Butterfly Man. Lew Levenson

against her body as they walked to the hotel.

      ​"Don't you think we oughta rehearse in the morning?" Ken asked.

      "What for? Take it easy. Don't wear yourself out," she said. "Feinberg saw us, that counted for more'n I thought. Squeeze that lime into my glass. And drink."

      Ken squeezed the lime. "I can't go this stuff much," he said. "It hits the lining of my stomach."

      "You'll get use to gin and alkie again if you stay in vaudeville." She sat down on the bed. "Come here, sit beside me."

      He sat down.

      The room was steeped in the musty odor of an old hotel. Even the bedclothing was impregnated with the dry smell.

      "You're a strange boy," she said. "Here we are old friends. This is the first time in history you've sat next to me on a bed."

      She slipped a bare arm around his neck and kissed him. He smiled and returned the kiss.

      "I like you," he said. "Guess I'm a little afraid of you still."

      "You don't have to be, sweet," she said. "I wanta tell you something tonight before it's too late. You've done great things for me. It wasn't so much that I was busted when I met up with you—I still am, for that matter—but you've made me feel full of wim and wigor again. I'm ambitious again. Anyone who ever said Nita Rogers would slave the way I did with you woulda been put out of the kingdom of heaven just on general principles."

      "I don't believe you were so bad." He laughed. She smiled and they found themselves kissing. She slipped away from him, poured another drink and drank it.

      "You've had me on the wagon, imagine that … me!" ​She put the glass down. "Let's go to my room," she said. "No use bringing my things in here."

      "Let's wait a while," he said. Then he looked up at her and noticed that she was removing her dress. "You can put a newspaper over that table lamp," she was saying. She slipped down into the overstuffed chair. "Pour me another drink, too."

      "Don't drink any more," he said.

      "A little gin and ginger ale won't hurt me. Don't look so funny about me and help me outa this slip." He still sat on the bed. "Come on."

      He rose and poured some ginger ale in her glass.

      "There's only one kinda paradise on earth, boy," she said. "When I tell you I've been stuck on you since I saw you, that means a lot. When I tell you I ain't been out with a man in all that time—" The slip dropped to the floor and she tossed it on the table.

      "Except Ed Feinberg," she added.

      "The agent?"

      "You don't s'pose he booked the world famous dance team of Rogers and Gracey without me coming across with a date, do you?"

      He hesitated.

      "Switch off the lights and cover up the lamp with a paper, hon."

      "I don't want to," he said.

      "You don't want to?" she repeated with blank astonishment. "Aw, don't be nervous. It won't make any difference one way or another, sweet."

      "Nita," he said. "I'm awfully fond of you. You're swell." He tucked her slimness in his arms. "But—"

      ​"What is it?" she looked up. "Oh, I can see it in your face. You don't love me."

      "I ought to. I should—"

      "But you can't?"

      He let her go. His movements had been mechanical. He had not been thinking. Nothing to think about, until she had mentioned Ed Feinberg. Then the coarse features of the agent returned vividly to his mind.

      "I … we … we meet somehow in different ways. I don't know how to explain what I mean," he said. "I love you—I seem to love you for everything you are—everything you are to me."

      "Then why?" She changed expression suddenly. "I know. Because this will be your first affair?"

      "No—" Deep in his consciousness he discovered the obscure memory of an unforgettable night at Malibu. A shudder shook him. His face became a plastic study in hatred.

      "I know," she said.

      "How could you?" he cried.

      "You hate me … that's the real truth, isn't it?"

      "Oh, no!"

      She turned away. "And I thought I was so wise." She took the last swig of gin raw from the bottle. Then the slip and dress from the table. "What a fool I've been!"

      "Where are you going?" he asked her as she opened the door and, still half undressed, entered the corridor.

      For a long time Ken stood motionless. He could feel the numbing after-effect of the gin. His thoughts were jerky, broken. He shook his head helplessly. He could not understand why Anita had gone. Slowly an intense deep-rooted urge to find her rose within him. A sere slow ​passionate pain made him turn toward the door. He wanted her.

      Coldly the pale light in the corridor illumined the dreary walls. He was such a weak fool. What of it? He would be strong. He would renounce his own imaginary scruples and warm himself to her, in love with her, despite everything.

      He knocked on the door. No reply. It was unlocked. He entered the room, another drab chamber such as his own. She was not there.

      He ran downstairs to the desk.

      "Did Miss Rogers leave the hotel?" he asked the drowsy night clerk.

      "Ain't seen no one since one o'clock," the man said. "Maybe she slipped out the side way. It's a warmish sorta night, just right for a walk or a—" He winked a drooping eye-lid with almost malicious delight, sighed deeply and went back to sleep.

      The waitress was busy at the other end of the cafeteria. "I'm sorry I acted that way last night," Anita said. In the cold morning light, her face was gray and lined.

      "This coffee," she added, "will take that taste outa my mouth. It's the ginger ale. I like seltzer water with my gin."

      "Where did you go?" he asked.

      "For a walk. Found myself in the alley back of the hotel with my dress on my arm. That shows you how nuts I can be."

      "You better not drink so much."

      "It wasn't the drink," she explained. "At least not entirely."

      ​She took his hand. Hers was cold as ice.

      "This is the last time I'll talk this way, boy. I was wrong, dead wrong. We gotta be a success. We mustn't drink. Or love. Or anything like that. Get me?"

      The prickling uneasiness which had tortured him during a restless night disappeared.

      "I do," he said.

      Her face lost its hardness. She looked up with almost wistful longing and the fragment of a tear rose into the corner of her eye. But the tear vanished in a smile and she sipped the coffee before she added: "I'm gonna stick to business, Ken—and it's nobody's business what business. Hey, girlie, pour me another cup of shellac."

      Anita was tired. After rehearsal she returned to the hotel and Ken took a walk through the town. In a palm-shaded park he rested. It was noon and workers lay flat on the carpet of grass, while children played ball on the intertwining walks. A pleasant enough spot, Ken thought, hot under the early December sun. He was not entirely comfortable, however. He missed Anita. She had not lunched with him as was their custom and his second day in San Bernardino thus differed from the days that preceded it.

      Here was lulling quiet, children laughing, motor cars purring past. He wondered why she had fled from him. Could he have told why he had fled from Mr. Lowell?

      I was afraid, he thought. And she is afraid of me. But not for the same reasons. I was afraid because … I can't explain why, even to myself … because I mixed up the idea of what Mr. Lowell was with what other people thought him to be.

      ​She's maybe afraid HI