She had him for an instant, but he broke away and raced to the door and opened it and scampered out.

  Pauline fell to her knees. She shook her fist at the door. She opened her mouth very wide and sobbed wheezingly. She stretched herself out so that she was flat face-down on the floor and she beat her fists against the splintered wood. She went on doing that until a noise from across the room caused her to raise her head.

  The noise was made by the springs of the cot as Cassidy slowly sat up.

  Pauline stared at him and moaned, “Oh, Mother.”

  “Get me a drink,” Cassidy said. He frowned at her while she got up off the floor. “Go on, go downstairs and bring me a bottle. And not that white rotgut, either. I want rye whisky.”

  Pauline smiled brightly. She wiped her hands across her tear-stained face.

  “Tell Lundy to charge it,” Cassidy said. Then he remembered the roll of bills in his trousers pocket. He reached under the thin blanket, and discovered he wasn't wearing the trousers. He was wearing only his cotton shorts.

  Pauline hurried out of the room. Cassidy sat stiffly upright in the cot, wondering what they had done with his pants. Goddamnit, he had something like eighty dollars in those pants. His lips were very tight, clamped grimly as he told himself he needed that eighty dollars, it was all he had. Suddenly he was aware of something more important than the money. The bad pain had gone away and now there was only a dull ache and it, too, seemed to be subsiding. He could feel the balance and the clarity returning to his head. He reached up and back and felt the bump on his skull. It pained sharply when he touched it, but that was only the bruise and it didn't go any deeper than that. It was dry and he knew the skin hadn't been broken and it was just a bad bump on the head, that was all.

  The door opened and Pauline came in with a bottle of rye whisky and a pack of cigarettes. She lit two cigarettes and filled two water glasses almost to the top. She pulled a chair toward the cot and sat down and gave Cassidy his smoke and his drink.

  Cassidy sipped the whisky and shook his head. “Pauline, I hate to bother you again but I want some water. My stomach's empty and I'll need a chaser.”

  “Why, certainly, honey. By all means.” She ran out of the room and came back with a glass of water.

  “Thanks,” Cassidy said. He took a long but rapid drink of the rye whisky.

  Pauline smiled at him. “Now drink your water, honey. Drink it down.”

  He gulped some water. Then he repeated it with the whisky and the water. He dragged at the cigarette, inhaling very deeply and letting the smoke come out slowly. He grinned at Pauline and said, “Now I feel better.”

  “Oh, that's wonderful, honey. That's just wonderful.”

  He drank some more whisky.

  Pauline said, “Now look, honey, if there's anything you want me to do, just tell me. Anything at all.”

  “Just sit here,” he said. “Just sit here and drink with me.”

  They lifted their glasses and looked at each other while they drank.

  Then there was the sudden crackle of angry electricity in the sky and Pauline gave a little scream. Cassidy turned fast and stared at the window. He saw it was almost pitch-black out there. The high crackling sound came again and beyond it, like a bass effect, there was the dull booming noise.

  “Here,” Pauline said. “Here's another drink.”

  She was filling his glass again. She handed it to him and refilled her own glass.

  Cassidy gulped some whisky and chased it with the water. He lifted the glass of whisky to take another drink and then he noticed the way Pauline was sitting there and looking at him. Her very thin and very white face was whiter than usual, and her eyes were extremely sharp and bright.

  She said, “Don't get the wrong notion. It ain't that I don't want Spann. I guess I'll always want Spann.”

  Cassidy lowered the glass to the floor. He lit another cigarette.

  “But then,” Pauline said, “if you wanted to take me away from Spann, I think you could do it.”

  He grinned at her. He twisted the grin and shook his head.

  “Well, anyway,” she said, “you could try.”

  There was another crackling banging booming in the air high above Lundy's Place, and Pauline shivered violently and spilled some whisky on the blanket over Cassidy's legs.

  “Oh, God,” she said. “Oh, Jesus.”

  “It's only the weather.” He reached across the bed and put his hand on her shoulder to steady her.

  But she went on shivering and her lips quivered. “Listen to it. When it sounds like that it scares the life out of me. It makes me think it's the end of the world.”

  “Maybe it is.”

  “Oh, no,” she said very fast. “Oh, no. Cassidy, please don't say that.”

  “But then, suppose it is. What's the difference?”

  “Oh, for God's sake. Oh, please, honey, you mustn't talk like that. Oh, please, please.” She was spilling whisky on the blanket, then allowing the glass to roll down toward the edge of the cot. She was starting to weep again. She wrapped her arms around the blanket where it covered Cassidy's legs. She was hugging his legs and working her way toward his knees, then past his knees.

  He caught her wrists and said, “Hey, where you going?”

  “You gotta believe me. It ain't that I don't want Spann.”

  “Then what do you want?”

  “Can't we just have a session? Just once?”

  “No,” he said. He felt sorry for her and there was no way for him to say it or show it, so he said angrily, “If you can't hold your whisky better than that, get the hell out of here.”

  “Honey, I'm not drunk. Don't be sore at me.”

  “All right then. Cut it out. Behave yourself.”

  “Look at me, I'm crying. Look how shaky I am. I guess it's a lot of things. Seeing you here like this. All banged up with a bump on the head and not being able to move out of this room. Hiding up here like an animal. Listen, honey, I have to tell you this. You don't have a chance. I know you don't. Don't you see? I only want to do something for you, make you feel better.”

  He released her wrists. She put her hands against his ribs and he sat there and allowed her to do that. She wrapped her arms around his middle and lowered her head so that it rested against his side. He patted her head and with his other hand he reached over the side of the cot, lifted the whisky glass, and took a gulp. Pauline turned her head and he gave her some of the whisky.

  “There,” he said. “How's that?”

  “Oh, honey.” She raised herself a little so that she was trying to press all her weight against his chest. “It's such a rotten life. Sometimes I'd give anything just to be dead. Look at what they're doing to you. A fine sweet honest man and, yes, I mean that, I mean it from the heart. And that's where it hurts me because I know they'll put you away for years, and years, and years. The dirty bastards. All of them.”

  He gazed past her head and saw the torn wallpaper across the room. He said, “You're a good friend.”

  “And you, honey,” she said. “You stand aces high with me. You always did.”

  They were smiling fondly at each other and he said, “You're not sore at me?”

  “Why should I be sore?”

  “Well, I said no.”

  “Ah, honey, that's all right. I'm glad you said no. I guess I just got worked up for a minute. Now I'm calmed down. But still I wish there was some way I could help you.”

  Just then the walls seemed to groan and shudder and from outside there was a tremendous crash and rumbling and another crash and a flare of blue-white came blazing into the room.

  “Oh, Mother,” she gasped.

  Cassidy took hold of her shoulders. “Listen,” he said. “There is a way you can help me. I want you to go find Doris.”

  She was staring at the window. “Doris?”

  “Find her and bring her up here.”

  “When?”

  “Now,” he said. “If you go now you won't get caught in the rain.”

  Pauline took her eyes away from the window. She looked at Cassidy and nodded seriously and said, “That's right. I'll go and I'll find Doris and I'll bring her here. Because this is where she should be. With you. You're absolutely right.”

  “Then go,” he said. “Hurry.”

  And he shoved her gently away from the cot and saw her walking toward the door. But then he wasn't looking at her. He was looking at the door as it opened and Mildred came in.

  Pauline was startled by the abruptness of Mildred's entrance and let out a little cry and veered to one side. Then she darted toward the door, trying to get past Mildred.

  “What's the rush?” Mildred said. She took a backward step and blocked Pauline's path to the door.

  “Let me out,” Pauline said.

  Mildred was looking at Cassidy. “What's going on?”

  “What's that to you?” Pauline screeched. “Who asked you to come in?”

  Mildred turned her head slightly and frowned at Pauline. “Why? Wasn't I supposed to come in?”

  Instead of replying, Pauline made another attempt to reach the door. Mildred caught her around the waist, raised an elbow to hold her there, bent back. Pauline began to struggle and Mildred tightened the hold. Her elbow pressed against Pauline's chin. Pauline's head was bent far back.

  “Just answer me,” Mildred said to Pauline. “Just tell me what was going on.”

  Pauline tried to speak but the pressure against her chin prevented her from moving her jaws.

  Cassidy said, “Let go of her.”

  “I'll break her goddamned neck,” Mildred said. She gave a sort of jab with the elbow, and Pauline fell back and sat down hard on the floor.

  Cassidy rolled himself off the cot and started toward Mildred. She stood there waiting for him, her hands on her hips, her feet planted wide, bracing herself, all set for him.

  He turned away from Mildred and focused his attention on Pauline. He was helping Pauline to get up from the floor. Pauline had sat down very hard and she had a thoughtful, somewhat worried look as she reached back to rub her thinly upholstered behind.

  “Hey, now,” she said. “It feels like it's fractured.”

  But then she saw Mildred standing there and instantly she forgot everything but the animosity she felt for Mildred. Her eyes narrowed and she smiled a thin and vicious smile and said to Mildred, “Please forgive me. I should have told you. Your husband was sending me out on an errand.”

  Mildred didn't budge. “What kind of errand?”

  Pauline widened the smile. “He wants Doris.”

  It was quiet for a few moments and then Mildred said, “All right, dearie. That's all right with me.” She stepped aside, giving Pauline a clear path to the door. “Go ahead. Go bring Doris.”

  The smile faded from Pauline's lips and her eyes began to widen. She walked out of the room and closed the door.

  Cassidy went to the cot and sat down on the edge of it. He lit a cigarette and as he took the first long puff he was hearing another extended crash of thunder. He turned his head and looked out the window and saw the first big drops coming down. Then there were more drops and faster and faster and louder and then it was really coming down.

  He heard Mildred saying, “I guess she won't bring Doris. She'd be crazy to go out in that rain. Look at the way it's raining.”

  He kept his eyes on the window. He watched the torrent of the slashing rain.

  Then his voice was part of the torrent, with the force of it and the tremor of it as he said, “I don't know why you're here, but I'm waiting here for Doris. When Doris comes, I'm throwing you out.”

  13

  He expected her to reply immediately, and he braced himself for what he thought would be a violent reaction. Instead, it was quiet in the room and the quiet seemed to be heavier than the sound of the storm outside. Then, after a while, he heard the tinkling of a bottle against a glass. He turned away from the window and looked toward the center of the room.

  Mildred was sitting at the table. She was pouring herself a stiff drink. She was sitting there comfortably with the drink and a cigarette. She was bent forward just a little so that her plump elbows were on the table, her tremendous breasts jutting out like a shelf above the table, her back slanting down straight along the spine until it made the start of the big bold swirling roundness, very heavy, very round, balanced with the rest of her, the brazen luscious roundness.

  She saw Cassidy looking at her, and she bent further forward and twisted her body just a little so that she was effectively displaying the slimness of her waist in contrast to the big bulging roundness up front and in back. Then, very slowly, she lifted an arm and let her fingers sink deeply into the thick mass of her black hair, and with her other arm she sort of played around along the top of her blouse. Gradually the buttons up there were slipping out of the buttonholes. She bent over just a little more and it showed the massive thrust of her breasts, bared very low and trying to burst away from the edge of the brassiere.

  Cassidy turned his back to her and walked over to the cot. He stood at the edge of the cot, looking down at the rumpled blanket. He heard the soft, almost imperceptible sound of rustling fabric. It was entirely apart from the sound of the storm outside. In his ears it became a loud sound.

  He pivoted and moved toward the table, not looking at Mildred. His eyes aimed at the bottle and the glasses and the cigarettes. He was at the table and pouring a drink. He heard the sound of something soft hitting the floor, and he looked at the floor and saw her blouse.

  Again he turned away from the table. He carried his drink and his cigarette to the cot and sat down at the end of the cot so that he was facing the door. He put the glass of whisky on the floor and took a few puffs at the cigarette, then slowly lowered his hand toward the glass, lifted the glass to his hips and was starting to drink the whisky when he heard the metallic sound of a zipper being opened. He spilled some of the whisky on his chin.

  Then there was the somewhat thick and definite sound of the skirt sliding down past the hips. The sound of the storm came crashing through, seemed to recede to allow the sounds in the room to become dominant, then crashed through again, then receded again. Cassidy started to turn his eyes toward the center of the room, jerked his head back to force his eyes toward the door, toward the floor, toward anywhere except the table. But just then something bright purple came sailing past his eyes and fell on the floor at his feet.

  He looked at it. The bright purple was her favorite color and she had a habit of dyeing all her underclothes a bright and bold shade of purple. The rayon slip at his feet was an extremely bright purple and as he looked at it, it seemed to be on fire. The purple blaze of it came flaring up into his eyes and he winced and bit hard at his lip. He looked at the glass of whisky in his hand and suddenly it seemed that something was happening to the whisky. The color of the whisky was bright purple.

  Cassidy stood up and hurled the glass of whisky at the door. There was the sound of breaking glass, but it was only a small sound because just then a crash of thunder jarred the room.

  The electric light went out.

  He gazed up in the complete darkness, trying to estimate where the bulb would be. Maybe the bulb needed tightening. He reached up and moved his hand back and forth and couldn't feel the bulb or the wire. He lowered his arm and stepped backward toward the center of the room. There was another crashing booming sound from the storm outside and then the light suddenly came on again.

  The edge of the table seemed to be pressing against his back. He was facing the window. It was like a weird kind of mirror made out of black glass, with little pools of water running wild all over it. But against the wet black there was a white shimmer, and then against the white there was the bright purple. He had his hands gripping the edge of the table as he stared at the window and saw the movement of the bright purple. It was coming up and out and away from the white.

  He heard it as it landed on the floor. He looked down and saw the bright purple brassiere on the floor.

  His hands came away from the edge of the table. He was moving slowly toward the cot. He told himself to get in under the blanket and close his eyes and try to go to sleep. He climbed onto the cot and started to pull the blanket over his legs and toward his shoulders. There was a sound from the center of the room. It was the sound of wood scraping against the floor as a chair was pushed back.

  Cassidy tossed the blanket off the cot and threw his legs over the side. He started to rise from the edge of the cot, but he saw something in front of him that caused him to blink, caused him to bounce back onto the cot. It was as though he had been hit in the chest with a sledge hammer.

  He saw Mildred standing there in the center of the room: She wore shoes and stockings and a bright purple girdle. Her hands were cupped against the swirl of her hips. Her breasts were high up and all the way out and the nipples seemed to be precisely aimed.

  Mildred said, “Come here.”

  He tried to drag his eyes away from her. He couldn't do it.

  “Come here,” she said. “I want to tell you something.”

  Her voice was soft and rich and thick. Like thick taffy. She smiled and took a step toward him.

  “Keep away,” he said.

  “What's the matter?” she asked easily with the taffy voice. “Don't you like what you're looking at?”

  “I've seen it before.”

  She raised her hands to her breasts. She cupped her hands under her breasts and tested the fullness and the weight of them. “They're heavier now than they've ever been. Aren't they gorgeous?”

  He felt as though he was being choked. “You cheap tramp.”

  “But look at them.”

  “You know what I ought to do? I ought to—”

  “Come on, look at them,” she said.

  He told himself it shouldn't be difficult. It was just a matter of taking his mind away from what he was seeing, and thinking solely in terms of what a scum she was.