The Old Man and Me Read Online Free PDF Page B

few minutes chat with him—just a half-hour would do—at his home if possible to get the atmosphere, that sort of nonsense, for our readers, you know? C. D. looked down at the table-cloth. It was a tense moment for us all. Then he looked up again and speaking slowly and with an incredibly musical voice he said that it probably could be arranged. Mr.—Smithers was it? was to telephone him in the morning. “And?” he continued, his eyes sliding over to me, his musical voice rising up into an insistent question mark. “And?”
    “Oh. Oh, Miss Flood. Allow me to present Miss Flood. Just over from the States.”
    “How do you do, my dear?” C. D. asked me, gravely offering his paw.
    “Hello,” I answered as gravely, taking it, and we smiled at each other as if sharing some private joke. Abruptly he switched and began quizzing me. Was it my first time in England? Yes. How did I like it? Oh, fine. Hmmm. There was a faint withdrawal, a faint frown. Yes, I had disappointed him, he had expected more. And what did I think of this restaurant? he continued almost sternly: “Like eating in a dining car en route to Lyons, wasn’t it?”
    I looked around in panic. The eerie yellow low voltage electricity combined with the long narrow shape of the room and the swaying light fixture with its peculiar handkerchief-covering fluttering in the iron fan’s breeze certainly gave off an atmosphere of old trains at night. But Lyons? Christ, I’d never been out of America. Then a waiter, eight clacking coffee-cups balanced on a tray on one arm, a purple-stained napkin under his other, swerved unexpectedly close to me. I backed away as a flash of one-two-three studs on his shirt front loomed in front of me and then sighed with relief as, with a whirl of his shabby swallow tails, he spun away from me, neatly avoiding disaster by some very fancy manoeuvring of his game leg. It was terrible, all I could think of was that religious movie short I’d seen a couple of days before. “It’s more like Miracle Day at Lourdes,” I heard myself say.
    C. D.’s laughter gurgled and gushed and squeaked and squealed. It was the laughter of a child—free and unfettered. His head rolled back and his belly fairly shook, the old jelly. And every time he looked at the waiter it started up again. Hiss—giggle.
    “Delicious,” he said when he could. “You must come with ah...” indicating Smitty, “both of you. Day after tomorrow. Drinks.” A touch of the paw again. A passionate appeal in his eye. “You won’t let me down, will you? I’m so looking forward to it. Do bring her, please.” And the audience was over. But not for the rest of the audience, I noticed, which was a good part of the restaurant. The Patron flew to my side with a great snapping of fingers for my coat, my coat, “
le manteau de Madame la Princesse!
” I gave him a look. Was he putting me on? Not especially. Fall-out from the presence of C. D. McKee.
    I felt suddenly very tired. Outside, I said goodnight to my new friends and exchanged telephone numbers and promises and hopped in a cab for my hotel.
    I went up to my room and got undressed, carefully avoiding the great clumps of hotel furniture rising like sharp rocks from the hysterically patterned carpet in the tiny room. I made my way to the even tinier bathroom and stared at myself in the mirror. Then I began combing my hair, admiring its shining blondness. I put on my white silk pyjamas, snapped the elastic waistband twice hard against my stomach, and rubbed my hand under it. I wandered over to the window and looked down at the lonely noisy traffic-filled street below. How ugly it looked under the arc light. I tried to think of the evening with pleasure. It had been an unqualified triumph. Why was I so angry? Then I knew. It had been practically the first time in a whole month that I’d held a conversation with English people that didn’t involve asking for a direction or paying for a cheque. One whole long lonely