by Charles Webb
“It’s all right,” Benjamin said.
“Who screamed up here.”
“Mr. Berry, it’s all right,” Benjamin said.
“Who was it.”
“A visitor. But it’s all right now.”
“Whose visitor.”
“Mine.”
“What did you do to her.”
“Excuse me,” Benjamin said. He began moving around him but Mr. Berry stepped in front of the door. “She’s all right!” Benjamin said. “She was upset and she screamed! Now I’m taking her some water!”
“I’ve called the police,” Mr. Berry said.
“On my God.”
“What did you do to her.”
“Goddammit!” Benjamin said. “Now call the police and tell them not to come! Nothing’s wrong!”
“What did you do to her?”
“Get out of the way,” Benjamin said. He pushed past him and into the room, closing the door behind him. “Here,” he said. He gave her the glass.
“What’s happening.”
“Nothing.”
“Who’s out there.”
“My landlord,” Benjamin said. He turned around and went back out into the hall. Mr. Berry tried to look around him and in through the door as he came out but he closed it. Two students were standing together at the end of the hall and one was leaning down over the banister from upstairs. “It’s all right!” Benjamin said. “Now everybody go back to their room.” No one moved. Benjamin looked back at Mr. Berry. “Will you call the police back?”
“Tell me what happened.”
“She was upset and she screamed. Now call the police back and tell them not to come.”
“Why was she upset.”
“It’s not your business why she was upset.”
Suddenly the front door of the rooming house was thrown open and a policeman hurried in and up the stairs. “Who called,” he said.
“I did, sir,” Mr. Berry said.
“Look,” Benjamin said. “It’s all right.”
“He has a girl in his room that was screaming.”
The policeman looked at Benjamin. “What happened,” he said.
“I have a friend visiting me,” he said, “and she became upset as we were talking and screamed. But everything’s fine now.”
“Why does she want to scream if everything’s fine.”
“Look. We were talking about something that upset her.”
“What was it.”
“What?”
“What were you talking about.”
“A private matter.”
“What was it.”
“I said it was a private matter.”
Elaine suddenly opened the door and looked out. The two students at the end of the hall took several steps forward and Mr. Berry craned his head up to look at her over Benjamin’s shoulder. “Was it you screamed?” the policeman said. “Yes.”
“What did he do to you.”
“Nothing,” she said. “I was upset about something.”
“What were you upset about.”
“It was a private matter!” Benjamin said. “Can you understand that?”
The policeman turned to frown at him. “What’s your name,” he said. “What?”
“What’s your name.”
“What’s the charge.”
“Don’t worry about the charge. What’s your name.”
“His name’s Braddock,” Mr. Berry said. “His name’s Benjamin Braddock.”
“Are you a student?”
“No.”
“What are you.”
“I’m a resident.”
“What’s your job. What’s your occupation.”
“I don’t have one.”
“What do you mean you don’t have one.”
“I mean I don’t have one.”
“You getting smart?”
“No.”
“Then what’s your occupation.”
“I don’t have one.”
“What do you do.”
“Look,” Benjamin said. “I don’t think this is too relevant.”
“Then what do you do.”
“Are you booking me or something?”
The policeman looked a moment at Mr. Berry, then at the two students standing halfway down the hall. “Get back to your rooms,” he said, waving them back. They walked back down the hall and into their rooms and closed their doors behind them. “There won’t be any more trouble,” Benjamin said. The officer looked at him a long time, then nodded. “Okay Ben,” he said. “I’ll take your word for it this time.” He turned around and walked back down the stairs and outside. “Mr. Braddock?” the landlord said. “What.”
“I want you out of here in a week.”
“What?”
Mr. Berry turned around and began climbing down the stairs. “Mr. Berry?”
“You heard me,” he said.
Benjamin hurried down the stairs after him. “You want me out of here?”
“That’s right.”
“What for.”
“You know what for.”
“I don’t know what for, Mr. Berry. Tell me what for.”
“Because I don’t want you here.”
“Why not.”
“Because I don’t like you,” he said.
Benjamin frowned at him as Mr. Berry walked past him and along the hall and into his room. He listened to the latch sliding into place on the other side of Mr. Berry’s door, then turned around and walked slowly back up toward his room. Elaine was still standing in the doorway. Benjamin walked past her and to his bed. He seated himself on its edge and looked down at the rug.
“Benjamin?”
“What.”
“I’m sorry I screamed.”
He sat awhile longer on the bed, then stood and walked across the room for his suitcase. He carried it back and opened it on the bed. Elaine closed the door. She walked to the chair in the center of the room and sat.
“Benjamin?”
“What.”
“Can I ask you something?”
He nodded and walked across the room to his bureau and opened its top drawer. From inside he lifted out a shirt and carried it to the bed to put it in the suitcase.
“What did you think would happen,” Elaine said.
“What?”
“When you came up here,” she said. “What did you think would happen between us.”
“I don’t know.”
“Did you ever think of how I might feel about you?”
“Look,” he said, turning around from his bed. “I don’t want to talk right now. I’m sorry about everything but if you don’t mind I’d just as soon be alone right now.” Elaine nodded. “All right?”
“All right,” she said. “May I just sit here till you finish packing?”
“Do what you want,” he said.
“But can’t you just tell me what you were thinking about when you decided to come up here?”
“I don’t know what I was thinking about,” he said. He walked to his closet and took his suit out on its hanger. “You just came up here?” she said. He nodded and carried the suit to the bed. “Just because I was here.”
“That’s right.”
“Well, were you afraid to come and see me?”
“What do you think.”
“Were you?”
“I was,” he said. He removed the coat from the hanger and began folding it.
“But what did you do.”
“What?”
“Did you just get in your car one day and drive up here?”
“What does it matter, Elaine.”
“I’m just curious.”
“That’s what I did.”
“And what happened when you got here.”
“What happened?”
“I mean can’t you tell me a little bit about it?” she said.
He turned around to frown at her.
“Because I can’t understand any of this,” she said. “Didn’t you have any i
ntention of coming to see me? Or were you just going to wait until we happened to meet.”
“I came to see you the first night.”
“You did?”
“I mean I drove up here,” he said. “I was in kind of a strange mood and I drove up here and got a hotel and got some reservations at a restaurant for us.”
“You were going to invite me to dinner?”
“That’s right.”
“Then what did you do.”
“I didn’t invite you.”
“I know.”
“Elaine, I just came up here,” he said. He set the coat into the suitcase on top of the shirt. “I just kind of wallowed around. I wrote you some letters.”
“Love letters?”
“I don’t remember.”
“And you sold your car.”
He nodded. “The first day I was here,” he said. “I got this room and I sold the car the first morning.”
“And then what.”
“Then I sat around,” he said, picking up the hanger and removing the pants from it.
“Well, did you go out?”
“What?”
“Did you go out with girls or anything?”
“No.”
“But how did you spend your time,” she said. “Did you read all day?”
“No.” He glanced at the paperback book on the desk. “That’s the first book I’ve started since college.”
“Don’t you like to read?”
“I like newspapers.” He folded the pair of pants to his suit and laid them in the suitcase. Then he walked to his desk and opened one of its side drawers to remove a handful of socks.
“What’s the book you’re reading,” she said.
Benjamin picked it up from the desk and handed it to her.
“Are you interested in astronomy?” she said, looking at the cover.
“No.”
“Then why are you reading this.”
“I just picked it up,” he said, carrying the socks to his bed. “I just wanted to be reading something when you came.” He set the socks in the empty half of the suitcase.
“You wanted to be reading something when I came?” she said.
“That’s right.”
“Why.”
“What?”
“Why did you want to be reading something when I came.”
“Because,” he said, “I didn’t want to be just lying on the bed or sitting in the chair. I wanted to be doing something worthwhile.” He shook his head. “I don’t know what I’m doing,” he said. “Where’s my belt.” He walked back to the bureau, looked in the top drawer, then the next one and then the bottom drawer. Then he walked to his desk and opened all the side drawers and finally the large drawer under the desk-top. He reached in for the bundle of money and stuffed it into his pocket.
“Is that the money from your car?”
“Yes.”
“How much was it.”
“It was twenty-nine hundred,” he said. “It’s about twenty-four hundred now. Twenty-three or-four.”
“And you just keep it lying around in that drawer?”
“It’s safe enough.” He closed the drawer and walked across his room. He opened the closet door wider to let in more light and frowned down at the closet floor. Then he got down on his hands and knees and looked under the bureau.
“What are you looking for.”
“My belt.”
“Don’t you have it on?”
“No,” he said, reaching under the bureau. “I have two. I have one on, then I have another. What’s this.” He pulled out a marble covered with dust, looked at it a moment, then returned it under the bureau and stood. “It was from my grandmother,” he said, brushing some dust off one of his hands and onto his pants.
“What?”
“The belt. It was from my grandmother.”
“Oh.”
He walked to his bed and pulled it away from the wall. “What’s this,” he said. He bent down and pulled up a red plastic ruler from the floor beside the wall. He looked at it a moment, then knocked it against the metal frame of the bed to get some of the dust off and dropped it into his suitcase on top of his socks.
“Benjamin?”
“What.”
“What are you going to do now.”
He shook his head and moved the bed back against the wall.
“What are you going to do now.”
“Elaine, I don’t know,” he said. He walked back to the bureau and opened its top drawer again. Then he reached inside and moved his hand across the bottom of it.
“Are you going home?”
“No,” he said. He closed the top drawer and opened the next one to feel inside it.
“Well, where are you going.”
“I said I don’t know!” he said. He closed the middle drawer and opened the bottom one. When he had finished feeling inside it he closed it and returned to his desk. He opened each drawer again to feel inside it.
“Well what are you going to do.”
“Excuse me,” Benjamin said. He walked out of the room and down the hall to the bathroom. He washed his hands off under the faucet, then dried them on someone’s towel beside the sink and walked back and into the room. “What?” he said, shutting the door.
“What are you going to do.”
“Elaine, are you deaf?” he said.
“What?”
“I do not know what I am going to do,” he said.
“You have no idea.”
“No.”
“Not the faintest idea.”
“That’s right,” Benjamin said. He looked at her a moment longer, then returned to his closet and pushed the door open again so the light would come in. He took a hanger down from the bar and bent over and began scraping one end of it back and forth across the floor of the closet through the dust. Then he dropped it and walked back into the room.
“Well what about tomorrow,” she said.
“What?”
“Don’t you even know what you’re going to do tomorrow?”
“No.”
“But will you get on a bus or what.”
“Elaine,” he said, “if I knew I’d tell you. But I don’t, so don’t keep asking me.”
“A train?”
“Good God,” Benjamin said. He walked to his bed and looked under his pillow.
“Benjamin?”
“What!”
“I don’t want you to leave tomorrow until you know where you’re going.”
He turned around, holding the pillow in one of his hands, and frowned at her.
“I want you to have a definite plan before you leave.”
“What for,” he said.
“Because I want you to.”
“Well, do you want me to leave or not.”
She nodded.
“Then what’s this all about.”
“Will you tell me a definite plan before you leave?”
“Well, are you concerned about me or something?”
“Benjamin,” she said, standing up from the chair, “you came up here because of me. You sold your car because of me. You’ve changed your entire life because of me and now you’re leaving because of me.”
“So?”
“So you make me responsible for you,” she said.
Benjamin turned around and put the pillow back at the head of the bed. “Elaine?”
“I don’t want to be worried that you’re drunk out in some gutter because of me.”
“Oh my God.”
“Then what are you going to do!”
“I don’t know!” he said, turning around and taking a step toward her. “I don’t know! I don’t know! I don’t know!”
“Well, make up your mind before you go.”
“Elaine,” he said, “what business is it of yours what I do.”
“You make it my business, Benjamin.”
“I don’t.”
“What do you mean you don’t,” she said. “Do you think I can just ignore so
mebody who rearranges their life because of me?”
“Come on, Elaine.”
“Do you think I can?”
“Why can’t you.”
“Because I can’t.”
“Then you’re a phony.”
“What?”
“Elaine, you’re a phony,” he said. “If you tell me to leave one minute, then tell me to stay the next, then—”
Elaine turned around and walked toward the door. “Goodbye,” she said.
“Well Elaine?”
She slammed the door behind her. Benjamin heard her walking quickly down the stairs and then out the front door. The front door banged shut and then he hurried out of his room, and after her. When he caught up with her she was almost to the corner. “Elaine,” he said.
She shook her head and kept walking.
“Elaine?”
“Just get out of here,” she said. She stopped on the curb, looked down the street, then walked across to the other side.
“I’m sorry I said that, Elaine.”
“Will you just leave please?” she said. She reached up to wipe one of her cheeks with the back of her hand but kept walking.
“Elaine!” Benjamin said. He took her arm but she pulled it away. “Elaine, I didn’t mean that.”
“Don’t you see what you’re doing?” she said, stopping suddenly to look up at him.
“Can’t you see what’s happening? What’s going to happen?”
He frowned at her. “What is,” he said. When she didn’t answer he looked down at the sidewalk. “Anyway I didn’t mean that,” he said.
A student walked past them carrying a book. Benjamin glanced at him, then back at Elaine. “Well Elaine?” he said.
“What.”
“Do you want me to stay around then? Till I figure out what I’m going to do?”
“Do what you want,” she said.
“But I mean if you’d worry about me then I’ll try and get a definite plan before I go.”
She took his hand and looked at it. “Do what you want,” she said, “will you?” She looked up into his face a moment, then dropped his hand and walked on down the sidewalk.
“Well Elaine?”
She didn’t stop or look back.
“Elaine, I’ll try and get a definite plan,” he said after her.
She kept walking.
“Elaine?” he said. “I’ll call you in a day or two when I have a definite plan. All right?”
She continued on down the sidewalk.
“All right, Elaine?”
She turned around the corner and out of sight.
***
It was several days later that he called her. It was in the evening. He ate dinner in the university cafeteria, then walked up toward his rooming house and into the phone booth on the corner of his block.