"What?"
564
"You have to call the girls, because they're going
crazy, Ilse in particularAnd Pam?"
"What, hon?" I'm sure she said it without thinking,
without knowing how it could cutAh, well - she
probably felt the same when she heard my pet name
for her coming up from Florida, growing colder
with every mile it sped north
It was only quarter to eleven when we said goodbye
and hung upTime never went faster that winter
than it did during my evenings in Little Pink -
standing at my easel, I'd wonder how the colors in
the west could possibly fade so fast - and it
never went slower than it did that morning, when I
made the phone calls I'd been putting offI
swallowed them one after the other, like medicine
I looked at the http://www.naluxury.com/scategory_26_Chanel-Jewelry.html" target="_blank cordless sitting in my lap"Fuck
you, phone," I said, and started dialing again
v
"Scoto Gallery, this is Alice
565
A cheery voice I'd come to know well over the last
ten days
"Hi, Alice, it's Edgar Freemantle
"Yes, Edgar?" Cheery became cautiousHad that
cautious note been there before? Had I just
ignored it?
I said, "If you have a couple of minutes, I wonder
if we could talk about ordering the slides at the
lecture
"Yes, Edgar, we certainly could The relief was
palpableIt made me feel like a heroOf course
it also made me feel like a rat
"Have you got a pad handy?"
"You bet your tailfeathers!"
"OkayBasically, we're going to want them in
chronological order-"
"But I don't know the chronology, I've been trying
to tell you th-"
"I http://www.muluxury.com" target="_blank know, and I'm going to give it to you now, but
listen, Alice: the first slide won't be
chronologicalThe first should be of Roses Grow
from ShellsHave you got that?"
566
"Roses Grow from Shells For only
the second time since meeting me, Alice sounded
genuinely happy that we were talking
"Now, the pencil sketches," I said
We talked for the next half an hour
vi
"Oui, all??"
For a moment I said nothingThe French threw me a
littleThe fact that it was a young man's voice
threw me more
"All?, all??" Impatient now"Qui est a
l'appareil?"
"Mmm, maybe I have the wrong number," I said,
feeling not just like an asshole but a monolingual
American asshole"I was trying to reach Melinda
Freemantle
"D'accord, you have the right number Then, http://www.culuxury.com/category_3_Chloe_1.html" target="_blank off a
little: "Melinda! C'est ton papa, je crois,
ch?rie
The phone went down with a clunkI had a
momentary image - very clear, very politically
incorrect, and very likely brought on by Pam's
567
mention of the cartoon books I'd once drawn for a
little sick girl - of a large talking skunk in a
beret, Monsieur Pep? Le Pew, strutting around my
daughter's pension (if that was the word for a
bedsitter-type apartment in Paris) with wavy aroma
lines rising from his white-striped back
Then Melinda was there, sounding
uncharacteristically flustered"Dad? Daddy? Is
everything all right?"
"Everything's fine," I said"Is that your
roommate?" It was a joke, but I realized from her
uncharacteristic silence that I had unwittingly
hit the http://www.enluxury.com/scategory_11_Prada.html" target="_blank nail on the head"It's not a big deal,
LinnieI was just-"
" - goofin wit me, right It was impossible to
tell if she was amused or exasperatedThe
connection was good but not that good The subtext of that one to come through
loud and clear: Want to make something of it?
I most assuredly did not want to make something of
it"Well, I'm glad you made a friendDoes he
wear a beret?"
To my immense relief, she laughedWith Lin, it
was impossible to tell which way a joke was going
568
to go, because her sense of humor was as
unreliable as an April afternoonShe called: "Ric!
Mon papa" Something I didn't catch, then: "
si tu portes un b?ret!"
There was faint male laughterAh, Edgar, I
thoughtEven overseas you lay them in the aisles,
you pere http://www.muluxury.com/category_1_Balenciaga_1.html" target="_blank fo