Staring at her Temple moved her mouth as though she were experimenting with words, tasting them.
“Will you go out the back and get into it and go away and never come back here?”
“Yes,” Temple whispered, “anywhere.
Anything.”
Without seeming to move her cold eyes at all the woman looked Temple up and down.
Temple could feel all her muscles shrinking like severed vines in the noon sun.
“You poor little gutless fool,” the woman said in her cold undertone.
“Playing at it.”
“I didn’t.
I didn’t.”
“You’ll have something to tell them now, when you get back.
Wont you?”
Face to face, their voices were like shadows upon two close blank walls.
“Playing at it.”
“Anything.
Just so I get away.
Anywhere.”
“It’s not Lee I’m afraid of.
Do you think he plays the dog after every hot little bitch that comes along?
It’s you.”
“Yes. I’ll go anywhere.”
“I know your sort.
I’ve seen them.
All running, but not too fast.
Not so fast you cant tell a real man when you see him.
Do you think you’ve got the only one in the world?”
“Gowan,” Temple whispered,
“Gowan.”
“I have slaved for that man,” the woman whispered, her lips scarce moving, in her still, dispassionate voice.
It was as though she were reciting a formula for bread.
“I worked night shift as a waitress so I could see him Sundays at the prison.
I lived two years in a single room, cooking over a gas-jet, because I promised him.
I lied to him and made money to get him out of prison, and when I told him how I made it, he beat me.
And now you must come here where you’re not wanted.
Nobody asked you to come here.
Nobody cares whether you are afraid or not.
Afraid?
You haven’t the guts to be really afraid, anymore than you have to be in love.”
“I’ll pay you,” Temple whispered.
“Anything you say.
My father will give it to me.”
The woman watched her, her face motionless, as rigid as when she had been speaking.
“I’ll send you clothes.
I have a new fur coat.
I just wore it since Christmas.
It’s as good as new.”
The woman laughed.
Her mouth laughed, with no sound, no movement of her face.
“Clothes?
I had three fur coats once.