Garbo Laughs Read Online Free PDF

reservation.
    To Lew she said, “You’re the man who sings the song from
High Noon.”
    About a month ago, when she was peeling a late-night peach on the back steps and it was too dark and leafy to make out the source, she’d heard a voice in the alley on the other side of the big oak, just past Bill Bender’s garage, a man speaking to a dog in a tone so natural and easy that she’d known everything about him she needed to know. Then he began to sing softly, “‘Do Not Forsake Me,’” and that was it: her heart said uncle.
    Now here he was. The man with the tender voice.
    Harriet said, “Lew knows the words to a million songs,” a compliment so heartfelt it produced a smile, since wifely admiration was hard to come by. Lew reached for his wife’s hand, but she batted him away. The kids were used to this: their dadreaching for their mom’s hand, and their mom batting him away.
    Despite the heat, Kenny was wearing his gangster jacket. In the inner pockets he carried a thick wad of paper money, an old lighter, an expired credit card, a flat silver case that contained one of his dad’s business cards –
Lew Gold, Heritage Architect—
and a two-dollar toy pistol.
    “Who are you?” Dinah asked him.
    He smiled sheepishly but not uncomfortably. “Nathan Detroit,” he said.
    “So, tell me why you like Frankie.” Settling deeper into one of the padded folding chairs at the table.
    Lew and Harriet observed their son’s conquest, and so did Jane. She listened closely but didn’t speak, this twelve-year-old girl with the Bette Davis eyes who put herself to sleep every night planning what she would wear to the Oscars.
    “Because he’s a great singer. A good dancer, not a great dancer, and a great actor. And he hates Marlon Brando.”
    “What’s the matter with poor Marlon?”
    “He’s a bum. He can’t sing, he can’t dance, he can’t act, and Frank Sinatra hates him.”
    Dinah laughed her smoky, raspy laugh, and Harriet, bringing out cold drinks and an ashtray, stopped in her tracks to listen.
Sandpaper calling to its mate
, she thought, having read the description of Louis Armstrong’s voice in a Pauline Kael movie review. “You have the best laugh,” she said, looking down at Dinah and her son, and she quoted the review and gave credit where credit was due.
    Lew said, “Hattie writes to Pauline Kael.”
    “You know Pauline Kael?”
    “No,” Harriet admitted sadly.
    “But you write to her. Does she write back?”
    “Oh, I don’t mail the letters.”
    “Why not?”
    “They’re stupid. The first letter I wrote to her was about Cary Grant. It was an incredibly stupid letter. Actually, it was a story. It was an incredibly stupid story.” And she meant what she said about the story, but if she’d been pressed she would have defended the letters. She was a writer who wasn’t really writing
except
for the letters, except for this ongoing, one-sided intimacy that she didn’t have to justify to anyone. It relaxed her and kept her company.
    “Well,” said Dinah, stubbing out her Craven A, “that’s one way to save on postage.” And she laughed until she nearly choked. One manicured hand slapped the table, the other flew to her face, which for all its years of hard living was still extremely pretty. “Excuse
me,”
she sputtered, pushing back her silver hair. It was early evening and still light, but they were the only ones outside.
    “No,” shaking her head at the beer, “just a glass of water if you don’t mind.” And she lit up again and stifled a cough.
    And then they got down to business.
    “Now listen.” His mother’s face took on the ardent, competitive look that Kenny liked best. “Kenny tells me you don’t like Fred Astaire.”
    Dinah, amused and imperturbable, winked at Kenny and Jane. “Give me Gene Kelly any time.”
    Their mother leaned closer. “I’m going to have to educate you.” And Dinah replied, “You don’t like Gene Kelly?” and their mother said, “Nobody