He pointed his finger at me abruptly, popping the knuckle of his thumb.
"Got ya!" he chortled, when I jumped.
He started fitting the back of the radio into its proper place again.
"There's a trailer camp right behind this Palm Springs motel, see, the
one where I've got my radios, an' it's full of all these ritzy guys and
dames, see. In the morning when they get up--an' that ain't early--you
oughta see 'em, lined up to go to the bathroom. They just stand there
an' talk, see, an' sometimes they get so interested in what they're
sayin', that they just keep on standin' there for a long time, talkin'
and talkin'."
The radio man got into his car to go, after all of the money had been
divided; I glanced at him, on my way back to the house, when he didn't
start up his car immediately.
He had a small can of oil in his hand, and, apparently assiduous and
intent, he was oiling the hinges in his elbows.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
I'M TOLERANT ABOUT it when men customers flirt with me, but when women
customers flirt with Grant, that's different.
Grant and I had been pulling weeds from around the shrubs in front of
cabin 3 when a lank, stick-shaped woman appeared by the office. Grant
went to talk to her, while I stayed on my knees pulling weeds and
wondering what it was about the woman that disturbed me. I had seen her
before, I felt sure; no doubt she had occupied one of our cabins
recently. But there seemed to be something different about her now; all
I could think of was that she seemed much thinner and more shapeless
than she had been before. Perhaps at the moment she was simply wearing
a dress that didn't flatter her.
I glanced up, studying her as she talked to Grant, trying to decide
whether it could be her clothing that made that annoyingly intangible
difference in her.
She was alternately smiling at Grant, and looking down toward her feet
with apparent embarrassment; and she was making vague gestures toward
her chest. I began to watch more closely. I couldn't quite hear what
she was saying.
The woman was definitely blushing now, laughing and pointing toward her
chest. I brushed the earth from my hands, stood up, and stalked over to
where they were standing.
I didn't know exactly what was going on, but I felt that my presence
would do no harm.
". . . you might call them eye-catchers," the woman was saying, cupping
her hands at strategic points over the flatness of her dress.
I tucked my arm possessively through Grant's, and stood there tapping
my foot.
To my surprise, the woman seemed glad to see me. "Oh, never mind, your
wife will know what I mean," she said. With a dismissing sweep of her
eyes she brushed Grant out of earshot. When he had gone back to his
weeding she said, "It's so hard to talk to a man, isn't it? You can't
call a spade a spade for fear of embarrassing them."
I was still a little suspicious of her. "What was it you wanted?" I
asked, my tone aloof.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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