Hell, I wouldn’t even take the pictures. We’d get a professional photographer to do it. That would please her. Her vanity probably as great as always. She always liked people to look at her, admire her; anybody. I guess most women are like that. They crave attention all the time. They’re very babyish that way.

He thought, Juliana could never stand being alone; she had to have me around all the time complimenting her. Little kids are that way; they feel if their parents aren’t watching what they do then what they do isn’t real. No doubt she’s got some guy noticing her right now. Telling her how pretty she is. Her legs. Her smooth, flat stomach.

“What’s the matter?” Ed said, glancing at him. “Losing your nerve?”

“No,” Frink said.

“I’m not just going to stand there,” Ed said. “I’ve got a few ideas of my own. And I’ll tell you something else: I’m not scared. I’m not intimidated just because it’s a fancy place and I have to put on this fancy suit. I admit I don’t like to dress up. I admit I’m not comfortable. But that doesn’t matter a bit. I’m still going in there and really give it to that poop-head.”

Good for you, Frink thought.

“Hell, if you could go in there like you did,” Ed said, “and give him that line about being a Jap admiral’s gentleman, I ought to be able to tell him the truth, that this is really good creative original handmade jewelry, that—”

“Handwrought,” Frink said.

“Yeah. Hand wrought. I mean, I’ll go in there and I won’t come back out until I’ve given him a run for his money. He ought to buy this. If he doesn’t he’s really nuts. I’ve looked around; there isn’t anything like ours for sale anywhere. God, when I think of him maybe looking at it and not buying it—it makes me so goddam mad I could start swinging.”

“Make sure you tell him it’s not plated,” Frink said. “That copper means solid copper and brass solid brass.”

“You let me work out my own approach,” Ed said, “I got some really good ideas.”

Frink thought, What I can do is this. I can take a couple of pieces—Ed’ll never care—and box them up and send them to Juliana. So she’ll see what I’m doing. The postal authorities will trace her; I’ll send it registered to her last known address. What’ll she say when she opens the box? There’ll have to be a note from me explaining that I made it myself; that I’m a partner in a little new creative jewelry business. I’ll fire her imagination, give her an account that’ll make her want to know more, that’ll get her interested. I’ll talk about the gems and the metals. The places we’re selling to, the fancy stores…

“Isn’t it along here?” Ed said, slowing the truck. They were in heavy downtown traffic; buildings blotted out the sky. “I better park.”

“Another five blocks,” Frink said.

“Got one of those marijuana cigarettes?” Ed said. “One would calm me right about now.”

Frink passed him his package of T’ien-lais, the “Heavenly Music” brand he had learned to smoke at W-M Corporation.

I know she’s living with some guy, Frink said to himself. Sleeping with him. As if she was his wife. I know Juliana. She couldn’t survive any other way; I know how she gets around nightfall. When it gets cold and dark and everybody’s home sitting around the living room. She was never made for a solitary life. Me neither, he realized.

Maybe the guy’s a real nice guy. Some shy student she picked up. She’d be a good woman for some young guy who had never had the courage to approach a woman before. She’s not hard or cynical. It would do him a lot of good. I hope to hell she’s not with some older guy. That’s what I couldn’t stand. Some experienced mean guy with a toothpick sticking out of the side of his mouth, pushing her around.

He felt himself begin to breathe heavily. Image of some beefy hairy guy stepping down hard on Juliana, making her life miserable… I know she’d finally wind up killing herself, he thought. It’s in the cards for her, if she doesn’t find the right man—and that means a really gentle, sensitive, kindly student type who would be able to appreciate all those thoughts she has.

I was too rough for her, he thought. And I’m not so bad; there are a hell of a lot of guys worse than me. I could pretty well figure out what she was thinking, what she wanted, when she felt lonely or bad or depressed. I spent a lot of time worrying and fussing over her. But it wasn’t enough. She deserved more. She deserves a lot, he thought.

“I’m parking,” Ed said. He had found a place and was backing the truck, peering over his shoulder.

“Listen,” Frink said, “Can I send a couple of pieces to my wife?”

“I didn’t know you were married.” Intent on parking, Ed answered him reflexively. “Sure, as long as they’re not silver.”

Ed shut off the truck motor.

“We’re here,” he said. He puffed marijuana smoke, then stubbed the cigarette out on the dashboard, dropped the remains to the cab floor. “Wish me luck.”

“Luck,” Frank Frink said.

“Hey, look. There’s one of those Jap waka poems on the back of this cigarette package.” Ed read the poem aloud, over the traffic noises.

He handed the package of T’ien-lais back to Frink. “Keeriiist!” he said, then slapped Frink on the back, grinned, opened the truck door, picked up the wicker hamper and stepped from the truck. “I’ll let you put the dime in the meter,” he said, starting off down the sidewalk.

In an instant he had disappeared among the other pedestrians.

Juliana, Frink thought. Are you as alone as I am? He got out of the truck and put a dime in the parking meter.

Fear, he thought. This whole jewelry venture. What if it should fail? What if it should fail? That was how the oracle put it. Wailing, tears, beating the pot.

Man faces the darkening shadows of his life. His passage to the grave. If she were here it would not be so bad. Not bad at all.

I’m scared, he realized. Suppose Ed doesn’t sell a thing. Suppose they laugh at us.

What then?

On a sheet on the floor of the front room of her apartment, Juliana lay holding Joe Cinnadella against her. The room was warm and stuffy with midafternoon sunlight. Her body and the body of the man in her arms were damp with perspiration. A drop, rolling down Joe’s forehead, clung a moment to his cheekbone, then fell to her throat.

“You’re still dripping,” she murmured.

He said nothing. His breathing, long, slow, regular… like the ocean, she thought. We’re nothing but water inside.

“How was it?” she asked.

He mumbled that it had been okay.

I thought so, Juliana thought. I can tell. Now we both have to get up, pull ourselves together. Or is that bad? Sign of subconscious disapproval?

He stirred.

“Are you getting up?” She gripped him tight with both her arms. “Don’t. Not yet.”

“Don’t you have to get to the gym?”

I’m not going to the gym, Juliana said to herself. Don’t you know that? We will go somewhere; we won’t stay here too much longer. But it will be a place we haven’t been before. It’s time.

She felt him start to draw himself backward and up onto his knees, felt her hands slide along his damp, slippery back. Then she could hear him walking away, his bare feet against the floor. To the bathroom, no doubt. For his shower.

It’s over, she thought. Oh well. She sighed.

“I hear you,” Joe said from the bathroom. “Groaning. Always downcast, aren’t you? Worry, fear and suspicion, about me and everything else in the world.” He emerged, briefly, dripping with soapy water, face beaming. “How would you like to take a trip?”