Show 1 CHAPTER I hadn't had a real holiday for j about two years when Delphine made I me take that trip to I really know where the place t. was except that we named a skin lotion after it and the Main Line used to go there for This August however so everything was pretty Bermuda had just teen discovered as the stenographer's bought my ticket and saw me when she looked the crowd over she said what you better drink this trip is Bronx always a bit A but if a woman isn't a snob t of some kind she's probably short on I A Anyway she had me fixed up in a deck cabin and private bath i and a chaise lounge reserved for a. I was feeling one of those f. heavy summer and it was hot humid It wasn't Bronx it was k Planters That was new to me then like lots of other I i didn't even know Bermuda was I supposed in a sort of way it was part of As a matter of fact if you off the tourists it acted a good deal like the cricket club wing of I recognized the tourist bunch all right because I'd seen them stripped for action in the The girls wore shorts up to the timber line and by the time they hit Hamilton they were as burned as grilled Not even our Caribbean Cream could take care of exposure like that It was a shock to them when they they found they had to get the shorts down to the knee or else really wear Bermuda didn't seem the least bit curious about the Upper West Side They consoled themselves buying sun Delphine knows all the ropes aboard i she must have given the deck steward some big sweetening because while I was flopped out in my chair he came round to know what he could do for can all the lunch bells I I guess I ought to go down and The steward explained those weren't lunch gongs just the I didn't know what they would be doing out in the unless warning people away from Staten but I was too limp to He said I could take my lunch right there in the I said L I would be more conscientious for k my first sea I better go down- stairs and cat a square L a cold and starve a Then p. the man in the next chair pipes t I'd sort of half way noticed him B. because he was watching things as Y if he was He was Jewish so I figured he'd probably been cruising lie means if FT you feed a cold you'll have to starve f a fever With a cold like you got it I'm prescribing j Planters maybe some jelly and toast The last thing I felt like it was starting but the ard thinks that's a good idea and brings it to me on a And Marcus that being who it was in didn't make any attempt to carry He went off downstairs and got his own lunch and when he came up again I was By evening I felt better and even got into the I found him at the same table with I just sup- posed maybe the seating was arranged P according as the chairs were on t of course when my wits got l sorted out I realized he had fixed it with the maitre m It was fun to be talking to a man just It's like a good tJ highball after a long spell of soda rl He was smart enough to sec I wasn't in a mood for any for-SY ward passes to be thrown at I guess he used me for his intellect if and when he wanted chicken gumbo he'd go after some of the deck tennis gals in I figured I must be a pretty sour old spinster to accept the situation like but l Gulf Stream air just makes you let things It was hot as my old j bedroom under the roof in and everything was new to the funny smell of a ship and that lY tort of anxiety in your stomach and J such blue water with big yellow I guess the sail was only two days but it certainly seems like nm Of course Wyn got me so conditioned about mill's clothes that I hate to sec them Mark's striped creased like a would blackball him at any cricket and those black and white yachting shoes with perforated breathing holes were definitely Then you'd notice his hands and forget about the other Massage and chiropractic I studied out in Chicago made me observant about When I learned he was working in the Children's Hospital we lots to talk He was curious what kind of line was I in and I wouldn't tell After a couple of Planters Punches some of his stories were a bit but I'm not too easily frightened that way and a few of Parry old Racquet Club favorites were even-Steven with There was a good many ways Mark would look like the answer to a maiden's if you were that kind of a What interested me was how he knew his stuff about On the voyage two weeks he was on the same ship it was end of August and we ran into one of those A little boy fell downstairs and broke his collarbone and Mark and I happened to be standing right The ship's doctor was busy with and Mark had the child bandaged up and comfortable before you'd know That made a big hit with We were staying different places when wc got to and I was having fun with another crowd so I didn't see much of I ran into him one day over at Elbow tanned as brown as He took me dancing on the hotel terrace one he's a good dancer too though he was crowding a bit more than is comfortable in Bermuda August There's a terrace right alongside the water and the colored boatmen drift their little sailing boats up to the edge like butterflies in the moonlight We went for a sail in the but I had to explain to him that I starved one fever successfully and I had no intention to start up He was so good humored about it vacation to get good and tough for an extra number of lie got That was why he always stopped after the third and I liked that in Wc a picnic to one of those islands there's an old prison and the cockroaches spring at you as big as Mark was so excited about them he couldn't believe lie caught one in an olive bottle and took it back to his hotel and dissected it up with a razor blade to see what it was all about I knew in a way that 1 was going to sec him again because he could teach me a but I thought it was good for his soul to stall a while and 1 wouldn't give him any What I he had something to work for that was worth I think of that when I go down to visit Mac and Martha and sec little sprawled out asleep in What's wonderful is to have something besides Maybe these white collar business sharecroppers Molly calls who've been through it and learned what to do wouldn't make such bad wives after Learning to do without is the only weapon we got It was a long time till I saw Mark again To be honest I guess I forgot his existence except for a snapshot someone took on that his shoes showed up I had to think about After Pearl Velour and Delphine not in such good I found myself practically running the It began to look as though anyone in the cosmetic business had no private life at I didn't take much time for and sometimes to get away from perfumery I'd stop in at a quick eats on Sixth Avenue and read the paper while I had a Everybody there looked so hard-run it cheered me I didn't figure out at first what made the place look then I noticed it was because all the men ate with their hats The chewing made their hats ride up and you would almost feel seasick if you watched it too One day I see a brown plush fedora that demands attention and sure enough it's Mark He was so pleased It is a poser for Kitty Foyle when Bhe encounters Wyn's baby another woman's child I Rogers as I was a bit Of course successful and bright the way he can always get as many of his own kind as he'd care to whistle at I was someone outside his routine and I had him The most I would tell him was I came from and he'd say it's only two hours I think he believed I was some kind of a trained nurse that hadn't had the advantages of a New York or John Hopkins If he'd known I was getting ready to move into my own apartment on Riverside he'd have had the number out of mc after two Aquarium He told me a lot about infantile how it usually moves from South to North and comes in a kind of annual epidemic mostly late summer and early Matter of fact he said he was taking this and and I was feeling I couldn't very well avoid him walking back as far as the office with It seemed to give him a great kick when he learned what line I was I thought all the time you were taking people's temperatures in After that my phone bell began to ring on Reminds me of the call I got from his nice old She rang said Mark talked so much of me and wouldn't I come to their apartment Saturday they were going to have bar mitzvah for Mark's kid I said I supposed that was something to cat Then I found it was a confirmation ceremony and made me practically a member of the be Copyright by Christopher Morle |