350
PARTISAN REVIEW
she made him go back, and she washed his thighs, his backside, and
then, his genitals. He had no self-consciousness about these, and so she
didn't either. And then, he could get out, which he did laughing, and
shaking himself into the towel she held. She enjoyed hearing him laugh:
it was like a bark. Long ago she had a dog who barked like that.
She dried him, all over, and then led him back to the other room,
naked, and made him put on his new underpants, his new vest, a char–
ity shop shirt, his trousers. Then she put a towel around his shoulders
and as he began to jerk about in protest, she said, "Yes, Ben, you have
to."
She trimmed his beard first.
It
was stiff and bristly, but she was able
to make a good job of it. And now his hair, and that was a different mat–
ter, for it was coarse and thick. The trouble was his double crown
which, if cut short, showed like stubbly whorls on the scalp.
It
was
necessity that had left the hair on the top of his head long, and at the
sides . She told him that one of these new clever hairdressers would make
him look like a film star, but since he did not take this in, she amended
it to, "They could make you look so smart, Ben, you'd not know your–
self. "
But he didn't look too bad now, and he smelled clean.
It
was early evening and she did what she would have done alone: she
brought out cans of beer from her fridge, filled her glass, and then she
filled one for him. They were going to spend the evening doing what he
liked best, watching television.
First she found a piece of paper and wrote on it:
Mrs. Ellen Biggs
I I
Mimosa House
Halley Street, London SE6.
She said, "Ask your mother for your birth certificate.
If
she has to
send for it, then tell her she can always write to you care of me-and
here is the address."
He did not answer: he was frowning.
"Do you understand, Ben?"
"Yes."
She did not know whether he did or not, but thought so .
He was looking at the television. She got up, switched it on, and came
back by way of the cat. "There, there puss, it's all right." But the cat
never for one moment took its eyes off Ben.
