“I don’t want to talk to your little answering service. Just the thought of her voice makes me go cold all over.”

“Nelson usually answers the phone. She never answers it.”

“I don’t want to hear her, or see her, or hear about her. I can’t describe to you, Harry, the disgust I feel at just the thought of that person.”

“Have you been on the bottle again? You sound screwed-up.”

“I am sober and sane. And satisfied, thank you. I want to know what you’re doing about Nelson’s back-to-school clothes. You realize he’s grown three inches this summer and nothing will fit.”

“Did he, that’s terrific. Maybe he won’t be such a shrimp after all.”

“He will be as big as my father and my father is no shrimp.”

“Sorry, I always thought he was.”

“Do you want me to hang up right now? Is that what you want?”

“No, I just want you to call me someplace else than at work.”

She hangs up. He waits in Pajasek’s wooden swivel chair, looking at the calendar, which hasn’t been turned yet though this is September, and the August calendar girl, who is holding two ice-cream cones so the scoops cover just where her nipples would be, one strawberry and one chocolate, Double Dips! being the caption, until the phone rings.

“What were we saying?” he asks.

“I must take Nelson shopping for school clothes.”

“O.K., come around and pick him up any time. Set a day.”

“I will not come near that house, Harry, as long as that girl is in it. I won’t even go near Penn Villas. I’m sorry, it’s an uncontrollable physical revulsion.”

“Maybe you’re pregnant, if you’re so queasy. Have you and Chas been taking precautions?”

“Harry, I don’t know you any more. I said to Charlie, I can’t believe I lived thirteen years with that man, it’s as if it never happened.”

“Which reminds me, what shall we get Nelson for his birthday? He’s going to be thirteen this fall.”

She begins to cry. “You never forgave me for that, did you? For getting pregnant.”

“I did, I did. Relax. It worked out great. I’ll send Nelson over to your love nest to go shopping. Name the day.”

“Send him to the lot Saturday morning. I don’t like him coming to the apartment, it seems too terrible when he leaves.”

“Does it have to be Saturday? There was some talk of Jill driving us both down to Valley Forge; the kid and I’ve never seen it.”

“Are you poking fun of me? Why do you think this is all so funny, Harry? This is life.”

“I’m not, we were. Seriously.”

“Well, tell her you can’t. You two send Nelson over. Only send him with some money, I don’t see why I should pay for his clothes.”

“Buy everything at Kroll’s and charge it.”

“Kroll’s has gone terribly downhill, you know it has. There’s a nice little new shop now up near Perley, past that submarine place that used to be Chinese.”