One Coffee With Read Online Free PDF

swallowed deeply and grimaced, “God, Vance! This tastes like one of your acid baths!”
    All this time Harley Harris, who barely came up to Nauman’s chest, had been dancing for attention, and the artist looked down at him in mystified bewilderment as a Great Dane might gaze at a yipping Chihuahua . Frustrated, Harris shrilled, “You just wait then! You’ll be sorry! And I hope you roast in hell!”
    Nauman watched him flounce away through the nursery exit and, honestly puzzled, appealed to Sandy. “Is he upset about something?”
    Malicious laughter rippled through the big room as Sandy reminded him of Harley’s failure. “Professor Quinn told him yesterday that he wouldn’t qualify for an M.F.A., but I think he was hoping you’d override the committee’s decision. He was supposed to have a meeting with you today but it had to be postponed.”
    Nauman frowned, uncomfortably aware that he’d been unintentionally rude to the boy. He could be, and often was, merciless in his treatment of those with intellectual pretensions, but picking on someone of Harley Harris’s mental size was not quite sporting.
    Around him the conversation had reached a raucous pitch. Among the younger staff members at the corner table, battle was joined over whether or not there was a shred of individuality in the whole second generation of abstract expressionists. Both sides had fervent, articulate defenders who shouted to be heard.
    A bearded latecomer pushed his way into the group, snarling good-naturedly at a friend who’d maneuvered him into dating his girl friend’s cousin. “You promised me a Venus,” he grumbled. “She was a Venus, all right. The Willendorf Venus!”
    Which led to fertility symbols, Paleolithic cave paintings, Stonehenge, Toltec technology and present-day earthworks and “—so his uncle’s in the business, and he can borrow a bulldozer whenever—”
    “I’ll be damned if I’ll buy it. What kind of art is it if you’ve got to go up five miles in a frigging helicopter to see the whole thing?”
    “Ah, you’re a reactionary—”
    “—combines soft sculpture with collage and gets—”
    “—so I told him where he could put holography, and she said—”
    Nauman shook his head over so much simultaneous vociferous enthusiasm, but on the whole he approved. Some of his best paintings had been generated by freewheeling debate. He took a final gulp of the really unpalatable coffee and set the empty cup on the file cabinet between two of Sandy’s potted geraniums while he pulled out an elaborately carved meerschaum pipe. As he lit it, he was cornered by Lemuel Vance, who began buttressing his demand for a new printing press for the graphics workshop with data from three different catalogs. He almost had to shout to be heard over the surrounding din.
    In the midst of all the loud hilarity and noisy arguments Sandy noticed a girl hesitating by the mail rack. At Sandy’s gesture the girl, a student aide for Dean Ellis’s office, edged her way over. Clearly such bedlam never occurred in the hushed sanctuaries below.
    “The dean wants to know if Professor Quinn’s all right,” she whispered.
    “All right?” repeated Sandy in a puzzled tone. The decibel level began dropping as others became aware of this new diversion and paused to eavesdrop.
    The girl nodded. “Dean Ellis was speaking with Professor Quinn on the telephone when he suddenly started—I mean, the dean said it sounded like Professor Quinn was—” Embarrassed, she groped for a diplomatic term. “Like he was, well, you know, upchucking.”
    Sandy half rose. Nauman was closer to the door, but before he could move it was wrenched open and Riley Quinn staggered across the threshold. He clutched a wastebasket to his soiled shirtfront, and an acrid stench reached their nostrils as he heaved into it spasmodically. His eyes were glassy, his skin green white beneath its deep tan.
    “Help me!” he gasped hoarsely, retching at every word. “Oh my