UNLIKE OTHERS

By

Valerie Taylor

Unlike Others

By Valerie Taylor

First published in 1963.

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ISBN:  978-1-936456-35-2

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

CHAPTER 1

There’s no point in owning a double bed if you have to sleep alone. Thinking about the fifty dollars she'd paid out for this good-looking piece of junk, useless since Karen had gone off to get married and lead the square suburban life, only made Jo Bates feel worse about waking up alone in it. The fifty was irrevocably gone. And so was Karen.

Jo's reflection looked back at her from the dressing-table mirror, a neatly built girl a little above average height, in striped pajamas; short brown hair tousled around an alert, intelligent face. A useful body too, seldom sick or tired, capable of giving and receiving a great deal of pleasure. It was too bad nobody seemed to want the kind of pleasure she could give.

She rolled out and started making the bed, frowning as she leaned across to smooth the covers. New double-size sheets and blankets too, naturally; add that to the initial cost. Karen had paid for the bedspread, her only contribution to the household economy during the four months of her stay. The only trace of Karen left in the apartment, unless you counted the heavy early-morning feeling of loss that lurked somewhere between Jo's windpipe and diaphragm.

She showered, decided there wasn't time to make coffee, and got into her bra and panty-girdle, nylons, low-heeled pumps and favorite pleated blouse. Sunday's bermudas lay on the bathroom floor. She hung them in the closet and took her gray suit off the hanger. The girl in the gray flannel suit, she thought, applying bright lipstick and running a comb through her short hair. She picked up her handbag and gloves, got to the door, then went back for silver earrings and a lapel pin. Now she looked like a thousand other girls heading for buses and subway trains, putting their personal lives aside until next weekend, starting another five-day block of office work. Nobody would look beyond the career girl's uniform and see the real Jo.

We all look alike, she thought, climbing on the bus. If there's a difference, it's not the one straight people make such a fuss about. (Her stomach tightened at the thought of discovery; her chief dread since she was sixteen.) The only real difference is that I want more out of life. Yes, and the way things are going I'm likely to end up with a damn sight less.

She stood holding a strap, pressed against the broad beam of a man who smelled of perspiration. A car of my own, she thought. She and Karen had talked about buying a car. By staying home nights and doing their own cooking, they could have managed it. She remembered lying in bed beside Karen and arguing about the advantages of American and foreign-made compacts, putting off in mixed dread and hope the moment when she would touch Karen and wait for a response that might or might not be forthcoming.

And all the time Karen had been seeing David Breen. All her little hints about moving out and starting her therapy again hadn't been anything but a smoke-screen. The little cheat.

It would be easier if I could hate her, Jo thought, shutting her eyes as the bus swayed past Grant Park where the beds of cannas stood red and yellow, past the Conrad Hilton with sunlight glancing off the east facade, down Van Buren past the big Sears-Roebuck store. This was the daytime world—State Street slipping past, separating her from the apartment and everything unconnected with her job. She was glad now that Karen had worked in their own neighborhood. There were no invisible footprints of Karen's on these sidewalks to remind her of what she had lost.

The bus turned east again, got back on Michigan Avenue. She liked working on North Michigan. The buildings were new and streamlined, the sidewalks wide, the shops exclusive and uncluttered. From her office window she could look down sixteen stories over the gray-green river and northward past the Tribune Building and the Wrigley Building.

She rode up to sixteen with nothing on her mind except the November issue of the magazine. Even the sight of the publication's name, Produx Topix, in gold letters on the door no longer made her squirm. I'll get it changed yet, she thought.

She hadn't known anything about magazine editing when she answered the ad in the Tribune. A certain dexterity with words and a tremendous willingness to work were all she had; Stan had hired her on the strength of these. Or so he told her. After two years she suspected there had been other things in her favor, like being a girl. Stan looked at a female's figure first and her references second. He should only know, she thought wryly.

It hadn't done him any good or her any harm. They worked together like parts of a machine, Jo doing most of the work and Stan getting most of the credit, to put out the throw-away that was read by more than two thousand Plastix Produx workers. Maybe it was small time, as Stan pointed out when he had more than one martini at lunch, but it was fun, and a fairly honest way to make a living.

Some day, when she knew more about magazine production, she would go to New York and get a job with one of the big publications. Listening to Stan's troubles was a small enough return for all he had taught her.

She passed the tiny reception room where Gayle sat, breathing on her diamond and polishing it on her skirt whenever the phone wasn't ringing; the smaller office where the assistant worked—they were always losing assistants; as soon as a girl learned to read proof she either got married or got a better job and left without notice. Stan wasn't in yet. She passed his door and entered her own room at the end of the hall. Here she spent seven and a half hours a day writing about other people's engagements and weddings, funerals and new babies, surprise birthday parties and vacation trips. Her daytime world.

Gayle peeked in. "Jo, Betsy Considine is here. She's applying for Nancy's job."

Jo nodded. "Send her in."

The Considine girl was small, blonde, and calm. Good, Jo thought—Nancy had been given to tantrums.

She said, "Mister Haxton will be in any minute. Would you like a cup of coffee?"

"Love it."

"Run down and get three coffees, Gayle. I’ll take the phone."

Big deal, having somebody you can boss around. Do this, do that. She said, "The turnover on assistants is pretty high here. They keep getting married."

"I won't be."

"Are you married?"

Betsy Considine considered this. "I'm divorced. Any objections?"

That takes care of that, Jo thought. Not that she had hoped—still, you never knew. She said neutrally, "This is a business office, more or less. Your personal life doesn't enter into it."

She liked the girl's looks. Perhaps because she looked a little like Karen. Not a real resemblance, but they were the same general type: fair, with a wide forehead, heart-shaped face and gentle blue eyes. Betsy Considine returned her look steadily. Jo grinned, wondering if she threw things when she was angry, like Karen. You couldn't tell with these little hausfrau types.

"How old are you?"

"Twenty-three."

Karen was twenty-four.

Gayle pushed the door open with her knee and walked in, balancing a stack of paper cups. "Here's our coffee," Jo said. "Ask Gayle any questions you want to, Betsy. I'll see you again after you talk to Mister Haxton."

They left. She sat looking around her office.

This small room with its one window overlooking Michigan Avenue was the center of her working life. The desk and chair, typewriter and file cabinet belonged to Plastix, but she'd bought the thin gold-colored curtain and half a dozen of her own books lay on the file, handy for lunch-time reading. The Roget, dictionary, Literary Market Place and Writers Market were her own, and she had never returned the New York Times Style Book, which belonged to Stan. The metal pica stick and long-bladed scissors were hers too. Stan needled her about it. He said it was evident she'd turned into an editor and this was the most dismal thing that could happen to a nice girl. "You’ll end up marrying a printing press."

"That's all right with me."

"It's a waste of womanpower."

Goaded, she might answer, "How about you? I don't hear any wedding bells ringing for you."

"I've got my mother to think about."

And I have problems of my own, Jo wanted to say. But she knew better. You couldn't tell the truth to straight people, ever; the best you could hope for was tolerance without understanding. They saw the different ones as emotionally retarded or, worse, guilty of some nameless sin against society'.

You can't escape it, Jo mused, taking her first sip of the cooling coffee. Still vivid in her own mind were the twelve years of her misery: guilt, worry, daydreaming, trying to find out from books what no one would tell her. It was no wonder Karen's crazy middle-of-the-night attempts to respond to her lovemaking had been followed by the broad-daylight blues. She herself hadn't settled all the moral and religious angles; it was more that she'd quit struggling.

To hell with it. Jo opened a folder of news items and began to leaf through them, selecting a few from each factory department for the next issue. She continued to sip her coffee, not because it was good but because it was paid for.

The door of the outer office slammed. That would be Stan, underlining his masculinity. He came back to her door, already pulling off his suit-coat. Bypassing his own office to talk to her, not because she counted as a person but because she could be relied on to sympathize with him. A mother surrogate. With that bitch he had at home to sour him on all motherhood? Sure, she thought, he needed the old harridan, fake heart attacks and all; otherwise he'd get out. Can't tell him that, though.

"Hi, Jo. Did you see the new babe?"

Jo said neutrally, "I talked to her."

"What did you think?"

But of course. Stan was the boss. He expected her to make the decision and then convince him it was his own. She said, "I haven't found out if she knows anything, but she seems to have good sense."

"Think we can do better?"

"For what we're paying?"

"Yeah, I know."

She put down the manila folder, gave him her whole attention. A tall lanky man with a crest of red hair and an outsize adam's apple, he was in no way handsome, and nobody knew better than she did (unless it was God, or his bitch of a mother) how insecure he was. But she was sorry for him.

He waited, leaning against the door-jamb. She said, "Have a good weekend? How was the stag?"

"I didn't go." She waited. After a moment's uncomfortable silence he said, "She had an attack after supper, Saturday night. It wasn't a bad one, but I didn't want to leave her."

Between them hung the shared knowledge of what he could and couldn't do. He could go to church, unless the weather was bad; the old lady was at her worst on rainy days. He could get to his Great Books group on alternate Thursdays, and his disappointment when he missed a session was pitiable. But a bachelor party suggested drinking, off-color stories and, worst of all, sex. That took care of that.

The pause was lasting too long. She said, "Maybe she’ll feel better when the weather settles. I'm going to make up the weddings while you talk to Missus Considine."

"Missus?"

"Divorced."

He grinned. "Guess I’ll hire her. Then well have three good-looking girls in the place."

"Gee, thanks."

He went out. She looked after him with a mixture of affection and annoyance. If he had any guts he'd throw that complaining old bag into a rest home. Wouldn't cost any more than keeping that big old house where she lived and ailed, surrounded by out-of-date furniture, keeping a stranglehold on her only child. Find himself a warm and willing girl who'd give him some affection and not ask for the moon in return.

It had reached a point where she, Jo, looked hopefully at all the girls Stan met, the girls in the Plastix plant who handed him their news notes every week and the stenos from the building pool who took dictation when they were between assistants. Pimping for the boss, she told herself. But that didn't keep her from wishing he could find somebody.

She turned back to her desk, determined to think only about her work. But the unease that had haunted her all morning was too strong. I need to talk to somebody, she thought. She laid down the folder and reached for the telephone.

CHAPTER 2

Richard Kauffman was waiting at the front entrance of the building when she came out at five-o'clock. She gave him a warm smile and raised her cheek for his kiss, aware that Gayle was directly behind her and couldn't help seeing. "Rich, you've saved my life. I was afraid you'd be out with a client."

"On Monday? Business should be so good." He took her by the elbow, beaming at Gayle as she emerged from the revolving door, enjoying this little comedy as much as Jo did. "I'm meeting Michael at eight," he said, "that gives us three hours. What's on your mind?"

"Oh, you know, I had a miserable weekend and I wanted to see you."

"I'm very happy you wanted to see me," Richard said seriously. He was a big man, tall, barrel-chested, with blunt features. A regular Babbitt, Jo thought, marveling as she often did at the way people hid behind their outward appearance. She said, "Rich, if I were on my death bed you're the one I'd want to hold my hand."

"You're good for another sixty years yet, darling. Except we all die a little at a time."

"Too true."

"Where do you want to go?"

"Oh, I don't know. Some place where we can talk."

"Life among the straight people getting you down?"

She gave him a weak smile. "You know how it is."

"I sure do," Kauffman said with feeling. "I go out to lunch with the guys from my office, and all they talk about is the girls they were out with last weekend, or how their wives behave in the sack. I feel like a foreigner.

"Well, you can't expect them to ask how you're getting along with Michael. How are you getting along with Michael, by the way?"

“Fine. Heaven forbid any of the shnooks I work with should ever ask that question. It's getting harder all the time to get unemployment compensation in this town."

Jo stood still, looking at him. He smiled. "Michael gets nicer every day. Also every night. I hate to think about its ever ending."

"Maybe it won't."

"That's a female idea. You girls really believe in faithfulness, don't you?"

Jo said carefully, "I don't think it's very probable, but I'd like to hope it's possible. Even if I'm leading a dull life right now."

"Look, let's take a taxi and go to the Silver Spike. It's nice and quiet there, and the liquor's good. Also, we can get something to eat if you're hungry."

"I'm always hungry," Jo admitted, "but I thought the Silver Spike was strictly stag. Are you trying to embarrass me?"

"No, we went one night a couple weeks ago, and it's about half and half now. Very nice. If you didn't know, you wouldn't even guess anyone was cruising."

"You know I'm not much for night life. Besides, they change so fast I can't keep up. They ought to advertise."

Rich chuckled. "I'd like to see it. A little notice in the newspaper, in the Classified. Gay bar, dancing, good cuisine. Girls, come and meet the Sweetheart of Sigma Chi."

A cab pulled up at the curb and he helped her in. She said, in a whisper that the driver couldn't hear, "It's easier for you. There's always the art museums."

"Also the men's rooms at the Parisienne."

"I'm afraid to go to the Parisienne. I went once with a couple of girls from the office, to see a foreign film. You never saw such weird types.''

"That's in the auditorium. I think all the hopheads on the Near North Side go there to sleep it off after they've had a fix. No, I'm just talking about the men's room. You wouldn't know what goes on down there."

"Well, hardly." She grinned at him.

The Silver Spike was down four steps, in what Chicago called an English basement. More basement than English, Jo decided, unless they were thinking about Charles Dickens and his ragged little boys. She got out of the cab three doors away and waited, clutching her purse, stirred in spite of herself by the familiar anticipation that always rose in her at the threshold of a gay bar or a party. Maybe there'll be something here for me. Maybe this time I’ll meet somebody or learn something, and it will make all the difference.

Rich paid the driver and joined her. We make a nice-looking couple, she thought, seeing their reflection in a store window. I bet everyone thinks we're married. Rich looks exactly like the kind of husband who spends Saturday putting up storm windows.

"Sometimes I understand why foreigners gang together so," he said. "This is like finding somebody who speaks my own language."

"That's what I was thinking."

The opened door released a hum of voices and a whirl of jukebox music. They looked intently through the semi-darkness, partly to find seats, partly to see if they knew anyone. Richard said, "All the booths seem to be taken. You mind sitting at the bar?"

"Not at all, it's closer to supplies."

A youngster came to take their order. Girl or boy, it was hard to tell which in this light. Girl being boy, Jo decided. "Gin and tonic, please."

"Two gin and tonic."

This was the office crowd, stopping on its way home. Most of the girls were in skirts and blouses or between seasons cottons, their faces neatly made up, their young legs in nylon. Later in the evening the car-coat crowd would take over. The boys were mostly young. On a long bench along the wall, close to the jukebox, three young men who might have worked on a newspaper or in an ad agency sat talking in low voices. At the other end of the bar a woman in a flowered hat—the only hat in the room—sat next to a short man in glasses. "Tourists," Richard said scornfully.

"Or a protectorate."

"Not with that hat, I don't think so."

"I don't either," Jo admitted. "I'm not sure about him, but she's straight."

"How can you tell?"

1 don't know. Sometimes I make mistakes, but not very often."

They smiled at each other. Richard paid for the drinks. Jo said, "Thanks. I'll see you payday."

"No you won't. It's my pleasure."

"You have Michael, you don't need any more pleasure.

It took him a minute or so to frame the question that had been in his mind all day. He was concerned. At the same time, he didn't want to hurt her. She waited, knowing this. He said, looking not at her but at the boy on the other side of her, "Have you heard from Karen?"

"Not since I saw you. I told you she called me up, didn't I? They're back from the honeymoon and she's gone into analysis. Her analyst thinks she's making headway. Maybe shell be normal eventually." Jo's smile was a grimace. "We're all cases of retarded development."

"Sure, we're neurotic. Who in hell isn't?" Richard wanted to know. "Society breeds neurosis. I suppose the heteros who run around laying every female they can get their hands on are normal. I suppose the morons who rape and dismember little girls are mature mentally. Also the frigid housewives who are always so tired when their husbands come to bed."

"Well, anyhow you're the nicest neurotic I know.”

"Thanks, darling. I love you too."

The beautiful thing was, he really did. Looking at his profile as he scanned the men around the long oval bar, Jo felt the familiar warm affection. There was no one in the world she trusted more than Rich, or liked better, or relied on more often for understanding. Not that she often asked for advice, or took it when it was offered, but it was a comfort to know he was there to be counted.

She said absently, "It's too bad I hate men.”

He laughed. "All Lesbians hate men. If they didn't they'd get married."

"Good old stereotypes. The boys are all artistic and the girls are all athletic."

"Some are." With the smallest possible gesture he indicated a girl of twenty or so sitting next to the three young advertising men on the bench. Hair cut like a boy's and slicked back, knees brawny under olive drab bermudas, moccasins planted flat, she wore the challenging expression of a tough little boy looking for trouble. Jo said, "It's too bad I don't go for butches, they're so easy to identify."

Rich finished his drink. The barboy picked up the glass. "You ready for another?" he asked Jo directly.

"Not for me. Go ahead, Rich, unless you'd like to leave."

Now that the first drink was down, he went back to the subject at hand. He said, "I thought maybe you saw her, or something."

Jo said, "I've been thinking about her all day, off and on." She put her elbows on the bar and hunched forward, as though she could collect her thoughts by pulling her body together. "We hired a girl for Nancy's job this morning. She looks a little bit like Karen."

"Is she gay?"

"I don't think so. She's divorced."

"Don't mean a thing. I've been married and divorced myself."

"I know. The thing is," Jo said anxiously, "I don't want to start thinking she might be gay because she looks like Karen. She's quite a common type."

"Karen wasn't a member of the club anyway, she was just experimenting. A lot of girls do that. They hear about it and they're curious. All you can do is let them go when the novelty wears off."

"I know."

"Sweetheart, the trouble with you is you're too monogamous. Why can't you pick somebody up and have a good time? It would do you good."

"I was ready to last night." She looked into her empty glass, decided to have another gin after all, and beckoned the barboy. Her smile was answered by a hopeful look. Girls, she decided. "I was absolutely crazy last night," she said in a small abashed voice. "Not just in my body, the way you get when you haven't loved anybody for a long time, but my mind too. I was so lonesome I thought I'd die. You know?"

"Baby, I do know."

"I couldn't see anything ahead for me."

"There's this new girl."

"I'm trying not to think about her. I'd rather not be disappointed."

"You've been thinking about her all day."

"Have I? I don't think so. Anyway, I guess Stan's looking her over. Every time I went past her office today he was in there, explaining the job to her and looking down her cleavage."

"Let him find his own girls. What's the matter with him anyhow?"

"He has to be home by five-thirty," Jo said, "or his mother sends the sheriff out with a posse. He does a lot of talking, but I bet he hasn't laid a girl in the last five years." She sipped delicately at her new drink. "If this keeps up, I’ll be able to say the same for myself."

"You know what I'd do in your place?"

"Oh sure. You'd look around till you found something you liked, and move in on it. It's not that I have anything against the system," Jo explained, "I wash I could do it, but I can't."

"You want a whole-personality relationship."

She smiled. The drink was beginning to make her feel a little more cheerful, but sleepy too. "Thank you, Dr. Freud. I'm a bitch to keep you here when you could be with Michael."

"It's only six-thirty." He checked his watch against the wall clock. "Let's have a sandwich or something, there's plenty of time. Excuse me just a minute."

What a great guy, Jo thought, watching him walk in the direction of the telephone booths. If I were straight, that's the kind of man I'd go for. He deserves something better than those selfish young bastards he's always getting hung up on.

The girl in the tan bermudas stood beside her. "You mind if I sit here?"

"My friend's coming back."

"That's all right," she grinned. Jo said, "Maybe another time."

Because she herself looked so ambiguous, in spite of her short haircut and tailored clothes which were the style now, anyway, she was careful not to behave like a tourist in places like this. Just as careful as she was to hide her real nature from her fellow-workers. One was a necessary self-protective measure; the other, a way of identifying with her own kind.

For these were her people. Not only the two career girls in the corner booth, touching each other with their looks even as their hands lay on the bare tabletop, but the others. The shabby little girls holding hands, the butches in jeans and heavy oxfords, the nervous-looking woman in high heels who was visibly and unsuccessfully cruising. They were hers. Just the middle-class, solvent and well-washed poet has to acknowledge his obscure colleague, reading for drinks in a cellar pad, so she had come to admit her relationship to the entire homosexual world—that society within a society whose existence most people never even suspect. It was easy. Too easy, she thought, following her idea carefully because the gin was clouding her mind a little. Once you learn to accept yourself, it's easy to accept other people.

That was where she'd made her mistake with Karen. She had supposed that Karen was simply reluctant to admit her own deviant nature. It's not easy to make a commitment to an idea that's going to take you out of the main stream of society. She hadn't realized, until the day of their separation, that their relationship was based on a false premise. For Karen seemed to feel, with her analyst, that the only possible commitment was to the normal. Anything else was a falling short, a detour rather than a destination. Jo's kind of love was not an alternative but only a phase she might go through.

That takes care of that, Jo thought. If Karen had been attracted to another woman she might eventually have come back. Or if she had fallen irresistibly in love with a man. But no, she snatched at David Breen as a drowning person snatches at a life preserver, not caring who tosses it.

Karen couldn't realize that it was normal for some people to be gay, just as it was normal for others to be attracted to the opposite sex. And failing to learn that, she would be miserable until she learned to live with a man—or with her own ambivalent feelings, a cold and cheerless outlook. I guess it had to be, Jo thought, taking a good long drink to drown her thoughts.

"I feel happier," she told Rich when he came back from the telephone, looking flushed and a little smug.

"Sure, it's the gin."

"No, it's from talking to you. You always make me feel better."

"You never take my advice. Maybe it's a good thing."

"You always listen while I gripe."

"No, but I've decided I have to forget about Karen. I decided that two or three times before," Jo admitted, “but I think I can make it stick this time. Then I'm ready for whatever happens next."

"I thought nothing was ever going to happen again?"

"Well, I don't know what it can be, but I'm willing to admit there might be something."

Richard looked uneasy. Jo said kindly, "We really ought to go pretty soon. Is Michael downtown already?"

"He's coming down a little early, but it doesn't make any difference. Let me get you something to eat."

Jo tipped her glass to get the last of her drink. "I ought to get home early myself. And Richard, thanks again."

"Think nothing of it. I'd do anything I could for you."

"Me too," Jo said. They got up and walked around a little cluster of people just coming in. "You're a good guy," she said gratefully.

"You're pretty okay yourself. I think everything's going to come out all right for you."

"Sure." She blinked at the late-afternoon daylight, just beginning to pale. "Only tell me one thing, will you?"

"What's that?"

"Considering everything," Jo said, "why in hell do they call us gay?"

CHAPTER 3

But what else could you call it? she wondered, getting out of her clothes slowly. The gin had cleared her mind but was making her fingers a little stiff and slow. All the words people use for us seem so—ishy, somehow. Dirty, like something out of a medical book, Greek and Latin names for diseases. Which is what Karen's doctor thinks it is, she admitted, placing her gray skirt on a hanger and then putting the hanger away carefully in the closet.

Homosexual. Like klepto or dipso. Don't call me a homosexual unless you want your face pushed in. Not that I mind being one. It's a long, long time since I was sixteen and that girl in my gym class asked me home to spend the night, and I found out there was something better than smooching with boys in parked cars. Allene, or Eileen or something like that.

I'm like anybody else, medium intelligent, a good editor, I like to cook, I look like a lot of other people—hell, I'm exactly like a thousand other girls, except I like making love to women instead of men. So what? It's my own private business.

She unbuttoned her blouse and tossed it into the hamper. I don't seduce teen-agers, she continued her mental inventory, I don't pick people up, I'm not promiscuous. I tell the truth and pay my bills promptly. I do an honest day's work in return for my pay. They ought to have a better name for people like me.

Nylons and panty girdle followed the blouse into the hamper. She stood in front of the long bathroom mirror, naked, and gave her reflection one of those searching inspections. It was a good enough body, slender and solid, slim of hip, with small but adequate breasts and a nice line from waist to knee. The body of an adolescent girl, at twenty-eight, yet soundly female.

The girl in the tan bermudas had been built like a boy, with wide shoulders and muscular legs. Not Jo. She and Karen, on one of their few evenings out, could have been meeting to nice young men for a double date.

She could see why the boys she knew, especially, had settled on "gay" as the least offensive word. It had a good go-to-hell sound. But there were all these times between lovers—they were about as un-gay as anything could possibly be. And even when you were most in love there was the knowledge that the rending lay ahead, hope as you might.

Monogamy? She knew one couple who had been together six years, stable hard-working girls with half a dozen interests in common. Dina and Olive were buying a house in the suburbs. They were the only ones.

Straight husbands and wives changed, grew apart, saw the dulling of the rainbow. But at least they started out with the intention of permanence.

It was too complicated. She gave up trying. Abruptly she was no longer interested in evaluating herself or in finding a word for her own dilemma. She was achingly tired. She switched off the bathroom light, picked her way across the bedroom like a sleep-walker wading in dreams, and fell into bed. In less than five minutes she was asleep. Thinking as she went under, darling Rich; and then, that wonderful gin.

She woke before full daylight, and lay comfortably with her hands under her head. It was as though, having pushed the affair into the past, she could see Karen in her true perspective. Or as though Karen had died and could be remembered without grief, with a gentle accept-ant sorrow.

She had met Karen in a bar. It seemed odd now, partly because neither of them was much of a drinker, partly because it was an ordinary downtown bar catering mostly to squares—the sort of place where a secretary might go hoping to meet a man, or simply for a half-hour's relaxation on the way home from work. No such place as Richard had taken her to last night, where you might hope to meet somebody. That she had been in this bar was strange enough; that Karen would perch on the stool next to hers and there dissolve into gentle weeping was even more to be wondered at.

What impulse had swerved her, Jo, aside from her bus trip homeward into this chrome and neon paradise for five-o'clock drinkers? She couldn't remember. Nor why she had taken a handful of crumpled tissues from her jacket pocket and offered them to the blonde girl who sat beside her, ignoring her drink and the tears that rained down her cheek. Jo's first year in the city had taught her to mind her own business. If someone dropped dead in the street, you called a cop. If a scream rang out in the middle of the night, you closed your window and went back to sleep. People in the city not only wanted but demanded anonymity—that was one reason she'd left Cottonwood Falls, the job in the drugstore and the Sunday dinners with the family. Whatever she was, she had to come to terms with herself; and that was a thing that could be done only among people who didn't care.

Not that I'm doing such a wonderful job, she reminded herself. I found out what I was, all right, but what good's it doing me?

She looked at the crying girl. A slender blonde about her own age, maybe a little younger. Little heart-shaped face all pink with whatever emotion was shaking her. Even if it was nothing but fatigue at the end of a wearing day, her sorrow gave her a vulnerable, childish look. She smoothed back the fight hair from her rounded forehead, a woman's gesture of distraction. Jo's hand reached into her pocket without any instructions from her and brought up the wad of Kleenex. With no intention of doing so, she shoved it into the girl's hand.

"Thanks."

"That's all right."

"I feel so stupid," Karen said, blowing her nose heartily. She blinked at Jo. Tears hung on her lashes. "I just had a fight with my analyst and I'm so tired, and everything's a mess."

Well, naturally. All these neurotics transferring the guilts and conflicts and their love, too, to some stranger who didn't really give a damn. Some guy who sat behind a desk and listened, for twenty bucks an hour. Trying to find in professional impersonality something of the deep and meaningful closeness people have lost in the modern world. If you have enough love, you don't need psychiatry. That was Rich's theory. Jo went along with it.

That was the place to end the whole thing, before it started. Just get up and walk out.

Back in Cottonwood Falls, baby-sitting for spending money, she had loved the sick children best of all. Tiny babies, too, because they were so helpless. Their bodies sagged against you, their heads wobbled, they were dependent. Later, working in the drugstore, she always made the best and biggest shakes for Jimmy Pearsall because he'd had polio and old Mr. Acosta because he was an alcoholic.

As long as she lived, she supposed, it would be easier to love people who were hurt or helpless. According to religion and her mother's moral axioms—the ones she talked about, not the ones she lived by—that was commendable. Actually she thought it was a stupid way to be, it created a lot of messy situations, but people are what they are. By the time you discover that your supposed virtues are really faults, it's too late.

So she followed the Kleenex with a question, and some time later Karen walked out of the bar beside her, still pale and shaky but without tears. Not knowing the score, of course—and Jo had no intention of starting anything.

The kid was too depressed to go back to her furnished room, so she could spend the night and Jo would curl up on the davenport. That was all.

I might have known how it would turn out, Jo thought, turning over and pulling up her knees. Karen never really said she was gay. She never told me till after that crazy mixed-up night that she'd been worrying about it since she was in high school. Or maybe I knew. Maybe there's a sixth sense that tells people. Otherwise how would Richard know about men who look just like any other men to me?

If she'd known, she might have let Karen alone. Might have sent her back to bed when she got up at three in the morning, crying again, and threw herself into Jo's comforting arms and refused to let go. She might not have made it, hungry for love as she was, but she'd have tried. The strong are supposed not to hurt the weak. The strong have an obligation to the weak.

At three in the morning, however, the obligation seemed to consist of taking the girl back to bed and comforting her. And one thing led to another.

The hell of it is, Jo mused, the weak always win. They have a terrible strength, weak people do, and they get the best of the deal every time. If I ever find another girl, a real girl I can love and not just somebody who wants to play around, it'll be one who can carry her share of the load. I'm tired.

How about this Considine kid? She does look like Karen, a little. Is that just an accident? I look like my sister, but we're totally different.

She's not gay. She probably doesn't know it, just divorced and all, but she’ll be looking around for another husband. They always do.

Here we are, right back where we started from. She reached out and throttled the alarm just in time to keep it from sounding off. That's a good start for the day, she told herself cheerfully, getting out of bed and standing tall and white on the chenille throw rug. At least I don't have to listen to that awful racket.

Today she would make her own coffee. She'd have a good breakfast before she started another day of earning a living, building up Stan's ego, and learning to live alone. Plus getting acquainted with Betsy Considine, that soft, faced blonde.

She made her way to the kitchen, still naked.

Betsy might very well be what Stan was looking for. When a man was that hungry, any decent-looking female had a chance. He could see her every day without trying to figure out a way to get free from his mother, that human octopus.

Somebody might as well be happy. There's so little happiness lying around, it's a shame to waste any.

She found a clean dish towel and wiped the dust from the percolator. The kitchen linoleum needed scrubbing; she should have spent the weekend cleaning instead of sitting around feeling sorry for herself. So Karen wasn't around to keep things in order. So all right, she'd have to get used to the idea.

Somebody had to look after poor old Stan, the nebbish. If this little blonde turned out to be what he was looking for, she'd try to be happy about it.

The old lady across the back court was looking out, peeking around the edges of her cafe curtains. Let her look, Jo thought with a grin. She pulled her own curtains shut to hide her nakedness, and whistled softly as she measured coffee into the percolator basket. She was young yet. Anything could happen.

CHAPTER 4

Stan was doing all right for himself. He had managed to get to the office before nine, for the first time in three years. When Jo walked in he was leaning over the new assistant's desk, showing her a copy of the magazine and looking down the front of her blouse. He straightened up, looking flustered, at the sound of Jo's heels in the hall. She said "Good morning," in a cooler voice than usual, and walked past to her own cubicle. It didn't seem so welcoming this morning.

She'd grown accustomed to a certain amount of faking where Stan was concerned. A smart woman working with a not-so-smart man always had to pretend. The authors of popular sociology books insisted that the United States was a matriarchy, with women holding eighty per cent of the buying power and making all of the domestic decisions. Maybe so. But in the business world, where protocol had been shaped about the time Bob Cratchit sat stoop-shouldered over his ledgers, the myth of male superiority still held.

She and Stan divided their duties about equally. Several times she'd caught him up on blunders that might have been disastrous. But he got seven thousand a year, while her salary was about four before deductions, and he was the boss. That was because he wore pants and she came to the office in a skirt.

The moms of America might regard their men as big lovable boys, but in the office world men got their own back, so far as money and prestige were concerned. The vice president of a bank might be a woman, but the president was always a man. Hospitals included women doctors on their rosters but didn't seem disposed to make them chiefs of staff. The pattern was set in high school, where the girls voted for some popular boy as class president and then allowed a girl to be elected secretary. By the time you got old enough to earn a living you were supposed to be adjusted to it.

Stan was better than some men she'd worked for. He was damn competent, and he recognized her ability—so long as she didn't insist on it. They worked well together. It was only that she got tired of building him up all the time.

She had to admit that the man had special problems. Who didn't? She'd never seen old Mrs. Haxton, but they'd talked on the telephone and for almost three years Stan had reported every one of his mother's tantrums to her. He called them heart attacks, but they were tantrums; no heart attack was ever that well timed, no old lady ever survived so many of them and recovered to eat a hearty breakfast the next morning. The old witch had him in a double scissors lock that would loosen only when she died; and then he'd feel guilty about being so relieved. They always were. It was a mess, but a common enough one. There were women like her back home, in Cottonwood Falls.

Stan was forty-one and hungry, scared to death of attractive females even while his mouth watered for them. God help the girl he gets, Jo thought devoutly. And God help him, whether he gets one or not. Only let him leave Betsy Considine alone.

What can he give a girl that I can't? Babies, that's all. And judging from the number of illegal operations that get performed every day, that's not such a big attraction.

Oh, stop it.

She ran a lipstick over her mouth, chucked her purse into a corner and got to work, trying to ignore the hum of voices from Betsy's little office.

Getting out Produx Topix was easy enough, if you could keep from upchucking over the name. Because it was company-subsidized, they didn't worry about advertising. Now and then Stan got a few small ads from stores and taverns in the neighborhood of the factory. He got a commission on these. Jo was always relieved when this happened, because it built him up in his own mind and she didn't have to spend so much time and ingenuity reassuring him. She was also a little resentful because of the money, which she could have used.

Her job was simply to get out a new issue of Topix every month, getting in as many readers' names as possible and presenting everyone in a flattering light. All brides were beautiful, all old-timers were touched and happy to receive their forty-year pins, all vacations were loads of fun. A dozen or so representatives, one from each department, collected these little items and turned them over to Stan when he visited the plant. So far as they were concerned it was his magazine. It was Stan who assigned the linage for her departments, selected type faces and artwork, and made the final decision as to what should be included. If it was an exciting basketball season or the plant bowling teams were going strong in the semifinals, he might drop her lead article without even consulting her. The shop girls were right: he was the boss.

She opened the top drawer of the file, took out half a dozen manila folders and spread them out on her desk. They were labelled in red: Weddings, Engagements, Babies, Vacations, Deaths and Honors. Better start with weddings; September was a great month for them, almost as good as June. It was also good for Honors, which meant sons being inducted into the armed forces and children going away to college. I don't suppose there's another country in the world, Jo thought, where factory workers send their kids to college on their own money. It always made her feel good.

“What's on the agenda?"

"Miss Shirley Kowalski a beautiful autumn bride," Jo said, turning so that she could face Stan. This was going to be one of his restless days; and since she hated talking to people she couldn't see (a fact which accounted for the admirable brevity of her telephone conversations) she wasn't going to get much done. "Glamour girl of the toy finishing department will wear white panne satin with a court train and sweetheart neckline, the bodice strewn with seed pearls and miniature sequins. The bouffant skirt is softly gathered over the hips. Her veil will be of re-embroidered silk net and she will carry a white satin prayerbook, the gift of the groom, with her initials in rhinestones. Her going-away dress is fawn crepe with bronze accessories, and there are six bridesmaids, a flower girl and a matron of honor in pastel velveteen. The groom works in the shipping department, so we're related on both sides of the family."

"All with names in nine syllables, and God help you if you miss on the spelling."

Jo grinned. "That's why I save the little notes your girl friends over at the plant turn in, so I can prove it isn't our fault."

"It'll take the girls years to pay for all this jazz."

"It’ll take the girl's lifetime savings," Jo corrected him. "It was a great day for working-class parents when they invented the typewriter. These days, the kids provide their own white satin and sequins."

"What worries me, don't they ever think about anything but clothes? How about the groom, doesn't he rate a little attention?"

"Sure. She's got a white nylon nightgown and peignoir to match, with Chantilly lace. That's for his benefit."

"You're making that up."

"Wanna bet?"

Stan came around behind her and leaned over to look. "You're faking. It doesn't say a word about her nightgown."

"Certainly not. This is a family magazine. I read the ads," Jo said smugly. "The nightgown and peignoir sets cost from $24.95 to $49.95, depending on how much you want to spend. After the wedding night you put them away until you go to the hospital for the first baby."

"In about six and a half months," Stan said cynically. "Have you got a nylon nightgown and a whoozis to match?"

"No," Jo admitted, "but then I've never been on a honeymoon. It's illegal to wear them for anything but a honeymoon. After the baby's born you wear an old seersucker duster from the bargain basement.”

"You've never been married, have you?"

"No, I've been lucky." She looked down at her copy. How much had he guessed? Was he trying to find out? So far, her talks with Stan had always centered around his own problems and ideas. She existed as a listener and sympathizer. She waited, wary.

"Betsy has. We've been talking.”

"She's a nice-looking girl. Nice girl, too."

“She's feminine. She's capable too," he added hastily. “I think she's going to work out all right."

"Just so she can spell," Jo said. "The last one couldn't spell. Or the one before that. You're the champion speller around here."

He looked pleased. "Oh, I don't know. I'm literate, that's all. Why do you suppose a girl like that would bust up with her husband?"

"Maybe he was a drunk, or something. Maybe he chased blondes—no, it would have to be brunettes, wouldn't it? Maybe he spent the grocery money on slot machines. Happens all the time."

She could see him softening up at the thought of helpless little Betsy in the clutches of a drunken husband. He said casually, "Well, it's none of my business. Good luck with the Kowalski wedding. Mark the date on the calendar. I'll buy you a drink when Junior shows up, some time next March."

“More power to 'em," Jo said. She took a long breath as he ambled away. It must have been a shot in the dark, after all.

She wondered if he had ever realized that she had a personal life. She was the kind of girl who's naturally suspect: tailored, crisp and efficient, not to mention being unmarried at twenty-eight. It could add up, if you had that kind of mind. That was why she asked Richard to pick her up at the office every once in a while. He was so obviously virile (the boys he dated probably thought so, too) that even Gayle came out of her pre-nuptial fog to admire him. "Gee, he's cute," she said, looking at Jo with new respect and visibly wondering if they were having an affair. Which was exactly what Jo intended her to wonder.

It was dishonest. But an attractive man was a smokescreen between you and the evil-minded people, a form of social security in an age that placed too high a value on early marriage. If he also understood things the way Richard did, liked you and was always ready to listen to your troubles, you really had it made.

She had called him the night Karen walked out with a suitcase in her hand and tears running down her set face. She'd sat for a few minutes, numb, listening to the slamming of David's car door and the sound of his motor pulling away from the curb and the vacant silence that followed. She had come out of it to telephone Richard, without even remembering that it was Saturday night, and he might not be at home; or, if at home, he might be pleasurably occupied. And he had come at top speed, on the double; had listened to her sad story, let her cry on his chest, and finally tucked her into bed with a sleeping pill, to sit holding her hand in his big hairy paw. Falling asleep at last, she had thought for the umpteenth time, "I do love Richard. Not in love with, but love. That's better, not so many worries."

It was good as far as it went. The trouble was, it didn't go far enough. She had a public escort and private friend, but there were things that friendship didn't cover. She needed someone to dedicate herself to, someone to become involved with. She needed to be first with someone.

Beyond that, she needed someone with whom she could make happy, crazy and satisfying love. She stirred uneasily, feeling the pressure and tingle and the urgency of her need. Better get back to the Kowalski nuptials, she thought, in a minute I’ll be going wacky from wanting someone. It's been a long dry spell. And no matter what you try to do for yourself, it's not the same.

She concentrated on a description of the dress worn by the bride's mother, the beige satin (size 44) of the groom's mother and the ruffled orchid organdy of the flower girl, little Donna Spinelli, cousin of the bride. How did a Spinelli get in there? she wondered.

It was tripe, but she liked writing it. It was noon by the time she got all the September weddings and engagements under control, regretting as she always did that the magazine was made up two months in advance so the glamour would wear off all those shiny new marriages before they appeared in print. The Westminster chimes of a downtown church broke into her last page of typed copy. And Stan was in the doorway, looking embarrassed, with Betsy clutching her purse and gloves behind him. "We're going to lunch. Want to come along?"

"Not today, thanks. I've got a date."

He looked relieved. "How are the Kowalskis?"

"On their honeymoon. You’ll have to give me an extra page for weddings this month, everybody's getting married."

"Sure. Well make it for lunch some other time," he said, taking Betsy's arm as they turned away. That'll be the day, Jo thought.

Usually she liked having the office to herself. Gayle went out to shop for her trousseau, and Jo kept an eye on the switchboard. It was quiet, the street sounds were muted, the hum of voices in the next suite of offices made a pleasant background for her thoughts. She leaned against the windowsill and looked at the tops of the cars and cabs lined up below, waiting for the light to change. Office girls scuttled across the street intersections; older women in from the suburbs for a day of shopping moved more slowly, laden with their packages.

She would go out after the others got back, have a good lunch and look at the fall clothes on display in the specialty shops. It was a long time since she'd bought anything, thanks to Karen, who was out of work when she moved in and didn't try very hard to find anything. She had gone back to work just two weeks before leaving. Jo thought about Karen fleetingly, wondered how her husband felt about paying an analyst and whether Karen was better in bed than she used to be.

Don't think about that. She tried, she did try, and it's not her fault she hardly ever made it.

She'd paid for Karen's nylons and other little incidentals; and then there was that damn bed, and the pale blue sheets to set off Karen's fair prettiness. All in cash. She was the only person she knew who didn't have a charge account. Her first layoff had taught her that.

The trouble with working through the noon hour was that she never got anything done. It was too good a time for thinking.

She was sitting with her folders spread out on the desk when Stan came in alone. "Betsy has some shopping to do."

"So have I."

She walked up and down the aisles of the biggest department store, looking at furs, suede shoes, woolen dresses. The thought of winter clothes made her feel itchy and scratchy. She walked briskly up-street to a small hotel dining room where the roast beef was good and the coffee strong.

There was only one thing wrong. The chair facing her was empty, and the back half of the double bed in her apartment was empty. She felt a little empty herself.

CHAPTER 5

An office, like a home, has a climate of its own. It's dominated by the emotional content of the people who spend their time there. So far as Jo was concerned, the office on the sixteenth floor of the Harrington Building had been a good place to work, busy yet relaxed, housing a small group of people who liked the work they were doing and the people with whom they were thrown into contact. She even felt herself the center of things there, thanks to her own secret, repressed yet honest recognition of Stan's weakness and his constant need of reassurance.

Within a week after Betsy joined the payroll, things were different. It was Stan who came down early now, and not the same Stan who had been bringing his layouts for her admiration and his problems for her sympathy. This one was more self-assured, and in some way she couldn't analyze, more consciously male. She recognized the quickening because she had felt it in her own body, the heightened perception, the sharpening of colors and outlines, the feeling of pleasurable suspense. But to find it in Stan disturbed her.

"All that little chick has to do is sit at her desk and look helpless," she told Richard, "and he stands around for hours, talking to her. About nothing. I'm getting the book out single-handed."

"So what's bothering you?" Richard handed her a menu. "I'm having the swiss steak, what are you having?”

"I don't care. Swiss steak, I guess." She considered, her head bowed. "It's raising hell with the magazine. I'm the only one that's doing any work. Little Miss Hot Pants at the desk is just waiting for the day when the priest says it's legal and she can climb into bed with her guy. I don't expect anything better from her, but Stan isn't getting anything done either."

Richard stirred his coffee. "All this indignation is for the magazine, Jo?"

"No."

He chuckled. "If I didn't know better I'd say you were jealous of Stan. It would be a triangle, two women both after the boss. Right? It's still a triangle, but who would believe it if you put it in a book?"

"Don't think I haven't thought of that! Only it can't be, Rich, she's straight."

"Darling, don't try so hard to be logical. There's nothing logical about love."

"Well, the job enters into it just the same. It may not pay a hell of a lot, but it beats typing invoices all day long. That's what I did in my last office. Only now I'm doing three people's work for one lousy paycheck."

"You still think this girl looks like Karen?"

"A little, yes."

"Because it makes a difference, Michael reminds me sometimes of the boy that brought me out. In military school. Somebody ought to tell these parents about military schools."

She put her hand on his wrist. "I wish you'd been my little boy," she said softly.

"Me too, ma." Richard smiled. "Why don't you move in on her? Don't just give up, let her know you're available."

"Would you, if it was a man in your office?"

"Not if I was sure he was straight," Richard admitted. "There's a long cold winter coming, and I'm going to stay employed if I can."

"Oh hell, Jo, it's easier for girls. You know it is. They're always hugging each other and all that jazz. Nobody thinks anything about it if two girls share an apartment, they're doing it to save money. But let a pair of fellows move in together and the eyebrows go up."

"Sure," Jo said, "it's easy. Hug her, and she hugs back. Kiss her, and she puckers up. Then what am I supposed to do, put my hand under her skirt and wait for her to call the cops?"

"You sound to me like a girl who's leading a celibate life."

"I am. It's damn uncomfortable."

They were silent while the waitress set their plates in front of them. She asked, "You folks want anything else?"

"Coffee with it." Richard looked after her. "That's what I like about these cheap joints, they let you have coffee all the way through."

"You’ll get caffeine poisoning."

"I know, but it keeps me awake."

"You sound so smug. Big night?"

"I'm not complaining."

Jo pushed the food around in her plate. "Well, I am!" she said with a bitterness that surprised her. "I don't mind living like a puritan, but I mind being reminded of it twenty-four hours a day. Damn it, I'm human."

"You know what you ought to do?"

"Sure, I ought to pick up a girl and have me a party. I've done it two or three times," Jo admitted, "but damn it, I'm a monogamous bitch by nature. I don't want a series of cheap one-night stands."

"What you want is to get married."

"Anything wrong with that?"

"That's the trouble with you goddam Lesbians," Richard said, "you want all the advantages of both sexes. Have your cake and eat it too. Sometimes I hate you."

"No you don't."

"That's right, I don't." He cut a mouthful of steak and looked at it critically. "When you're sixty and I'm seventy, I'm going to propose to you. You can put the heating pad on my lumbago."

"Gee, I can hardly wait."

"Look," Richard said, "you got over Karen when this Betsy girl came along. That's all it took, a new face." He tore open the little envelope of sugar and emptied it into his coffee, stirred it, tasted, and took another envelope. "Look," he said, tearing it across, "maybe face isn't what I mean."

"So what do I do, run an ad in the Personals column? Refined business girl wishes congenial roommate familiar with the Songs of Bilitis?"

"Something will come along when you're ready for it."

"Sure." Suddenly and surprisingly, she was hungry. She hadn't been hungry for a week. She sampled the canned green beans that went with swiss steak in this eatery. They tasted good. She said, "I can cook better than this. Could I have more bread and butter?"

"You decide to live all of a sudden?"

"You and your psychology books."

"Don't forget," Richard said, "life isn't all a bed of roses for the straight people, either."

She thought it over, lingering at the door of the little restaurant while he bought cigarettes. She supposed he was right, but it didn't seem that way. Except for weak types like Stan, men seemed to have it made. All a man had to do was make a pass at a girl, and she said yes or no. That was how it was supposed to be, and nobody got shook up over it. You didn't catch a man losing his job because he made out with the receptionist or came in hung over on Monday morning. Whoring around, for men, was like being able to hold their liquor. It was a proof of virility and a sign of belonging.

She supposed that was true of girls too, it had become more and more true in the last forty years or so, but that aspect of the matter didn't interest her. Men were the competition. For girls like her the standard of performance was a kind of male standard, but pursued in secret and under a cloud of social disapproval. Maybe it wasn't fair, but that was the way things were.

This wasn't getting her anywhere. She said, turning to face Richard as he rejoined her, "You're probably right. What I need isn't theory, it's action."

"I wish I could do something about it. Michael and I have been leading such a quiet life lately, I don't see anybody. He knows all kinds of people."

"That's all right. I'm a big girl, I can pay my own cab fares. Give my love to Michael—I think he's cute."

"He likes you too."

She skimmed into the lobby of the Harrington Building with a lightened heart, cheered as always by the simple therapy of talking things over with the one friend who understood. And saw, too late, that Betsy and Stan were already in the waiting elevator, looking at her as though they wished she were somewhere else. Betsy smiled first. "Hi. I saw you coming across the street with a terribly nice-looking man. Boyfriend?"

"Just a friend."

She hated herself for the reticent tone and the modest downcast look, but she couldn't help it. The best way to lie is to tell the truth, she reminded herself as she stepped out of the elevator and marched into the office, leaving the other two to exchange a few low-voiced sentences in the hall.

She dived into her folders with enthusiasm, turning her thoughts into their regular Monday-through-Friday channels. She needed eighteen more lines of wedding and engagement news, and she had already described the costumes of brides, bridesmaids and flower girls, the showers and office parties in honor of the bride, and the honeymoon plans—so far as they were printable. Having persuaded Stan to give her extra space, she felt obliged to use every bit of it. She thought about throwing in an extra photograph, and realized that it would bring bitter complaints from all the brides not so honored—one picture to a function, that was the standard. Linage was a delicate matter anyway, the girl who got half a column was likely to call up the week after the honeymoon full of ire because someone else had three-quarters. They measure it with a slide rule, Jo told herself, they go over it with a fine-tooth comb, they count the words.

She decided to feature the "quiet home wedding" of the plant vice-superintendent and his former secretary. The bride, peeking coyly over her orchid corsage and obvious falsies, had a determined look. The groom was balding and nervous. I bet she leads him a merry life, poor little guy. She looks like she's been saving it up for the last twenty years, and he's past the age.

The thought of someone else's troubles cheered her up.

"What you doing?"

"Getting out the November issue."

"Funny."

Stan leaned against the doorjamb in his old relaxed attitude. His face was a little flushed; he looked guilty. She noticed that he was wearing a tie, although he usually pulled it off as soon as he got in. He was using a new kind of shave stuff too, or maybe it was a men's cologne; sweet and spicy. She said, sniffing, "What's on your mind?"

"Nothing special." He shifted from the right foot to the left. "You live alone, don't you?"

"Sure."

"Lucky. You don't have trouble getting out if you feel like a night on the town."

Jo made a' small arrow with red grease pencil. "After a day on this job I'm glad to sleep nights."

He scowled. "I can't even go down to the corner for a pack of cigarettes without my mother wanting to know where I'm going and who I'm going to see there and when I’ll be back."

"I know."

"So what am I supposed to do?"

Walk out over her unconscious body, Jo thought. She knew better than to say it aloud. The big idiot loved his mothersure he did, if she dropped dead he’d cry buckets. She said carefully, "You might be working late. Or Saturday, if you ever got interested in anyone who was free Saturdays."

He didn't answer. Oh Christ, Jo thought, I forgot—on Saturday he goes to the laundromat and does the marketing. Probably cleans the silver too. She looked out of the window. "You know what they say. If you can't get what you want, want what you can get."

"I guess that's right." He moved uneasily. "Well, I guess you're busy."

"Everything's under control.”

"You're a good worker, Jo."

"Gee, thanks."

"How do you like the new kid? Betsy?"

Poor idiot, trying so hard to sound casual. She tried to put the warmth he wanted to hear into her voice. "She's pretty good, I think. She seems to be learning all right." That wasn't enough to make him happy. She added, "She's pretty, isn't she? If you go for blondes."

"Blondes are all right. So are brunettes and redheads."

"Men, they're all lechers."

He smiled widely. There, she'd done it. He said kindly, "Don't knock it. There isn't anything else for girls to go out with." That's what you think, Jo thought. "You going to need that extra page?"

"Sure, I wouldn't have asked for it if I didn't need it."

He finally unwound himself and left.

He began to whistle as he passed Betsy's door. Jo's mouth tightened. I bet he hangs around for a month before he asks her for a date. If he ever does. Mother's little gentlemen.

What does he mean, there's nothing else for girls to date? There's me. Any girl suffering for attention, let her speak up. I'm available, kids. She picked up the glossy print of the middle-aged bride and groom and looked at it again, squinting a little. The bridegroom, in his sixties and looking both jumpy and pleased with himself. The bride, every bit of fifty in spite of all the Elite Beauty Shoppe could do, triumphant. They would vacation in Florida, buy a home in one of the better suburbs and go to dinner once a year at the company president's mansion. She'd have a maid. Sounds real exciting.

Betsy hovered in the doorway. "What do you want me to do now, Jo?"

"In about ten minutes you can take some stuff to the engraver's."

"Have I got time to run down for coffee? Do you want some?"

"No thanks, I had two cups with my lunch."

"You're lucky, you've got somebody to take you to lunch. Are you engaged or anything?"

"No."

Betsy said in a little rush of confidence, "I've been going out with Stan at noon. I don't know if I should or not."

"Why not? He wouldn't ask you if he didn't enjoy your company."

"He isn't married, is he?"

"No." Jo cast around for the most tactful way to tell her. "He supports a widowed mother."

"I think that's wonderful. I honestly do. Some people won't even support their wives. Some men won't do anything but drink and run around," Betsy said angrily. Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes shone. She looked beautiful, like Karen when she lost her temper. Jo asked, "Was your husband like that?"

"Worse than that. Don't ask me about it."

"Okay, I won't." A wife beater? A dope addict? Jo gathered her pictures into a neat pile and began looking through the desk drawer for a big enough envelope.

"He did horrible things," Betsy said. Her eyes avoided Jo's. She was embarrassed, and at the same time she wanted to talk about it. Just call me Uncle Sigmund, Jo thought resigning herself to another season of confession. I must have a kind face. She turned in the flap of the envelope and handed it to Betsy, who ignored it.

"With men." Betsy's whisper was almost inaudible. Jo waited. Betsy said, "I thought he loved me. I never even knew about people like that. And then one day I went to my mother's, it was a Sunday, and when I got there mama was at a neighbor's. Mama's wonderful when anybody's sick or in trouble or anything like that, everyone on the block counts on her." She took a deep breath. "So when I got there, she was gone. So I went home again."

Oh, no, Jo thought. She could see it all. The young bride unlocking her own front door and walking quietly into the house, opening the bedroom door to find—what?

"They were in bed together."

Poor kid. And poor boy, taken by surprise. As though she had walked in behind Betsy she could visualize that scene, the bed tossed and rumpled, the floor strewn with garments, the two male bodies entangled in a position that must have puzzled Betsy as much as it shocked her. The classic betrayal scene, with one major difference.

What struggles had the boy endured in his fight for a normal married life? What had happened in his wife's absence to make him capitulate? The arrival of an old friend, the approach of the boy next door—the one irresistible temptation, at the moment of weakness.

Jo said, trying to keep her voice even, "That happens to a lot of people. Kids in school and all. It doesn't mean he didn't love you."

"I never heard of anybody doing a thing like that before."

And I suppose you think the stork brings babies, too. "Did you talk to him about it?"

"No. What could I say? I walked out. He came to see me, though." Betsy's face got even redder. "He said he married me because he wanted to stop being—that way. That's what he said, if he had a wife he might get over it. If I'd come back to him, he said."

Like taking aspirin for TB, Jo thought. Poor kid, poor lonesome kid, afraid to face himself and unable to accept himself. And you wouldn't give him a chance, you smug little snip. For a moment she was warm with anger, seeing in Betsy all the stupid people who would never understand. She looked at the girl with hostile eyes.

Betsy turned her face away. She was crying. Jo's antagonism melted. She reached out, unwillingly, and touched Betsy's shoulder. It was warm and solid under the thin blouse, the young bone hard under the flesh. Jo wanted to run her hand down over the girl's fragile collarbone, to cup the small round breast that showed in outline under the sheer material, to feel the nipple come up hard against her fingers. She wanted to take this crying child into her arms and fit their two bodies together until they felt like parts of one person.

She did none of these things. She pulled her hand away, reached into the open desk, and came up with one of those little wads of tissue she was always stashing in drawers and pockets. "Here," she said, shoving them into Betsy's unresponding hand. Here we go again, Jo, it's getting to be a habit. I use up more Kleenex that way.

Betsy sniffled. "Don't tell anybody, will you?"

"Of course not."

"I'm sorry to be such a sissy."

"That's all right. Anybody has a right to bawl once in a while."

Anybody but me. I'm tough.

Betsy tossed the used tissues at the wastebasket, and missed. Jo picked them up. "You'll get over it," she said kindly.

"Anyhow," Betsy said.

She came to a full stop. Jo said, "Huh?"

"Stan isn't like that, is he? Not being married or anything, you sort of wonder."

"No, I’m sure he isn’t like that.”

Well, she told herself, that's life. It's not enough I have to go to bed alone seven nights a week, I'm a wailing wall for every damn fool in the building. Might as well buy a couch and set up a business, I could use the money. I wonder what you have to do to get a headshrinker's license?

She rubbed her right hand against the rough wool of her skirt. But the memory of Betsy's shoulder lingered on her fingertips. A sweet kid, a beautiful little body. I'd like to unbutton her blouse and take it off, and kiss her, and—damn her, she forgot the photos.

She had had about all she could take for one afternoon. She got up and pulled on her jacket, straightened her skirt, ran a comb through her hair and inspected her seams. Picking up the manilla envelope, she marched down the hall. Stan was at his desk, doing some work for a change.

"I'm going over to Simon's with the artwork. I won't be back today."

"You sick or something?"

"No," Jo said evenly, "I feel fine. I want to do a little shopping, that's all. Everything's under control."

"Oh. Well, okay, have fun."

Riding down in the elevator, alone except for two very young girls carrying bottles of coke, she lit a cigarette. It tasted good. She felt fine, rather as though she had just regained her strength after a long dragged-out illness.

To hell with it, she told herself. To hell with all the straight people and their troubles. They've got everything their own way and they don't even know it. Me, I'm going to think about myself for a change.

CHAPTER 6

It was a good afternoon, sunny and a little misty at the same time, not too warm for a jacket. She thought about going home and changing into slacks and a shirt, but that meant two train rides and a waste of time. Besides, she wanted to do a little shopping before she set out on the evening's search. Maybe she wouldn't buy anything, but she guessed she was female enough to enjoy walking through the stores, looking at things.

She didn't know what had made up her mind so suddenly, but she felt free and somehow appeased, as though she had made a difficult decision.

Plenty of other people were shopping this afternoon. The department store was full of beautifully groomed women, the kind for whom buying clothes is not a lunch-hour scurry but a leisure activity like bridge or concerts. Jo walked around looking at everything: the baubles on display, the shoppers, the waiting saleswomen. She caught a questioning look from an exquisite young thing in autumn black and mink, the first of the season's velvet hats set like a pixie cap on hair artfully streaked with blonde lights; creamy leather gloves held in a manicured hand, earrings set with something that looked like rubies. Maybe garnets? Jo didn't know anything about gems; she had never owned anything but costume jewelry, and usually forgot to put that on.

I look all right, she thought, uneasily avoiding the blonde's eyes. I look like anybody else. Why should she stare at me? Unless she's one of us-no, I don't think so. She moved on toward the escalator, leaving the blonde looking at blouses.

The encounter had made her self-conscious. She elbowed her way past a long double row of busy telephones, muttering apologies to women who protruded into the aisle. In the women's washroom she took off her jacket and did as thorough a repair job as she could with the contents of her handbag. She had a nice clear skin, that was one thing. She made up carefully, even putting a bit of perfume behind her ears; Karen had liked perfume on her, and there was a tiny flacon at the bottom of her bag. She sniffed it appreciatively. Her face was too thin, the cheekbones high, the mouth firm, it wasn't a pretty or a sexy face, but she felt that she had done the best she could with it and that would have to do. She put her jacket back on and inspected her cuffs, which were none too clean after a day at the office. She went out the other door, past the waiting room where ranks of women with discontented faces sat on high-backed benches.

The stout matron on the end bench, barricaded with shopping bags, gave her a suspicious look as she whisked past. The woman had a sagging pink face, and her wiry gray hair had been treated to a cheap home permanent and set. She wore a flowered nylon dress with a piece of lace at the neck. Her stockings sagged. Probably hates all working girls, Jo thought, meeting her antagonistic gaze. Probably thinks we're all out raising hell while she's home doing the washing.

The little encounter made her feel better. In the shoe salon she bought a pair of fine black leather pumps with tall heels, cut so well they needed no trimming; she loved beautiful shoes, and the only thing she had minded when Karen wasn't working was being unable to buy them. It felt good to be solvent again. Maybe the girl in the mink scarf wouldn't feel that a new pair of shoes was anything to be pleased about; probably she bought a whole new outfit whenever she felt like it, and sent half of the stuff back the next day. The chief pleasure in having money to spend, as in having a free weekday afternoon, was that it happened so seldom.

Did that go for other things too? Was love better if you went hungry for it? She felt, winding through a roomful of people who looked as though their feet hurt, that the principle of scarcity value didn't apply here. If you went without sex long enough you might get used to it; and while that would solve some of her problems, it wasn't a solution she cared to try. Maybe I ought to work on it, she thought, smiling at the idea and not noticing the aging saleswoman who smiled hopefully back. But not yet. It's like going to heaven, I'd like to put it off as long as possible.

She decided to leave the shoes in a safe place until tomorrow. They weren't suitable for the place she planned to visit, and there was a very good chance that she'd have too much to drink and leave them somewhere. After she dropped her parcel in the locker she counted the money she had left, wrapped a ten-dollar bill in a leaf from her address book and tucked it under the string of her shoe package.

It was after four. In half an hour the stenos and file clerks would be pouring out of office buildings funnelling through the swinging doors into the street, separating to go their different ways home. A world peopled by women, even though largely directed by men. Somewhere in this crowd, she told herself with rising confidence, there has to be somebody who wants what I have to give.

Some day she would be faded and tired like the aging women she'd seen in the gay bars late at night, cruising, thankful for anything they could pick up, living as best they could in a world that had never accepted them. Old age came to them, too. And they didn't have the compensations of straight people. That fat bitch in the women's waiting room probably had a husband who brought his paycheck home twice a month, a couple of married kids and a batch of grandchildren who came to dinner on Sundays. She belonged to some club where she could visit with about forty other women just like her. When she died all the members of the African violet society would come to the wake and sit around telling each other what a good neighbor she was and how nice she brought up her kids. She belonged somewhere.

Jo shivered. In the full-length mirror the management had obligingly placed near the exit she inspected her face, the hang of her skirt, her seams. The reflection was reassuring. She wasn't going to grow old or die for a while yet, and she wasn't going to waste any more of her youth if she could help it. What she needed now was a drink—maybe two drinks—and something good to eat.

Two martinis and a steak later, feeling better, she walked north on State Street in the direction of the theatre district. There were a lot of people on the sidewalk, almost as many as during the rush hours but with a difference. Some of the men were bearded, and the girls wore jeans or slacks and no makeup. Jo walked briskly, her head up, elbows close to her side, looking alertly around.

It seemed to her she had never been so aware of girls before. Just looking at them sharpened her desire. She wondered what would happen if she simply picked one at random, walked up to her and said, "Pardon me, but would you like to go to bed with me?"

That little soft-looking thing with the red ponytail hanging down the back of her sweater, how would she react? Scream? Call a cop? Pull out a switchblade and carve her monogram on Jo's cheek? Or throw out rapturous arms and yell, "Come on, baby, let's go"?

I should be so lucky, Jo thought. She accelerated to pass the redhead, who was unaware that she existed.

She wasn't sure exactly where she was heading. She knew the name of the place—The Spot—and approximately where it was located, but it was her first visit. Like so much else, her information had come from Richard, who got around considerably in the gaps between lovers.

The Spot had changed location and management half a dozen times in the last few years; Rich had gone there when it was all-male and mostly rough trade, but in its newest incarnation it was well mixed and, he thought, as safe as any place was likely to be.

Jo was in no frame of mind to be timid. There was no point to the way she was living, and it was worth taking a few chances if she could break up her emotional logjam. She reminded herself that women hardly ever get picked up by the police, that constant threat to the security of the homosexual male. She might get caught in a raid. She was almost certain not to be approached by a detective and propositioned. Entrapment is for the boys.

She followed two swishy boys, careful to look the other way when they stopped and looked around. Should have gone home and put on blue jeans. Not being recognized by your own people is just as bad as being identified by the other kind.

The small place with curtained windows was The Spot. The boys went in, still talking, and Jo followed.

It was embarrassing to sit alone in a bar, but less embarrassing here than elsewhere. She sat at the long counter and ordered beer, taking into account the two pre-dinner martinis and the fact that she might do a lot of drinking before the night was over. She sat up, alert, and looked around.

Average type place. Either the jukebox was quieter than most or whoever had put the money in liked soft music. The lighting was subdued but not enough so as to hinder seeing. Most of the customers were young. She was fairly sure they were over twenty-one, the law was stringent on that point; you could get away with murder, rape and arson in this town, but let a bartender serve one bottle of beer to a minor and he was likely to get his license revoked.

Gay boys, of course, were likely to look younger than they really were. She figured the clientele was about seventy per cent masculine, mostly in the twenties and early thirties—maybe it was the slacks and fashionable loose sweaters, maybe there really was a tie-in between body build and emotional predisposition. Anyway, she wasn't interested in men.

The girls looked like high-schoolers, especially the butch types with their short hair and shiny cheeks free of makeup. Wholesome-looking kids. She sorted out a few obvious couples, although it wasn't easy to tell whether two girls were together or just sitting side by side. The ones who cared most might sit together for an hour, sipping beer and listening to the jukebox, without touching or speaking. That was the old female duplicity which seemed to go on even in boy-type girls. Or maybe duplicity was too unfriendly a word; maybe it was reticence. A lost virtue among straight women, she sometimes thought, observing their behavior in bars and other public places.

There were girls by threes and fours, like school kids dropping in at the drugstore for a soda; and then there was a good sprinkling of solitaries. Jo looked these over carefully. Not much choice at this end of the room. There was a tall black-haired girl who looked as though she might be nervous and passionate; a young woman in a suit not unlike her own, with beautiful clear features and a closed look, as though caution were her watchword; a plump cheerful woman of thirty-five with a sagging bosom and fair curly hair, in dungarees and a plaid shirt. That was all.

People walked around slowly, threading their way between dancing couples, as though they were looking for a friend. Which they probably were, she decided, only in some cases they didn't know who the friend was.

She took a deep breath. These were her people. More her people than Karen had ever been, because they had stopped fighting it. Here she could take off her mask and relax for a while.

In a few minutes the girl with the cautious expression picked up her drink, came around to the end of the bar and slid onto the next stool. "Mind if I sit here?"

"Glad to have you."

"I thought maybe you were waiting for someone.”

"No, I'm alone."

"So am I." She spoke precisely, with what Jo thought of as a New England accent. "It gets tiresome." She finished her drink and beckoned to the bar hop.

Jo said, "Let me buy you something. What are you having?"

"Bourbon and water."

"I’ll have one, too."

Time was suspended. Jo wasn't sure when the girl's hand touched her own; she knew it was the one real, solid thing in a room grown pleasantly misty. She closed her fingers around the other girl's thumb. "Would you hit me, or anything, if I asked what you're going to be doing tonight?"

"Depends."

"Would you come home with me?”

"What would your girl think?"

"She left me for a husband and a psychiatrist. Hey, that's bigamy." That seemed terribly funny. They both giggled.

"Where do you live?"

"Hyde Park."

"I'm Near North, but we can't go to my place because I'm sharing the apartment with a friend. We could take a taxi to your place. I have money enough to pay for one."

"So have I. Can you still walk if we have another drink?"

"Sure. How about you?"

"I'm feeling fine."

She did feel fine. A little drowsy, but that would wear off when the alcohol left her bloodstream. She said formally, "My name is Jo."

"I'm Linda."

They left together, hand in hand. Linda's steps were a little uneven, but not enough to create a problem. Following her into the cab, leaning over her to close the door, Jo took her hand again. The pressure of Linda's fingers was gentle and reassuring. She wore a light perfume. Her profile was clear and strong, seen in the muted glow from the street lamps. I like her, Jo thought.

She might wake up disgusted and tired, but she didn't think so. She yawned in the smoky warmth of the cab, then smiled. She wouldn't worry about tomorrow. She sat with her hand in Linda's, looking ahead to the moment when she would shut the apartment door behind them and turn the latch and take this pleasant girl in her arms.

CHAPTER 7

“Jo.”

"Yes?"

"Are you asleep?"

Jo lay still. A sweet familiar tingling beginning at the center of her body. So soon again? She thought in wonder. She said, "Sure."

Linda's laugh was soft and husky in the dark room. "It's cold over here."

"Move over, then."

They must have fallen asleep. And no wonder, considering all that had happened-all that had started happening as soon as the apartment door clicked shut behind them. Jo lay quietly, waiting. Linda's hand touched her breast. The nipple stiffened to meet it. All of the feeling in Jo's body concentrated in one small spot. She was afraid to breathe.

The hand moved down, turning on an electric current wherever it touched. "Are you tired?" Linda whispered.

"No. Here, put your hand here."

Quickly, without warning, Linda turned. A white blur in the darkness. The blanket slid to the edge of the bed and fell to the floor with a soft plop. "Are you tired? Do you want me to do this?"

Jo shivered. "Oh, yes."

Linda's tongue was tentative, delicately teasing. Jo's spine stiffened, her body moved uncontrollably. She was full of electricity. It spread in a widening arc until there was no Jo, only the current that sang and sizzled through her. Higher and higher, in waves. She heard her own voice from far away. "Don't stop. I'll die if you stop."

The current rose from the center of her being where Linda was, and spread to her toes and the roots of her hair. She writhed in wonderful anguish. When it began to ebb she clutched at Linda. "You too. Let me do it to you too."

To give pleasure, an equal need. To be carried away on this tide of electricity. Clutch at the excitement, hang on, don't let it go. She moaned.

Until she screamed in pleasure, and too late tried to be still.

The slow shuddering drop. Linda raised her head. "Wonderful," she whispered.

"Did it happen to you too?"

"Don't talk," Linda said. She moved over so that her head lay on the pillow beside Jo's. Linda's hair was wet with sweat, her breathing fast and shallow. Her body relaxed heavily against Jo.

"I want you to be happy," Jo said. A wonderful drowsiness was creeping over her. She shifted to put her arm under Linda's neck. Linda said, "I am happy," as if she meant it. Jo closed her eyes.

Jo reached over the side of the bed, found the blanket and spread it over their close-lying bodies. "I'm asleep," she whispered. And it was almost true. Her arms and legs were weightless and non-existent, her head was empty. She managed to open her eyes and take a last look at Linda's head, warm and damp against her breast. Linda's face was calm and beautiful in its satisfied repose. Her eyes were open. Jo said, "Darling, go to sleep."

"I won't stay unless you want me to."

Jo giggled. "It's almost morning. Go to sleep."

It was almost nine when she woke. Sunlight streamed in at the window, and Linda sat on the edge of the bed, pulling on her stockings. Jo rolled over and put her arm around Linda's waist, snuggling against her warm back. "Hey, don't get up."

"I'm late to work."

"So am I. Shall I call in sick for you?”

"No, I’ll go in." Linda looked around at her, smiling. "Thank you, darling. It's been the best."

"For me, too." She leaned forward as Linda moved, unwilling to lose contact. Don't ask. But she had to ask, the words were torn from her. "Am I going to see you again?"

"Maybe." Linda stood up. The space between them was suddenly cold and lonesome. She pulled on her panty girdle, fastened the tops of her stockings in four quick motions, reached behind her to hook her bra, and picked her skirt off the floor. Everything she did was neat and quick. Looking at her, Jo felt gawky and too tall. She watched while Linda found comb and lipstick in her clutch bag and neatly, quickly made herself ready for the day. Linda said, "I found towels and things in your bathroom. Thank you for everything, Jo."

"You're welcome."

Linda's face, made-up, took on the impassive look it had worn the night before. She's getting ready to go out and face people, Jo thought, feeling that something good was slipping away from her. She had to keep it from happening. "Linda, I have to tell you-it's never been this good before. With anyone."

"I know."

"Do you have a regular girl?"

"I don't want a regular girl." Linda bent and kissed her, carefully so as not to smudge the lipstick. "There's a girl staying with me now, she's a drunk and she needs help, but she isn't my regular girl. If I had one, though, I'd want her to be something like you."

She would have to be satisfied with that. She lay back against the pillow dented by both of their heads, pulling the sheet up against the cold morning air. Linda turned at the door of the bedroom. "I go to The Spot every once in a while," she said. "Mostly on Saturday nights."

"I’ll see you. Take care."

I'm going to feel terrible later on. Not because it was disgusting, like with that Marge—no, Madge, I picked up that time. But because it was so good. It was never so good with Karen, she was always holding back. Fighting herself. Or me. Or the fact of us together.

She was almost asleep when the telephone rang. She got up, shivering, and made her way a little unsteadily to the living room. "Yes?"

"Jo?"

"What's the matter, Stan?"

"Are you sick?"

"I feel terrible," Jo said, crossing her fingers behind her back, "but I'll be down in a little while."

"If you feel bad you better take the day off. There's a lot of this virus stuff going around."

"I'm all right." She hung up before he could start an argument. Once Stan got onto a subject he hung on forever. Now I've got a virus thing, she thought, I better remember to act sick and not go around beaming.

But her reflection in the bathroom mirror was clear and radiant, the eyes wide. I'm beautiful, she thought in surprise. That comes from being loved. Even an imitation of love will do it. She dressed with more care than usual, putting on silver hoop earrings. The hell with it, she thought cheerfully. I feel good, I'm going to look good. Maybe I'm no beauty but if I can make a girl like Linda happy, I can't be such a drip either.

Stan was in a dither. He was waiting for her at the door of the Topix office, his hands full of proof sheets. "Everybody must have a bug," he said crossly. "Gayle acts like she's walking in her sleep, and Betsy isn't coming down at all."

"What's with Betsy?"

"How would I know? Gayle's just putting in time until she's deflowered. I wish she'd do it and get it over with."

"Give me the galleys, I’ll rush them through."

For all her loss of sleep, she felt great. If he'll shut up and let me alone, she thought, I'll have the book out in no time. But he trailed her back to her office and stood there propped against the door, his favorite place for confidences and confessions. She sat down, waiting for him to get his troubles off his chest

"Have a good time yesterday?"

She had to stop and think. So much had happened since yesterday. "Oh sure, I bought some new shoes. That is, I picked some out," she said happily, "They're beautiful."

"Women!"

"Well, you wouldn't want me to come to work barefoot."

"My mother's always buying shoes."

She made a mental note not to bring the subject up again. "Anything exciting happen after I left?"

"Not especially. I’ll sure be glad when Gayle marries that guy and gets her mind back on her work. She's got a bad case of hot pants."

Jo thought that Gayle would most likely start worrying about a possible pregnancy the minute she got back from her honeymoon, but she knew better than to say so. "Well have to send wedding presents. A small office like this."

"I don't mind that." He looked past her at the gold curtain, rippling in the breeze. "I left a little early myself, last night. In fact, I took Betsy out for a drink."

"Yeah?" She looked at him. "That was nice."

"Why are women so inconsistent?"

"Are they?"

"One minute they're snuggling up to you, wide open for attention. The next they're ready to push your face in. It doesn't make sense."

"Maybe you startled her. She hasn't been divorced very long. Maybe she's a little jumpy."

"You don't think she's queer or anything, do you?"

I should be so lucky, Jo thought. She said, "No, I don't think so. She's just a little nervous."

"I'm taking her out tonight." He stopped, looking abashed. I will not ask for details, she thought stubbornly. But it didn't do any good, she was going to get them just the same. He said, "I told my mother I have to go to a meeting. As long as I'm in by ten-thirty or eleven she won't mind."

Well, Jo thought, we've been over this before. But she was a slow learner, she had to try one more time. She said gently, "Look, you're a grown man. Why don't you simply tell your mother you have a date with a girl?"

"She might have an attack."

"If she can have an attack whenever she feels like it, then she's faking."

"I know it. The thing is," Stan said miserably, "if anything serious happened, I'd never forgive myself."

So there you are, Miss Bates. You can't very well tell this devoted son he'd be better off with the old girl dead. Or that he ought to put her in a nursing home with an attendant physician who knows the difference between real heart trouble and the kind you turn on and off. She said cheerfully, "Well, have fun. Buy her a couple of drinks, a girl always appreciates that."

"My mother always waits up for me. She’ll smell it on my breath."

Oh, Jesus, Jo thought, who unbuttons your rompers when you go to the bathroom? She turned away, spreading the galleys on her desk, reaching for a pencil, testing the point against her thumb. Stan said, "Let me know if you get snowed under, I’ll help," and moved away, his high forehead puckered with anxiety.

He hadn't solved anything, but he felt better. Jo thought: poor weak-minded bastard, if he'd put his foot down just once he'd have it made. Maybe he doesn't want a solution. Maybe he just likes to suffer; lots of people do.

But she couldn't waste this day worrying about Stan and his mother. Not when she felt like this, with the wonderful warm languor of after-love running through her like fine wine. She shoved the galleys away, stretched, and got up and went to the window. The familiar scene below was like a confirmation of her own well-being. The roofs of the cabs were bright and shiny, the buildings rose proudly above the street, the sounds of traffic and voices came up muted and harmonious.

She didn't know Linda's last name, where she lived, what she worked at or whether she would ever see her again. She didn't know, really, whether she had a steady girl—it was possible, in spite of Linda's protests. Fidelity didn't always go hand in hand with love. It had taken her a long time to realize that. Now she no longer blamed a girl for lying, or at least keeping one side of her life secret.

Linda might even be married. She might have a couple of kids. Plenty of women found out what they were when it was too late, and some of them were able to live a double life. She might be bisexual, taking love where she found it, with both men and women. That was a big subject for discussion with Rich and his boys, it cropped up every time someone in their crowd made a straight marriage. Rich said it all depended on your concept of love. If you were really involved with someone, it was hard to tell where affection ended and passion began.

Jo was sure of only two things. One was that Linda was a superb lover. No matter what the pattern of her life might be, she had the finesse that has to be learned as well as the capacity for passion that's inborn.

The other was that if it was at all possible, she was going to see Linda again; she was going to take her to bed.

CHAPTER 8

She thought about Linda often in the days that followed. On Saturday she considered going to The Spot on the off chance that Linda would be there, but she was incapacitated (Karen's word for a simple biological process that she had always taken for granted until she discovered Karen's pathological resentment of it). She put in a dull weekend tidying the apartment, getting her clothes washed and ironed, cooking a Sunday dinner for which she had no appetite. This is how it will be when I'm old, she told herself. I’ll come home from the office every night and do my housework and maybe watch television for a while before I go to bed, alone. After a few years maybe I won't even notice it. What else is there for an old dyke?

It was a disheartening thought.

She wasn't sure what to think about developments at the office. Stan was going out with Betsy. Neither of them made any attempt to hide it. Even Gayle, wrapped up in last-minute plans for her wedding, noticed and commented. "Gee, they're having lunch together again. From the way those two act you'd think they had a thing for each other. You think she's the kinda girl that gets in solid with the boss like that?"

"I don't know."

"Believe me, I wouldn't let any man get away with that. I do my work from nine to five and that's enough. If a boss made a pass at me, Eddie'd make me hand in my resignation."

Jo's private opinion was that Betsy was relieved and happy to be dating a man—any man. It restored her female pride, shaken by the divorce. She came to work on time and went through the motions, but it was evident that her heart wasn't in it. Jo admitted that she did her work as well as any of her predecessors, which wasn't saying much. Why should a girl put any enthusiasm into a business that meant nothing to her, that was only a source of income? Still, a little more interest on Betsy's part would have made things easier for everybody.

Stan was lukewarm, too, and Jo's pleasure in her own professional achievement was constantly being threatened by a put-upon feeling she couldn't shake off.

Damn it, she thought, I'm not going to get the magazine out single-handed. I could, but I'm not going to. I don't care what other people do after five o'clock. He can move in with her if he wants to. But when he hangs around all day whispering sweet nothings in the girl's ear, while I do three people's work, it's too much. I'm going to quit and go to New York if this keeps up.

She didn't want to quit. She liked her job, even if some of the things she had to do were silly, and she liked the quiet and privacy of her own little office and the feeling that she was her own boss. She was safe here. In a big office full of cliques and chatter there would be the lurking dread, the ever-present fear that someone would know she was different. If Stan suspected, he hadn't said anything. Men were likely to be more trusting than women, especially middle-aged women. In a bigger place someone might realize that she was a Lesbian.

Silly word, she thought, with the automatic rejection that the homosexual vocabulary always aroused in her.

That brought her back to Betsy's ex-husband. She thought about him every once in a while, with a sort of exasperated sympathy. He would be about twenty-five, charming and intelligent like the gay boys she knew, a man with a lot of charm, probably handsome, not too swishy. Hindered at every turn, of course, by the dread of discovery. In large offices—most of all in the kind of company that gave placement tests and personality evaluations—the mere suspicion could lead to a discharge. No proof was required. "He's a nice person and a good worker, but." She wondered if Betsy's husband, his hope for marriage and a normal life shattered, had lost his job when the divorce proceedings became known. She hoped not. The poor guy had three strikes against him without that.

Sometimes, she told herself, wiping the suds off her kitchen floor with clear water and watching the tile pattern of the linoleum come up clear and bright, sometimes I feel so sorry for the whole damn human race. Betsy and the poor kid she married, and Stan tied to that horrible old woman, and Rich so sweet and kind, always chasing some young punk he knows is going to take him for all he's got and then move out. Yeah, and some days I'm tempted to feel sorry for myself, too. She laughed at that, and scoured briskly at a spot of spilled grease, seeing with real pleasure the immaculate sweep of floor emerge from under her sponge. You poor kid, you lead a very sad life.

Just the same, it was a relief to go back to work on Monday morning. Putting together a list of babies born to Plastix workers in the last month, with special mention for the twin grandsons of the shipping-room foreman, she didn't have time to think about personal matters. No wonder older women who lived alone were always so glad when Monday morning came; their weekends were a walking death.

There was this feeling that shot through her every time she looked at Betsy. It was a small nagging pain like an intermittent toothache, dormant for a while and then hurting to remind her of its existence. She wanted a girl in her arms, a girl whose body would respond to the love she longed to give, who would accept her ministrations and give back the pleasure that made her whole body blossom into excitement. But even more than any physical relationship she wanted somebody who would come first in her life. A girl who would be more important to her than anything else in the world, a love that was emotional and spiritual as well as physical.

She told Richard, mentioning Linda briefly but skipping the details because she didn't want to dwell on what she might never have again. He nodded. "Sure, you're looking for the love of a lifetime. We all are."

"You don't think anyone ever finds it?"

"So far I never knew it to happen." He thought about it, and shook his head. "It's the same with straight people, if that makes you feel any better."

It didn't. She said, "Skip it. How's Michael?"

"Interested in an Air Force man. He hasn't said anything about it yet, but I know the symptoms. I know the guy, too. I introduced them." Richard looked older, and tired. "I've been through it often enough. He's probably making out with the guy in the afternoon, while I'm out trying to sell houses."

"I'm sorry."

"It's all right."

She decided not to bother him with her personal affairs again. He had enough to cope with. Sometimes she envied the gay men she knew, because they seemed to take things so lightly. Then something like this with Michael came along and it was evident that the pangs of insecurity weren't restricted to women.

We've got all the handicaps of straight people, she thought bitterly, living in a crazy mixed-up world. And a few extra ones of our own.

She walked slowly back to the office, reluctant to go in and settle down to the afternoon's work. Gayle will be painting her nails or fixing her face, she thought, or talking to one of her girl friends on the telephone. I wonder what she looks like with the makeup off? It could be frightening. And Betsy will be making eyes at Stan, and just when I get into the work, Stan will come wandering in and tell me how persecuted he is. I'm getting fed up.

There was the old dream of escape. Save two or three hundred dollars—it wasn't easy, but you could do it if you didn't buy a single thing—and go to New York. That was the place for publishing. The city's full of gay girls, she reminded herself. There's less danger of getting your personal life tangled up with your business life.

But her stomach pinched when she thought about it. She was afraid to make the change.

She went up, feeling listless. Past Gayle, who was sorting out carbon copies for a change; past the other offices. Betsy and Stan would be taking a two-hour lunch, holding hands over the dessert, making verbal passes at each other. How adolescent can you get? she asked herself savagely. Why don't they go to bed and get it over with?

She shut her eyes and shook her head to shake out the picture of Betsy, undressed and moving with pleasure in a man's arms.

It was after two when they came in. Stan came to her door, looked in, and backed away. Now what? Do I look like I bite, or something? She bore down on her pencil until the point snapped.

He came back half an hour later, looking fatuous and ashamed at the same time. "Betsy says she'll drive over to Cal City with me on Saturday," he said, not looking at her. "Have dinner and a movie and maybe take in some of the gambling places. I told my mother I was going out with some customers. Maybe we’ll find a place with a good floor show, huh?"

"That's nice," Jo said. She wondered why he had chosen Calumet City, the local small-time version of Las Vegas—but of course it represented glitter and gilded vice to squares like Stan. Nothing there you couldn't find in Chicago, if you knew where to look, but it was across the Indiana line and that made it seem safer. It was the old gimmick, take the girl to a burlesque show and get her warmed up. He doesn't know much about girls, she thought.

The Travel Now, Pay Later sign across the street flashed off and on. That's a good idea, Jo decided. Maybe I will.

Stan didn't notice her inattention. He stood looking at the floor, getting more and more embarrassed. "Look, I don't expect anything to happen. You know how it is though, people get carried away sometimes. I could get something—but that doesn't always work. I don't suppose—"

She stiffened. "What?"

"You couldn't give her a little good advice, could you?”

Like, stay away from the guy? Jo said coldly, "I'm not married."

"Yeah, sure, I know. I just thought—"

You just thought you could have some fun and not take any chances, Jo filled it in for him. You just thought I'd been around, seeing I'm older and have a place of my own. You just thought Betsy was a helpless little thing who needed good advice, how to have fun without getting caught. You can go and screw yourself—no, I guess not, it takes two. She said aloud, chipping the words off like icicles, "She's been married. She can probably take care of herself."

By this time he was obviously wishing he'd never brought the matter up. He'd fire me this minute if he dared, she told herself. He said, "Well, okay," wanting to untangle himself from this embarrassing situation and leave but not knowing how. Jo sat with her eyes lowered, waiting for him to rescue himself. Finally he got his feet into gear and ambled off without saying another word.

She didn't know whether to laugh or cry—or throw something. Her fingers closed around the cube of monotype metal she used for a paperweight. It was solid and heavy. She hefted it. Make a nice satisfying crash if I sent it flying through the window. But the habit of self-control was too strong. She said, "Oh, hell," and put the slug down again, blinking back tears of anger.

At least he was giving her credit for being normal. At least he assumed she'd been with men. Which meant that, although she might eventually be fired because she knew too much about the boss's private affairs, she wouldn't be fired because he knew too much about hers. That was some help.

He avoided her all the rest of the week.

By Saturday her body's hunger was more than she could endure. She thought about Linda, her silent understanding and her excellence in love. She thought about Karen, cold and grudging, whom she had still loved with all the need that was in her. She thought about Betsy, who was going to Cal City with Stan this very evening and who might very well be eager and willing to give him what he was looking for. Three girls in her life, more less, and nothing but trouble and frustration from all them.

Betsy and Stan would have dinner and go somewhere for a show, and park for a while, and then he would take her to a hotel. Or more likely a motel, lots of transient trade in for quickies and no questions asked. Jo didn't think he would make love to her in the car, like a pair of teen-agers, all cramped and squashed and half-dressed. She hoped not. If Betsy were really going to do this idiotic thing, she hoped it would be better than that. It hurt to think about Betsy in a man's arms, but she couldn't help it. She knew how Betsy would look with her clothes off, the tender slim perfection of her young body, the soft curve of her breasts with the twin pink rosebuds, the almost adolescent lines of her and the whiteness of her skin. Relentlessly, her mind followed the two of them, man and woman, through every stage of their lovemaking. When she came to the final consummation she put her hands over her face, as though to hold off a blow.

She had never felt any jealousy of Betsy's young husband, only a motherly pity and a sense of kinship. He was one of her own people, caught in a situation she knew only too well. But the idea of Betsy in bed with Stan was too much. She felt as though she would choke.

In this frame of mind she changed her shirt and went to The Spot, stopping on the way to have a steadying drink because she was afraid of what she might find when she walked in. She wanted to see Linda, but there was a chance of finding Linda with someone else—or of being rebuffed even if Linda were unattached.

Besides, she felt confused. She wanted Linda, who could satisfy her needs so expertly. At the same time she loved Betsy, who didn't even know she was gay, who very well might not be gay, although Jo had never felt this way about a straight girl.

It was a mess.

Linda wasn't at The Spot. Jo stayed for almost four hours, drinking slowly but steadily and beginning to feel tearful as she always did when she was loaded. Linda didn't show up. In the end Jo went home with a chubby-faced blonde butch in jeans who pulled no punches asking her, and wasted no time getting her into bed once the door was locked behind them.

Even with all that bourbon under her belt, she found a fierce pleasure in the girl's lovemaking. She was aggressive, violent at times, but good. But Jo's head ached and at the craziest moments the picture of Betsy in Stan Haxton's arms kept coming back to her.

She didn't want to be here in this room with this stranger.

It was almost daylight when she went home. Her head ached and she had heartburn. She didn't know why people never included heartburn when they talked and wrote about the evil effects of drinking, it was painful enough. She couldn't turn her head without losing her balance. Her face felt gritty. A lot of nothing, and for what? A cheap, dirty satisfaction.

She took a taxi to the station and caught the first southbound train of the morning. The passengers looked tired and dejected. Bums and drunks, she criticized them. That's what I am, a bum. And a Lesbian too. Puts me right down at the bottom of the social scale.

She let herself into the building, got up the stairs to her own room—thank God, she wasn't rich enough to live in a place with doormen and elevator operators—and finally got her apartment door unlocked, after missing the keyhole a couple of times. All the corny jokes, all the funny-paper gags, she thought wearily, sunk in the beginning of a familiar morning-after letdown. In the comics it's the young man who comes dragging in after a night on the town. What does that make me?

She knew she was regressing. She'd overcome this shamed, abashed feeling a long time ago. But there were still moments when her bringing-up was too much for her.

She pulled off her shoes and lay down on the bed, pulling up the spread for warmth. The early light of a cold September morning was just beginning to filter in under the drawn shades.

At nine she was waked by a terrible crashing and jangling. She was out of bed, mouth dry and heart pounding, before she realized that it was only the telephone. It kept on ringing. She picked her way into the shadowy living room and lifted the handset. "Hello?"

Betsy's voice came to her muffled and far-away. "Jo, can I come and see you? Something terrible has happened."

She hesitated. The way she felt, if it were anybody else the answer would be a flat no. "I guess so," she said slowly, rubbing her eyes. "Do you know where I live?"

Hanging up, she wondered what was the matter. Betsy was all right—at least, she was conscious and able to talk. For a second she considered the fantastic notion that old Mrs. Haxton had died while her son was in Cal City, making love to his assistant. That would look great in the papers.

Or maybe the old lady's heart trouble was the real thing, and ran in the family. Maybe Stan had dropped dead in a motel and there would be a real scandal. Come on, she scolded herself, you've been reading too many drugstore novels.

She shook her head, which still ached. Whatever it was, she'd have to wait until Betsy got there before she could do anything about it. She turned on the ceiling light in the kitchen and got out the percolator. The smell of the raw ground coffee made her gag, but she fixed up the pot and got it on the burner, then went into the bathroom to investigate the hot water situation. In the back of her mind a strange excitement began to stir. Betsy was in trouble, and had turned to her for help. Betsy was on the way over. Anything could happen.

CHAPTER 9

By the time the doorbell chimed she'd showered, dusted herself with scented powder, pulled on clean pajamas and her plaid robe, and covered the worst of the bruises with lotion makeup. Not bad, she decided, looking at her reflection. She still looked tired, her eyes ringed with brown shadows, but that was natural in anyone who'd been dragged out of bed after four hours' sleep. She drank a cup of freshly-made coffee and waited for Betsy, not knowing where she was calling from or how long it would take her to get there.

It seemed longer than it probably was, but at last the bell rang. Jo pushed the buzzer, opened the door a crack and stood waiting to be sure it was really Betsy and not a Sunday-morning prowler. No use taking chances. It got more dangerous every year to go out on the streets after dark.

But it was Betsy who tiptoed up the stairs, making more noise than if she hadn't tried to be so quiet. She stood in the hall, looking around. Jo opened the door and hugged her, coat and all.

"Jo, I thought I'd never get here."

"Well, you're here now." Jo led her into the living room, latched the door, looked at her in the light from the desk lamp. Betsy's face was pale and her eyes swollen. She looked scared. Jo slipped the light coat from her shoulders and laid it across a chair. "You want some coffee?"

"I'd love some. It's getting cold out."

It was good to be doing something. Maybe if she kept her hands busy she could keep them off Betsy. She poured two cups of coffee and carried them back to the living room, turning off the kitchen light as she passed the dangling cord. "Sit down and drink it while it's hot."

Betsy took the cup in shaking hands. It rattled against the saucer. When she carried it to her mouth, a little of the coffee ran down her chin. Jo wanted to take Betsy in her arms and hold her until the shaking stopped. She sat up straight, keeping both hands on the hot cup, her slippers planted firmly on the rug. If she got up and went to Betsy now, it would be the end.

She said carefully, "It's none of my business, but I'm ready to listen if you want to tell me about it."

"I'm so ashamed," Betsy said. Her shivering worsened. She decided she couldn't manage the cup and saucer, and set them carefully on the floor. "You knew I had a date with Stan last night, didn't you? He talks to you a lot."

I knew a hell of a lot more than that, Jo thought grimly. She nodded. "He said something about it."

"There didn't seem to be any reason I shouldn't go," Betsy said defensively. "Unless you think it's not a good policy to date anyone you work with. I wouldn't if it was a larger place. I mean, well, my divorce is final and he's not married or anything, I thought it would be okay."

He's married to a horrible old hypochondriac and a flock of guilt complexes, he's Oedipus in person, Jo thought, but she managed not to say it. She nodded. "I'd say it was your own business. A girl has to make up her own mind about things like that."

"I don't want to marry anyone, but that doesn't mean I can't go to dinner with a man."

"I wouldn't think so."

Betsy fell silent. Stalling, Jo thought. She wants to tell me, but she doesn't know how to get started. Once the first word comes out it'll be easy, like getting the first olive out of a bottle. She sighed. Looks like I’ll have to do all the work.

She asked gently, "Did you go to the movies, or dinner or what?"

“Both. It was all right—I mean, he seemed sort of absent-minded, but it's different from the office and I thought, well, maybe he was tired or something. I thought maybe he was worried about his mother, too. I know he hardly ever leaves her alone in the evenings."

“And?"

“We went to the movies." Betsy faltered to a stop. After a minute she went on, "Then went to a restaurant and had a drink. I didn't want anything to eat, but he ordered steak.”

Trite, Jo thought tiredly. He plies the kid with liquor takes her to a motel, or a hotel. Right out of East Lynne. She asked, "Did you drink very much?"

"I wasn't stoned, if that's what you mean. I felt relaxed—you know the way you feel after a couple of drinks. Only after dinner we went to a place, sort of a night club I guess. They had a strip-tease act I thought was disgusting." Betsy shook her head. "Men seem to go that kind of thing, I don't know why."

Jo waited.

"So then he said, ‘Let's go someplace where we can talk.' Like that. All he wanted was to talk, that's what he said."

Betsy got up and walked across the room. Standing with her back to Jo, she looked smaller and younger than she really was. "I knew what he wanted," she said in a muffled voice. "Fellows all tell you that. Everybody does it, I'm not going to hurt you, I’ll take good care of you, and so on. That's why I liked Chuck, he never tried to make any time with me before we were married. The rest of them were always wanting me to come up to their room, or something. Just to talk!" she said with sudden sharpness.

Jo was silent. She could see Betsy following Stan into a room, standing silent and acquiescent while he shut the door behind them. It hurt. She couldn't have spoken if she'd wanted to.

Betsy said, "We went to a motel."

Okay, girl, put that quarter in your other pocket, you were right the first time. Jo moved a little. The soft wool of her robe whispered against the upholstery, the only sound in the room.

"I knew what he wanted. I'm not going to pretend I didn't, it wouldn't be any use. They all want the same thing no matter what they tell you. Only by that time I didn't care so much," Betsy said honestly. "I guess I was a little drunker than I thought"

"You didn't have to go."

"I know. I thought about it while he went in the office and paid the man. There was a little office at one end, and I sat in the car while he went in. I guess they expect you to do that. I thought, well, what difference does it make? I like Stan." She sounded defiant. "He's been nice to me and he has a pretty thin time at home. I thought we could go in and smooch a while and then I'd stop him before things got out of hand. You know what I mean. If you've had any experience with men you can usually head them off before they really do anything."

Why, you little cheat, Jo thought. But she couldn't take her eyes off the back of Betsy's neck, where the little tendrils of soft fair hair stirred when she moved. It was as though there were two Jos, one scornful of Betsy and one wanting to love and cherish her. She asked hoarsely, "What happened?"

Betsy looked at the floor. "It didn't work," she said flatly. "We hardly got inside the door when he started pulling my clothes off. He'd had about five drinks, more than I had—maybe he didn't really know what he was doing. I didn't know a man could be so rough."

"And then?"

"I started to yell. I was scared, honest. He put his hand over my mouth. He pushed me down on the bed,"

Jo whispered, "He raped you."

"No. He couldn't."

"What do you mean?"

“Nothing happened."

A flow of relief poured through Jo. It was all right Betsy was unharmed.

"He kept trying and trying," Betsy said in such a small voice that Jo had to lean closer to hear her. "He made me help him, you know what I mean? But even then he couldn't do anything."

"So?"

"So we got dressed and came back and he never said anything the whole way," Betsy said rapidly. "He never said anything all the way home, and I was scared to death. I mean, you keep hearing about men going berserk and killing people. Only I don't think he's the kind. Anyway, it wasn't my fault."

Jo clenched her hands behind her back.

"I felt terrible. I kept feeling like I was going to throw up. I got out at my aunts' house. I was scared to death she'd be waiting up for me, but she wasn't. I felt like I couldn't stand it to go to bed, I had to talk to somebody and I couldn't talk to my aunt because she'd flip. So I went down to the drugstore on the corner and called you."

"Will she worry about you if you don't come home?"

Betsy's blush darkened. "I told her I might stay all night with a girl friend."

And what a giveaway that is, Jo thought, her tenderness mixed with disgust. She stood up, stretching muscles that were stiff and sore. It's been quite a night, she thought. She said, "You better stay here. You can sleep in the bedroom and I'll curl up on the davenport. I got in late myself."

"I wouldn't take your bed. Let me sleep on the davenport."

"No, that's all right. Just give me a minute to change the sheets. I’ll fix you some hot milk and a pill," Jo said, glad to be moving around and doing something useful, "and you’ll be asleep in no time. Good thing this is Sunday, we can sleep all day if we want to."

"I hate to think about going back to work."

"It’ll be even more embarrassing for him than for you, if that's any comfort. Anyway, you don't have to date him again."

"I suppose not." But she sounded depressed.

Jo, stripping the blue sheets from the double bed, turned and looked at her sharply. "What do you mean, you suppose not? You don't want to go out with him again, do you?"

"I guess not. Only I haven't dated anybody since I got my divorce and it seems too bad to have it work out like this. Maybe he won't try any funny business the next time—I mean, if I don't want to—well, maybe he’ll be willing to just park or something." Betsy's eyes filled with tears. "Don't make me say such things, it's too embarrassing."

Careful, Jo thought. She carried the used sheets into the bathroom and stuffed them into the hamper, came back with clean linens and remade the bed. Shaking the pillow into a fresh case, she said in a voice that tried to be unconcerned, "I don't know much about men, but I don't think it works that way. They keep right on trying. Especially if you're divorced—they just naturally figure divorced girls are panting for a man. Unless you think he was just drunk and didn't know what he was doing."

"He didn't have any trouble driving. It was more like he wanted to, real badly, but he was scared."

The long arm of mother. You don't rape mother, do you, Sigmund—not the image of pure chaste womanhood? Give me a girl just like the girl who married dear old dad, but what in hell am I supposed to do with her when I get her? Jo tucked in the blanket at the foot of the bed and tried not to look at Betsy, who went right on. Maybe he could tell I’m not that kind of a girl, I didn’t really want to.”

The hell you didn't. Jo said aloud, "You've been married, haven't you? Or didn't your husband ever do anything?"

"Chuck?" Betsy looked shocked. "Sure. I told you, 1 didn't even know there was anything the matter with him till I found him in bed with that-that monster." Tears began to roll down her cheeks. "He always turned off the light. He didn't make me look at him. Men are so ugly, and they act so silly. It never lasted very long with Chuck and then I could go to sleep."

Naturally. Poor kid, trying so hard, and not able to talk it over with her or ask her to help him. It's a fine setup for the boy.

"He never liked to make love to me. He told me so— he was nice enough to come to mama's funeral, when mama died. Only he did what they all do, before I found out. It's a good thing he didn't give me a baby, that's all."

Jo turned down the blanket and whisked into the kitchen. Lifting the quart container of milk out of the refrigerator with trembling fingers, she thought: if I had any sense I'd take something. But then she might wake up and want something.

Stop dreaming, Jo Bates. Nothing like that's going to happen.

She said, "You get into bed. I'm going to give you something to put you to sleep."

Betsy looked more childish than ever curled up under the blue blanket. Blue was her color, as it had been Karen's. Seeing her like this, small and perfect with the arms and legs of her pajamas turned up, Jo had a momentary illusion that she was Karen. She blinked.

"Oh, Jo, there's a big black and blue spot on your arm. What happened?"

"I must have bumped into something."

Betsy swallowed the pill solemnly, big-eyed and obedient as a child. She took the cup and sat back against Jo's pillow, watching the delicate wisps of steam curl up into the air. "You know something? If I do go out with Stan again, I think I can keep him in line."

"Think so?"

"Because it's not so easy to find a fellow who’ll take you places. All the girls get married when they're around eighteen or nineteen now. I think he simply got too excited tonight, and it was my fault as much as his. Next time I'll be more careful."

There was no resemblance to Karen now, and the jealousy was a pure hurt that she'd never felt with Karen—not even on the dreadful day when Karen, packing, had stood back to say that she was leaving and would be married. Jo wanted terribly, with a physical longing that was like pain, to slide into bed beside this small girl. To hold her close, to unbutton the blue pajamas and slip them off, to explore her body with tender questioning fingers until she was ready to be roused to ecstasy. She stood still beside the bed, her arms hanging empty at her sides.

"Anyway," Betsy said sleepily, "there's nothing wrong with him. I mean like Chuck." She punched the pillow into shape, turned on her side, and curled herself into fetal position for sleeping. "Anyway," she said, closing her eyes, "he's not a queer."

Her eyes closed. Long eyelashes lay on her cheeks like little fans.

Jo turned away. "I think I’ll take a pill too," she said abruptly. "Like I said, it's Sunday and we don't have to get up until we feel like it. We don't even have to go out for food. There's soup in the cupboard—and stuff."

Betsy didn't answer. Jo resisted an impulse to smooth her covers. Quietly, wanting to cry—pure fatigue, she scolded herself-she tiptoed into the living room and began spreading sheets on the davenport.

In spite of the wild evening and the sedative, it was almost noon before she fell asleep. The chilly day threw a cold foggy veil over everything. Jo lay on the narrow couch, aching with weariness, prickling with desire. Finally she got up and took another pill, knowing that this one would knock her out for hours and leave her feeling groggy and headachy when she did wake.

She slept at last, half conscious of Sunday noises in the building, water running, footsteps overhead, the slamming of the outside door as a tenant left. She dreamed about Karen and Betsy, and about the girl with whom she had spent the early part of the night. All three were confused, changing from one to the other in her arms, becoming one person and then another. The details of the dream were blurred and mixed with sounds from the street.

She woke once, crying quietly and with a feeling of utter hopelessness, to turn the pillow over and go back to sleep.

It's a mess, she thought sadly as she drifted into a real and drug-sodden sleep that would last, blessedly, for hours. It's a terrible mess. How am I going to get out of it?

CHAPTER 10

There’s one good thing about a bursting headache: it makes everything else seem unimportant. Jo went through that Sunday, after a miserable waking in early evening, too tired and queasy to care about anything else. She wasn't even moved by the sight of Betsy, her young body suggested by the lines of the thin pajamas, sitting up in bed to receive the warmed-over coffee Jo brought her. She simply wished that Betsy would go home and let her get some sleep.

Betsy had slept well, as the young do who lay all their troubles on someone else's shoulders. She drank her coffee, gathered her clothes and went into the bathroom to dress. Trim and clear-skinned, her face made up and her hair in order, she thanked Jo for her kindness as though they were strangers brought together by an act of God. Which we are, Jo thought, walking politely to the head of the stairs with her and feeling relieved to see her go.

She came back to sit on the bed and think of things she might do. Wash her hair, clean the apartment, go for a walk. All of them took too much energy. Finally she lay down on the unmade bed, her head on the pillow where Betsy's had been, and fell asleep again.

Around eleven she woke, nauseated and giddy. She got up and found some crackers in the cupboard, opened a can of peaches, and ate standing beside the sink. When her hunger was satisfied she put away the leftover peaches and went back to bed.

Monday morning brought a drizzle of rain and a chill in the air, together with a feeling of depression familiar to her from other weekends. Apparently an emotional hangover had the same symptoms as an alcoholic one. She showered and got into her favorite suit, the gray one, remembering all the women's magazine axioms about building morale by looking her best. Her raincoat was a favorite garment too, thick yellow-green silk with silver buttons, a mad extravagance. This morning she wished she had the money back. That morale stuff must only be for housewives, she thought, turning up her collar and going out into the fog.

There were days when everything she did was simply paper-shuffling. This looked like one of them. Maybe I should call in sick, she thought, passing a drugstore that looked bright and warm, with people having breakfast at the counter. There was an empty phone booth, its door standing open in invitation. But the habit of reliability was too strong and she went on to join the parade of storm coats and plastic rainboots en route to the bus stop.

A fat cheerful woman smiled at her and said, "No fit day for man or beast." They climbed into the big yellow bus and stood jammed against the knees of two tired-looking men, in an atmosphere of damp raincoats and stale smoke.

So much had happened since Friday that the office looked unfamiliar, like a place revisited after long absence. She let herself in with her passkey and walked back to her own office, passing Stan's room with the desk cluttered: a wad of tissues, a library book, a sheaf of half-done work and the pipe he wasn't allowed to smoke at home. Betsy was late too, but her office was neat and impersonal as though she knew her stay would be brief and wanted to leave no trace of herself. Ashamed but compelled, Jo went in and pulled open the desk drawers one after another, looking for some clue to the girl. There was nothing of Betsy there except a bottle of nail polish and a nickel. She closed the desk carefully.

She hung up her raincoat, which felt slick and clammy, and sat down at her own desk. In some way she seemed to have outgrown the place. Like her love for Karen and her griefs for earlier loves, it had already taken its place in the past. She was here, with the November issue to close and no plans for doing anything else, no intention of making any changes in her way of living, but she knew the feeling. It was time to make a change. She sat with her hands in her lap, a little frightened by the strength of her conviction that she was coming to the end of something.

Her feeling for Betsy was alive this morning, now that the nagging headache was gone and her mind felt clear. Granted, Betsy was unreasonable and almost surely unavailable. She wanted to be admired by men, she had no doubt been brought up in the American tradition that evaluates women from the age of thirteen by their appeal to men—the eighth grader who goes steady is already successful in life. It wasn't surprising if Betsy accepted this standard. At the same time she was afraid of love with either man or woman, and whatever warmth she had was hidden.

She had been upset by Stan's failure; but why? Baffled passion or hurt pride? Jo doubted that Betsy herself knew the answer.

Here was a girl who combined in one small well-made body all the inconsistencies that made Jo impatient with women. Straight women, and many Lesbians, seemed unable to do anything in a reasonable manner. It was advance and retreat, go away and come closer. She supposed that her own straightforward reactions were masculine. Anyway, she was past reasoning. Annoyed by Betsy's attitudes, she still desired her.

She had always been scornful of Lesbians who hung around straight women, yearning over what they couldn't have and making fools of themselves. There had been an older woman who worked in an insurance office where she spent several months, a strained-looking creature whose smile covered the panic of finding herself fifty. Jo watched her hovering over an accountant with a husband and small child. Finally, after the office Christmas party, Marie Bartell had made some advance to the girl—nobody knew just what. Two weeks later the office manager called her in and told her they were "reorganizing the department.''

I wonder where she is now, Jo thought. There was that long stretch between forty and sixty-five when women had such a hard time to find work; worst of all for those who walked the lonely path of the homosexual.

The world she lived in had its own rules. You tried to conform, because being found out meant more than rejection by society. It meant losing your job and having trouble finding another. Sooner or later someone who knew your history showed up, and there were washroom whispers.

It was a lonely world, and you cherished your own people. She was twenty-two before she realized that she wasn't alone. Jeannine had taught her that, in the ten months they were together, and that was one of the things she had to thank Jeannine for. Once you admitted to yourself that you were what you were, and stopped feeling guilty about it, you came to realize that you were surrounded by companions. Now there was the boy at the Andes Candies shop on the corner, one of the older women at the branch library, a file clerk in the building with whom she sometimes shared coffee breaks, the handsome young intern who took care of her the winter she had pneumonia. It was like belonging to a secret society.

Friends introduced you to friends, and sooner or later you learned to recognize your own people. It wasn't easy, because Lesbians, contrary to popular belief, have no physical characteristics that set them apart. Sometimes it was easier with men; not always. She'd known Richard for more than a year before she found out, and then she thought the boy who told her must be mistaken. A good thing he wasn't. Richard was the best and truest friend she'd ever had.

There were ways to find out, once your curiosity was aroused. You watched for conversational clues. You carried a book like We Walk Alone or The Lonely Path to the lunchroom, and waited for the other person to make an opening. That didn't always work, because recently there was a tremendous interest in gay books on the part of straight people, but sometimes you picked up a friend that way. Or you could read one of the special magazines, Different or Spiral, but that was dangerous because only people who belonged to the club would be likely to have a copy of those. Books were safer.

There were the bars, of course. But they changed all the time, and it cost money to go to them, and Jo wasn't much of a drinker. Too, there was the danger of being picked up by the police. She had never heard of a gay girl being entrapped by a policewoman as men often were by detectives. I'd know a lady cop in any disguise, she thought, grinning at the idea. But women were sometimes taken in when a place was raided.

So it was best to meet people here and there, moving carefully and not taking off your mask unless you were sure. Dirty hypocrites they make of us, she thought. Love ought to be open and honest for everybody. Whose business is it so long as we're not hurting anyone?"

Knowing the percentages, you never betrayed anyone. If you had straight friends who knew what you were and accepted you just the same, without any reservations—she never had, but some of the boys claimed it was possible—you never gave anyone away to them. It was a little world within a world, at least ten million women in the United States according to some sociologist's estimate, and God knew how many men; assorted people walking the streets and working in stores and offices, eating in restaurants and riding on trains like everybody else, but set apart in their private lives. Sometimes she thought it was rather like being a freedom fighter or an early Christian. She wished she could go around leaving a token mark on the walls of Chicago's glass and steel catacombs, so those who came after would know that one of their own kind had passed that way.

She didn't think that Betsy was a member of that secret society. Would she ever be? Richard said it was impossible to convert anybody. A man or woman who came over from the straight world had been potentially gay all the time; it was an act of recognition, not a change. She wasn't sure she agreed with him. And she didn't know about Betsy. I'm stuck, she thought. I don't know what to do next. Gayle came in. Jo could hear her moving around the little reception room, going through all her morning beauty rituals. And in a few minutes Stan came in. He came back and sat down in her guest chair, a thing he seldom did. "Hi. How you getting along?"

"Almost ready to paste up. I have a few questions for you when you're not busy."

"Did you use all that extra wedding linage?"

"Sure, there's more fools getting married all the time."

He started to say something, and stopped. She looked at him. He was fidgeting even more than usual. She asked, "How's your mother?"

"She didn't feel very well Saturday night, but she's all right now." He moved uneasily. "The wet weather's hard on her. You haven't talked to Betsy, have you?"

She considered and discarded several good evasions. "I saw her at work Friday." she said. It was true as far as it went. Stan looked relieved. He said, "I just wondered." It always took him forever to get out of a room; be was the kind of guest who lingers at the door, saying good-bye, until a hostess feels like hitting him. She handed him a sheaf of papers to speed him up. One down, one to go.

A few minutes later Gayle came in, bright-eyed and curious, to say that Betsy had called in sick.

I’ll go and see her, Jo thought. Then she remembered that Betsy lived with an aunt who might be surprised at this show of solicitude. If she really wasn't ill at all—if she was out looking for another job, which she very well might be doing under the circumstances—it would be mean to give her away to auntie. The call was out.

But she found Betsy's address and telephone number in the file and wrote them down. She tucked the slip of paper into her wallet, behind the bills. Having it there made her feel better. It was as though, knowing where Betsy lived, she had some assurance of seeing her again.

CHAPTER 11

There's more to publishing than meets the eye of the casual reader, even when the magazine is a little throw-away that's not fisted in Writers Market. There are things like gathering material and verifying it, being sure that people's names are spelled right, writing items and fitting them so you have just enough fines and columns and pages, not too few or too many. There's selecting and scaling photos, choosing type faces, writing heads and decks, deciding on margins and department headings and a dozen other things. When the proofs are all cut apart and pasted neatly in place, when the dummy's done, then the gestation period is over. The book is ready to be born.

"It's crazy," Jo said, "real crazy. No matter how many we put out, I get all shook up over every one."

Stan grinned. He held the dummy sheets in the crook of one arm like a baby. His tie was wadded around under one ear, his crest of reddish hair stood up wilder than ever. There was a carbon smear on his upper lip and a blob of rubber cement on the front of his shirt. It was the twenty-sixth of September, time for the November issue to go to press.

He said, grinning, "You don't have to be crazy to be in publishing, but it helps."

"Who wants to be sane?"

"You're a good kid, Jo. I wish you'd try to get along a little better with Betsy."

Jo looked up sharply. "What's the matter with Betsy?"

Stan moved uneasily. "Maybe you're a little sharp with her sometimes. I know, you have to tell her what to do. But try and go easy on the kid, will you?"

"Why, I don't—"

"She thinks you don't like her."

Astonishment went off in Jo like a firecracker. She looked at him, without words for once.

"She's just a kid."

"She's almost as old as I am," Jo said, "and if she expects to hold a job she'll have to learn to work. I've never said a cross word to her, anyway."

Tears came to her eyes. She turned back to her desk and began going through her recent correspondence. Stan stood there a moment, looking at her. He said, "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to get you all riled up," and stepped out into the hall, still clutching the dummy sheets.

The carbon copies didn't make sense. She laid them down, automatically evening the edges, and put a stapler on top so they wouldn't blow in the breeze from the open window. It was a fine late September day, the sky intensely blue over the tops of the many-windowed buildings, with a few plump white clouds drifting. It would be cold and blowy in another six weeks or so, but now the air was soft with late summer. Jo's suit coat hung over the back of her chair, her silver cuff links lay in a glass tray with paper clips and rubber bands. Now she shivered, as though a cold breeze had crept into the room.

Sure, she thought, defensively, I've been telling the kid what to do. I have to. She types all right, but she can't spell worth a damn, and she might as well learn a little something while she's here. How to fit copy and how to do simple editing, at least. Otherwise she's no good to us. If it makes her mad to be told what to do she might as well quit right now. Someone has to train the assistants.

She was defending herself to Stan, even though he'd left the office and couldn't hear a word she was thinking. He knew it all anyway. She made a face.

Because that wasn't why she had been hanging over Betsy's desk, spelling out the details of her job for her. With the others the briefing sessions had been a couple of ten-minute interviews, very cut and dried, at the beginning.

Try to be honest, she told herself. She had in fact been finding tiny flaws in Betsy's Dictaphone transcripts and bringing them to her attention, going into detail on what was expected of an assistant for reasons of her own. Sounding like any picky, fussy old maid, not because she was displeased with Betsy's work or because she hoped that Betsy would become an asset to the magazine some day. Betsy's abilities were those of the average stenographer with a high school diploma and six months of business college, no more and no less. Jo knew she was looking for an excuse to go into Betsy's office and stand near her, look at her and talk to her.

The realization made her feel a little sick.

You've got it bad, she thought scornfully. Where do you think it'll get you? Carrying the torch for a girl who doesn't even know the score. How adolescent can you get?

If I had the sense I was born with I'd fire the kid tomorrow and get somebody else in here, a girl who could do the work—a girl who didn't appeal to me. Also I'd find myself a woman somewhere, without all this eternal love jazz. The boys are right. She had never done much cruising. The night with Linda, the couple of hours with the blonde butch had been the only times in the last couple of years. Like a man going to a whore, she thought.

I'll let the kid alone after this.

She pulled down her sleeves and put in the cuff links, heavy round silver ones with a tiny central stone in each, dark red against dull metal. Jeannine had given them to her and they were precious for that reason, less precious than the self-respect Jeannine had also given her but still a tangible reminder of a good era in her life. She was wearing them a great deal these days, for reassurance. Someone loved me once, someone thought I was important.

She shrugged into her coat and buttoned it, ran a comb through her hair and reddened her lips with only a casual glance in the mirror. She knew how she looked. Anyone who liked her would have to take her as she was. She got up and walked down the hall.

Betsy was at her desk, reading a magazine. She jumped when Jo's shadow fell across the page. "Oh!" she said, like a child caught doing something naughty.

Jo's mouth was dry. She ran her tongue across her lips, tasting the faintly bitter oiliness of fresh lipstick. "Hi," she said in a voice that sounded a little wobbly. "Have you had lunch?"

"Not yet." Betsy looked up at her, putting a hand over her magazine as though she could hide it. With her nose shiny and her fair hair ruffled she looked about sixteen. There was a dimple in her chin.

"How about going out with me? My treat. I didn't take you to lunch when you first came," Jo said, improvising, "so I'd like to now. Okay?"

"Oh, thanks. Gee, I'd like that very much. Only I'm not dressed to go anywhere fancy."

"Neither am I. Nobody dresses for lunch in this town."

"Well, if you think I look all right."

Kid, Jo thought, you look so all right I could scream. She waited while Betsy straightened her seams and smoothed her skirt, then followed her silently out of the office, ignoring Gayle's surprised look.

The Manchester House was dusky even at noon on a brisk fall day, chintz curtains pulled across the windows, candles flickering in ruby hurricane glasses on the small tables. A well-rounded hostess in black led them past the bar where a dozen men were having pre-luncheon drinks (or possibly drinking their lunch, thought Jo, harking back to her ad agency days), and seated them in the far corner. From this point they could see the whole dining room.

Since it was a fairly expensive place there were more men here than women, most of them in pairs, combining business with good fellowship that was probably spurious but that Jo found relaxing. Here and there sat a mixed couple, a man with his secretary or perhaps a business associate who happened to wear shirts. At two tables women sat together, so Betsy would have no reason feel out of place. For herself, it didn't matter; she found the company of men more relaxing and definitely more interesting than that of most women.

"This is a nice place," Betsy said, sounding a little awed.

"At least there's no Muzak. Want a drink?"

"I probably shouldn't on a working day.”

Jo grinned. "Come on, nobody's going to fire you for one drink. They might for two."

"All right, I'll have an old-fashioned."

"One old-fashioned, one Gibson." Jo took the large stiff menu the waitress offered and flipped it open, not caring what she ate, but concerned that Betsy should have a good meal. "Do you like seafood?”

"Not very much," Betsy admitted. "I guess I have ordinary tastes in food. I like steak or hamburger or ham, something like that. I'm not really very hungry."

"Well, I am. You’ll have to eat to keep me company." she took the drink the waitress set in front of her. "How do you like your steak, Betsy? Medium? Can we have coffee with it and after, too?"

"Certainly," the waitress said primly. She moved away. Jo laughed. "This place feels like a cathedral. I keep expecting the menus to turn into prayer books and the drinks to holy water."

"It's a wonderful place." Betsy looked at her wide-eyed above the glass. "It's nice of you to ask me. I don't know how I'm going to pay you back."

"No need to," Jo said absently. The gin was cold and delicious, the first sip a pure pleasure. She gave up all attempts to be tactful and jumped into the subject with both feet. "Stan thinks you probably hate me for pushing you so hard. I don't mean to be a slave driver, I just thought it would be easier for you if you knew how we want things from the beginning. It's a little different from regular office work, you know."

It was no good. She sounded ninety-nine years old and dry as Webster's Unabridged. But Betsy was blushing. The only female I know who still blushes, Jo thought "That's all right," she said in a soft little voice. "I just thought—I thought you didn't like me. I'm pretty dumb sometimes."

"You're not dumb at all." Jo looked intently into her glass, trying to get her voice under control. "I like you very much."

"Well, you've been so good to me I'd hate to think you didn't like me. I never did thank you for taking me in that night."

No, and you never will, Jo answered her silently. Not in any way I want to be thanked. She said, "That's all right."

"I was afraid my aunt would worry, but she didn't say anything. She thinks I'm still a child. You know how relatives are."

"Sure."

Betsy looked at the pineapple stick as though she wanted to fish it out and eat it, but didn't think it would be polite in such a plush place. "Stan asked me to go out with him tomorrow night," she confided. "I don't know if I should or not."

Keep your mouth shut, Jo warned herself. Anything you say is going to be all wrong, so keep your great big mouth shut. She concentrated on her drink, taking it slowly to make it last and knowing that she would want another when this was gone. After all her common-sense thinking, she was still miserable at the thought of those two together.

"I haven't had a date with him since. Maybe he’ll be all right this time."

And maybe not, Jo thought. Maybe he's ready to try again. She didn't claim to be an expert on male psychology, but she did know something about love and ego, and she supposed they operated the same way in men. She remembered how, after her first failure with Karen, she had been afraid to approach the girl for almost two weeks—until need got the better of fright, and a couple of drinks gave her courage. It might be the same way with Stan.

"He knows now I'm not the kind of girl who does things like that."

"I'm sure he does."

The thought of Stan's hands on Betsy—rather clumsy hands, long and thin, with reddish hair on the backs and clean ridged nails—made her a little dizzy. She thought of those hands unhooking the little elastic back band of Betsy's bra, that showed through the thin blouse. Exploring the firm gentle curve of Betsy's long and lovely thighs.

Serves me right, she thought dryly. She had wished often enough that Stan would have a fling with someone warm and willing. He needed a little passion and a little affection in his life, in whatever spare moments he could snatch from his mother.

But not with this girl, she thought in panic, feeling that she must somehow snatch Betsy back from danger. I want this one myself. She said aloud, "How about another drink?" Betsy giggled. "All right, but you won't get any work out of me all afternoon."

"That's all right."

Betsy's attention had been diverted by a little stir near the door. She said, almost in a whisper. "The two that came in. I think that's disgusting." Jo turned to look, and froze. Because the taller of the two women who had just entered the dining room was Linda. She stood poised and lovely, her eyes wide against the dim light, looking around. Jo had never seen her in a skirt, much less a black wool suit with a little fur collar, and a tiny fur cap set on her sleek cropped head, but there was no doubt. Linda's eyes caught hers for a moment. Then she looked away, without smiling or making any sign of recognition, and led her companion to a table on the far side of the room.

The smaller girl needed to be led. She had evidently been drinking, and while she walked well enough, she had the confused look of one who will have trouble later remembering what's happened. She'll be dizzy if she turns suddenly, Jo thought. But the girl sat down without mishap and looked around, frowning as though it were hard to focus. She was young and not bad-looking, but she had the soft and slightly swollen look of a woman who habitually drinks too much and takes no exercise. A lady lush, Jo thought. Another ten years, she’ll be a mess.

It wasn't the girl's face that held Betsy's attention, or the degree of intoxication that made her young face stiffen with disapproval. It was her clothes. She wore tight tapered pants with a fly front, in the popular olive drab shade; a sports shirt a tone lighter; a black suede jacket, argyle socks, and oxfords that might or might not have been bought in the boys' department. Her reddish hair was cut in a ducktail and she wore no makeup at all. A little tardily, Jo realized that this outfit, which might have passed without comment at The Spot, was attracting curious and knowing looks here. She longed to wipe the smiles off the faces of the young executives.

She said, "How do you mean?" And felt her hands and the back of her neck cold, because she knew the answer.

"Those two girls. The one in pants is queer. She'd have to be." Betsy blushed redder than ever. "She ought to be ashamed to come into a place like this."

"They're rather becoming clothes," Jo said, after a moment in which she considered and discarded several other possible answers.

She looked around, a little panicked at finding herself the midst of a world that was not only alien but hostile. It wasn't the first time; she had grown up in the straight world, but there were still these terrifying moments. What if someone looked at her or talked about her that way?

She looked at Linda. But Linda was ignoring her, turning a black-covered shoulder to her, talking to the waitress. All right, so Linda didn't want to be recognized. That solved a moral problem very neatly. If Linda had given her a welcoming smile, would she have responded, or not? Loyalty—yes, common decency—required that she align herself with this lovely warm-hearted girl who had given her so much pleasure. But here sat Betsy, capable of looking at her with the same coldly critical eyes she now turned on Linda's companion.

Betsy said, "They don't have to wear fly-front pants. No normal woman would do that." She looked again at the redhead.

Jo picked up her second drink. Her hand shook so that the clear liquid slopped over the glass. The waitress, hovering, stepped up quietly and wiped the drops from the tablecloth. When she had retreated Jo said carefully, "Look, Betsy, there are all kinds of people in the world. Does everybody have to be alike?"

"Well, no, but they don't have to be criminals either."

"Why criminals?"

"Isn't it against the law?"

"A great many things are against the law," Jo said shortly, "including most of the things husbands and wives do together. Including a lot of things even churches approve of. People have to decide what's right and wrong for themselves."

"I don't see how anybody can think that's right. Only what do you suppose they do?" Betsy looked at the tablecloth. "I mean, how can they really do anything? It seems kind of silly."

"I wouldn't worry about it," Jo said. She heard her own voice, low and harsh, and stopped.

"Of course, what men do with women seems silly too. What do they get out of it? I mean, it's embarrassing."

The steaks came then, beautifully grilled, with a mushroom on top of each and the natural juices forming a little ruddy pool on the platter. A beautiful steak, Jo thought as the waitress set hers in front of her, and the last one I'll have in quite a while, the shape my budget's in. She cut a piece and put it in her mouth.

Betsy was still looking at the two girls. Jo's meat was without texture or flavor. She took a drink of water to wash it down. Betsy said in a low shamed voice, "I guess I know what they do. At least, I can figure out most of it. But it seems so, so sort of—"

I give up, Jo thought. It's like planning a college education for someone who doesn't even know the alphabet. This kid's not only straight but square, as square as they come. And she doesn't even know the difference.

She looked at Linda, her profile glimmering clear and lovely between the fur collar and the little fur cap. Why was she here and why was she dressed that way? Her working clothes, no doubt—she moved like an actress, a dancer, a model. Then she had a glamour job. File clerks don't wear suits cut like that, with real Persian collars.

But then why was she here with this half-drunk girl whose clothes were a walking advertisement? A client, maybe. She listened as the girl broke into a whining complaint that was audible all over the room. The food was lousy. She didn't want anything to eat, she wanted to have a drink and go home. She gestured, and tipped over her water glass. Jo burned with vicarious shame for Linda, who sat calm and unconcerned as though her partner were a complete stranger. Knowing the quick response and the sharp perceptions of this calm-looking young woman from their single night together, she knew how embarrassed Linda must be.

I give up, she thought. She forced herself to take another bite of her steak.

She wasn't sure now what she had hoped to accomplish by taking Betsy to lunch. It had been an instinctive thing, worked out in detail before she knew what she was going to do. Whatever my little id had in mind, she thought grimly as she paid the check and counted out a generous tip, it didn't work. I'm out more money than I can spare, and I'm farther than ever from understanding Betsy or getting her to understand me. All we've touched on is the dress and behavior of dykes—and now I know what she thinks about all of us.

She winced over "us" as she hadn't done in years.

"It was a wonderful lunch," Betsy said, following her through the revolving door and into the sunlit street. "Thank you so much for asking me. I'll make it up to you some day." She laid a hand on Jo's jacket sleeve, and Jo flinched as though her fingers had been red hot.

“That's all right," she said in a low voice. "It's been nice getting to know you a little better."

You liar, liar, she told herself, crossing the street amid a flurry of lunch-hour shoppers. Now she really thinks I'm a crab. She looked at Betsy, walking along beside her. Betsy's face was pleasant and innocent. She gave Jo a friendly smile that meant nothing except good will. Jo smiled back, with stiff lips. I'll never make any time with this kid. It's too bad I love her, because I sure as hell do love her and it's not going to pay off. I can't help it, though.

It's such a wonderful business being gay. Just one mad round of pleasure all the time.

She waited for Betsy to precede her into their building.

CHAPTER 12

She woke up on Saturday morning feeling wonderful. The warm clear weather held and the air was soft with Indian summer. Sunshine poured in when she rolled up the bedroom shade. Be a good day to clean the place, she thought, forgetting how depressing the job had seemed the last time she tackled it. She jumped out of bed making plans: She would get into all the cracks and crevices and go after every speck of dirt, the cupboards too, because Mrs. Riggs' cleaning woman didn't do a halfway decent job.

She was down on her knees in the bathroom, digging around the edges of the tiles with a bobby pin, when the telephone rang. It was Richard. She could tell from the sound of his voice that he had something on his mind, so she pulled up the step stool and sat down, sneakers hooked over the second rung, wet wrinkled-pink hands dangling between her knees. "Hi. How's everything?"

"Just wondering how things are with you."

She always forgot how deep and kind Rich's voice was. Just listening to him made her feel good. "You weren't at Jerri's party the other night, so I thought, well, I’ll call up Jo and see how the world's treating her," the soft rumble went on.

"You know I'm not a party person. They either bore me or scare the hell out of me. I stay home and curl up with a good book."

"Yeah, I know. You should get out once in a while, just the same.”

"All right. Next time."

There was a little waiting silence. She asked, "Did you and Michael have a good time?"

"Michael doesn't live here any more. He moved out last week."

"Oh." The silence lasted. All the things she wanted to ask him and couldn't tumbled into her mind. Had he found someone else? Do you feel terrible about it? Did you see it coming or where you completely surprised? Did you have a fight or did he just walk out?

She couldn't ask. Karen had made a real production out of leaving—that was female bitchiness, but men could be that way too. Especially the ones like Michael, who was a real nellie. She waited tensely, the muscles in her upper arms jumping from the unaccustomed exercise of scrubbing.

"It's all right," Richard said gently. "We had a civilized people talk and parted on friendly terms, and all that jazz. These things happen."

"That's the story of my life too." Jo looked glumly at her dirty knees. The bathroom floor was only half scrubbed; by the time they got this thing talked over to everyone's satisfaction the dirty water would be dried on and she'd have to start all over.

It didn't matter. Michael said to break the silence, "How you doing, darling?"

"Not too good. The girl of my dreams is being courted by my boss."

"That's real great. Which one am I supposed to feel sorry for?"

"Why," Jo said, "you might be happy for all of us. She's lovely and popular and he's having a fine time planning what he’ll do to her when he gets her in the hay. And I'm suffering from unrequited love. First thing you know I’ll be writing poetry."

"Darling, you can read it to me. That's true love."

"Sure."

"What are you planning for tonight?"

"Going to wash my hair and take a good hot bath, if the bitches downstairs leave me any hot water. I'm cleaning the whole apartment on my hands and knees."

"You don't feel like going pub crawling, do you? I'll buy you a drink if you're thirsty."

Well, Jo thought, why not? Rich held her hand when she was depressed or in a state of crisis; he didn't ask for help very often. A friend like Richard shouldn't have to bury his face on your shoulder and burst into tears for you to know he's unhappy. She said carefully, "I was thinking about it myself. Did you ever go to a place on Rush called The Spot? I was there a couple of weeks ago—nice quiet place."

"Mixed?"

"No, dear, I thought you'd like to cruise the girls for a change."

Richard chuckled. "All right, all right, what kind of a place is it? The bar Freedburg took us to the other night was full of rough trade, I was afraid to take off my muffler for fear someone was going to cut my throat. Or to take my hand off my zipper—"

Jo cut in firmly. "I've only been there a couple times. It was pretty quiet. Of course I wasn't paying much attention to the boys."

"Music? Dancing?"

"Just a jukebox. Dancing, yes." She hesitated. "We can go somewhere else if you'd rather."

"No, it sounds like fun. We don't have to stay."

Linda, she thought. In the next breath, warning herself not to count on seeing Linda. If you don't hope for too much you can't be disappointed. She said, "It'll be good to get out of the straight world for a while."

Jo moved impatiently on her step stool.

"How about it? Ill pick you up around eight?"

"Sure, fine."

She climbed down and went back to the bathroom. The tiles she had washed were a precise pattern of white edged in black, sharp against the smeary grayish ones that were still dirty. She dumped the cooling water out of her plastic pail, refilled it with hot, added detergent and a sprinkle of bleach, and got down on her knees again to finish the job. It didn't seem so dull now that she was looking forward to an evening out. If she hit lucky and brought somebody home—it was easier that way, because she lived alone and most girls didn't—the apartment would be looking its best. It was bourgeois to care, a holdover from the housekeeping standards of Cottonwood Falls, and she was ashamed, but she couldn't help it. She couldn't help making her bed and washing her breakfast dishes before she left in the morning.

While the bathroom dried she threw a storm coat over her damp-streaked jeans and ran down to the corner for French bread and cold cuts, a fifth of red wine and some whiskey. She came back hugging her brown paper bag, made a sandwich and ate it standing beside the kitchen table, washing the crusty bread down with the warmed-over coffee from breakfast. That she had less than five dollars to last until payday didn't bother her in the least. She would be all right unless someone at the office ran short and wanted to borrow; Stan sometimes asked for small sums which he always paid back the next day. She had her monthly commuter's ticket and she could carry a sandwich.

The lunch at the Manchester House had cost eleven dollars and hadn't produced anything but embarrassment and a sense of failure. It was like fishing where you know there aren't any fish, all you do is waste your bait. If nothing interesting turned up tonight, she could at least get her money's worth out of her own liquor.

Over and over she had heard the theory that Lesbians drink too much because they have to drown their guilt feelings before they can make love. She was doubtful that they drank more than other people, on the average—which took care of that. But for those who did, she suspected that it was more to ease their frustration when they found themselves without a partner than to nerve themselves to a brand of lovemaking they thought wrong. She herself had drank little through the six years of her guilt and anguish, from sixteen to twenty-two. And in the six years since Jeannine had taken her in hand and made her proud and glad to be loved, she did her drinking when she was lonely and insecure.

On the other hand, there were ad men and copywriters, always bragging about their affairs with women, who drank a great deal. So how did you know?

She dressed carefully for her evening out. Tapered slacks, striped shirt a little shabby now but still becoming, the car coat that was her favorite wrap. I look all right, she thought, brushing her hair close to her head. The boyish clothes were becoming without being butch, When Richard's car pulled up in front of the building she dropped her billfold and keys into her pocket and ran down, feeling the familiar warm pleasure that came before an evening on the town. Anything could happen. Perhaps nothing would, but there was always a chance. At this point the whole evening lay ahead, untested and full of possibilities.

She climbed into the car beside Rich and kissed his cheek with extra warmth, so that he might feel some of the sympathy he didn't want her to put into words. "You really want to do this," she asked, "or are you just brightening up my dull day?"

He patted her shoulder. "You're good company."

Funny what a lift it gave you to touch somebody you really liked—no passion, no involvements, just honest affection. She settled down beside him and watched the neighborhood flow past, an unending amusement for a girl who seldom rode in a car. "It's not the same on a bus," she said.

"Still sightseeing? Well take the Outer Drive."

"Oh, lovely."

The Lake lay to the right of them, vast and brooding beyond its curving reach of sand. On the left rose the dark bulk of housing projects, irregularly dotted with lights. As they neared the downtown area the office buildings rose tall and proud against the night sky. "The only thing in Cook County worth looking at," Jo said, pleased.

"Besides the Forest Preserve."

"Yeah, I forgot that. We didn't get to go this summer. I wonder who picked all our wild raspberries."

"I went with Michael a couple of times. He didn't care much about picnics, though."

"Some day," Jo said dreamily, "I'm going to take my vacation in the fall and go on a camping trip. Don't laugh—you know what I mean, sleeping out in a tent. We females don't use that word the way you do, anyway."

"You're so middle class. I won't ask how your little romance is coming along."

"Nothing to report." She put her hand on his knee. "Rich, there just might be somebody I know at The Spot"

He smiled at her. "Just wink, and I’ll vanish. Who knows, maybe I'll hit lucky myself."

She wanted to cry. She said, "How come all the gay places we know about are on the North Side? There must be some in other places."

"Most of our friends live north," Richard said reasonably. "You know how word gets around on these things. Somebody really ought to publish a directory."

They turned off the Drive at Randolph, crossed Michigan and Wabash and State, looking oddly quiet at this hour on a Saturday evening; Jo was used to the crowds and hustle of the rush hours. Rich turned the car north on Dearborn, sliding smoothly into a row of cabs waiting for the light. "It's livelier in New York," he said wistfully. "This town's nothing but an overgrown village."

"I've been thinking about going there. Only I'd like to have a little money saved up first."

"Better be sure you've got a job lined up before you make the break. Money goes awfully fast when you're not working."

"You grew up there, didn't you? How come you've never gone back?"

He shrugged. "Inertia. Also I never seem to get a dollar ahead. Real estate's a funny business, you have to know somebody to get a job. Pull won't keep you in, but it gets you in. Besides," he said, stopping for a red light, "every time I think about making a change I meet someone."

He backed neatly into a parking place, came around and opened her door. A couple of girls going into The Spot paused and looked them over. Tourists or members of the club? Jo felt embarrassed. She walked beside Richard, holding her head up, refusing his hand at her elbow. This was one place where a male escort was no advantage.

The place was busier than it had been on her last two visits. The juke box was going full blast, there was a loud clatter of voices, the lads behind the bar rushed back and forth serving beer, a little wine, not much hard liquor. The young people who came here couldn't afford much but beer, and the older customers wanted to relax but not to drink too much. Jo had seen little intoxication in the gay bars she'd visited, a thing she couldn't say for some of the places downtown.

She and Rich got into the room by squeezing past several dancing couples. "Like to sit at a table?"

"No, I like the bar."

A boy of twenty or so moved over so they could sit together. Richard gave him a searching look and got back a smile. Jo grinned. Now he'd have to wait to be sure the kid didn't have a friend in the men's room or the phone booth, that he wasn't expecting anyone to come in later. If the boy was alone he'd start a conversation. She said, "I'd like beer."

"You can have a drink if you want it.”

"No, beer sounds good."

She didn't much like beer. But Richard had taken her to lunch a couple of times lately, and she knew that his commissions had fallen off. The country hadn't settled down after inauguration, as everyone predicted; it was a real recession and not just an election year flurry. And he had bought Michael a new sports jacket—perhaps other things, too, that she didn't know about.

Anyway, if she drank nothing but beer there was no chance of taking too much. She looked around the long oval bar, seeking one face and sizing up the others she encountered.

They're so young, she thought. Although she knew you had to be of voting age to get served, and plain clothes and short hair make almost any woman look younger than she is. Too bad the old ones couldn't learn that, instead of piling on pounds of makeup and junk jewelry in a vain attempt to fool the public, having their fancy waves set every week and tipping around on high-heeled pointed shoes.

The two who sat quietly sipping Chianti and holding hands, for example, were probably in the middle twenties instead of sixteen or seventeen as they appeared to be. She glanced at them from time to time as she sipped her beer. They didn't talk at all, and she suspected that they had just found each other or that it was their first time together in public since making love. They were enclosed in an invisible bubble that shut them away from everyone else. The younger was a slight little thing with reddish-blonde hair, not unlike the schoolgirl Jo had admired on the street the other day; her long straight mane, the clear shade that's often imitated and never duplicated, flowed down her back without ornament. Her companion was a little older, solid and sturdy, with a square dimpled chin and a good-natured expression.

Bless them, Jo thought, feeling like their mother. The look so nice together.

Richard said, "What's the matter, kid?"

She indicated the two girls. He looked. "It's nice to see somebody happy," he agreed.

They had been there perhaps half an hour when Linda came in. She was alone. She wore pedal pushers and a car coat very like Jo's, and she looked tired to the point of exhaustion. She climbed on a stool halfway around the bar from Jo and ordered an old-fashioned which she didn't bother to drink when it came. One of the boys spoke to her. She answered inaudibly. Jo watched her for a while as she stared into space, her fingers clutching the small glass. Then she touched Rich. "That's the one, at the end. I'm going over and talk to her."

"Good luck."

She made her way around the bar until she could touch Linda's shoulder. Linda turned without surprise. "Hi."

"Are you waiting for somebody?"

"No, I'm alone."

"Want to dance?"

"Not tonight, I'm too tired. Sit down. What are you drinking?"

"Beer."

The bar girl brought it. Linda looked around, frowning. "It's noisy in here. I like this place, but you can't hear yourself think."

"Would you like to go somewhere else?"

"Where?"

"My place."

Linda pushed up her sleeve and looked at her watch. "I have to be back by midnight, or I turn into a pumpkin."

Passing Richard, Jo reached over a talking boy and touched him. He turned, nodded, and went back to his beer. She went on, reassured. He'd call tomorrow or Sunday, depending on how things worked out for him.

Linda hailed a cab. "Let me, I just got paid.”

That was the last word she said until they were in front of Jo's building. She sat upright through the half-hour ride, holding her eyes wide as though she would be undone once they closed, letting her knee touch Jo's very lightly.

It was warm in the apartment. The first steam heat of the season sighed and rattled in the pipes. Linda slipped her jacket off and sat down in the deep chair, kicking off her loafers. "I can't stay long," she said.

Jo said, "That's all right."

"Debby's sick," Linda said. She stopped, and looked at Jo. "The girl that's staying with me. She's getting over a terrible hangover. Did you ever give anybody Antabuse?"

"I never did. I had a friend who took it, but he was in the hospital at the time."

"It's enough to make you sign the pledge."

"Reminds me—want a drink?”

"A very small one, or it'll put me to sleep."

Jo went into the kitchen, turned on the light and found the whiskey and two glasses. The glasses were a little dusty from disuse, so she wiped them out with a dish towel. Linda sat looking flustered, holding her untouched drink. Finally she said, "I couldn't speak to you the other day. Debby's terribly jealous and she'd been drinking. She came to the store in that rig and insisted on being taken to lunch. My supervisor's all right, a very understanding woman—usually they just send out for sandwiches, because noon's our busy time. I work at Vogue North, selling and some modelling."

That accounted for the air of elegant simplicity. Store discount, of course, and end of the season sales. Vogue North sold everything for the chic tailored woman, and Jo longed for but had never been able to afford one of their suits. She was glad to know that Linda was a working girl.

She could visualize the scene. Debby showing up, loaded and noisy, practically in drag, demanding to see Linda no matter what she happened to be doing at the time, demanding to be taken to the ultra-conservative Manchester House. The other models and saleswomen watching, drawing their own conclusions. And Linda carrying off the whole thing as no one else could have done.

She felt a little sick, as though it had happened to her.

"She’ll do it once too often," Linda said, closing her eyes, "and I’ll lose my job. Then we’ll both go hungry." She opened her eyes again and looked at Jo. "If I'd spoken to you she'd have made a scene. Anybody at all, but especially an attractive woman."

"Thanks."

"Besides," Linda said, smiling a little now, "I didn't want to embarrass you in front of your girl."

"She's not my girl, I just work with her.”

"But you'd like her to be."

"I guess so."

"Is she gay?"

Jo was silent.

Linda said, "I can almost always tell. Don't ask me how, but I can. Not any of the ways you read about in books, it's something I can't explain."

"And?"

"I think this one would be a fast learner."

"I can tell sometimes, not always." Jo held her glass up to the light. It was a lovely pale clear color, almost no color at all. "Even if there's no percentage in it," she said in a low voice, "I can't help it."

Linda took a very small sip of her drink. Her face was impassive. "I like you," she said. "Usually I can't get away. But when I can, when Debby goes out to see her family in the suburbs, for example, could I come and see you?" She looked at the floor. "I feel I can talk to you. And let's be honest, you make love beautifully. That was the first time in months—" She stopped. "I wasn't going to tell you that"

“I know," Jo said. She thought about the months when she had given Karen everything she had, when all her patient wooing and Karen's willingness to learn hadn't added up to anything but frustration for both of them. “I do know. You make love beautifully too. It isn't that good very often."

"You don't think it would be wrong? Debby and I aren't really married or anything like that. She only moved in because she couldn't pay the rent on her apartment. She keeps getting fired."

"No," Jo said, "I don't think it would be wrong." She set her glass down, almost full, on the end table. She came to stand beside Linda, letting her hands rest on the other girl's shoulders. Linda's skin felt smooth and warm through the cotton shirt. She breathed a light clean fragrance—not perfume, maybe an expensive soap. Her bosom, slight but feminine, rose proudly, the buds standing out. Jo knew how it would look when she took off the shirt. She knew Linda's skin was like warm silk to touch, and exciting to the lips. She knew the sweet vaselike curve of Linda's hips.

Jo shivered. She managed to say, "Maybe it's selfish, because I'm not going with anybody right now, but I think it would be good for both of us."

"It's too bad we can't ever have anything permanent," Linda said in a light ironic voice. "We never will, you know. We're the kind of fools that go through life supporting other people. I get awfully tired of it sometimes."

"Do you really have to be home by twelve?"

"I really do. Debby had a sleeping pill," Linda said, "and it’ll wear off around midnight and shell wake up scared to death. That's the last stage, after all the vomiting and chills." She moved her shoulders restlessly under Jo's hands, which tightened. "I ought to throw her out," she said. "Only you can't do that to people. Can you? She suffers so—she has nightmares and screams in her sleep, she sits on the floor and cries."

Jo said, "The trouble with us is, we're strong. Everybody takes advantage of us. My last girl moved in when she was out of work; she didn't even look for a job until she made up her mind to leave me."

But she didn't want to think about Karen, not now with Linda's body leaning back against her. She moved a hand down Linda's shirt collar, and undid the top button. Her cheek lay against Linda's black hair. It smelled clean and sunshiny, as though she had dried it outdoors in the wind. Impossible in this town, of course. Jo said, "Do you want to do anything? Are you too tired?"

"You know what I'd like? I'd like to lie still and have you love me. With your hands and your mouth." Linda smiled a little. "I haven't slept at all for the last two nights, but I'd like that."

"Come on, then. The bed's all made up."

"You won't let me sleep too long?"

Jo took off the shirt. Naked from the waist up, Linda turned and leaned against her soft breasts. "No," Jo said gently, "I won't let you sleep too long. Lie down, let me make you happy."

An hour later, lying with Linda's head against her, hearing Linda's light even breathing, she told herself this wouldn't be the last time. At least, she hoped not. Don't look ahead, she reminded herself, shifting so Linda wouldn't be cramped or crowded in the bed. Don't look back either. Take it the way it comes, that's the only thing to do.

And don't think about Karen. Or Betsy, either.

She felt wide awake, and sharply aware of her own body's needs. She wished that Linda would wake up and lay a hand on her own aching and hungry flesh. But she lay still, cradling the other girl and looking into the darkness.

CHAPTER 13

In spite of her good resolutions, she fell into a light sleep around eleven. A few minutes later she woke, frightened and uncertain, to the ringing of the telephone. Linda lay against her, sleeping soundly. Jo disentangled herself as gently as possible and hurried to answer, stumbling against a chair and scraping her shin. Betsy, maybe.

She knew as soon as she heard the voice, heavy, authoritative, bored. A desk sergeant's voice. "You Josephine Bates? We got a man here that says he's your cousin. Name of," she could hear the rustling of papers as he checked it, "Richard Kauffman. That right?"

"Yes, it is." She held herself stiff for the rest of it. Hit and run, maybe, or a traffic accident—but she was afraid she knew. The vice squad had been busier than usual lately, raiding suspect bars, taking in employees and customers alike. She waited, with her eyes on the bedroom door behind which Linda lay asleep.

"He wants you to raise bail for him. We got him here on a Section Thirty-seven."

"What's that?"

"Crime against nature," the officer said, sounding embarrassed.

Jo snickered. She couldn't help it, the whole thing was so grotesque and at the same time so frightening. "I don't know, I've never had anything like this happen before. How much bail will he need?"

"Five hundred, probably. They'll let them out in the morning, fix a time for the trial later."

"Shall I call you back?"

"Don't bother. Just show up in the Twelfth Street station tomorrow morning at nine o'clock." The cop had slipped back into his routine boredom. "Have somebody prepared to sign his bail bond. You can get a professional bondsman if you want to. Case'll come up in a couple weeks, maybe a month."

She hung up, beginning to tremble. Her bank book was in the top desk drawer. Without looking, she knew that she had less than thirty dollars on deposit. The rent would be due on payday. Linda—no, Linda was supporting her drunken Debby. She turned on the desk lamp and pulled out the small notebook in which she kept addresses. Harris, Marjorie Mary. A private listing, of course; that was the only way you could avoid friends or enemies, and Mag had plenty of both. God, Jo prayed, please let her be in that fancy high rise apartment. Please let her be sober.

She gripped the handset so tightly that her knuckles ached, listening to the faraway ringing at the other end of the line.

"Hello?"

Thank God. Jo said sharply, "Mag, this is Jo Bates. The law and order boys are all over the place tonight They've picked Rich up on a thirty-seven."

"Where? Who was with him?"

"I don't know a thing about it. The fuzz just called. I was at The Spot with Rich earlier, but I don't know that he stayed there. He wants me to find somebody who will put up bail for him, they'll let him go in the morning."

"Good God," Mag said in her rich contralto, "the boys get the bad end of the stick every time, don't they? Wait a minute."

There was silence. Jo could see her pondering, her large shapeless body wrapped in one of the rich brocade dressing gowns she loved, her untidy gray head bent. Probably had to put her glasses on to find the phone, near-sighted as she was. Pencil in her hand—that was the old newspaper girl, get the story on paper and be sure you spell the names right. After what seemed like an endless wait, during which the clock hands moved steadily and Linda slept, Mag said cheerfully, "I’ll call Emily Fosgett and ask her about bail. She can also tell us how to go about getting the charges dismissed."

"All I know," Jo said guardedly, "he's at the Twelfth Street station and they'll probably set five hundred dollars bail."

"Will his analyst testify that he's had therapy? You know, these poor misguided people aren't bad, they're just sick."

"Testify him right out of a job. There's no way this can be kept out of the papers, is there? He’ll be fired if it makes the papers, even if they clear him."

"Look," Mag said, "I’ll cut over to Emily's. She's home, I know, because she's having a party. She asked me, but I'm fighting the virus flu. Want to come along?"

"I have a girl here who has to be home by midnight."

"One of those, huh? Come on, I'll drop Cinderella wherever she's going. I guess my pumpkin will hold three."

Heaven bless Mag, Jo thought, she always knows exactly what to do and she always does it, too. She dressed quickly, putting on her frilliest blouse, adding earrings and a bracelet. Look as feminine as possible. Nothing like having a flock of Lesbians come busting in to rescue you, when you're fighting a morals charge. I look like a goddam Christmas tree.

She turned on the burner under the coffeepot and stood jiggling with impatience while it heated. When it began to steam she poured a cup and took it into the bedroom. "Darling, wake up, you have to go home."

Linda was used to mobilizing in a hurry. She sat up, rubbed her eyes, reached for the coffee and took a long swallow before she said a word. "What's the matter? You're all dressed up."

"One of my best friends is in jail. I've got to go and see somebody who can bail him out."

"Anything I can do? No—Debby's home alone."

"Mag Harris is coming over. She’ll drop you off."

Linda's eyes widened. "The columnist? Is she gay?"

"Used to be, I guess. I'm not sure. She's the kind of big-hearted gal who runs around in the middle of the night getting people out of jail, anyhow. She has pull, too."

Linda got out of bed. "I guess all minorities stick together. Ought to, anyway. The trouble is telling who your lodge brothers are."

Jo went back to the kitchen, poured the rest of the coffee and drank it standing. "I'm sorry to get you involved in this. It’ll work out all right, though."

"Is this the man I saw you with at The Spot? What happened, did they raid it?"

"I don't know. The fuzz won't give out any information unless they can hurt your feelings with it—not unless they think you're going to slip them twenty."

"Oh, you know there's no graft here since that politician took over. He cleaned up the bingo games—you can't buy package liquor before twelve noon on Sundaysman, this is a moral town." Linda fluttered her eyelids.

"There's a car stopping." Jo put her cup down. "Come on, get your shoes on and let's go. It's quarter of."

Linda stepped into her loafers, stuffing her stockings into her pocket, "Got your keys?"

Mag, peering through her glasses at them, looked like somebody's grandmother in from the country. Cushiony, untidy, with a small black hat crammed down on her mass of white hair and her feet in arch support oxfords. Jo said, "Mag, this is Linda," and caught the familiar reaction: surprise, then polite blankness. Linda said, "I read your column all the time."

"Can't tell a thing by looks, can you?" Mag slapped Jo on the shoulder. "She belong to the club?"

"Sure."

"You never know."

Linda's smile was full of memories. Mag chuckled. "Not that it's any laughing matter. Where do you want to go, doll?"

Linda gave the address. "I'm sorry to make all this bother for you."

"No trouble. Not unless the cab drivers' union gets after me for not paying my dues. I do this all the time."

Linda's block was dark. Mag said, "We'll wait till you're in," and settled back behind the wheel. Linda leaned to kiss Jo and then ran up the steps, keychain dangling from her hand. The door swallowed her up.

"What's the deal?"

"Her girl's getting over a binge. Alcoholic.”

One of those, huh? Waste of girlpower." Mag drove the way she wrote, not the way she looked. The car careened around a corner and settled back on all four wheels, and Jo sighed. Mag said, unruffled, "Let me tell you something, baby, there's nothing in this one-night-stand business. Find yourself a nice congenial girl and get married. It's the only way."

"Find me one. Hell, find me a couple and let me take my pick."

"What's wrong with this one?"

Jo's smile was sour. "According to her, we're both strong people. That makes us natural fall guys for any slob that comes along. She could be right."

"Sure. There's always something the matter with your girls, either they're frigid or they can't hold a job—it's a wonder you haven't had a drunk or a dope addict. I've wanted to tell you for a long time, don't be a masochist There's nothing but grief in it."

"That's easy to say."

"Too bad I'm not twenty years younger. I'd take you on myself."

"Just say when, Mag. I'm willing."

Mag laughed. Like her pink and white skin, her laugh was young. "I'll be sixty-two on my next birthday, Josephine. That's a little too much difference. Besides, I get the most godawful backache when I exercise."

"Mag, how about Rich's bail? Have these people got that kind of money?"

"First, they've got it. Second, they won't lose it unless Richard jumps bail, which I don't see him doing. The main reason I thought about Emily," Mag said, whamming on the brakes for a red light and almost sending Jo through the roof, "she may be able to keep the thing from coming to trial. She has loads of money and she's related to one of the important aldermen. Besides, she's married to Kingsley Fosgett, the architect. Between them, they know everyone."

"The one who designed the Scott Building?"

"Yeah You'll love Kingsley, she's just a sweet, great big girl."

Jo's head ached. So did her arms and legs; she'd lain unmoving for almost an hour while Linda slept. She sat motionless while Mag got out of the car. "Come on, come on, don't just sit there," Mag said brusquely. "Sooner we get at this, sooner it’ll be over."

The Fosgetts were having a real party. A brawl, Jo thought, wanting to put her hands over her ears as the double doors of the studio opened and the noise broke over them. There was a record player going in a far corner of the room, and two boys were sitting on the floor just inside the door, playing bongos. A dozen different conversations rose and broke around the musicians without disturbing them. It was deafening.

Emily Fosgett came to meet them. She was about Mag's age, but slender to the point of being haggard, curled, creamed, powdered and decked with jewels that looked real and probably were. There was even gilt dust sprinkled in her carefully arranged hair. She wore an evening dress of fuchsia satin, cut low over her bony collarbone and flat chest. Jo though she looked like an intelligent, aging man in drag.

She said without wasting any time on greetings, "Come in King's study and well see what we can do. Then you girls can have something to drink and meet some of the people."

"Have to go home, Em. I've got a hell of a cold, sore throat and everything."

"You need a drink, that's the thing for a cold." The study walls and ceiling were lined with acoustic . Perhaps, Jo thought, the Fosgetts gave parties often. They sat down. Mrs. Fosgett said, "I called the station soon as you hung up. King's got a man on the vice detail. Only way to keep track of what goes on."

"What's the story?"

"The man—your cousin—was picked up in a place on North Clark, the Happi Time. It's a hangout for rough trade, apparently. He had too much to drink, let a stranger pick him up, and when they got outside—"

"Cop, of course."

"What else?"

"The bastards," Mag said. "The goddam town's full of murder and rape and gang wars. Five thousand kids in the Cobras—the cops are afraid of them. You can buy H or M anywhere. It's not safe for a woman to go out on the streets after dark in any residential neighborhood. And what are the police doing? Trapping homos and taking bribes."

"Keeping a lot of sweet little old ladies from playing bingo, and banning Sartre from the movie features."

"If he'd picked up a kid, or raped somebody—"

Jo laughed. The idea of Rich forcing anybody to do anything was too much. Mag grinned. "Let's quit worrying about the decline and fall of western civilization and get the man out."

"The bail's no problem. The money's available—in cash; King always keeps a little on hand for emergencies. Stay away from the commercial bail places, they're honest enough but why pay their rates? Jo, you be at the station house by nine sharp. If you're lucky they may get around to him by afternoon. Court doesn't convene on Sunday. They'll set his bond and let him go." She gave Jo an appraising look. "Wear that outfit, dear. You look so straight it makes me sick."

Mag said, worried, "The rough part will be keeping it out of the papers."

"We'll get to work on that later. One thing at a time." Jo said, "I don't think he has a record."

"Good, then he can plead that it was all a misunderstanding. The man invited him out for a drink, or something, and he didn't know the score. That's if it comes to trial, which we hope it won't." Emily Fosgett looked at her sharply "What does he do?"

"Real estate."

"Could be worse. He could be a teacher—or a minister." She drew a finger across her throat. "Christ, imagine putting your heart's blood into a career and then having it all torn apart by some fool thing like this."

There was a tap at the door. Emily pulled it open. A short rosy-faced man with a crest of white hair came in. His round tummy was tucked into a magnificent brocaded cummerbund, his dinner jacket was of Italian silk, his studs were of smoky pearl. Emily looked at him fondly. "Mag, you know King. Jo, this is my husband."

"Delighted to have you here, but I'm sorry your friend's in trouble." Kingsley Fosgett gave the impression of bowing without actually doing so. "I don't know what you drink, but I brought you both gin and tonic. That's Mag's tipple. If you want something different, I’ll get it."

"Gin and tonic's fine, thanks," Jo said, giving him her best smile. "I'm beginning to feel better about Rich."

"It's a rough world for people like us. That's why Em and I decided to stick together. We've been married almost twenty years and it seems to be working, she's a good girl to have around and every now and then we take a vacation together. Most married couples need vacations from each other, you know. We may run over to India this winter."

"I'm for marriage," Emily said firmly. "If you can find somebody who thinks the same way you do, it's the best answer."

Mag took a glass. "Not for me. I'm such a slob no man could possibly live in the same house with me. How about you, Jo?"

"I can see bringing my girls home to a third-floor walkup, with a husband underfoot"

"What do you do?"

"Editor on a crummy little magazine.”

"Ever do any free-lance work?"

"When I can get it. Editing doesn't pay so very well."

"Call me up some day next week. I have a friend who may want somebody to write his life story for him."

"Thanks."

"Not at all. Mag will give you my office number. Now why don't you girls come in and join the madhouse?"

"How about it, Jo?"

Jo blinked. "If I'm going to be in court at nine I'd better get some sleep. It's almost two o'clock."

"I've got a flu bug myself." Mag got up with surprising agility considering her size. She shook hands with Kingsley Fosgett, who stood beaming at her like a secular Santa Claus, and kissed Emily's cheeks in European style. Emily said, "Call me as soon as your friend is booked. They'll let him out on bail, no questions asked."

"I'll go to court with the kid. Moral support." Mag laid a plump hand on Jo's arm. "Come on, kid, let's roll."

Nobody paid any attention to them as they picked their way through the party. You could strip naked on the Oriental rugs, Jo thought, and you wouldn't get more than a glance from any of these people. It was a crazy world, exotic and fascinating. Fun to peek into it—but she thought with longing of her own small apartment.

Speeding through the dark, she sat silently trying to figure things out. Finally she said, "Mag, why do they always pick up the fellows? I've never heard of a girl being arrested this way. In raids, yes. Jeannine was in a raid once. But trapping people—"

"A lot of people don't even know that women do these things. Say ‘homosexual,' and nine people out of ten think about men." Mag's voice was matter-of-fact, as though she'd known for a long time that it was like this. "It's all right for girls to share an apartment, and all that."

"Why not for men?"

"Sure, sure, it's a crazy world." Mag sneezed. "If it's all right with you, if you're not scared of my virus, I'll spend what's left of the night at your house. We've got about seven hours before we start singing those jailhouse blues."

"Poor Rich."

"They'll get him off. King Fosgett isn't just a damn good architect, he has connections. The worst that can happen to Richard is he might get fired."

"Did he mean it about ghosting a book?"

"Sure, why not? The people he knows are loaded. Why shouldn't you pick up a couple thousand? The thing is, can you fit it into evenings and weekends?"

"Sure." Jo considered. "If I had a little extra money I could do something nice for Betsy."

"Take my advice," Mag said harshly, "and let Betsy do something nice for you. She'll appreciate you more."

"You're so cynical."

"You wouldn't think it to look at me," Mag said, "but I didn't use to be a bad-looking broad. If I were twenty years younger I'd seduce the hell out of you."

Jo giggled. "You'll be the second woman to share my bed tonight," she said, laying a hand on Mag's broad shoulder, "and nobody's made a pass at me yet. I would be better off in a girl's school."

"Better, indeed. You'd have more opportunity and less competition. On second thought," Mag said,. taking a hand from the steering wheel to pat Jo's knee, "you better stay in the world. You look so good in pants."

CHAPTER 14

"Gee, you look tired," Gayle said. Her soft dimpled face long with concern, she looked at Jo as though she were seeing her for once. "Don't you feel good, or something?”

"Just a little tired," Jo said. Thinking, I must look like Frankenstein's monster if that one notices anything.

"You must have had a big weekend." Gayle turned the diamond on her finger, smiling secretly. Three years of going together, always teetering on the edge of fulfillment and then pulling back because of moral and religious scruples, had turned most of her thoughts to sex. Everything revolved around the day, less than two months away, when the waiting would be over and she'd know.

Jo went back to her own office without bothering to answer. Gayle was being polite. She didn't really give other people credit for having any personal life. If she thought about it at all, which was unlikely, she pictured washing out her nylons, going to the supermarket, maybe taking in a movie at the neighborhood theatre for excitement. What a nice peaceful idea that is, Jo thought, hanging up her topcoat and unbuttoning her jacket in preparation for the day's work. She and Mag had spent Sunday morning at the old Twelfth Street station, which smelled even worse than most city police stations, waiting while a thin crabbed-looking officer talked in a low voice to assorted people. A bony young fellow who identified himself only as Galloway showed up, handed the officer an envelope, and sat down beside Mag to wait. Someone the Fosgetts knew, Jo supposed—Mag raised an eyebrow at the sight of him but offered no introduction. It was all so casual that Jo couldn't quite believe the stories she had heard, of beating and brutal interrogations, of suspects kicked and slapped around. Outside the sun was shining, people walked freely in the streets, women ambled home from eight-o'clock Mass.

Finally she was called to sign some papers, which she did without reading them because she was so nervous her eyes would not focus. Then Rich came in through a side door with a policeman beside him. He looked as he always did, except that he needed a shave. He signed something too, and they walked down the corridor together and out into the noise of the street. Galloway had disappeared somewhere. It was all so simple that Jo felt it couldn't possibly be legal.

"Every time I'm in this place," Mag said, "I swear I’ll never break another law." She looked gratefully at an old man in a tattered army overcoat, who was going systematically through a trash barrel at the curb. "Or at least I'll try not to get caught."

Jo said blankly, "What do we do now?"

Mag sneezed. "I'm going to have a nice long drink. It’ll either clear up the infection or knock me out, and I don't care which."

Rich said, "I thought I'd buy you girls some breakfast."

How does he know we haven't eaten? Of course, Jo thought, he wouldn't be able to enjoy food if he had a friend in jail, so he figures we can't either. Right, too. She thought of coffee and sighed. Mag said hastily, "I'm taking you both to breakfast. I'm loaded today, got the royalties on my book last week, I don't want to hear any arguments."

They sat at a marble-topped table in a combination drugstore and lunchroom on Sixty-third Street, a neighborhood that was unfamiliar to Jo, but Mag knew the counter boy and the woman behind the cash register. Mag knew people everywhere. Two women in Sunday clothes were having waffles and coffee at the next table, their religious obligations behind them and a long sunny day ahead. Three young men in handsome sweaters came in together and sat down near them. Richard looked them over with interest, caught Jo looking at him, and grinned. "All I want is coffee and sleep. Jo, can I come to your house and sleep?"

"Why not? Everybody else does.”

Mag chuckled. "And not a lay in a carload. The kid spends her life ministering to the sick, the poor, the huddled masses yearning to breathe free."

"Oh, shut up." Jo felt her face get hot. "Besides, I offered and you turned me down. My feelings are hurt."

"Don't think I couldn't teach you a thing or two." Mag smiled at the waitress. "Hello, Marge. We want scrambled eggs and Canadian bacon, toasted pecan rolls and lots of toast, coffee, a whole pot of coffee, and orange juice. That all right?"

"Mag, for Christ's sake, I'd die if I ate all that.”

"All right, Rich and I will eat your share." But when the food came she was ravenous. She started to laugh, feeling that things were going to turn out all right after all. "I'm sorry, I'm a little light-headed, I guess."

Rich said, "That's all right, I feel pretty good myself. Except that I'll have to go to court in a few weeks."

Mag forked up a mouthful of eggs. "Our friends are working on it. I don't think this will come to trial."

"Seems unethical."

"Unethical hell. You can't be ethical with a steam roller, you just get out of its way before it mashes you to a pulp."

Rich's eyes were half shut before he finished his second cup of coffee. He looked older, his pupils bloodshot, his face strained under his artificial tan. Jo said, "Let's get going. I can't carry this big lug upstairs and he’ll never make it by himself.''

"I need a shave." He rubbed his chin. "Jo, you got a razor you shave your legs with, or whatever the hell it is girls do with razors? If I could shave and have a shower, I'd sleep all day."

So the guy turns out to be a prophet, Jo thought an hour or so later, looking up from her book at the large bump under the blanket. A fine way to spend Sunday afternoon—reading, not daring to get up and rattle a few dishes because someone's asleep in your bed. Good old Aunt Jo, dedicated to charity and chastity, while everybody you know moves in.

At least, she thought, they don't all demand clean sheets. How many people's germs are fighting it out on that pillowcase? Mine and Linda's—but our germs are all homogenized by this time anyhow. Anybody else I can invite to the party?

She tiptoed into the bedroom. He didn't open his eyes, but he put out a wavering hand and she took it. His fingers closed around her thumb and held on. She sat down carefully on the side of the bed, hoping not to wake him. After a minute or two she dropped the book and stretched out beside him, and he disentangled his arm and threw it over her. It felt rather good. She shut her eyes and went to sleep.

How pleased Gayle would be to know that I spent Sunday in bed with a man, she thought smiling. She got up from her desk and walked to the window, thinking once more about the circumstances of Rich's arrest and the incongruity of it: that such a thing could happen. This big, patient, generous man with the compassionate heart and open hand, a lawbreaker. But that's because the laws are stupid, she reminded herself. Any relationship between consenting adults is their own affair, but the law doesn't admit that, the law reaches into the most delicate and meaningful human relations with a big dirty hand and kills everything that's good.

She had to admit that Rich had been indiscreet. Soon after she walked out of The Spot with Linda he apparently decided that there was nothing for him. He drifted on to the Happi Time, which she had never heard of because it was an all-male bar and you didn't know about those places unless you belonged. She didn't suppose there were twenty straight people in the city who could tell you the location of a single gay bar—except the members of the vice squad, who staged raids at irregular intervals, often around the first of the month or before the Grand Jury convened.

But Rich had known. Had been there before, probably. He'd gone in and ordered beer; and after the first three or four, beer was as lethal as whiskey where Rich was concerned. The rest was easy to reconstruct. A man sat down beside him, drifted into conversation, suggested that they go out for a walk or even, perhaps, to his room. He must have been good, perhaps even one of the boys turned informer, because as a rule Rich was cautious. By this time, though, his guard was down and he was taken in by the guy's technique.

Damn that Michael, she thought savagely. It was not really Michael's fault, she couldn't blame him for leaving Rich if he found somebody he liked better. She resented him just the same. Any punk who hurt Rich was hurting her too. She'd blame Michael if she felt like it.

She made a mental note to call Rich later in the day and see how he was getting along. If he hadn't been fired by this time he probably wouldn't be—not unless the case made the papers. But even if his job were safe, he would be feeling terrible, not so much about the arrest as because of Michael's defection. She remembered how it had been when Karen left: after the first shock wore off she went around as though someone had hit her over the head, too shocked for feeling.

It was Rich who put her to bed then, sat beside her and held her hand and talked to her until she felt better. One good turn deserves another.

Standing there watching the traffic flow past, she came back to the present and the office. Something was missing—Stan was later than usual for one thing. Maybe his mother had a fatal stroke or something, she though hopefully. She wandered out into the aisle with a handful of papers so that she would seem to be working, not snooping, if he had come quietly in and gone to work. But his office was empty. So was Betsy's. She asked Gayle, "Stan call in, or anything?"

"He's got the virus."

"How about Betsy?"

"Not yet, but it's Monday morning. I almost didn't come in myself. Me and Eddie went to a party—"

Jo stood unhearing while she went on and on. When the words stopped, she nodded. "Okay, we'll do the best we can."

For just a second, hearing that it was Stan and not his mother who was sick, she had felt a pang of relief. But why? She didn't have any reason to love the old lady, knowing what havoc she'd worked in her son's life. Better she should die and leave him free to court a girl, and marry.

So that was it.

Sure, if Stan was free he'd probably grab the first woman who was available and reasonably attractive. Meaning, as of right now, Betsy. Betsy was no doubt beginning to feel out of the social swim without a man, even if men didn't appeal to her physically. Jo doubted that anyone appealed to her physically; she had never been awakened. Like many another women, Betsy probably felt that what happened between two people in bed took only a short time and was a small price to pay for security and acceptance. Even if her Chuck hadn't been too good at the "normal" life, she knew what to expect from a husband. It was endurable. And as for Stan, he was panting to get married.

I know I haven't got a chance, Jo admitted. But as long as she's free I'm going to keep on trying.

She went back to the office and forced herself to go over the first folio of Topix with close attention. Usually several glaring mistakes hit her in the eye as soon as she opened the pages. This morning she looked mechanically down the printed columns without making sense of anything she read. She was tired and worried—and apprehensive. And hungry for love; not just for sex, although she had reached the point where the thought of Betsy produced an immediate and appreciable physical reaction, but love.

She knew that Mag was right. The solution was to find a good steady girl, who wasn't frigid or alcoholic or any more neurotic than the average run of human beings. Somebody warm and intelligent who would be glad to settle down and make a home. This would be about as easy as finding uranium in the back yard.

Sure, she knew couples who had been together four, five, even six years, girls who seemed to be faithful to each other, who didn't drink too much, who paid their bills and went on vacations together and were concerned with the everlasting female business of making a home. When they gave a party, it was for people they liked. They had, or hoped they had, a future. It sounded good. But where do you find someone like that?

Mag would have been a great girl to take on, say thirty years ago. Humorous, ambitious in her work and good at it but not dominated by the job. She'd have been off on assignments much of the time, preventing the boredom and friction that come from being together too much. Jo would have kept the household going and helped earn the living. And at night they would have found pleasure and comfort in each other's arms. But Mag was sixty-two. Thirty years ago, Jo's parents had been on their honeymoon.

Rich laughed at her for believing in romance, but a homosexual woman was still a woman, with the same psychology as the others. It wasn't enough to look for excitement; she wanted something more durable. And just now she was head over heels with Betsy Considine, who didn't even know that Jo wanted herwho was involved with their employer. Some office triangle, Jo thought. They ought to make a movie out of it.

Betsy came in around eleven. She sailed past Gayle without a word, ignored the two empty offices and came back to stand in Jo's doorway. Jo said, "For heaven's sake come in and sit down, it's bad enough to have Stan holding up the woodwork." She noticed that the girl's face was swollen and unhappy. "What's the matter, flu bug bit you too?"

"Guess so."

"Well, you're in good company. Here, have a Kleenex." Betsy perched on the edge of the visitor's chair, began to cry. "Blow your nose.”

“I'm sorry.”

“Nothing to be sorry about. Flu makes you feel terrible.” Provide her with an excuse if she needs one. “Why don’t you go home and take some aspirin and go to bed?”

"I’ll be all right in a minute."

Sure, sit there and breathe on me. That's all I need right now, a good case of virus flu. The back of her throat was beginning to itch, her sinuses felt stuffy—or was that her imagination? She decided not to make a diagnosis until she'd had eight hours' sleep. There wasn't anything she could do about it if she did get sick.

She folded her hands on the desk, like a teacher hearing a recitation, and waited.

"I've got to talk to somebody," Betsy said. "You don't talk about people, I noticed that." She looked at Jo timidly, but with courage. Jo said,

"Okay, go ahead," with no special sympathy.

"Not here, somebody might hear."

There was nobody here but Gayle making a long telephone call to one of her bridesmaids, but Jo knew what Betsy meant. An office is no place for confidences; gossip and clothes chatter, yes, but nothing that matters. She said, "All right, let's go out and have a cup of coffee. Things are slow this morning anyway."

It was a lie, but it seemed more reasonable to be leaving the office if there was nothing much to be done. She wanted a drink. She wasn't a heavy drinker, but there were times when a drink came in handy and this looked like one of them. Instead, she took Betsy to the corner drugstore, ordered two coffees and watched while they put cream and sugar in hers, as though she might have been mixing hemlock. There was a self-conscious silence. Jo took a sip of her black brew, decided that hemlock would have been an improvement. She said. "Go ahead, what's biting you?"

"Well," Betsy said. Apparently she had prepared her story before coming in, but it hadn't done any good; she couldn't get it out. She looked past Jo at a case full of hot-water bottles and enema syringes. “You know what happened when I went to Cal City that time?”

"You told me."

"He called me at my aunt's house last night," Betsy said, plunging in. "I wasn't expecting it Sunday night and all. He asked me if I'd go to the movies. I said I would—only I had to be in early." She looked at Jo. "There's no reason I shouldn't, is there? Nothing can happen to a person at the movies, out in a public place that way."

"So?"

"It was all right, he wasn't fresh or anything. I mean, like he put his arm around me, but everybody does that, you know what I mean?" Jo nodded. "Then afterwards he took me home. It was nice and warm out but he didn't mention parking or anything. I told him he had to go right straight home and he said sure, he would. It was all right."

Jo sat watching her, afraid to say anything now that she was under way.

“So," Betsy said in a rush, "he took me home and I told him not to come in. I said, ‘I’ll be all right, you don't have to come to the door,' but he came in with me and we sat down on the davenport for a while." Betsy's voice was so small Jo had to lean close to hear her. "I didn't want to make any fuss because I was afraid I'd wake up my aunt."

"And besides, you were enjoying it."

"Maybe I was. I like to be kissed. So pretty soon he started to unbutton the top of my dress, and I asked him not to, but he didn't pay any attention to me. I might just as well not have said anything. He fooled around a while—you know—and then he pulled my skirt up. And then he—"

She stopped, unable to say what had to be said.

"He screwed you. What were you expecting?”

Betsy gave her a miserable look.

"What's the matter, didn't you know how it's done? You've been married."

"Yes, but—"

"What?"

"I hated it." Betsy's cheeks were red. She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. "It was horrible. I always hated it when I was married too. I don't see how anybody likes it. Damn it, a man climbs on top of you and does that silly thing and then he gets up and goes away. Why do they talk like it's something wonderful?"

"I suppose it can be," Jo said slowly. Words she dared not say were trembling on the tip of her tongue. "That I the way it was with him?"

"Sure. He straightened up his clothes and went away. He didn't even kiss me good night" Betsy said angrily. "They get you all worked up to wanting-I don't know what, wanting something you never had. Then they do that and it's all over. I don't see what they get out of it."

I will be fair, Jo told herself firmly. "How long did all this take?" she wanted to know. "The actual lovemaking, I mean."

"A couple minutes. They make you think it's something big and wonderful, all the fuss they make about it.” Betsy's tears had stopped now. She reached for a paper napkin from the metal holder, blew her nose and sat upright, looking pugnacious.

Jo said slowly, "Maybe it's different for men. They get everything they want in just a few minutes. A woman takes a lot of getting ready for love. Not just kissing, butother things. Smart men know that, the ones that have had a lot of experience, they do all the things that make you feel good." She stopped. Betsy's eyes met hers, troubled and curious, and skeptical too.

Betsy said, "I don't like men. I don't like the way they smell or the things they do when they kiss you. It embarrasses me to look at one with his clothes off. I feel ashamed just thinking about it."

Jo said, "Betsy, women know about this too. If a girl loved you she'd do all sorts of things to make you happy. Don't you know this?"

"I've heard about people like that." Betsy looked at the tabletop. "I always wondered. I mean, when I was in high school I had an awful crush on one of the girls in my gym class, and one day she kissed me. We were dressing in the locker room. I don't know—" She trailed off. "I thought about it a lot. It made me feel funny."

So what am I supposed to do now, draw her a diagram? Jo said dryly, "Well, there are a hundred things a man can do to make you feel good. If he'll take the time and patience for it. A woman can do ninety-nine of them better. Because she knows how you feel, she's not just thinking about herself, she wants to make you really happy."

"I still don't see it."

"Just take my word."

Betsy was silent. Jo stirred her coffee, not because there was anything in it that required stirring but because it gave her something to do. She said gently, "Don't worry about it, you'll be all right."

“I hate Stan. I don't ever want to see him or talk to him again."

"Why don't you quit? You're young and nice-looking, you won't have any trouble getting another job."

"I'm going to. Only," Betsy said in a whisper, "he didn't do anything to keep from getting me in trouble. Suppose I have a baby? I’ll have to marry him."

"Do you want to marry him?"

"Oh, God, no, I'd rather die."

"Then you don't have to. Besides," Jo said, hoping she was right, "It hardly ever happens. Don't worry about it.

Betsy said, "I was so scared I didn't sleep all night.”

That makes two of us, Jo thought. It's practically a lost art. Before she could stop herself, she said. "Why don't you come over to my place and take a nap? I'm going home this afternoon. I don't feel so well myself."

"I don't want to be a bother."

"You won't be any bother. Come on." If Mag's running a taxi service, I'm running a high-grade hotel. She could see the apartment as she had left it that morning, promising herself a good cleaning-up after work. Rich's whiskers scumming the bathroom basin, damp towels on the floor, the bed unmade and a two-day supply of coffee cups in the sink. The sheets were ready to walk to the laundromat all by themselves. The bed hadn't been made since Friday night—no, Saturday morning. A mess.

She said again, "Come on. We’ll call Gayle and tell her I'm sick and you're taking me home. Or vice versa. She'll be alone in the office, she won't do any work—oh well, it doesn't matter."

"All right."

Betsy waited outside the door while Jo paid the check. Damn it, Jo thought, I'm tired too. Touch me with the tip of a finger and I’ll fall over. Why in hell doesn't somebody tuck me in once in a while? I'd like a friendly shoulder to cry on, too.

She didn't have money for a cab, so they went down the long double flight of steps into the station and waited a few minutes for a train. Some courtship. No soft lights, no wine, no music, and the girl doesn't even know I'm chasing her. Both of us bleary-eyed and all pooped out.

She held out her strip ticket to be punched. It's the best I can do right now, she assured herself. If it's not good enough then I'm sorry, but it's the best I have and it'll have to do. If she wants soft lights and music she's out of luck.

They got on the train and sat without speaking all the way to Fifty-third Street. Jo's eyes kept falling shut. She pried them open by pure will power and kept changing her range of vision, to stay awake. All I want is to sleep around the clock, she thought. She sat looking out of the train window, watching the back porches and fire escapes go by, conscious of Betsy dozing in the seat beside her and of the slow rise and fall of Betsy's breathing.

CHAPTER 15

At least she was getting her money's worth out of that damned expensive bed, but in what a platonic way. She shook her head to get rid of the buzzing in her ears, a product of fatigue, flu and the whiskey she'd polished off around two a.m., while Rich was snoring with his head on this very pillow. She wished she could put her own head down and sleep for at least a week.

Betsy stood beside the window looking as though she wished she were somewhere else. She was probably sorry she'd told Jo her story and doubly sorry that she had accepted this invitation. It's not the kind of thing a girl goes around telling people, Jo thought, not until she reaches the age where a ten-minute workout on the davenport seems like something to brag about.

She said as calmly as she could, "Hop into bed, and I'll bring you some Seconal."

"I don't need anything. I'm a terribly heavy sleeper."

"That's all right, you'll sleep better with a pill, and wake up feeling better too."

The blue pajamas were in the bottom drawer, washed, ironed and folded away for an overnight guest. Jo got them out, together with a pair of knitted stretch socks her aunt had sent at Christmas time. Even a girl who sleeps au naturel ought to keep pajamas on hand, she decided; made it easier when assorted people dropped in for the night. She handed the clothes to Betsy and withdrew to the bathroom, cleaned Richard's whiskery fuzz off the sides of the basin, put a new blade in the safety razor, picked up the soggy towel he'd draped over the tub and wiped up the floor. The room was now ready for the next invasion.

She ran a glass of cold water, found the barbiturate Rich's doctor had prescribed when she was getting over Karen, and sat on the john waiting modestly until she was sure Betsy had finished undressing.

Betsy swallowed the pill obediently, like a good child. This is getting to be a pattern, Jo thought. Betsy said, sitting up. "I feel so scared. Everything's happening so fast."

"It'll be all right. Go to sleep."

"Suppose I find out I'm pregnant? I might be pregnant right now."

"All right, it's a simple operation if you catch it early. Just takes a few minutes and everything's all right."

Betsy's eyes widened. "I don't think I can sleep. You won't go away, will you?"

"No, I'll be right here."

I'm too tired to move, Jo added, sinking down on the davenport and shutting her eyes. It was about noon, a strange time to be home from work. Outside, children from the grade school at the corner were coming home for lunch. She could hear their voices, fresh and clear. The building had the blank, alien feeling of daytime.

Jo turned, trying to find a comfortable position, feeling the ache in her neck and back. The little sleep she'd had the night before had been on the very edge of the mattress, with Rich's heavy arm flung over her body; no wonder the boys leave him, she thought, he's a diagonal sleeper.

Must call Rich. He’ll be missing Michael and worried about this jail bit. Maybe he’ll lose his job because of it. And I ought to call Mag and see how her cold is—and Mrs. Fosgett to thank her for everything. How does it feel to have that kind of money, that kind of influence? Plus a husband who likes you and leaves you free to live your own life.

Picking up the telephone took more energy than she had. She laid her cheek against the prickly upholstery and fell asleep.

She woke, disturbed by some movement in the room, and sat upright, trying to remember where she was and what had happened. Then her vision cleared, and she saw Betsy standing beside the bed. Jo asked, "What's the matter?"

"I feel so awful." Betsy shivered, although the room was stuffy. "I keep thinking about last night."

"Well, don't worry about it. Everything will work out all right."

"I feel sort of jumpy. As if something was going to happen, and I don't know what."

"Nothing's going to happen that you don't want to have happen."

"That's the trouble. I don't know what I want. I want something and I don't know what it is. Ever feel like that?"

"Look," Jo said, "you're tired and upset. Why don't you sleep it off?"

"I'd like to sleep." Betsy's heart-shaped face was vague with fatigue, the eyes swollen, the skin blotched with tears. She looked at Jo through the half-darkness. "Are you getting any sleep on that davenport?"

"More or less."

"Why don't you come to bed? It's a nice big bed.”

Sure is, Jo thought. That's why I bought it. She yawned. "Maybe I will, if it wouldn't keep you awake."

"I'd feel safer with you there."

This is great, Jo thought. Everyone feels safe with me around, but where's there any security for me? Who tucks me in and holds my hand and wipes my nose for me? She stripped off her dress, unhooked her bra and took it off and then, in deference to Betsy's idea of propriety, wriggled her slip straps up on her shoulders again. The bed was smooth now, with fresh sheets—must remember to go to the laundromat on Saturday. Jo pulled the top sheet and wool blanket up around her neck and lay still, careful not to touch Betsy.

The first effect of the sedative had worn off, and Betsy was wide awake and talkative. She moved around restlessly, stuck her feet out from under the covers, then turned over in search of a sleeping position that felt good. "I don't know what's the matter," she said sadly. "I feel jumpy, but why should I? Makes me feel so silly."

For two cents I'd tell you. Jo mumbled something meaningless and turned to face the room, her back to the other girl. But Betsy plunged like a porpoise. The covers pulled off. Oh, hell, Jo thought. At the moment she would have given up all her hope of love, present and future, for ten hours of uninterrupted sleep.

Betsy said in a small voice, "My head hurts."

"That's the pills."

"Well, I wish it would go away."

“Look, do you want me to rub your back? Maybe it would help you sleep."

"Okay."

Jo turned up the hem of the blue jacket—pajamas by courtesy of the management. (Let her give you something, Jo, there's no percentage in all this big-hearted stuff.) Betsy's skin was milk-white where it had been covered from the sun. Days on the beach had turned her skin creamy beige, not molasses-brown like Jo's back and arms, and the area covered by her bathing suit was smooth and white. She lay on her side, while Jo ran gentle fingertips from neck to waist. "Let me know if it's too much."

"Ooh, that feels good."

"Try to relax."

And try to relax yourself, Miss Bates. Remember, this kid is straight. Or at least, she doesn't know what she is. If she's anything.

"Jo.”

"Yeah?"

“What you said in the drugstore."

"What about?"

"Liking girls." Betsy burrowed her face in the pillow, like the proverbial ostrich. Her body tensed. Jo's fingers moved carefully, nape to waist, following the delicate ridge of the spine. Betsy asked, "Did you ever do it?"

"Sure."

"Is it fun?"

How do you answer that one? It's better than fun, it's the greatest happiness in the world when you have the right person. Jo sat still, her hand at the curve of Betsy's hip. "I think so."

"Would it be for me?"

"How do I know?"

"I used to wonder about it. There was this girl in high school." Betsy's voice dwindled off. She took a deep breath. "Do you want me to?"

"Look," Jo said. She closed her eyes to shut out the sight of Betsy's neck with the delicate little tendrils of hair against the creamy skin. "You're tired. Sure I'd like to. I like you." The understatement of the year, her mind jeered. "Look, I'm not going to rush you into anything and have you feeling sorry later. You get some sleep."

"I think I'd like to. What hurt could it do?"

How noble can you get? Jo sat up and swung her feet over to the floor. "Betsy, I've wanted to make love to you since the first time I saw you. But I don't want it to be for kicks, the way kids play doctor or smoke pot just to see what it's like. This isn't something I care to fool around with."

"Oh." Betsy sat up. Her face was that of a slapped child. Jo touched her hair. "You get some sleep now," she said. "Think it over. If you're interested, let me know. If you're not, then just don't bring it up again. Okay?"

"Where you going?"

"Back on the davenport. Get some sleep now, like a good kid."

The davenport had lumps in it. The blanket was one she'd used on the beach all summer; a few grains of sand fell out as she spread it. But it felt so good to lie down that nothing else mattered. She shut her eyes and lay still, listening to the rhythmic gurgle of the radiator.

She didn't know whether Betsy's courage or her curiosity would survive this emergency. She might wake feel-jug rested and self-assured, confident that she could manage Stan—or any other male who might conceivably he waiting for her. She might decide that her willingness had grown out of gratitude. She might conceivably be shocked, and thankful that her offer to do a thing she regarded as abnormal had been turned down. In that case, it would be all over.

I don't care, Jo thought. But she did care, achingly. She wanted Betsy, had wanted her since the day she walked into the office and found Betsy sitting there with her white-gloved hands folded so primly. But more than anything else, she wanted Betsy to make up her own mind. She wanted love, certainly. (She moved restlessly on the narrow space of the davenport, feeling desire stronger than fatigue.) But love is for adults. She wasn't going to hang on to a girl who was only half willing; Karen had taught her the futility of that.

This time she was out for a two-way relationship, Betsy would have to make her own decisions. Nothing real or lasting was possible unless it was on that basis. I won't settle for anything less, Jo thought.

She felt that this decision wasn't especially admirable. It was for her own sake as much as Betsy's that she wanted complete acceptance. She had done Karen an injustice, earning the living for both of them, babying her, making all the decisions, behaving in general as though Karen were a pretty doll, to be pampered and cuddled but not trusted. Granted that this was what Karen wanted, hadn't it been all wrong for both of them?

She fell asleep with the first words of a prayer in her mind, addressed to a God she had stopped believing in a few years back. Outside the wind blew, the sun shone, a few first leaves drifted down from the autumn trees, people went about their daytime business. It was two o'clock of a Monday afternoon in September.

CHAPTER 16

She hadn't stopped to think about the possibility of losing Betsy by this postponement, until after the words were spoken. It had been compulsive, a thing for which she could claim neither blame nor credit. Waking at her usual time, stiff and unrefreshed, depressed as she often was after a long sleep, she found Betsy gone. The blue pajamas lay neatly folded on the unmade bed.

That takes care of that, she thought. It was seven o'clock on Tuesday, a nothing sort of day, a gray hour. No telling when Betsy had left, but one thing was sure: she wouldn't have gone this way, without a word, if she'd been joyful over the prospect of being initiated into the mysteries of Lesbian love.

Jo made the bed, scoured the bathtub, crammed more clothes into the full hamper, and showered. As an afterthought, she cooked a good breakfast and ate it with appetite, even though she had supposed she wasn't hungry. It seemed unworthy to let the alimentary tract rule her emotions, but she decided that unhappy people skipped meals just because malnourishment helped them bang on to their misery. It was deplorable but understandable.

She put on her gray suit and the pleated white shirt, the silver cuff links, oval silver earrings, the new black pumps with teetering heels. She decided she wasn't a bad-looking wench considering what a crazy life she'd been leading. She had another cup of coffee, sitting on the step stool, waiting for it to be time to go to work.

She wondered if Betsy had squared things with her aunt, and whether she would really leave Topix, and whether Stan would be well enough to come back to work. She felt sure that his flu was remorse and not a virus.

Her head hurt, after almost sixteen hours of sleep. Apparently it didn't pay to lead a virtuous life.

The office was empty and quiet. She let herself in and tiptoed back to her own room, almost afraid to disturb the silence. Her desk stood as she had left it the day before, printed sheets spread out, pencils lying here and there. Gayle wasn't in yet and the telephone was silent. Jo went down to the fifth floor lunchroom and had a cup of coffee, sitting at the counter next to a thin gloomy man.

She thought about Linda, and realized that she didn't know Linda's last name or her home address. There was Vogue North, but they might be suspicious, and rightly, of strangers who called their employees to the phone but didn't know their names. She would have to wait.

She was tired of her job. She was tired to death of Topix and all the jolly little bits about who was engaged and married and having babies. Presumably it was important to the actors in these domestic dramas to be immortalized in type; she sympathized with the universal human desire to see one's name in print. She herself had high school annuals and family snapshots stored on a high closet shelf. But she was tired of other people's vital statistics.

She was tired of getting up at seven and drinking coffee in a rented kitchen, of catching the bus downtown and watching the days crawl toward payday. She was tired of loving girls in a world that expected women to love men, or at least go to bed with them. She was tired of the remnant of guilt she carried in the back of her mind all these years, that rose to nag her on rainy nights and dull Sundays. She was tired, period.

She could go to New York. It would be more of the same thing on a larger scale, but it would mean novelty: a different apartment, unfamiliar streets and the challenge of a new job. With part of her mind she clung to the known and familiar. The little waitress who served her lunch at least three days a week, the letterhead sheets in her second desk drawer were known. With another part, she longed for change.

For a long time she had supposed that only gay people felt like this. Not until a girl in an office where she worked slashed her wrists did she realize that depression was, as Jeannine said, a modern epidemic. It was part of being alive in a vast, mechanized, impersonal culture that made intimate association almost impossible, so that even two coming together in bed might be strangers to each other and therefore find no real pleasure or fulfillment in the closest of contacts. Everyone was lonely, bored and tired, and no one knew what to do about it.

This kind of thinking made her nervous. People in offices were supposed to work—at least, they were supposed to give the impression of working. She called Richard at his realty office and found him there early for once, feeling more cheerful. Mag had called to say that the charges against him were being withdrawn. The whole thing had been an embarrassing mistake; the police had dropped the matter. Jo wondered who had been paid and in what coin. Favors, probably. Operators like King Fosgett didn't stoop to vulgar bribery unless they had to.

"Of course it might come out some time in the future, but you learn to live with that," Rich said. He sounded muffled. Hearing the voices of his fellow workers in the background, she guessed that he had a hand cupped around the mouthpiece to keep the others from hearing. He said, "I'll see you in a day or two, darling," and hung up.

She called Mag's apartment and got no answer. Either Mag was out, in which case she felt better, or she had taken a sleeping pill (or a good slug of gin) and was too far gone to wake—in which case she didn't care how she felt. Jo considered and rejected the possibility that she might be in the hospital. When Mag went to the hospital she notified everyone she'd met in sixty-two years of gusty living, and the result was pandemonium.

Jo made a mental note to call later, and started to dial Betsy's number. After the second digit she hung up, shaking her head. It's no good, she thought. She has to call, or it doesn't mean anything.

If she doesn't call, it's over. End it nice and clean. Gayle came in, spent ten minutes arranging her hair, and sprayed herself and most of the office from a pink flask of perfume, very fine if you liked Night of Passion or Seductive Temptress or whatever she was using this week. Jo opened a window and gratefully breathed in exhaust fumes and soft-coal smoke. Stan came in, hung up his hat and spring topcoat and stood around in the hall for a while, looking undecided. He said good morning to Gayle, got a drink of water from the cooler and opened and shut his desk drawers. After about five minutes, during which Jo sat seething with restrained impatience, he plodded back to her office and took up his stance against the doorjamb. She was almost irresistibly tempted to put a foot out and trip him.

She said "Hi," instead and went on looking through the morning mail as though she expected to find a million dollars in one of the letters. Stan tried to light a cigarette. His hands were shaky, but he finally made it. His eyes were pouchy, his cheeks vertically lined; he avoided looking at her. Feeling guilty, she thought coldly. Let him suffer, he deserves to.

He said stiffly, "Betsy's not coming back. She called to say she's found another job. Will you make out a check for what she has coming?" He hesitated. "Give her a week's severance pay. She didn't give us any notice, but what the hell, she probably has extra expenses. New place and all."

Some people paste prayer slips on a wheel, Jo ought. Others say a specified number of Hail Marys. Others leave their millions, gouged out of working people, to set up charitable foundations. Penance is penance. She nodded.

Stan said, "She wasn't very good on the job anyway."

"She was all right. Where's she going?"

"She didn't say. I wish women wouldn't call me at home," he said, aggrieved. "My mother answered the hone, and she raised holy hell. She can't understand why an employee would call on business, she thinks everybody's chasing me." His face got red, even redder than Betsy's when she was embarrassed. It's catching, Jo thought. He said, "It's so silly. I was a little bit late getting home the other night, and she had an asthma attack. I was up almost all night giving her medicine and heating the steam kettle."

Of course, Jo thought. You fight a rival by demanding extra attention. The poor jerk, all worn out from the session on auntie's davenport. But she kept a straight face. "She might be better off in a nursing home."

"Oh, I think she would. With people her own age, and all. My aunt's in an old ladies' home, my father's sister, and they have a fine time. A nurse on hand all the time, and everything. She won't do it, though, and the house belongs to her."

Her mausoleum, Jo thought. She had taken a walk in Stan's neighborhood one Sunday afternoon when she had nothing better to do, had walked down a street of two-story brick and frame houses until she came to the number that was on his personal correspondence and stood for a minute or two looking at it. Four-square and ugly, its bay window filled with thick-leaved plants, it looked like a house that would smell of cellar and dusty upholstery and old cooking.

She had never seen Stan's mother, but she knew, from Cottonwood Falls, the kind of old woman who lived in a house like this. She might be skinny and querulous, with her hair strained back from a shiny forehead. She might be shapeless and tallowy. She might even be a corseted travesty of style, with her hair curled though thinning. But she would be a familiar figure if you met her (as you were likely to meet her) at a meeting of church women or in a relative's home on Sunday afternoon.

Maybe she did have asthma. It was almost always emotional in origin, wasn't it? Maybe she really did have a bad heart, especially if she was a fat old lady who ate too much. (Stan, she knew, resembled his father; his mother had never forgiven him for it.) Doctors were cagy about things like that, especially the lovable old family physician type who hadn't opened a medical journal since 1920. You could have a functional heart disorder, you could have attacks brought on by rage or fear, and they hurt just as much as the real thing. Like arthritis, like allergy, it was a genuine illness.

It was easy to feel that she'd have left the old lady wheezing if she had been in Stan's place, but how did she know? What did she expect him to do, for God's sake, step over the old bitch's prostrate form and walk away? And even if that were the thing to do, what could you expect from a man who had been smothered and squeezed to death by that kind of maternal devotion, among the aspidistras or whatever the hell they were?

She always fetched up against this conclusion, and it always spoiled the fine contempt she'd have liked to feel for Stan. I'm a better man than he is, she reminded herself, looking at him with new curiosity. He wasn't just the friendly colleague or the weak-kneed yearner after women, he was the man who had possessed Betsy. More or less against her will, yes. Clumsily, yes. But he was her rival. She hated him for it.

She could see the whole thing, just as though she had been hiding in the shadowy corner of the living room. The girl pushed back against the scratchy couch, the man half undressed, at once forceful and ridiculous in eagerness. And later, the shame that overcame both of them, and the wordless parting.

No wonder Stan had the flu. No wonder Betsy, bewildered by the way things were developing, decided to leave her job in a year when jobs weren't too plentiful. Neither of them could bear to face the other.

She asked, "How's your flu?"

"Better."

"The corrected pages are on your desk."

He wasn't thinking about the magazine. He said abruptly, "Make that two weeks severance pay, will you? I guess it's my fault she didn't stay and work out her notice. I got a little fresh the other night."

"All right."

Stan's blush deepened to purple. "Tell her she should let me know if she ever needs anything."

The hell I will, Jo thought. If what you're thinking about happens, I’ll take care of it myself. You’ll never know. She looked at him blankly.

She wondered for the hundredth time why normal people were always getting into such sickening messes. They ought to be happy as all get-out, she thought. Everything was on their side, religion and morality and even the advertising industry, a bigger influence than either morality or religion. Yet almost everyone she knew was all miserable and confused, either because of sex or because of its lack. It made her own problem seem clean and honorable, a question to be answered or, if no solution were forthcoming, a sorrow to five with in dignity.

Stan hovered. She knew what he wanted. He wanted to tell the whole story and get rid of it, to lay his guilt in a mother's hands and be forgiven. She had been a mother surrogate about as long as she cared to be. She said sharply, "I better get to work, they're waiting for the okay on the last folio," and turned over a page.

Stan wandered away, looking rebuffed.

She did all the routine things. She made out a check for half a month's pay, improving on Stan's instructions by two days, and another check for the money Betsy had coming as of right then. She put both slips in an envelope and addressed it to Betsy. A wave of faintness swept over her; she sat staring at the envelope, waiting for things to come into focus again. This couldn't be the end.

She held the envelope for a while as though some of her feeling might penetrate and permeate it; then she carried it into the hall and dropped it down the chute, watching it until it disappeared. That's that, she thought. At least the kid won't go hungry for a while.

She had forgotten that she wanted Betsy to be self-reliant.

She corrected pages with great care, frowning over details that she would normally have caught at first glance.

She didn't want to go home. There was plenty to do there, the whole apartment needed to be cleaned, the laundry was overflowing the hamper again, she ought to stop at the supermarket and replenish her dwindling food supply. She didn't feel like doing any of these things. The long sleep of the day and night before had left her heavy-headed and, at the same time, restless. Calling it another wasted day, she was prepared for another un-relaxed night.

She plodded up the stairs to her own apartment, gripping the rail, although usually she ran up briskly. Unlocked the door and went in.

A girl was sitting primly in the overstuffed chair, gloved hands in her lap, handbag on the floor at her feet, wisps of hair escaping under a small brimmed hat. Jo stopped short in the doorway.

Karen.

CHAPTER 17

"How did you get in?"

Karen smiled. "I have a key, remember? Not that I meant to keep it, I was going to mail it back to you, but I keep forgetting. Aren't you even glad to see me?"

"Depends." Jo looked at her. "What do you want?"

"Do I have to want something? Can't I just come calling?"

"Not without an invitation," Jo said. "Most of my guests wait to be let in."

Karen shrugged. She was looking very soft and pretty—new dress, new topper, smart hat, fancy shoes with extremely high heels. On her wrist was a thin watch set about with diamonds. "Anyone would think I'd walked in on something," she said. "Are you expecting guests? Or a guest?"

"It doesn't matter." Jo shut the door behind her and came a little way into the room. "Do you want a drink? I'm sorry all I have is a little bourbon."

"No thanks. I had a couple before I came."

"Coffee?"

"All right. I'll come in the kitchen while you make it." Karen stripped off her gloves and laid them on the desk. "It's been a long time, Jo."

"Almost four months," Jo said flatly. "How's marriage? You look as though it agreed with you."

Karen stood beside the cupboard. "All right, I guess. Dave's nice. We're going to buy a house in Wilmette—his mother's lending us the money for the down payment"

"Sounds like fun."

"Oh sure. I'm going to furnish it all in contemporary. Hand-loomed fabrics and a couple of good original paintings. You know I've always wanted to furnish a home of my own."

Jo spooned coffee into the percolator basket. "I'm sorry I haven't any cream. You’ll have to take it black."

"That's all right. I have to watch my weight."

"You're not pregnant, are you?"

Karen's face changed. She looked at once frightened and stubborn. "No, and I'm not going to be. Dave keeps talking about having a family, he's crazy about kids, but I don't want to be tied down. It's twenty years—and then you're too old to enjoy life."

"Seems a little unfair to Dave. Not that it's any of my business."

Karen looked through her bag, found a cigarette case and snapped it open. "Smoke? Dave bought me this on our honeymoon. It's pretty, don't you think?"

"Sure."

"Are you going with anybody now?"

"Maybe." Jo turned on the burner under the coffeepot. A ring of blue flame leaped into being. She adjusted it.

Karen said, "Jo, I'm sorry I walked out on you the way I did. I've missed you terribly. Don't you miss me at all?"

"It's a little bit late to think about that." Jo looked at her. "It's all over. Don't try to get me stirred up. I'm not going to be dramatic about this."

Karen took three steps into the kitchen. She put her arms around Jo's waist and leaned her head against Jo's breast. She was still using the same perfume. "Don't you love me any more? Not even a little bit? I've been so lonesome I thought I'd die."

Jo looked down stonily at the back of her head. The chic little hat had fallen off, unnoticed. Tendrils of fair hair curled at the nape of Karen's neck. It reminded her of Betsy. "Look, girl, you left me of your own accord. I didn't throw you out. This getting married bit was your own idea, remember?"

"I'm sorry."

Jo stepped back, breaking Karen's hold. "The coffee's going to boil over."

"It isn't even hot yet." Karen's chin quivered. She looked pleadingly at Jo. That used to be a good way to get out of things, Jo thought. It isn't going to work this time. Not any more.

"Look, Jo, I'm not saying anything against Dave. He's a fine person. He gives me everything a girl could ask for."

"Things."

"Tears came into Karen's eyes. "We get along all right—except in bed. It's just nothing, Jo. I don't mind it, it doesn't hurt or anything, but nothing happens to me. It's nothing."

Jo adjusted the fire under the percolator again. It began to glug. Karen went on nervously, "It isn't his fault, he tries, he doesn't know I'm not getting anything out of it. I try to act like I'm excited, honest I do. I'm numb."

"I don't know why you're telling me this. It's none of my business."

Karen looked at her, all soft with feeling. "Can't I come back?"

"You mean, leave Dave and move in with me?"

"No. Oh no, I couldn't do that. He'd be so hurt, there's no reason I can't come and see you once in a while, is there?"

I ought to feel great about this, Jo thought. After all the crying and bickering and accusations, like I made her do it and she didn't want to. "That's pretty silly," she said when she could trust her voice.

"But why? Dave doesn't know about us. He thinks I've always been straight. I am straight, really. He knows we’re friends, we used to share an apartment, he wouldn't think anything of it if I came to see you sometimes."

And besides," Jo said, "I don't earn much and you're not trained for anything but a typist or file clerk. There wouldn't be any diamond wrist watches."

"All right, that's important too. Look, darling, all I want is to see you once in a while."

"I don't like people who cheat."

"It wouldn't be cheating. It isn't the same thing, what I have with Dave and what I have with you."

"Would he feel that way?"

"He doesn't know about us, silly."

"Supposing he found out?"

"But how would he find out? We'd be careful. Darling," Karen said, coming closer and laying her hand on Jo's arm, "I want you so much. You're the only person that's ever given me any happiness."

Jo said harshly, "I've never given you anything but trouble. You hated me for bringing you out. Every time you got a couple of drinks in you we went all over that. It was a fight every time I wanted to love you, and you were frigid with me, too. Remember? You left me flat without any warning." She was sweating; she stopped and wiped her wet forehead on her sleeve. "You can't keep changing your mind all the time. There has to be an end to it."

"I was a bitch. Can't you forgive me?"

"Oh, sure, I'm not holding any grudge."

"Then why can't I come and see you once in a while? Nobody will think anything of it. Everybody has friends."

"Because I don't want you to. You're no friend of mine—nor an enemy either. You're nothing as far as I'm concerned."

"You don't mean that."

"Sure I do."

Karen's hand travelled up her arm and moved to her breast. Jo stood still. Karen said, "Darling, let's go to bed. You've forgotten what it was like."

"Look," Jo said, "you're just a straight girl looking for kicks. You never were anything else."

"Don't try to tell me you didn't like it!"

Jo removed the hand. "I liked making love to you, sure. That's not enough any more. I'm not a kid any more, that's not what I'm looking for."

"Oh, hooey."

"I mean it."

"All right, what are you looking for?”

Jo swallowed. "Love."

"All right, I love you."

Jo took a step backward. "Honey, you don't know what the word means. Now will you get the hell out of here?"

"Darling, you're still angry at me."

"No," Jo said. "Go on, get out. Be happy—if you know how, which I doubt. It's no use telling you to be fair to Dave because you can't be, you don't know there's anyone but you in the world. Just don't come here again, that's all. I haven't got time for you."

She waited. If Karen was angry, fine. If she cried—but Karen's tears had stopped. She walked past Jo into the living room, picked up her gloves from the rug where they had fallen, and headed for the door. Jo followed her. "My keys."

"What's the matter, can't you afford to get some made for your new girl?"

"It doesn't matter. I can change the lock."

"All right, goddam it!" Karen jerked her purse open, rummaged in it and threw the key ring at Jo. It hit her in the chest. She made no move to pick it up. Karen said, "It was a bad day for me when I moved in here. I'm glad to have it over."

She was working up to a real tantrum. Jo grabbed her by the shoulders and pushed her into the hall, slammed the door shut behind her and shot the bolt. There was a moment of silence, during which the small faraway clatter of dishes could be heard from the apartment downstairs. Then Karen began to cry. Jo went into the kitchen and pulled the swinging door shut behind herself. Karen's hat lay on the linoleum where it had fallen.

In a moment she could hear the clatter of heels descending the front stairs.

She felt a little sick, looking around the kitchen as though she were taking inventory. We never did drink any coffee, she thought. She took down a cup, poured it half full and took it into the living room, avoiding the chair where Karen had been sitting. Her back and arms ached as though she had just laid down a heavy load. The coffee was acrid. After the first sip she set the cup on the floor.

How stupid I must have been to fall for that one, she thought. And why can I go to Linda, who has a girl, and it doesn't bother my conscience at all, but not with Karen who's married to a man? I don't like men especially.

Linda's a person of character, she takes the responsibility for her own actions. This one blames other people. It wouldn't matter if she were bi. Jeannine was, she slept with men. This one's no-sexual. She hasn't got any warmth for me or her husband or anybody else.

She began to relax. In a way, it was a relief to have it over. She would have bumped into Karen sooner or later, people always did. I'm always trying to live my whole life at once, she thought, and you can't do it that way, it comes one day at a time.

Now the way was free and clear.

For what? She didn't know.

She went back in the kitchen and picked up Karen's hat. For a moment she stood holding the flimsy bit of felt looking at it. Then she lifted the lid of the garbage pail and dropped it in.

Now the last reminder of Karen was gone. Jo opened the cupboard door, found a new can of scouring powder, punched in the little holes and set about putting her kitchen in order.

CHAPTER 18

The telephone rang for the third time since nine o'clock. Jo marked her place with a pencil and reached for the handset. "Hello?"

For once it was neither a salesman nor a printer. Betsy's voice was in her ear, soft and hesitant "Jo, is that you?"

"Sure."

Play it cool. It won't be what you hope. She's sighted a job and wants a reference, or else this is just a social call—she's bored and lonely. She left something in her desk and wants you to send it to her. Jo asked brightly, "What can I do for you, kid?"

"Well," Betsy said. She came to a dead stop.

"Something the matter?"

"I'd like to see you. When can I?"

Jo was having trouble with her breathing. "How about lunch? Can you be downtown at twelve-thirty? Or one o'clock?"

"Sure, I'm a lady of leisure."

"Stadler's at one?"

"Fine. I’ll see you then."

She wanted to say something tender and meaningful. She wanted to weep. She hung up quietly and sat still, looking out of the window at the Travel Now Pay Later sign flashing on and off in the morning sunshine.

There were other possibilities besides the obvious ones. Betsy's time had come and gone, and she was pregnant from that humiliating tussle on the davenport. Jo's hands tightened into fists.

I’ll have to see her through it. God, what a sickening mess.

Don't cross your bridges.

All the rest of the morning she kept reminding herself that this encounter probably wouldn't bring forth anything interesting. She'd had dozens, hundreds of business luncheons. But she found herself reading the same paragraph over and over, making no sense of the words. By half-past twelve she was jittery. She felt that she'd like to get it over with and settle back into her office routine. She combed her hair, wiped the dust off her shoes with a tissue and set out to walk the six or seven blocks to the restaurant.

Stadler's was an old-fashioned restaurant that served good solid Hungarian and American food without fanfare. Overlooked by most of the tourist guides, it featured real linen tablecloths, yard-square napkins, candles in brass holders and an atmosphere of unhurried leisure. The prices were about two-thirds as high as in fancier places and the food was superb. Jo, hurrying to see Betsy, arrived ten minutes early and out of breath. She walked past the door, went into the drugstore at the corner and stood in front of the magazine rack, blindly turning pages while the hands of the clock above the drugstore door crept forward.

By this time she was late. She hurried back to the restaurant and found Betsy standing at the door, looking anxiously up and down the street.

She looked so young and so desirable that Jo had to stop and adjust her expression before Betsy saw her. She felt that the people going into the building surely knew how she felt and were inwardly jeering at her.

She said, "Hi. Have you been waiting long?"

"I just got here. It's good of you to come."

"Don't be silly, I'm glad to see you." She wanted to take Betsy's arm and hold her close as they crossed the threshold. She held her hands stiffly at her sides.

This dining room was as dim as the Manchester House, but with a difference. They followed the waiter to a small table against the wall, under an unframed abstract water-color. Jo took Betsy's coat, spread it over one of the extra chairs and took the menu a hovering waiter was offering. "This is on me, by the way."

"No." Betsy's eyes were fixed on her face, "I invited you."

"All right, if you want to." She realized that the matter had some inner meaning for Betsy; she wasn't sure what, but she was willing to go along with it.

Betsy suggested, "It's hot in here. Why don't you take your coat off?"

That was a departure, too. Jo was used to taking the lead. But she unbuttoned her tweed topcoat and laid it back over her chair, smoothed her gloves together and laid them on the table beside her clutch purse. "Tell me what you've been doing."

"Looking for a job. I'm sure I’ll find something."

"You know Stan will give you a good reference. Or I will. Tell people to call either of us."

"Yes, I know," Betsy said with a small tight smile. “I'm not blaming him for anything really. It was my fault."

"Takes two."

"Sure, but he'd have stopped if I asked him to."

The waiter came to their table. Jo said, "Do you want something to drink? I'd like a Gibson."

"Old-fashioned, please." Betsy closed the menu, then opened it again. When they were alone, in a little circle of candlelight not broken by the low voices at the next table, she went on. "I wanted you to know—it didn't happen, what I was afraid of. I've known for several days now."

"That's good.”

“I’ve been awfully silly. Now I'm going to try and grow up a little. You know," Betsy said, "everywhere you go you meet a lot of retarded people—women forty, fifty years old who still act like spoiled kids. I don't want to be like that."

Jo looked at her with new respect. "You're right."

"So slap me down if you ever catch me acting like a spoiled brat again, will you?"

Jo's lips were stiff. She nodded.

Betsy took the glass the waiter set before her, without seeing it. "If you'll let me see you sometimes."

Well, Jo thought, hurray. All of a sudden I'm popular. Girls all over the place offering to keep me company—when they haven't got anything better to do. It wasn't funny. She nodded again, unable to speak, wanting desperately to reach out and touch Betsy. She knew that a casual touch would start things, like the dropped match that touches off a forest fire. Must be national hackneyed metaphor day, she thought.

Betsy said, "The other day you told me something. About yourself."

"Yes."

"I know you don't tell everybody. Only people you like in a special way."

"Damn few people," Jo said in a low harsh voice. "Only my own kind. If you're asking out of curiosity, you can forget it."

Betsy looked hurt. "Naturally I'm curious. Aren't you, about the way people live? I've been reading about it at the library, that's why I didn't do much job hunting till this week. But there's a lot you can't find in books."

"You can say that again."

"Like, how do you know? Do you have to be born with it or is it something you can learn? I mean," Betsy said, "a girl isn't born knowing about men and being married—all that jazz. I didn't really know anything till I got into high school, then the dean of women told us quite a lot. But I never could see how it was so exciting. It has to be," she added hastily, "I know, or girls wouldn't do it and get in trouble. But how?"

"You learn. It gets better with practice."

Betsy looked frightened. "Is it the same way when you're a girl that—I don't even know what to call it"

"Gay. Queer. Abnormal." Jo's face was stern in the candlelight. "Sure, it's exactly the same. Only straight people never think so, they think it's terribly wicked."

"How did you find out?"

"I fell in love."

"Why—"

"Sure."

Betsy sighed. "You make it sound so reasonable."

"It is reasonable. Not always, at first, because people do their best to louse it up for you. I used to feel terribly guilty. That's why I quit going to church, because I thought I was committing an awful sin and God would punish me." Jo smiled. "I know a minister who's one. He's one of the nicest people I know. That helps."

"Can I ask you something?"

Jo was afraid she knew what was coming. She sat motionless for a moment Then she smiled. "This isn't a thing you do for kicks. You have to mean it."

"You don't have to answer if you don't want to." Betsy's cheeks were red. She looked both ashamed and eager. "The other day when I woke up in your bed, I came out and looked at you asleep on the couch. It gave me an awfully funny feeling. I wanted to wake you up and hug you—it seemed as if there wasn't any way I could get close enough to you. I mean, with a man you know why—I mean, it scared me."

"Was that why you left?"

"Sure."

Jo picked up her glass. Their eyes met and held.

The waiter, bald and serious, had been waiting for a break in the conversation. Now he returned to the table. Are the ladies ready to order?"

Jo flipped open her menu. "Chicken paprikash," she said mechanically. It was on the top line. Betsy said, "I'll have that too." There was a moment of waiting silence while he gathered up the menus and tiptoed away.

Jo felt electric with energy, alive in every cell of her body. "Betsy, are you sure?"

Betsy nodded.

"Then come to my place and well find out. Only—if you're not happy about it, don't hate me."

"I couldn't hate you " Betsy said softly. "When shall I come?"

"When you want to. But be awfully sure," Jo said. She stood up, took her coat off the chair back and hung it around her shoulders, with the sleeves dangling. She gathered up her purse and gloves, leaving a bill on the table. "I have to go. I'll be home every night this week."

The waiter was coming toward her with a loaded tray. She swerved to miss him, and went on past the cashier's desk through the revolving door, out into the street.

My God, she thought.

Betsy sat with her hand over her mouth. The waiter hovered, his forehead a washboard of anxiety. "Is something wrong?"

"No." I mustn't hurt his feelings, Betsy thought. I don't want to hurt anybody's feelings today. "No, she remembered an appointment. Everything is all right."

She forced herself to sit in front of her plate for at least ten minutes. It looked good, the rust-red chicken and gravy, the neat boiled potato and thin ice-cold slices of cucumber in sour cream. A little picture, a still life. She picked up her fork and arranged the vegetables, took up a bit of the chicken and laid it down again. She couldn't have eaten a bite if it had been manna from heaven. She was full to overflowing with something she had never felt before.

She picked up Jo's ten-dollar bill and looked at it curiously, as though it were the first one she had ever seen. Someone had slashed across Alexander Hamilton's face with red pencil. When the waiter finally brought the bill she paid it with her own money, and by turning out the contents of her purse got enough change together for a decent tip. She folded the ten neatly and put it in her wallet. I'll give it back to her when I see her, she promised herself.

She didn't know why this seemed important. It was as though, having something of Jo's in her possession, she was sure to see Jo again.

She put on her coat and walked out. The daylight seemed remote and unreal, as though she had left everything that really mattered behind her in the candlelit dining room.

CHAPTER 19

By eight o’clock she had cleaned the living room, wiped up the kitchen linoleum and started going through her dresser drawers. Not that anybody cared whether the house was clean or not, but she had to do something and she couldn't think of anything else to do. I'll know by ten, she thought. If she isn't here by ten I’ll know she's not coming tonight.

Then maybe tomorrow. Or the next night. If she hasn't come after two weeks Ill know she isn't coming at all. You had to have a boundary to hope, a limit to despair, even if it's artificially imposed. The human heart can endure just so much.

But she felt that it would be tonight.

The telephone rang. She hurried to answer, with three orphaned stockings in her hand. It was Richard. "Hello darling, are you busy?"

"Killing time. It's good to hear your voice."

“I’ve been trying to get hold of Mag, but she's never home. If I had a pad like hers I'd stay there and enjoy it," Rich said, sounding happy. "Anyway, did I tell you they're dropping the whole Happi Time bit? Somebody fixed it."

"Mag told me. Must be nice to have pull, huh?"

"That's what we need, more friends with influence. There's nothing wrong with having money, either."

"I thought maybe you and I would be meeting at the unemployment place."

"You're all right. They couldn't get out that crummy little paper without you."

"I don't plan to spend my whole life there." She didn't say she was going to New York. He'd heard it before—besides, at the moment it didn't seem to matter. She said, "How's everything otherwise "

"Fine. I met some interesting people the other night. Nothing special, you know how it is, but fun."

She grinned, translating that to mean one interesting person. The boys were lucky enough to switch affections easily—not all of them, but a lot. The pickup, the one-night stand, the merely physical affair. We're always wanting things to last forever, like cotton stockings.

All the disadvantages of being female and none of the advantages, that's us.

She said, "Good enough. Maybe I’ll hit lucky myself, one of these days."

"Care to go to a chamber music session this coming Friday night? They're playing a lot of Purcell."

"I don't know, Rich. My plans are indefinite for the rest of the week."

"Like that, huh?"

She felt her skin prickling as it always did when she was embarrassed. "Don't tease me, Rich. This is serious."

Rich's voice was tender. "I'm not teasing, darling. I wish you all the happiness in the world."

"I know you do."

He did, too. After she hung up and went back to her compulsive housecleaning, she kept on thinking about him, his kindness, his real concern for the people he loved, the patience with which he kept plugging away at a dull job. He had been a music teacher for a few years before deciding that it wasn't possible to do any real teaching in a city system; the formalities of discipline and the pressure from extra-curricular activities and assorted good causes bogged everyone down, and most of his colleagues were not only uninformed but uncaring. He moved to a small town and found the pressure to conform even greater; every hour of his day and night was under constant scrutiny by the board members and the townspeople. "I couldn't even burp without its being heard at the other end of town," was the way he put it. "You're a small town girl yourself, you know how it is. In a city you at least have a little privacy for your personal life."

They were more than a protectorate, she and Rich. They were friends. Just talking to him on the telephone gave her a warm sheltered feeling she hadn't known since she was a very small child, before she realized that the all-wise, all-powerful father, the one person who really loved her, was subject to her mother's whims like the rest of the family.

All Lesbians hate men. That's why they make love to women. It says so in the books. Jo laughed, pulling the used case off her pillow and folding up the soiled sheets so they could go in the hamper. It was easier to work with men than with women and infinitely easier to work for them. They were more objective, less personal, less trivial. They had more sense; that summed it up. Even Stan. She got along fine with Stan, except for her growing irritation over his mother fixation, his constant need of praise, his inability to resolve any of the problems that seemed so simple to an outsider. And when you got right down to it, those were traditional female qualities, the same traits that had irked her in her feminine colleagues.

She realized that she was thinking about everything else—Richard and their friendship, the office, the feasibility of actually saving two or three hundred dollars and making a break—so that she wouldn't have to think about Betsy. It was twenty-three minutes to nine.

She turned the mattress, put on the fitted bottom sheet and smoothed out its tiny wrinkles, put on a clean top sheet and replaced the blue blanket and tailored spread. Looks all right, she thought. She picked a used tissue off the floor, straightened the things on the dressing table, threw a pair of shoes into the closet and shut the door on a tangle of hangers and garments. Short of washing windows or woodwork, there was nothing else she could do.

She should have learned to knit. Women knit in doctors' offices, pushing back terror with action.

She had never cared much for this apartment. It was a standard arrangement of rooms laid out in the familiar pattern: small living room with an adjacent coat closet, kitchen door and bathroom door on one wall, bedroom door on another. A chopped-up layout that left only one place for the davenport, one for the big chair, and permitted no originality. The kitchenette looked out on a paved court and the brick walls of the building next door. She had taken it because it was handy to the train station and because, being in a racially mixed neighborhood, it was cheap. Not as cheap as the budget books stipulated; they allowed one-fourth of the salary for rent, and Jo didn't know a single office worker who managed on that, but cheaper than anything else she could find.

In any case, the furniture was inoffensive. She'd bought it piece by piece at the Goodwill and the Catholic Salvage, scraped and painted it; had made the long full curtains. It was no dream setting for the beginning of a long-time love, but no place within her reach was that.

Suppose she could live anywhere she wanted to, where would she take Betsy? An apartment in Paris, like that girl in The Well of Loneliness? A cottage at the seashore, with waves crashing and gulls flying over? A shack in the dunes, where they could be in the sun and go swimming in the lake all summer long? She felt cheered, having at last thought of something possible.

Eight minutes to nine.

She'd go crazy if she had to sit here doing nothing for another hour. She could take a drink, it would relax her; but she wanted to be fully aware. In case.

She went into the kitchen. Blank cupboard doors looked down at her. She measured coffee into the percolator basket, fitted the apparatus together and set it on the stove. On impulse, she got down measuring spoons, a cup and green mixing bowl. Milk—eggs—sugar. There were no raisins, but she could do without. She didn't know who was going to eat oatmeal cookies, maybe she could take some to work, but making them was something to do.

Lesbians hate housework, they can't cook or sew. Hah. She wiped her hands down the sides of her clean slacks, and then tried to wipe off the floury traces with a dishtowel. She had bathed and washed her hair, pushing it into place while wet so it would wave. A touch of cologne. The mirror above the sink showed her face clearly. A good enough face. Whether Betsy could love it, she didn't know. Other people had, and she had noticed that looks had nothing to do with love, really, any more than youth or character or intelligence had. Love, like lightning, strikes in unexpected places.

What Betsy felt and thought was all strange to her, a country on whose border she now stood without a map.

The cookies came off the baking sheet thin and crisp, with lace edges. She ate one before she scraped the brown crumbs from the sheet and spooned out another four rows of batter. Tastes pretty good, she thought, considering I didn't have any dinner. Or any lunch, come to think of it. She wondered how Betsy had felt about her sudden flight.

She was washing the mixing bowl when the doorbell rang. It slipped through her fingers and scattered across the floor in a dozen odd-shaped pieces. She put the slotted spoon in the sink, gently, as though it might break too, and wiped her hands and pressed the button above the stove. Far below she heard the buzzer, and—listening intently—the opening of the outer door. Or perhaps she imagined that.

She turned off the oven. Never mind the half-raw cookies, she'd take care of that mess tomorrow.

She walked into the living room on rubbery legs, telling herself that it might be a tenant who'd forgotten his key, or a door-to-door salesman, or a political canvasser.

But it was Betsy who stood outside the door. She wore her office coat, a dark tweed that hung loosely from her shoulders. Her fair hair was bare and the little tendrils on her forehead were curly. She looked alert and a little frightened.

She said nervously, "Hi. What smells so good?"

"Oatmeal cookies. Come on in and have one."

Betsy came into the room slowly. The clicking shut of the door behind her had a sound of finality. She said, "Do you always have a coffeepot on the stove?"

"Most of the time."

There was this wall around them, transparent but keeping them apart. Betsy handed Jo her coat. Jo found a hanger and put it in the front closet. "Sit down," she said, "and I'll see if the coffee is done."

Betsy was too nervous to sit down. As Karen had done—but with what a difference—she followed into the kitchen. She looked at the broken pieces of bowl on the floor, the small clutter of dishes in the sink, the dusting of flour on linoleum and work table. A smile touched her mouth. "What have you been doing? The living room's so clean it scares me."

"It's in your honor."

"I don't need all this elegance," Betsy said. "That's not what I want." She touched Jo's shoulder. "I don't really want coffee, either."

They stood looking at each other. Jo drew her breath in sharply. The plastic wall was gone. She put her arms around Betsy and pulled her close.

"Promise me," she said in a whisper, feeling the white cotton of Betsy's blouse warm and smooth against her cheek. "No matter what happens, promise you'll never tell me anything but the truth."

CHAPTER 20

"You're beautiful," Jo said softly.

Betsy hung her head. In the soft light from the dressing table lamps she looked like the ivory figurine on Jo's bookcase—slight and white, yet with the promise of warmth in living flesh. Jo shivered a little in anticipation.

Betsy said shyly, "I want to be beautiful for you."

"Are you scared?"

"No." Betsy's head turned; their eyes met. "I was afraid before," she said in a whisper. "Not now."

"If you want me to stop, say so."

"I won't want you to," Betsy said. She took the first step. They came together in a need and desire that was neither Jo's nor Betsy's, but belonged to both.

"Come to bed," Jo said, in a hurry now, impatient with desire.

Betsy pulled her down to the floor. "Now," she said with a new harshness. "Quick, darling, do it to me. Put your hand on me."

They went down together on the scratchy rug, not caring. Betsy's body was warm and ready. Jo held herself back, running both hands down over the slender neck, across her shoulders, along the spine, down over her hips and slender thighs. Give her time to catch fire. She held Betsy close and bent to kiss the small breasts like flowers just budding. Betsy said, "Oh," on a quick breath; and then, "Don't stop!"

Holding Betsy with one arm, she used the other hand to make her ready. Her fingertips would remember every inch of Betsy's body as long as she lived.

"Now," Betsy said, breathing hard. "Now! I can't wait!"

It was joy to give. As though the explosions were taking place in her own body. As though the moaning of pleasure came from her own throat.

She had expected Betsy to be slow and cool, knowing all that happened to her before. The girl's response almost frightened her. She came with joy to her peak—and no one learns that rhythmic moving, that soft crying in the back of the throat. It was real. Jo's mouth was dry, her neck and shoulders ached, she felt faint with shared excitement.

Next time, she thought, contented. When Betsy lay spent at last, the final bubbles of her excitement rising in soft whispered moans, they stayed together. "We have to go to bed," Betsy said sleepily.

Finally they got up, leaning against each other as though neither could bear to move alone. The bed was smooth and cool. They fell into it together and pulled up the blue blanket. Betsy put both arms around Jo and at once they were asleep.

Jo woke to the thick blackness that comes just before daybreak. Four or four-thirty, she thought, trying to collect herself. What happened? She opened her eyes, seeing specks of gold against the velvety darkness, and then nothing but black. Something wonderful

Her body came to life slowly, full of remembered delight. Heavy and deeply drowsy as she had been when she fell into bed, now she was light and easy, rested as she hadn't been for a long time. Betsy lay along her left side, warm and soft; and she was awake too. She put out a questioning hand and touched the roundness and softness of Betsy's breast. Betsy said, "Hi."

"Can't you sleep?"

"I just woke. I'm lying here being happy."

"Me too."

"I'll make you happy."

Jo said, "Shut up and go to sleep." Because for now it was enough to lie here like this, with her girl against her and the rest of the world shut out They were young, and they had tomorrow and each other. She moved closer, pressing her breasts against Betsy's back, and went to sleep.

It was really day when she woke again. She realized that she was late for work; it didn't matter. She didn't want to go to work. She wanted to lie in bed and look at Betsy. They didn't even need to talk. What they had was closer than words.

Let Stan wonder. Let him get upset. She was through with Stan and Produx Topix. She didn't know how the decision had been reached, but it was all settled. She wondered how she could ever have worked for an outfit with a name like that.

She lay on her back looking up at the specks of sunshine on the ceiling, not really thinking, just feeling. After a while she turned over, very carefully so as not to wake Betsy. Betsy was curled up like an embryo, knees pulled up, arms wrapped across her chest. Jo felt her mouth widen with pleasure—what a crazy way to sleep! She felt her own arms and legs spread out cool and easy on the crumpled sheet. She looked at Betsy's face, open and childlike. Sweet and wonderful.

Betsy stirred. Yawning like a satisfied baby, she uncurled, turned halfway over so that she was lying on her back, and opened her eyes. She frowned as the light struck her lids. Jo said with her heart in her mouth, "Good morning, darling."

"I feel so good."

"Honestly do you?"

"Honestly. I was ready to have it not be good the first time. I thought maybe I'd hate it, and I'd have to let you find out," Betsy told her, sounding surprised. "I was afraid to ring the bell last night. I stood in the hall a long time before I could."

The inside of Jo's eyes prickled. "It will get even better. I promise you."

"I don't see how. When you did that at the end—you Know—"

"You like that?"

"It was like lights going off in me. I didn't know where I was.”

Jo hugged her. "Don't try to tell me. I know.”

"Can I do it for you tonight?"

"We'll do it together."

"But how can we?"

Jo explained. Betsy looked surprised. Then she started to giggle. "Don't laugh at me. I never heard about it before—I mean, just one person at a time. It's an awfully good idea, isn't it?"

Jo sat up. "What do you want to do today? Stay in bed, or start moving your stuff in, or what?"

"Never mind me. Just go to work. I’ll clean the kitchen for you, and then I’ll go over to my aunt's place and calm her down."

"But you’ll come back?" Might as well get up and put in a delayed appearance, if Betsy had the day all laid out. She rolled out and stood slim and naked beside the bed, feeling the sunshine slant warm and kind across her flat hips and bare legs. "I want to live with you, Betsy. I don't want an affair. We need to be together."

Betsy's face changed. "Not until you're sure. Not until I can pay my share of the rent and things—I'm no freeloader."

Well, Jo marvelled, I’ll be damned. The kid's an adult. She sat down again on the edge of the bed and reached for the other girl. "I want to come back to bed," she said.

"Me too. You can't, though." Betsy shook her wrist to be sure her watch was still running. "It's after ten. You better hurry."

"Will you come back tonight, then? We've got an awful . lot to catch up on. I need to know all about you, not just in bed."

"Lend me a key and I’ll come this afternoon and cook you a wonderful dinner. I'll give the key back, though."

Jo was gathering clothes from drawers and hangers. She carried them into the bathroom, turned on the shower, and came back to get a skirt from the closet. Betsy sat up in bed, watching her with a face of pure love. Why did I ever think she looked like Karen? Jo wondered. She doesn't look a bit like Karen.

She hurried back into the bathroom, shutting the door tightly behind her because she knew that if it stayed open she would never be able to wait until evening.

When she emerged, dressed and combed, the bed was empty. The smell of coffee drifted in from the kitchen and she could hear dishes rattling. She went to investigate. Betsy, lost in her old striped bathrobe, was getting down cups. She reached up, the lovely curves of arm and shoulder falling into new patterns as she stretched and relaxed. She said sweetly, "I know you don't eat breakfast, but you'll drink some coffee, won't you? How about juice?"

"No juice, just coffee. You're an angel."

"I don't want to be an angel. I want to be your girl."

"You are."

The coffee was weak. She was damned if she'd mention it. She said, "I'm not used to being waited on."

"Do you mind?"

"It's fine."

"I love to keep house. That's one reason I married Chuck."

"Will you marry me?”

"In say three months, if you still want me to."

It didn't matter any more that Betsy had lived with Chuck or that she'd been tumbled by Stan. No more than Karen and Linda and Jeannine and the anonymous girls of the last few years mattered. Jo felt that she could love the whole world today. With every new love, she thought in wonder, you become a new person.

She drank her coffee standing and set the cup in the sink. "I have to run. It's sort of silly to check in this late, but after lunch would be even worse. You'll find keys in the drawer of the living room table."

"I’ll take them because I want to fix you a good dinner." Betsy looked at her bravely. "I won't ever tie you down or anything like that. I'll always ring the doorbell when I come to see you."

"Idiot."

"You’ll let me come often, won't you?”

"I’ll wait for you."

"I love you."

"Me too."

Betsy disengaged her hands. "Go on, get out of here," she said laughing. "You'll get fired."

"Doesn't matter," Jo told her absently. "Tell me something, Betsy. What made you decide to call me yesterday? Did you know this was going to happen?"

"I got to thinking about Chuck," Betsy said. Jo could see that she was finding this difficult to tell; she was ashamed of it. Still, it needed saying. She waited. Betsy said in a low voice, "I've thought a lot about Chuck lately. Ever since I got the divorce. He looked so terrible in the courtroom. I couldn't hate him any more."

She added as though it were a serious fault, "I'm not a good hater."

"Sure, but what's the connection?"

"Why, I was thinking about you, and all of a sudden I felt I couldn't wait another minute. And then I thought, this was how Chuck felt. I never really loved anybody before," Betsy said, troubled. "I wish I could tell him."

Jo grinned. "Some day we'll have him over to dinner. He sounds like a nice fellow."

Betsy came into her arms, raising her face to be kissed. "Go on, get a lot of work done, but think about me once in a while. Will you?"

"And you’ll be here tonight."

She ran downstairs lightly, swinging her keys.

Out on the sidewalk, she turned and looked back.

Betsy was at the front window, smiling out. Jo had known she would be.

She broke into a run as the yellow bus lumbered to a stop at the corner. Better get to work, she told herself sternly. My girl's out of a job.

CHAPTER 21

The heavy dull feeling that had hung over her lately was gone. In the late morning sunshine the many-windowed towers of North Michigan shone like gold. She got off the train at the Randolph exit and walked three blocks to the office, breathing in the crisp cool air with real pleasure. The elevator operator, heavy-lidded and relaxed between the morning coffee break rush and the early lunch crowd, smiled at her and flung open the door of the end cage. "Good morning, Miss Bates. It's a beautiful day."

She marched into the office with her shoulders squared and head up. Gayle, reading a confession magazine, jumped and looked guilty. She ignored the magazine. "Hi, Gayle, what's new?"

"Well, I'm going to buy my veil on my lunch hour."

And wouldn't you know it. Jo said heartily, "That's wonderful," and escaped without hearing the details. She already knew about Gayle's wedding dress, candlelight satin with a lace yoke; her slippers, white satin with seed pearls embroidered on the vamps; her wedding nightgown, blush pink with coffee lace and a plunging neckline. Enough was enough.

I've got my own wedding to think about, such as it is. Three months. Maybe she’ll change her mind. If she comes to live with me—oh God, if she does-maybe I'll have that nice boy in Cleveland make us some rings. If she'd like a ring. Better not go too fast, remember it's all new for her.

Stan was in his office. He lifted a hand as she sailed past. "Jo, come here.”

"What?"

"Come in a minute, I want to talk to you."

This was something new. Usually she sat at her desk, the mother image enthroned, while he stood bashfully in the doorway pouring his troubles and inadequacies into her lap. She was scornful of him, it was a reversal of roles that deepened her contempt, already solidified by his mother-domination and his inability to make the simplest decision without someone else's approval. It was difficult sometimes to let her real sympathy come to the face.

But something in his voice bothered her. She came back and stood in front of his desk. "What's the matter?"

Stan said, "Have you seen Betsy?" Jo said warily, "We had lunch together yesterday." Only yesterday, she thought, and so much has happened since. Now we're "Us". She added; "She's looking for a job," and then remembered that Betsy was supposed to have a job.

"I talked to her aunt last night. You haven't seen her otherwise?"

"Why should I?"

Stan's face was red. He looked like a spoiled child who, denied a toy, is debating whether to ask once more or throw himself on the floor and scream. He said, "I've called her a couple times, but she hangs up."

Well, good for her, Jo thought. After all, she didn't know until a few days ago—but that was in the past, it was better to forget it. She said cautiously, "Maybe she's busy."

She tell you she was dating me?"

"I knew it, yes."

“Maybe you didn't know I was laying her." His voice was cold acid. "Maybe you didn't know that."

Jo’s hands were icy. She said, hearing her voice thin and remote, "That doesn't have anything to do with me."

"Doesn't it?"

"Of course not, why should it?"

Stan said, "I called her house last night. Her aunt said she was spending the night with you."

"What of it?"

Stan said, "I've never had any use for queers, Jo, but up till now I figured your personal life was your own business. You've done a good job and I'd hate to have to let you go."

She said, playing it stupid, "I'd hate to have you. What's the matter?"

He looked down at the desk top, avoiding her eyes. "She went to your place about nine-thirty last night. I called her aunt's at nine this morning and she wasn't home yet. Now you're just coming in—with the day half over." He hesitated. "The way you look—"

She knew how she looked. She said, "You don't think I'm entitled to a half-day once in a while? I take work home all the time."

"I know about women like you." A dull red crept up Stan's neck and spread over his cheeks. "The girl I dated in college was ruined by one. Can't you stick to your own kind? Do you have to get your hooks into decent girls?"

But I haven't seduced Betsy, Jo thought. She came to me of her own free will, because she loved me. Already I've made her happy.

She knew better than to say so.

"Betsy's my girl," Stan said. "Keep your dirty perverted hands off her."

"What makes you think she's your girl?"

His face was mottled now. Of course, Jo thought with a pang of pity, poor miserable guy, he's lived in a dream world so long he doesn't know the difference. He fails once and just barely makes it once—that makes her his girl. Maybe he thinks they're engaged, or something.

But this was no time to analyze the workings of his mind, such as it was. She had to salvage what she could. She said quite calmly, considering that her knees were trembling, "I'm sorry this came up just when I was ready to hand in my resignation. We've worked well together. I thought we could part on friendly terms."

"Resignation? How come?"

"I have a terrific job in New York. More money than here and a good chance for advancement. Do you want to take my two weeks' notice or give me two weeks' severance pay?"

Stan stood up. His eyes glittered. She'd read about eyes glittering; she had supposed it was just a figure of speech. "You can go now," he said, his voice rising hysterically. "You can go right now, and you don't need to mink you're going to get any severance pay either. I'm firing you."

“Okay. Ill take it up with the Labor Board."

"And I'll tell them you're a Lesbian. A dyke, a dirty pervert. That'll take care of you all right."

"I’ll tell them I took in the little girl you seduced, that she didn't want to go with you but she had to or lose her job. And after that," Jo said thoughtfully, "I believe I’ll pay a social call on your mother. I've always wanted meet her."

He caved in. It was pitiful; she tried not to feel sorry for him, but the habit was too strong. He said, "All right, goddam it, I’ll give you two weeks' pay. Now will you get out?"

"Plus what I have coming. It's almost half a month."

"I’ll have your check in five minutes."

“I’ll be ready to leave in five minutes.”

He looked baffled. She walked unsteadily back to her own office; hers no longer. The curtains she'd bought, the off-white paint she had selected for the walls and ceiling, even the Travel Now Pay Later sign outside the window had a special meaning because she was leaving them behind. For a moment she felt the emptiness of the dispossessed. She had been safe here; and now the safety was torn away.

She gathered up the things that were hers. Stacking them together, her spirits rose. She had a trade and she was good at it. These were the tools of her trade. For this she could forgive Stan the damage he was inflicting on her.

She bundled everything up, looked around to be sure she wasn't leaving anything, and was back at the door of Stan's office within the stipulated five minutes. "My money."

"Here, damn it."

She looked at the check, doing mental arithmetic. Folded it and put it in her billfold. "Thanks." Better cash it before he changes his mind and stops payment.

"Jo, maybe you wouldn't have to go. You could try to do better. We always got along all right."

She felt her face grow cold and stiff. For a while there, she thought, I really believed he was growing up. Standing on his own feet. But he never will. It's too late, his mother caught him too young. She could picture him down the years, growing older and more petulant, confiding in an endless series of secretaries and assistants and casual female friends. Always searching for love and afraid of it, always falling back on sympathy.

She felt a burden lifted from her. "I'm sorry, I have this other job. I hope things work out all right."

"Same to you."

She walked out without looking back. She said to the astounded Gayle, "You can have my tissues and pencil mug. Good luck with your wedding," and went on out, shutting the frosted glass door behind her for the last time.

The operator looked at her curiously as she stepped into his car. He didn't ask any questions. He'd seen other girls walk out in the middle of the morning, carrying a little stack of personal belongings. This one was easier than most to get along with.

She said, "Thanks, Tim. This is for your baby, get him something from me."

"You don't have to do that, Miss Bates. It's been a pleasure."

She swung out of the building. In the street she stopped, standing like an island around which currents of people moved.

Call Betsy. First thing, before I start planning. Then Mag. She’ll know somebody, she always does. Or Richard will.

She went into a drugstore, ordered coffee, and let it cool while she added and subtracted. The arithmetic came out better than she'd dared to hope. With what she had left from last payday she had almost four hundred dollars. Bus fare would be fifty for the two of them; meals en route; a month's rent on a cheap room. Within . a month one should be working. It could be done.

She left a dime and two pennies for the coffee and a nickel for the waitress, reassembled her belongings and went to the row of telephone booths. Two were occupied by paunchy men with sample cases. She shut the door of the third behind her, feeling slightly nervous as she always did in closed places. Her fingers were cold. She dropped a dime into the coin slot and rang her own number.

There was no answer. The dime dropped down into the little metal hatch, and she retrieved it. There was no need to look up Betsy's number; she had called it once, and it was clear in her mind.

A hesitant elderly voice answered. Jo said, "May I speak to Betsy?" and stood waiting for the voice to say that Betsy wasn't home. I can't stand it if she's not there. I have to talk to her.

"Why, I’ll call her. Just wait a minute." There was the click of the handset as she put it down, then footsteps going away. In a minute Betsy's voice said, "Hello?"

“It's Jo. Look, how much money have you got?”

"About forty dollars. Do you need it?"

Jo said, "That's all right. I've got almost four hundred.”

“How would you like to go to New York? Tomorrow, or the next day?"

"With you? Sure."

Relief flooded Jo. I knew she'd take it like this, I knew she'd trust me. She hadn't known anything of the kind, she had been terribly frightened.

She said briefly, "I've left my job. Look, Stan knows all about me, what I am. He got unpleasant about it, so I resigned."

"Did he say anything about me?" She wanted to say no. Desperately, she wanted to protect Betsy. She’ll have enough to face, she thought in self-defense. Hip in a square world, gay in a straight world, broke in a culture where practically everything's measured by money—she’ll find out.

Betsy said, "I'm not a baby. Tell me the truth."

"He guessed, yes. He seems to think you're in love with him or something—the bastard."

She heard Betsy's sharp intake of breath. That was a shocker, poor kid. But she felt proud and possessive. Betsy had guts, she would make out all right.

Betsy said cheerfully, "We’ll be okay. We'll get jobs right away, you’ll see. If I can't find an office job I'll wait tables, I did it in college for a while."

"Sure, we'll be fine."

"Find out about bus schedules. It's cheaper than taking a train, and more fun besides."

"Well take sandwiches and skip the lousy roadside restaurants."

"And cushions. They charge you fifty cents for a pillow. Jo," Betsy asked practically, "What will you do about your furniture?"

It was the first time she had thought about it, but the answer came without effort. "I have a friend who'll dispose of it for us. The lease runs from month to month, so that's no problem."

"All right, I'll be there when you get home. This calls for a steak. The time for a steak is when you're out of work."

"Swell. You know I love you?"

"That goes both ways," Betsy said. She hung up. Jo waited a moment, then dialed again.

Richard was in. It's my day, she thought in exultation, I'm fortune's darling. Any other time he'd be out in the suburbs trying to sell a row house to some happy bride and groom, or on the far west side trying to get rid of some white-elephant mansion. Today he's at his desk, and how's that for luck?

She told him what had happened, leaving out the details. He knew, it had happened to him too. He said, "Good for you, kid. I'll get rid of your stuff, it won't bring much but it's better than paying someone to haul it away. I've got a property in the University area, nice young couples going to school on a shoestring, they're hot for good cheap furniture."

She said, with tears filling her eyes and threatening to spill over, "I want to see you before I go."

"How about dinner tonight?"

"No, my girl's cooking a steak. Why don't you come over and share it with us? She's going with me."

He accepted that, too. "Naturally. I want to look her over. I can tell you one thing now, she's not good enough for you."

"You’ll see."

"What about money? I'll split my parachute fund with you."

That was the hundred he kept for dire emergencies, not to be broken unless actual hunger threatened. The tears rolled down her cheeks. She said with a sniffle, "I'm loaded, but thanks just the same."

"You're bawling."

“Only because you're such a fool.”

Richard snorted. "You know something? This is the best thing that ever happened to you."

"Certainly, I'm thrilled to death."

"Seven o'clock all right?"

"Sure, whenever you can get there. I want you and Betsy to know each other."

God bless him, she thought, hanging up and hearing her coin clink into the money box. I'm going to miss him. The sweetest guy in the world.

She didn't want to go home just yet. She wanted to give Betsy time to get there, to find Betsy waiting when she unlocked the door. We can go marketing together, she thought, it'll be the first time. But first I want to tell her how much I love her.

She decided to walk down Michigan, past the Art Institute, and say good-bye to the lions.

It was a sunny, windy day, the kind of day that comes too seldom to the middle west. Jo stepped along briskly, shifting her load of books and working tools from arm to arm. Between Washington and Madison she stopped to pick up a shopping bag in a small specialty shop where she bought things now and then. The owner, shingled and tailored, refused her dime. "Take it for luck, Jo. It's been nice knowing you."

All the good people, she thought. My own people. We’ll find more of them in New York.

She passed the Art Institute without noticing what displays were placarded, glancing vaguely at the people going up the wide front steps: students, courting couples, middle-aged shoppers, tourists. She turned east on Jackson, past the art students sitting on benches in the little park beside the Institute, making the most of what well might be the last warm day. Bless them, she thought, feeling a warm regard for everybody in the world.

A few blocks to the east, placid and undistracted by traffic and commerce, the Lake lay. From the corner Jo could see the line of blue where it met the sky. A pair of gulls, veering westward from the beach, circled above her. Their wings moved in unison against the blue autumn air.

We're losing the lake, she thought, but we’ll have the ocean. And we’ll fly together.

To her right lay the long platform of the Van Buren Street train station, echoing with the feet of arriving and departing commuters. Red and green lights glowed down the long network of tracks.

Betsy will be there by now, she thought. She ran down the long flight of wooden steps, her heels clattering, and towards the waiting train.

~ ~ ~

AFTERWORD

A new revolution was underway at the start of the 1940s in America—a paperback revolution that would change the way publishers would produce and distribute books and how people would purchase and read them.

In 1939 a new publishing company—Pocket Books—stormed onto the scene with the publication of its first paperbound book. These books were cheaply produced and, with a price of twenty-five cents on their light cardboard covers, affordable for the average American.

Prior to the introduction of the mass-market paperback, as it would come to be known, the literary landscape in America was quite different than what it is today. Reading was primarily a leisure-time pursuit of the wealthy and educated. Hardcover books were expensive and hard to find, so purchasing books was a luxury only the rich living in major metropolitan areas could afford. There simply weren’t many bookstores across the country, and only gift shops and stationary stores carried a few popular novels at a time.

The Pocket Books were priced to sell, however, and sell is what they did… in numbers never before seen. Availability also had a great effect on sales, in large part due to a bold and innovative distribution model that made Pocket Books available in drugstores, newsstands, bus and train stations, and cigar shops. The American public could not get enough of them, and before long the publishing industry began to take notice of Pocket Book’s astonishing success.

Traditional publishers, salivating at the opportunity to cash in on the phenomenal success of the new paperback revolution, soon launched their own paperback ventures. Pocket Books was joined by Avon in 1941, Popular Library in 1942, and Dell in 1943. The popular genres reflected the tastes of Americans during World War II—mysteries, thrillers, and “hardboiled detective” stories were all the rage.

Like many of the early paperback publishers, Dell relied on previously published material for its early books, releasing “complete and unabridged” reprints under different titles by established authors. Within a couple of years it was focused exclusively on mysteries, identifiable by the Dell logo on the cover—a small keyhole with an eye looking through it. Many of the Dell mysteries also featured a colored map on the back cover representing the various locations pertaining to the story’s crime. These “mapback” editions became extremely popular and by 1945, Dell was publishing four new books a month.

The new paperback industry was faced with some difficult challenges during World War II. In particular, the War Board’s Paper Limitation order placed serious restrictions and rations on the use of paper. Publishers began to worry whether they would have enough paper to satisfy both the civilian and military appetite for paperbacks. Manpower shortages and transportation difficulties were also proving to be difficult challenges. In response, some publishers—Pocket Books, for instance—reduced their publication schedules and reset their books in smaller type thereby reducing the number of pages per book. Others simply rejected longer books in favor of shorter ones.

In the end, World War II proved to be a boon to the emerging paperback industry. During the war, a landmark agreement was reached with the government in which paperbound books would be produced at a very low price for distribution to service men and women overseas. These books—Armed Services Editions, as they were called—were often passed from one soldier or sailor to another, being read and re-read over and over again until they literally fell apart. Their stories of home helped ease the soldier’s loneliness and homesickness, and they could be easily carried in uniform pockets and read anywhere—in fox holes, barracks, transport planes, etc. Of course, once the war was over millions of veterans returned home with an insatiable appetite for reading. They were hooked, and their passion for reading these books helped launch a period of unprecedented growth in the paperback industry.

The reading tastes of these veterans were directly reflected in the popularity of certain genres at the turn of the decade. In the mid- to late 1940s, mysteries, romance, thrillers, and hardboiled detective stories seemed to sell better. In the early 1950s new genres—science fiction, westerns, gay and lesbian, juvenile delinquent and “sleaze”, for instance—gained in popularity as readers were presented with stories never before seen in print. Publishers also came to realize that sex would sell books… lots of books. In a competitive frenzy for readers, they ditched their conservative and straightforward cover images for alluring covers that frequently featured a sexy woman in some form of undress, along with a suggestive tag line that promised stories of sex and violence within the covers. Before long, books with sensational covers had completely taken over the paperback racks and cash registers. To this day, the cover art of these vintage paperback books are just as sought after as the books themselves were sixty years ago.

Science fiction titles reflected the uncertain times during which they were written. The Cold War was just beginning, the threat of nuclear annihilation was on everyone’s mind, governments in Eastern Europe were falling to Communists, and Senator Joseph McCarthy was looking for “un-American activities” everywhere in the United States. Many science fiction stories in the early days of the paperback revolution were little more than soap operas or westerns set in space—good guys taking on bad guys while rescuing damsels in distress—that were short stories taken from the pulp magazines. In 1952, however, Ballantine Books changed all that by becoming the first paperback publisher to release novel-length science fiction stories that were sophisticated, intelligent and thematically serious. In 1953, Ballantine Book No. 41 was released—Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451—and the paperback’s science fiction genre launched like a rocket heading to Venus.

The popularity of this new genre wasn’t lost on new paperback publisher, Ace Books, which became known primarily for its publication of sci-fi titles. Not content with publishing one science fiction novel at a time, Ace came up with an interesting gimmick—the double novel. Priced at thirty-five cents, the “Ace Double” featured two paperback novels bound back-to-back with the back cover appearing upside-down in the racks. The stories contained within these “double” paperbacks were novellas or long short stories, rather than novels, but the reading public didn’t care—they loved getting two books for the price of one! The format also worked to the advantage of Ace Books, as they were able to combine the work of an unknown (and, therefore, less expensive) writer with that of a prominent and popular author. As a result, the careers of more than a few aspiring science fiction writers were launched via the innovative “Ace Double.”

Science fiction would not be the only genre with titles flying off the shelves in the early 1950s, however. And, it is unlikely that even Gold Medal Books knew, in 1950, just how successful its first lesbian-themed paperback original novel—Women’s Barracks—would be. Written by Tereska Torres, and based on her experiences in London with the French Resistance movement during World War II, the book was not intended to launch an entire lesbian genre—it was a story about women during wartime, some of whom happened to be romantically involved with other women. The story simply resonated with men and women alike—both straight and gay—and by the end of 1950 had sold more than a million copies for Gold Medal.

Women’s Barracks also caught the attention of the government, unfortunately, and was singled out by the Gathings Committee as an example of how the paperback industry was subverting the morals of America. The threat of fines and incarceration made the paperback industry skittish about publishing anything that could be considered “indecent” and before long, a sort of self-censorship was in full swing. Many stories featuring characters that lived their lives outside the rules of the prevailing morality of the times soon became dark and punishing, as there could be no happy endings for those who defied convention. Still, the lesbian titles were enormously popular and soon paperback publishers—beginning with Gold Medal—realized sales would skyrocket if they moved from reprints to “paperback originals.”

This move toward of the publication of original fiction by paperback companies created an immediate and strong demand for writers and provided unprecedented opportunities for women writers in particular. While it is true that some of the lesbian titles during the 1950s were written by men using female pseudonyms, a good number were written by women, many of whom were lesbians themselves. And although they were still required to write within the prescribed moral guidelines set by their editors, quite a few were able to portray the lesbian lives of their characters with a significant degree of honesty and compassion.

For lesbians across the country, especially those living isolated lives in small towns, these books provided a sense of community they never knew existed… a connection to women who experienced the same longings, feelings and fears as they did—the powerful knowledge that they were not alone. With the birth of the lesbian-themed pulp novel, women who loved women could finally see themselves—their experiences and their lives—represented within the pages of a book. They finally had a literature they could call their own.

We are excited to make these wonderful paperback stories… these pulp novels, as they have come to be known, available in ebook format to new generations of readers. We present them in their original form, with very little modification, so as to preserve the tone and atmosphere of the time period. In fact, much of the language—the slang, the colloquialisms, the lingo, even the spellings of some words—appear as they were written fifty or sixty years ago. We hope you will enjoy this nostalgic look back at a period in American history when dames were dangerous, tough-guys were deadly and dolls were downright delicious.

--Kathryn James, Editor

For more classic pulp ebooks, visit us online at www.vintage-pulp-ebooks.com!

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