Hearts in Atlantis(109)

'What?'

'I was thinking about riding to an antiwar demonstration in a station wagon with a Goldwater sticker on the bumper.'

I guessed that was sort of funny.

'Besides,' she said, 'I imagine you had other things to do.'

'What's that supposed to mean?' As if I didn't know. Through the glass of the phone-booth and that of the lounge, I could see most of my floor-mates playing cards in a fume of cigarette smoke. And even in here with the door closed I could hear Ronnie Malenfant's high-pitched cackle. We're chasing The Bitch, boys, we are cherchez-ing la cunt noire, and we're going to have her out of the bushes.

'Studying or Hearts,' she said. 'Studying, I hope. One of the girls on my floor goes out with Lennie Doria - or did, when he still had the time to go out. She calls it the card-game from hell. Am I being a nag yet?'

'No,' I said, not knowing if she was or not. Maybe I needed to be nagged. 'Carol, are you okay?'

There was a long pause. 'Yeah,' she said at last. 'Sure I am.'

'The construction workers who showed up - '

'Mostly mouth,' she said. 'Don't worry. Really.'

But she didn't sound right to me, not quite right . . . and there was George Oilman to worry about. I worried about him in a way I didn't about Sully, the boyfriend back home.

'Are you on this Committee Nate told me about?' I asked her. 'This Committee of Resistance whatsit?'

'No,' she said. 'Not yet, at least. George has asked me to join. He's this guy from my Polysci course. George Gilman. Do you know him?'

'Heard of him,' I said. I was clutching the phone too tightly and couldn't seem to loosen up.

'He was the one who told me about the demonstration. I rode up with him and some others. I . . . ' She broke off for a moment, then said with honest curiosity: 'You're not jealous of him, are you?'

'Well,' I said carefully, 'he got to spend an afternoon with you. I'm jealous of that, I guess.'

'Don't be. He's got brains, plenty of them, but he's also got a wiffle haircut and great big shifty eyes. He shaves, but it seems like he always misses a big patch. He's not the attraction, believe me.'

'Then what is?'

'Can I see you? I want to show you something. It won't take long. But it might help if I could just explain . . . ' Her voice wavered on the word and I realized she was close to tears.

'What's wrong?'

'You mean other than that my father probably won't let me back into his house once he's seen me in the News? He'll have the locks changed by this weekend, I bet. That's if he hasn't changed them already.'

I thought of Nate saying he was afraid his mother would see a picture of him getting arrested. Mommy's good little pre-dent pinched down in Deny for parading in front of the Federal Building without a permit. Ah, the shame, the shame. And Carol's dad? Not quite the same deal, but close. Carol's dad was a steady boy who said ship ahoy and joined the Nay-yay-vee, after all.

'He may not see the story,' I said. 'Even if he does, the paper didn't use any names.'

'The picture? She spoke patiently, as if to someone who can't help being dense. 'Didn't you see the picture?'

I started to say that her face was mostly turned away from the camera and what you could see was in shadow. Then I remembered her high-school jacket with HARWICH HIGH SCHOOL blaring across the back. Also, he was her father, for Christ's sake. Even half-turned away from the camera, her father would know her.

'He may not see the picture, either,' I said lamely. 'Damari-scotta's at the far edge of the News's area.'

'Is that how you want to live your life, Pete?' She still sounded patient, but now it was patience with an edge. 'Doing stuff and then hoping people won't find out?'

'No,' I said. And could I get mad at her for saying that, considering that Annmarie Soucie still didn't have the slightest idea that Carol Gerber was alive? I didn't think so. Carol and I weren't married or anything, but marriage wasn't the issue. 'No, I don't. But Carol . . . you don't have to shove the damned newspaper under his nose for him, do you?'

She laughed. The sound had none of the brightness I had heard in her earlier giggle, but I thought even a rueful laugh was better than none at all. 'I won't have to. He'll find it. That's just the way he is. But I had to go, Pete. And I'll probably join the Committee of Resistance even though George Gilman always looks like a little kid who just got caught eating boogers and Harry Swidrowski has the world's worst breath. Because it's . . . the thing of it is . . . you see . . . ' She blew a frustrated I-can't-explain sigh into my ear. 'Listen, you know where we go out for smoke-breaks?'

'At Holyoke? By the Dumpsters, sure.'

'Meet me there,' Carol said. 'In fifteen minutes. Can you?'

'Yes.'

'I have a lot more studying to do so I can't stay long, but I . . . I just . . . '

'I'll be there.'

I hung up the phone and stepped out of the booth. Ashley Rice was standing in the doorway of the lounge, smoking and doing a little shuffle-step. I deduced that he was between games. His face was too pale, the black stubble on his cheeks standing out like pencil-marks, and his shirt had gone beyond simply soiled; it looked lived-in. He had a wide-eyed Danger High Voltage look that I later came to associate with heavy cocaine users. And that's what the game really was; a kind of drug. Not the kind that mellowed you out, either.