The Trouble With Eden - Lawrence Block [97]
“I greet you with a concert.”
“A good point,” he conceded. “Better a concert than a Cognac. One understands.”
“I’d make the drinks now, but I’m playing the piano.”
“A noble cause. A noble savage. Odets, where is thy sting? You persist in the notion that the martini is a civilized drink at this hour.”
“There is no clock on my palate, love.”
“I shall do the honors, such as they are. Martinis and music. If they be the food of love, play on!”
It was just one of those things
Just one of those fabulous flings
One of those bells that now and then rings
Just one of those things… .
In the kitchen, he poured Bombay gin into a pitcher, added ice and a drop of scotch. The scotch, he had established, was better than vermouth at masking the sharpness of the gin. He stirred the mixture gently with a long silver spoon.
… just one of those nights
Just one of those fabulous flights
A trip to the moon on gossamer wings
Just one of those things….
He strained the martinis into a pair of large stemmed crystal goblets, added a slender shaving of lemon peel to each glass. The house was Warren’s, and all its furnishings, with the exception of Bert’s piano and a writing desk that had belonged to Bert’s mother, had been carefully selected and purchased by Warren. The house itself was unprepossessing enough on the outside, a small frame house on the northern edge of New Hope that differed little from its neighbors on either side. Inside it was a refuge, with every object within its walls carefully chosen to reflect Warren’s taste and provide his life with a framework of order and dignity. It was, indeed, a refuge he rarely sought; he preferred to spend his time in the company of others, over drinks or cups of coffee. But when he did come home it was important to come home to something perfect.
The house had been Warren’s before Bert entered his life, and the years Bert had spent there had had precious little impact upon it. A few objects had been shuttled about to accommodate his Regency desk and his Gulbrandson spinet (a grand piano would have dislocated things badly, and Warren thanked sundry gods that Bert was content with an upright), but otherwise things stayed as they were, with Bert appreciative of pleasant surroundings but generally indifferent to them. It was Warren’s special shelter from the storm, and it would continue to shelter him when he and Bert parted company and Bert moved elsewhere. Not that Warren specifically anticipated such a parting of the ways. It was entirely possible that they would live out their lives together under this roof. But it was also possible that they would not, and Warren had learned over the years always to be prepared for such contingencies. He did not believe that heterosexual marriages were inclined to be any more permanent than homosexual alliances. But marriages had that illusion of permanence. They were bulwarked by children, reinforced by judicial recognition, predicated on the assumption that no man or woman should tear their bond asunder. They were as apt to deteriorate as any other relationship, yet when they did so it was generally a considerable shock to the participants. They hadn’t expected this, they had quite believed the till-death-do-us-part number, and they were thus unprepared. Homosexuals expected that things would ultimately go to hell, and were more inclined to be surprised when they didn’t.
When he brought the martinis into the living and placed Bert’s upon the piano, Bert was singing:
If we’d thought a bit
Of the end of it
When we started painting the town
We’d have been aware
That our love affair
Was too hot not to cool down
He broke off with a quick embarrassed smile and reached for his drink, smiling again in appreciation at the first sip. Warren moved up behind him, placed his hands on Bert’s shoulders, kneaded the fine muscles.
“You should sing more,” he said.
“You always say that.”
“No doubt I always shall. You have a fine voice, but it’s more than