226
PARTISAN REVIEW
I didn't know what was going on. There are still no logical
explanations.
It
was February. I was having trouble with my
story. I tried to proceed. I didn't know what to do in the next
paragraph. Should the lovers meet after a period of time? Are
they lovers or husband and wife? Is the time element important?
I decided to solve those problems later, and went on with the
part I had meant for the fourth paragraph.
"It
all started with the green dress," he said. "You came down
to breakfast that morning, wearing that little green dress, sort
of old-fashioned looking, with its puffed sleeves, white trim
and white buttons. And one of the buttons unbuttoned. You
bent your head to button it, then you looked up, sort of shy, to
see if anyone had noticed. You saw me watching you and gave
me a funny smile. It was fantastic. Suddenly, at breakfast,
those two round shapes were there visible. Did you do it on
purpose?" he asked and touched my nose. "On purpose?" he
teased.
My hands were shaking. I was having trouble typing. What was
the computer picking up? I gave the command to print.
It
printed the three paragraphs I just entered, and then:
Remember. Brother. Kicked by a horse. Putting the furniture
in the basement on fire. Almost drowned in the river in his
light blue suit. Your sister's dream.
I was not dreaming, I was wide awake. I looked around the study
and its usual clutter of computer printout, envelopes, manu–
scripts, packages to be mailed, photographs of friends on the
wall, a Coptic weaving, a lithograph showing Edgar Allen Poe,
some Chinese calligraphy. I typed:
What dream?
The terminal head nodded and typed:
Your sister dreamed she wa afraid of her brother. Your
brolher. She dreamed he wa crazy, or drunk. He had a sack
with a leg inside it. The sack opened.
It
was full of fish eyes.
