From Here to Eternity_ The Restored Edit - Jones, James [36]
“A smile, to him, is only an invitation to put his hands between your legs. He’s got a wife. Why doesnt he take it out on her?”
“Yes,” Holmes said tautly. “Why doesnt he?”
Karen winced before the accusation, even knowing it was purely theoretical. Before this melancholy suffering-lover role the nerve ends of her body vibrated shatteringly.
“It was your part of our agreement,” Holmes said sadly.
“All right,” she said. “All right. I’ll go. There I said it, now lets talk about something else.”
“What are we having for lunch?” Holmes said. “I’m hungry, hungry as hell. I’ve had one hell of a day, listening to Delbert. He can talk your leg off. Then having to argue half the morning with the kitchen force, and this new transfer Prewitt.” He looked at her closely. “It completely exhausts me nervously.”
She waited until he finished. “You know this is the maid’s day off.”
Holmes’s eyes crinkled painfully. “Is it? By god! What is today? Thursday? I thought today was Wednesday.” He looked hopefully at his watch, then shrugged. “Well, its too late to go up to the Club now. Wouldnt I do it though?”
Karen, feeling him watching her closely, tried to go on brushing to escape the sense of guilt because she was not offering to fix a lunch for him. He never ate lunch at home and it was not in her part of the bargain they had made, yet still he was making her feel like a heartless criminal.
“I guess I’ll just have to catch one of those lousy sandwiches at the PX,” Holmes said resignedly. He fidgeted around for a minute and sat down on the bed. “What do you eat for lunch?” he said with the air of one who shamefacedly makes a great imposition.
“I usually just fix soup for myself,” Karen said, breathing deeply.
“Oh,” he said. “You know I dont eat soup.”
“You asked me, didnt you?” she said, trying to keep her voice from going higher. “I fix myself soup. Why should I lie?”
Holmes got up hastily. “Now, darling,” he said. “Now take it easy. I’ll just go on over to the PX. I dont mind. You know what it does to you to get upset. You just cant stand it. You’ll have yourself sick in bed.”
“Theres nothing wrong with me,” she protested. “I’m no bedfast invalid,” thinking how he had no right to use that word with her, to call her darling. He always did it, in these spells, and the word was like a skewer pinning her to the beaverboard among the other butterflies of his collection. In her imagination she saw herself rising up, telling him what she thought of him, packing a bag and leaving, to live her own life and earn her own way. She would get a job and an apartment someplace. What kind of a job? she asked herself. In your physical condition what can you do? what training have you? Besides to be a wife.
“You know your nerves arent strong, darling,” Holmes was saying. “Just quiet down now and take it easy. Just relax.” He walked over and put his hands soothingly on her shoulders, gripping them affectionately and lightly, and looking solicitously into her eyes in the mirror.
Karen felt them on her, holding her down, tying her down, as her life was tied down, and she had the same sensation she remembered having as a child when out in the woods she had caught her dress on the barbs of a wire fence, and she had lunged and plunged and pulled until she got loose leaving half her dress behind, even though her mother was coming all the time to help her.
“Thats it, relax,” Holmes smiled. “Now you just fix yourself lunch the way you would if I wasnt here and I’ll eat whatever you have for yourself. Now. Hows that?”
“I can fix you a toasted cheese sandwich,” Karen said weakly.
“No,” he smiled. “No sir. I’ll eat what you eat.”
“It wont take but a minute.”
“No,” he said. “Theres no sense in you working yourself up over such a silly thing as lunch, and I wont let you.” His eyes crinkled up along the white sunburnt lines. “I tell you what. Have we got any meat around? I believe I’ll