Conrad Aiken - The Collected Short Stories of Conrad Aiken

“I wonder if it’s still snowing,” said Cleghorn, sitting down for a moment with his cue between his knees.

“Sure, it’s snowing. It’s going to snow all night.”

“I hope to God the cars are running. I’d hate to walk all the way from the Square in this.”

“Good for you.… You don’t get enough exercise anyway.”

Jackson stooped beside the table, flushing, to get the cue-bridge. He arose with the bridge clutched in a plump pink hand, tight-skinned. He gave a puff, blowing out his cheeks. Cleghorn laughed.

“Well, I don’t lose my wind when I stoop for a bridge, anyway,” he said. “You’re getting fat, Henry.”

“Don’t be personal.”

“I know why it is, too.” He gave a sly smile, which had the effect of pushing his gray mustache up toward his spectacles. Jackson, calm, absorbed, leveled his cue along the bridge and began aiming it at the white ball. Cleghorn knew that he was listening, and went on. “It’s all this high living. All these little parties.”

Jackson made his stroke sharply, and snorted, following the balls with an angry eye.

“What parties?… You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Ha! don’t I! … My detectives inform me, Henry, of your every gesture.”

“Oh! they do, do they? A lot of good may it do them.”

Cleghorn sighed, rose, walked heavily round the lighted table, peered closely and near-sightedly at each ball in turn.

“Ah! I wish to God I wasn’t married,” he said. “I’d show you some tricks, Henry!”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.… Have a lemonade?”

Cleghorn gave a violent shot which made the cue-ball leap off the table. It crashed to the floor, and rolled to the wall.

“If I couldn’t play billiards any better than that,” Jackson continued evenly, “I’d sell out and keep pigs. I’d be ashamed of myself.”

“Well, I’ll bet you I can pick it up without losing my wind, anyway. And that’s something.”

He picked up the ball and dropped it with a little thump on the green baize. Then, by a tacit agreement they sat down, somewhat wearily, in two chairs by the wall, both holding their cues between their knees.

“Some women,” said Jackson after a moment, “are damn fools.”

“You surprise me, Henry.… Have a cigarette.”

“No, thanks.… Yes.… A patient telephoned me this morning at ten o’clock, to say that she had started to have a hemorrhage, and what should she do. It’s a childbirth case with a threat of abruptio. We’ve been expecting it to happen. I told her to get a taxi and run straight to the hospital—not to stop a minute. I telephoned to the hospital and had everything ready. Thomas was there. I was there myself in twenty minutes. And that woman took three hours to get to the hospital— three hours! As a result of which she’s dying.”

“What on earth made her do that?”

Jackson stared at the green lights over the billiard table.

“Oh, she wanted the proper clothes with her—did a regular packing up, as if she was going for a holiday at Palm Beach.… Lots of them do that.… They’ve got to have their best Sunday-go-to-meeting nighties.… And there she is.”

“Really dying?”

“I think so. A transfusion didn’t help. I’m expecting a call any time tonight. Thomas is there.”

Cleghorn felt depressed. Seeing people die was no joke. Supposing he had, at this hour, on such a night, to go slopping through a foot of snow and slush to a hospital, all to watch a foolish woman die?… All the same he envied Jackson. Jackson had more experience in a day than he himself had in a decade. All sorts of queer intimacies and insights. Intimacies with young women. The nurses, too, of course. The doctors weren’t supposed to know the nurses. But then—! … Besides, was it any worse for Jackson to trot off to a hospital on a winter night than for himself to trot home, every night in the year, to Clara?…

“I wonder if it’s still snowing,” he said, morosely.

“Sure, it’s snowing. Snowing like hell, probably. Thank God, I put the chains on my car this morning.”

“Tomorrow’s the fifteenth anniversary of my wedding.”

“Go on!” … Jackson was surprised, goggled at Cleghorn with round protruding eyes, apoplectic.

“What does that make it—brass?” … Cleghorn was sardonic. “The twenty-fifth is silver.”

“I don’t know. It ought to be something pretty good after fifteen.”

Jackson took a slow deep breath and, seeming to become absent-minded, stared at the floor, inclining his head against his cue, and rubbing his forehead against the cool polished wood. He moved his head softly from side to side, staring.

“Well,” he said with a kind of abstracted gentleness, “I think that deserves a little drink.” He turned and pressed a button in the wall. “A health drunk in near-beer never hurt anyone.”

“Beer is thicker than water,” Cleghorn replied, “but not much.”

The two men sighed almost simultaneously and became silent. Cleghorn, leaning his head back on the chair, blew a turbulent cloud of smoke toward the ceiling, propelling into it, at the end, a rapid succession of small swimming rings. He watched them admiringly. Wedding rings. Wedding rings of smoke. Smoke, but horribly binding, just the same. What a simple solution if Clara had only, like this woman at the hospital—what was it Henry called it?…

“I sometimes wonder why it was you never married, Henry.” His expression was a little malicious.

The boy brought their drinks on a tray, pulled the little table near to them, and carried away their cues. Jackson lifted his glass.

“I would have, Charlie, if I’d been as lucky as you. Here’s how—happy returns!”

“Well, I’d swap with you for nothing—for an old doughnut and a pair of emasculated garters.”

Jackson growled, frowning into his beer, where he seemed to see something that annoyed him.

“You don’t know what you’re talking about. Swap? By God, I’d swap, let me tell you.”

“All right then—you go home to Clara tonight, and I’ll take your case at the hospital. Also the key to your secret flat.” Cleghorn gave a peculiar self-conscious laugh. Over the rim of his beer glass he eyed Jackson with an uneasy challenge.

“You make me tired when you talk like that. You ought to know better.… What the devil do you mean by the key to my secret flat?”

“Don’t be so coy, Henry. The nice little flat where you entertain your chorus-girl friends.… Ah, I wish to God I wasn’t married! I’d show you some tricks.”

“Phhhh! You make me sick. Chorus girls! What do you think I am?”

“My detectives watch you night and day, Henry. You’ve been seen putting your bald head out of your car window in the alley behind the Casino. Lulu, the star-spangled queen, was seen to leap in beside you, giving a loud parrot scream of delight, and scattering diamonds. At the oyster house, later, it was observed that you devoured two dozen oysters and a hen lobster, while Lulu worshiped.… Introduce me to Lulu, Henry. I’d like to know her.”

“Who the devil is Lulu?… You’re crazy.…”

Cleghorn laughed, and then sighed.

“I like to talk through my hat,” he said. “If I’m not crazy already I’d as lief be.… You can talk till all is blue about the sacred joys of married life, but I’m sick of it.”

Jackson, at this, gave a quick startled look at Cleghorn, who was staring at the ceiling. He opened his lips as if to say something, but then, instead, lifted his glass, turned it meditatively around, and took a deep drink.

“Funny I haven’t heard from the hospital,” he murmured. He looked at his watch. “Nine o’clock.”