What's for Dinner? by James Schuyler (to read list .txt) 📕

Lottie said, “that it tastes as though something other than coffee went into it. But I can say that drinking it has not interfered with any of my functions.”

“That’s what you say,” Mrs Judson said.

“Mr Brice says it tastes like old boots,” Mrs Brice said.

“I wouldn’t drink it if you paid me,” Bertha said.

“You drink up all the soda pop in the ice box,” Mrs Judson said to her. “Last night I wanted a ginger ale and there wasn’t any left. That’s your work.”

“Nuts to you,” Bertha said, and returned to the phonograph.

Enter Mr Mulwin. “Well, well, well,” he said, “or three holes in the ground. Look who’s back. How was home sweet home?”

“It was just fine,” Lottie said. “I had a delightful two days. You seem in good spirits.”

“A lot better than some,” Mr Mulwin said.

“Oh,” Mrs Judson said, “I’m not going to stand here and be talked about like that.” She left the room.

“My gracious,” Mrs Brice said. “It’s almost impossible not to offend her.”

“And when she arrived here,” Lottie said, “she was such a sympathetic, mousey little woman.”

“Seemed afraid of her own shadow,” Mrs Brice said.

“Well,” Mr Mulwin said, “that’s what they put us in here for: to turn your personality inside out and upside down. I’m just afraid they’ll turn me into such a sunny Jim that I won’t be able to run my business when I get back home.”

“You’ll be glad enough to find yourself back in harness,” Lottie said. “There’s no stopping an old fire-horse like you.”

“I believe I’m some years younger than you are, Mrs Taylor,” Mr Mulwin said. “What’s with this old fire-horse?”

“I intend it as a compliment, but if the remark offends I’ll withdraw it.”

“How touchy everyone seems this morning,” Mrs Brice said. “I wonder if I’ll be next to have my toes trod on?” Mr Mulwin feigned stepping on her feet. “Please, nothing physical: I don’t like to be touched. That’s why I never cared for ballroom dancing. Having some boy’s hand planted in the middle of my back. Ugh.”

“I loved dancing class,” Lottie said. “And if I do say so myself, I was quite a good dancer. A boy I used to date in my girlhood and I were singled out for the waltz.” She hummed a few strains of “The Blue Danube.” “But Norris doesn’t know his left foot from his right, so that was the end of that.”

“I’d ask you for a dance,” Mr Mulwin said, “but this be-bop rock and roll hooey Bertha plays isn’t my style. Ethel and I like to go out dancing. Or we used to. Maybe we will again. It’s good exercise and takes your mind off things.” He looked over at the pile of records beside the phonograph. “I’ll bet there isn’t a fox trot in the bunch. Not that my rhumba is all that bad.”

“Why you young dancing thing,” Lottie said. She did a waltz spin on one foot and dipped. “It takes me back, it takes me back!”

4

“Norris?” Mag said.

“Yes, kitten?”

“What’s to become of us?”

“I thought,” Norris said, “we’d talked that all out. Nothing is what’s going to become of us. It’s no good digging that field over again, Mag. We’ve enjoyed ourselves: isn’t that enough? Because I’m afraid it’s going to have to be.”

“I wish it was I who had died and not Bartram.”

“I’m glad you didn’t. Bartram was a good fellow, but we wouldn’t have hit it off the way you and I have.”

“Oh, you tease. You see, Bartram and I were like a pair of old shoes. So when he was taken, it wasn’t as though it had happened in the first flush of our romance. And it was a romance. Besides, with his heart, we’d had warnings, so it wasn’t the shock it might have been.”

“Sometimes I feel like rather an old rooster for these carryings on.”

“But not while we’re making love?” Mag said.

“No, not then. Not then at all.”

“How does that Cole Porter song go? ‘. . .a slap and a tickle is all that the fickle male ever has in his head.“’

“Where in Goshen did you pick that up?”

“It was in a musical comedy Bartram and I once saw in New York. I have quite a good memory, though I forget the name of the show. Sophie Tucker sang it, and Mary Martin was in the cast. She sang, ‘My Heart Belongs to Daddy.“’

“I am in no sense musical,” Norris said, “but even I remember that one. It was quite a hit.”

“I told you I have a good memory—shall I sing it for you? The Mary Martin song, I mean?” And scarcely without pausing she sang through the verses and chorus of “My Heart Belongs to Daddy.” When she finished, she reached across the bed and twitched away the towel with which Noris had covered himself.

“Hey,” Norris said, hastily pulling up the top sheet.

“Mr Shy and Modest. You don’t hide before, why should you afterward? I like to look at you.”

“It’s the way I am,” Norris said. “You make me self-conscious.”

“If you’d let me, I bet I could get you to do it twice to me.”

“No. You’re not going to try. What’s gotten into you, baby?”

“I believe it’s called lust. Or if you prefer a more refined word, desire. Yes, it’s desire. You ought to feel flattered.”

“I’m more alarmed than flattered,” Norris said, not sounding particularly scared. “Act your age.”

“That’s just what I’m doing, acting my age, which is about that of Mount Etna.”

“Mount Etna sometimes becomes dormant.”

“Not right now.” They tussled on the bed, but Norris would not give in.

“I’m going to take a shower,” he said, “and then be sneaking on my way.”

“Let me wash your back.”

“Okey-dokey said his highness, but no funny business.”

Chapter IX

1

“And that’s enough about me and my little vacation,” Lottie said. “It was pretty much a complete success.”

“It was indeed,” Norris said.

“Lucky you,” Mrs Judson said with her new sarcasm.

“Perhaps in the near future,” Sam Judson said, “you’ll have a weekend home yourself.