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By Root 1201 0

around the house, he liked to fix doorknobs and electric switches, and he knew all about his car. He was polite and he was stable (paradoxically I was most attracted to his stability—it intrigued me as much as anything), he was—let’s see, have I left anything out? … Gaiety. Nope. He wasn’t gay. But what he was most deadly earnest about was his art. He was constantly trying to “purify” it. And Judy was right. He was a good painter. I felt it personally from being around his paintings so much. Most paintings just disappear off the wall for me after a while, but these were paintings you wanted to have. And a lot of art dealers felt that way about it too. He exhibited rarely—at the Salon d’Automne and a few others, but he wouldn’t sell anything yet; he felt he wasn’t ready.

“What’s the matter?” he asked me one night after the theater.

“Nothing.”

“Yes there is.”

“I want to go to the Ritz,” I said, already uneasy at the suggestion.

There was panic in his voice. “Why? What do you want to do that for?”

“Because I feel the need to sin. Quelle façon de parler.”

“To sin?”

“Oh God.” How to explain? “I don’t mean it like that. I mean … oh.… Luxe … satins and silks … leopardskins and peacocks’ tongues. Silk—that’s what I want rubbing against me. I feel so woolen all the time.”

A pause for the struggle with his soul, and then reluctantly “O.K., I’ll take you there——”

“No,” I said sadly. “No, it’s no good. It wouldn’t be any fun. You couldn’t afford it. I only like spending rich people’s money.”

We went on eating in silence.

“I’ve got to tell you something,” he said finally. “I haven’t been honest with you. I am rich. In fact, my father is very rich. One of the richest men in Delaware.…”

This was so much like something out of the Student Prince that I started to laugh, but when I looked at his grief-stricken face I had to stop.

“Du Pont?” I asked gently.

He nodded miserably.

“The President?”

He smiled wanly. “No, it’s not that bad. I mean he’s on the Board. I’m … running away from it. I’m trying to live it down.”

I looked at his checked wool shirt (one of three), his muddy shoes with flapping soles, and his Army ducks, and nothing could stop the twinge of annoyance snaking around my stomach. How typical, I thought irritably. But of course it all made sense now, it all fitted in; his unwillingess to sell his paintings yet, and his determination to live like everyone else on the Left Bank. What worried and depressed him more than anything, he confided in me, quite seriously, was that when he’d told his family of his decision to go abroad and paint, having two other sons they hadn’t taken it too badly. He would have felt much safer being cut off without a penny. And I suppose there was some kind of rough logic in his assumption that to begin being an artist, you had to live like most artists begin living.

At any rate I felt sorry for him and I said, “Never mind, I don’t care about the Ritz. Really I don’t. Let’s go to the Select.”

Gosh he was funny about his money. All very rich people are, I suppose. Suspicious, afraid of being used, afraid they’re not being loved for themselves and all that. But Jim was funny in his own special way. For instance, while he would gladly have bought me six dozen dry martinis in a row at one of the Left Bank cafés, the Deux Magots, let’s say (and they would have cost exactly what they did at the Crillon), or a trip around the world on a tramp steamer, or every bit of equipment needed for a ski trip or underwater fishing, I could never have got out of him a single fur, or a single jewel, or a jar of fresh caviar.

You couldn’t blame him in a way; he just wasn’t the type, I mean he was small and mild and serious and utterly unlike all the grandeur and pomp and splendor that attaches itself to great wealth. He stretched his own canvases and he drank beer and his car was a baby Renault. But it wasn’t out of meanness. I mean he paid for all the meals that we had together and willingly “loaned” me money at the end of each month when I went broke, which I seemed to be doing more and more. And for