Voice of our Shadow

1

The flight from Vienna to New York takes nine hours. As the plane took off I felt a profound rush of relief. I was free! Paul and India and death and anxiety — I was leaving it all behind.

That relief lasted all of about five minutes. What followed was guilt and a paralyzing disappointment with myself. What the hell was I doing running away? How could I leave India alone in the darkness? I knew then how great a coward I really was, because I didn't want to stay. If anything, I wanted to be in New York in an hour. A hundred thousand miles away from Vienna and the Tates. I knew it and hated myself for the joy that had slyly bloomed inside me when I knew I'd made it — I had escaped.

I watched the movie, ate all the meals and snacks; twenty minutes before we landed, I went to the toilet and threw up.

I called India from the airport, but there was no answer. I called again from the city bus terminal; the connection was so clear it sounded as if she were in the next room.

"India? It's Joe. Listen, I'm going to come back."

"Joe? Where are you?"

"New York."

"Don't be goofy. I'm fine, so don't worry. I've got the phone number there, and I'll call you if I need you."

"Yes, but will you?"

"Yes, Mr. Jet Lag, I will."

"You won't, India, I know you."

"Joe, please don't be a horse's ass. This call is costing you a fortune and it's not necessary. It's adorable you called and are concerned, but I'm fine. Okay? I'll write, and I'll really call if I need you. Be good and eat some cheesecake for me. Ciao, pulcino." She hung up.

I smiled at her orneriness and her guts and my freedom. I couldn't help it. She'd ordered me to stay.

India hung on to a co-op studio apartment in the city on Seventy-second Street that had belonged to her mother. She had given me the key to it before I left. I went over and dropped off my bags. It was musty and dirty; but tired as I was, I gave the place a good scrubdown. It was night before I'd finished, and I barely had enough energy to stagger to the corner restaurant for a sandwich and a cup of coffee.

I sat at the counter and listened to the people speak English. I was so used to hearing German this language sounded bright and crisp as a new dollar bill.

I knew I should call my father and tell him I was in town, but I put it off so I could be by myself for a few days. I went to the bookstores and ate pastrami sandwiches and took in a few movies. I walked the streets like some rube from Patricia, Texas, gaping at the people and colors and life that floated in the air like an invasion of kites. Because I hadn't been there for so long I couldn't get enough of it. The weather was sour and cold, but that didn't stop me one bit. At times my head was so full of New York I actually forgot Vienna for a while, but then a sound or the way a woman touched her hair reminded me of India or Paul or something I knew back there.

I bought her a number of presents, but the one I liked best was an antique rosewood box. When I brought it home I put it on the dresser and wondered if I would ever give it to her.

I got in touch with my father, and we set up a lunch date. He wanted me to come up to the country to see their new apartment, but I wiggled out of it by saying I'd come to the States to camp out in the New York Public Library and had to work my schedule around their hours. I could say that sort of thing to him and get away with it because he loved the fact I was a writer; anything having to do with "the trade" was okay by him.

The real reason for my avoiding the visit was that I disliked his new wife, who was irritatingly garrulous and suspicious of me. My father thought she was great, and they seemed to have created a really happy life together, but whenever I had appeared on the scene in the past, it had thrown things out of kilter for all of us.

He liked pubs, so we met in front of O'Neal's on Seventy-second Street and Columbus. He caught me by surprise because he was dressed very nattily in an English raincoat that made him look like an old James Bond. He had also grown a whopping gray mustache that only added to his flash. I loved him for this new image; when we greeted each other with a bear hug, he was the one who let go first.

He was beaming and full of pep and said his new life was going great guns. He's such an honest person that I knew none of it was pretense or showing off. Good things were happening to this man who for so long had his share of the bad. What I adored about him was how he kept shaking his head at all his new good fortune. If ever there was a person who counted his blessings, it was my father.

We sat in a corner and ate jumbo hamburgers. He asked me about Vienna and my work. I told him a few lies that made it sound as if I had the world on a string. By the time coffee was served, he'd brought out a bunch of recent photographs of his family and, handing them to me one by one, made little comments on each.

His wife's two children by a previous marriage had grown and were both on the brink of adolescence. My stepmother had begun to lose the nice figure she'd brought to their marriage, but at the same time, she looked both more relaxed and more sure of herself than when I'd last seen her.

There were pictures in front of their new apartment building, in the jazzy new living room, of a trip they'd all taken together to New York. In that one they stood in front of Radio City Music Hall looking shy and secretly frightened of what they'd gotten themselves into by coming.

My father handed them to me gently, almost as if the pictures were the actual people. When he spoke his voice was amused, but love had hollowed out a corner in it; it was plain he cared very much for these people.

I smiled at each and tried to listen carefully to his explanations, but after I've seen ten or fifteen of them, snapshots of people I am not intimately involved with make my eyes swim.

"This one, Joe, is of that birthday party we had back in October. Remember, I was telling you about it?"

I glanced at the picture and reared away from it as if it were on fire.

"What is this? Where'd you get it?"

"What, son? What's the matter?"

"This picture — what's going on in it?"

"It's Beverly's birthday. I told you."

Three people stood holding hands, facing the camera. They wore normal clothes, but each wore a black top hat — just like Paul Tate's.

"Jesus Christ, get it away from me! Take it away!"

People were staring, but none of them as intently as my father, the poor guy. I hadn't seen him for many months, and then this had to happen. I couldn't help it. I'd thought Vienna was behind me and that for the time being I was safe. But what is safety? Physical? Mental?

When we were out on the street again, I tried feebly to make up a story about working too hard and needing a rest, but he didn't swallow it. He wanted me to come home with him, but I wouldn't.

"Then what can I do for you, Joe?"

"Nothing, Pop. Don't worry about me."

"Joe, you promised me when Ross died that you'd come to me if you were ever in bad shape and needed help. I think you're breaking your promise."

"Look, Pop, I'll call you, okay?" I touched his arm and started to move away. I knew I was going to start crying and I'd be damned if I'd let him see it.

"When? When will you call? Joe?"

"Soon, Pop! In a few days!" I hurried to the corner of Seventy-second Street. Once there, I turned back toward him and, sticking my arm up as high as it would go, waved. As if one of us were on a ship, sailing away from the other forever.

I didn't see them until I had already opened the door to my building. It was after midnight. The black man had pushed the woman into a corner of the entryway. He was slamming her head against the metal mailboxes.

"What the hell's going on? Hey!"

He turned; I could barely make out that the sides of his mouth were shiny-slick with blood.

"Fuck off, man!" He held her by the neck while he spat this at me over his shoulder.

"Oh, help me!"

He shoved her away and came at me. Without thinking, I kicked him as hard as I could in the crotch, an old trick I had learned from Bobby Hanley. The man gasped and fell to his knees, both hands clamped between his legs. I didn't know what to do then, but the woman did. Stumbling for the second, inner door, she flung it open with a bang. I followed, and it whomped shut behind us, locking. The elevator was there, we were in it before the man even looked up.

Her hand was shaking so badly she was barely able to press 7, the floor below mine. When the car started to move, she bent over and threw up. She kept retching even when there was nothing left. She tried to turn to the wall, but she started coughing and choking; I was afraid she couldn't breathe. I went over and slapped her hard on the back.

The doors slid open, and I helped her out of the elevator. We stood in the hall while she took quick, heavy breaths. I asked her for the number of her apartment. She handed me her purse and started down the hall. She stopped in front of a door, pointing. She started retching again, and without thinking, I took hold of her shoulders.

Her name was Karen Mack. The man had been waiting for her in the hallway and had punched her in the face the first thing. Then he tried to kiss her, and she bit him.

It came out gradually. I made her lie down on a bright-blue couch and wiped her face with a wet washcloth I'd been careful to soak in warm water. She didn't need any more shocks. The only liquor in the place was an unopened bottle of Japanese plum brandy. I opened it and made both of us take big, disgusting swigs. She didn't want me to call the police, but when I said I should go, she begged me to stay. She wouldn't let go of my arm.

The apartment must have cost a fortune, because among other things, it had a large balcony that looked out over hundreds of rooftops; it reminded me of Paris.

When I'd patted her hand enough and reassured her I'd stick around, she asked me to turn out the lights and sit next to her. The moon was full and lit the room with its own smooth blue light.

I sat on the thick carpet next to the couch and looked out at the winter night. I felt good and strong. Later, when she touched my shoulder and thanked me again in a low, sleepy voice, I felt like thanking her. For the first time in weeks I felt valuable again. A human being who had for once stepped out of his own selfishness to help another.

I woke up the next morning on the floor, but a heavy wool blanket was over me and one of the soft pillows from the couch was under my head. I looked toward the balcony; she was out there. She'd put on a robe and fixed her hair.

"Hello?"

She turned and smiled lopsidedly. One side of her mouth was swollen and purple, and I saw she'd been holding an ice pack to it.

"You're up." She came in and slid the glass door shut behind her. Although the balloon lip distorted her face, it appeared she had one of those incredible Irish-white complexions that go so well with deep green eyes, which she also happened to have. Big eyes. Great eyes. Her nose was small and nondescript, but strawberry-blond hair framed her narrow face and made it a wonderful one, in spite of the smudge-purple lip.

She took the ice pack away, and her tongue snuck out to give the spot a lick. She winced when she touched it. "How many rounds does it look like I boxed?"

"How are you? Are you all right?"

"Yes, thanks to you I'm all right. After you live in New York for a while, you stop thinkin' there are any heroes left, you know what I mean? You proved me wrong. What would you like for breakfast? And would you please tell me your proper name so I don't keep callin' you 'you.' "

"Joseph Lennox. Joe, if you like."

"No, I like Joseph more, if you don't mind. I've never liked nicknames much. What can I give you for breakfast, Mr. Joseph?"

"Anything. Anything's fine."

"Well, from the looks of my icebox, anythin' can be a cantaloupe, or fresh waffles and Canadian bacon, coffee. ."

"I would love waffles, Karen. I haven't had them in years."

"Good, you got 'em. If you'd like to take a shower, the bathroom's opposite the bedroom. Gee, I'm makin' it sound as if you've got all the time in the world. Can you stay for breakfast? I called the school and told them I was sick. Do you have to be somewhere? It's only eight o'clock."

"No, no, I've got nothing planned. Waffles and coffee sound like the best thing I could do this morning."

Her bathroom looked like World War III. Damp towels on the floor, hand wash hung limply on a clothesline strung across the bathtub; a twisted tube of toothpaste lay in the sink with no cap in sight. I worked my shower around her obstacle course and even cleaned up a little before I left.

The living room was a shock of sunlight and morning warmth; the dining table was full of good things to eat. The orange juice was in thick crystal goblets, and the silverware caught the fierce morning light and bounced it off the walls.

"Joseph, please come and eat before it gets cold. I'm a terrific cook. I made you seven hundred waffles, and you have to eat them all or you'll get a D."

"Are you a teacher?"

"Yes, indeed. Seventh-grade social studies." She made a wry face and flexed her muscles like a strongman in the circus.

She sat down at the table and picked up a fork. We both sat there and watched her hand shake. She slowly put it in her lap. "I'm sorry. Please, though, you go on and start eatin'. I'm sorry, but I'm still scared to death. It's sunny out, and it's over, and no one's goin' to get me now, but I'm scared. It's like havin' a bad chill, you know?"

"Karen, would you like it if I stayed with you today? I'd be glad to."

"Joseph, I would like that very very very very much. Which part of heaven did you say you came from?"

"Vienna."

"Vienna? That's where I was born!"

Vienna, Virginia. Her parents lived near there and raised greyhounds for dog racing. She said they were fine people who had both inherited so much money it confused them.

Karen went to Agnes Scott College in Georgia because her mother had gone there, but she hated everything except her history courses. Richard Hofstadter came to the college and gave a lecture on Jacksonian democracy. She was so overwhelmed by it that she instantly decided to transfer wherever he taught permanently, which turned out to be Columbia University in New York. Totally against her parents' wishes, she applied and was accepted at Barnard. Later she went on to get a master's degree in history at Columbia before she got tired of going to school. She liked New York so much that when she was finished she took a teaching job at a private girls' school in the lower sixties.

This all came out over the longest breakfast I'd ever eaten. I kept asking her questions so she wouldn't think about the night before. But you can eat only so many waffles. Staggering up from the table, I suggested through swollen cheeks that we go out for a walk. She agreed; it crossed my mind it would be nice to have a change of clothes, but I wasn't sure if I should leave her alone yet, so I went as I was.

The day was snappy cold, but it was clear for the first time since I'd arrived. West Seventy-second Street is a world in itself, and whatever you're looking for is usually there: cowboy boots, organic pasta, Japanese box kites. . We promenaded up and down and spent a long time looking in store windows, comparing notes.

I fell in love with a pair of cowboy boots that she made me try on. I remembered Paul's story about the Austrians in the Vienna airport wearing them, but they were beautiful. I came close to buying them, until I found out they cost over a hundred and forty dollars.

We had lunch at a delicatessen. She had a hard time eating her corned beef sandwich because her lip was so sore, but she laughed and started purposely talking out of the corner of her mouth like Little Caesar.

"Awright now, Lennox. I told you enough about myself. What's the dope on you? You gonna open up or am I gonna have to pound it out of you? What's your story?"

"What would you like to hear?"

She looked at an imaginary wristwatch. "Your life story in one minute."

I told her a little about everything — Vienna, my writing, where I came from. When she listened, her eyes grew wide and excited. Without thinking, she touched me often when some part of my story moved or dismayed her. She said things like "No!" or "You've got to be kiddin'!" and I often found myself nodding to assure her that it was true.

An hour later we were having a glass of hot spiced wine at a glassed-in sidewalk cafй. We started talking about the theater; in a small voice I asked her if she had ever seen The Voice of Our Shadow.

"Seen it? Hoo, Joseph, I had to read that play for a drama class at Agnes Scott. I made the mistake of bringin' it home over vacation, and my daddy got hold of it. Wow! He picked it up and flew 'round the house like an eagle, yellin' about how they were makin' us young girls read books about juvenile delinquents and feelin' girls up! Hell, Joseph! I know all about that play!"

I changed the subject, but later, when I told her about my connection to the play, she smiled sadly and said it must be hard to be famous for something you didn't do.

The wine turned into a Cuban dinner and more talk. It had been a long time since I'd so comfortably shot the breeze and laughed and not worried about things. With India you quickly realized she expected you to speak well and interestingly because she was listening so carefully. A moment before you said anything, you were still shaping and polishing it so it would arrive in first-class condition. When I was around India, both before and after Paul died, every moment shook with such importance that I was sometimes afraid to move for fear I'd break something — the mood, the tone, whatever.

Here, on the other side of the world, Karen made you feel that with no effort at all you were the cleverest, wittiest devil in town and that laughter was meant to boom across a room and drain you of everything you had. Life wasn't easy, but it certainly could be fun. We made plans to see a movie together the next night.

We went to a revival of the original Lost Horizon. When we left the theater she was wiping her eyes with my handkerchief.

"I hate them, Joseph! All they have to do is throw me some violins and that old Ronald Colman and I'm a goner."

I wanted to take her arm, but I didn't. I looked at the sidewalk and felt glad she was there.

"I had this boyfriend a couple of months ago? He'd take me to movies like that and then get all mad when I started cryin'! Now, what did he expect me to do, take notes? New York intellectuals — ink for blood."

"Do you go with anyone special?"

"No, that fellow was my last big steady. Oh, you can go to parties. I even went to a singles' bar once, but I don't know, Joseph, who needs it? I get choosier the older I get. Is that a sign of senility? I go into one of those jittery places, and everybody's eyes are as big as TVs. It makes me all depressed."

"What was the name of your last steady?"

"Miles." She pronounced it "Molls." "He was a very big-time book editor. He gave me a rejection slip."

"Oh, yeah? Didn't he like your style?"

She looked at me and poked me in the ribs. Then she stopped dead in the middle of the sidewalk and put her hands on her hips. "Do you really want to know or are you just makin' chitchat?"

People walked by with smirks and expressions that said they knew we were fighting. I told her I wanted to know. Sticking her hands back in her coat pockets, she started walking again.

"Miles wore his watch when we made love. Do you believe it? Drove me completely crazy. Why would someone do that, Joseph?"

"Do what, wear a watch? I never thought about it."

"Never thought — Joseph! Don't start makin' me upset. I have great hopes for you. No man should wear a watch when he's makin' love. What is he — on a schedule? What would you do if a woman came into bed wearin' a big Timex on her arm? Huh?" She stopped again and gave me the big stare.

"Karen, are you serious?"

"You bet I'm serious! Miles wore this big hundred-pound dive-bomb thing. Every time. It'd end up cuttin' me to pieces. Then I'd lose all the bliss because it was tickin' away at me."

"Karen. ."

"Don't look at me like that. You're lookin' just the way he did when I told him about it. Listen — a woman wants to be taken and ravished and adored by a man. She wants to forget the world and leap right the hell off the edge! But not here — tick, tick, tick — it is seven-oh-eight and thirty seconds. You see what I mean?"

" 'Taken and ravished and adored'?"

"That's right. Don't start embarrassin' me — you asked."

We went back to her apartment for a cup of coffee. It was raining again; I watched it smash against the balcony windows. The living room was a bright fortress against it. The blue couch, thick carpet, soft white drops of light in each corner. The great contrast was the pictures on the walls. I would have expected Bernard Buffet clowns or Picasso doves to go with the softness and exuberant colors, but it wasn't so. Behind the dining table was a sludgy brown Francis Bacon print in a dull silver frame. I couldn't make out much of what was happening in the picture except that the subject was melting. Otto Dix, Edward Hopper, and Edvard Munch rounded out the happy lineup.

When she came in with the coffee, I was looking at a big print of Munch's The Shriek.

"What's with all the gloomy pictures, Karen?"

"Aren't they scaly? Music to have nightmares by." She perched on the couch and, with the most delicate movements possible, arranged two places on the coffee table, complete with miniature place mats. It reminded me of the care little girls take when they set up tea parties for their dolls and stuffed animals.

"Miles said I was a secret psychotic. Me and my penny loafers and lemon-meringue blouses. . Miss Fair Isle Sweaters. Do you want sugar? Oh, Miles. Miles should have been a screenwriter for French movies. He needed one of those severe knee-length leather coats and a Gauloise cigarette hangin' from his lip in the middle of the rain. Here, Joseph, I hope you like your coffee strong. This is Italian and it's good."

I sat down next to her. "You still haven't explained why you like such melancholy pictures."

She even sipped gently. "You're hurtin' my feelin's, Joseph."

"What? How? What did I say?"

"You're sayin', dear man, that I've got to like this kind of picture because I dress or talk this way. I'm not supposed to like anythin' black or sad or alone because. . Well, sir, how would you like it if I put you in that kind of little box?"

"I wouldn't. You're right."

"I know you wouldn't. You don't know me all that well yet, but you're pretendin' you do by sayin' things like that. How would you like it if I said, 'Oh, you're a writer! You must like pipes and Shakespeare and Irish setters. At your feet!' "

"Karen?"

"What?"

"You're right." I touched her elbow. She pulled it away.

"Don't do that! Stop tellin' me I'm right. Put up your dukes and fight." She made a bird-sized fist and stuck it up under my nose. The fun behind the gesture wrenched something loose inside me, and looking at her, I opened my mouth to say, "God, I like you," but she interrupted me.

"Joseph, I don't want you turnin' out to be a male chauvinist pig. I want you to be exactly what I think you are, which is very special. I'm not goin' to tell you about that yet, though, because it'll only give you a swelled head. First you saved me from that black dragon, and then you turned out to be nice and interestin'. I will be madder than hell if you end up disappointin' me. Understand?"

Her school was old and red brick; you felt wealth radiating out from it like heat. I stood on the other side of the street at three-thirty and waited for her to come out. She had no idea I'd be there. Surprise!

A bell clanged and girls' heads leapt up in every window. Voices and shouts and high laughter. Moments later they swelled out of the building in soft gray and white waves. Hefting books, looking at the sky, talking to each other; all of them wore gray blazers, matching gray skirts, and white blouses. I thought they looked wonderful.

I saw a blond woman who looked like Karen toting a big briefcase. I started blindly across the street, but saw halfway there that it wasn't her.

After half an hour she still hadn't shown, so I gave up and started home. I didn't understand it. At a corner phone booth I called; she answered on the first ring.

"Joseph, where are you? I'm bakin' a pecan pie."

I explained what had happened, and she giggled. "Today's the day I get out early. I went down to Soho to shop for our dinner. You are comin' to dinner, you know."

"Karen, I bought you a present." I looked at it clenched in my hand.

"It's about time you got me somethin'! No, I'm kiddin'. I'm very touched. Bring it along to dinner. I'll open it after."

I wanted to tell her what it was. It was heavy; the big Edward Hopper book with color plates she liked so much. I put it down on the small metal shelf beneath the telephone box.

"Joseph, tell me what it is. No, don't! I want to be surprised. Is it great?"

"Why don't you wait and see?"

"Stinker."

I wanted to put my hand through the receiver and stroke that smooth, velvet voice. I could see her face — the delight and the sauciness. I wished I was there. "Karen, can I come over now?"

"I wish you were here an hour ago."

I almost ran down the hall when I got out of the elevator. I arrived at her door with the book under my arm and my heart in my throat. There was a note taped up: Don't get mad. We'll have the pie when I get back. Something came up. Its name is Miles and says it needs help bad. I don't want to go. Repeat — I do not want to go. I owe him for a lot though, so I'll go. But I'll be home as soon as I can. Don't be mad or I'll kill you. There's a good movie on the Late Movie. I'll knock three times. Don't be mad.

I bought a pizza and brought it home so I could be there in case she got back early. She didn't. She didn't come back at all that night.

2

The next morning I got a letter from India. At first I looked at it as if it were a key or paper I'd lost long ago and, now that I'd found it, didn't know what to do with.

Dear Joe,

I know I've been rotten about writing, but please assume things have happened that kept me from it. There's been no real sign from Paul, although twice he's done little bad things to remind me he's still here. Since I know you'll worry if I don't tell you what I mean, the other morning I went to the kitchen and found a Little Boy glove on the table where he used to sit. As I said, small things, but I got scared enough and reacted like a maniac, so I guess he was satisfied.

I've made an appointment to see a famous medium here in town, and although I've never had much faith in those table thumpers, an awful lot of what I used to believe has been washed right down the drain in the last few months. I'll tell you if it turns up anything.

Now, don't take it the wrong way, but I'm enjoying living by myself. There are so many more things you're responsible for — the things your other half used to take care of without your even knowing it. But the compensation is, you're free as a bird and answerable to none. God knows, I liked living with Paul, and maybe someday I'll like living with you, but for now I like having the double bed to myself and all options open.

How are you, slugger? Don't you dare misinterpret anything I've said here, or else.

Little hugs, India

I swallowed my pride and called Karen's apartment. It rang seven times before she answered. Each ring made my heard beat faster and faster.

"Hello, Joseph?"

"Karen?"

"Joseph. Joseph, I'm so bad."

"Can I come down?"

"I spent the night with him."

"I sort of guessed that when you didn't show up for the Late Movie."

"Do you really want to see me?"

"Yes, Karen, very much."

She was in a pink flannel bathrobe and ugly pink bedroom slippers. She held the robe closed at the neck and wouldn't meet my eyes. We went into the room and sat down on the couch. She sat as far away from me as she could get. The dead couldn't have been more silent than we were for those first five minutes.

"Do you have someone over there in Vienna? Not any here's or there's. Someone special?"

"Yes. Or maybe yes. I don't know."

"Are you lookin' forward to goin' back to her?" Her voice took on the slightest edge.

"Karen, will you please look at me? If you're worried about last night, it's all right. I mean it's not all right, but I understand. Oh, shit, I can't even say that. I don't have any right. Look, I hate the idea of your sleeping with someone else now. It's a compliment, okay? A compliment!"

"Do you hate me?"

"God, no! Everything is crazy in my head now. Last night I thought I was going to end up chewing the carpet, I was so jealous."

"You were?"

"Yes, I was."

"Do you love me, Joseph?"

"What a time to ask that! Yes, after what I felt last night, I guess I do."

"No, maybe you were just jealous. It's easy to be jealous, especially with somethin' like that."

"Karen, if I didn't care about you, I wouldn't give a damn about last night, would I? Listen, I got a letter from Vienna today, okay? I got a letter, and for the first time I had no desire to go back. None. I don't even want to write back. Doesn't that mean something?"

She was silent. She still wouldn't look at me.

"And what about you, anyway? Who do you love?"

She pulled one of the couch pillows into her lap and began smoothing it with her hand again and again. "You more than Miles."

"What does that mean?"

"It means last night taught me somethin', too."

We finally looked at each other over the miles of couch that separated us. I think we both yearned to touch but were afraid to move. She went on smoothing the pillow.

"Did you ever notice how differently people act on a Saturday afternoon?"

We were walking arm in arm down Third Avenue. It was noisy and wet all around us, but the sun was out. We tramped along, paying no attention to where we were going.

"What do you mean?" I reached over and fixed her green muffler. She looked like a bright bandit in the middle of a holdup when I was done adjusting it.

"Don't strangle me, Joseph. Well, if nothin' else, they all laugh differently. Kind of fuller. I guess maybe it's relaxin'. Hey, can I ask you a question?"

"Is it about last night?"

"No, it's about her in Vienna."

"Okay."

We crossed the street into a patch of sunlight. The street glistened; someone passed us talking feverishly to his friend about Alitalia Airlines. She took my arm and slid her hand into mine in my pocket. It was warm and thin, fragile as an egg.

I looked at her. She'd pulled the muffler down from her top lip. She stopped and pulled me against her with the hand she had in my pocket. "All right. What's her name?"

"India."

"India? What a nice name. India what?"

"Tate. Come on, let's walk."

"What does she look like, Joseph? Is she pretty?"

"She's a lot older than you, for one thing. But, yes, she's quite pretty. Tall and thin, dark hair, kind of long."

"But you think she's pretty?"

"Yes, but in a different way than you."

"How?" Her eyes were skeptical.

"India is fall and you're spring."

"Hmm."

Five minutes later, the sun snuck behind the clouds and stayed. The sky turned to steel, and people began walking with their heads hunched into their shoulders. Neither of us said anything, but I knew the day was failing, no matter how many truths had shown their faces along the way. There was love on both sides, but it was cloudy and formless. I felt that if I didn't do something right then, this cloudiness would drain the intimacy from the day and leave us confused and disappointed.

Ross and Bobby went to New York a lot. They explored the city as if they were looking for buried treasure and, in so doing, found just what they wanted. Manhattan is full of strange and mysterious places that hide under the city like a secret heartbeat: the windows over the front entrance to Grand Central Terminal that go up ten stories and look down over the inside of the building like God's eyeballs through dirty glasses. Or a bomb shelter on the East Side designed to hold a million people and dug so deep into the earth that a tractor moving across the floor looks, from one of the upper staircases, like a yellow matchbox with headlights.

The two of them collected these spots and told me about them once in a while. But they shared very little, whether it was cigarettes or a bottle of stolen liquor, and they were even more tight-fisted when it came to showing anyone these unknown, magical places.

Consequently, I almost swooned the day they offered to take me to the abandoned subway station off Park Avenue. It was the only one of their trove of places I ever actually saw with them. I decided on the spur of the moment to take Karen down there.

When we arrived at the spot on the sidewalk, I bent down and started to yank at one end of a long rectangular subway grate. She asked me what I was doing, but I was too busy groaning and pulling to answer. I realized after too long that there was a latch beneath the grate that had to be released before anything would happen. As soon as I'd done that, the thing flew right up and almost decapitated me. The two of us were down on our knees over a subway grate, huffing and puffing to get it up, and not a soul stopped or said a word to us. I doubt if anyone even looked at what we were doing. Welcome to New York.

A flight of steel steps went straight down into the darkness, but Karen climbed down without a question. The last I saw of her face, she had a little knowing smile on. I followed right on her heels and pulled the grate over me like a submarine hatch.

"Joseph, my dear, what the hell is this?"

"Keep going. If we're lucky you'll see a light in a minute. Follow it."

"My God! Where'd you ever find this place? Looks as if the last time a train stopped here was in 1920."

For some reason the station was still lit by two dim bulbs at either end of the platform. We stood there, and only after some time did the distant sound of a train break the enormous silence. It got louder and louder, and when it scrabbled through on an outside track, Karen put her arm around my shoulder and drew my head to hers so I would be able to hear her above the roar.

"You are completely nuts! I love this!"

"Do you love me?"

"YES!"

When we were out of there and had walked a few blocks, Karen suddenly grabbed my coat and swung me around to face her.

"Joseph, let's not sleep together for a while. I want you so much I'm dyin', I won't be able to breathe. Can you understand? It's goin' to happen, but let's wait until" — she shook her head from side to side in a delighted flurry — "until we're drivin' ourselves crazy. Okay?"

I slid my arms around her and, for the first time, pulled her close to me. "Okay, but when it gets to that point, it's boom and it happens. No questions asked, and either side gets to say boom. Fair enough?"

"Yes, fair enough."

She gave me an incredibly hard squeeze, which left me gasping. To look at her, you'd never have thought she was that strong. It made "boom" even more wonderful to anticipate.

I was in New York for almost two months before India called. I knew that, compared to my growing feelings for Karen, I had never truly been in love with India. I felt guilty about that, but Karen and New York and the excitement of this new life drew a thick velvet curtain between me and what had happened in Vienna. When I was alone I wondered what I would do if the call or letter came. I honestly didn't know.

When I was a boy the house next door to ours burned down. For a year after that I was terrified whenever I heard the fire alarm go off in town. It blew in such a way that you knew immediately where the fire was: five toots — western section, four — eastern. . But that made no difference to me. No matter where I was, I would run for a telephone and call home to see if everything was all right. Finally, and it really was almost a year later, I was playing punchball after school when the alarm went off. No answering alarm echoed inside of me, and I knew I was all right again. That night the house on the other side of ours went up in flames.

"Joseph Lennox?"

"Yes?" I was alone in my apartment. Karen was at a faculty meeting. It was snowing outside. I watched it wisp and float as the connection went through.

"Vienna is calling. One moment, please."

"Joey? It's India. Joey, are you there?"

"Yes, India, I'm here! How are you?"

"Not so good, Joey. I think you have to come home."

Karen came in her front door with a big package under her arm.

"I see you lookin' at this box. Don't think it's for you 'cause it's not. I bought myself a little somethin' which I will show you in a minute."

I was always glad to see her. Neither of us had gotten to the "boom" stage yet, but for days both of us had reveled in the delicious edge the waiting created. She dropped her coat on the couch and bent down to kiss my nose — her favorite form of greeting. The cold steamed off her, and her cheeks were wet with melted snow. She didn't notice anything was wrong because she was in too much of a hurry to get on with her show.

I looked out the window and wondered briefly if it was snowing in Vienna. Paul had returned and so frightened India with his Little Boy tricks that over the phone she seemed on the verge of a breakdown. The curtains to their bedroom had burst into flame that night as she was getting into bed. It was over in a few seconds, but it was only the latest thing. She admitted that since I'd left he had constantly been at her, but she'd avoided telling me because she'd kept hoping he would come to her and talk. He hadn't, and now she was at the end of her taut rope.

"TA-DA!" Karen stumped into the living room in nothing but a Hawaiian print bikini and the pair of brown cowboy boots I'd admired so long ago in the shop window.

"You thought I'd forgotten, didn't you? Ha! Well, you old cayuse, I didn't. Happy Cowboy Boot Day. If I don't take these things off this minute, my feet are going to warp."

She sat down next to me and pulled them off. When she'd finished, she picked one up and ran her hand along its side. "The man in the store told me that if you take care of them with polish, this leather'll last you a hundred and fifty years."

She looked at me with a smile so loving and excited by what she'd done that for some seconds I thought, Fuck it, I cannot go away from this woman. I don't care about anything but this face and these cowboy boots and this room and this moment. That's all. Fuck it. What could I do in Vienna, anyway? What could I possibly accomplish there that India hadn't? Why did I have to go? Close that door in my mind, lock it tightly, throw the key as far away as I could. Basta. If I could keep my mind from opening it again or, better, forget that door completely, I would be home free. Was that so hard? What was more important — love or nightmares?

"You don't like them." She dropped the boot and pushed it a little with her bare foot.

"No, Karen, it's not that at all."

"They're the wrong color. You hate them."

"No, they're the best present anyone ever gave me."

"Then what's wrong? Why are you lookin' so sad?"

I got up from the couch and walked to the window. "I got a call from Vienna tonight."

Karen was unable to hide her emotions; the word "Vienna" made her catch her breath so sharply I could hear it clear across the room.

"All right. What did she say?"

I wanted to tell her! I wanted to sit beside her, take those lovely hands in mine, and tell her every bit of the story. Then I wanted to ask this wise and generous woman what in God's name I should do. But I didn't. Why involve her in this? It would be cruel and unnecessary. Whether I was right or wrong, for the first time in my life I realized love meant sharing the good and trying like hell to keep the bad away, no matter what shape or size. So I didn't say anything about the darkness in Vienna. I said only that India was in very bad shape and had asked me to come back and help her.

"Is she tellin' the truth, Joseph? And are you tellin' me the truth?"

"Yes, Karen, both."

"Both." She picked up the cowboy boot again and placed it gently on the coffee table. She put both hands up to her ears as if suddenly there were too much noise in the room. Strangely, the Munch print of The Shriek was directly behind her and she looked eerily like the bedeviled person in the painting.

"It's not right, Joseph."

I went over to the couch and put my arm around her. She came, unresisting. My mind was so blank that the only thing going through it was how very cold her shoulders were. How different from India, who was warm all the time.

"I want to say ten bitchy things all at once, but I'm not goin' to, damn it. It's just not right."

I rocked her under my arm for a long time.

"I want to trust you, Joseph. I want you to tell me you're just goin' back there to help that woman out, and as soon as you can you'll come back to me. I want you to say that to me, and I want to believe it."

"It's true. That's just what I was going to say." I said this with my head resting on hers. She gave me a slight push away and looked at me.

"Yes, you say it now, but I'm scared, Joseph. Miles said it, too. Miles told me he just had to get some things straight in his life and then he'd come back to me. Sure, sure. I was such a sap. He didn't come back! When he left for his 'little while,' he left, and that little while didn't end. I wanted to trust him, too. I did trust him, Joseph, but he never came back! That one time he called, right? You know what he wanted? He wanted to get laid. That's all. He was sweet and funny, but all he wanted was to get laid. Remember, I told you I learned some stuff that night? Well, that's what." She started rocking again; only this time it was hard and mechanical, like a machine.

"I'm not Miles, Karen. I love you."

She stopped. "Yes, and I love you too, but who can I trust? Sometimes I feel so small and alone that it's like death. Yes, that's what death is — the place where you can't trust anybody. Joseph?"

"Yes?"

"I want to trust you. I want to believe every word you say to me, but I'm afraid. I'm afraid you'll say you've got to go for this little while and then. . Aw shit, I hate it!"

She stood up and began walking around the room. "You see? You see? I'm so scared right now I've been lyin' to you! Even after that night with Miles, when I started realizin' things about my relationship with him, he called me. You didn't know that, did you?"

My heart dropped on hearing his name, but I kept quiet and waited for her to go on. It was some time before she did. She paced the room the whole time. Watching her small, bare feet cross the floor in the middle of that winter night made everything so much worse.

"He called me a couple of days ago, okay? I never have the guts to tell anyone just to stop, but with him I wanted to ever since that night. I mean, I wanted to ninety percent, but there was a little ten percent in there that kept sayin', Be careful, don't burn those bridges, dearie. You know what happened, though, the last time he called? This is the honest-to-God truth, too, Joseph, so help me. He called and wanted to take me ice skatin' at Rockefeller Center. He knows how I love to do that. Hadn't forgotten a thing, the skunk. Never misses a trick. A little hot cocoa afterward, too? But you know what I said to him, Joseph? Talk about burnin' your bridges? I said, 'Sorry, Miles, Karen's in love right now and can't come to the phone!' Then I hung up. Me! I felt so good doin' it that I picked it up and hung up again."

She laughed to herself and, basking in the memory, put her hands on her hips and smiled at the wall.

"But you said he used you the last time you were together. Did you still want to go out with him after that?"

"Not at the time, no! I had you. But what about now, Joseph? You go away and he happens to call again. He probably will — he's got an ego as big as this room. What do I do when that happens?"

"If he calls again, you go out." I didn't want to say it, but I had to. I had to.

"You don't mean a word of that."

"No, I mean it, Karen. I hate it, but I swear I mean it."

"It wouldn't bother you?" Her eyes narrowed but said nothing I could understand. Her voice was ice.

"It would drive a stake through my heart, my love, if you want the truth-truth. But you'll have to. But don't lie to me either, Karen; there's a part of you that wants to, isn't there?"

She hesitated before answering. I appreciated the fact that she really thought for an instant before speaking.

"Yes and no, Joseph, but I think I've got to do it now. You have to go back to Vienna, and I have to see Miles again."

"Jesus Christ."

"Joseph, please tell me the truth."

"The truth? The truth about what, Karen?"

"About her. About India."

"The truth is, I hate the fact you'll be seeing him. I hate having to go back to Vienna. For a number of reasons I'm truly scared of what's going to happen when I get back there. I'm also afraid of what's going to happen here with you and him. Let's say I'm afraid of a lot of things now."

"Me too, Joseph."

3

I wore my cowboy boots the day I flew back. I felt funny in them, the way they canted my whole body this way and that like a drunken ride at an amusement park. But I'd be damned if I'd take them off. I'd packed my bag the night before; it was much fuller than when I'd arrived. My life was fuller than when I'd arrived. But there was India and her agony in Vienna, and a part of me, a new and, I hoped, good part, said notwithstanding the near-happiness I'd recently found, my duty now was to return and do whatever I could to help her, no matter how useless it seemed or how much I wanted to stay with Karen in New York. Even watching Karen that night, so small and defeated on the couch, I knew that for once I had to sacrifice what I wanted for someone else's well-being. Despite my pain at having to leave America, the act itself might end up being the only thing in my life that would make me feel a little better about myself. What Karen had said was true — it wasn't right, but it was necessary. Our parting was bad and tearful. At the last moment we almost succumbed to it by sleeping together for the first and only time. Luckily we had enough strength of heart to avoid the mess that would have created.

People think of Austria as a snowy, Winter Wonderland sort of country; it is, except for Vienna, which rarely has much snow in the winter. Yet the day I flew in, there was such a bad blizzard that we were diverted to Linz and had to take a train the rest of the way. It was snowing in Linz, too, when we arrived, but it was a crisp, light snow and the flakes came down lazily, at their leisure. Vienna was under attack. Winds made traffic lights jerk and twist on their cables. There were long lines of taxis at the train station, all of them wearing chains and covered with snow. My cabdriver couldn't get over the storm and spent the ride telling me about some poor man who'd been found frozen to death in his house, and how a roof collapsed at a movie theater under the weight of the snow. . It all reminded me of one of my father's letters.

I was expecting a cold, dead apartment, but the instant I opened the door, the smells of spicy roast chicken and radiator heat surprised me completely.

"Hail the returning hero!"

India looked as if she'd come back from a month in Mauritius.

"You're so tan!"

"Yeah, I've discovered tanning studios. How do I look? Are you going to put your bags down or are you waiting for a tip?"

I put them down, and she came over and hugged me for dear life. I hugged back, but unlike the time with my father, I let go first.

"Let me look at you. Did you get mugged in New York? Talk to me! I've been waiting to hear your voice for two months —"

"India —"

"I was so afraid the snow was going to keep you away. I called the airport so many times they finally got me a private answering service. Say something, Joey. Did you have a million adventures? I want to hear about all of them right now." Everything came out in a machine-gun stutter. She'd barely catch her breath before the next sentence flashed out of her as if it were afraid it wouldn't get its chance before the next one came trampling through.

"— I decided to come over here and cook because —"

"India?"

"— and I knew. . What, Joey? Is the Great Silent One going to say something?"

I put a hand on each of her shoulders and held her tight. "India, I'm back. I'm here. Take it easy, pal."

"What do you mean, take it easy?" She stopped with her mouth halfway open. She shivered as if the cold outside had pierced her. The basting brush she'd been holding in her hand fell to the floor. "Oh, Joe, I was so afraid you wouldn't come back."

"I'm here."

"Yes, you really are. Hello, pulcino."

"Hello, India."

We smiled, and she dropped her head to her chest. She shook it from side to side, and I gripped her more tightly.

"I'm home, India." I said it softly, a good night to a child you're tucking in.

"You're a good man, Joey. You didn't have to come back."

"Let's not talk about it. I'm here."

"Okay. How about some chicken?"

"I'm ready."

Our meal went well; by the time we'd finished, both of us were much happier. I told her about New York, but not about Karen. That was for some other time.

"Let me see how you look. Stand up."

She checked me out carefully, reminding me of someone looking over a used car before they bought it.

"You're not any fatter, God knows, but your face looks good. New York did you good, huh? How do I look? Like Judith Anderson with a tan, right?"

I sat down and picked up my wineglass. "You look. . I don't know, India. You look the way I thought you would."

"And how's that?"

"Tired. Scared."

"Bad, huh?"

"Yeah, kind of bad."

"I thought the tan would hide me." She shoved back from the table and put her napkin over her head. It covered her eyes completely.

"India?"

"Don't bother me now. I'm crying."

"India, do you want to tell me about what's been happening or do you want to wait a while?" I pulled the napkin away and saw her eyes were wet.

"Why did I make you come back? What good will it do? I couldn't get Paul; I couldn't talk with him. He came and he came and he came, and each time there was a moment when I actually had the guts to say, 'Wait, Paul. Listen to me!' But it was so stupid. So fucking stupid."

I took her hand, and she squeezed mine in a scared vise.

"Everything is shit, Joe. He won't go away. He's having so goddamned much fun. What can I do? Joey, what am I going to do?"

I spoke as gently as I could. "What have you done so far?"

"Everything. Nothing. Gone to a palmist. A medium. Read books. Prayed." She brushed the air with her hand, dismissing it all with a contemptuous wave. "India Tate, ghost hunter."

"I don't know what to say to you."

"Say, 'India, here I am back with a million answers to every one of your questions.' Say, Til kick out the ghosts and I'll warm up your bed again, and just ask me 'cause I'm your Answer Man.' " She looked at me sadly, knowing my answer even before I gave it.

"The sun is ninety-three million miles from the earth. The pitcher's mound is ninety-feet from home plate. Carol Reed directed The Third Man. How are those for answers?"

She picked up a fork and tapped me on the back of the hand with it. "You're a jerk, Joe, but you're a nice jerk. Can I ask a favor?"

I'm not an intuitive person, but this time I knew what she was going to say before she said it. I was right.

"Can we go to bed?" As if she knew I'd hesitate, she didn't wait for an answer. Getting up from the table, she moved toward the bedroom door without looking at me. "Leave the lights on in here. I don't like to think of the house dark these days."

That last sentence struck me hard, and still not knowing what I'd do when I got there, I followed her.

On the plane I'd resolved not to sleep with India when I returned. A private promise to myself to remain true to Karen, however sophomoric that seemed. I felt that, if I kept that promise, somehow Karen would know or sense it in that profound and mysterious way women are capable of sensing things, and it would reassure her when we got back together again. I didn't know when that reunion would take place, but I was sure it would.

The familiar glow of the familiar lamp in that familiar room. India was taking two small brown combs out of her hair and had already unbuttoned the top brass button of her jeans. I could see the top line of white on her underpants. I stood in the doorway and tried not to watch or respond to the casual sensuality of her actions. For a moment, while her arms were raised high and angled over her head, she stopped and looked at me with a combination of desire and hope that made her look sixteen years old and open to everything in the world. How unfair! It wasn't right for her to show me this side of her when all I wanted to do was help, not love, her. I felt the pulse in my throat and was scared by the extravagance of my heart's response.

"You look as if you swallowed a clam shell. Are you all right?"

"Yes, but I have to go to the bathroom."

"Uh huh." She was already back into the private motions of undressing and seemed to have barely heard me. I was grateful for that, because I needed time to break the uncertain spell she had cast.

I had only just clicked on the light in the toilet when she screamed.

The first thing I saw was her standing by the side of the bed in only her white panties, looking down. Her breasts were so much older than Karen's.

She had pulled the bedspread back. Laid carefully in a row were many centerfolds from Playboy magazine. The vaginas of the women had been cut out, and in their place were faces: old men, children, dogs. . All of them were smiling with the greatest glee. Written somewhere on each picture in big crude letters was WELCOME HOME, JOE! GOOD TO HAVE YOU BACK WITH US!

4

The Viennese, who are old hands at snow in the Austrian mountains, seemed dismayed that it had come to visit them in town, particularly in such abundance. Children and a few slow-moving cars owned the streets. While looking out the window, I saw both a man and his dog slip and fall down at the same time. Every few hours the snowplows tried to bully the snow out of the way, but it was useless.

India stayed with me that night, but I did no more than hold her in my arms and try to calm her. At her insistence I took the pictures off the bed and burned each to a gray-violet crisp in the sink before washing the ashes down the drain.

The next morning the sun shone weakly for a few hours, but by midmorning the sky had clouded over, and it was snowing hard again by the time we reached the street.

"I want to walk for a while. Can we walk?" She was holding my arm and watching where our feet went. With every step her high rubber boots disappeared up to the calf in the white.

"Sure, but I think it'd be better if we walked in the street."

"I don't know why, but I feel a lot better today. Maybe it's just being outside." She looked at me, and her eyes, straining to be happy and unconcerned, asked that I agree. The complete whiteness of the world did calm some of the violence of the night before. But I had a strong feeling that no matter what we did or where we went, we were being watched.

India reached down and took a handful of snow. She tried to pat it into a ball, but it was too fresh and light to stay together.

"Old snow is best for that."

We were standing in the middle of the street, and I kept looking around for cars. "India, are we going to walk or what?"

"I'm pretending this interests me so I can avoid asking why you didn't make love to me last night."

"Last night? Are you nuts?"

"I wanted you to."

"Even after all that?"

"Because of all that, Joey."

"But, India, he. . he might've been there."

"Too bad. I wanted you."

"Come on. Let's walk."

She dropped the snow and looked at me. "You know what? You held me as if I were dying of the plague."

"Stop it!" My embarrassment turned to anger. The kind of anger that comes when you know you're to blame but don't want to admit it.

"You said he might've been in the room. But you know what, Joe? He's been in the room for months. You know what it's like to have him there for months? It's shit, Joe. And, God, I wanted you back. If you came back, so what if he was there? Months, Joe. Live alone with him for months like this and then ask me why I wanted you last night. He's everywhere now; there's nowhere to hide. So take me and let him see us. I don't care."

What could I say? Better to explain it all, tell her about Karen, so at least she'd have a concrete answer? There are so many different ways to fail a person. Answer this question honestly, thereby hitting her again after she'd already been hit so many times? Keep quiet and add to the confusion, her valid fear that she was almost entirely alone now in the battle against her dead husband? Standing there, helpless, I felt the weight of her need, and I came close to hating her for it.

My heart was beating like an angry dog's, and I was so overdressed against the snow that I felt hot and bound in by all my clothes. If I'd had three wishes, I'd have rolled them into one and asked to be sitting in a Chock Full o'Nuts in New York, drinking coffee and eating doughnuts with Karen. That's what owned my mind then — coffee and doughnuts with Karen.

The year before he died, Ross had a girlfriend named Mary Poe. She was a tough babe who smoked two packs a day and had the longest fingernails I'd ever seen in my life. She'd been Bobby's girl for a while, but it hadn't worked out, and Ross'd inherited her. Between cigarettes, she laughed a lot and hung on Ross like tinsel on a Christmas tree. After they'd gone out for a few months, however, Ross grew tired of her and tried to end the relationship. It turned out to be one of the few times I ever saw my brother completely confused, because no matter what he did, she would not go away. He stopped calling her, wouldn't go near her at school, and for spite started dating her best friend. That didn't stop Mary. The crueler he got, the more she pursued him. She knitted him two sweaters and a pair of gloves (which he ceremoniously burned in front of her at school one day), called at least once a night, and sent him letters so drowned in Canoe cologne that our mailbox began to smell like a whore's handkerchief. At one particularly desperate point, he halfheartedly threatened to kill her, but she shrugged and said she was already dead without him. Luckily, in the end she found someone else, and Ross vowed he would never get involved with girls again.

Why I bring all this up is that I remember the scared, trapped look he used to get whenever the phone rang at night during that time. As India and I trudged down the silent, abandoned street that morning, I felt the same "no exit" way, only a hundred times worse because of Paul's immanence.

"Let's go in here for a coffee, Joe. My toes just went into shock."

It was midmorning, but because of the snow, the cafй was almost empty. A tired-looking old man sat with a glass of white wine in a corner, a chow dog asleep at his feet under the table.

We ordered, and the waiter, happy to have something to do, rushed behind the counter to get it.

Things were uncomfortably silent; I got so desperate for some kind of noise I was about to tell India a dumb joke, when the door opened and a big fat man came in with a dachshund right behind him. The chow took one look at them and leapt to attention, barking. The dachshund marched right over to the chow and nipped him on the leg. India gasped, but the big dog loved it. He jumped back and started hopping around, barking all the time. The dachshund took two steps forward and nipped him again. The two owners watched it all with big smiles on their faces.

India crossed her arms and shook her head. "What is this, the zoo?"

"I just noticed the dachshund's a girl."

India laughed. "That's the answer. Maybe if I bite Paul, he'll go away."

"Or at least he'll baric at you."

"Yeah." She stretched both arms over her head and, smiling, looked at me. "Joe, I'm being really stupid. I apologize. Maybe it's my way of paying you a compliment."

"How so?"

"Maybe I had so much faith in you I thought once you returned, everything would immediately be all right again, like I said last night, you know? Did you ever get that feeling about a person? That they can fix anything as soon as they get their hands on it? Yeah, that's what it was. I thought your return would send those bogeymen way the hell away."

"Bogeyman."

"Yeah, singular. One at a time, huh? Let's go. This place is beginning to sound like Born Free."

The rest of the day went well as we roamed around town, relishing the feeling that the whole place belonged entirely to us and the snow. We went shopping in the First District, and she bought me a crazy-looking T-shirt at the Fiorucci store.

"When am I supposed to wear it?"

"Not when, Joe, where? It's the ugliest shirt I've seen since Paul's Hawaiian disaster." She said it as if he were only a step away, and I recalled for an instant all the good times we'd had together in the fall.

As time went on, I noticed how often both of us spoke of him in loving and nostalgic ways. India didn't want to talk about what he'd done to her while I was away in New York, but the days of Paul alive were always fresh and near to her, and I truly liked being swept back to the days of our joint happiness.

The snow held on for a few more days, and then one of those weird, spectacularly warm and sunny spells came and erased most traces of winter. I'm probably one of the few people who don't like that kind of weather. It's false; you walk around looking suspiciously at the sky, sure that any minute now all snowy hell will break loose. But people started wearing light coats and sat with their faces to the sun in parks on the still-damp benches. Horse-drawn carriages were full of smiling tourists, and I knew when they got home they'd rave about Vienna and its marvelous winter weather.

The one thing I did like about it was the change it brought in India. She was suddenly gay and full of life again. Although my longing for Karen deepened by the day, being around India again reminded me why I had been so attracted to her from the beginning. At her best, she radiated a supremely clever and interesting life-view that made you want to know her opinion on everything. Whether it was a painting by Schiele or the difference between Austrian and American cigarettes, what she had to say made you either sit up and take notice or else hate yourself for never having had the intelligence or imagination to see it that way yourself. So many times I wondered what would have happened to us if I hadn't met Karen. But I had, and she now monopolized my capacity to love.

I thought about her constantly and, mustering my courage one Saturday night, called her in New York. While the phone rang, I moved through her apartment in my mind, an affectionate camera stopping here and there to focus in on things I liked or felt particularly nostalgic about. She wasn't in. I feverishly figured out the time difference and felt a little better when I realized I'd miscalculated — it was only a little after one in the afternoon there. I tried again later, but still no answer. It made me groan with doubt and jealousy; I knew if I called again and she wasn't there, my heart would break. I called India instead and asked in a sad voice if she wanted to go to the movies.

When we got to the theater we discovered the film didn't start for fifteen minutes; I was all for taking a slow walk around the block to kill time. When I moved to go, India took my arm and held me there.

"What's up?"

"I don't want to go tonight."

"What? Why?"

"Don't ask why, I just don't want to go, okay? I changed my mind."

"India —"

"Because this theater reminds me of Paul, all right? It reminds me of the night we all met here. It reminds me of —" She whirled around and walked away. She stumbled once and then strode forward, widening the gap between us with every step.

"India, wait! What are you doing?"

She kept moving. Trying to catch up with her, I noticed out of the corner of my eye an ad in a travel agency window for a trip to New York.

"India, for godsake, will you stop!"

She did, and I almost bumped smack into her. When she turned, the tears on her face shone, reflecting the white lights from a store window. I realized I didn't want to know why she was crying. I didn't want to know what new thing I had done wrong, or in what new way I had failed her.

"Can't you see he's everywhere in this town? Everywhere I turn, everything I see. . Even you remind me of him."

She was off again, with me trailing after her like a bodyguard.

She crossed a couple of streets and entered a small park. It was dimly lit; a bronze statue in the middle was our only companion. She stopped, and I stood facing her back a few feet away. Neither of us moved for some time. Then I saw the dog.

It was a white boxer. I remember someone once telling me that breeders often kill white boxers when they're born because they're freaks, mistakes of nature. I sort of liked them and enjoyed seeing such funny yet brutal faces the color of clouds.

The dog came from nowhere and gleamed, a moving patch of snow in the night. It was alone and had no collar or muzzle on. India hadn't moved. I watched it sniff its way over to us. When it was only a few feet away, it stopped and looked directly at us.

"Matty!" She sucked in breath and grabbed my arm. "It's Matty!"

"Who? What are you talking about?" The tone of her voice made me scared, but I had to know what she was saying.

"It's Matty. Matterhorn! Paul's dog in London. We gave him away when we moved here. We had to because — Matty! Matty, come here!"

He started moving again: in the bushes, on the walk, across the flower bed. In the dark he glowed and moved busily, doing dog's business. He was huge. He must have weighed over eighty pounds.

"Matty! Come!" She bent down. He came right toward her, wiggling and whimpering like a puppy.

"India, be careful. You don't know —"

"Shut up. So what?" She looked at me with eyes as mad as fire.

The dog heard the change in her tone of voice and stopped dead, two feet away. It looked at India and then at me.

"Matty!"

It lowered its head and growled.

"Go away, Joe, you're scaring it."

It growled again; only this time the sound was longer and deeper, far more feral and threatening. The lips curled back, and it began to wag its stump of tail too fast.

"Oh, God. Joe?"

"Move back."

"Joe —"

I spoke in a quiet monotone. "If you go too fast, it'll come. Go slow. No, slower."

She was in a squat, and it was almost impossible for her to move backward. For an instant I looked around for a branch or a stone I might use to hit it with, but there was nothing. If it came, I would have only my hands and feet; stupid, impossible weapons against the giant boxer.

India managed to move two or three feet. With all the courage I'd ever had in my life, I slowly slid over so that I was standing between India and the dog. It was growling continually now; I wondered if it was rabid. I didn't know what to do. How long would it stand there? How long would it wait? What did it want? The growl turned into a kind of snapping snarl, and it sounded as if something were hurting the dog from inside its body. It turned its head left and right, then widened and narrowed its eyes. If it was rabid and bit me. .

I realized for the first time I was chanting, "Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ. ." under my breath. I didn't dare move. My hands were splayed flat against the sides of my legs. My fear had turned into a thick, evil taste in the back of my mouth.

Someone whistled, and the dog snapped at me in a madness of fast little bites at thin air, but it stayed where it was and moved only when the whistle came a second time.

"Very good, Joey! You passed the Matty test! He passed, India!"

Paul stood at one edge of the park. He was wearing the Little Boy top hat, white gloves, and the most beautiful black overcoat I had ever seen.

The dog bounded up to him and jumped high at a hand Paul had raised in the air over his head. The two of them disappeared into the dark.

5

"Joseph?"

"Karen!"

"Hello, love. Is it okay to talk?"

"Sure, just let me sit down."

Karen. Karen was on the other end of the line, and Karen was the heaven that made everything right again.

"Okay, so tell me what's up? Tell me everything. I tried to call you."

"Hey, Joseph, are you okay? You sound as if you just got your teeth pulled."

"It's the connection. How are you?"

"I'm. . I'm okay."

"What does that mean, okay? Now you sound as if all your teeth were pulled."

She laughed; I wanted the sound to go on forever.

"No, Joseph, I'm really fine. What's goin' on there? What's happenin' with that Miss India and you?"

"Nothing. I mean, nothing's going on. She's all right."

"And you?"

Oh, did I want to tell her. Oh, did I want her there with me. Oh, did I want this all to be over.

"Karen, I love you. I don't love India, I love you. I want to come back. I want you."

"Uh huh."

I closed my eyes and knew something awful was about to come. "What's with Miles, Karen?"

"You want the truth?"

"Yes." My heart raced to match the beat of the heart of a man about to be hanged.

"I've been stayin' with him. He's asked me to marry him."

"Oh, God."

"I know."

"And?" Don't say yes. God in heaven, don't say you said yes.

"And I told him I wanted to talk to you."

"He knows about me?"

"Yes."

"Do you want to marry him?"

"The truth?"

"Yes, goddamn it, tell me the truth!"

Her voice went cold, and I hated myself for snapping at her. "Sometimes I think I do, Joseph. Sometimes I do. What about you?"

Shifting in my seat, I banged my calf on the leg of the chair and nearly fainted from the pain. It clouded my mind badly, and I groped for something clear and right to say to stop the best thing in my life from going down the drain.

"Karen, can you wait before you tell him anything? Can you wait a little while longer?"

A silence followed that lasted a hundred years.

"I don't know, Joseph."

"Do you love me, Karen?"

"Yes, Joseph, but I might love Miles more. I swear to God, I'm not trying to be coy, either. I don't know."

I sat in my room and smoked. The radio was on, and I smiled bitterly when India's song from our night in the mountains, "Sundays in the Sky," came on. How long ago had that been? How long ago had I held Karen in my arms and sworn to myself I wouldn't go back to Vienna? Ever. Everything was in New York. Everything. But how close was I to losing it now?

As had happened several times, the face of a white boxer raced across my mind, followed by the sound of India screaming. I knew somewhere inside I should have felt proud for having saved her that night, but the experience only made things seem more futile. How do you defeat the dead? Do you tell them to fight fair, no tricks or crossed fingers behind their back? What good was it to put up your two dukes, only to discover your opponent had a hundred, and another hundred, waiting when the first ones tired. I asked myself if I hated India, and knew I didn't. I didn't even hate Paul. It was impossible to hate the insane — like being angry at an inanimate object after you've banged your elbow on it.

I heard the refrigerator click on in the kitchen. A horn beeped in the street. Some children in the building screeched and laughed and banged a door. I knew it was time to talk to India. I would stay and help her all I could, but in return she would have to know that, if Paul's siege ended, I would not stay with her any longer than I had to. It would hurt and confuse her, I knew, but my ultimate allegiance was to Karen, and I could not ask her in all good faith to wait for me so long as I was being dishonest with India. Before we hung up that night, Karen asked if I was staying in Vienna because I was India's friend or because I was her lover. When I said "friend," I knew it was time to start acting truthfully, all the way around.

I asked India to meet me at the Landtmann. She wore a moss-green loden coat that came down to her ankles and black wool gloves that suited her perfectly. What an attractive woman. What a hell of a mess.

"You're sure you don't mind being here, India?"

"No, Joe. They have the best cake in town, next to Aida, and I owe you at least two disgusting pieces after the other night.

"Remember the first night we met? How we sat out here and I complained about how hot it was?"

We stood with our backs to the door of the cafй. The trees were bare; it was hard to imagine them in full bloom. How could nature shed its skin so completely and then recreate it so exactly only a few months later?

"What are you thinking about, Joey?"

"The trees in winter."

"Very poetic. I was thinking about the first night. You know what? I thought you were kind of nerdy."

"Thanks."

"A good-looking nerd, but a nerd."

"Why in particular, or just generally?"

"Oh, I don't know, but I forgave you because of your looks. You're very cute, you know."

If you want Vienna to live up to your romantic expectations, get off the plane and go directly to Cafй Landtmann. It is marble tables, velvet seats, floor-to-ceiling windows, and newspapers from every interesting part of the world. It is, to be sure, one of the places where people go to look at one another, but it's such a large cafй that even that doesn't matter.

We chose a table by a window and looked around a while before either said anything. When we did, it was at the same time.

"In —"

"Who was —"

"Go ahead."

"No, you go ahead, Joe. I was only going to blabber."

"Okay. Are you in the mood to talk? I want to tell you something important."

She bowed her head, giving me the floor. I had no idea if this was the proper time to bring up Karen Mack, but like it or not, I had to.

"India, when I was in New York, I was with someone."

"I kind of thought so by the way you've acted since you got back. Somebody old or somebody new?"

"Somebody new."

"Uh oh, they're the most dangerous kind, aren't they? Before you go on, tell me her name."

"Karen. Why?"

"Karen Why. Is she Chinese?"

Despite the heaviness of the moment, I cracked up. I shook my head and kept laughing. Then our cake came, and we compared whose was better and who'd gotten gypped with a smaller piece.

"So go on with Karen, Joe. She's not Chinese and she's new."

"Why did you want to know her name?"

"Because I like to know the name of the enemy before I charge."

I told her about it generally, and India didn't say a word until I'd finished.

"And you slept with her?"

"No, not yet."

"Spiritual." She took a fork and squashed half her cake down flat on her plate.

She wouldn't look at me when she spoke again. She kept attacking the cake. "Why did you come back?"

"Because you're my friend and because a lot of this is my fault."

"Any love in there, Joey?"

"How do you mean?"

"I mean, did any of your choosing to come back have to do with loving me?"

Her head was bent, and I saw the careful, exact part in her hair.

"Of course there was love, India. I'm not. ."

She looked up. "You're not what?"

"I'm not a good enough person to have returned if I didn't love you. Does that make sense?"

"Yes, I suppose. What are my chances against her?"

I closed my eyes and rubbed my face with my hands. When I took them away, I looked at her. She had the most astounded look on her face. She was gaping over my shoulder, and both hands were on the table, trembling. I turned around to see what was so amazing. Paul Tate, in his beautiful black overcoat, was making his way through the cafй to our table.

"Hello, Kinder, can I sit down?" He slid in next to his wife and kissed her hand. Then he reached over the table and touched me gently on my cheek. His fingers were warm as toast.

"It's been a long time since I was in here. Right before you went to Frankfurt, Joey." He looked around fondly.

It was Paul. It was Paul Tate. He was dead. He was sitting across the table from me, and he was dead.

" 'Men, you may wonder why I've gathered you all here today. .' No, I won't be dumb now."

"Paul?" India's voice was the chiming of a small clock in a room miles away.

"Let me say what I have to say, love, and you'll understand everything." He smoothed his hair back with one brisk gesture. "You were right, by the way, India. Right all along. When I died I didn't know if it was because of my heart or because of what you two did to it. It doesn't matter. It's over. Now all of my stuff is done, too. All of the Boy, all of the birds and the white Mattys. . Done. You two betrayed me once and that's unforgivable, but it was because you loved each other. Finally I'm convinced of that. I see it's true now."

Despite his presence, India and I snuck glances across the table to see how we were reacting to that. Especially in light of what we'd just been saying.

"I loved India and could not believe she'd done it. You see, Joe, she really is a true person, no matter how it looks now. You remember that. When she loves you, it's all yours. When I realized what had happened, I wanted to kill you both. Big irony — I died instead. Death wasn't what I thought it would be; I was given the chance to come back and get you guys, and I took it. Brother, did I take it! It was fun at first too, seeing you little bastards screech and run around, really scared. It was. Then, Joe, you kept protecting her. Sticking your neck out so far it should have been cut off ten times. You did everything right and loving, and after a while and a lot of pain, it struck home how much you loved her. You didn't have to come back from New York, but you did. The way you protected her from the dog the other night. . It showed me you loved her with everything you've got, and I was amazed. You passed the test, if you can call it that, with flying colors, Joey. You convinced even me. So no more Boy. No more of the dead, Goodbye."

He got up, buttoned his overcoat to the neck, and, with a quick wink for both of us, walked out of our lives.

6

One of the famous Lennox family stories goes like this: Right after my father's mother died, my mother made us all go on a picnic to Bear Mountain. She wanted to keep my father as busy as possible, and picnics were a favorite of his. Ross didn't want to go at the last minute, but after a slap and some whispered oaths from the boss, he behaved himself and ended up eating more fried chicken and potato salad than anyone else. When we were done, my father and I went for a walk. I was terribly worried about him and kept thinking of the right thing to say to ease his pain. I was five and there weren't many things I knew how to say, much less well, so when it came I was excited and proud that I had thought it up all by myself.

We sat down on a couple of tree stumps, and I took his hand in mine. Did I have something to tell him!

"Daddy? You know you shouldn't be so sad that Grandma's dead. You know why? Because she's with our Big Father now, the one who takes care of evvveryone. You know who that is, Daddy? He lives up in the sky and his name is D-O-G."

In the days that followed our meeting with Paul, I wondered where he was. If he'd told the truth, where did people go after they died? I now knew one thing for sure — there were choices on that other side of life; things were far more complex there than anyone could imagine. Never once when he was sitting with us had I thought to ask him about it, but afterward I realized he probably wouldn't have said anyway. I was sure of that. It was Paul's way.

D-O-G. I was sorry I'd never had the chance to tell him that story.

7

"Where's Paul's pen?"

She stood in the door of my apartment in a purple rage.

"Do you want to come in?"

"You took it, didn't you?"

"Yes."

"I knew it, you little thief. Where is it?"

"It's on my desk."

"Well, go get it."

"All right, India. Take it easy."

"I don't want to take it easy. I want that pen."

She followed me in. I felt stupid and guilty. Ten-year-old guilt. My head bulged with conflicting ideas and emotions. Paul was gone, but exactly what did that mean? I could go now; I had done my duty to India. When was anything ever that simple? I hadn't answered her question about whether or not she had a "chance" against Karen. If Paul had remained a factor in our lives, I wouldn't have had to answer that question for a long time. Now I did.

"Give me that! Why'd you steal it, anyway?" She shoved it into her pocket and patted it a couple of times to make sure it was there.

"I guess because it was Paul's. I took it right after he died, before anything started to happen, if it makes any difference."

"You could have asked, you know."

"You're right — I could have asked. Do you want to sit down or anything?"

"I don't know. I don't think I like you very much today. What are you planning to do now? What's on your agenda? You could have called me, you know."

"India, back off, huh. Slow down."

Karen in New York; a fifty-fifty chance I could win her back if I left immediately. India in Vienna; free, alone, angry. Angry because she had betrayed the true love of her life for me. Angry because she thought I had come back to her for all the best reasons in the world, only to find at the worst possible time I'd done it out of ninety percent duty and only ten percent love. Angry because her betrayal had caused death and pain and fear and finally, in the end, a future that promised little more than permanent guilt and self-hatred.

Looking at her, I knew all of that and, in an incredible instant of clarity, decided that no matter what happened I would stay with India as long as she needed me. A montage of Karen in bed, at the altar, raising and loving his children, laughing forever at his jokes, came and went, and I told myself I had to believe it didn't matter anymore. India needed me, and the rest of my life would be utterly false and selfish — inexcusable — if I failed her now.

It wasn't martyrdom or altruism or anything as lovely as all that. I would simply be doing what was right for the third or fourth time in my life, and that was good. I realized how naive and unrealistic people are to think you can be both right and happy.

If it happens that way, you are truly one of the blessed. Right, however, should win if you have to choose. A great deal has happened since those thoughts paraded grandly through my head, but I still believe that's true. It is one of the few things I still believe at all.

"Joe, since you'll probably be leaving soon, I want to tell you something. I've been wanting to tell you for a long time, but I haven't. I think you should know, though, because it's important, and no matter what happens with us, I still love you enough to want to help."

"India, can I say something first? I think it might have some bearing —"

"No, not until I've finished. You know me. Whatever you say may take the wind out of my sails, and I'm mad enough at you to let it rip, so just let me, okay?"

"Okay." I tried to smile, but she frowned and shook her head. No smiles allowed. I sat back to let her blow her top, knowing I had the ace up my sleeve the whole time. Was she going to be surprised!

"This pen is part of it. I know why you wanted it. Because it was Paul's, and you wanted it to remind you of Paul's magic. Right? I understand. You're like that, Joe. You want part of everyone's magic, but you're too damned wimpy at heart to reach it the hard way, so you snitch Paul's pen, make love to me —"

"India, for godsake!"

"Shut up. You make love to me. . You even steal your brother's life, put it down on paper, and make it into a million-dollar story. Okay, not a million dollars, but enough to keep you sitting pretty for the rest of your life. True? You're talented, Joe, no one is arguing that, but have you ever thought maybe your greatest talent is stealing other people's magic and using it for yourself? Here, I want to read you something."

I couldn't believe what she was saying. Stunned and hurt more than I'd ever been in my life, I watched as she pulled a slip of paper out of her back pocket.

"It's from the novelist Evan Connell. You know him? Listen a minute. 'Originals attract us for another reason, which goes all the way back to prehistoric belief in magical properties. If we own something original, whether it's a skull or a lock of hair or an autograph or a drawing, we think maybe we acquire a little of the strength or substance of whoever it belonged to or whoever made it.' "

She threw the paper on the coffee table and pointed a finger at me. "It's you in a nutshell, Joe, and you know it down deep inside. I've been trying like hell to figure it out. The only word I can think of is parasite. Not a bad parasite, but one just the same. The two people you've truly loved and admired in your life — Ross and Paul — so overwhelmed you with whatever kind of magic they had that you knew you had to have some of it. So you stole your brother's story after he was dead, and it worked! When Paul arrived, you stole his wife, you stole his pen. . Do you get what I mean, Joseph? Jesus, why am I calling you Joseph? You know the only reason why you'll stay with me? Because I might still have some of his magic left, and you can't bear to be alone in the world without any. Or maybe you'll leave because your Karen has a fresh supply and she'll keep your tank filled. It's a bad way to put it, Joe, but you get exactly what I mean. I'm sorry to stab you with all this at one time, but it's the truth. That's all. I've had my say. Do you want to talk now?"

"No. I think you had better go."

"All right. Think about it. Think about it a lot. Before you come and punch me in the nose, tear it apart and put it back together again. I'll be at home."

She got up and left without another word.

I sat in the chair for the rest of the afternoon. I looked at the floor and out the window. How dare she! What hideous thing had I done to her to deserve those words? I'd simply been honest, and she'd returned the favor by cutting me in half with a dull razor blade. What if I had been totally honest with her? Told her I truly loved someone else but was going to stay with her because it was my duty rather than my desire. That was the first, scorched-ego part of the afternoon's thoughts. The part where I very much wanted to punch her in the nose for having the nerve to tell me. .

The truth? Had I been searching for that truth ever since the death of my brother, or running away from it as hard as I could? I picked up the paper with the Connell quote and read and reread it.

The sun crossed the sky, and the shadows through the Venetian blinds followed it. I would allow her one thing — I had taken advantage of Ross's death, sure, but wasn't that what a writer was supposed to do? Cash in on his life's experience and try to make some sense of it on paper? How could she fault me for that? Would she have condemned me if the story hadn't happened in the right place at the right time? What if it had been an exercise for a creative-writing class in college and nothing more? Would that have been okay in her eyes?

She was jealous. Yes, that was it! All my fluke money and success from "Wooden Pajamas," being able to pull her away from Paul and then hinting I didn't want her after the danger had passed. She was a loser and I was a winner and. . Hard as I tried for a couple of minutes, I couldn't dress her in that outfit either. She wasn't the jealous type and certainly wouldn't wither up and blow away if I walked out of her life. There was a toughness in her that could weather all kinds of storms, and I wasn't egotistical enough to think my departure would bring the curtain down on her life. Pain and guilt, yes, but no final curtain.

Part Two in the revelations on a winter afternoon of one Joseph Lennox, writer and parasite.

When it grew dark outside, I walked without thinking into the kitchen and opened a can of soup. I have no memory from that point on, until I realized I'd just washed my dinner dishes. I zombied back to my thinking chair and sat down for the next installment.

Had my life, lucky as it was, run on automatic pilot from the day I'd pushed Ross until now? Was that possible? Could a person function in that kind of vacuum for so long without knowing it? It wasn't true. Look at all the work I'd done! All the places I'd visited, all the. . the. .

A light winked on in an apartment on the other side of the courtyard, and I knew what she'd said was right. Not exactly, because I knew it wasn't magic I was trying to suck from other people, but rather a delight in life I knew I'd never have.

A delight in life. That was what Ross and Paul Tate had in common, as did India and Karen. If magic was the thing, India had sold herself short by not taking her own into account. I did want what she and those other people had — the ability to live at ten out of ten on life's scale for as long as they possibly could. Me? I'd always chosen three or four, because I was afraid of the consequences of higher numbers.

Ross stuck his nose right in life's face and challenged it to constant duels. Paul and India jumped into it blindly, not ever worrying about what would happen to them, because no matter what, the results would be interesting. Karen went out and bought you cowboy boots because she loved you. She was awed by the light coming through a glass of red wine and cried at old movies because one should cry then.

A delight in life. I put my head in my hands and wept. I couldn't stop. I had done so many things wrong; judged distances and temperatures and hearts (including my own!) incorrectly from Day One, and now I knew why. I wept, and it didn't even feel good, because I knew I'd never have the delight they did; it tore me apart.

What could I do? I had to talk to India. I had to tell her all of this. I also wanted to tell her about Ross and what I had done to him. She was a good psychiatrist (a little off the mark, but not much, considering the things she didn't know!). Even if she thought I was using her again, I wanted her thoughts on what I should do, now that the cat was out of the bag; now that I had the rest of my life to live.

As I rubbed my nose on my sleeve, I started laughing. I remembered a ridiculous poster I'd seen in a head shop years before, which even then struck me as particularly trite and offensive: Today is the first day of the rest of your life. You could say that again.

"India? It's Joe. Can I come over and talk?"

"Are you sure you want to?"

"Very sure."

"Okay. Should I put on my boxing gloves?"

"No, just be there."

I took a shower and chose my clothes carefully. I wanted to look good, because I wanted it all to be good. I even put on a tie I'd been afraid to wear for a year because it had cost so much. When I was ready, I stood in the doorway and gave a quick look around the apartment. Everything was neat and tidy, in place. Maybe when I returned my life would be in place, too. I had a chance, a fighting chance, to set things right, and I was grateful.

I would have walked, but was so excited by all I had to say to her that I took a cab. As with the soup I'd eaten earlier, I was so preoccupied that I didn't realize we'd moved until the taxi pulled up at her door; the driver had to ask twice for eighty schillings. I got out the key she'd given me and let myself into the building. A smell of cold stone and dust was waiting, but I had no time for it and took the stairs to her apartment two at a time.

"Two-at-a-time. Two-at-a-time." I said it to match the cadence of my feet on the steps. Unconsciously I counted how many there were. I'd never done that before. Thirty-six. Twelve, then a landing; twelve, then a landing. .

"Twelve-then-a-landing!" I was out of breath, but so hyper by the time I got to her floor I was afraid I'd break her door down.

She preferred that I use my key to the apartment because every time I rang the bell she was either in the bathroom or taking a souffle out of the oven. Inevitably, as soon as she opened the door and greeted me, the next moment she was off, flying down the hall — back to whatever she'd been tending when I buzzed. I let myself in and was surprised to see that all the lights were out.

"India?" I went into the living room, which was only dark shapes lit by the night-gray light from the windows. She wasn't there.

"India?" Nothing in the kitchen. Or the hall.

Puzzled both by the darkness and by the silence, I wondered if something had happened while I was coming over. It wasn't like her to do this. What was wrong?

I was about to turn on the lights when I remembered the bedroom.

"India?" The light from the street fell in stripes over the bed. From the doorway I could see her lying there, with her back toward me. She had no top on, and her naked skin was like soft, bright clay.

"Hey, what's up?" I stepped halfway into the room and stopped. She didn't move. "India?"

"Play with Little Boy, Joey."

It came from behind me. A familiar, beloved voice that sent a vicious, twisting chill down my spine. I was afraid to turn, but I had to. He was there. Little Boy. He was behind me. He was there.

I turned; Paul Tate stood leaning in the doorway, his arms crossed over his chest, the tips of white gloves showing behind his armpits. His top hat was cocked to one side. A dancer in the night.

I began to crouch like a child. There was nowhere to go. Lower. If I got lower, he wouldn't see me. I could hide.

"Play with Little Boy, Joey!" He took off his hat and, in a slow dream, peeled Paul Tate's face down and off his own: a smirking Bobby Hanley. "April Fool, scumbag."

"Joe?" India called from the bed and, a snake to the charmer's pipe, I turned.

She was facing me now, the light unnaturally bright over her naked form. She reached behind her head and, in a quick ripping motion, tore her hair and face away.

Ross.

Where the strength came from I don't know, but I sprang from my squat and, shoving Bobby aside, ran out of the apartment.

I was going so fast I slipped on the first steps and almost fell, but I grabbed the metal banister and righted myself. Out of the door to the street. Move, run; go, run.

What do I do? Where do I go? Bobby, Ross, Paul, India. My feet slapped those names at me as I ran nowhere, anywhere. Away. As fast as I'd ever run in my life. Move! A car honked, and I brushed its cold metal with my hand. A dog screamed because I kicked it running by. The owner's outraged cry. Another car horn. Where was I going? Ross. He'd done it.

Karen! Get to Karen! The idea lit my mind. A gift from God. Get to Karen! Get to New York. Run and hide, and go to Karen, where there was love and truth and light. Karen. She would save me. I looked fearfully over my shoulder for the first time to see if they were following me. They weren't. Why? Why weren't they there? It didn't matter. I thanked God for that, thanked him for Karen. I ran and prayed and saw it all — the whole Ross game. Saw it all with such perfect clarity that it was all I could do to keep myself upright. I wanted to lie down in the street and die. But there was Karen. She was sanctuary.

Things became clearer. I knew I was near an overhead station stop, and the train went near the Hilton Hotel. I could go to the Hilton and take a bus from there to the airport. Still running, I felt my back pocket to see if my wallet was there with all my money and credit cards. It was. Hilton, bus to the airport, first plane — any plane — out of Vienna, and then a connection from wherever to New York. To Karen.

Heaving for breath, I got to the station and once again took stairs two at a time.

No one was on the platform. I cursed because that probably meant a train had recently come and gone. I clenched and unclenched my fists at no trains, Ross, life. Ross was India. I had fallen in love with, made love to. . my brother. How brilliant. Utterly fucking brilliant.

I paced up and down the platform, straining my eyes down the tracks, trying to will a train to appear. Then I looked behind me at the steps to see if anyone was coming. No one. Why? When that question began to frighten me, the thin line of a train light showed down the track. I was saved. As it grew larger, I heard someone coming up the stairs. The steps were slow and heavy, tired. The light loomed larger; the steps kept coming. The train snaked noisily into the station and stopped. The steps did too. The two cars in front of me were completely empty. I reached for the door and was about to pull it open when she spoke.

"Joseph?"

I turned; Karen was there. My Karen.

"Play with Little Boy!"

Ross.