Page 161 - tender-is-the-night

appeal.
‘If I go to a hotel and get all steamed and curry-combed,
and sleep awhile, and fight off these Senegalese—could I
come and spend the evening by the fireside?’
Dick nodded at him, less in agreement than in mockery
and said: ‘You have a high opinion of your current capaci-
ties.’
‘I bet if Nicole was here she’d let me come back.’
‘All right.’ Dick went to a trunk tray and brought a box
to the central table; inside were innumerable cardboard let-
ters.
‘You can come if you want to play anagrams.’
Abe eyed the contents of the box with physical revulsion,
as though he had been asked to eat them like oats.
‘What are anagrams? Haven’t I had enough strange—‘
‘It’s a quiet game. You spell words with them—any word
except alcohol.’
‘I bet you can spell alcohol,’ Abe plunged his hand among
the counters. ‘Can I come back if I can spell alcohol?’
‘You can come back if you want to play anagrams.’
Abe shook his head resignedly.
‘If you’re in that frame of mind there’s no use—I’d just
be in the way.’ He waved his finger reproachfully at Dick.
‘But remember what George the third said, that if Grant was
drunk he wished he would bite the other generals.’
With a last desperate glance at Rosemary from the golden
corners of his eyes, he went out. To his relief Peterson was
no longer in the corridor. Feeling lost and homeless he went
back to ask Paul the name of that boat.

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