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"It's German. I picked it up when I was with Schirmer's. I represented them in Germany."
Awed, she ran her fingers over the type bars. "Does it make that fu
"The umlaut?" He typed an umlaut for her. "See?"
He put on his big Magnavox phonograph, set the record changer for seventy-eight speed, and then, while it was warming up, entered the pantry and looked over his wine. Without consulting her he selected a bottle of Mackenzie's Fino Perla sherry, found two small wineglasses, and returned to the living room. Presently they were sprawled out listening to Heinrich Schlusnus singing "Der Nussbaum."
"I've heard that," Mary A
"What was that?" she asked.
"Aksel Schitotz." Then he added the title of the work.
"You're more interested in who sings it. Who is he? Is he still alive?"
"Schiotz is alive," Schilling said, "but he's not singing much anymore. Most of his highs are gone ... all he has left now is his lower range. But he's still one of the really unique voices of this century. In some ways, the finest of all."
"How old is he?"
"In his late fifties."
"I wish," Mary A
Schilling lifted the needle from the record; it had not yet reached the grooves. "Well," he said, "the only solution is to search. Read the ads in the paper, go around town finding out what exists."
"Will you help me? You have a car ... and you know about these things."
"When do you want to look?"
"Right away. As soon as possible."
"You mean now? Today?"
"Could we?"
A little amused, he said: "Finish your wine first."
She drank it down without tasting it. Resting the glass on the arm of the couch, she scrambled to her feet and stood waiting. "It's seeing your place," she told him as they left the apartment. "I can't go on living with that fool-her and her Oregon apples and her mambo records."
At the corner drugstore Schilling picked up Saturday's edition of the Leader; there was no Sunday edition. He drove through town as Mary A
Within half an hour they were tramping up the stairs of a great modern concrete apartment building on the edge of town, part of a newly developed improvement area, with its own stores and characteristic streetlamps. A tinted fountain marked the entrance of the area; small trees, California flowering plums, had been planted along the parking strips.
"No," Mary A
"Refrigerator, electric range, automatic washer and drier downstairs," the agent said, offended. "View of the mountains, everything clean and new. Lady, this building is only three years old."
"No," she repeated, already leaving. "It has no-what is it?" She shook her head. "It's too empty."
"You want a place you can fix up yourself," Schilling told her as they drove on. "That's what you're looking for, not just something you can move into, like a hotel room."
It was three-thirty in the afternoon when they found what she wanted. A large home in the better residential section had been divided into two flats; the walls were redwood-paneled and in the living room was an immense picture window. A smell of wood hung over the rooms, a presence of coolness and silence. Mary A
"Well?" Schilling said, observing her.
"It's-lovely."
"Will it do?"
"Yes," she whispered, only half-seeing him. "Imagine how this would look with a Hollywood bed over there, and Chinese mats on the floor. And you could find me some prints, like those you have. I could build a bookcase out of boards and bricks ... I saw that once. I've always wanted that."
The owner, a gray-haired woman in her sixties, stood in the doorway, gratified.
Schilling walked over to Mary A
"Oh," Mary A
"Do you have fifty dollars?"
"I have exactly one dollar and thirty-six cents." Defeat settled over her; shoulders drooping, she said mournfully: "I forgot about that."
"I'll pay for it," Schilling said, already producing his wallet. He had expected to. He wanted to.
"But you can't." She followed after him. "Maybe you could take it out of my salary; is that what you mean?"
"We'll work it out later." Leaving Mary A
"How old is your daughter?" the woman asked.
"Eh," Schilling said, staggered. There it was again, the reality under the surface. Mary A
"She's very pretty," the woman said, writing out the deposit receipt. "Does she go to school?"
"No," Schilling muttered. "She works."
"She's got your hair. But not quite so red as yours; much more brown. Shall I make this out in your name or hers?"
"Her name. She'll be paying for it." He accepted the receipt and herded Mary A
"We can haul over my things in the car," she said. "I don't have anything very large." Rushing ahead of him, turning and skipping back, she exclaimed: "It doesn't seem possible-look what we've done!"
"Before you unpack your things," Schilling said practically, but experiencing the same spur of excitement, "the ceilings should be painted, wherever there isn't the wood paneling. I noticed the paper's begi
"That's so," Mary A
"There's paint in the back of the store," he said as they drove toward the business section. "Left over from the redecorating. I kept it for touch-up. There's probably enough, if you don't object to the limited assortment. Or if you'd prefer to wait until Monday-"
Mary A
While Mary A
In the back of his mind was the realization that, customarily, he should be in the store providing his Sunday afternoon record concert. But, he said to himself, the heck with it. He found it hard to concentrate on records or business; it was impossible to imagine himself going through the motions of lecturing on Renaissance modality.
They had di
Well, a lot had happened. He had gone a long way since the previous Sunday. He wondered what he would be doing in another week. He now had a certain life to lead, and a certain person to be. That person had to be careful of what he did and said; he had to be careful to keep on being that person. Could he keep it up? Anything could happen. He recalled his lecture to Mary A