“Yes,” Nat said. “She’s been bringing them down regularly.”

“I’ll never get out of this hospital,” Charley said. “I know that.”

“Sure you will,” Nat said.

“Tell her I know it,” he said, “and I don’t care. Tell her it’s all the same; I don’t give a good god damn. She can have the house. She can remarry anybody she likes. She can do anything she wants with it.”

“You’ll feel better later,” Nat said, patting him on the arm.

“No,” he said. “I won’t feel better.”

9

In the evening, Nathan Anteil sat at the kitchen table of their one-bedroom home, studying. He had shut the door to the living room to diminish the sound of the tv set; Gwen was watching Playhouse 90. The oven, propped open, let heat out to warm the kitchen. Beside him he had put a cup of coffee where he could get at it, but he had become too involved in his studying and the coffee had cooled.

Dimly, he noticed that Gwen had opened the door and come into the kitchen. “What is it?” he said finally, laying down his ball-point pen.

Gwen said, “It’s Fay Hume on the phone.”

He had not even been aware that the phone had rung. “What’s she want?” he said. When they had seen her last he had taken pains to tell her that he would be tied up all week studying; he had an exam, to be taken down at the San Rafael public library.

“She’s got her bank statement and she can’t get it reconciled with her stubs,” Gwen said.

“So she wants one of us to come over and help her.”

“Yes,” Gwen said.

“Tell her we can’t.”

“I’ll go,” Gwen said. “I told her you were studying.”

“She knows that.” Picking up his pen he resumed taking notes.

“Yes,” Gwen said, “she said you’d mentioned it. She thought maybe I could come over. She really can’t do that kind of thing—you know she hasn’t got any head for finances.”

“Can’t her brother do it?”

“That goof,” Gwen said.

“You go do it,” he said. But he knew that his wife could not because she was no better at reconciling a checkbook than Fay Hume was, possibly even a little worse. “Go on,” he said, with annoyance. “You know I can’t.”

Dithering, Gwen said, “She says she’ll drive over and pick you up. I really think you ought to go… it’ll only take you half an hour—you know that. And she’ll fix you a steak sandwich; she promised. Please. I think you should.”

“Why?”

Gwen said, “Well, she’s all alone there in the evenings, and she gets nervous; you know how nervous she gets with him in the hospital. Probably it’s just an excuse to get somebody over to talk to; she really needs company. She’s going down to that analyst three times a week, now; did you know that?”

“I know,” he said. He continued to write. But Gwen did not go out of the room. “Is she still on the phone?” he demanded. “Is she waiting?”

“Yes,” Gwen said.

“Okay,” he said. “If she’ll pick me up and drive me back.”

“Of course she will,” Gwen said. “She’ll be so pleased. And it’ll only take you fifteen minutes; you’re so good with math.” She left the room, and he heard her, in the living room, telling Fay Hume that he would be glad to help her.

He thought, If it’s just a pretext so she can have company, then why can’t Gwen go? Because, he realized, even though she does want company—and in a sense, then, it is a pretext—she also does want somebody to balance her checkbook. She wants both. Very efficient. Both things done at once.

Putting away his pen he went to get his coat from the closet.

“You do object, don’t you?” Gwen said, as he stood by the front door, waiting to see the headlights of Fay’s Buick flash at the corner.

“I’m busy,” he said.

“But often times even when you’re busy you don’t mind stopping and doing things.”

“No,” he repeated. “I’m just involved and I don’t like to be disturbed.” But she was right. There was more to it.

The Buick’s horn brought him from the house and onto the porch. As he started down the front steps, Fay leaned out and called,

“You’re very sweet—I know you’re studying. But this won’t take a minute.” She held the door open for him as he got into the seat beside her. Starting up the car, she continued, “Actually I guess I could have done it myself; there’s one check in particular—evidently I forgot to mark a stub. It’s a check for one hundred dollars that I cashed at the Purity in Petaluma.”

“I see,” he said. He did not particularly feel like talking; looking out the window he watched the dark trees and bushes go by. She did drive very well; the car sailed around the curves.

“Are you still thinking about your studying?”

“Somewhat.”

“I’ll get you right back as soon as I can,” she said. “I swear I won’t keep you very long; I hesitated a long time before I called—as a matter of fact, I almost didn’t call. I hate to bother you when you’re studying.” She did not mention Gwen and he was aware of that. No doubt she had known that Gwen was out of the question.

He thought, I shouldn’t be doing this.

One afternoon, over at her place, he had happened to notice an opened bill lying on the coffee table in the living room. The bill was from a clothing store in San Rafael, for children’s dresses. The amount would have paid his and Gwen’s bills for the entire month, all of them. And this was for the girls’ clothing alone.

His income, from his part time job, and Gwen’s income from her two-day a week job in San Anselmo, added up to about two hundred dollars a month. It was barely enough for them to squeeze by on. To the Humes, two hundred dollars amounted to nothing; her psychiatrist bill, he knew, often came to more than that a month. And their heating bill—even a utility bill, he thought. One utility. The money would keep us alive. And she wants me to go over her check stubs for the month. I have to scrutinize every check. See all that money, all that waste. Things they don’t need …

One night, when he and Gwen had eaten dinner at the Humes’, he had stood by watching while Fay handed the dog a t-bone steak which she had unfrozen, along with the others, but which had not fitted onto the grill of the barbecue pit. He had asked her, trying to keep his feelings out of sight, why she simply didn’t put the uncooked, uneaten steak into the refrigerator and have it in the following day or so. Fay had stared at him and said,

“I can’t stand leftovers. Little remains in the bottoms of cups. I always throw what’s left from dinner to the dog. If he won’t eat it then it goes down the disposal.”

He had seen her put smoked oysters and artichoke hearts down the disposal; the dog did not care for either.

Aloud to her now he said, “You should keep a stub for every check you write, regardless.”

“Oh I know,” she said. “Sometimes I’m overdrawn at the bank by two or three hundred dollars. But they always put through my checks; they never send them back. They know me. They know I’m good for it. God, if they ever sent back one of my checks I’d never speak to them again; I’d raise such a ruckus there that they’d never get over it.”

“If you don’t have funds,” he said, “they ought to send the check back.”

“Why?” she said.

“Because it’s not good,” he said.

“Oh, it is good,” she said. “Don’t you know that? What do you mean, not good? Don’t you think I’m good for it?”

He gave up and relapsed into silence.

“Why so quiet?” she said.

“They put them through for you,” he said, “but if I’m overdrawn they don’t put them through. They send them back.”

“Do you know why?” Fay said.

“Why.”

She said, “Because they never heard of you.”

Turning toward her, he stared at her. But there was no malice on her face, only the cautious alertness for the road. “Well,” he said with hard irony, “that’s the price you pay for being a nonentity. For not being a big person in the community.”