Listen, he said. "The trouble with you is that you dont have any real kindness. Not but one woman Fve ever known had this real kindness Im talking aboutWell, Ive known you to do things no man in this world would be proud of. Ive known you to------』
Or maybe its curiosity I mean. You dont ever see or notiything important that goes on. You never watd think and try to figure anything out. Maybe thats the biggest differeween you and me, after all.』
Alice was almost asleep again, and through the mirror he watched her with detat. There was no distinctive point
about her on which he could fasten his attention, and his gaze glided from her pale brown hair to the stumpy outline of her feet beh the cover. The soft curves of her face led to the roundness of her hips and thighs. When he was away from her there was no oure that stood out in his mind and he remembered her as a plete, unbroken figure.
"The enjoyment of a spectacle is something you have never known, he said.
Her voice was tired. "That fellow downstairs is a spectacle, all right, and a circus too. But Im through putting up with him.』
Hell, the man dont mean anything to me. Hes ive or buddy of mine. But you dont know what it is to store up a whole lot of details and then e upon something real. He turned o water and quickly began to shave.
It was the m of May , yes, that Jake Blount had e in. He had noticed him immediately and watched. The man was short, with heavy shoulders like beams. He had a small, ragged mustache, ah this his lower lip looked as though it had been stung by a . There were many things about the fellow that seemed trary. His head was very large and well-shaped, but his neck was soft and slender as a boys. The mustache looked false, as if it had been stu for a e party and would fall off if he talked too fast. It made him seem almost middle-aged, although his face with its high, smooth forehead and wide-open eyes was young. His hands were huge, stained, and calloused, and he was dressed in a cheap white-linen suit. There was something very funny about the ma the same time another feeling would not let you laugh.
He ordered a pint of liquor and drank it straight in half an hour. The at one of the booths and ate a big chi dinner. Later he read a book and drank beer. That was the beginning. And although Biff had noticed Blount very carefully he would never have guessed about the crazy things that happened later. Never had he seen a man ge so many times in twelve days. Never had he seen a fellow drink so much, stay drunk so long.
Biff pushed up the end of his h his thumb and shaved
his upper lip. He was finished and his face seemed cooler.
Alice was asleep when he went through the bedroom on the way downstairs.
The suitcase was heavy. He carried it to the front of the restaurant, behind the cash register, where he usually stood each evening. Methodically he glanced around the place. A few ers had left and the room was not so crowded, but the set-up was the same. The deaf-mute still drank coffee by himself at one of the middle tables. The drunk had not stopped talking. He was not addressing anyone around him in particular, nor was anyone listening. When he had e into the place that evening he wore those blue overalls instead of the filthy linen suit he had been wearing the twelve days. His socks were gone and his ankles were scratched and caked with mud.
Alertly Biff picked up fragments of his mo