Van Gogh's Room at Arles Read Online Free PDF Page B

for the color.”
    “There’s no scientific reason for it I can think of,” Jenny Simmons said, “but it’s been my experience that we have less trouble with a plain white unit than with any other color.”
    “Plain white it is for me,” Schiff said.
    “There you go,” Bill said. “It’s just we’re required by law to show you what’s available.”
    Schiff looked to Jenny, who seemed to be frowning. By law? Was he serious? Required by law? Schiff smiled at her. Jenny looked down. Then Schiff wondered if she knew about his situation. Sure, he thought, she had to. They’d come together in the van. They were partners. Like cops. The salesman would almost certainly have passed on all that Schiff had himself volunteered—— that he’d been married thirty-six years and that this was the day the Lord had made for his wife to just up and leave him, fled to her boyfriend in Oregon, spilling his life like a suicide. Also, she’d seen him with bank statements in his mouth. Now Schiff looked down. And only a few minutes earlier he’d been thinking of giving them tea, hard stuff even. (Schiff remembered when he was a kid, his parents offering “a shot” to men who came to do for them, carry their furniture up and down flights of stairs. Maybe that’s why he was still afraid of them—— their power and rough, blue-collar ways.) He felt a little betrayed. Even at that, though, he took a sort of comfort in their company, and if it wasn’t for the fact that he had still to call the banks and check with them about his accounts he would have been content to spend the rest of the afternoon being sold to. There was something soothing about it, like watching a fishing show on TV that taught you to tie your own flies or showed you how to paint a picture. It was a little, he imagined, like a woman getting a free makeover in a department store. (Schiff, abandoned, on his own, was coming a little to terms with the domestic.)
    “I took the liberty of making some notes during our earlier phone conversation.” Bill said. “Whenever you’re ready we can check out your floor plan. Jenny’s the expert. I’d like her to walk us through it. Nothing’s written in stone yet. There could still be some changes you might want to make.”
    “Of course, of course, but I don’t think you really need me. While you’re pacing it off I could be making some calls.”
    “Sure thing,” Bill said, “we’ll take care of it. Go make your calls.”
    “Well, that’s just it,” Schiff said. “I have this cordless phone? I may even have mentioned it to you.”
    “I remember you did.”
    “It’s up on the bed in my room. I live by the cripple’s code. That you must never do anything twice. Unfortunately, I do just about everything twice. Well,” he said, “I’m crippled. I almost have to.”
    “You mustn’t say that. You’re hardly a cripple,” the salesman said. “You know how to cope. I hope I cope half as well as you do if I’m ever handicapped.”
    “Well,” said Schiff, “in any event. I wasn’t able to bring it with me when I came down. If someone could just get it for me?”
    “No problem,” Bill said. “Your room is——?”
    “First door on the left, top of the stairs.”
    Which left him alone in the living room with Jenny. She seemed shy for someone who worked with Bill. Stuck for something to say, she grinned at him goofily. It occurred to him she was embarrassed by everything she already knew about him. Bold cop, shy cop. Schiff poked around, looking for something he could say to put her at ease.
    “I had you for a professor,” Jenny told him.
    Schiff felt himself flush, a stain of red discovery cross his features.
    “I don’t blame her,” he blurted. “Not for a minute. She should have done it years ago. I would’ve. In her place I would’ve. No one owes anyone that kind of loyalty.”
    Before either of them could recover Bill was back with Schiff’s phone. “There you go,” he said.
    “Thank