'God, what's in me?' he asked his father.
'Feels like it's rusted shut, doesn't it?' the good doctor said. 'Now let me see it.'
Fred let his hand drop to his knee, listening for the plop on the bathroom floor.
'Who was it?' his father asked, touching the tip of his life.
'Elsbeth Malkas!' he crooned, hating his betrayal of her but finding nothing delicious enough in his memory of her to make protecting her worthwhile.
Elsbeth Malkas! His toes stuck out so straight he thought he'd fall. Elsbeth Malkas! Bring her in here, stretch her out, discover what in hell she hides in that deceptive snatch of hers ...
'Clap,' his father said, and like most things his father said, it sounded like a command. And Fred thought, Clap? Oh no, please be careful. No-one should clap anywhere near it now. God, don't anyone clap, please ...
Then his mother came to the bathroom door and called his father to the phone. 'It's Cuthbert Bennett,' she said.
'For Fred?'
'No, for you,' she told the good doctor, following him down the hall, looking anxiously back at Fred, who was as white as an Elsbeth Malkas canvas. 'Edmund,' she followed, chirping, 'be nice to Cuthbert. He's just lost his father, and I think he wants your advice.'
Fred came grimacing after them down the hall, watched his father pick up the phone, slumped against the wall and waited.
'Yes, hello, Cuthbert,' his father said in a kindly tone, plastering the mouthpiece with blood-pink shaving lather. 'Yes, of course, what is it?' Then his whole face changed and he shot a look at Fred like a killer-dart. Far off, in a tiny sound of panic, Fred heard Couth's hysterical voice; his father stared down the hall at him, shocked as the voice over the phone went on and on. 'No, no, not here. I'll see you in my office,' his father said irritably, and Fred simply had to smirk, a breaking grin. 'In an hour, then,' his father said, holding in his rage. 'All right, in half an hour,' he said, louder. Fred slouched haughtily against the wall, then dissolved in a cackling fit as his father shouted into the phone, 'Well, don't pee, then!' Hanging up, he glared at Fred, now laughing uncontrollably against the wall.
'Why can't Cuthbert pee?' his mother asked, and his father wheeled on her, his wild head in a gory froth.
'Clap!' he shouted at her. He frightened the poor woman; she began to clap.
918 Iowa Ave.
Iowa City, Iowa
Nov. 3, 1969
Dr Edmund Trumper
2 Beach Lane
Great Boar's Head, New Hampshire
Dear Dr Trumper:
As I understand your feelings, if Fred had not brought me back pregnant from Europe and married me, you would have continued to support him through graduate school. You have never made it clear, however, that if I hadn't been pregnant, you might have continued your support of Fred. Well, frankly, this all strikes me as both insulting and unfair. If Fred didn't have a wife and child to support, he would not really need your money. He could pay for himself through graduate school with part-time jobs and scholarships. And if I hadn't been pregnant I could have gotten a job to support the remainder of his studies. In other words, the situation we are now in requires your support more than both situations you claim you would have supported us in. What exactly is it you don't approve of? That I was pregnant? That Fred didn't wait to do things in the order you did them in? Or is it just me in particular whom you simply don't like? It's like some moral punishment you are handing out to Fred, and don't you think that someone over twenty-five shouldn't be treated this way? I mean, you had this money set aside for Fred's education, and I can understand you not being willing to support his wife and child too, but isn't it sort of childish to refuse to pay for his education as well?
Yours,
Biggie
918 Iowa Ave.
Iowa City, Iowa
Nov. 3, 1969
Dr Edmund Trumper
2 Beach Lane
Great Boar's Head, New Hampshire