While I was hanging my clothes up in the study closet, Nat approached me. “Come on into the living room and we’ll discuss this,” he said.

Enjoying myself, yet wanting to be at the job of getting my stuff arranged, I followed him. It was nice to seat myself there on the couch and not have to retire off somewhere in the rear while others conducted their affairs.

Fay said, “How the hell do you plan to make your payments on the house? There’s two hundred and forty dollars due a month on this place, including interest. Half of that is yours to pay. One hundred and twenty a month. And that doesn’t include taxes or fire insurance. How can you pay that?” Her voice shrilled with outrage at me.

Actually, I hadn’t given much thought to that. The realization diminished my pleasure somewhat.

“By acquiring half the title to this place,” Nathan said, “you acquire half the indebtedness. You’re responsible for maintenance costs, utility costs, as much as Fay is. Do you know what it costs to heat this place? She’s not going to pay them; that’s a cinch.”

“Fifty dollars a month,” Fay said. “That’s what your share of the heating bill is going to be. My god, it’ll cost you another hundred a month for utilities—it’ll cost you three hundred a month to own half this house. At least three hundred.”

“Oh come on,” I said. “It doesn’t cost six hundred a month to maintain this house.”

At that, Nat whipped out the big cardboard carton in which Fay kept incoming bills; he had also the checkbook and past stubs and bills. “That’s what it comes out to,” Nat said. “You know you have no money. Your part is going to lapse. How can it not lapse? You can’t live here. It’s impossible.”

All I could think to do was smile at them, to show my lack of anxiety.

“You horse’s ass,” Fay said, her voice continuing to rise in accusation. To Nat she said, “This is just to pay him so he’ll go into court and tell a lot of lies about you and me—good god, Charley must have been out of his mind; he must have been a paranoid at the last, there, in the hospital, believing all that crap.”

“Take it easy,” Nat said to her. Of the two of them he seemed to me the more rational. “You better sell your equity right now,” he said to me. “Before it’s encumbered with indemnities.” On a piece of paper he made out figures. “You’ve got approximately a seven thousand dollar equity,” he said. “And you’ll have to pay inheritance tax on that—did you realize that?”

I said, “You mean, you people buy my share of the house?”

“Yes,” Fay said. “Otherwise the bank’ll be taking your share and you’ll wind up with not one god damn cent out of this.” To Nat she said, “And then we’ll be living here with the Bank of America.”

“I don’t feel like selling,” I said.

Nat said, “You have no choice.”

To that, I said nothing. But I continued to smile.

“There’s a bank payment due right now,” Fay said. “One of them. One-fifty-five. Do you have half of that? You have to have. It’s your share. Don’t imagine I’m going to pay your share of it, you—” She called me a name vile beyond belief. Even Nat looked embarrassed.

We argued to no avail for at least an hour, and then Fay went off into the kitchen to fix herself a drink. Meanwhile, the girls had come home from playing with some friend of theirs. They both seemed quite glad to see me, and I played the airplane game with them. Fay and Nat watched with dark countenances.

Once, I heard Fay said, “… gets to play with my kids, and what can I do about it? Nothing.” She hurled her cigarette at the fireplace, and it missed and landed on the floor beyond. Nat went over and got it. She paced around and around the living room while he sat gazing somberly at the floor, occasionally crossing and recrossing his legs.

When I got tired of playing with the girls I sent them off to their rooms to watch tv, and then I joined Nat and Fay in the living room. I seated myself in the big overstuffed easy chair that had been Charley’s favorite. Putting my hands behind my head I leaned back and made myself comfortable.

After some silence, Fay said suddenly, “Well, I’ll tell you one thing; I won’t live in this house with this asshole around. And I won’t have him playing with my kids.”

Nat said nothing. I pretended not to hear.

“I’d rather give up my share of the house,” Fay said. “I’ll sell it or give it away.”

“You can sell it,” Nat said. “It shouldn’t be hard.”

“What about now?” she said. “Right now? Tonight. How’m I going to sleep here?” Glancing at Nat she said, “God, we can’t make a move; we can’t even eat a meal or take a bath—nothing.”

“Come on,” Nat said, standing up and motioning to her. Together they went outdoors onto the patio and stood together, far enough away from the house so that I couldn’t hear them.

The upshot of their discussion together was that they decided to leave the house entirely and move over to the smaller house that Nat rented, the one which he and Gwen had lived in together. As far as I was concerned, that was fine. But what about the girls? That house was too small for four people, even two adults and two children. At least, that was my understanding, from what I had heard. It had only one bedroom, and then one small utility room in which he had done his school work late at night. Plus of course a living room and bathroom and kitchen.

They took the girls that night, at about nine, and drove off with them. Whether they stayed at Nat’s house or in a motel I don’t know. In any case, I prepared to go to bed alone, in the empty house.

It gave me an odd feeling that night as I changed from my day clothes into my pajamas and prepared to get into the guest bed in the study. After all, this had been Charley’s study, where he had spent a good deal of time. Now he was dead, and his wife had gone off, taking his and her daughters, leaving no one in the house but me. All of them gone. All of them had left this house which they had gone to so much trouble to build. And who was I? For a time, as flay in bed, I felt confusion. I wasn’t actually one of the persons who owned this house … at least, who owned it in a real sense. Perhaps I owned a legal share of it, but I certainly had never thought of it as mine. I might as well have had someone point to some movie theater or bus station and tell me that I owned a share of it. In some respects it was like when as a child I had been told that, as an American citizen, I’d someday “own” a part of every public bridge and dam and street.

I had lived well in this house, for a short period of time. But not because of the house itself; more, because of the good meals and the warmth. Now, if! wanted warmth, I would have to pay for half of the bill that came as a result. And I would be buying my own food, as clearly as I had had to buy it when living in one single rented room in Seville. Nobody would charcoal broil t-bone steaks on the outdoor grill and hand me a piece free.

And the animals were dead. Except for the banty chickens. Now, at night, the banties had gone into their shed and gone to sleep. No ducks. No horse. No sheep. Not even the dog. Their carcasses had been dragged off for fertilizer.

The house and the land around it was absolutely silent. Except that now and then I heard quail whirring around in the cypress trees. I heard the quail calling like Oklahoma teen-agers to each other; ah-hawhoo-whoo. A sort of Okie yell.

And then, lying by myself alone in the dark, empty house, hearing the refrigerator in the kitchen turn on occasionally, and the wall thermostats open and shut, I felt one thing. Fay and the girls and the animals had left, but someone besides myself remained. Charley was still in the house, living there as he had always lived there since the house had been built. The refrigerator that I heard was his. He had supervised putting in the radiant heating. The different sounds were made by things that belonged to him, and he had never left them. I knew it. It wasn’t merely an idea. It was an awareness of him, just as at any previous time, during his stay in the physical world, I had been aware of him. By sight, smell, sound, touch.