Reinhart's Women Read Online Free PDF Page B

bigoted images in private. He had himself, for a few days, thought of Grace Greenwood as his own girl friend. Of course his criteria for a female companion had altered greatly over the years. That sex no longer took priority among the various possible uses of a lady friend was due partly to his own time of life and partly to that of the culture. A sensitive man nowadays, even if young, did well to hang back—for example, had it not turned out that he was right to do so in this case? But not only because inversion was rife. Women in general had grown assertive, had their own magazines displaying naked men and relating filthy fantasies, took out loans from banks, tried murderers, and performed brain surgery. For ever so long now it would have been simple bad taste to buy a broad a rum-and-Coke, kid her along for a moment or two, and then expect to pry her legs apart immediately thereafter in the back seat of a gas-guzzler. Not that this sequence had been characteristic of his experience even when he was young and lusty. Oh, he might well have bought the drinks, but it was typical of the girls he frequented not to keep their part of the implied bargain. In truth, the one time that he did succeed, his companion had been Genevieve, for whom the parked car was a means to ensnare him for marriage—that being in the remote day when girls had a virtue that could be lost.
    Reinhart had had nothing to fear from female “liberation”: under the old system women had either disregarded him or run him ragged.
    But lesbians were something else again. But what? Not “masculine,” really, except for the cigar-sucking character alluded to in his bitter joke, who probably existed only in the imagination. He had seen more than one TV discussion show that dealt with these matters when the subject had come into vogue some years earlier, and while the “gay” men never seemed altogether credible when on such display, the homosexual women were seemingly well balanced and in fact often quite attractive to his eye—though in view of what had happened with Grace, should he not suppose his vision to be faulty, or even corrupt? Was there a name for the kind of pervert who preferred members of the opposite sex who were themselves inverts?
    By the time he had finished the kitchen cleanup Grace had surely reached home, if indeed that had been her destination. He went to his bedroom, sat down on the bed, and lifted the phone from the adjacent table. He was amazed to discover that without trying he had learned Grace’s number by heart. He must have had high hopes of some sort. Imagine being cut out, with a woman, by your own daughter!
    He fingered the dial. Before any electronic sound was heard at the other end of the line, Grace answered. The surprise made Reinhart mute for an instant: he could have sworn the bell had not rung. This was not the sort of situation in which he was ever glib. The result was that having impatiently cried “Hello” twice, Grace gasped dramatically and began a monologue in a high, fluttery voice that sounded for all the world as though she were giving a malicious imitation of an adolescent chatterbox.
    “I’ve been naughty! A quart of Pralines ’n’ Cream! You called just in time, but I knew you would. You always come riding to the rescue like the U.S. Cavalry, flags flying, swords clinking. Oh, I was joking, you know that. I never mean these things. I just get so flustered! Well, I mean, I didn’t really know how he’d take it, regardless of what you said. No, I didn’t doubt your word, but sometimes the closest person to another doesn’t see a certain side. And after all it could be pretty devastating. But he’s so sweet I could just hug him, but of course I see so much of you in him, though I must say you’re not always as good-humored—now don’t take offense, you know I’m just teasing. Are you on your way? I lied: I haven’t touched the ice cream. I’ve been waiting for you, but unless you come soon,