Ira Levin: A Kiss Before Dying

That evening, his landlady having gone to an Eastern Star meeting, he brought Dorothy back to his room. During the two hours they spent there, he was as warm and tender as she had ever wished him to be. In many ways be liked her a great deal, and he was conscious of the fact that this was to be her last such experience.

Dorothy, noticing his new gentleness and devotion, attributed it to the nearness of their wedding. She was not a religious girl, but she deeply believed that the state of wedlock carried with it something of holiness.

Afterwards they went to a small restaurant near the campus. It was a quiet place and not popular with the students; the elderly proprietor, despite the pains he took to decorate his windows with blue and white crepe paper and Stoddard pennants, was irascible with the noisy and somewhat destructive university crowd.

Seated in one of the blue-painted wall booths, they had cheeseburgers and chocolate malteds, while Dorothy chattered on about a new type of bookcase that opened out into a full-size dining table. He nodded unenthusiastically, waiting for a pause in the monologue.

"Oh, by the way," he said, "do you still have that picture I gave you? The one of me?"

"Of course I do."

"Well let me have it back for a couple of days. I want to have a copy made to send to my mother. It's cheaper than getting another print from the studio."

She took a green wallet from the pocket of the coat folded on the seat beside her. "Have you told your mother about us?"

"No, I haven't"

"Why not?"

He thought for a moment. "Well, as long as you can't tell your family until after, I thought I wouldn't tell my mother. Keep it our secret." He smiled. "You haven't told anyone, have you?"

"No," she said. She was holding a few snapshots she had taken from the wallet. He looked at the top one from across the table. It was of Dorothy and two other girls,-her sisters, he supposed. Seeing his glance, she passed the picture to him. "The middle one is Ellen, and Marion's on the end."

The three girls were standing in front of a car, a Cadillac, he noticed. The sun was behind them, their faces shadowed, but he could still discern a resemblance among them. All had the same wide eyes and prominent cheekbones. Ellen's hair seemed to be of a shade midway between Dorothy's light and Marion's dark. "Who's the prettiest?" he asked. "After you, I mean."

"Ellen," Dorothy said. "And before me. Marion could be very pretty too, only she wears her hair like this." She pulled her hair back severely and frowned. "She's the intellectual. Remember?"

"Oh. The Proust fiend."

She handed him the next snapshot, which was of her father. "Grrrrr," he growled, and they both laughed. Then she said, "And this is my fiancй," and passed him his own picture.

He looked at it speculatively, seeing the symmetry of the clear planes. "I don't know," he drawled, rubbing his chin. "Looks kind of dissolute to me."

"But so handsome," she said. "So very handsome." He smiled and pocketed the picture with a satisfied air. "Don't lose it," she warned seriously.

"I won't." He looked around, his eyes bright. On the wall next to them was a selector for the jukebox at the rear of the restaurant. "Music," he announced, producing a nickel and dropping it into the slot. He traced a finger up and down the twin rows of red buttons as he read the names of the songs. He paused at the button opposite Some Enchanted Evening, which was one of Dorothy's favorites, but then his eyes caught On Top of Old Smoky further down the row, and he thought a moment and chose that instead. He pushed the button. The jukebox bloomed into life, casting a pink radiance on Dorothy's face.

She looked at her wristwatch, then leaned back, eyes closed rapturously. "Oh gee, just think..." she murmured, sniffing. "Next week no rushing back to the dorm!" Introductory guitar chords sounded from the jukebox. "Shouldn't we put in an application for one of the trailers?"

"I was down there this afternoon," he said. "It may take a couple of weeks. We can stay at my place.

I'll speak to my landlady." He took a paper napkin and began tearing careful bits from its folded edges. A girl's voice sang: On top of old Smoky, All covered with snow, 1 lost my true loved one, For courtin' too slow...

"Folk songs," Dorothy said, lighting a cigarette. The flame glinted on the copper-stamped matchbook.

"The trouble with you," he said, "is you're a victim of your aristocratic upbringing."

Now courtin's a pleasure, But partin's a grief, And a false-hearted lover Is worse than a thief...

"Did you take the blood test?"

"Yes. I did that this afternoon too."

"Don't I have to take one?"

"No."

"I looked in the Almanac. It said 'blood test required' for Iowa. Wouldn't that mean for both?"

"I asked. You don't have to." His fingers picked precisely at the napkin.

A thief he will rob you, And take what you have, But a false-hearted lover Will lead you to the grave...

"It's getting late..."

"Just let's stay to the end of the record, okay? I like it." He opened the napkin; the torn places multiplied symmetrically and the paper became a web of intricate lace. He spread his handiwork on the table admiringly.

The grave will decay you, And turn you to dust. Not one man in a hundred A poor girl can trust...

"See what we women have to put up with?"

"A pity. A real pity. My heart bleeds."

Back in his room, he held the photograph over an ashtray and touched a lighted match to its lowest corner. It was a print of the yearbook photo and a good picture of him; he hated to burn it, but he had written "To Dorrie, with all my love" across the bottom of it AS USUAL SHE WAS LATE FOR THE NINE O'CLOCK class. Sitting in the back of the room, he watched the rows of seats fill up with students. It was raining outside and ribbons of water sluiced down the wall of windows. The seat on his left was still empty when the lecturer mounted the platform and began talking about the City Manager form of government.

He had everything in readiness. His pen was poised over the notebook opened before him and the Spanish novel, La Casa de las Flares Negras, was balanced on his knee. A sudden heart-stopping thought hit him; what if she picked today to cut? Tomorrow was Friday, the deadline. This was the only chance he would have to get the note, and he had to have it by tonight. What would he do if she cut?

At ten past nine, though, she appeared; out of breath, her books in one arm, her raincoat over the other, a smile for him lighting her face the moment she eased through the door. Tiptoeing across the room behind him, she draped the raincoat over the back of her chair and sat down. The smile was still there as she sorted her books, keeping a notebook and a small assignment pad before her and putting the remaining books in the aisle between their seats. Then she saw the book that he held open on his knee, and her eyebrows lifted questioningly. He closed the book, keeping his finger between the pages, and tilted it towards her so that she could see the title. Then he opened it again and with his pen ruefully indicated the two exposed pages and his notebook, meaning that that was how much translation he had to do. Dorothy shook her head condolingly. He pointed to the lecturer and to her notebook -she should take notes and he would copy them later. She nodded.

After he had worked for a quarter of an hour, carefully following the words of the novel, slowly writing in his notebook, he glanced cautiously at Dorothy and saw that she was intent on her own work. He tore a piece of paper about two inches square from the corner of one of the notebook's pages. One side of it he covered with doodling; words written and crossed out, spirals and zigzagging lines. He turned that side downward. With a finger stabbing the print of the novel, he began shaking his head and tapping his foot in impatient perplexity.