218
DAVID JACKSON
days to force Walter to tell her Nicolas's whereabouts.
Packing a small suitcase, informing her husband whom she
found in Harry's Bar that she was taking a train to Germany to
get away for a while, patting his arm, refusing a drink, getting
on the train-all this had only taken her two hours. She had
arrived this morning and come straight to the English Gardens.
"Dear girl," Walter had finally said, "he writes me that he is
sleeping in the English Gardens." "How like him!" Mary Jane
had smilingly said. "His address," Walter added, "is that great
foundling home, the American Express. And I will greatly ap–
preciate it if you will not tell your husband...." For the last
half hour Mary Jane had criss-crossed half the length of the
Gardens and, at last, come upon her knight. His presence there,
asleep in the grass, confirmed all that Mary Jane believed it was
in his power to teach her: freedom from the tedium of needs
such as hotels, the meaning of nature, how to live, simply, with
the angels.
She set down her suitcase. Should she wake him? No. Smil–
ing, she sat down on the suitcase and waited and watched.
The sun grew hotter as it approached the midday. Nicolas
was dreaming he had his head pressed against the dashboard of
a speeding car. He began sweating. In his dream he cried, "Slow
down, for Chrissake!" He half woke and rolled over with his face
in the cooler grass. His nose was tickled. He sneezed. He blew his
nose expertly between his fingers. He spit. He half sat up and
scratched at the hair on his forehead and then, more vigorously,
between his legs. He belched, he stretched.
Mary Jane got up, quietly, and walked away.
Twenty minutes later she was at the desk of the Grafin's
pension, her tears dried, signing a hotel form and asking for a
bath.
Mary Jane belonged to a world acquainted with small at–
tractive hotels and pensions in all the major and minor cities.
She had retreated to this world. The Grafin, who was charmed
by her, told her, "Your sister who was here two years ago has
