“It's just the way I feel.”

  Spann came away from the window and blew a thick stream of smoke toward the floor. He flipped a thin forefinger along the smoke, cutting slices of it. He said, “You've slept a good nine hours. You ought to be hungry.”

  “Want to bring me something?”

  “Sure,” Spann said. “How would you like a nice bowl of stew?”

  Cassidy shook his head. “No. Nothing to eat. Just get me a bottle of whisky.”

  He let his head drift back to the pillow and he heard Spann walking out and closing the door.

  When he opened his eyes again it was an hour later and he saw that some furniture had been added to the room. There was a table and a few chairs. He saw them sitting at the table, Spann and Pauline and Shealy. They were sitting there and drinking quietly and he noticed there wasn't much left in the bottle.

  For some unaccountable reason he didn't want them to know he was awake. He tried to probe the reason but it skipped away from him and it was playing with him, teasing him. He had his eyes closed and yet his full attention was aimed at the table.

  He heard Shealy saying, “I don't know. Maybe I did wrong.”

  “I think you did,” Pauline said.

  Spann told Pauline to shut up.

  “No,” Pauline said. “I won't shut up, I say it was a rotten thing to do.”

  “You'll shut up,” Spann told her, “or I'll reach inside your mouth and rip your tongue out.”

  Pauline said, “It's plain as day what'll happen now. We all know what'll happen. We know we can't trust Mildred. She's no good, she never was any good—”

  “That isn't what bothers me,” Shealy said.

  “It should bother you,” Pauline told him.

  There was the sound of a chair scraping. Cassidy opened his eyes and saw Spann rising and Pauline rising. Spann aimed the heel of his palm at Pauline's face and Pauline leaned far back to get away, then came in very fast to collect a handful of Spann's hair. She pulled hard, and Spann opened his mouth wide and screamed without making a sound.

  “Oh, stop it!” Shealy said wearily. “Stop it, will you, please?”

  Pauline let go and returned to her seat. Spann lowered his face into his hands and stayed that way for a few moments. Then he took a comb from his trousers pocket and combed his hair until it was flat and shining satiny across his head. He smiled sort of fondly at Pauline.

  “Now the next time you do that,” he told her, “I'm going to kill you. I'll get hold of your throat and I won't let go until you're dead.”

  Pauline was looking at Shealy and saying, “Sure it was a mistake. I can't understand why you didn't do what he asked you to do.”

  Shealy poured some whisky into a glass. He sent it down his throat and said, “1 had my reasons. I'm beginning to think my reasons weren't good enough.”

  “Well, anyway,” Pauline said, “you meant well.”

  “But I ruined it, didn't I?” Shealy's voice was dry and dragging and weary. “I ruined everything for him.”

  Spann said, “I think I'll go down and bring up another bottle.”

  “We could use another bottle,” Shealy said.

  Spann was at the door when Pauline said, “Bring a bottle of the special.”

  “That isn't for now.” Spann was opening the door. “That's for later, when we can't taste it.”

  “I want it now,” Pauline insisted. “I'm very much upset and I need it now. Oh, God, look at Cassidy there. Look at poor Cassidy. Look at him, sound asleep. They'll find him, they'll snatch him, I know they will. Look at him, he wrecked the bus and killed twenty-six people—”

  Spann came toward her and she grabbed the empty bottle and held it over her head.

  “Put it down,” Spann said.

  Pauline lowered the bottle to the table. She sat down at the table and started to cry.

  “Now, listen,” Spann said gently to his girl friend. “You know better than to say a thing like that. You know it wasn't Cassidy's fault.”

  “What difference does that make?” Pauline cried. “The point is, he's getting the blame. They're looking for him. And they'll find him. And I hate to think what they'll give him.”

  Shealy's voice was down to a cracked whisper. “What do you think, Spann? What do you think he'll get?”

  “It's hard to say. They can make it very stiff. After all, he broke away, he's on the loose. And another thing. Like it said in the papers. He's got that airplane crash on his record.”

  “What airplane crash?” Pauline asked.

  “Didn't you know? He drove an airplane.” Spann's tone was purely explanatory, as though what he had just stated was only a fact and not part of a personal disaster.

  Pauline was incredulous. “You mean Cassidy?”

  “Sure,” Spann said. “An airplane. One of them big jobs we see every day going back and forth up there. One of them great big silver jobs. He was the driver. Then in the paper it says how one day he's loaded when the plane takes off and instead of taking off it just folds up and lays down and starts to burn. So there's a lot of people killed. They put Cassidy on the grill and then after a while they let him go but it's on the record. You see what I mean? It's written there on the record.”

  “What else?” Pauline asked.

  “On the record?”

  “No,” Pauline said. “Just about Cassidy. What else about Cassidy?”

  “She means the good things,” Shealy said to Spann. “The good things that they don't put on the record. The brighter side of the picture, like his family and where he went to school, and what college he attended.”

  “College?” Spann said. “Did he tell you he went to college?”

  “No,” Shealy replied. “He never mentioned a thing about it. But I'll wager that I'm correct. He has a college education.”

  “He sure don't talk like it,” Spann murmured.

  “I'll tell you why,” Shealy said. “He's been through a certain process. It's something on the order of oxidation. When the bright polish comes off and for a while there's only the dull surface and then slowly it arrives, the rust. It's a special kind of rust. It gets under the surface and goes way down deep.”

  “Will you do me a favor?” Pauline said to Shealy. “Will you please tell me what it is you're talking about?”

  “We're talking about Cassidy,” Spann said.

  “I didn't ask you, you lizard. All I asked you was go downstairs and bring up a bottle.”

  Cassidy was flat on his back on the cot, feeling the stabbing burning of the pain that was now acute in his skull. He had his head turned slightly so that he was afforded a full view of them at the table. He saw Spann moving toward the door, opening the door and walking out. Then Pauline got up from the table and approached the cot. Cassidy's eyes were closed again.

  “Look at him,” Pauline said. “Look at this poor devil.”

  He could feel the pressure of Pauline's eyes looking down at him with sympathy, the pure kind, the kind that wasn't embroidered.

  “They'll catch him,” Pauline moaned. “I know they'll catch him. Oh, God, they'll put him away for a hundred years.”

  “Not that long,” Shealy said.

  “How long?” Her voice aimed at the table. “Tell me, Shealy. What's the rap on a deal like that?”

  “Spann knows more about it than I do.”

  “Spann was never up for that. Spann was up for forgery and embezzlement. For passing bad checks and mail fraud. He was up for—well, he was up for a lot of things. But never anything like this. This is something altogether different. For God's sake, look what's happening to this poor man. He's gonna be held for mass murder.”

  “I wish you'd sit down and be quiet for a while.” Shealy sounded as though he were in pain. “You're not helping me any.”

  “Helping you?” Pauline's voice was brittle. “What do you mean, helping you?”

  “Good Christ,” Shealy groaned. “What did I do? What did I do?”

  “I'll tell you what you did.” Now her voice climbed and became harsh and unmerciful. “You took your good friend Cassidy and sent him on a trip straight up the creek. You even admit it. You said you made him a promise. You promised him you'd bring Doris to that boat—”

  “But I knew—”

  “You knew too much. You always know too much. You go around telling people what you know. But here's what I think, Shealy. I think you're slaphappy. Now how do you like that?”

  “I don't like it. But I'm afraid it's true.”

  “You're goddamn right it's true. You're just a slaphappy old soak. It's got so you can't weigh yourself in terms of pounds. Now it's in terms of quarts. And another thing—”

  “Oh, please. Please, Pauline—”

  “Please nothing. I say what I think. I ain't no hypocrite. Look at that man over there on the cot. Just look at him. I tell you my heart bleeds for that man. I can see them sending him up for twenty, thirty years—”

  “Maybe we can—”

  “There ain't a thing we can do and you know it. You had a chance to help him, Shealy. You had a wonderful chance to really do something for him. And for Doris. Yeah, for him and Doris. For the two of them.”

  Shealy lowered his head to the table.

  “But no,” Pauline said. “Instead of helping them, what did you do? Instead of telling Doris where he was, who did you tell? You told that filthy tramp, that mud hen with the big mouth, that sloppy thing who has the colossal gall to say that she's married to him.”

  “But they are married,” Shealy groaned. “They're man and wife.”

  “On what basis?” she demanded. “Because someone got paid to stand in front of them and read some lines? Because Cassidy went out and bought a ring? You telling me that made it sacred? That put a blessing on it? I don't see it that way. I see it the other way. I claim that Cassidy was cursed. Yes, goddamnit, I say she put a curse on him.”

  Shealy raised his head slightly. “You say that because you hate Mildred. You envy her. She's got the looks.”

  “Looks?” It was a screech. “If that's what they call looks, I'll stay thin as a rail and I'll make myself get thinner. I'll live on water and dry figs. You see these things I got up front? They're little, aren't they? They hardly show. But I'll tell you what they can do. They can hit my boy friend Spann like bullets shot from a gun. They hit him and he staggers and he gets dry in the mouth. He looks at them and he gulps like he's choking on something. But then when I give it to Spann I give it to keep him alive, like he's my baby and I'm feeding him. And sometimes I cry, I cry real soft but there's tears. And I whisper in his ear. I say, 'Spann, you're evil, you're a lizard. But you're my baby.”

  “If it's that way,” Shealy said, “if you have that, you shouldn't envy anybody.”

  Pauline didn't hear him. “Yes,” she stated emphatically. “Of course I'm thin. After all, that's the fashion. To be like a straw, like a reed. To be slender like you see them in the magazines advertising the dresses. To be like that. Built like that. Not like a goddamn battleship.”

  “Then I was right,” Shealy murmured. “You do envy her.”

  It was quiet and Pauline was lowering herself into a chair at the table. Finally Pauline said, “I'm sick. That's why I'm so skinny. I'm skinny and I'm sick. But Mildred? She's healthy. Why is it the meaner they are, the healthier they are?”

  Shealy rested his chin on his folded arms on the table. He peered up at Pauline and said nothing.

  She answered her own question. “I'll tell you why,” she said. “Because they're always taking. Like bloodsuckers.”

  “No,” Shealy said. “Not Mildred.”

  Pauline leaped up and banged her bony fist against the table. “I say yes,” she cried. “I call her a rotten bloodsucker.”

  “You know nothing about it.”

  “More than you, Shealy. A lot more than you.” She beat her fist against the table. She started to cry.

  Cassidy had his eyes half-opened. He noticed that the light from the electric bulb was more intensified, which meant it was getting darker outside. It was going to be a big storm. Very nice weather for April, he remarked to himself. Another series of pains started shooting back and forth inside his head and he decided it must be something serious. If it wasn't a skull fracture it was probably a bad concussion. Or maybe he had some kind of a hemorrhage in there. He told himself it really didn't matter too much. But it would be nice if Doris was here. No, that wasn't what he meant. He meant it would be nice if he wasn't here, if he was somewhere far away with Doris. And it could have been that way. They could have been on the boat together. Well, it was too bad. But all at once he wasn't thinking about that. He was listening to Pauline.

  Pauline was saying, “I ought to know all about it. I lost out.” She inhaled deeply and it made a grinding sound and then it was a quivering sob. “I remember the way it was, it was four years ago, that day when Cassidy came walking into Lundy's. A lot of us girls were there and right away we were looking at him. Me especially because Spann was doing a stretch and I'd been without it for months and months. So I'm sitting there and I see that thick curly blond hair and that big fine chest and all that solid muscle beef, all that fine man.”

  “Oh, stop it,” Shealy said. “You've been drinking all last night and all today and now you're drawing pictures.”

  “Am I? It's a picture that happened. The way I'm sitting there, hoping he'll see me. I tell you I kept crossing my legs and lighting cigarettes, just hoping he'd notice me. But no. Instead he notices something sitting at a table. He sees a great big pair of cantaloupes sticking out from under a blouse.”

  “Forget that.”

  “I was sitting there lighting cigarettes. I weighed ninety-two pounds.”

  “It was a long time ago,” Shealy said.

  “It was four years ago and I sat there and I saw them walk out. I went to my room and I wrote a long letter to Spann. Then I read it and I tore it up.”

  “All right,” Shealy said. “All right.”

  “But let me tell you. Will you let me tell you? It was after Mildred got him to marry her. That was when I got the other feeling. I mean, just feeling sorry for him. Maybe just wanting to touch the fuzzy gold hair on his thick wrist, or give him a very light kiss on the side of his face. Maybe knit him a pair of socks or something like that. Like going to his room just to see that his bed was made and he had a clean sheet to sleep on. To cook him a decent meal because I'm ready to swear she never did that for him. I remember once in the winter he had a bad cold and he treated it here, right here in Lundy's Place. His throat was so bad he could hardly talk and he stood at the bar and drank glass after glass of rock-and-rye until it made him damn good and sick and he threw up. And where was his wife? I'll tell you where she was. She was having herself a time in Chinatown. At one of those places where they play fan-tan and drink some rice slop.”

  “You mean rice wine. It's good. I've tasted it.”

  “His wife. How can you sit there and say it? How can you say she's ever been his wife? What did she ever do for him? What did she ever give him? I'll tell you what she gave him. Pure hell.”

  The door opened and Spann came in carrying a bottle of colorless liquor. He opened the bottle and Pauline extended a water glass and he filled it for her. Then he filled Shealy's glass. He poured the equivalent of a jigger into his own glass.

  Pauline raised her glass and took several long gulps. She banged the half-empty glass on the table and turned to Shealy and said, “So that's what you did. Instead of telling Doris where he was, you told his wife.”

  Spann circled the table and came toward Pauline and said, “Are you still at it?”

  “I want him to know what he's done.” She lifted her glass to her lips and took another long gulp. “Shealy, it's only that I've known you for so long. It's only that I'm so fond of you. If it wasn't for that, I'd take the bottle and smash it across your face.”

  Shealy got up from the table, crossed the room and opened the door and walked out.

  “That just about does it,” Spann said gently. He lowered his head, as though he was bowing to Pauline. And he took her wrist, as though he meant to kiss the back of her hand. He bit hard into the back of her hand, and Pauline shrieked and jerked her hand away.

  “Look what you did,” she said, indicating the teeth marks on her hand. “Look, look!”

  “I told you to leave Shealy alone. Why do you drill away at people?”

  “Look what you did to my hand.”

  “That's only a sample. You start with Shealy again and I'll give you the rest of it.”

  “Give it to me now,” Pauline said. She backed away so that the table was between herself and Spann.

  “Come on, give it to me now.”

  Spann started to turn his back to her and she reached down and picked up the bottle and threw it at him. It barely missed him and he stood still and watched it crashing against the wall.

  “Come on,” Pauline said. “Come on, lizard.”

  Spann's small, slim body went flashing around the table and then, like a tiny animal making a precise attack, he flew to Pauline's side and he had her arm and he was biting at the upper part of it. Pauline shrieked again and struggled to break away.

  “Oh, Mother,” she shrieked. “Oh, Jesus.”

  She quivered and shrieked very loudly as she rolled her head and stood there allowing Spann to bite away at her arm.

  “Biting me,” she sang out at the top of her voice. “Look what he's doing. He's biting me to death. Why, just look at him, will you? He's biting my arm off.”

  Then for a moment she was an interested spectator watching Spann as he bit away at the upper part of a woman's arm. Her eyes widened slightly, then suddenly closed and were shut tightly, and with her other arm she pistoned her fist against Spann's forehead. Spann's teeth were parted and he sailed back, collided with a chair, and landed on his side. Pauline had another chair in her hands and she was raising the chair, aiming it at Spann. He crouched there on the floor, his arms in front of his face. Without a sound he was begging her not to throw the chair. She raised the chair higher. Then she hurled the chair at Spann and he was darting to one side, but he wasn't fast enough. The chair caught him in the ribs and he made a sound something like a howling dog. He howled again as Pauline ran at him. He went on howling as he rolled across the floor, evading her clutching fingers.