The Blunderer Read Free Page B

people’s boots and take all their insults to keep them as friends. I’ve never seen anybody so concerned with whether every Tom, Dick and Harry likes you or not!”
    â€œLet’s not quarrel, honey.” Walter put his hands over his face, but he took them down again at once. It was an old gesture he made at home, and in private. He couldn’t bear to do it at the end of a vacation. He turned around to look for Jeff again. Jeff was way across the room, trying his best to embrace a woman’s foot. The woman didn’t seem to understand, and kept patting Jeff’s head. “Maybe I ought to go and get him,” Walter said.
    â€œHe’s not harming anything. Calm yourself.” Clara was dismembering her lobster expertly, eating quickly, as she always did.
    But the next instant a waiter came up and said smilingly, “Would you mind putting your dog on a leash, sir?”
    Walter got up and crossed the room towards Jeff, feeling painfully conspicuous in his white trousers and bright blue jacket. Jeff was still making efforts with the woman’s foot, his black-spotted face turned around and grinning as if he couldn’t quite take it seriously himself, but Walter had a hard time disengaging his wiry little legs from the woman’s ankle. “I’m very sorry,” Walter said to her.
    â€œWhy, I think he’s adorable!” the woman said.
    Walter restrained an impulse to crush the dog in his hands. He carried him back in the prescribed manner, one hand under the dog’s hot, panting little chest and the other steadying him on top, and he set him down very gently on the floor beside Clara and fastened the leash.
    â€œYou hate that dog, don’t you?” Clara asked.
    â€œI think he’s spoiled, that’s all.” Walter watched Clara’s face as she lifted Jeff to her lap. When she petted the dog her face grew beautiful, soft, and loving, as if she were fondling a child, her own child. Watching Clara’s face when she petted Jeff was the greatest pleasure Walter got out of the dog. He did hate the dog. He hated his cocky, selfish personality, his silly expression that seemed to say whenever he looked at Walter: “I’m living the life of Riley, and look at you!” He hated the dog because the dog could do no wrong with Clara, and he could do no right.
    â€œYou really think he’s spoiled?” Clara asked fondling the dog’s floppy black ear. “I thought he followed rather well this morning when we were on the beach.”
    â€œI only meant you chose a fox terrier because they’re more intelligent than most dogs, and you don’t take the trouble to teach him the most rudimentary manners.”
    â€œI suppose you’re referring to what he was doing across the room just now?”
    â€œThat’s part of it. I realize he’s almost two years old, but as long as he keeps on doing that I don’t think we should let him roam around dining-rooms. It’s not particularly pleasant to look at.”
    Clara arched her eyebrows. “He was having a little harmless fun. You talk as if you begrudge him it. That astounds me—coming from you,” she said with cool amusement.
    Walter did not smile.
    They got home the following afternoon. Clara learned that the Oyster Bay sale could easily hang fire for a month, and in her state of suspense a party was out of the question until she either sold it or didn’t.
    During the following fortnight Chad was rebuffed when he called and asked to come by, refused and perhaps hung up on before Walter could get to the telephone. Jon Carr, Walter’s closest friend, was put off right in front of Walter on Saturday morning when he telephoned. Clara told Walter that Jon had invited them to a little dinner party he was giving the following week, but Clara hadn’t thought it worth driving in to Manhattan for.
    Walter had dreams sometimes that one, or several, or all of