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Show •198 if I'd come back alone. Fancy would wander away without a sign, disappear in a crowd or dart into a shop, leaving me to talk to myself or turn by mistake to a surprised stranger. Once, when I went looking and found her, she cocked her head and stared as if wondering who I could be. Then she remembered and smiled. "If you want to stick with me, buster, you've got to be quick," she said. I can't play innocent; I'd like to say she treated me badly and because of that certain things happened which wouldn't have otherwise, but it won't wash. The deeper I plunge into because, the less light there is, the more pressure, until at last my lungs, my head, my body, cry enough! and I kick myself upward out of the murk. You can't even say because about billiard balls, says the English philosopher Hume. You can say it even less about human beings with their deeply out of round wounded erratic hearts. The truth is that Fancy had her bizarre qualities and I had mine. We got used to each other gradually- We did the best we could. One night in the hammock, after we'd had some friends over for dinner, Fancy lay tense against me, her body rigid. She muttered something I couldn't make out. "What?" "I said Hubert t r e a t s that poor g i r l like a whore." This concern was something new for Fancy, who generally didn't like other women. |