The Lottery and Other Stories (22 page)

“Daphne?” she called.

After a hesitation: “Yes, Miss Style?”

“Aren’t you through yet?” Elizabeth said; she could afford to let herself speak gently now. “That letter to Miss Wilson should only take a minute.”

“Just getting ready to leave,” Daphne said.

“Don’t forget to leave your name and address.”

There was a silence from the other room, and Elizabeth said to her closed door, raising her voice again, “Did you hear me?”

“Mr. Shax knows my name and address,” Daphne said. The outer door opened, and Daphne said, “Good-bye.”

“Good-bye,” Elizabeth said.

She got out of the taxi at her corner, and after paying the man, she had a ten-dollar bill and some change in her pocketbook; this, with twenty dollars more in her apartment, was all the money she had until she could ask Robbie for more. Figuring quickly, she decided to take ten dollars of her money at home to get her through the evening; Jim Harris would have to pay for her dinner; ten dollars, then, for taxis and emergencies; she would ask Robbie for more tomorrow. The money in her pocketbook would go for liquor and cocktail things; she stopped in the liquor store on the corner and bought a bottle of rye, a fifth, so that she would have some to offer Robbie the next time he came down. With her bottle under her arm she went into the delicatessen and bought ginger ale; hesitantly she selected a bag of potato chips and then a box of crackers and a liverwurst spread to put on them.

She was unused to entertaining; she and Robbie spent evenings quietly together, seldom seeing any people except an occasional client and, sometimes, an old friend who invited them out. Because they were not married, Robbie was reluctant to take her anywhere where he might be embarrassed by her presence. They ate their meals in small restaurants, did their rare drinking at home or in a corner bar, saw neighborhood movies. When it was necessary for Elizabeth to invite people to visit her Robbie was not there; they had once given a party in Robbie’s larger apartment to celebrate some great occasion, probably a client of some sort, and the party had been so miserable and the guest so uncomfortable that they had never given another and had been invited to only one or two.

Consequently Elizabeth, although she spoke so blithely of “coming down for a drink,” was almost completely at a loss when people actually came. As she climbed the stairs to her apartment, her packages braced between her arm and her chin, she was worrying over and over the progress of having a drink, the passing of crackers, the taking of coats.

The appearance of her room shocked her; she had forgotten her hurried departure this morning and the way she had left things around; also, the apartment was created and planned for Elizabeth; that is, the hurried departure every morning of a rather unhappy and desperate young woman with little or no ability to make things gracious, the lonely ugly evenings in one chair with one book and one ashtray, the nights spent dreaming of hot grass and heavy sunlight. There was no possible arrangement of these things that would permit of a casual grouping of three or four people, sitting easily around a room holding glasses, talking lightly. In the early evening, with one lamp on and the shadows in the corners, it looked warm and soft, but you had only to sit down in the one armchair, or touch a hand to the grey wood end table that looked polished, to see that the armchair was hard and cheap, the grey paint chipping.

For a minute Elizabeth stood in the doorway holding her packages, trying clearly to visualize her room as it might be smoothed out by an affectionate hand, but the noise of footsteps above coming down the stairs drove her inside with the door shut and, once in, there was no clear vision; she had her feet on the unpolished floor; there was a dirty fingerprint on the inside doorknob. Robbie’s, Elizabeth thought.

She opened the glass French doors that screened the kitchenette and put her packages down; the kitchenette was part of one wall, with a tiny stove built in under a cabinet, a sink installed over a refrigerator, and, over the sink, two shelves on which stood her collection of china: two plates, two cups and saucers, four glasses. She also owned a small saucepan, a frying-pan, and a coffeepot. She had bought all her small house furnishings in a five-and-ten a few years before, planning a tiny complete kitchen, where she could make miniature roasts for herself and Robbie, even bake a small pie or cookies, wearing a yellow apron and making funny mistakes at first. Although she had been a fairly competent cook when she first came to New York, capable of frying chops and potatoes, in the many years since she had been near a real stove she had lost all her knowledge except the fudge-making play in which she indulged herself occasionally. Cooking was, like everything else she had known, a decent honest knowledge meant to make her a capable happy woman (“the way to a man’s heart,” her mother used to say soberly), which, with the rest of her daily life, had sunk to a miniature useful only as a novelty on rare occasions.

She had to take down the four glasses and wash them; they were dusty from standing so long unused on the open shelf. She checked the refrigerator. For a while she had kept butter and eggs in the refrigerator, and bread and coffee in the cabinet, but they had grown mouldy and rancid before she had been able to make more than one breakfast from them; she was so often late and so seldom inclined to take time over her own breakfast.

It was only four-thirty; she had time to straighten things up and bathe and dress. Her first care was for the easy things in the apartment; she dusted the tables and emptied the ashtray, stopping to put her dustcloth down and pull the bedcovers even, smoothing the spread down to a regular roundness. She was tempted to take up the three small scatter rugs and shake them, and then wash the floor, but a glance at the bathroom discouraged her; they would certainly be in and out of the bathroom, and the floor and tub and even the walls badly needed washing. She used her dust cloth soaked in hot water from the tap, getting the floor clean at last; she put out clean towels from her small stock and started her bath water while she went back to finish the big room.

After all her haphazard work the room looked the same; still grey and inhospitable in the rainy afternoon light. She debated for a minute running downstairs for some bright flowers, and then decided that her money wouldn’t last that far; they would only be in the room for a short while anyway, and with something to drink and something to eat any room should look friendly.

When she finished her bath it was nearly six, and dark enough to light the lamp on the end table. She walked barefoot across the room, feeling clean and freshened, conscious of the cologne she had put on, with her hair curling a little from the hot water. With the feeling of cleanness came an excitement; she would be happy tonight, she would be successful, something wonderful would happen to change her whole life. Following out this feeling she chose a dark red silk dress from the closet; it was youthfully styled and without the grey in her hair it made her look nearer twenty than over thirty. She selected a heavy gold chain to wear with it, and thought, I can wear my good black coat, even if it’s raining I’ll wear it to feel nice.

While she dressed she thought about her home. Considered honestly, there was no way to do anything with this apartment, no yellow drapes or pictures would help. She needed a new apartment, a pleasant open place with big windows and pale furniture, with the sun coming in all day. To get a new apartment she needed more money, she needed a new job, and Jim Harris would have to help her; tonight would be only the first of many exciting dinners together, building into a lovely friendship that would get her a job and a sunny apartment; while she was planning her new life she forgot Jim Harris, his heavy face, his thin voice; he was a stranger, a gallant dark man with knowing eyes who watched her across a room, he was someone who loved her, he was a quiet troubled man who needed sunlight, a warm garden, green lawns….

A Fine Old Firm

M
RS
. C
ONCORD
and her older daughter, Helen, were sitting in their living-room, sewing and talking and trying to keep warm. Helen had just put down the stockings she had been mending and walked over to the French doors that opened out on to the garden. “I wish spring would hurry up and get here,” she was saying when the doorbell rang.

“Good Lord,” Mrs. Concord said, “if that’s company! The rug’s all covered with loose threads.” She leaned over in her chair and began to gather up the odds and ends of material around her as Helen went to answer the door. She opened it and stood smiling while the woman outside held out a hand and began to talk rapidly. “You’re Helen? I’m Mrs. Friedman,” she said. “I hope you won’t think I’m just breaking in on you, but I have been so anxious to meet you and your mother.”

“How do you do?” Helen said. “Won’t you come in?” She opened the door wider and Mrs. Friedman stepped in. She was small and dark and wearing a very smart leopard coat. “Is your mother home?” she asked Helen just as Mrs. Concord came out of the living room.

“I’m Mrs. Concord,” Helen’s mother said.

“I’m Mrs. Friedman,” Mrs. Friedman said. “Bob Friedman’s mother.”

“Bob Friedman,” Mrs. Concord repeated.

Mrs. Friedman smiled apologetically. “I thought surely your boy would have mentioned Bobby,” she said.

“Of course he has,” Helen said suddenly. “He’s the one Charlie’s
always
writing about, Mother. It’s so hard to make a connection,” she said to Mrs. Friedman, “because Charlie seems so far away.”

Mrs. Concord was nodding. “Of course,” she said. “Won’t you come in and sit down?”

Mrs. Friedman followed the Concords into the living-room and sat in one of the chairs not filled with sewing. Mrs. Concord waved her hand at the room. “It makes such a mess,” she said, “but every now and then Helen and I just get to work and make things. These are kitchen curtains,” she added, picking up the material she had been working on.

“They’re very nice,” Mrs. Friedman said politely.

“Well, tell us about your son,” Mrs. Concord went on. “I’m amazed that I didn’t recognize the name right away, but somehow I associate Bob Friedman with Charles and the Army, and it seemed strange to have his mother here in town.”

Mrs. Friedman laughed. “That’s just about the way I felt,” she said. “Bobby wrote me that his friend’s mother lived here only a few blocks from us, and said why didn’t I drop in and say Hello.”

“I’m so glad you did,” Mrs. Concord said.

“I guess we know about as much about Bob as you do by now,” Helen said. “Charlie’s always writing about him.”

Mrs. Friedman opened her purse. “I even have a letter from Charlie,” she said. “I thought you’d like to take a look at it.”

“Charles wrote you?” Mrs. Concord asked.

“Just a note. He likes the pipe tobacco I send Bobby,” Mrs. Friedman explained, “and I put a tin of it in for him the last time I sent Bobby a package.” She handed the letter to Mrs. Concord and said to Helen, “I imagine I could tell you all about yourselves, Bobby’s said so much about all of you.”

“Well,” Helen said, “I know that Bob got you a Japanese sword for Christmas.
7bat
must have looked lovely under the tree. Charlie helped him buy it from the boy that had it—did you hear about that, and how they almost had a fight with the boy?”

“
Bobby
almost had a fight,” Mrs. Friedman said. “Charlie was smart and stayed out of it.”

“No, we heard it that
Charlie
was the one who got in trouble,” Helen said. She and Mrs. Friedman laughed.

“Maybe we shouldn’t compare notes,” Mrs. Friedman said. “They don’t seem to stick together on their stories.” She turned to Mrs. Concord, who had finished the letter and handed it to Helen. “I was just telling your daughter how many complimentary things I’ve heard about you.”

“We’ve heard a lot about you, too,” Mrs. Concord said.

“Charlie showed Bob a picture of you and your two daughters. The younger one’s Nancy, isn’t it?”

“Nancy, yes,” Mrs. Concord said.

“Well, Charlie certainly thinks a lot of his family,” Mrs. Friedman said. “Wasn’t he nice to write me?” she asked Helen.

“That tobacco must be good,” Helen said. She hesitated for a minute and handed the letter back to Mrs. Friedman, who put it in her purse.

“I’d love to meet Charlie sometime,” Mrs. Friedman said. “It seems as though I know him so well.”

“I’m sure he’ll want to meet you when he comes back,” Mrs. Concord said.

“I hope it won’t be long now,” Mrs. Friedman said. All three were silent for a minute, and then Mrs. Friedman went on with animation, “It seems so strange that we’ve been living in the same town and it took our boys so far away to introduce us.”

“This is a very hard town to get acquainted in,” Mrs. Concord said.

“Have you lived here long?” Mrs. Friedman smiled apologetically. “Of course I know of your husband,” she added. “My sister’s children are in your husband’s high school and they speak so highly of him.”

“Really?” Mrs. Concord said. “My husband has lived here all his life. I came here from the West when I was married.”