336
RICHARD STERN
going to New York, take in some shows and restaurants before she
gets the word and tries to get her hands on it. I don't
think
she's
given up on me. Every so often, she gets soused up and calls me
on the phone, gives me a good chewing out. You don't do that
if
you've given up on somebody. Maybe you can give me a list, Miss
Wilmott." A list of what-girls? "I don't know the restaurant situa–
tion too well there."
Ah. She said she knew very little about New York.
Dr. Hobbie's hands at her mouth were sure as ever, but Miss
Wilmott did not feel comfortable. He talked a blue streak. "People
been calling me day and night asking about the old man. They
can't figure out why his phone doesn't answer. Think they'd read
the papers. That's a nasty one you have back there." He touched
her with a silver prong. "I'm on the run every minute. Have to shut
off his phone, sub-let his office, the apartment. Papers, you have no
idea, writing relatives, the funeral. Dying is harder on the relatives
than the dead man. I'll bet getting born is easier. Not that I know
much about that. You ever had a child, Miss Wilmott?" He'd run
on too fast, and blushed. Miss Wilmott's file turned up a sentence,
"A blush is a primitive erection." Her own face chugged
with
capillary action. "Of course not," he was saying. "Excuse me. I was
just shooting off. The old man's kind of thrown me. Never had a bad
word for me since I was a little tyke. Helped me through school,
helped me furnish the office, helped with Suzanne." Had his old
man given him the kitchen chair, the TV set, the glass case?
Miss Wilmott nearly invited him to dinner on the spot. But
held back. This time she'd prepare. There'd be another appointment
in a week. She'd invite him then.
Two days before the appointment she went down to Halstead
Street and bought a fine roast, a Greek cheese and olives, baklava, and
a beautiful egg plant which she would transform into a marvelous
Greek dish she'd read about in an eighteenth century cook book. It
took two days to make, and Miss Wilmott turned to it from her
opium with the energetic passion she knew great cooks must have.
So there she was, the day of her appointment, ready to show
her stuff. But oh how foolish was Miss Wilmott. The most untutored
person would not prepare so elegantly for an empty chair.
If
she'd
telephoned even one day early, Dr. Hobbie might have cancelled
