"And what about the fact that you and I are both in theater? That's no coincidence, I suppose?" He knew he had her there.

"Well-l-l, in a way it's a coincidence."

"Ah!"

"But in another way, it isn't."

"Oh."

"Consider this: Take any two people meeting anywhere in the world. Many things about their meeting will be incidentally identical-and that's not the same thing as being coincidental."

"It isn't?"

"No. For instance, they would have been walking on the same street, or else they would not have met. So that is a condition of their meeting and not a coincidence. You see what I mean?"

"Hm-m."

"Also, it's likely that both had coffee that morning, that they both glanced at the newspapers, that they were born in the same century, in the same country, and that they have similar reservations about eating live worms, or the practice of hurling oneself out of second-story windows to get the exercise of walking back up the stairs. But none of these things could properly be called coincidences."

"They couldn't, eh?"

"No. They are merely the normal, random, incidental identities that one finds in any encounter. Indeed, if there weren't even one single identity in the circumstances of their meeting, thatwould be a coincidence. You understand?"

"Ah-h... almost."

"I hold that the fact that we both are in theater is one of those normal, mathematically probable identities without which our meeting would have been truly coincidental, and therefore not, in itself, a coincidence at all, but indeed quite the opposite. And there you are."

He looked at her levelly for a long moment. "Did you go to a Jesuit school, by any chance?"

"Girls are not admitted into Jesuit schools. Yet another instance of mindless prejudice."

"So, if I understand correctly, you're saying that if I were to write a play based on the circumstances of our meeting, I couldn't be accused of relying on cheap, unlikely coincidences, am I right?"

She frowned. Wait a minute, hadn't she been arguing the opposite way? And somehow twisting everything until... Hm-m.

He smiled. "I considered ending the play with a quintuple wedding including the playwright character and the actress character."

"Oh?"

"But, of course, that would be ridiculous."

"Yes, of course.... Why?"

"Fivemarriages at once might seem a bit much. Then too, the playwright and the actress are what we dramaturges call 'the agents'-and they couldn't possibly get married."

"No, of course not.... Why not?"

"Well, for one thing, it would be too predictable. The audience would see it coming the minute he jumps into her cab. Then too, there are the medical and religious implications."

"Medical-?"

"-and religious. When their brothers and sisters marry, they'll be brother-in-law and sister-in-law twice over. And when their parents marry, they'll also be stepbrother and stepsister. The Bible frowns on unions of that sort. And the biologists warn us against them pretty sternly. But whether or not I decide to marry them off isn't my greatest problem."

"It isn't?"

"No, no. My greatest problem will be finding a cast. The role of the young playwright doesn't present insurmountable problems. It could be played by any clever, charming, intelligent, reasonably good-looking actor-provided he has a quick wit and a winning personality. But a young woman who goes around wearing short dresses and agitating for social change and chucking stewards out of compartments and jumping onto trains with strange men and threatening that her granddaughter will one day rule Europe-it won't be easy to find an actress who can pull all that off, and still be charming and lovely and desirable and winning and bright and entertaining and-well, all the qualities that I admire in-in this character I've invented. No, I'll have to search long and hard for an actress who can do the role justice. This is no job for a beginner. I'll need an actress with a long list of successes to her cred— Ai-i-i!"

She nearly twisted the skin off the back of his hand. After which totally unjustified but infinitely gratifying assault, she left her hand on the table, the tips of her fingers accidentally brushing the backs of his. They were not holding hands. No one could say they were in any way holding hands. No. It was just that her hand was resting on the table near his because... well, it had to rest somewhere, didn't it? He was intensely aware of her soft touch, and he didn't dare move his hand even a fraction of an inch lest she suddenly realize that their hands were in contact and withdraw hers. In fact, he needn't have worried.

The waiter brought their desserts, and she began to eat hers slowly, her thoughts turned softly inward. He could not eat his, because it was his right hand she had accidentally rendered immobile, and he would rather have died than move it.

"Aren't you going to eat your dessert?" she asked.

"I don't seem to have any appetite." This was a lie; he was seething with appetite, but not for food.

"Well... if you're sure." She took his creme brulee, and his heart was lifted by the symbolic significance of it all, as he watched her finish his last spoonful. Then they both spoke at once.

"By the way, what's-?"

"May I ask-?"

"I'm sorry, what were you-?"

"No, you first."

"Well, I was just wondered what your name was."

"I was going to ask you the same thing," she said.

"Now, surely that'sa coincidence."

"Not at all."

This tale borrows a narrative device from a story by Robert W. Chambers that appeared in the bound European version ofNew Harper's Monthly Magazine, August, 1903 (Volume CVII, no. DCXXXIX). I gratefully acknowledge my debt to Mr Chambers, and I should be delighted to hear from his descendants.

The Widow Etcheverrigaray took great comfort and pride from the splendid apple tree that grew on the boundary of her property, just beyond the plot of leeks that every year were the best in all the village; and her neighbor and lifelong rival, Madame Utuburu, drew no less gratification from the magnificent apple tree near the patch of pimentsthat made her the envy of all growers of that sharp little green pepper. Unfortunately for the tranquillity of our village, we are not speaking of two trees here, but of one: a tree that grew exactly on the boundary between the two women's land and was, by both law and tradition, their shared property. It was inevitable that the apples from this tree should lead to dispute, for such has been the melancholy role of that disruptive fruit since the Garden of Eden.

As all the world knows, neither pettiness nor greed have any place in the Basque character, so one must look elsewhere for the cause of the Battle of the Apple Tree that became part of our village's folklore. The explanation lies in the bitter rivalry the two woman cultivated and nourished for most of their lives. When young, one of them had been accounted the most beautiful girl in our village, while the other was considered the most graceful and charming-although in later years no one could remember which had been which, and, sadly, no evidence of these qualities remained to prompt the memory. As mischievous Fate would have it, both the young women fancied that handsome rogue, Zabala, who was not yet called Zabala-One-Leg, for he was still to commit the unknown (but doubtless carnal) offence for which the righteous God the Father punished him by taking one of his legs in the Great War, while His benevolent Son, Jesus, revealed His mercy by leaving him the other to hobble along on. All the village knew that the young women admired Zabala because neither of them would deign to dance with him at fetes, and both would turn their faces away and sniff when the cheeky rascal addressed a word to them, or a wink. If further proof of their attraction were needed, both village belles were heard to vow upon their chastity that they would not marry that flirting, two-faced scamp of a Zabala if he were the last man in Xiberoa. They would become nuns first. They would become prostitutes first! They would become Protestantsfirst! (Of course, nobody believed they would go so far as that.)