"Because it's finer."

"I thought maybe it was the freight cost."

"Did you?" His great contemptuous grin reappeared.

"See, I've never had a chance to find things out. Where do you find out things like that?"

"A lifetime of broad experience. A cultivated taste is acquired gradually over the years. To some people eastern beer and western beer taste exactly alike."

Mary Anne didn't like beer of any kind. Dutifully she sipped at her glass, wishing, in a wan sort of way, that she was older, that she had seen more and done more. She was aware of her ordinariness in comparison with Carleton Tweany.

"How does it feel to be a singer?" she asked.

"In art," Tweany told her, "there's a spiritual satisfaction that goes beyond material success. The American society is only interested in money. It's shallow."

"Sing something for me," Mary Anne said suddenly. "I mean," she murmured, "I like to hear you."

"Such as?" He raised an eyebrow.

"Sing 'Water Boy.'" She smiled at him. "I like that ... you sang it at the Wren, one night."

"It's a favorite of yours, then?"

"We sang it once in grammar school assembly, years ago." Her thoughts eddied back to her earlier life, when she, in scotch-plaid skirt and middy blouse, had trooped as part of an obedient line from one classroom to another. Crayon drawings, current events, air raid drills during the war ...

"That was better," she decided. "During the war. Why isn't it like that now?"

"What war?"

"With the Nazis and the Japs. Were you in that?"

"I served in the Pacific."

"Doing what?" She was instantly curious. "Hospital attendant."

"Is it fun to work in a hospital? How'd you get to do it?"

"I signed up." His activity in the war had never ranked high in his own estimation; he had come out as he had gone in: a private earning twenty-one dollars a month.

"How do you get to be a nurse?" she asked. "You take courses, like anything else."

Mary Anne's face glowed. "It must be wonderful to be able to devote your life to something real and important. A cause-like nursing."

Distastefully, Tweany said: "Bathing old, dried-up men. There's no fun in that."

Mary Anne's interest waned. "No," she agreed, sharing his aversion. "I wouldn't like that. But it wouldn't be that all the time, would it? Mostly it would be healing people."

"What was so fine about the war?" Tweany said. "You never seen a war, young lady. You never seen a man get killed. I've seen that. War's an awful business."

She didn't mean that, of course. She meant the unanimity that had arisen during the war, the evaporation of internal hostility. "My grandfather died in 1940," she said aloud. "He used to keep a map of the war, a big wall map. He stuck pins in it."

"Yes," Tweany agreed, unmoved.

But she was greatly moved, because Grandfather Reynolds had been a vast and important person to her; he had taken care of her. "He used to explain to me about Munich and the Czechs," she said. "He loved the Czechs. Then he died. I was-" She computed-"I was seven years old."

"Very young," Tweany murmured.

Grandfather Reynolds had loved the Czechs, and she had loved him; and, perhaps, he was the only human being she had ever had real affection for. Her father was a danger, not a person. Since one certain night when she had come home late, and he, in the living room, had caught her, had really caught her: not in a game. Since that night she had been afraid. And he, the grinning little man, knew it. And enjoyed it.

"Ed was working in a defense plant in San Jose," she said. "But my grandfather was home; he was old. He used to own a ranch in the Sacramento Valley. And he was tall." She felt herself drifting, falling away into her own thoughts. "I remember that ... he used to lift me up and swing me around a long way off the ground. He was too old to drive; when he was a boy he rode on a horse." Her eyes shone. "And he wore a vest, and a big silver ring he bought from an Indian."

Getting to his feet, Tweany walked around the apartment pulling down the window shades. He leaned over Mary Anne to reach the window behind her; he smelled of beer and shirt starch and men's deodorant. "You're a nice-looking girl."

She roused herself a little. "I'm too thin."

"You're not a bad-looking girl," he repeated, looking down at her legs. Instinctively she drew them under her. "Do you know that?" he demanded, in an oddly hoarse voice.

"Maybe." She stirred fitfully ... it was getting late. Tomorrow morning she had to be up early; she had to be alert and fresh when she went to see about the ad. Thinking of it, she took hold of her purse.

"You a friend of Nitz's?" Tweany asked.

"I suppose."

"You like him?" He settled himself facing her, his body slack. "You like Nitz? Answer me."

"He's all right," she said, feeling uncomfortable.

"He's little." The man's eyes were full of brightness. "I bet you prefer your men large."

"No," she said irritably, "I don't care." Her head had begun to ache, and Tweany's closeness seemed oppressive. And she hated his beer smell: it reminded her of Ed. "Why don't you clean this place up?" she demanded, shifting away from him. "It's an awful mess-junk everywhere."

He sat back and his face collapsed into itself.

"It's terrible." She got to her feet and collected her coat, her purse. The apartment was no longer interesting: she blamed him for spoiling it. "It stinks," she said. "And it's all littered and I'll bet the wiring is bad."

"Yes," Tweany said. "The wiring is bad."

"Why don't you have it fixed? It's dangerous."

Tweany said nothing.

"Who cleans up?" she demanded. "Why don't you have somebody come in?"

"I have a woman come by."

"When?"

"Once in a while." He examined his jeweled wristwatch. "It's time we were getting back, Miss Mary Anne."

"I suppose. I have to be up early tomorrow." She watched him go to get his coat; he had withdrawn back into his shell of formality, and it was her fault. "I'm glad your hot water heater's okay, she said, as a sort of apology.

"Thank you."

As they walked down the dark night street, Mary Anne said, "Tomorrow I'm going job hunting."

"Are you."

"I want to work in a record shop." She felt his disinterest, and she wanted to draw him back. "It's that new one that's opening." In the late air she trembled.

"What's the matter?"

"My sinuses. I'm supposed to go down and have them drained. Changes of temperature make them hurt."

"Will you be all right?" he asked. They had come to the edge of the business section; ahead, along the street of locked shops, she could see the red glow of the Wren.

"Yes," she said. "I'm going home and go to bed."

"Good night," Tweany said, and started away.

"Wish me luck," she called after him, suddenly feeling the need of luck. Loneliness closed in, and she had to force herself not to flee after him.

Tweany waved and continued on his way. For a moment she stood anxiously watching the diminution of his figure. Then, holding onto her purse, she turned toward her own neighborhood.