A Treasury of Stories (Collection of novelettes and short stories)

He put out the lights and went downstairs. He opened the front door wide and went back in again. “From now on,” he told himself, “I don’t think; I let my reflexes work for me!” He picked the long cylinder up with both arms, got it to the porch, and propped it upright against the side of the door for a minute while he closed the door after him. Then he heaved it up onto his right shoulder and kept it in place with one upraised arm, and that was all there was to it. It dipped a little at both ends, but any rolled-up rug would have. Cleopatra had gone to meet Caesar like this, he remembered. The present occupant was going to keep a blind date with her murderer — three or four hours after her own death.

Someone on the porch of the next cottage was strumming Here Comes Cookie on a ukulele as he stepped down to the sidewalk level with the body transverse to his own. He started up the street with it, with his head to one side to give it room on his shoulder. He came to the first street-light and its snowy glare picked him out for a minute, then handed him back to the gloom. He wasn’t walking fast, just trudging along. He was doing just what he’d said he’d do: not thinking about it, letting his reflexes work for him. He wasn’t nervous and he wasn’t frightened, therefore he didn’t look nervous and he didn’t look frightened.

“This is a rug,” he kept repeating. “I’m taking it to the cleaners. People taking rugs to the cleaners don’t go along scared of their shadows.”

A rocking chair squeaked on one of the wooden platforms and a woman’s nasal voice said: “Good evening, Larry. What on earth are you doing, trying to reduce?”

He showed his teeth in the gloom. “Gotta get this rug to the cleaners.”

“My stars, at this hour?” she queried.

“I’ll catch it if I don’t,” he said. “I was filling my fountain pen just now and I got ink all over it.” He had deliberately stopped for a moment, set the thing down, shifted it to his other shoulder. He gave her another flash of his teeth. “See you later,” he said, and was on his way again.

She gave a comfortable motherly laugh. “Nice young fellow,” he heard her say under her breath to someone beside her. “But that stepmother of his—” The sibilant whispers faded out behind him.

So Doris was already getting a bad name among the summer residents — good. “Go to it!” he thought. “You’ll have more to talk about in a little while.”

Every porch was tenanted. It was like running the gauntlet. But he wasn’t running, just strolling past like on any other summer evening. He saw two glowing cigarette ends coming toward him along an unlighted stretch of the sidewalk. As they passed under the next light he identified one — a girl he knew, a beach acquaintance, and her escort. He’d have to stop. He would have stopped if he only had a rug with him, so he’d have to stop now. The timing wasn’t quite right though. Instead of coming up to them in one of the black stretches between lights, the three of them met face to face in one of the glaring white patches right at the foot of a street lamp.

“Hello, old-timer.”

“Hello, babe.” He tilted his burden forward, caught it with both arms, and eased it perpendicularly to the pavement.

“Johnny, this is Larry.” Then she said: “What in the world have you got there?”

“Rug,” he said. “I just got ink all over it and I thought I could get it taken out before I get bawled out.”

“Oh, they’ll charge like the dickens for that,” she said helpfully. “Lemme look, maybe I could do it for you, we’ve got a can of wonderful stuff over at our house.” She put her hand toward the top opening and felt one of the wedged-in cushions.

He could feel his hair going up. “Nah, I don’t want to undo it,” he said. “I’ll never get it together again if I do.” He didn’t, however, make the mistake of pushing her hand away, or immediately trying to tip the thing back on his shoulders again. He was too busy getting his windpipe open.

“What’s that in the middle there?” she said, poking her hand at the cushion.

“Sofa pillows,” he said. “They got all spotted, too.” He didn’t follow the direction of her eyes in time.

“How come you didn’t get it all over your hands?” she said innocently.

“I was holding the pen out in front of me,” he said, “and it squirted all over everything.” He didn’t let a twitch get past his cuff and shake the hand she was looking at, although there were plenty of them stored up waiting to go to work.

Her escort came to his aid; he didn’t like it because Larry’d called her “babe.”

“Come on, I thought you wanted to go to the movies—”

He started to pull her away.

Larry tapped his pockets with his free hand; all he felt was Doris’s wrist-watch. “One of you got a cigarette?” he asked. “I came out without mine.” The escort supplied him, also the match. Larry wanted them to break away first. They’d put him through too much, he couldn’t afford to seem anxious to get rid of them.

“My, your face is just dripping!” said the girl, as the orange glare swept across it.