Сол Беллоу - Dangling Man

"That's the silliest proposal yet," said George.

"Why shouldn't I be his subject?"

We waited to hear what Abt would say. He had so far given no indication of what he thought of her proposal. I–Ie regarded her with raised brows like a doctor who is considering how fully to answer a layman's question while, with quizzical, concealing eyes, he keeps him waiting. The indirect ceiling light gave the side of his face the look of a sheet of thick paper, artfully folded at the eye and pierced, high on the forehead, by straight, black hairs.

"I'll be damned," Jack Brill said softly to me. "He'll take her up on it, too."

"Oh, impossible," I said. Abt hesitated. "Well?" Minna said.

"All right," he said. "Why not?"

He disregarded me.

And the others also protested. "She's drunk," said Still-man. And George said, "Are you sure you know what you're up to?" But he disregarded them, too, and made no attempt to explain or justify himself. He and Minna started off toward the study.

"We'll call you. I mean, Morris will call you," Mirma said. "Then you can all come in."

When they left, the rest of us fell silent. The dancing had stopped. Jack Brill, leaning one shoulder against the wall, smoked his pipe and seemed to relish watching us. Harry Servatius and Gilda were together on a narrow seat in the corner. They were the only ones talking; no words, however, were audible, only his heavy burring voice and her occasional choppy laughter. What on earth could he be saying that she found so funny? He was making an idiot of himself, and if Abt were correct in saying that he was not too drunk, then he was doubly idiotic. Iva still kept her glass on the piano ledge and took a small sip every so often. I did not like the aimless absorption with which she smoothed out the paper napkin on her knee, nor the rapid yet vague way her eyes moved around the room.

She remained behind with Harry and Gilda when Abt called us. The rest of us crowded into the study and, in embarrassed silence, stood looking down at Minna on the couch. I could not believe at first that she was not pretending; the change seemed too great. I was soon convinced that this was real enough. She lay loosely outstretched, a strong light behind her turned against the wall. One of her sandals had come unfastened and swung away from her heel. Her hands lay open at her sides. One noticed how narrow and bony her wrists were and the mole between two branches of a vein on her forearm. But, for allthe width of her hips, and the feminine prominences, her knees under the dress, her bosom, the meeting of her throat and collarbones, she looked less specifically like a woman than a more generalized human being-and a sad one, at that. This view of her affected me greatly. I was even more prejudiced against Abt's performance.

He sat beside her and talked to her soothingly, i-Ier breathing was regular, but touched with hoarseness; her upper lip was drawn way slightly from her teeth.

He began by making her feel cold. "Someone must have turned off the heat. I'm chilled, lon't you fed cold, too? You look cold. It is cold here; it's almost freezing." And she gasped a little and drew up her legs. He went on to tell her that when he pinched her hand she would feel no pain, and so she felt none, though the skin, where he had twisted it, remained white long afterwards. I–Ie deprived her of the power to move her arm and then ordered her to raise it. She struggled until he released her. The rest of us, half-tranced ourselves, eager to see and yet afraid of what we were seeing, concentrated on her face with its lifted lip and creased eyes. He let her rest, but only for a moment. Then he asked her to recall how many glasses of punch she had drunk. He would give a series of numbers and she was to make a sign at the right one. At this, her eyes moved or flinched under her lids, as though in protest. He began counting.

I was standing at a corner of the couch in such a position that her bare heel, the one from which the sandal hung, grazed my trouser-leg. I had an impulse to touch the mole on her arm with my finger.

All at once, looking at her face and her closed lids, my impatience with Abt turned into anger. Yes, I thought, he likes this. I tried to think what I could do to stop it. Meanwhile he was counting. "Six? Seven?" She tried, but was unable to answer. Perhaps she was aware of the insult.

"So you can't remember?" said Abt. "No @8@? She rolled her head. "Maybe you've forgotten how to count? Let's see if you have. I'm going to tap your cheek a few times. You count and tell me how many. Ready?"

"Bring her out of it, Morris, we've all had enough," I said.

He did not seem to hear me. "Now I'm beginning," he said. He struck her lightly four times. Minna's lips beganto form the first "f" but dropped away, and the next instant she was sitting up, open-eyed, exclaiming, "Harry! Oh Harry!" Then she began to cry, her face fixed and bewildered.

"I told you you were going too far," I said.

Abt reached his hand out to her in surprise.

"Let her alone!" someone said.

"Oh Harry, Harry, Harry!"

"Do something, Morris!" Robbie Stillman shouted. "Slap her, she's having a fitl"

"Don't touch her. I'll get Servatius," said Jack Brill. He ran, but her husband was already at the door, staring in. "Harry, Harry, Harryl"

"Get out of the way, she doesn't see him,"

George said. "Let's clear the room." Jack Brill began herding us out. "Go on, don't stand there.". Abt pushed Brill's hand away and muttered something to me which I did not hear.

Iva was no longer in the living room. I went looking for her and found her on the porch off the kitchen.

"What are you doing here?" I said roughly.

"Why, it was warm. I wanted to cool off."

I pulled her inside. "What's the matter with you tonight88I said. "What's got into you?"

I left her in the kitchen and strode back to the study.

I found Brill guarding the door.

"How is she now?" I asked.

"She'll come out of it," said Brilh "George and Harry are in there with her. What a wow of a finish."

"My wife's gone and made herself drunk, too."

"Your wife. You mean Ira."

"Yes, Ira." He was right. I was still treating him like a semi-stranger and he resented it. He had irritated me befwhen I had thought that he was goading Minna on; but I saw now that, after all, he was no worse than any of the others.

"Well, the party turned into a terrible mess, didn't it?"

"Yes," I agreed.

"Do you ever wonder what's the matter with these people?"

"I've been wondering," I said. "What do you think?"

"So you want my opinion," Brill said, smiling. "You want to see this as an outsider sees it?"

"Yon're not exactly an outsider, Jack."

"I've only been around five or six years.

Well, if you want to know how I feel about it '@.

"You're being a little hard on me," I murmured.

"That's right. I am. This is a tight little bunch.

I like some of the people in it. I like Minna a lot.

Others lean to the snob side. They're not very agreeable. They're cold.

Even you, if you don't mind my saying so."

"I don't'.

"You're all fenced around. It took me some time to find out you weren't such a bad guy. At first I thought you wanted people to come up and sniff you, as if you were a tree. You're a little better than that. Not Abt, though, he's a bad case."

"Maybe he needs more study."

"I wish I could give him what he needs more of. No, there's something wrong. And then you people all seem satisfied to settle down to a long life of taking in each other's laundry. Everybody else is shut out. It's offensive to people like me."

"What makes you come around then?" I said.

"I don't know," said Brill. "I guess it interests me to watch you carry on."

"Oh, I see."