Two Weeks in Another Town Read Online Free PDF Page B

taller of the women said, near tears, “why do you do things like that?” She was wearing a hat with two artificial gardenias sewed on it, flat across her head.
    “Should I call a policeman, sahr?” It was the doorman, looking grave, standing at Jack’s shoulder. “There’s one on the corner.”
    “Oh, please…” the woman with the gardenias cried.
    “Just let the sonofabitch stand up,” Jack said. He felt his nose and his hand came away bloody.
    The man sprawled on the steps looked up at Jack, his head rocking, the cunning and triumphant smile on his lips. “ ‘Arrivederci, Roma,’” he sang.
    “He’s drunk,” the short woman said. “Please don’t hit him.” She and the other woman managed to haul the man to his feet and fussed around him protectively, straightening his clothes, supporting him, whispering to him, pleading with Jack and the doorman, standing between Jack and the drunk. “He’s been drinking ever since we got to Europe. Oh, Sanford, you ought to be ashamed of yourself.” The woman with the hat spoke rapidly, in all directions. “My dear man, you’re bleeding horribly. I do hope you have a handkerchief, you’re ruining that nice gray suit.”
    Before Jack could break in, the woman had whipped out a handkerchief and thrust it into his hand. As Jack put it to his nose, the shorter woman pushed the drunk back a little farther away from danger, murmuring, “Oh, Sanford, you promised you’d be good.”
    Jack could feel the handkerchief, which was soft and fragrant, soaking quickly in his hand. Even through the blood the perfume on it smelled familiar and he puzzled about it as he stood there, snuffing uncertainly.
    A taxi drew up under the portico and the man and the woman who dismounted from it stared curiously, first at Jack and then at the two women and the drunk, as the man paid the fare. Their disapproving cool eyes made Jack feel, stupidly, that, out of a sense of social responsibility, he owed it to them to explain what had happened.
    The woman with the hat fumbled once more in her bag, talking all the while. “Prudence,” she said in a loud Bostonian whisper, “put that bad boy right in that cab. This is becoming a scene.” She took a ten-thousand-lire note from her bag and crumpled it into Jack’s pocket. “There’s no need to call the police, is there now? I’m frightfully sorry. That’s for cleaning the suit, of course.”
    “Now, see here,” Jack said, taking the note out of his pocket and trying to give it back to her. “I don’t want…”
    “I wouldn’t dream of it,” the woman said, recoiling. She produced a thousand-lire note and gave it to the doorman, while the new arrivals went slowly past them, into the hotel, staring. “For being so kind,” she said grandly. “Now you get into that taxi, Sanford. And apologize to the man.”
    “That’s what they sang,” the drunk said, nodding and grinning, “when the Doria went down.”
    “There’s just nothing to be done with him when he drinks,” the woman said. With athletic dexterity she bundled the drunk into the cab and slammed the door behind them.
    “ ‘Arrivederci, Roma,’” the man’s voice floated back as the cab drove off. “Italian navigation. While the crew went off in the. lifeboats. The bastard had it coming to him. Did you see his face when I gave it to him? Did you see it?”
    Surprisingly, from the open windows of the taxi, came the sound of women’s laughter, high, shrill, uncontrollable, over the coughing of the old engine and the whining tires.
    “Are you hurt badly, sahr?” the doorman asked.
    “No,” Jack said, shaking his head, watching the cab as it turned into the street and vanished. “It’s nothing.”
    “Is the gentleman a friend of yours?” The doorman gently held Jack’s elbow as Jack went toward the entrance, almost as though he were afraid that Jack, reacting slowly, might finally drop at his feet.
    “No, I never saw him before in my life. Do you know who