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By Root 8282 0

– that was how she called him – she ran downstairs and brought back a couple of bottles of white wine. I was to stay and have dinner with her – she insisted on it. As she drank she became by turns gay and maudlin. I didn't have to ask her any questions – she went on like a self-winding machine. The thing that worried her principally was – would he get his job back when he was released from the hospital? She said her parents were well off, but they were displeased with her. They didn't approve of her wild ways. They didn't approve of him particularly – he had no manners, and he was an American. She begged me to assure her that he would get his job back, which I did without hesitation. And then she begged me to know if she could believe what he said – that he was going to marry her. Because now, with a child under her belt, and a dose of clap besides, she was in no position to strike a match – with a Frenchman anyway. That was clear, wasn't it? Of course, I assured her. It was all clear as hell to me – except how in Christ's name Fillmore had ever fallen for her. However, one thing at a time. It was my duty now to comfort her, and so I just filled her up with a lot of baloney, told her everything would turn out all right and that I would stand godfather to the child, etc. Then suddenly it struck me as strange that she should have the child at all – especially as it was likely to be born blind. I told her that as tactfully as I could. "It doesn't make any difference," she said, "I want a child by him."

"Even if it's blind?" I asked.

"Mon Dieu, ne dites pas ça!"

she groaned. "Ne dites pas ça!"

Just the same, I felt it was my duty to say it. She got hysterical and began to weep like a walrus, poured out more wine. In a few moments she was laughing boisterously. She was laughing to think how they used to fight when they got in bed. "He liked me to fight with him," she said. "He was a brute."

As we sat down to eat, a friend of hers walked in – a little tart who lived at the end of the hall. Ginette immediately sent me down to get some more wine. When I came back they had evidently had a good talk. Her friend, Yvette, worked in the police department. A sort of stool pigeon, as far as I could gather. At least that was what she was trying to make me believe. It was fairly obvious that she was just a little whore. But she had an obsession about the police and their doings. Throughout the meal they were urging me to accompany them to a bat musette. They wanted to have a gay time – it was so lonely for Ginette with Jo-Jo in the hospital. I told them I had to work, but that on my night off I'd come back and take them out. I made it clear too that I had no dough to spend on them. Ginette, who was really thunderstruck to hear this, pretended that that didn't matter in the least. In fact, just to show what a good sport she was, she insisted on driving me to work in a cab. She was doing it because I was a friend of Jo-Jo's. And therefore I was a friend of hers. "And also," thought I to myself, "if anything goes wrong with your Jo-Jo you'll come to me on the double-quick. Then you'll see what a friend I can be!" I was as nice as pie to her. In fact when we got out of the cab in front of the office, I permitted them to persuade me into having a final Pernod together. Yvette wanted to know if she couldn't call for me after work. She had a lot of things to tell me in confidence, she said. But I managed to refuse without hurting her feelings. Unfortunately I did unbend sufficiently to give her my address.

Unfortunately,

I say. As a matter of fact, I'm rather glad of it when I think back on it. Because the very next day things began to happen. The very next day, before I had even gotten out of bed, the two of them called on me. Jo-Jo had been removed from the hospital – they had incarcerated him in a little château in the country, just a few miles out of Paris. The château, they called it. A polite way of saying "the bughouse." They wanted me to get dressed immediately and go with them. They were in a panic.

Perhaps I might have gone alone