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.He said they were making less than they had expected.The store was fine for one man but not for two, so they each wanted to buy the other out.Pederson’s nerves couldn’t stand the fighting, and Taast bought him out at the end of May and had the place all to himself.But he found that the long hours alone were killing his feet.His wife came in to help out around suppertime; however Taast couldn’t stand being away from his family every night, when everyone else was free and at home, so he decided to close at seven-thirty and stop fighting Frank until almost ten.These couple of hours all to himself at night helped Frank.He got back some of the customers who came home from work late, and also the housewives who at the last minute needed something for breakfast.And Frank noticed, from peering into Taast’s window after he was closed, that he was no longer so generous with the specials.The weather turned hot in July.People cooked less, lived more on delicatessen, canned goods, bottled drinks.He sold a lot of beer.His pastas and pizzas went very well.He heard that Taast had tried making pizzas but they were too doughy.Also, instead of using canned soups, Frank made a minestrone of his own that everybody praised; it took time to cook up, but the profit was better.And the new things he was selling pushed other goods along.He now paid Ida ninety a month for rent and the use of her store.She was earning more money on her epaulettes, and did not think so often that she would starve.“Why do you give me so much?” she asked him when he raised the money to ninety.“Maybe Helen could keep some of her wages?” he suggested.“Helen isn’t interested any more in you,” she said sternly.He didn’t answer her.But that night after supper—he had treated himself to ham and eggs and now smoked a cigar—Frank cleared the table and sat down to figure out how much it would cost to support Helen in college if she would quit her job and give all her time to education.When he had figured out the tuition from the college catalogues he had collected, he saw he couldn’t do it.His heart was heavy.Later he thought maybe he could work it if she went to a free college.He could give her enough for her daily expenses and also to make up whatever money she now gave her mother.He figured that to do it would be a rocky load on his head, but he had to do it, it was his only hope; he could think of no other.All he asked for himself was the privilege of giving her something she couldn’t give back.The big thing, exciting yet frightening, was to talk to her, say what he hoped to do.He always had it in mind to say but found it very hard.To speak to her, after all that had happened to them, seemed impossible—opening on peril, disgrace, physical pain.What was the magic word to begin with? He despaired he could ever convince her.She was remote, sinned against, unfeeling, or if she felt, it was disgust of him.He cursed himself for having conceived this mess he couldn’t now bring himself to speak of.One August night after he had seen her come home from work in the company of Nat Pearl, sick of the misery of un-motion, Frank made himself move.He was standing behind the counter piling bottles of beer into a woman’s market bag when he caught sight of Helen going by with some books on her arm.She was wearing a new summer dress, red trimmed with black, and the sight of her struck him with renewed hunger.All summer she had wandered at night alone in the neighborhood, trying to outwalk her loneliness.He had been tempted to close up and follow her, but until he had his new idea he could not think what he dared say that she wouldn’t run from.Hurrying the customer out of the store, Frank washed, slicked back his hair and quickly changed into a fresh sport shirt.He locked the store and hurried in the direction Helen had gone.The day had been hot but was cooling now and still.The sky was golden green, though below the light was dark.After running a block he remembered something and trudged back to the store.He sat in the back listening to his heart hammering in his ears.In ten minutes he lit a lamp in the store window.The globe drew a ragged moth.Knowing how long she lingered among books, he shaved.Then locking the front door again, he went toward the library.He figured he would wait across the street till she came out.He would cross over and catch up with her on her way home.Before she could even see him, he would speak his piece and be done with it.Yes or no, she could say, and if no, he would shut the joint tomorrow and skiddoo.He was nearing the library when he glanced up and saw her.She was about half a block away and walking toward him.He stood there not knowing which way to go, dreading to be met by her as lovely as she looked, standing like a crippled dog as she passed him.He thought of running back the way he had come, but she saw him, turned and went in haste the other way; so, reviving an old habit, he was after her, and before she could deny him, had touched her arm.They shivered.Giving her no time to focus her contempt, he blurted out what he had so long saved to say but could not now stand to hear himself speak.When Helen realized what he was offering her, her heart moved violently.She had known he would follow and speak, but she could never in a thousand years have guessed he would say this.Considering the conditions of his existence, she was startled by his continuing ability to surprise her, make God-knows-what-next-move.His staying power mystified and frightened her, because she felt in herself, since the death of Ward Minogue, a waning of outrage.Although she detested the memory of her experience in the park, lately it had come back to her how she had desired that night to give herself to Frank, and might have if Ward hadn’t touched her.She had wanted him.If there had been no Ward Minogue, there would have been no assault.If he had made his starved leap in bed she would have returned passion.She had hated him, she thought, to divert hatred from herself.But her response to his offer was an instantaneous no.She said it almost savagely, to escape any possibility of being directly obligated to him, of another entrapment, nausea.“I couldn’t think of it.”He was astonished to have got this far, to be walking at her side—only it was a night in a different season, and her summer face was gentler than her winter one, her body more womanly; yet it all added up to loss, the more he wanted her the more he had lost.“In your father’s name,” he said.“If not for you, then for him.”“What has my father got to do with it?”“It’s his store.Let it support you to go to college like he wanted you to.”“It can’t without you.I don’t want your help.”“Morris did me a big favor.I can’t return it to him but I might to you.Also because I lost myself that night—”“For God’s sake, don’t say it.”He didn’t, was dumb.They walked dumbly on.To her horror they were coming to the park.Abruptly she went the other way.He caught up with her.“You could graduate in three years.You wouldn’t have any worry about expenses.You could study all you want.”“What would you expect to get from this—virtue?”“I already said why—I owe something to Morris.”“For what? Taking you into his stinking store and making a prisoner out of you?”What more could he say? To his misery, what he had done to her father rose in his mind
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