out of the lesson in his book
     called 'Le Jardin Potager,' and his order consisted only of cabbage, string beans, and
     carrots. So when on her own she had added an order of chicken for him, Anacleto had opened
     his eyes just long enough to give her a deep, grateful little look. The white coated
     waiters clustered about this phenomenon like flies, and Anacleto was much too exalted to
     touch a crumb.
    'Suppose we have some music,' she said. 'Let's hear the Brahms G Minor Quartet.'
    'Fameux,' said Anacleto.
    He put on the first record and settled down to listen on his footstool by the fire. But
     the opening passage, the lovely dialogue between the piano and the strings, was hardly
     completed when there was a knock on the door. Anacleto spoke to someone in the hall,
     closed the door again, and turned off the phonograph.
    'Mrs. Penderton,' he whispered, lifting his eyebrows.
    'I knew I could knock on the door downstairs till doomsday and you all would never hear
     me with this music going on,' Leonora said when she came into the room. She sat down on
     the foot of the bed so hard that it felt as though she had broken a spring. Then,
     remembering that Alison was not well, Leonora tried to look sickly also, as that was her
     notion of the proper behavior in a sickroom. 'Do you think you can make it tonight?'
    'Make what?'
    'Why, my God, Alison! My party! I've been working like a nigger for the past three days
     getting everything ready. I don't give a party like this but twice a year.'
    'Of course,' said Alison. 'It just slipped my mind for a moment.'
    'Listen!' said Leonora, and her fresh rosy face flamed suddenly with anticipation. 'I
     just wish you could see my kitchen now. Here's the way it will go. I'm putting in all the
     leaves in the dining room table and everybody will just mill around and help themselves.
     I'm having a couple of Virginia hams, a huge turkey, fried chicken, sliced cold pork,
     plenty of barbecued spareribs, and all sorts of little knickknacks like pickled onions and
     olives and radishes. And hot rolls and little cheese biscuits passed around. The punchbowl
     is in the corner, and for people who like their liquor straight I'm having on the
     sideboard eight quarts of Kentucky Bourbon, five of rye, and five of Scotch. And an
     entertainer from town is coming out to play the accordion '
    'But who on earth is going to eat all that food?' Alison asked, with a little swallow of
     nausea.
    'The whole shebang,' said Leonora enthusiastically. 'I've telephoned everybody from Old
     Sugar's wife on down.'
    'Old Sugar' was Leonora's name for the Commanding General of the post, and she called him
     by it to his face. With the General, as with all men, she had a flip and affectionate
     manner, and the General, like most of the officers on the post, fairly ate out of her
     hand. The