The Girls in Their Summer Dresses
Fifth Avenue was shining in the sun when they left the Brevoort and started walking toward Washington Square. The sun was warm, even though it was November, and everything looked like Sunday morning – the buses, and the well-dressed people walking slowly in couples and the quiet buildings with the windows closed.
Michael held Frances’ arm tightly as they walked downtown in the sunlight. They walked lightly, almost smiling, because they had slept late and had a good breakfast and it was Sunday. Michael unbuttoned his coat and let it flap around him in the mild wind. They walked, without saying anything, among the young and pleasant-looking people who somehow seem to make up most of the population of that section of New York City.
“Look out,” Frances said, as they crossed Eighth Street. “You’ll break your neck.”
Michael laughed and Frances laughed with him.
“She’s not so pretty, anyway,” Frances said. “Anyway, not pretty enough to take a chance breaking your neck looking at her.”
Michael laughed again. He laughed louder this time, but not as solidly. “She wasn’t a bad-looking girl. She had a nice complexion. Country-girl complexion. How did you know I was looking at her?” Frances cocked her head to one side and smiled at her husband under the tip-tilted brim of her hat. “Mike, darling. . .” she said.
Michael laughed, just a little laugh this time. “Okay,” he said. “The evidence is in. Excuse me. It was the complexion. It’s not the sort of complexion you see much in New York. Excuse me.”
Frances patted his arm lightly and pulled him along a little faster toward Washington Square.
“This is a nice morning,” she said. “This is a wonderful morning. When I have breakfast with you it makes me feel good all day.”
“Tonic,”
Michael said. “Morning pickup. Rolls and coffee with Mike and you’re on the alkali side, guaranteed.”
“That’s the story. Also, I slept all night, wound around you like a rope.”
“Saturday night,” he said. “I permit such liberties only when the week’s work is done.”
“You’re getting fat,” she said.
“Isn’t it the truth? The lean man from Ohio.”
“I love it,” she said, “an extra five pounds of husband.”
“I love it, too,” Michael said gravely.
“I have an idea,” Frances said.
“My wife has an idea. That pretty girl.”
“Let’s not see anybody all day,” Frances said. “Let’s just hang around with each other. You and me. We’re always up to our neck in people, drinking their Scotch, or drinking our Scotch, we only see each other in bed. . .”
“The Great Meeting Place,” Michael said. “Stay in bed long enough and everybody you ever knew will show up there.”
“Wise guy,” Frances said. “I’m talking serious.”
“Okay, I’m listening serious.”
“I want to go out with my husband all day long. I want him to talk only to me and listen only to me.”
“What’s to stop us?” Michael asked. “What party intends to prevent me from seeing my wife alone on Sunday? What party?”
“The Stevensons. They want us to drop by around one o’clock and they’ll drive us into the country.”
“The lousy Stevensons,” Mike said. “Transparent. They can whistle. They can go driving in the country by themselves. My wife and I have to stay in New York and bore each other tˆte-…-tˆte.”
“Is it a date?”
“It’s a date.”
Frances leaned over and kissed him on the tip of the ear.
“Darling,” Michael said. “This is Fifth Avenue.”
“Let me arrange a program,” Frances said. “A planned Sunday in New York for a young couple with money to throw away.”
“Go easy.”
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