Nightwork

She and the boy seemed in no hurry to be on their way, and I sat there looking at her for what seemed like a very long time. Consciously, I made myself assess, at that one moment, what I felt on the deepest level, as I watched her. I saw a nice enough little woman, ordinarily pretty, who in a few years would look austere, who had no connection with me, who could not move me to joy or sorrow. There was a faded, almost obliterated memory of pleasure and regret.

I turned on the ignition and started the car. As the car moved slowly past her and the boy, they were still talking. She did not look at the car. They were still standing there, on the windswept. darkening street, when I took a last look back in the rear-view mirror.

I drove to the Howard Johnson Lodge and put in a call for Sag Harbor.

'Love, love!' Fabian was saying disgustedly. We were in the living room of his suite in the St Régis. As usual, as in anyplace he lived even for a day, it was littered with newspapers in several languages. We were alone. Lily had had to go back to England. I had driven directly to New York. I had told Evelyn on the phone that I would get to Sag Harbor the next day. 'I thought that you had at least gotten over that,' Fabian was saying. 'You sound like a high-school sophomore. Just when everything is going so smoothly, you've got to blow up the whole thing....'

Remembering the morning on the dock at Porto Ercole, I was displeased with his choice of words. But I said nothing. I was going to let him talk himself out.

'Sag Harbor, for Christ's sake,' he said. He was pacing up and down, from one end of the big room to another. Outside there was the sound of the traffic on Fifth Avenue, reduced to a rich hum by thick walls and heavy drapes. 'It's just a couple of hours from New York. You'll wind up with a bullet in your head. Have you ever been in Sag Harbor in the winter, for God's sake? After the first fine flush of passion dies down, what do you expect to do there?'

'I'll find something,' I said. 'Maybe I'll just read. And let you work for me.'

He snorted and I smiled.

'Anyway,' I said, 'I'll probably be safer in America surrounded by millions of other Americans than in Europe. You saw for yourself - I stick out like a lighthouse among Europeans.'

'I had hoped to be able to teach you to blend into the scenery.'

'Not in a hundred years. Miles," I said. 'You know that.'

'You're not that unteachable,' he said. 'I saw certain signs of improvement even in the short time we were together. By the way, I see you went to my tailor.'

I was wearing one of the suits from Rome. 'Yes,' I said. 'How do you like it.' I nipped the lapel of the jacket.

'A welcome change,' he said, 'from the way you looked when I met you. You got a haircut in Rome, too, I see.’

'You never miss anything, do you?' I said. 'Good old Miles.'

'I dread to think of what you're going to look like after a visit to the barber at Sag Harbor.'

'You make it sound as though I'm going to live in the wilderness. That part of Long Island is one of the swankiest places in the United States.'

'As far as I'm concerned,' he said, still pacing, 'there are no swanky places, as you so elegantly put it, in the United States.' '

'Come on, now,' I said. 'I remember you come from Lowell, Massachusetts.'

'And you come from Scranton, Pennsylvania,' he said, 'and we both should do our damndest to forget the two misfortunes. Righto, marriage. I grant you that. You're pleased at the prospect of having a son. I'll grant you that, even though it's against all my principles. Have you ever taken a good look at American kids today?'

'Yes. They're endurable.'

That woman must have bewitched you. A lady lawyer!' He snorted again. 'God, I should have known I should never have left you alone. Listen, has she ever been to Europe? I mean before this - this episode?'

'Yes; I said.

'Why don't you make this proposition to her - You get married. Righto. But she tries living in Europe with you for a year. American women love living in Europe. Men chase them until they're seventy - especially in France and Italy. Let her talk to Lily. Then she can decide. Nothing could be fairer than that, could it? Do you want me to talk to her?'

'You can talk to her,' I said, 'but not about that. Anyway, it's not only the way she feels. It's the way feel. I don't want to live in Europe.'

'You want to live in Sag Harbor.' He groaned melodramatically. 'Why?'

'A lot of reasons - most of them having very little to do with her.' I couldn't explain to him about Angelo Quinn's paintings and I didn't try.

'At least can I meet the lady?' he asked plaintively.

'If you don't try to convince her,' I said. 'About anything.'

'You're some dandy little old partner, partner,' he said. 'I give up. When can I meet her?'

'I'm driving out tomorrow morning.' - 'Don't make it too early,' he said. 'I have some delicate negotiations starting at ten.'

'Naturally,' I said.

'I'll explain everything I've been doing over dinner. You'll be pleased.'