Moise and the World of Reason Read Online Free

floor!”
    â€œWhat right has she got to give a theatrical performance during my announcement?” Moise demanded. “Get her up and out of here this instant.”
    â€œBut, Moise, she is genuinely affected by your announcement, in fact I believe she’s the only one here who is at all interested in it besides you and me.”
    â€œHush! The announcement continues!”
    And it did continue and I must say that despite the fact that I am accustomed to shocking revelations or confessions, having devoted half my life to them, I was embarrassed, yes, I was truly shocked by what she was now announcing.
    â€œThis gentleman, eighty-seven, lost at Bellevue, it is pitiable but not shameful for me to admit this, was, in a sense, my lover as well as my patron. It is probably more accurate to say that I performed for his sake certain little services such as a bit of prostatic massage along with a bit of fellatio and out of his loneliness, the terminal affliction of the old, he would call me his love, and I, well, I was in no position to decline his material assistances, on Saturdays in summer, Wednesdays too in winter, and in spring, yes, actually that season affects the elderly too, more frequent summonses to Apartment F, third floor right, appalling stairs, had to pause for breath on the second landing. And ladies not being allowed there, it was a bachelors’ home supported by B’Nai B’Rrith, he had provided me with a tall black hat and a pair of trousers inherited from his father, a rabbi in New Rochelle, to wear when summoned. I received strange glances, caught on the run rushing through, but bus fare there and back was added to the remittance taken out of a padlocked metal box and handed me with whispers of devotion. I don’t suppose this belongs in the world of reason. I only meant to tell you that he is gone, too, and I am bereft, I am left without further means to continue beyond this announcement, unless it reaches South Orange. . . .”
    She stopped as if to inquire if it would or would not and during this pause in the announcement, which, needless to say, I was no longer repeating, a tall young man appeared directly before us and said, “Unreal, unreal.” I recognized this personable new arrival as Big Lot. And then I noticed that Charlie was crossing to him with a cup of Gallo. I caught him by the belt of my army coat which gave him a jolt that caused him to spill the Gallo on my coat and Big Lot.
    â€œCharlie, the party is over,”
    â€œParty, did you say party, and did you mean this one-joint smoke-in without a shot of vodka?”
    I looked at Big Lot who said this with one of his impish smirks that enchant some people some of the time and simply seem to be cruelly appropriate to others, the way some people laughed when Candy would not, they say, take the chemotherapy treatment because it would make her hair fall out. But I had stopped interpreting the smiles of a winter night and I only said lamely, “If it wasn’t a party, wouldn’t you be in the bushes on Central Park West?”
    â€œNo, baby, in the trucks with some old trick of yours!”
    It was not a scintillating exchange of bitcheries nor was it meant to be, and Big Lot’s baby-brown eyes turned upon Charlie with a dreamily appraising up-down look.
    â€œWhy don’t we go down to Phoebe’s for some chow, it’s a night for hot chili.”
    He hardly returned his look to my direction as he ordered me imperiously to give Charlie some cab fare.
    â€œWhat is a cab?”
    â€œA four-wheeled conveyance used for urban transport by successful writers.”
    Allusions to my calling always score painfully when made by faded friends and I never answer, but Moise had emerged from her moments of inner reflection. She said to Big Lot, “It’s a distinction to be a master of anything, which includes the cunning of betrayal.”
    Her ice-gray look removed the languidly