70
PARTISAN REVIEW
only a plasterer looking for a steady job, and as for being a kerblayer or
even a bricklayer, that is far from the truth."
"Please yourself who you haunt," said Ben. "I am totally indifferent.
The fact remains that I am a kerblayer at heart, whatever the nature of
the temporary job as plasterer, etc., etc., that I am economically forced
to accept from time to time."
"And what is 'etc., etc.'?" said the ghost nastily. "Do you mind
explaining?"
"Curl up and return to your drawer, " Ben bade him. "And mind you
don't crush my pajamas."
"Your pajamas," said the ghost, "have no place in the top drawer
where I come from. They are not pure silk; they are Marks
&
Spencer's. "
Ben was secretly very anxious lest it should be known he was not a
kerblayer after all. But he was a brave fellow. "Get back to your place
or else," he said.
The ghost curled up again, murmuring, "At least you admit that I
have a right to be here. As it happens I know what is going to win the
three-thirty tomorrow. It is Bartender's Best."
True enough that horse won the race and Ben was furious with him–
self for failing to take the tip, for he liked to play the horses when he
had some money.
"Any more tips?" he asked the ghost that night.
"I thought you would ask that question," said the ghost. "But as you
know, your girlfriend doesn't like betting. If you give her up I'll tell no
one your secret and I'll give you good racing ti ps."
" Do you know what?" said Ben. "You are getting on my nerves. You
are the result of stale air, neither more nor less. Stale air becomes
radioactive. It becomes luminous.
If
I open the window you will gradu–
ally disappear."
"Not me," said the ghost. "Not me, I won't."
"I can't think of any more mindless occupation than to be a ghost in
that post-mortem way you have in coming and going. So very unneces–
sary. I could have you psychoanalyzed away."
Enter into the story Genevieve, young and fair, a designer of scare–
crows, Ben's girlfriend: Ben was convinced that her occupational status,
the only type of status that apparently he knew, was beneath his, par–
ticula rly now that he had become" Profession: kerbla yer's apprentice."
The passion with which the ghost despised Genevieve could only be
matched by Ben's genuine and desperate love for her. In the meantime
