Islands in the Stream (38 page)

“It has dignity. But why not just: Down with the Home?”

“
Abajo el Home.
It’s a beautiful sentiment but many might confuse it with
béisbol
.”

“What about Little Children?”

“Suffer them to come unto me once they are of electoral age,” said the Alcalde Peor.

“What about divorce?” Thomas Hudson asked.

“Another touchy problem,” the Alcalde Peor said. “
Bastante espinoso.
How do you feel about divorce?”

“Perhaps we shouldn’t take up divorce. It conflicts with our campaign in favor of the Home.”

“All right, let’s drop it. Now let me see—”

“You can’t,” Honest Lil said. “You’re cockeyed.”

“Don’t criticize me, woman,” the Alcalde Peor told her. “One thing we must do.”

“What?”

“Orinar.”

“I agree,” Thomas Hudson heard himself saying. “It is basic.”

“As basic as the lack of the aqueduct. It is founded on water.”

“It’s founded on alcohol.”

“Only a small percentage in comparison with the water. Water is the basic thing. You are a scientist. What percentage of water are we composed of?”

“Eighty-seven and three-tenths,” said Thomas Hudson, taking a chance and knowing he was wrong.

“Exactly,” said the Alcalde Peor, “Should we go while we can still move?”

In the men’s room a calm and noble Negro was reading a Rosicrucian pamphlet. He was working on the weekly lesson of the course he was taking. Thomas Hudson greeted him with dignity and his greeting was returned in kind.

“Quite a chilly day, sir,” the attendant with the religious literature observed.

“It is indeed chilly,” Thomas Hudson said. “How are your studies progressing?”

“Very well, sir. As well as can be expected.”

“I’m delighted,” Thomas Hudson said. Then to the Alcalde Peor, who was having certain difficulties, “I belonged to a club in London once where half the members were trying to urinate and the other half were trying to stop.”

“Very good,” said the Alcalde Peor, completing his chore, “What did they call it,
El Club Mundial?”

“No. As a matter of fact, I’ve forgotten the name of it.”

“You’ve forgotten the name of your club?”

“Yes. Why not?”

“I think we better go get another one. How much does this urination cost?”

“Whatever you wish, sir.”

“Let me get them,” Thomas Hudson said. “I love to buy them. It’s like flowers.”

“Could it have been the Royal Automobile Club?” the Negro asked, standing proffering a towel.

“It could not have been.”

“I’m sorry, sir,” the student of Rusicrucian said. “I know that’s one of the biggest clubs in London.”

“That’s right,” Thomas Hudson said. “One of the biggest. Now buy yourself something very handsome with this.” He gave him a dollar.

“Why did you give him a peso?” the Alcalde Peor asked him as they were outside the door and back to the noise of the bar, the restaurant, and the traffic on the street outside.

“I have no real use for it.”

“Hombre,”
the Alcalde Peor said. “Are you feeling all right? Do you feel OK?”

“Quite,” said Thomas Hudson. “I’m quite OK, thank you very much.”

“How was the trip?” Honest Lil asked from her stool at the bar. Thomas Hudson looked at her and saw her again for the first time. She looked considerably darker and much wider.

“It was a nice trip,” he said. “You always meet interesting people when you travel.”

Honest Lil put her hand on his thigh and squeezed it and he was looking down the bar, away from Honest Lil, past the Panama hats, the Cuban faces, and the moving dice cups of the drinkers and out the open door into the bright light of the square, when he saw the car pull up and the doorman opened the rear door, his cap in his hand, and she got out.

It was her. No one else got out of a car that way, practically and easily and beautifully and at the same time as though she were doing the street a great favor when she stepped on it: Everyone had tried to look like her for many years and some came quite close. But when you saw her, all the people that looked like her were only imitations. She was in uniform now and she smiled at the doorman and asked him a question and he answered happily and nodded his head and she started across the sidewalk and into the bar. There was another woman in uniform behind her.

Thomas Hudson stood up and he felt as though his chest was being constricted so that he could not breathe. She had seen him and she was walking down the gap between the people at the bar and the tables toward him. The other woman was following behind her.

“Excuse me,” he said to Honest Lil and to the Alcalde Peor. “I have to see a friend.”

They met halfway down the free corridor between the bar and the tables and he was holding her in his arms. They were both holding hard and tight as people can hold and he was kissing her hard and well and she was kissing him and feeling both his arms with her hands.

“Oh you. You. You,” she said.

“You devil,” he said. “How did you get here?”

“From Camag
ü
ey, of course.”

People were looking at them and he picked her off her feet and held her tight against him and kissed her once more then put her down and took her hand and started for a table in the corner.

“We can’t do that here,” he said. “We’ll get arrested.”

“Let’s get arrested,” she said. “This is Ginny. She’s my secretary.”

“Hi, Ginny,” Thomas Hudson said. “Let’s get this mad woman behind that table.”

Ginny was a nice, ugly girl. They were both wearing the same uniform; officers’ blouses without insignia, shirts and ties, skirts, stockings, and brogues. They had overseas caps and a patch on their left shoulders he had not seen before.

“Take your cap off, devil.”

“I’m not supposed to.”

“Take it off.”

“All right.”

She took it off and lifted her face and shook her hair loose and moved her head back and looked at him and he saw the high forehead, the magic rolling line of the hair that was the same silvery ripe-wheat color as always, the high cheekbones with the hollows just below them, the hollows that could always break your heart, the slightly flattened nose, and the mouth he had just left that was disarranged by the kissing, and the lovely chin and throat line.

“How do I look?”

“You know.”

“Did you ever kiss anybody in these clothes before? Or scratch yourself on army buttons?”

“No.”

“Do you love me?”

“I always love you.”

“No. Do you love me right now. This minute.”

“Yes,” he said and his throat ached.

“That’s good,” she said. “It would be pretty awful for you if you didn’t.”

“How long are you here for?”

“Just today.”

“Let me kiss you.”

“You said we’d be arrested.”

“We can wait. What do you want to drink?”

“Do they have good champagne?”

“Yes. But there’s an awfully good local drink.”

“There must be. About how many of them have you had?”

“I don’t know. About a dozen.”

“You only look tight around the eyes. Are you in love with anyone?”

“No. You?”

“We’ll have to see. Where is your bitch of a wife?”

“In the Pacific.”

“I wish she was. About a thousand fathoms deep. Oh, Tommy, Tommy, Tommy, Tommy, Tommy.”

“Are you in love with anyone?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“You bastard.”

“Isn’t it terrible? The first time I ever meet you since I went away and you’re not in love with anyone and I’m in love with someone.”

“You went away?”

“That’s my story.”

“Is he nice?”

“He’s nice, this one, like children are nice. I’m very necessary to him.”

“Where is he?”

“That’s a military secret.”

“Is that where you’re going?”

“Yes.”

“What are you?”

“We’re USO.”

“Is that the same as OSS?”

“No, goofy. Don’t pretend to be stupid and don’t be stuffy just because I love someone. You never consult me when you fall in love with people.”

“How much do you love him?”

“I didn’t say I loved him. I said I was in love with him. I won’t even be in love with him today if you don’t want. I’m only here for a day. I don’t want not to be polite.”

“Go to hell,” he said.

“How would it be if I took the car and went to the hotel?” Ginny asked.

“No, Ginny. We’re going to have some champagne first. Do you have a car?” she asked Thomas Hudson.

“Yeah. Outside on the square.”

“Can we drive out to your place?”

“Of course. We can eat and then go out. Or I can pick up something for us to eat out there.”

“Weren’t we lucky that we could get here?”

“Yes,” Thomas Hudson said. “How did you know anyone was here?”

“A boy at the field at Camag
ü
ey told me you might be here. If we didn’t find you, we were going to see Havana.”

“We can see Havana.”

“No,” she said. “Ginny can see it. Do you know anybody who could take Ginny out?”

“Sure.”

“We have to get back to Camag
ü
ey tonight.”

“What time does your plane leave?”

“Six o’clock, I think.”

“We’ll fix everything up,” Thomas Hudson said.

A man came over to the table. He was a local boy.

“Pardon me,” he said. “May I have your autograph?”

“Of course.”

He gave her a card with the picture of the bar on it with Constante standing behind it making a cocktail and she signed with the overlarge theatrical writing Thomas Hudson knew so well.

“It’s not for my little daughter or my son who is in school,” the man said. “It’s for me.”

“Good,” she said and smiled at him. “You were very nice to ask me.”

“I’ve seen all of your pictures,” the man said. “I think you are the most beautiful woman in the world.”

“That’s wonderful,” she said. “Please keep on thinking that.”

“Would you let me buy you a drink?”

“I’m drinking with a friend.”

“I know him,” the radio announcer said. “I’ve known him for many years. May I sit down, Tom? There is an extra lady here.”

“This is Mr. Rodr
í
guez,” Thomas Hudson said. “What’s your last name, Ginny?”

“Watson.”

“Miss Watson.”

“I’m delighted to know you, Miss Watson,” the radio announcer said. He was a good-looking man, dark and tanned with pleasant eyes, a nice smile, and the big good hands of a ball player. He had been both a gambler and a ball player and he had some of the good looks of the modern gambler left.

“Could you all three have lunch with me?” he asked. “It is nearly lunchtime now.”

“Mr. Hudson and I have to make a trip into the country,” she said.

“I’d love to have lunch with you,” Ginny said. “I think you’re wonderful.”

“Is he all right?” she asked Thomas Hudson.

“He’s a fine man. As good as you’ll find in town.”

“Thank you very much, Tom,” the man said. “You are sure you won’t all eat with me?”

“We really have to go,” she said. “We’re late now. Then I’ll see you at the hotel, Ginny. Thank you so much, Mr. Rodríguez.”

“You really are the most beautiful woman in the world,” Mr. Rodríguez said. “If I hadn’t always known it, I know it now.”

“Please keep on thinking so,” she said and then they were out in the street.

“Well,” she said. “That wasn’t too bad. Ginny likes him, too, and he’s nice.”

“He
is
nice,” Thomas Hudson said and the chauffeur opened the door of the car for them.

“You’re nice,” she said. “I wish you hadn’t had quite so many drinks. That’s why I skipped the champagne. Who was your dark friend at the end of the bar?”

“Just my dark friend at the end of the bar.”

“Do you need a drink? We could stop somewhere and get one.”

“No. Do you?”

“You know I never do. I’d like some wine though.”

“I have wine out at the house.”

“That’s wonderful. Now you can kiss me. They won’t arrest us now.”

“¿Adonde vamos?”
the chauffeur asked looking straight ahead.

“A la finca,”
Thomas Hudson said.

“Oh, Tommy, Tommy, Tommy,” she said. “Go right ahead. It doesn’t make any difference if he sees us, does it?”

“No. It makes no difference. You can cut his tongue out if you like.”

“No, I don’t want to. Nor nothing brutal ever. But you were nice to offer it.”

“It wouldn’t be a bad idea. How are you? You old love-house of always.”

“I’m the same.”

“Really the same?”

“The same as one always is. I’m yours in this town.”

“Until the plane leaves.”

“Exactly,” she said and changed her position for the better in the car. “Look,” she said. “We’ve left the shining part and it’s dirty and smoky. When didn’t we do that?”

“Sometimes.”

“Yes,” she said. “Sometimes.”

Then they looked at the dirty and the smoky and her quick eyes and lovely intelligence saw everything instantly that had taken him so many years to see.

“Now it gets better,” she said. She had never told him a lie in his life and he had tried to never lie to her. But he had been quite unsuccessful.

“Do you still love me?” she asked. “Tell me true without adornments.”

“Yes. You ought to know.”

“I know,” she said, holding him to prove it if it could prove it.

“Who is the man now?”

“Let’s not talk about him. You wouldn’t care for him.”

“Maybe not,” he said and held her so close that it was as though something must break if both were truly serious. It was their old game and she broke and the break was clean.

“You don’t have breasts,” she said. “And you always win.”

“I don’t have a face to break your heart. Nor what you have and the long lovely legs.”

“You have something else.”

“Yes,” he said. “Last night with a pillow and a cat making love.”

“I’ll make up for the cat. How far is it now?”

“Eleven minutes.”

“That’s too far the way things are now.”

“Should I take it from him and drive it in eight?”

“No, please, and remember everything I taught you about patience.”