At five-thirty the world ceased to be official and became private.
Happily Robert Holton put away his books and figures and prepared to leave. Monday was over and he wouldn’t let himself think of the other days of his week.
Caroline was putting on her hat and Mr Murphy sat at his desk behind her, dreaming, his eyes fixed shrewdly upon nothing.
Robert Holton walked over to Caroline.
“Ready to go?”
She nodded. “All ready.” Together they walked through the emptying offices, rode down the crowded elevator, and stepped out into the more crowded street.
The sky was gray now and the sun had vanished behind buildings. The air was cool and the smell of exhaust was strong as cars moved slowly in the streets, trying to escape to less crowded places. They walked with the stream of people toward the subway opening. They talked.
“Guess what?” said Caroline.
“What?”
“I’m going out tonight.”
“Well?”
“I’m going out with Lieutenant Trebling.”
He was surprised. “That was fast work. Did he do that while he was in the office?”
“We talked about it. He called me back later and I told him I’d go out with him.”
“Well, well.” Holton was admiring but Caroline was not sure whether he was admiring her or Trebling.
“I think he’s nice,” she said, not committing herself.
“Yes, he’s a good guy.”
They crossed a street nervously and in silence. On the other side they went on talking.
“Tell me something about him?” she asked.
“There’s not much to tell. He’s from the West Coast. He went to UCLA, I think, and his old man’s in the insurance business. He went into the army about the same time I did and he’s still in.”
“That’s not what I want to know.”
“Well, what do you want to know?”
She had trouble saying this. “Oh, you know ... the sort of person he is. All that sort of thing.”
Robert Holton, who hadn’t thought much about it, had a hard time answering. “I guess he’s what you’d call a dreamer. He’s not very practical. He always wants to start things ... businesses, you know. In the war he was pretty good and other people liked him. He wasn’t very wild then.”
“Is he now?”
“Just his ideas. In those days I used to be the wild one.”
She laughed and thought he was joking with her and this made him angry and sad but there was nothing he could do about it because he had assumed a certain identity with her and it had to be maintained.
“I’ll bet you were wild!”
“We all change,” he said.
She wasn’t interested in how he’d changed, though: she was interested in Jim Trebling. “I don’t suppose he’s engaged or anything like that?” She was casual.
Holton laughed. “No, you can get him if you want to.”
“I didn’t mean that at all. What do you mean by saying that?”
“Not a thing.”
She went on talking for several moments, trying to be indignant. Then they crossed another street and she stopped talking.
They walked with the current of people, walked uncomfortably but deliberately over the sidewalk ventilators of the subway beneath. As they walked they could feel the thunder of a subway train under their feet, vibrating upward, like a great emotion, into their stomachs.
Then they came to the opening of the subway. With a deep breath they descended into the pit. Like lemmings dashing seaward the people pushed down the steps and into already crowded trains.
Caroline and Holton were separated. A sudden push of the crowd threw her into the train just before the door closed. He caught a last glimpse of her serene beauty being crushed between a large Negress and a tall white man. The train gave a rumble and pulled away.
Holton stood on the concrete platform with a hundred others who had missed this train and were waiting for the next.
He walked up and down between the concrete pillars, looking at the broken machines which were supposed to sell gum and peanuts and, from habit, he put his finger into one of the slots to see if anything was there: nothing was there however.
He admired the advertisements. His favorite one, the girl advertising beer, was not in this station but there were others. Two very excellent ones of movie actresses, young women hauntingly attractive with red lips. He admired these even though the most beautiful actress of all had had her front teeth blacked out and a crude phallic image drawn over her passionate face. There were people in the world who would do those things, of course, and he was not annoyed.
The other advertisements were less interesting and he didn’t look at them very long.
Another train roared through the tunnel, stopping with great noise; the doors opened and people flowed out; then another rush to get on the train. Robert Holton allowed himself to be carried into the hot stale car.
He liked to walk in the Park. In the evenings the Park was the most peaceful place in the city. A few people would be sitting on the benches and a few couples would be walking between trees but there were never many people here in the early evening and the ones that were there were always quiet.
As Robert Holton walked the miracle of the street lamps took place, white light filling the bulbs and changing the early evening, the twilight period, to a premature night.
He walked quickly now because it was almost six o’clock. Mrs Raymond Stevanson’s cocktail parties often went on until nine or ten o’clock and occasionally they lasted all night but he couldn’t know this for certain and he didn’t want to be late.
Robert Holton thought sadly about Jim Trebling as he walked, breathing the cool air. A short time had made a lot of difference and he was aware of this difference.
Trebling was apt to be impractical. It was a likeable quality in the army; he himself hadn’t made much sense in those days, but things had changed now. This was the time to be practical and Jim Trebling was not.
A couple were embracing beside a large rock. He watched them with interest as he went by.
He had tried to pretend to be the same but the effort, or the change, had been too great. It made him unhappy to think that he and Trebling had really been so different, had always been so different, even in those days. He was shocked to think that Trebling remembered the army as a pleasant period of his life. There had been times, of course....
Another couple came out of the woods, walked to the pathway and looked uncertainly about them, as though unsure of themselves. When he glanced at them they looked at him angrily, as if he had been spying. He walked away.
Robert Holton was not sure why he had changed toward Trebling. He wanted to be the same. He wanted to take up the friendship where it had been broken but he could not. He was not going to change again.
A nurse with a baby carriage was hurrying streetward. It was late, probably much too late for her to be out with the baby. As she passed him he caught a glimpse of the child and saw that it was staring vacantly ahead, concentrating upon growth.
He followed the nurse and the carriage toward the street. Robert Holton smiled to himself when he thought of Caroline and Jim Trebling going out together. It was always interesting when people out of different periods of his life came to know each other. He had never associated Trebling with Caroline before.
He took a last deep breath of air before he left the Park. He wished vaguely that he might have more time to walk in the Park and straighten out certain things.
The uptown streets were not crowded. A few people were coming home from work; most of the people were already home by now. Children played together in the streets, shouting at one another in sharp hoarse voices. A smell of cooking was in the streets.
There was no mail for him.
This was not a good day. On the good days there was mail; days could be bad when there wasn’t any. Not that there was anyone Robert Holton wanted to hear from in particular but he was less alone when he had letters to read.
“Been a nice day,” said the person behind the desk.
“It certainly has,” said Robert Holton.
“Won’t be long until it’s winter,” said the person behind the desk.
“It won’t be long,” said Holton. He turned then and walked through the dingy lobby to the elevator.
He and the elevator boy discussed the kind of day it had been. They also decided that it would be winter soon.
His room looked no more cheerful than usual. Robert Holton sat down on the bed, leaving the room dark. It gave him a feeling of power to think that, when he chose, he could turn on a light and dispel the darkness.
He started to think of Trebling but stopped himself. There was nothing to be done now. The old friendship was gone.
Trebling had mentioned a girl named Carla. He remembered her well. She had been pretty and intense and wealthy. He had not thought about her for a long time. She had been a strange girl, gentle and understanding. He had been greatly attracted to her and she to him.
They had walked around Florence and Fiesole. She had taken him to old palaces and churches although he hadn’t wanted to go. When he had objected she told him that she was trying to show him something. He never knew what it was she wanted to show him. When he left Florence he told her that he would write: he didn’t, though, and he had not thought of her again until today.
The thing he had liked most about Carla, the thing he could remember now, was her way of understanding him. She once told him that it wasn’t necessary to finish sentences when they talked; that she knew what he would say and that he should know what she would say.
Sitting in the dark of his hotel room, Robert Holton thought of all the women he had known and liked; some he had slept with and some he hadn’t. Most of them he had forgotten. Now he only thought of them when someone else recalled them to him.
And he did remember about Paris. He remembered the picnic outside Versailles, although he could not remember the faces of the two girls.
In Europe there had been so many women. He often was surprised now when he thought of how many he had known. There were periods when he had been never satisfied. Both Trebling and he had gone about it like hunters. Trebling was probably still hunting, thought Holton suddenly, and he wondered if he was, too. No, that was behind him. He had to live and act in a different way now. He had to be a different person.
Robert Holton turned on the light beside his bed. He blinked in the yellow light and suddenly he was dissatisfied with the room. He wished for the first time that he were somewhere else; it didn’t matter where, just somewhere else. He was a person of great logic, though, and he asked himself what he would rather be doing and he couldn’t think of anything else to do. He didn’t want to travel. He had no desire to escape. There was no place to escape to anyway and Robert Holton who had a kind of wisdom knew that.
Then he took his clothes off and got under the shower. This was usually the happiest part of his day. The warm water gave him a feeling of security, relaxing him; the world fell into a genial perspective. He finished bathing reluctantly and dressed quickly.
Finally he stood in front of the mirror again and combed his hair. He was glad to see that he wasn’t losing his hair. Sometimes he thought he was; at other times he knew he wasn’t.
He wasn’t displeased with himself. He wasn’t pleased either but he knew that he was acceptable. There was no use in worrying, anyway. He wished sometimes that his nose could have been more aquiline. He would like to look more impressive. Perhaps his face would get that way as he grew older. He turned away from the mirror.
He looked at the picture on the wall and wondered for the hundredth time why the painter had made everything look so blue. The painter had made one of the apples almost sky-blue and Robert Holton had never seen an apple that color before and he found it hard to believe that there was much advantage in so misrepresenting things. Perhaps in certain parts of France the apples were blue.
He was dressed and ready now. He looked at his watch and saw that it was a quarter to seven: he would have to hurry. Robert Holton looked around the room to see if there was anything he wanted to take with him. There wasn’t. He put on his trench coat, turned out the light, and left the room.
The elevator boy wanted to know if he was going to a party.
“Sure, I’m going to a big party.”
“Lots of girls, I bet.” The pale thin elevator boy was interested.
“A whole lot of them.”
“Boy, I wish I was going out to something like that. This night work is getting me down. I ain’t getting much relaxation.” He winked to show what he meant by relaxation and Holton smiled sympathetically.
Robert Holton stopped by the desk.
“I’ll be back pretty early,” he said to the clerk. He always told them when to expect him, told them from force of habit because no one ever wanted to know.
“Yes, sir,” said the clerk. “Nice night tonight,” he added.
“Nice fall night,” agreed Robert Holton.
They discussed the evening politely. Then Robert Holton left the hotel.
It was darker now and cooler. The night was refreshing and he felt suddenly strong and contented. The depression of the office left him and he was becoming alive. He prepared himself for the party and for the evening ahead. He walked briskly down the street and, to emphasize his mood of sudden power, he hailed a taxi and rode in it happily, without regret for the money he was spending.