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

might happen right in his house I’d never get out of this chair again. Read in the paper about a woman who was electrocuted when a hair drier fell in the tub.”

“For goodness sake,” Lottie said, “let’s get away from tubs.”

“Yes indeed let’s,” Biddy said. “They’re treacherous things.”

Deirdre left the room and returned with a large rubber bone in her jaws. “Why Deirdre Taylor,” Lottie said, “you know that’s not allowed in here.” Like a tugboat, the dog slowly turned and waddled out of the room.

“Isn’t it wonderful, the way they understand,” Biddy said.

Twing now decided to make a circuit of the room, giving its unpleasant Siamese cry. “They love to talk,” Biddy observed. Twing finally elected for Bryan and leapt up. In doing so, both cat and Bryan’s lap became covered with cigar ash.

“Oh gosh,” Bryan said, “look what you’ve done, kitty.”

“Brush it on the rug,” Lottie said. “Ashes are supposed to be good for the nap. Like damp tea leaves—not that I ever use them.”

“Damp tea leaves!” Biddy exclaimed. “I haven’t thought of those in years. They used to give the carpet a certain smell, funny but nice. I wonder why customs like that go out of style? It worked very well.”

“Perhaps the perfecting of the vacuum cleaner had something to do with it,” Norris said.

Finally the Delehantey’s took their departure, though not before a scramble with Twing over her leash. When the last goodbye and the protestations of pleasure and the praise of the food had all been said, and the driveway light turned off and the front door locked and chained, Lottie more or less flopped into a chair. “I don’t know that I think Mag’s personality is anything so out of the way,” she said.

“She’s a cheery little soul,” Norris said.

“Sometimes it grates. All that cooing. It isn’t so much that you wonder what she’s really thinking as I wonder if she’s thinking anything at all.” She got to her feet. “I’m not going to touch a dish tonight, but I do have to straighten up the kitchen a little. You go up to bed.”

“Yes,” Norris said. “I’ll do that.” He was not yet asleep when he heard his wife stumble on the stair on her own way up.

At the Delehantey’s the evening received short review: as a family, they were one and all devoted to sleep and plenty of it.

“I wonder what gives a person the idea you can’t smell vodka,” Bryan asked as he shed his garments. “Did you catch her breath?”

“Secret tippling,” Maureen said. “It never ends well. It went to my heart when she almost fell over that rug. I must say, Norris puts a good face on it.”

“Norris isn’t a lawyer for nothing.”

There came a light tapping. It was Biddy. “Twing was scratching at my door.” She was holding the purring cat in her arms.

“Give her to me, Mother,” Maureen said. “The lock on the kitchen door doesn’t always catch. Come with me, Twingy-poo.”

In the twins’ room the light was already off. After a time, Patrick began to breathe heavily. Shortly, and with practiced stealth, Michael got out of his bed and into his brother’s. They jerked each other off, Patrick never ceasing to feign the breathing sounds of sleep. A box of Kleenex stood convenient on the night table between their beds.

Chapter II

1

“If your wife seems a little euphoric,” the nurse said, “you must realize that she is taking paraldehyde, which tends to induce a state of—uh, euphoria.”

“I know,” Norris said. “The doctor told me.”

“She’s waiting for you in the sun room.” The nurse pointed down the corridor, where various patients were sitting or ambling about. It was indeed a sunny room, the curtains and furniture done in a cheerful leafy chintz. Lottie was seated at a table with two other women and a man playing bridge. They were between hands, and when she saw her husband she rose to her feet with a radiant smile.

“Why Norris! How nice.”

“Weren’t you expecting me?”

“Of course I was expecting you, but that doesn’t make it any less nice to see you, or of you to come see me.”

Norris kissed her on the cheek. “But I’m interrupting your game.”

“Oh tush. Mrs Brice will take my hand. Oh Mrs Brice, wouldn’t you like to sit in for me while I visit with my boy friend?”

Mrs Brice was a heavy woman in purple knit. She was sitting with her hands in her lap and her ankles crossed, doing nothing. “I’ll just spoil it for the others. I’m not any good.”

“It’s just a pastime,” Lottie said. “We none of us are exactly Olympic bridge champs.”

“You’ll be my partner,” the man of the foursome said. “If you get the bid, I’ll be dummy and can help you play the hand. You’ll see. It will all go swimmingly.”

Mrs Brice got up and joined them in a way that showed she felt she had no choice in the matter. “Clubs, diamonds, hearts, spades,” she said. “That’s how it goes, isn’t it?”

“I’ll write down the Goren point count system for you,” the man said. “Then you can refer to it when you count up your hand.”

“I’m sure it’s not going to be much fun for any of you,” Mrs Brice said.

“Think of it as a bridge lesson,” Lottie said. “That’s what we’re all here for: to learn something. Bridge isn’t anything so important but you’ll enjoy it. You’ll enjoy mastering something new. That’s what I say: we’re all here to learn.”

“That’s not why I’m here,” one of the women said. “I’m here because my husband hates me. Is it my deal?”

Lottie led Norris away. “Come see my room. I’m so lucky to have fallen heir to one of the single rooms, even if it is small. Two of the rooms even have four beds in them—I wouldn’t really care for that. Though of course I could cope with it, if destiny willed. I bless my stars that my own affliction is a relatively easy one to deal