The Burnt Orange Heresy

"I worked it all out, Mr. Westcott, and found that a beard would add about six weeks to my life, that is, six full weeks of shaving time saved in a lifetime, seven weeks if one uses an electric razor. But it wasn't worth it. Like you, I could hardly keep my fingers off the damned thing, and my neck itched all the time. The secret, they say, is never to touch your beard. And if you've already got that habit, Mr. Westcott, your beard is doomed."

"I see," he said shyly. "Thanks for the advice."

"Don't worry," I added, "you probably look handsomer without one."

"That's what Gloria said. Here," he took my empty Dixie cup-"let me get you a fresh drink. What are you drinking?"

"Eddy knows."

I turned back to examine the Marcel again. I wanted to leave. The small high-ceilinged room, which seemed smaller now as it began to get crowded, was jammed with loud-voiced people, and I did not want to talk to Westcott about his paintings. That's why I got off onto the beard gambit. They were all derivative, which he knew without my telling him. The entire show, including the Marcel, wasn't worth more than one column inch (I folded the catalogue and shoved it into my hip pocket), unless I got desperate for more filler to make the column come out to an even two thousand words.

Gloria was standing by the bar, together with a dozen other thirsty guests. Poor Westcott, who was paying for the liquor, hovered on the outskirts trying to get Eddy's attention. I took the opportunity to slip into the foyer and then out the door. I was on Worth Avenue in the late twilight, and heading for home. If Mr. Cassidy wanted to meet me, he could get my telephone number from Gloria and call for an appointment.

Twilight doesn't last very long in Florida. By the time I reached my ocherous predepression stucco apartment house-a mansion in the twenties, now cut up into small apartments-my depression was so bad I had a headache. I took off my jacket and sat on a concrete bench beneath a tamarisk tree in the patio and smoked a cigarette. The ocean wind was warm and soft. A few late birds twittered angrily as they tried to find roosting places in the crowded tree above my head. I was fified with emptiness up to my eyes, but not to the point of overflowing. Old Mrs. Weissberg, who lived in No. 2, was limping down the flagstone path toward my bench. To avoid talking to her I got up abruptly, climbed the stairs, heated a Patio Mexican Dinner for thirty minutes in the oven, ate half of it, and went to bed. I fell asleep at once and slept without dreams.

4

Gloria shook me awake and switched on the lamp beside the Murphy bed. She had let herself in with the extra key I kept hidden in the potted geranium on the porch. She had either witnessed Beremce using the key or heard her mention that one was there. I blinked at Gloria in the sudden light, trying to pull myself together. My heart was still fluttering, but the burbling fear of being wakened in the dark was gradually going away.

"I'm sorry, James," Gloria said briskly, "but I knocked and you didn't answer. You really ought to get a doorbell, you know."

"Try phoning next time. I almost always get up to answer the phone, in case it might be something unimportant." I didn't try to conceal the irritation in my voice.

My cigarettes were in my trousers, which were hanging over the back of the straight chair by the coffee table. I slept nude, with just a sheet over me, but because I was angry as well as in need of a smoke, I threw the sheet off, got up and fumbled in the pockets of my trousers for my cigarettes. I lit one and tossed the match into the stoneware ashtray on the coffee table.

"This is important to me, James. Mr. Cassidy came and you weren't there. He asked about you and I told him you had a headache and left early-"

"True."

Gloria wasn't embarrassed by my nakedness, but now I felt self-conscious, standing bare assed in the center of the room, smoking and carrying on a moronic conversation. Gloria was in her late forties, and had been married for about six months to a hardware-store owner in Atlanta, so it wasn't her first time to see a man without any clothes on. Nevertheless, I took a terry-cloth robe out of the closet and slipped into it.

"He wants you to come to supper, James. And here I am, ready to take you."

"What time is it, anyway?"

"About ten forty." She squinted at the tiny hands on her platinum wristwatch. "Not quite ten forty-five."

I felt refreshed and wide-awake, although I had only slept two hours. Being awakened that way, so unexpectedly, had stirred up my adrenalin.

"I think you're overstating the case, Gloria. What, precisely, did Mr. Cassidy say to make you so positive he wanted me-in particular-to come to his little gathering?"

She rubbed her beaky nose with a skinny forefinger and frowned. "He said, 'I hope that Mr. Figueras' headache won't keep him from coming over this evening for a drink.' And I said, 'Oh, no. He asked me to pick him up later at his apartment. James is veiy anxious to meet you: