The bar was quiet, and there was nobody else there. Then the jukebox came on, as if by itself. It was an old jazz tune, “Bad Penny Blues.” I turned around to see who was there, and there she was. She was dancing by herself—no, she was dancing with herself—and singing, even though there were no words to the tune, just ba-ba and yeah-yeah, softly.

I couldn’t see her face, but I knew it would be beautiful.

Her name was Helen.

Todd started at that.

“Something wrong?” said Behm.

Todd ignored him and went back to reading. His knuckles were white against the paper.

Her name was Helen. She told me she lived a couple of blocks away, in a cold water apartment.

“Is that why you’re here?” I asked her. “For the hot water in the bathroom?”

She shrugged. “Know how big my apartment is?” she said.

“I’ll bite,” I said.

“I can lie on the bed and put my hands out of both windows at the same time,” she said.

For a moment I had an image of her as a modern-day Alice, trapped in the doll’s house. Then her face cracked into a smile. It was a great smile.

“Sucker,” she said.

“Seriously,” I said, when she’d finished laughing, “how big is your apartment?”

“You wanna see?” she said.

There was a moment.

“Sure,” I said.

We did everything that night. Everything, that is, but screw. You recall I said I liked to talk? Turns out I was a rank amateur. Helen talked, and talked, through the night. I know that sounds like a putdown, but this wasn’t ordinary woman’s talk. Helen was a poem. She had no idea how wonderful she was to listen to. Her talk wasn’t like a man’s talk—it wasn’t full of opinions and facts and lists and boasts. Helen liked all kind of things, but she didn’t think she was a better person for liking them, or that the things she liked were more important than the things other people liked. She just liked. And sometimes she loved. She loved jazz, she loved books, she loved to dance.

And later, she loved me, and I loved her.

I got home in time for breakfast and bad temper. My wife wanted to know where I’d been all night. I told her. She walked out that morning.

Later that day, I put a note through Helen’s door. I HAVE HOT WATER, it said. An hour later, Helen appeared on my doorstep with a cardboard valise.

“Hi,” I said.

“Invite me in,” she said.

It was a weird thing to say.

“Come in, beautiful,” I said, and she stepped over the threshold.

We didn’t talk much that day. Nor the day after. Then, one morning when we could scarcely move for aching, she came back from the bathroom with a book in her hand.