VERONICA is missing. Not precisely missing, absent, rather. For several days nobody mentions the fact. Then on a Monday Anne says, "I wonder where the hell Veronica is."
"Probably with Thag," Dore says.
"Thag? Who is Thag?" Simon asks.
"Guy she met at the laundromat," Anne says. "Hes a broker. Hes with Smith Barney."
"If hes a broker whats he doing at the laundro?mat?"
"So hes thrifty. She should have called, though."
"Probably having a great time. The time of her life," says Dore. "Theyre probably sitting there drinking Dom Perignon and buying and selling Carbide right now." Dore reads the financial pages of the neers carefully and has fifty shares in a that is mar?keting a corrective for dry eye, or the inability to tear, a painful and depressing dition that afflicts hundreds of thousands of Ameris and tless fners, she says.
"What kind of a name is Thag?" Simon asks irrita?bly.
"I think its a beautiful name," Dore says. "Very Sdinavian."
"Well if she does her ass back here pretty damn quick Im going to give her bed away."
"Simon!" Anne exclaims. "Youre being possessive!"
"I dont mean it."
"I know. Thats the hell of it."
"You dont wao be possessive."
Oreet Simon and Anne gaze at a brand-new Honda, the paint a glittering dy red.
"I dont like what Honda did with the frohis year," he says.
"Yeah, its iive."
Simon makes a shapiure with his hand.
"That snout."
Anne nods.
"Very wrong. Still --" He puts an arm around her. "The first car I ever bought was a Hillman Minx. Ever see one of those?"
"Before my time," she says.
"A boxy little ragtop. Had all the power of a lawn-mower. Never had a car after that I liked as much."
"During which marriage was that?"
"You getting on me?"
"Not me."
"And I was going to take us for oysters at the Oyster Bar."
"Im ready."
"A certain dryness sets in. The situation dries out, as it were."
"I dido pry."
"When I was young I thought everything was very funny. I cracked up a lot. Dont do that anymore."
"Youthful arrogance."
"Id still like to think everything was funny."
"I used to work with children," Anne says.
"Disturbed children?"
"Not more disturbed than any other children. Just ordinary children."
"What did you do?"
"I worked with them. We worked together, me and the children."
" you be more specific?"
"I just worked with them. Ordinary children. The children need a lot of work. Theyre just like anybody else. They need a lot of work. Theyre not finished. We glued things to paper plates. I worked with them. Daily. On a daily basis."
"You had a place where you worked with them?"
"Yeah it was a kind of nursery. Painted greige. Gray-beige. The color is thought to have a bearing on how the children feel. Some places have a lot ht colors, thats aheory, this was a soothing calm?ing creige."
"So what were the children like?"
"You t generalize, they were all different. Not every child feels the same thing at the same time. They were all different. For example, some of them were male."
At the Oyster Bar under Graral they sit at a table o four men in business suits. One of the men has no arms and has removed his shoes. He has mittenlike socks on his feet and holds, between the big toe and the of the right foot, what looks to Simon like a Gibson.
Q