Mermaids on the Golf Course Read Online Free PDF

on a pogo stick, rather high in the air before a girl reached for his hand. More health, more youth! Bertie would never jump like that. Bertie would walk, could now in a way, but jump for joy to make a girl smile? Never!
    Suddenly Roland burnt with anger. He stopped, pressed his lips together as if he were about to explode, looked behind him the way he had come, vaguely thinking of starting back, but really not caring how late it got. He was not in the least tired, though he was now south of 34th Street. He thought of throttling Bertie, of doing it with his own hands. Bertie wouldn’t even struggle much, Roland knew, wouldn’t realize what was happening, until it was too late. Roland turned and headed uptown, then crossed the avenue eastward at a red light. He didn’t care if he roamed the rest of the night. It was better than lying sleepless at home, alone in that bed.
    A rather plump man, shorter than Roland, was walking towards him on the sidewalk. He wore no hat, he had a mustache, and a slightly troubled air. The man gazed down at the sidewalk.
    Suddenly Roland leapt for him. Roland was not even aware that he leapt with his hands outstretched for the man’s throat. The suddenness of Roland’s impact sent the man backwards, and Roland fell on top of him. Scrambling a little, grasping the man’s throat ever harder, Roland tugged the man leftward, towards the shadow of the huge, dark apartment building on the left side of the sidewalk. Roland sank his thumbs. There was no sound from the man, whose tongue protruded, Roland could barely see, much like Bertie’s. The man’s thick brows rose, his eyes were wide—grayish eyes, Roland thought. With a heave, Roland moved the fallen figure three or four feet towards a patch of darkness on his left, which Roland imagined was a hole. Not that Roland was thinking, he was simply aware of a column or pit of darkness on his left, and he had a desire to push the man down it, to annihilate him. Panting finally, but with his hands still on the man’s throat, Roland glanced at the darkness and saw that it was an alleyway, very narrow, between two buildings, and that part of the darkness was caused by black iron banisters, with steps of black iron that led downwards. Roland dragged the man just a little farther, until his head and shoulders hung over the steps, then Roland straightened, breathing through his mouth. The man’s head was in darkness, only part of his trousered legs and black shod feet were visible. Roland bent and grabbed the lowest button of the man’s gray plaid jacket and yanked it off. He pocketed this, then turned and walked back the way he had come, still breathing through parted lips. He paid no attention to two men who walked towards him, but he heard some words.
    “. . . told her to go to hell!— Y’know?” said one.
    The other man chuckled. “No kidding!”
    At First Avenue, Roland turned uptown. Roland’s next thought, or rather the next thing that he was aware of, was that he stood in front of the mostly glass doors of his apartment building, for which he needed his key, but in his left side trousers pocket he had his keys, as always. He glanced behind him, vaguely thinking that the taxi that had brought him might just be pulling away. But he had walked. Of course, he had gone out for a walk. He remembered that perfectly. He felt pleasantly tired.
    Roland took the elevator, then entered the apartment quietly. Jane was still asleep on the sofa, and she stirred as he crossed the living room, but did not wake up. Roland tiptoed as before. The lamp was still on, on his worktable. Roland undressed, washed quietly in the bathroom, and got into bed. He had killed a man. Roland could still feel the slight pain in his thumbs from the strain of his muscles there. That man was dead. One human being dead, in place of Bertie. That was the way he saw it, now. It was a kind of vengeance, or revenge, on his part. Wasn’t it? What had he and Jane done to deserve