“I’ll stamp them going out,” she said, and did so.
Albert shook his head in annoyance, then seated the milk glass of whisky on a hubcap, reclined on his trolley, and skidded underneath the Buick again. He fixed the beam of his Eveready flashlight on the master cylinder and slowly followed the hydraulic oil tubing across to the left wheel’s drum brakes. He thought he saw the problem and delicately skimmed a fingertip back along the brake line until he felt a fracture in the copper and also felt a cold draft, as if his wife hadn’t fully shut the door. And then for some reason the car jack whanged to the floor and the Buick crashed down, slanting forward onto the left wheel drum so that his feet and ankles were free outside the car, but his shins were hurt and his chest was being squashed underneath the Buick’s full weight.
“Root!” he shouted. “Root, help me! I’m pinned! Root, help get me out!” Albert thought she could have heard him if she were in the kitchen, but she could have been anywhere in the house. Squeezing his torso out a few inches from under the transmission, he caught his breath and screamed for her until he was exhausted with screaming. And then he managed to turn his head and found those gutta-percha overboots standing near the fallen jack, as if she’d been watching for a while. And this time he took care with her name: “Ruth?”
She hesitated before walking forward. “Are you okay?” she asked.
“I’m just stuck,” he said. “Jack up the car.”
She got down to her hands and knees and grinned when she saw his fury. “Say ‘please.’”
She and Lorraine shopped in the morning at the giant Macy’s in Herald Square and Ruth spent seventeen dollars on a girl’s red wool overcoat and matching hat for the winter. She confided, “Your daddy’s gonna have a cow. But what else is new?”
And then she telephoned the office of Benjamin & Johnes and invited Judd to join them for lunch at Henry’s.
Cold eddied from his camel’s-hair overcoat as he took off his tweed hat and enthusiastically sat with them, Lorraine on his right and Ruth on his left. He handed the girl a box he hadn’t had time to giftwrap, and she lifted the lid to find a pink pinafore inside.
“It’s so pretty!” she exclaimed. And she was so impressed that she wiped a tear from her cheek.
Ruth smiled. “She really likes it.”
Lora said, “I do! Thank you, Mr. Gray!”
“My pleasure.” And then he turned to Ruth. “It’s November sixteenth.”
She puzzled over it and said, “Oh. Your wedding anniversary.”
“Our tenth.”
Because Lora was there, they communicated in silence. Then Ruth asked, “So what are you doing tonight?”
“I have reservations at Claridge’s for dinner. And then we’re going to Dearest Enemy at the Knickerbocker. Rodgers and Hart. Their follow-up to The Garrick Gaieties.” Judd felt Lora watching him, so he turned back to her. “Have you heard why the broom was late?”
She was so confused she didn’t answer.
“Because it over-swept,” he said.
She snickered.
“What kind of hair does the ocean have?”
She was amused but said, “I don’t know.”
“Wavy.”
She giggled. “Like yours.”
“Where does the general keep his armies?” Judd asked. She smiled with puzzled expectation, and Judd answered, “Up his sleevies!”
Lorraine laughed wildly and Ruth felt Judd’s hand feel for hers under the checkered tablecloth. She held it and just relaxed in the calm of a luncheon as the man she loved won Lora over with zaniness.
“What has a bottom at the top?”
“Oh brother,” she said, and awaited him with a grin.
“Your legs.”
She guffawed.