Oh Pure and Radiant Heart by Lydia Millet (shoe dog free ebook .txt) 📕

course they would stay in a hotel. It was better for them. No one would turn down that offer.

—So you just feel free to take a break from playing hostess, OK?

She nodded and felt them slipping out of her hands, leaving in her a defeated, flat calm.

Larry leaned closer as they walked and whispered, in an understanding tone, —I know it’s been hard on you. Robert told me you guys have been a little strapped for cash recently. No worries, he told me in confidence.

Oppenheimer discussed her finances with Larry, Larry with his Tall Grays at Roswell, his autopsies and abductions and extraterrestrial squid swimming ceaselessly in the orbit of Jupiter.

—I mean I’d be happy to reimburse you for everything you’ve spent on them. I’m serious.

—Larry’s our sugar daddy, said Ben to Ann.

—Oh, no, said Ann. —Thank you, but—

—Are you kidding? It was our entire savings. We say yes, said Ben. —Reimburse us. Feel free! It’s been at least ten thousand.

—No problem, man, said Larry. —I’ll get the accountant to cut you a check. You need something, you just come to Larry.

—So you’re staying at the La Posada too? asked Ann quickly to cover her embarrassment.

—Nah, Oppie wanted his space. We got rooms at La Fonda.

—Lar! called Tamika from behind them. —They’re boarding!

—I gotta go, said Larry. —You’re driving from here, right? We’re flying. Oppie and Szilard too.

—Oh, said Ann.

He patted her on the shoulder. —You can see them whenever you want, right? It’s all good.

Then he went to rejoin Tamika and the rest of his group, who were milling around a water fountain between the rest room doors. Szilard was holding forth to Leslie, who listened to him nodding slightly but constantly, as though her head was bouncing on a rubber stalk. Straightening up from the water fountain, wiping stray water off his chin, Oppenheimer waved at her jauntily and tipped his hat.

Fermi had declined Larry’s invitation to stay in the hotel room with the other scientists. He did not wish to be indebted to Larry and his friends, who he claimed reminded him of gypsies, as he insisted they had been called in his day. They were insufficiently washed, it was possible they would steal, and they had loose ways of living.

He would be just fine where he was, as stationary as possible. He was looking forward to working in the garden again.

—I hope it’s not an inconvenience? he said to Ben, leaning up from the backseat to put his head between them. —If it is, I can go with them of course. But I wish to stay with you for a little longer if it is not a problem. I will be happy to work in return for my room and board. I am not lazy.

—We know you’re not, Enrico.

—I just don’t want to be around all those people all the time. They make me nervous.

—Of course you can stay with us, said Ann. —It’s what we were planning. Right, honey?

—Right, said Ben.

There was no edge to it, and she realized he was fond of Fermi. When it came to Fermi he still did not believe, but he also did not suspect.

It was soon after the end of the Second World War that the American government began exploding atom bombs in the air. Now that the bomb existed it had to be improved and refined.

When the Soviet Union made its own bomb, a little later, it too would begin exploding the bombs in the air. Both countries would reach thermonuclear fingers into the most remote and unsullied parts of the globe. They would look for places where they could explode their gadgets without obvious and immediate fatalities and quietly measure the gadgets’ effectiveness. These tended to be places where only poor people lived, sparsely distributed and ill educated, unable or disinclined to speak up in their own defense. Even if there was an outcry in such far-flung places, it would likely go unheard. And even if by some fluke it was heard, it would not be heeded.

Such places could be found both far away and close to home.

When they got back to the house Ann dropped her bags just inside the front door, ran upstairs and rolled into bed to take a nap. Ben washed his hands and face and then wandered through the rooms of the main floor, wiping dust off surfaces and ripping open the envelopes of bills and credit card offers.

Fermi spent the afternoon pottering around the rock gardens and flowerbeds, stooped over rosemary and lamb’s ear, rubbing the soft leaves between his fingers, raising the crushed leaves to his long nose and inhaling deeply. Ben watched him through the window as he pulled a white wooden stool from the garden shed and sat between the plants motionless. He looked like a man surrounded by family, face soft with relief.

With her cheek and eyelid against the cool pillowcase of her own bed she felt she could rest the true rest, which she could never find anywhere but at home.

Ben talked to no one and was glad. Behind him a fire burned in the fireplace despite the warmth of the evening and Larry’s friends lounged beside the hearth, some of them sitting around the large, deep wood table, others standing up with their drinks, clustered near Szilard. In the warm flickering light he was almost content. It was probably the wine.

He liked the curve of the goblet against his fingers. Since the arrival of the scientists he rarely felt the fullness of life, rarely ended the day as he used to in a globe of comfort. The closest he came anymore was alcohol and Larry’s pot.

He should probably be worried.

Beside him Fermi was trying hard to avoid conversation, affecting a shyness that bordered on the rude. He stood behind Ben’s right elbow, his head down, listening and saying nothing.

Outside Leslie and Clint stood on the sidewalk with Oppenheimer, talking to him eagerly as he smoked. Their conversation was inaudible but Ben suspected they were boring