she seduced him, he stopped having a rational thought. He was pathetic, believe me. Love? With that big obvious creature? How could a fine man love an animal? He was hypnotized by what was under her skirt. Excuse me for being coarse."
"These things happen."
She shrugged. "One expects them to happen, with women like that. But not with men like John. One doesn't expect a man like my brother to destroy himself for the sake of… access to a big meaty pretentious blonde floozy."
"Maybe he didn't."
"Mr. McGee, everything my brother dreamed of doing or being is dead. Maybe he can make a living in a correspondence school, or a textbook house, but his career is over. And he is a brilliant man. It's such a damnable waste. I couldn't make him see what an ass he was being. God knows I tried. We never fought like that before. He doesn't give a damn what he's done to me, either. Sacrifices I've made apparently mean nothing to him. Pride and devotion. They mean nothing. God, I've read about it enough times, how a sensual fixation can destroy a man, but I never thought it could happen to him. And it is all… so utterly meaningless. Some absurd little sexual spasms and releases, and the whole world thrown away just for that! I shall never, never understand it."
"Did you know he was going to run away with her?"
"I was afraid of it. He'd gotten so restless since the fall term started. Then, I would say about ten days ago, he changed. He seemed to be happy about something. He told me everything was going to work out. Arrangements were being made. He seemed very smug. He'd set up his schedule so that he had Tuesday and Thursday afternoons free every week, and Monday afternoons free every other week. He would leave on those afternoons and meet with her somewhere. And he would come dragging back here about seven or eight at night, dazed and exhausted, wearing that foolish grin. The damned woman was wearing him out with her demands on him. He had the impertinence to suggest that once things were all arranged, the three of us could live here. Can you imagine her as a faculty wife? She is two years older than John, you know. She would start telling the president of the university how to run things."
"Perhaps she told him that I was going to help her."
"Possibly. Oh, they were terribly optimistic about everything. They seemed to think that because they were infatuated with each other, the whole world should find them terribly attractive. But everyone knew it as… a distasteful and unpleasant situation."
She got up and got the coffee pot, unplugged it and brought it over and filled our cups. When she bent over mine I noticed she smelled like vanilla. I wondered if she had been drinking it. It did not seem likely. This was one of the intense ones. She was perhaps four years younger than her brother.
I could imagine her plodding around NYU in black stockings and short tweed skirts, arguing with a coffee-house passion about abstract concepts, trying the painter-loft sex and finding it overrated, trying the knock on the mescaline and finding it made her sick instead of exalted, signing up to picket this and that, sitting for hours of observation in the UN, wearing barbaric jewelry designed by no-talent friends, painting stage sets for amateur production; all in all an intense, humorless, intellectual child, full of heavy dedications and looking for some shelf to put them on.
"Yesterday, Tuesday," I said, "Mrs. Yeoman picked me up at the Carson Airport at noon. I understand that your brother took off Monday afternoon. That seems a little previous."
"I imagine they had it all planned. I've been taking some courses here. I have a Monday afternoon seminar. Mass Communication and Opinion Leadership. John had two classes Monday morning. Contemporary Philosophy. And Philosophy in Literature. He had Monday afternoon off. I expected he would be with her. When he didn't get back by nine o'clock, I felt uneasy. But I imagined he had somehow arranged to
"These things happen."
She shrugged. "One expects them to happen, with women like that. But not with men like John. One doesn't expect a man like my brother to destroy himself for the sake of… access to a big meaty pretentious blonde floozy."
"Maybe he didn't."
"Mr. McGee, everything my brother dreamed of doing or being is dead. Maybe he can make a living in a correspondence school, or a textbook house, but his career is over. And he is a brilliant man. It's such a damnable waste. I couldn't make him see what an ass he was being. God knows I tried. We never fought like that before. He doesn't give a damn what he's done to me, either. Sacrifices I've made apparently mean nothing to him. Pride and devotion. They mean nothing. God, I've read about it enough times, how a sensual fixation can destroy a man, but I never thought it could happen to him. And it is all… so utterly meaningless. Some absurd little sexual spasms and releases, and the whole world thrown away just for that! I shall never, never understand it."
"Did you know he was going to run away with her?"
"I was afraid of it. He'd gotten so restless since the fall term started. Then, I would say about ten days ago, he changed. He seemed to be happy about something. He told me everything was going to work out. Arrangements were being made. He seemed very smug. He'd set up his schedule so that he had Tuesday and Thursday afternoons free every week, and Monday afternoons free every other week. He would leave on those afternoons and meet with her somewhere. And he would come dragging back here about seven or eight at night, dazed and exhausted, wearing that foolish grin. The damned woman was wearing him out with her demands on him. He had the impertinence to suggest that once things were all arranged, the three of us could live here. Can you imagine her as a faculty wife? She is two years older than John, you know. She would start telling the president of the university how to run things."
"Perhaps she told him that I was going to help her."
"Possibly. Oh, they were terribly optimistic about everything. They seemed to think that because they were infatuated with each other, the whole world should find them terribly attractive. But everyone knew it as… a distasteful and unpleasant situation."
She got up and got the coffee pot, unplugged it and brought it over and filled our cups. When she bent over mine I noticed she smelled like vanilla. I wondered if she had been drinking it. It did not seem likely. This was one of the intense ones. She was perhaps four years younger than her brother.
I could imagine her plodding around NYU in black stockings and short tweed skirts, arguing with a coffee-house passion about abstract concepts, trying the painter-loft sex and finding it overrated, trying the knock on the mescaline and finding it made her sick instead of exalted, signing up to picket this and that, sitting for hours of observation in the UN, wearing barbaric jewelry designed by no-talent friends, painting stage sets for amateur production; all in all an intense, humorless, intellectual child, full of heavy dedications and looking for some shelf to put them on.
"Yesterday, Tuesday," I said, "Mrs. Yeoman picked me up at the Carson Airport at noon. I understand that your brother took off Monday afternoon. That seems a little previous."
"I imagine they had it all planned. I've been taking some courses here. I have a Monday afternoon seminar. Mass Communication and Opinion Leadership. John had two classes Monday morning. Contemporary Philosophy. And Philosophy in Literature. He had Monday afternoon off. I expected he would be with her. When he didn't get back by nine o'clock, I felt uneasy. But I imagined he had somehow arranged to
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