"Oh, that." He grinned rather sfully. "They do us a grand favor, Rusty andMag. We laugh over it: how they think they break our hearts when all the time wewant them to run away. I assure you, we were laughing when the sadness came."
His eyes searched the litter on the floor; he picked up a ball of yelloer. "This,"
he said.
It was a telegram from Tulip, Texas: Received notice young Fred killed in aoverseas stop your husband and children join in the sorrow of our mutual loss stopletter follows love Doc. Holly never mentioned her brain: except once.
Moreover, she stopped calling me Fred. June, July, all through the warm months shehibernated like a winter animal who did not know spring had e and gone. Herhair darkened, she put o. She became rather careless about her clothes:used to rush round to the delicatessen wearing a rain-slicker and nothingunderh. José moved into the apartment, his name replag Mag Wildwoods onthe mailbox. Still, Holly was a good deal alone, for José stayed in Washington threedays a week. During his absences she eained no one and seldom left theapartment -- except on Thursdays, when she made her weekly trip to Ossining.
Which is not to imply that she had lost i in life; far from it, she seemedmore tent, altogether happier than Id ever seen her. A keen sudden un-Holly-likeenthusiasm for homemakied in several un-Holly-like purchases: at a Parke-Ber au she acquired a stag-at-bay hunting tapestry and, from the WilliamRandolph Hearst estate, a gloomy pair of Gothic "easy" chairs; she bought theplete Modern Library, shelves of classical records, innumerable. MetropolitanMuseum reprodus (including a statue of a ese cat that her own cat hatedand hissed at and ultimately broke), a Waring mixer and a pressure cooker and alibrary of cook books. She spent whole hausfrau afternoons slopping about in thesweatbox of her midget kit: "José says Im better than the y. Really, whowould have dreamed I had such a great natural talent? A month ago I couldntscramble eggs." And still couldnt, for that matter. Simple dishes, steak, a propersalad, were beyond her. Instead, she fed José, and occasionally myself, outré soups(brandied black terrapin poured into avocado shells) Nero-ish ies (roastedpheasant stuffed with pomegranates and persimmons) and other dubious innovations(chi and saffron rice served with a chocolate sauce: "A Indian classic, mydear.") Wartime sugar and cream rationiricted her imaginatio cameto sweets -- heless, she once managed something called Tobacco Tapioca:best not describe it.
Nor describe her attempts to master Puese, an ordeal as tedious to me as itwas to her, for whenever I visited her an album of Linguaphone records neverceased rotating on the phonograph. Now, too, she rarely spoke a sentehat didnot begin, "After were married -- " or "When we move to Rio -- " Yet José had neversuggested marriage. She admitted it. "But, after all, he knows Im preggers. Well, Iam, darling. Six weeks gone. I dont see why that should surprise you. It didnt me.
Not un peu bit. Im delighted. I want to have at least nine. Im sure some of themwill be rather dark -- José has a touch of le nègre, I suppose you guessed that?
Which is fine by me: what could be prettier than a quite y baby with brightgreeiful eyes? I wish, please dont laugh -- but I wish Id been a virgin forhim, for José. Not that Ive warmed the multitudes some people say: I dont blamethe bastards for saying it, Ive always thrown