Sorry I Had to Leave You at the Nile

Six A.M. comes awfully early. Especially on Monday. Adeline was awakened this particular Monday morning by the sound of the alarm going off in her ear and the feel of Steve's hands between her legs, pulling them apart. She moved closer to him and forgot about the alarm. The alarm and Steve stopped together and for a while, all that could be heard in the room was the loud ticking of the clock and his heavy breathing. "Sorry, honey," he gasped finally, "guess I ain't awake yet." She smiled up at his ear and gently but firmly pushed his 240 pounds off. He lay beside her, his breath whistling between his teeth. Every morning when he was not on the road, including Saturday and Sunday, started the same way. And every morning, Steve made the same excuse, until she heard it even if he didn't say it. She didn't mind the mornings so much, because the nights were always good. And besides, what better way to start the day? So she smiled to herself, thinking about the nights, kissed him on the nose and rolled out on the other side of the bed.

Every morning, her answer was the same: "I know, bàby. It's OK."

Adeline was not a beautiful woman. Right now, stark-naked, she tended to look rather homely, eyes set too wide apart in her head and a body almost devoid of curves. And now, as she padded across the room, her arms stretched above her head and a loud yawn escaping her lips, Steve lay on his side, watching her. He watched and wondered what it was about her that excited him so much. What it was about her that always made him feel so damned good to feel the warmth of her next to him on mornings like these. She was incredibly thin. Almost bony. But he loved to hold her in his arms. He wondered if they'd ever get married. Probably not.

She was standing in front of him now, holding up the dress he'd bought her the day before. She was smiling like a little girl: "Thanks, honey, it's real pretty," she said, posing before the mirror on the dresser.

"Nothing's too good for my Addie. Nothing. If I'd had the money, I'd a bought you the best dress they had in the place."

"You don't think it's too short, do you?" she asked, adjusting the mirror so as to see the hemline better. She hated her legs.

"With your legs?" he said. "You gotta be kidding." He got out of bed and folded her in his arms, savoring the warmth of her naked back against his naked front. They stood like that for a moment, looking at their dual reflection in the mirror, each glad to have someone to share the moment with.

The raucous sound of a rock tune shattered their moment when Adeline's clock radio set for 6:15 went on. Adeline scrambled to turn it down and almost dropped the dress. She sat down on the side of the bed, crushing the shiny material in her fist and smiling to herself, wishing the alarm clock were enough to awaken her in the morning. Abruptly, she sprang up and started dressing. "I gotta get out of here before Brady thinks I ain't coming." She yawned again and picked up her bra from the floor by the side of the bed.

Brady's Beanery is one of those restaurants, equipped with a grill and ten rickety stools, that seem to defy the laws of business and economics by remaining open day after day, year after year. And Ben Brady is one of those restaurant owners who are often accused of giving away more food than they sell. But what no one has yet figured out is that Ben has a system. He is a fantastically good Indian-wrestler. And he wrestles his regulars, double or nothing.

On this particular Monday morning, Ben was standing at the grill, alternating between flipping pancakes over on the grill and flipping his gaze over the miniskirts and bobbing bosoms passing by outside the window. He finished the order, placed it on a plate and arranged four link sausages neatly around the stack of pancakes. "Pick up your pencil and paper," he called to Adeline, who was busy pouring a third cup of coffee for Steve with one hand while trying to extricate her other hand from his truck-driver's grip. She placed the coffeepot back on the burner and hurried up to the grill to get the order. When she got there, she was startled by the slight figure of a man smiling at her through the window. He smiled broadly, showing a row of unevenly spaced teeth. She returned the smile and delivered the pancakes to the customer who had ordered them.

A few minutes later, he was still standing there, staring at her, and she found it difficult to concentrate on the breakfast-check ritual going on between Ben and Steve. Steve's face was creased in a frown as he fought to keep Ben from forcing his fist to the countertop. As Ben forced his fist slowly down, Adeline heard the door open. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the stranger move up to the counter and sit down. She had hoped Ben would wait on him, but he was enjoying his victory too much to stop. "See what he wants, will ya, Addie?" Steve's fist hit the countertop, upsetting the half-empty coffee cup. "That'll be two-forty-two, thank you." Steve muttered something under his breath and grudgingly ran his hand into his pocket for his wallet.

She moved over to the stranger as Steve began demanding a rematch.

"Hello," the stranger said warmly.

"Hello," she answered with equal warmth, "what'll it be?"

The broad smile returned and, with seemingly genuine interest, he asked, "Are you glad to see me again?" Before she could speak, he added, "I'll bet you never thought you'd see me again, did you?" She stared at him for a second, trying to remember where they had met before. She decided there was some kind of mix-up. She was about to tell him so when he stopped her completely by saying, "Sorry I had to leave you at the Nile, but pressing business took me elsewhere."

He looked as though he were deadly serious and she found herself saying, almost without thinking, "That's OK. I understand." She felt a little silly.

"I knew you would." He paused for a moment, dropped his gaze and began cleaning one fingernail with another. She was about ready to call for help and turned to see Steve and Ben engaged in a rematch. She knew from past experience that Indian-wrestling matches took precedence over everything. Including nuts. The stranger was talking again. "But no matter what Caesar wants from now on, I'll never leave you alone again."

"Uh, how 'bout a cup of coffee?" she said, in an effort to collect her wits.

"Coffee's fine," he said, laying a quarter on the counter. She quickly gave him his coffee and turned just in time to see Steve lose his rematch. She could feel the stranger smiling at her over the rim of his coffee cup. When Steve's arm banged down on the counter for the second time that morning, she heard the door open and close again. When she looked up, the stranger was gone.

She had completely forgotten the incident by the time Steve came to pick her up that evening. And so, as they left the diner, she didn't see the stranger standing across the street. Nor did she notice him following about half a block behind them as they walked back to her apartment building.

When Steve and Adeline entered the building and the door closed behind them, the stranger stood across the street for a long time, staring at the building.

• • •

The following Thursday evening, Adeline's landlady, a woman known to friend and foe alike only as Mrs. Ellis, was sitting in front of an old-fashioned vanity, gazing at her reflection. She was silently bewailing the fact that her hair had once again rejected its bimonthly dose of dye. She had tried several different colors over the years and the end result was a sickly conglomeration resembling a fright wig done up in Easter-egg colors. She sighed and began to put it up in curlers. The doorbell rang. There was only one bell in the entire building and it rang only in Mrs. Ellis' apartment. That way, she could be sure no strangers ever darkened the doors of her tenants. Also, it made it easy for her to keep an eye on who came and went. She cursed softly as she struggled to bend down to find her slippers. When the bell rang the third time, she gave up and went to the front door in bare feet, dressed in housecoat and corset.

She didn't know the man who stood there smiling at her and displaying a row of unevenly spaced teeth. She was embarrassed, because she was sure she looked silly standing there with only half her head covered with curlers. But her embarrassment quickly passed as she gave him a lightning-quick perusal from head to foot. He was dressed in a dark topcoat that hung open, revealing a suit underneath. She liked that. His face was soft, almost childlike, and she liked the way he seemed to laugh with his eyes. But Mrs. Ellis had become suspicious of all strange young men since she had seen Tony Curtis in The Boston Strangler. She quickly clutched the neck of her housecoat and drew herself up to her full five feet, four inches.

"Good evening," the stranger said softly, "is Beatrice home?"

She clutched the housecoat a little tighter and readied for the doorknob.

"Beatrice who?" she asked, beginning to close the door. "No Beatrice living here, young man."

"Oh, yes she does. I've seen her come in and out several times." His smile changed to a knowing one. Impish but not impudent.

"What does she look like?" asked Mrs. Ellis, closing the door a little more.

"How do you describe a dream?" the stranger asked.

"Try," she said.

"Well, let's see if I can," he began. Mrs. Ellis stood listening to him rhapsodize about Beatrice. When he finished, she sifted it all out in her mind and it came to her that he was talking about Adeline. But that couldn't be. That was (continued on page 90)Leave you at the Nile(continued from page 86) crazy. She couldn't imagine why this well-dressed stranger was pouring out all those fine-sounding words about an ordinary girl like Adeline.

She'd better check it out a little. So, feeling a little like Perry Mason or some other TV detective, she asked, "Where does she work? You know that?" He told her. By God. It was Adeline. She mentally scratched her head. The curlers prevented the physical act. "I'll see if she'll see you," she said. As an afterthought, "Who shall I say is calling?"

"Just tell her Mr. Dante is here." The face became even more childlike.

Mrs. Ellis muttered the name under her breath to make sure she'd remember it and slammed the door in his face just as he was about to step in. She kept muttering the name to herself as she puffed her way up the thinly carpeted stairway toward Adeline's apartment.

"There's a fellow named Dante downstairs to see you," Mrs. Ellis said between gulps of air.

"Dante?"

"That's what he said his name was. And since when have you been going round telling people your name is Beatrice, anyway?"

"Mrs. Ellis, you know my name as well as I do. And it ain't Beatrice." She was a little put out at both the accusation and the substitution.

"Well, this fellow downstairs, he rung the bell and asked to speak to Beatrice. Described you to a tee. Well, not exactly to a tee. I had to work at it a little bit. But it was you he was talking about, all right. Knows where you work and everything."

"What does he look like?" Adeline asked. When Mrs. Ellis told her, Adeline moaned. She described the incident at the diner on Monday and ended by saying, "Throw the bum out." Then she slammed the door in Mrs. Ellis' face.

Back at the front door, Mrs. Ellis told the stranger with the childlike face to get lost and to stay lost. She was careful, however, not to open the door too wide. Just in case the stranger decided to get violent. But he didn't. He only smiled and said: "Tell her that when I have successfully survived the seventh circle, I shall return." When she recovered, Mrs. Ellis slammed the door and returned to do battle with the hair curlers. Her hand froze in mid-air as, once again, she thought of Tony Curtis and the Boston Strangler.

• • •

When two weeks went by without any further messages from the stranger, Adeline began to feel she had seen the last of him. So when Sunday turned out to be an extremely hot day, she suggested that she and Steve go to the beach. The stranger went with them. But at a safe distance. A few nights later, they went to the movies. And the stranger sat two rows behind them.

It was a month before he materialized again. Working a double shift had earned her a day off. Steve was away on a two-day haul. So when she got up that morning, she looked forward to having a whole day to herself. She decided to go shopping. She counted up her tips for the past few days and discovered she had enough to buy a cheap dress to surprise Steve when he returned.

That afternoon, as she was coming out of a department store, she saw a man standing at the curb beside a small vending stand loaded down with candied apples. She was about to pick one out when a hand on her arm stopped her. It was he. "Don't," he said softly. He was about to say more, but Adeline started screaming and beating him over the head with the paper bag containing the dress she had bought. A small crowd gathered and, with it, a policeman.

Before she knew it, both she and the stranger were in a police car on their way to the station. She was crying in earnest by this time, because, in the melee, the bag had split and her dress had sailed out into the street, where it was run over by a passing car. Each time the stranger tried to speak, she wailed all the louder. And that's the way she entered the station house, the torn bag in one hand and the crinkled dress with a brand-new greasy tire mark across the front of it in the other.

At the sound of the wailing woman entering the station, the desk sergeant looked up from his Sports Illustrated and, in two seconds flat, was all business. It had been a quiet afternoon. But he could tell from the looks of the scene in front of him that peace was coming to a quick end. Another wife beating, he thought, and flicked his ballpoint pen to the operational position. The patrolman brought Adeline and the stranger up to the desk.

"What have you got, Chuck?" he asked, sure he already knew the answer. Adeline and the officer started talking at the same time.

"My dress is ruined! Look at it! Just look at it!" she cried, shoving the dress into the desk sergeant's face with a force that made him draw back.

"Take it easy, lady," Chuck said. The stranger stood silent, like an innocent bystander, and moved up to the desk without resistance when Chuck took him by the arm.

"What did he do?" the desk sergeant asked again. Before Chuck could answer, Adeline started up again, demanding that someone do something about her ruined dress. "Will you calm down for a minute?" the sergeant said. "This is a police matter now."

She moaned, "It took almost a week's tips to pay for that dress. I was gonna be wearing it when Steve came back. But look at it! Just look at it! It's a wreck!" She started wailing again.

Chuck said to the desk sergeant, "This guy was molesting this woman on the street in front of Hochhuth's Department Store."

"Oh, one of them sex fiends, huh?" replied the sergeant, unhappy because he had guessed wrong.

"No, it wasn't like that at all," said the stranger. "I was trying to help her." His face became childlike again.

"Trying to help me!" squealed Adeline. "He damned near broke my arm!"

"Oh-ho," said the desk sergeant, "assault as well. Did he give you any trouble, Chuck? You know, did he resist?"

Chuck said to the stranger, "You had this woman by the arm, right? And she was screaming and beating you over the head with the bag when I come up, right?"

"Right, but I was only trying to stop her from eating the apple. I was trying to save her life. Didn't you see that?" From the look on his face, he seemed to be serious, but Chuck was used to that old dodge.

"No, I didn't see that," he answered. "What I saw was, and a helluva lot of other people saw it, too, was this woman fighting for her life in front of Hochhuth's Department Store. And--"

"No, no," interrupted the stranger, pausing to take a breath, "someone who is extremely jealous of her beauty wants her dead and plans to kill her with a poisoned apple." He stared into three silent faces. Even Adeline stopped wailing to look at him. The two policemen exchanged knowing looks. They had another nut on their hands. The stranger continued when he got no response. "I couldn't let that happen. I just couldn't. Look at her." The policemen looked at Adeline and then at each other. "I just couldn't let that happen, now, could I?" The policemen traded looks again, then looked at Adeline with a look that could only have been translated into: Why not?

"You want to press charges, lady?" asked the desk sergeant.

"Well," she hesitated, "I don't know...." She didn't say anything for a few seconds, she just looked into the faces of the three men. She had caught the glances of the two policemen and was smarting a little. And, deep down, she had to admit that the stranger was kind of cute, even if he was a nut. And also had to admit that she was a little flattered by the attention he had been showing her. They were staring at her without speaking and she knew she had (continued on page 176)Leave you at the Nile(continued from page 90) to say something. But she was enjoying the moment, now that the initial shock was over. She looked down at the dress and said, "If he'll buy me a new dress, I'll forget the whole thing." She thought that was a good compromise. After all, she didn't really want to send anyone to jail.

The two policemen were obviously disappointed. But the stranger's smile said that he wasn't. "How much?" he asked, reaching into his pocket. He pulled out a small roll of bills and pulled off the top two. He pressed them into her hands before she could speak. "I'm sure that will cover it." The two protruding edges showed that they were 20s. She started to say that he had given her too much, that she had paid only $9.98 for the dress. But he was speaking again. "But if it won't--" He started to peel off another bill.

"No," she said quickly, "this is more than enough." Now she could get that pair of shoes she wanted. The desk sergeant, bored and disappointed because he had been pulled away from his Sports Illustrated for nothing, only hoped to get them out of his station house. He was beginning to think the whole thing was a con on the girl's part, because he could see that she was obviously not from uptown. He clicked his ballpoint pen once more and told the stranger to stay while they asked him a few questions about poisoned apples. She started to protest, but the stranger assured her that he would be all right. So she left him there in the station house.

• • •

Another month went by before she saw him again. She didn't know that no matter where she went, he was never far behind.

Every Saturday afternoon, when Steve didn't have to work, he practiced with the baseball team that was sponsored by the trucking firm he worked for. He was always begging Adeline to come out and watch them practice. She always refused, but one Saturday afternoon, she decided that she didn't feel like sitting in the apartment, waiting for him to come back, so she went with him. On the way to the sand lot, he stopped and bought a six-pack of beer. When they got to the lot, he turned over a trash can, picked her up, sat her down on it, shoved a can of beer into her hand and went off to play.

Just as he did everything, he played hard, and she watched him intently. She knew that he was showing off a little for her benefit, because when he would hit a good one or would make an almost impossible catch, he would wave to her with a grin that covered his whole face and she would feel very warm inside. For a moment, she thought about the stranger and how different he was from Steve. She had asked around about a guy named Dante and a woman named Beatrice, but nobody in the neighborhood seemed to know them. She laughed and dropped the empty beer can onto the ground near two others that lay next to the overturned ash can.

Steve came up to bat. He winked at her and pointed off into the distance. She circled her thumb and forefinger and winked back. Then there was a loud crack when bat and ball connected and she watched the ball sail off. Steve was just coming into third base when she became aware that someone was standing behind her. There were a few other people watching the game, but they were all over on the other side of the field. She was about to look around when Steve slid into third just ahead of the tag. She jumped up and yelled out his name. He raised his fist into the air in a victory salute. She was laughing hard when she sat back down.

It was then that she heard a voice say, "I came to thank you for not pressing charges against me." She sat rigid for a moment, not believing her ears. It was as though she had conjured up the stranger out of her mind and the thought frightened her a little. She turned to look at him. And he was smiling that smile again, his uneven teeth reminded her of a broken picket fence. His smile suddenly irritated her, because it seemed that he was privy to some private joke he wasn't letting her in on.

Instead of speaking right away, she turned and pointed out to the baseball field. "See that big guy out there?" she asked.

"Yes," said the stranger, "his name is Steve Bernal. And--"

Not hearing him, she rushed on, "Well, he's my boyfriend and if you don't go away and leave me alone, he'll break you into little pieces. Now, beat it!"

The stranger shifted his weight and looked out at the big man, who was now at home plate, yelling at the umpire, who had just called him out. The smile faded for the briefest second as he watched the scene. But when he turned back to her, he was smiling again. "I know you're just testing my love for you," he said.

"Your what!?!" she screamed. "What are you, some kind of nut? You got a lot of nerve!" And she slapped him hard across the face. Steve, having lost his battle with the umpire, started walking toward Adeline just in time to see her swing at the stranger. In an instant, he dug in and, before either Adeline or the stranger knew what was happening, he was socking the stranger on the jaw.

Adeline yelled and started beating Steve on the back as he reached to pick the stranger up and sock him again. "Leave him alone, you nut! What're you trying to do, kill him? Leave him alone!"

"But I saw you swing at him," Steve said, trying to ward off Adeline's blows and reach for the stranger again.

"It's all right," she said, "it's all right. He's a friend of mine!" The stranger all this time lay on the ground, stunned but not out. Just one of Steve's punches had been enough to tell him that he didn't want to get up again. By this time, a small crowd had gathered, all hooked on the promise of a fight. And they laughed at the sight of Adeline pounding mercilessly on the big hulk of a man almost three times her size.

Like most men, Steve could not abide being laughed at. Especially in public. His solution to the problem was to turn around, pick Adeline up, tuck her under one arm, pick up what was left of the six-pack and march off the lot.

The stranger on the ground was forgotten as the crowd followed Steve and his cargo off the field. The sight of him walking down the street with Adeline kicking and screaming under one arm was the funniest thing they'd seen in a long time. They laughed, they hooted and they yelled after the retreating couple. They were so busy laughing they didn't hear the stranger, with his face beaming, say, "She loves me. She loves me." Not one head turned to watch him go when he got up and walked away, smiling and rubbing his jaw.

• • •

It was early in the morning two weeks later when the stranger came into the diner. But Adeline was gone. He sat down at the counter and when Ben, who was working alone, took his order, he asked for a cup of coffee. Before he knew it, Ben was back with the coffee, spilling part of it when he set it down, because he had to dash back to the grill to rescue some burning bacon. "Doesn't Josephine work here anymore?" he asked, when the crisis was over and Ben was clearing the dishes from the vacated counter space next to him.

Ben stopped wiping for a moment and, without looking up, said, "Must have the wrong place, buddy. No Josephine ever worked here." The stranger described Josephine. And, from the description, Ben knew he was talking about Adeline. He figured Josephine must have been a phony name Adeline had used. Suddenly, something clicked.

He stopped wiping and looked up at the man sitting across from him. It was the nut Adeline had told him about! The nut was speaking. "I would like very much to see her. I have something to give her."

Ben paused and took a deep breath. He was squeezing the rag so hard that water ran out onto the counter. "Listen, buddy, if you're the guy I think you are, I want you to know I lost the best waitress I ever had because of you. Look at this place. Empty. And at this time of the morning. She quit." He sopped up the water from the counter.

The stranger seemed upset. "Do you know where she works? How long ago did she quit?"

"About a week ago," Ben said, "and business ain't been the same since. I oughta bust you in the nose...." But the stranger didn't hear the last remark, because he was moving quickly out the door. And without paying for his coffee.

Mrs. Ellis didn't open the door when he appeared and rang the bell. She made him yell through the closed door. And when he asked where Josephine had moved to, she walked away and left him standing on the doorstep.

• • •

After a few weeks, Adeline began to think she had seen the last of the stranger. She had a new job, a new apartment and Steve was beginning to make noises about getting married. She was also glad to be away from the supernose of Mrs. Ellis, who had begun to make sly comments about how early in the morning Steve was leaving the building. But all of that was behind her, she thought, as she stepped off the bus that afternoon. It was a bright, sunshiny day and all was right with the world. She started to hum a tune vaguely resembling the wedding march. The tune stuck in her throat.

He was standing by the mailbox, smiling at her. She turned to get back onto the bus, but the door was already closed and the bus had started to move off. "Hello, Frankie," he said. His clothes were disheveled and he was badly in need of a shave, but the smile showed through the stubble on his face. She wanted to cry, scream, do something, anything to make him go away. She wondered if she could conjure him away, the way she had conjured him up that day at the sand lot.

She closed her eyes and whispered, "Go away." But when she opened them, he was still standing there, smiling at her. He seemed as happy as a little puppy. "Go away," she said, "or I'll call a cop--no, I'll holler rape, I'll--oh, go away. Please?" She looked around frantically for a policeman. There was none in sight. She wanted desperately to stop a passer-by.

He was standing there by the mailbox, not moving an inch toward her, with that stupid grin on his face. "I've been looking all over for you, Frankie," he said. "Why did you run away like that?" He moved toward her and she stepped back out into the street, only to jump almost immediately back onto the sidewalk when a honking horn scared her.

"What're you trying to do?" she pleaded, "kill me or something? Why don't you just get lost? My name's not Frankie!" she suddenly screamed, "or any other cockamamie name you might think up! It's--" She caught herself. There was only one thing to do, she concluded, and that was to run. Get the hell out of there and run as fast as she could.

"Please," the stranger said, "I don't want to hurt you. I just want ... here." He held out his hand. There was a book in it, bound in red leather.

She stared at it without moving. "What's that?"

"It's a book."

"What kind of a book?"

"Take it. I wrote it for you." The smile was gone now, replaced by a look of desperation. "Take it," he said again. The title page read: How I Survived the Seventh Circle. By Daniel Block. "Read the dedication," she heard him say. "To Adeline," it said, "who will always be Beatrice to me."

The leather was cool and smooth in her hand and the paper was almost tissue thin. She stared up at him with unbelieving eyes. She read the dedication again. "You wrote this for me?" she croaked. "Wow," was all she could utter. "Wow." She wanted to reach out and touch him. But she remained rooted. What do you say to a guy who writes a book for you? she wondered. "I can't take it," she said, the image of Steve rising in front of her. He'd never understand. The stranger begged her to take it, but she steadfastly refused.

"Then, as a last favor--call it payment for the book--will you at least have a cup of coffee with me? I know I don't look too good right now, but it is your fault I look this way. When I couldn't find you, I forgot about everything. Even shaving. Please. Just one tup of coffee." She wanted to refuse but somehow couldn't bring herself to do so. And, holding the book tightly in her hand, she walked beside him down the street in search of a café.

The waitress was obviously not pleased with the stranger's appearance. And when she brought the coffee, she stood fast, waiting to see who was going to pay for it. She was not prepared for the shock of receiving a five-dollar bill and being told to keep the change. Her expression changed immediately to one of lofty respect. She walked away sure that she had just encountered one of those rich eccentrics. There was a mirror behind the coffee urn and she compared her face and figure with Adeline's. She couldn't figure it. She was still puzzled when she waited on her next customer.

The two of them sat for several silent minutes. He stirred his coffee continuously as she turned the book over and over in her hand, as though she expected it to disappear at any second. He watched her as she thumbed through it, stopping several times to read a passage. Finally, she flipped back to the title page and read the name again. "Daniel Block," she said aloud. And simultaneously, almost automatically, she mentally tested the phrase Mrs. Daniel Block. She quickly erased the name from her mental blackboard.

When she looked up again, he was smiling at her across the rim of his cup. He seemed much calmer now. She was calmer, too, and for a second, it seemed as though she had known him for a long, long time. He was massaging the cup with his free hand. She marveled at how small and delicate it looked moving back and forth around the cup. His hair was longer than she remembered it and she felt a twinge of envy about the wavy shine of it. She inadvertently reached up and touched her own and quickly took her hand away when she felt its dryness. She followed the line of his forehead, which was a little longer than she would have liked it to be, down to his eyebrows, which seemed to have been set into his face unevenly, one at a time. In the dimness of the room, she couldn't tell if his eyes were brown or black, but they were dark. And, unlike the gaze of some men she could think of, she felt relaxed as they rested unmoving on her face.

She suddenly found herself wishing she knew more about make-up but hoping he couldn't see her face too well in the dim light. She tried to determine his age as she studied his high cheekbones and the small mouth surrounded by the stubble of beard. But she was no good at guessing men's ages. She guessed he must be 35 or so. She was fascinated with his face. Especially the eyes. Suddenly conscious of the fact that she was staring at him, she put the book down and quickly took a sip of coffee, spilling some on her hand in her haste. She took another sip and allowed the coffee to roll slowly down her throat to give herself time to think of something to say to the strange man who sat silently across from her.

"Daniel Block. That your real name? Or is it one you made up?"

"It's the name my parents gave me. But I use others from time to time." Silence was followed by another sip of coffee. She waited for him to go on. And when he didn't, she tried to frame another question. There were so many she wanted to ask him. And then, as though he sensed the way she felt, he started talking again.

"They think I'm crazy, you know."

"Who does?"

"My family. Which is ridiculous, of course."

"Of course."

Another long silence. Then, "They all live in me. Because I have a literary soul." He was leaning forward a little now, speaking in a lower tone of voice, as though he didn't want anyone around them to hear. "My family had me put away," he continued, "but I understood. They couldn't cope with it." She nodded, not understanding but trying hard to look as if she did. His face brightened and he leaned back a little in his seat. "They had to let me go when I passed all the tests they gave me, though." He chuckled with a mouth full of coffee and his Adam's apple bobbed up and down when he swallowed.

She wanted to say something, but she couldn't think what. So she sat there and smiled back at him as though she understood every word he said. He seemed pleased to have someone share his secret joke. She wished he'd get to the punch line, so she could enjoy it, too.

"They pay me to stay away," he said at last, "which is fine with me, since they don't understand me, anyway." He sighed contentedly and leaned forward on his elbows, his face cradled between his two fists. He grinned at her and said, "You're really beautiful, you know? Really beautiful." Here comes the pitch, she thought, now we get down to it. She felt a little sad. "They all live in you, too. That's why we belong together, you and I. Because they live in both of us. We are the living counterparts of all the classic lovers of literature. We belong together. And when the time is right, we will be together. I've searched for you for a long time and now that I've found you, I don't intend to lose you."

You're crazy as a bedbug, she thought, but she didn't say it. Instead, she got up from the table abruptly and hurried out before he could say any more. When he reached the door, she was jumping into a cab. He ran out into the street, calling after the disappearing vehicle.

In the back seat of the speeding taxi, Adeline sat hunched in one corner, shaking visibly. The driver, concerned, asked if she was feeling all right. She assured him she was. It was crazy. That's what it was. Crazy. It was like some dream that she couldn't seem to wake from. She became aware of a cramp in her hand. She was still clutching the thin red volume.

• • •

In the weeks that followed, she thought many times of the strange man named Daniel Block, though she never spoke of him aloud. She found herself looking over her shoulder when she walked down the street and each time she stepped off a bus, she expected to see him standing there, smiling at her. But she never saw him. She would find herself walking past the little café where the two of them had had coffee together, but she never went in. On the nights when Steve was out of town on a long haul, she would reach under the mattress and take out the book the stranger had given her and read parts of it, in an attempt to understand. But the book continued to baffle her, because its style was vastly different from that of the paperbacks she usually read. She would read until her head ached, because she felt sure that if she could understand the book, she could understand Daniel. Sometimes, she felt she was on the edge of understanding, but the edge would quickly vanish and she would shove the book back into its hiding place.

She was drying silver one day when Steve came bounding into the diner where she now worked. He was bursting with news. He had been promoted to branch manager, which meant he wouldn't have to go on the road again. He reached over the counter and lifted her bodily across it. "Marry me, Addie," he said, "you and me belong together." She froze for a brief moment, remembering the words of a stranger whose family had named him Daniel. But he was only part of a crazy dream. Something that never really happened. This was real. This feeling of being crushed in the arms of a man who shared her bed from time to time, a man whose words and thoughts and dreams she understood. This was real.

Steve's two lips as they crushed hers and the words in her ears she had never heard him say before: "I love you, Addie. Marry me. You know I'll be good to you. Marry me." Yes, this was real. The other was just some crazy thing she had conjured up.

Almost without thinking, she heard herself say, "You'd better be good to me, or I'll break your head." He crushed her to him again and roared with laughter. Laughter that was so infectious that soon the entire diner was laughing with him, happy for him. And as she joined in the laughter and accepted the congratulations, Adeline thought of the red volume resting underneath the mattress at home.

In the hustle of her impending marriage, she forgot all about the stranger. She went shopping and bought all the things a bride should have, with the help of a former roommate named Gracie, who had moved out when the marriage bug had bitten her. And she found that as the date drew closer and her happiness increased, the image of the stranger drifted further and further into the back of her mind. He had never appeared again and she no longer tried to read the book he had written. She had tried once to throw it out when she lurried the mattress, but went back to the trash can, took it out, wiped off the coffee grounds and returned it to its hiding place. When the date arrived, she had completely forgotten about the book.

He was standing outside the church when Adeline and Steve came out after the wedding. He looked thin and drawn, as though he hadn't eaten for a long time. His clothes looked even more disheveled than when she had last seen him. He made no move toward her as she walked down the steps. She shot a quick glance at Steve to see if he, too, had seen. But Steve was too busy. Too busy laughing and shaking hands to notice. Someone spun her around and hugged her tightly, knocking her bouquet from her hand. It was one of Steve's truck-driving friends. And for a moment, she lost sight of Daniel standing at the curb. When the truck driver released her, she was immediately grabbed by another and then another. This went on for several minutes and she wanted desperately to break away, so that she could explain to Daniel why she was doing this thing. She didn't know why, but she knew she had to explain it to him. But by the time the last pair of arms released her, he was gone. She ran down the remaining steps and looked both ways, up and down the street. He was nowhere in sight. The chance was gone and she felt sorry because of it. When Steve came down the steps and put his arm around her, she felt a strong urge to pull away from him. Feeling her tension, he asked, "What's the matter, Addie?" with genuine concern in his voice. She turned and looked up into his suddenly troubled eyes that had gone a little wide. And when she felt the warmth of his hand through the thin material of her dress, she looked once more up and down the now-empty street and said to herself, This is real.