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“Rudolph … It is Rudolph, isn’t it?”
“Yes.” His sister must have run off at the mouth like a faucet.
“Rudolph, do you intend to make a profession of the trumpet?” Kindly old vocational counselor, now.
“No. I’m not good enough,” Rudolph said.
“That’s wise,” Boylan said. “It’s a dog’s life. And you have to mix with scum.”
“I don’t know about that,” Rudolph said. He couldn’t let Boylan get away with everything. “I don’t think people like Be
“Who knows?” Boylan said.
“They’re artists,” Julie said tightly.
“One thing does not preclude the other, child.” Boylan laughed gently. “Rudolph,” he said, dismissing her, “what do you plan to do?”
“When? Tonight?” Rudolph knew that Boylan meant as a career, but he didn’t intend to let Boylan know too much about himself. He had a vague idea that all intelligence might one day be used against him.
“Tonight I hope you’re going to go home and get a good night’s sleep, which you eminently deserve after your hard evening’s work,” Boylan said. Rudolph bridled a little at Boylan’s elaborate language. The vocabulary of deceit. Trapped English. “No, I mean, later on, as a career,” Boylan said.
“I don’t know yet,” Rudolph said. “I have to go to college first.”
“Oh, you’re going to college?” The surprise in Boylan’s voice was clear, a pinprick of condescension.
“Why shouldn’t he go to college?” Julie said. “He’s a straight A student. He just made Arista.”
“Did he?” Boylan said. “Forgive my ignorance, but just what is Arista?”
“It’s a scholastic honor society,” Rudolph said, trying to extricate Julie. He didn’t want to be defended in the terms of adolescence. “It’s nothing much,” he said. “If you can just read and write, practically …”
“You know it’s a lot more than that,” Julie said, her mouth bunched in disappointment at his self-deprecation. “The smartest students in the whole school. If I was in the Arista, I wouldn’t poor-mouth it.”
Poor-mouth, Rudolph thought, she must have gone out with a Southern boy in Co
“I’m sure it’s a great distinction, Julie,” Boylan said soothingly.
“Well it is.” She was stubborn.
“Rudolph’s just being modest,” Boylan said. “It’s a commonplace male pretense.”
The atmosphere in the car was uncomfortable now, with Julie in the middle angry at both Boylan and Rudolph. Boylan reached over and turned on the radio. It warmed up and a radio a
“You’d think with the war just over,” Julie said, “God would lay off for awhile.”
Boylan looked at her in surprise and turned off the radio. “God never lays off,” he said.
Old faker, Rudolph thought. Talking about God. After what he’s done.
“What college do you intend to go to Rudolph?” Boylan talked across Julie’s plump, pointy, little chest.
“I haven’t made up my mind yet.”
“It’s a very grave decision,” Boylan said. “The people you meet there are likely to change your whole life. If you need any help, perhaps I can put in a good word at my Alma Mater. With all the heroes coming back, boys of your age are going to have difficulties.”
“Thank you.” The last thing in the world. “I don’t have to apply for months yet. What college did you go to?”
“Virginia,” Boylan said.
Virginia, Rudolph thought disdainfully. Anybody can go to Virginia. Why does he talk as though it’s Harvard or Princeton, or at least Amherst?
They drew up in front of Julie’s house. Automatically, Rudolph looked up at Miss Lenaut’s window, in the next building. It was dark.
“Well, here we are, child,” Boylan said, as Rudolph opened the door on his side and got out. “It’s been delightful talking to you.”
“Thank you for the ride,” Julie said. She got out and bounced past Rudolph toward her front door. Rudolph went after her. He could kiss her good night, at least, in the shadow of the porch. As she felt in her bag for her key, her head down, her pony tail swinging down over her face, he tried to pick up her chin so he could kiss her, but she pulled away fiercely. “Kowtower,” she said. She mimicked him savagely. “It’s nothing much. If you can just read and write, practically …”
“Julie …”
“Suck up to the rich.” He had never seen her face looking like that, pale and closed down. “Scaly old man. He bleaches his hair. And his eyebrows. Boy, some people’ll do anything for a ride in a car, won’t they?”
“Julie, you’re being unreasonable.” If she knew the whole truth about Boylan, he might understand her anger. But just because he was ordinarily polite …
“Take your hands off me.” She had the key out and was fumbling at the door, still smelling of apricot.
“I’ll come by tomorrow about four …”
“That’s what you think,” she said. “Wait until I have a Buick and then come around. That’s more your speed.” She had the door open now and was through it, a rustle of girl, a fragrant, snapping shadow, and was gone as the door slammed shut.
Rudolph went back to the car slowly. If this was love, the hell with it. He got into the car and closed the door. “That was a quick good night,” Boylan said as he started the car. “In my day, we used to linger.”
“Her folks like her to get in early.”
Boylan drove through the town in the direction of Vanderhoff Street. Of course he knows where I live, Rudolph thought. He doesn’t even bother to hide it.
“A charming girl, little Julie,” Boylan said.
“Yeah.”
“You do anything more than kiss her?”
“That’s my business, sir,” Rudolph said. Even in his anger at the man, he admired the way the words came out, clipped and cold. Nobody could treat Rudolph Jordache as though Rudolph Jordache was a cad.
“Of course it is,” Boylan said. He sighed. “The temptation must be great. When I was your age …” He left it unfinished, a suggestion of a procession of virgins, virginal no more.
“By the way,” he said in a flat conversational tone, “do you hear from your sister?”
“Sometimes,” Rudolph said guardedly. She wrote to him care of Buddy Westerman. She didn’t want her mother reading her letters. She was living in a Y.W.C.A. downtown in New York. She had been making the rounds of theatrical offices, looking for a job as an actress but producers weren’t falling all over themselves to hire girls who had played Rosalind in high school. She hadn’t found any work yet, but she loved New York. In her first letter she had apologized for being so mean to Rudolph the day she left, at the Port Philip House. She had been all churned up and not really responsible for what she was saying. But she still thought it was bad for him to stay on at home. The Jordache family was quicksand, she wrote. Nothing was going to change her opinion about that.
“Is she well?” Boylan asked.
“Okay.”
“You know I know her,” Boylan said, without emphasis.
“Yes.”
“She spoke to you about me?”
“Not that I remember,” Rudolph said.
“Ah-hah.” It was difficult to know what Boylan meant to convey by this. “Do you have her address? I sometimes go down to New York and I might find the time to buy the child a good di
“No, I don’t have her address,” Rudolph said. “She’s moving.”
“I see.” Boylan saw through him, of course, but didn’t press. “Well, if you do hear from her, let me know. I have something of hers she might like to have.”
“Yeah.”
Boylan turned into Vanderhoff and stopped in front of the bakery.
“Well, here we are,” he said. “The home of honest toil.” The sneer was plain. “I bid you good night, young man. It’s been a most agreeable evening.”