A Singular Man Part 7

George put his lips to the edge of the gla.s.s. Sweet but soft. Just touch the cherry with the tongue. Nice little cherry. Can never remember no matter how long I mix in circles whether to take the mixer out of the c.o.c.ktail. Don't like dripping on the table or poking out my eye. What's this standing in front of me.

"Hey don't leave your mixer in the gla.s.s."

"Sally, I megn Miss Tomson."

"Sally, why not."

"Sit down, Miss Tomson."

"I only just got up to go to the ladies. The rocking of the train makes me want to go. See you on the way back. What are you doing on this train. You don't have to answer that, see you on the way back."

Wham in just a flash she has me intimidated. What a time for her to pee. G.o.d let us get off at the same stop together. No G.o.d, let me rephrase that. Just let us continue on this train before reaching any stops. I want time. Must be some surrept.i.tious way I could sneak on the brakes. Or even a slight derailment in open country where Miss Tomson and I must trudge through underbrush looking for a farmhouse. But there is none and we've got to make the best of my coat for both of us, trying our level best to conserve body heat by proximity. Pa.s.sing a river now. My G.o.d, there's the cemetery. Thought we had pa.s.sed it already must have been dreaming. Great white houses of the dead, lonely in there at night. How's my plot. Engineers say some difficulty with the foundations and a reappraisal of costing is necessary. Whoosh. Up goes the price to box me. Never let Miss Tomson see those letters. Get the impression I was deeming demise. Suppose it's foolish of me, but I sometimes feel things are too complicated for me to die. feel things are too complicated "Hey anyway, Mr. Smith -"

"Miss Tomson will you join me for a drink."

"Can't. I'm with people."

"Just one, Miss Tomson."

"Can't get over it, isn't it rich, you right in here all the time and I didn't see you. No I really can't."

"You didn't collect your last pay check."

"Forget it, Mr. Smith. Hey you're derobing."

"Won't you join me ha ha, Miss Tomson."

"Ha ha, Smithy, since you put it like that, sure. Always willing to take off my clothes. But I can't stay. See down there. No you can't see. But see what you can see, the big blue shadow, that's my brother."

"Amazing shadow."

"Yesh."

"Waiter. Two derobers here."

"You catch on fast mister."

George had never been good at the fast remark. Miss Tomson brings that out. Must put up some sort of show. She's been amused down there with her brother and his socialites. She could easily slip back into that life. I'm so nervous. Just not made for making smart remarks. The waiter in his kind antic.i.p.ation of a dp could see I was new at it. Let me get away without crushing me altogether. I have warm inner feelings which explode resoundingly at boiling point.

"Miss Tomson, I'm glad."

"What for Mr. Smith."

"I'm just glad"

"Mr. Smith what are you doing on this train."

"Just glad I took it."

"You can't be on a train because you're glad."

"What stop, Miss Tomson, are you for."

"The last. What's yours."

"The Junction. I take a branch line."

"All by yourself, Mr. Smith, on this train like this. I can't get over it. Guess you're seeing friends."

"Not exactly."

"You're a mystery."

"What do you mean Miss Tomson."

"Why don't you find yourself some nice girl."

"Are you suggesting Miss Tomson I just find some nice girl just like that."

"Sure just like that. Crazy for a man living alone not getting any."

"Miss Tomson-"

"And you could get plenty if you got rid of that Matilda, While she's in the house you won't get a smell. I don't mean to sort of go into your personal life or anything, you know what I mean Smithy. It's unnatural."

"What's natural, Miss Tomson."

"This is for your own good, Smithy, and you ought to know. That Matilda will suck you dry. Before you know it you'll be one of these guys running around to museums collecting bra.s.s monkeys and that kind of thing."

Miss Tomson had her mixer out. Waiter gave her a tray with hers. Must be the brilliant pile of blond on her head and the legs. And in this dim blue her hands look longer than anything F^e ever seen before. Her fingernails around the gla.s.s. A black sweater and pearls.

"You looking at these, Mr. Smith."

"Yes."

"Pearls."

"Nice."

"Real ones. Ought to be hanging right between here but I don't feel like being half naked on a night like this. I just can't get over seeing you all by yourself on this train. Guess that's all right. But Jesus you're taking the branch line as well. Come and meet my brother and his friends why don't you. Maybe you want to be alone. And I'm barging in."

"Miss Tomson, no."

"But you don't want to meet anybody do you."

"Are you coming back."

"You mean the office. I don't know, Mr. Smith, I just honestly don't know. I've been laying in bed late just thinking of it. And I bought a machine that wakes you up with music and pours out hot coffee. Boy you ought to get one. You know that's what you need, Smithy. Lacking a loving hand when you wake up."

"I suppose so. Miss Tomson does your machine spit and grumble."

"It's magic."

"Where did you buy your machine, Miss Tomson."

"It really was a present."

"O.".

"I couldn't refuse it. On the floor outside my door in the dark. I tripped over it and broke the gla.s.s on the clock. And couldn't give it back. Now I don't want to give it back. The guy I gave the cheapest thrill he ever got to. That's who. You know all the while I'm working for you he had me watched. How do you like that. The nerve. My apartment's like a funeral parlour with all the flowers. I say to the boy, take them and give them to your mother sonny or your girl friend. You know what one little upstart says to me, I laughed, he said I like men. Smithy, can't get over this, running into you like this."

Miss Tomson's hand came down and for a second touched Smith's knee. The train slowing through a station. A strain of Christmas carol. Look out now in the night. Community singers with a Santa Claus ringing a bell. Soon see the lights of the dam and we'll be reaching the fountains all lit up and then it won't be long. Her eyes are even bigger than they seemed before. And lashes longer. Daren't ask where she got the great bracelet. Looks too much like something I might give her and I feel too much like the guy she gave the cheapest thrill he ever got to. The touch of the hand on the knee electrified me. The dam. Great granite face. And the gem like lake below. Lit up. People on the ice.

"Miss Tomson, they're skating down there."

"Isn't it beautiful. Love to be on that."

"You skate."

"On my a.s.s mostly. Maybe you'll give me a lesson sometime. Say where you going on the branch line."

"Last stop."

"Just like us on the main line. But that ain't too far, last stop of the branch, from the last stop on the main. Ha ha, sounds like a song. Why don't you drive over."

"No car, Miss Tomson."

"Well, why don't we drive over to you."

If I told Miss Tomson die whole truth I suppose she'd understand* But I don't even know myself what the truth is. She's got such a good nature. If I let this chance go, it may be gone forever. It is gone forever. Miss Tomson's brother I see somehow on top of me in the snow, take this buster and it wouldn't be a straightforward manly type of defeat like I could feel some pride being prostrated by a fist, but I get the impression from his blue shadow that there would be snow rubbing in the face and my collar opened to stuff snow down my back. And of course the red underwear would excite him to visit even greater ignominy upon me. He may even carry a whip.

"What's the matter, Smithy, you've gone silent. You don't want us to drive over."

"Forgive me Miss Tomson, just suddenly lately my mind goes vague. I suppose it's a few problems I've got on it recently."

"We could go skating together. Unless of course you're all tied up."

"O no, I'm not tied up."

Roped with cables I guess would be more like it. But how can I explain. What do you do. Can't say let's take this train ride all over again some other time and just plan to meet by accident. With all the night air frosty and hand in hand walking the ice hard ground. Looking for some chalet in the woods. Find it by its curling smoke. A log cabin made for us to have our hot chocolate drink. Or lemon and honey. When I could just lean over and eat her breath.

"What's the matter Smithy. It's O.K., you don't have to say anything. Just a wild suggestion. I used to love these weekends, mad and crazy. But they don't thrill me any more. Just if you didn't have anything better to do, you might enjoy a skate, that's all."

"Miss Tomson, I'm not really such good company."

"You're swell company."

Station name flies by. Another cemetery. Not much time left. Why do they need a junction. Tearing two people apart. Where the tracks divide. She's never said that before, swell company. Bring marshmallows to the side of the pond. Could support her under the armpit to the ice. Permit me, Miss Tomson, to show you how. Could start off off with a flashy backwards figure eight, last year did it twice in a row without thundering on my a.s.s. Need only do it once. So many excuses for grabbing her. And of course both of us could thunder down together. Doesn't bear thinking about. Save she'll bring her brother who seems terribly the type who sweeps around the ice so fast you don't know he's there till he's laid you out unconscious with a collision. with a flashy backwards figure eight, last year did it twice in a row without thundering on my a.s.s. Need only do it once. So many excuses for grabbing her. And of course both of us could thunder down together. Doesn't bear thinking about. Save she'll bring her brother who seems terribly the type who sweeps around the ice so fast you don't know he's there till he's laid you out unconscious with a collision.

Conductor entering the blue haze. All tickets please. Pa.s.sing with his little punch. Stuffing pockets. Peeling off bills. A little roving business all by itself. Has false teeth. Says, Pleasantville Junction, next. Euphemisms everywhere.

"Smithy. This is a house party. You know, just sort of drop over. You don't go for them."

"Never seems to fit."

"They'd go crazy over the bashful conservative way you are. I just wish myself I could be a wall flower like you. Come on Smithy, you got a girl up here."

"I beg your pardon, Miss Tomson."

"Don't hand me that I beg your pardon, Miss Tomson stuff. You got some nice rural nest tucked in the woods somewhere. Is she beautiful. A hick, maybe a farmer's daughter."

"Really, Miss Tomson."

How do I tell her with only minutes left that there is nothing of the sort. That I want her to come over the country hills. Meet me where I wait at some junction under the frozen winter trees with a gleaming pair of skates slung over my shoulder.

"Smith like all quiet guys, boy. Maybe I'm thinking you're a real operator. Anyway I got to go."

"Please stay."

"Your stop's next. Anyway I better get over to my brother, see the way he's rocking back and forth, means he's bragging. Don't fall through the ice with this little dish you're seeing. Thanks for the derobe. And Smithy, really have a good time, I mean it, so long."

"Goodbye Miss Tomson."

'Try Sally."

"Ha ha, Miss Tomson."

"Ha ha, see you."

Smith watching her dark figure float away down the blue train. I care so much. Inside me. And wonder why in this world you've got to look you're going someplace. To trains, planes or meetings, otherwise you get ignored. George George George. No sad now. Life is a big bowl of cherries. Provided you get most of them. Just grab. And you'll get Miss Tomson. Sure you will. Have her dark sweatered bosoms. Kissing those mounds like mad. Goodness. And hands gripping each thin shoulder. Four freckles under the right eye. Something awkward happening in my trousers. Which could block the aisle of the train, G.o.d and his apostles forbid. Conductors and commuters trying to get past. Watch the pushing, please. O watch the shoves. As George Smith in bare skin. Spiritual. Steps down from the high frosty train onto the snow of Pleasantville Junction platform. Light shines yellow under a green gla.s.s shade in the station office. Conductor with lamp and whistle. Swinging and blowing. Train gliding away on the track turning into the winter trees and snowy woodlands.

Smith a solitary figure with his little bag. Save for an old lady and a dog. As the great grey cars click down the rails, window by window, moving away. Give anything to be able to stand in a crowd. She'll be looking out of the club car showing me to her brother as they pa.s.s. Stand here. Show utter indifference to big country house parties everywhere. Here come the windows. All her friends will be looking too. Ready now, the pose just right. These first windows. No. The second. Must be at the observation gla.s.s at the end. Look more indifferent. Gee. Not a soul. To look at me.

Orget The message The message I'm self I'm self Contained. Contained.

5.

WHITE clapboard country hotel. The Goose Goes Inn. Often reminding George regrettably of Mrs. Goldminer. Last night the snow flurries turned into a blizzard. Whiteness now lays heaped high through the morning woods and pink on the sunny hills. clapboard country hotel. The Goose Goes Inn. Often reminding George regrettably of Mrs. Goldminer. Last night the snow flurries turned into a blizzard. Whiteness now lays heaped high through the morning woods and pink on the sunny hills.

Smith arrived at the hotel in the dark. And in his room pulled the curtains over and sat in the big flowered chair with legs crossed sipping a drink. Said snow you can't get me all cozy and warm in here. Standing in front of the mirror, red from neck to ankles. Rotating the throat and outstretched arms. A little ritual for the good night's sleep. It's freezing outside. And with that cold thought tuck the head into the white crisp pillow to sail away on the magic carpet. First checking the zip on the red underwear. Never know who might trip to the wrong door in the night. It is a matter of basic good manners to be properly zipped up. And then when they say O I beg your pardon, one can smile and pa.s.s for a glowing ember.

Few taps on the phone. Gay voice.