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her. She had her son and her job in the schools. They had little money but their own house. They were happy.
    In the end Bowman decided on journalism. There was the romance of reporters like Murrow and Quentin Reynolds, at the typewriter late at night finishing their stories, the lights of the city all around, theaters emptying out, the bar at Costello’s crowded and noisy. Sexual inexperience would be over with. He had not been shy at Harvard but it had simply not happened, the thing that would complete his life. He knew what the
ignudi
were but not the simply nude. He remained innocent and teeming with desire. There was Susan Hallet, the Boston girl he had gone with, slender, clear-faced, with low breasts that he associated with privilege. He had wanted her to go away for a weekend with him, to Gloucester, where there would be foghorns and the smell of the sea.
    “Gloucester?”
    “Any place,” he said.
    How could she do it, she protested, how could she explain it?
    “You could say you were staying at a friend’s.”
    “That wouldn’t be true.”
    “Of course not. That’s the whole idea.”
    She was looking at the ground, her arms crossed in front of her as if somehow embracing herself. She would have to say no, though she enjoyed having him persist. For him it was almost unbearable, her presence and unfeeling refusal. She might have said yes, she thought, if there were some way of doing it, going off and … she was able only vaguely to imagine the rest. She had felt his hardness several times when dancing. She more or less knew what all that was.
    “I wouldn’t know how to keep it a secret,” she said.
    “I’d keep it a secret,” he promised. “Of course, you would know.”
    She smiled a little.
    “I’m serious,” he said. “You know how I feel about you.”
    He couldn’t help thinking of Kimmel and the ease with which others did this.
    “I’m serious, too,” she said. “There’s a lot more at stake for me.”
    “Everything is at stake.”
    “Not for the man.”
    He understood but that meant nothing. His father, who had always had success with women, might have taught him something priceless here, but nothing was ever passed between father and son.
    “I wish we could do it,” she said simply. “All of it, I mean. You know how much I like you.”
    “Yes. Sure.”
    “You men are all alike.”
    “That’s a boring thing to say.”
    In the mood of euphoria that was everywhere after the war it was still necessary to find a place for oneself. He applied at the
Times
but there was nothing, and it was the same at the other papers. Fortunately he had a contact, a classmate’s father who was in public relations and who had virtually invented the business. He could arrange anything in newspapers and magazines—for ten thousand dollars, it was said, he could put someone on the cover of
Time
. He could pick up the phone and call anyone, the secretaries immediately put him through.
    Bowman was to go and see him at his house, in the morning. He always ate breakfast at nine.
    “Will he expect me?”
    “Yes, yes. He knows you’re coming.”
    Having hardly slept the night before, Bowman stood on the street in front of the house at eight-thirty. It was a mild autumn morning. The house was in the Sixties, just off Central Park West. It was broad and imposing, with tall windows and the facade almost completely covered with a deep gown of ivy. At a quarter to nine he rang at the door, which was glass with heavy iron grillwork.
    He was shown into a sun-filled room on the garden. Along one wallwas a long, English-style buffet with two silver trays, a crystal pitcher of orange juice, and a large silver coffee pot covered with a cloth, also butter, rolls, and jam. The butler asked how he would like his eggs. Bowman declined the eggs. He had a cup of coffee and nervously waited. He knew what Mr. Kindrigen would look like, a well-tailored man with a somewhat sinewy face and gray hair.
    It was silent. There