but forgotten about signing the damned thing, to tell the truth... and I still don't know exactly why he was so upset... but... but when he came back She hugged Natalie to her, trembling.
"Shhh, Helen, take it easy, everything's okay."
"No, it's not!" She looked up at him, tears streaming from one eye and seeping out from beneath the swelled lid of the other. "It's nub-nub-not. Why didn't he stop this time? And what's going to happen to me and the baby? Where will we go? I don't have any money except for what's in the joint checking account... I don't have a job... oh Ralph, why did you call the police? You shouldn't have done that!
"And she hit his forearm with a strengthless little fist. "You're going to get through this just fine," he said. "You've got a lot of friends in the neighborhood."
But he barely heard what he was saying and hadn't felt her small punch at all. The anger was thudding away in his chest and at his temples like a second heartbeat.
Not Why didn't he stop,-that wasn't what she had said. What she had said was Why didn't he stop this time? This time. "Helen, where's Ed now?"
"Home, I guess," she said dully. Ralph patted her an the shoulder, then turned and started for the d(!)or.
"Ralph?" Bill McGovern asked. He sounded alarmed. "Where you going?" Her voice was rising. "Lock the door after me," Ralph told Sue. "Jeer, I don't know if I can do that." Sue looked doubtfully at the line of gawkers peering in through the dirty window. There were more of them now. "You can," he said, then cocked his head, catching the first faint wail of an approaching siren. "Hear that?"
"Yes, but-"
"The cops will tell you what to do, and your boss won't be mad at You, either-he'll probably give you a medal for handling everything just right."
"If he does, I'll split it with you," she said, then glanced at Heleil again. A little color had come back into Sue's cheeks, but not much.
"Jeepers, Ralph, look at her! Did he really beat her up because she signed some stupid patition?"
"I guess so," Ralph said. The conversation made perfect sense to him, but it was coming in long distance. His rage was closer; it had its hot arms locked around his neck, it seemed. He wished he were forty again, even fifty, so he could give Ed a taste of his own medicine. And he had an idea he might try doing that anyway.
He was turning the thumb-bolt of the door when McGovern grabbed his shoulder. "What do you think you're doing?"
"Going to see Ed."
"Are you kidding? He'll take you apart if you get in his face.
Didn't you see what he did to her.
"You bet I did," Ralph replied. The words weren't quite a snarl, but close enough to make McGovern drop his hand.
"You're seventy fucking years old, Ralph, in case you forgot. And Helen needs a friend right now, not some busted-up antique she cat visit because her hospital room is three doors down from hers."
Bill was right, of course, but that only made Ralph angrier, He supposed the insomnia was at work in this, too, stoking his anger that made no difference. In a way, and blurring his judgment, buly, than drifting through the anger was a relief. It was better, certain of dark gray. A world where everything had turned shade some Demerol "if he beats me up bad enough, they'll give me the kid. "Now leave me alone, and I can get a decent night's sleep," he said Bill." parking lot at a brisk walk. A police He crossed the Red Apple Questionshing with its blue grille flashers pulsing. car was approaching. She okay?-were thrown at him, but Ralph ignored What happened? He waited for the police car to swing them. He paused on the side venue at that same brisk into the parking lot, then crossed Harris Avenue at a prudent walk, with McGovern trailing anxiously after him in the distance.
Part I LITTLE BALD DOCTORS CHAPTER 3
Ed and Helen Deepneau lived in a small Cape Cod-chocolatebrown, whipped-cream trim, the kind of house which older women often call "darling"-four houses up from the one Ralph and Bill McGovern shared.
Carolyn had liked to say the Deepneaus belonged to "the Church of the Latter-Day Yuppies," although her genuine liking for them had robbed the phrase of any real bite. They were laissez-faire vegetarians who considered both fish and dairy products okay, they