“And the time?”
“I’ll let you know.”
“As soon as you can. And that’s what you were so glum about? Now cheer up. Men are such lumps when they are happy.”
“You are very sweet about it.”
“Don’t mind me. Only go as fast as you can and get the details. You don’t know how important they are. I’ll expect to hear from you within an hour. You will call me up?”
“Yes.”
The next he knew he was in the Central Park Zoo looking at the monkeys and wondering why they were so mystified. What had they to be puzzled about? Then there was a little brown bear that precisely expressed the absurdity he felt in himself. He did not mind feeling absurd. No, that was even comforting. A pain in the ego counteracting one in the heart. Clumsy as the device was it had served his purpose. He had found out. But it was no relief whatever. In the way he hoped she might she cared less than not at all—less than a foster sister or an old maid aunt. He could not be mistaken. He had watched her closely. She had betrayed not the slightest sign of self-concern. He had that same diminished, ignominious feeling with which he retired from the boxwood hedge on the evening of their first youth-time encounter.
What an asinine thing to have done!
When he called her on the telephone two hours later, as he had promised to do, this conversation occurred:
“This is John.”