bougainvilleas on it, its loose bodice caught at the waist between her breasts and hips by a broad elastic woven into the material, and suspended from her shoulders by a couple of slim ribbons that left most of her back exposed. âExcuse me,â I said, over the roar of the vacuum cleaner. She looked at me dreamily and placed her lips very close to my ear, pressing the vibrating hose between us. âWhat,â she breathed into my ear, completely in symphony with the roar, âI canât hear you . . .â Her hands slid down my shoulders to my hips. She wore no shoes, certainly she wouldnât wear anything under the lavender and yellow dress. Even as my resolve began to disinte-grate I muttered something to the effect that I must take the air. Marlene smiled and turned her back on me. As she leaned into her work her buttocks brushed my pelvis. I was pressed between these and the wall as she moved the vacuum hose from side to side over the ancient hall carpet. My hand involuntarily strayed up the thin Dacron over the vertebrae of her spine, and onto the naked field beyond. My fingers plowed into the luxuriant tangle of hair at the nape of her neck, her hair was reddish blonde, but a tail of pure gold lay hidden there, I knew, beneath the strawberry curls and just above the hollow at the base of her neck, it flashed at me as I combed her hair with my fingers. She turned her head from side to side, against my palm. Much woman, Marlene OâShaughnesy, this marvelous landlady, I thought to myself, but I must take the air, and I pushed her gently forward, stepped toward the stairs, and released her. She rocked gently backwards against the wainscot and bounced back into her work, humming âThe Long and Winding Road.â
On the street the sun shone brightly, and a cool breeze with a tang of salt on it blew briskly from the west. Marleneâs house was an immaculate Victorian facing the south side of Alta Plaza Park, a block off Fillmore Street, in a neighborhood full of immaculate Victorians so expensive as to virtually assure that each contained a two-income executive couple or a bordello of international reputation. As I approached the steps that rose from the sidewalk north into the park, a lemon yellow two-seat Mercedes convertible pulled into a driveway across from me, and a woman in a uniform dating from the reign of Victoria herself, rather like a maidâs costume, a black satin camisole, trimmed with scarlet piping, black stockings, loosely wrapped withal by a white fur stole, exited the vehicle, leaving the top down and slamming the door. She precisely crushed a cigarette beneath the sole of her ebony high heel pump, carefully sectioned and draped the length of her impeccably groomed platinum blonde hair, so that three-fourths of it cascaded over her shoulders down to the middle of her back, the other one fourth over her ample bosom beneath the stole, and tripped purposefully up the steps of a lovely house, also facing the park, not four doors down from Marleneâs, and let herself in with her own key.
Pausing at the top of the concrete steps, fifty yards up the hill and into the park, I turned and scanned the automobiles parked along the block I call home. Behind me, children squealed with delight as their maids, au pairs , tutors, and rarely a mother or two pushed them in chain swings with canvas seats. The A-frame swing-sets, rusty from years in the salt air, squeaked loudly in a half-acre sandbox in the middle of the fenced-off kiddie park, beneath a tall grove of eucalyptuses that rattled and swayed in the afternoon westerly.
After awhile I spotted him, asleep in a four year old Plymouth parked across the street a few doors down from the house with the Mercedes in its driveway. All the signs were there. Sections of the Chronicle, the green sports page well-read and on top, piled on the dashboard, along with a digital clock, sandwich wrappers and several white styrofoam
On the street the sun shone brightly, and a cool breeze with a tang of salt on it blew briskly from the west. Marleneâs house was an immaculate Victorian facing the south side of Alta Plaza Park, a block off Fillmore Street, in a neighborhood full of immaculate Victorians so expensive as to virtually assure that each contained a two-income executive couple or a bordello of international reputation. As I approached the steps that rose from the sidewalk north into the park, a lemon yellow two-seat Mercedes convertible pulled into a driveway across from me, and a woman in a uniform dating from the reign of Victoria herself, rather like a maidâs costume, a black satin camisole, trimmed with scarlet piping, black stockings, loosely wrapped withal by a white fur stole, exited the vehicle, leaving the top down and slamming the door. She precisely crushed a cigarette beneath the sole of her ebony high heel pump, carefully sectioned and draped the length of her impeccably groomed platinum blonde hair, so that three-fourths of it cascaded over her shoulders down to the middle of her back, the other one fourth over her ample bosom beneath the stole, and tripped purposefully up the steps of a lovely house, also facing the park, not four doors down from Marleneâs, and let herself in with her own key.
Pausing at the top of the concrete steps, fifty yards up the hill and into the park, I turned and scanned the automobiles parked along the block I call home. Behind me, children squealed with delight as their maids, au pairs , tutors, and rarely a mother or two pushed them in chain swings with canvas seats. The A-frame swing-sets, rusty from years in the salt air, squeaked loudly in a half-acre sandbox in the middle of the fenced-off kiddie park, beneath a tall grove of eucalyptuses that rattled and swayed in the afternoon westerly.
After awhile I spotted him, asleep in a four year old Plymouth parked across the street a few doors down from the house with the Mercedes in its driveway. All the signs were there. Sections of the Chronicle, the green sports page well-read and on top, piled on the dashboard, along with a digital clock, sandwich wrappers and several white styrofoam
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