SSC (2004) The Complete Stories of Truman Capote Read Free

to some intercessory saint—say a seizure-ridden Spanish mystic or his simple cousin Sook—were ever a steady concern of Truman Capote’s life, but his lifelong pursuit of wide attention and wealth was appallingly successful. Before he was forty, he’d achieved both aims, in tidal profusion and utter heartbreak.
    In his final wreckage, this slender collection of short stories may well have seemed to Capote the least of his fulfillments; but in the arena of expressed human feeling, they represent his most impressive victory. From the torment of a life willed on him, first, by a viciously neglectful father and a mother who should never have borne a child and, then, by his own refusal to conquer his personal hungers, he nonetheless won on the battlefield of English prose these stories that, at their best, should stand for long years to come as calm enduring prayers and accomplished blessings—free for every reader to use.

    R EYNOLDS P RICE was born in Macon, North Carolina in 1933. Educated at Duke University and, as a Rhodes Scholar, at Merton College, Oxford University, he has taught at Duke since 1958 and is J.B. Professor of English. His first novel,
A Long and Happy Life
, was published in 1962 and won the William Faulkner Award. His sixth novel,
Kate Vaiden
, was published in 1986 and won the National Book Critics Circle Award.
Noble Norfleet
, his twelfth novel, was published in 2002. In all, he has published thirty-five volumes of fiction, poetry, plays, essays and translations. Price is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and his work has been translated into seventeen languages.

T HE C OMPLETE S TORIES OF

TRUMAN CAPOTE

T HE W ALLS A RE C OLD

(1943)
    “… so Grant just said to them come on along to a wonderful party, and, well it was as easy as that. Really, I think it was just genius to pick them up, God only knows they might resurrect us from the grave.” The girl who was talking tapped her cigarette ash on the Persian throw rug and looked apologetically at her hostess.
    The hostess straightened her trim, black dress and pursed her lips nervously. She was very young and small and perfect. Her face was pale and framed with sleek black hair, and her lipstick was a trifle too dark. It was after two and she was tired and wished they would all go, but it was no small task to rid yourself of some thirty people, particularly when the majority were full of her father’s scotch. The elevator man had been up twice to complain about the noise; so she gave him a highball, which is all he is after anyway. And now the sailors … oh, the hell with it.
    “It’s all right, Mildred, really. What are a few sailors more or less? God, I hope they don’t break anything. Would you go back in the kitchen and see about ice, please? I’ll see what I can do with your new-found friends.”
    “Really, darling, I don’t think it’s at all necessary. From what I understand, they acclimate themselves very easily.”
    The hostess went toward her sudden guests. They were knotted together in one corner of the drawing-room, just staring and not looking very much at home.
    The best looking of the sextet turned his cap nervously and said, “We didn’t know it was any kind of party like this, Miss. I mean, you don’t want us, do you?”
    “Of course you’re welcome. What on earth would you be doing here if I didn’t want you?”
    The sailor was embarrassed.
    “That girl, that Mildred and her friend just picked us up in some bar or other and we didn’t have any idea we was comin’ to no house like this.”
    “How ridiculous, how utterly ridiculous,” the hostess said. “You are from the South, aren’t you?”
    He tucked his cap under his arm and looked more at ease. “I’m from Mississippi. Don’t suppose you’ve ever been there, have you, Miss?”
    She looked away toward the window and ran her tongue across her lips. She was tired of this, terribly tired of it. “Oh, yes,” she lied. “A