Jane Ellen was silent for a while. Then she said: “Not anymore. Had some kind of trouble years ago, but that’s not for me to talk about.”
“Oh, I don’t know. There’s just stories floating around. I don’t pay much attention to them. Where do you know Mr. Avis from?”
“Oh, I don’t know him at all. We just found ourselves sitting together on a bus once and got to talking. You know, passing strangers thrown together—and he started talking about Mansard, and I found myself getting interested.”
Jane Ellen was starting to get suspicious. It wouldn’t be good if Dwayne Avis learned someone had called and inquired about him.
“So tell me,” Pearl said, “just what is the Fall Apple Theater?”
“I realize we’re both usually free around lunchtime,” Zoe said, “but we’ve got to do something about meeting like this.”
“We need a bigger bed,” Quinn said.
Zoe didn’t seem amused. She was standing alongside her bed, where Quinn still lay nude and perspiring and sexually sated. “You know what I mean,” she said. “I’m going to have to hurry to be in time for my next appointment.”
Quinn thought she sounded like a hotel prostitute, but he decided he’d better keep that to himself. He lay quietly and watched her dress. She’d showered, and her body was still damp despite all her toweling off, which made her clothes stick to her. He watched her wriggle into her panties, then her slacks. She smoothed material with her hands, tugged at it, rearranged it, glanced at her image in the dresser mirror and seemed dissatisfied by the way the slacks fit. Quinn thought they looked just fine. She bent down and picked up her bra from where she’d dropped it on the floor an hour earlier. He watched her extend her elbows out while leaning forward and reaching behind her to fasten the clasp. The movement reminded him of a graceful exotic bird flexing its wings.
“You sure you have to leave right away?” he asked.
“Oh, I’m sure.” She reached for her blouse.
While she was standing at the mirror working a comb through her mussed hair, he sat up in bed and scooted his body so he was leaning with his back propped against the pillows.
Zoe was fully dressed now. As soon as her hair was to her satisfaction, she’d pick up her purse, kiss him good-bye, and be gone. They were both out of the mood now, even as they enjoyed the afterglow. Quinn knew he should follow Zoe’s example and reset his mind for work. Noontime assignations were fun—more than fun—but you couldn’t let them control your life.
Still, he enjoyed simply watching her.
She turned sideways and craned her neck, looking out of the corner of her eye to see if her hair was okay in back. For some reason, the gesture reminded him of Pearl. Then he knew why. It was reminiscent of Pearl examining her mole.
“You know Pearl?” he said.
She caught his eye in the mirror. “I feel that I do.”
“She had this mole right behind her ear that kept worrying her. Worried her so much she had it removed and sent away for a biopsy. Now she’s worried about what the biopsy results will be. So rattled she has a hard time even sitting still. Her concern is way out of proportion.”
“And?”
“I’m afraid it’s getting in the way of her work. I guess I’m asking you, as a psychoanalyst, if there’s anything that’d ease her mind, make her revert to her old self on the job.”
“Does she suspect the mole is cancerous?”
“I don’t know what she suspects.”
“She’ll have the biopsy report pretty soon; then she’ll know, and even if the news is bad, she’ll find some relief from her immediate anxiety. Is there some reason for her to think she might receive bad news about the mole?”
“Her mother,” Quinn said.
Zoe stopped teasing her hair with her wide-toothed comb and looked at him curiously in the mirror. “Some genetic problem?”
“Her mother’s a pistol,” Quinn said. “Pearl says she’s trying to get her to go see this doctor Pearl used to date, get them together again. He’s a dermatologist, and Pearl’s mother figures if she can get Pearl worried enough about the mole, Pearl will make an appointment to see Milton Kahn—the dermatologist.”
“That’s horrible.”
“Well, you’d have to know Pearl’s mother.”
“I know about matchmaking mothers, and Pearl’s sounds like an extreme example.”
“Anyway, Pearl saw a different dermatologist and is waiting for the results.”
“Good for Pearl. But she’s defying her mother. That might be leading to a heightened sense of apprehension.
“So what should I do?”
Zoe finished with the comb, walked over, and kissed Quinn on the lips. “Wait,” she said. “Like Pearl.”
Then she smiled at him and hurried from the room.
Quinn lay for a while longer in Zoe’s bed, feeling the rush of cool air from the window unit and listening to traffic below on Park Avenue, letting his mind wander. He could still feel the heat of Zoe from her side of the bed, still smell her and almost hear her moans of ecstasy.
