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irritated by her tone. 'Lady, you can leave whenever you like.'
'But.. .' she started to say, 'but surely.. .'
I was stone-faced.
'Surely well stay together.' Her hands were held towards me, palms facing,
more in exasperation than pleading. 'We need each other, Hoke, can't you
understand that? Could you really go on living by
yourself, with only ... only a dog for company?'
Cagney, who'd stayed in a sunny spot by the entrance, cocked his head. He
looked from Cissie to me, as if waiting for the reply.
'Cagney's been enough so far,' I shot back. 'He doesn't gripe and he doesn't
need nurse-maiding. Yeah, I'll stick with the mutt.'
She left me then, stomping up the stairs, head and shoulders stiff with
suppressed - outrage, resentment, good old-fashioned pique? I didn't know
which - and I had to resist the urge to call her back. Cagney made a noise
deep in his throat, a kind of drawn-out groan, and rolled his eyes at me.
'Quit it,' I snapped, and went back out into the sunshine.
Muriel was waiting for me when I eventually got back to the suite. She was
standing by the window, a hand parting the net curtain so she could watch
feeble strands of smoke rising from somewhere across the river, another piece
of real estate damaged in last night's explosions. She dropped the curtain and
hurried towards me as I closed the door.
'I've been so anxious,' she said and stopped a few steps away when she saw the
dust in my hair and clothes. 'My goodness, what have you been up to? You look
so ... dirty.'
I'd left Cagney outside where he could guard the corridor, a position he was
well used to by now, so I
didn't have to contend with his growling suspicion of this stranger in the
room. Again I wondered at his swift acceptance of Cissie, particularly as I
hadn't been there to make the introductions in the first place. I
remembered I was still rankled with the girl, so any credit I gave her was
limited. Tossing my jacket onto the bed and ignoring Muriel's question, I
headed straight for the bathroom. She followed me in.
Muriel started the shower for me as I tugged off my undershirt and I heard her
gasp when she saw the massive bruising on my chest and the inflamed edges of
the gunshot nick showing around the dressing.
She took in some of the other cuts and bruises on my arms and body, shaking
her head in sympathy as she did so.
'Does it hurt badly?' It was a dumb question and she knew it 'Do you have any
pain-killers that I can get for you?' she added quickly.
I shook my head and took her by the elbow. 'I'm gonna take my shower alone,' I
told her.
'Let me help. You must be sore all over.'
Yeah, I was sore, and I ached too, some of that from the day's work I'd just
done, but I didn't need anybody's help to wash myself. 'I'd like some privacy,
Muriel.'
Disappointment, hurt - I guess both were in those grey-blue eyes of hers.
'Can't I stay and talk to you?
Last night-'
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I cut her off. 'Last night was last night. You needed me, and I wanted you -
last night. Today's another day, kid.' Bogart couldn't have put it better.
Now she looked stunned. 'I don't understand,' was all she could think of to
say.
'Look, you came to me for one thing last night, and you got it.' I'd never
spoken to a girl like that before and I think I was almost as shocked as
Muriel, although my anger covered it. Not only had the world changed, but I
had too. I didn't back off though, and the English Rose before me wilted under
the blast.
'You think you fooled me with all that stuff about seeing ghosts? Christ, I
knew what you wanted soon as
I opened the door. You and your friend, you just want a man around to look out
for you, keep you out of danger, keep you fed. Well you picked the wrong guy,
y'hear me? Maybe you better start cosying up to your friend Vilhelm. Sure,
hell take care of you. Didn't you know he's the new Master Race?'
'Why are you so angry?' she pleaded. 'What have I done?'
Why? The heck of it was that I didn't know myself. Maybe I was scared of
getting involved with other people after I'd spent so long looking out for
myself. Was I angry at their intrusion, the sudden burden of having all these
people around me? Or in truth, was I plain ashamed of myself for taking this
girl to the same bed Sally and I had first made love in? I felt my face redden
and it wasn't through rage. Yeah, that was it, or at least a big part of it
Maybe it was foolish, but I felt I'd betrayed the one love of my life, someone
I'd sworn eternal love for, no matter what. Stupid kid's stuff?
No, not really. Despite the war going on, and both of us knowing that we could
die the next day or even that night, we'd made promises to each other that we
vowed to keep. Not only had I broken my part of the deal, but I'd done it in
the very bedroom Sally and I had honeymooned in. Although I'd had pangs of
guilt at the time - all of them easily overwhelmed by the moment itself - the
real sense of what I'd done had hit me with its full force when I'd opened the
door to Suite 318-319 and found Muriel standing there.
Sure I was mad, madder than hell, but not at Muriel, not at Cissie, not at any
of them ('cept Stern, but that was different). I was mad at myself. And I was
ashamed. The combination was bad.
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