It offends Rabbit to hear his father swear; he lifts his head fastidiously, as if to watch the television, which has returned to a program where people are trying to guess what sort of prize is hidden behind a curtain and jump and squeal and kiss each other when it turns out to be an eight-foot frozen-food locker. He might be wrong but for a second he could swear this young housewife opens her mouth in mid-kiss and gives the m.c. a taste of her tongue. Anyway, she won’t stop kissing. The m.c.’s eyes roll out to the camera for mercy and they cut to a commercial. In silence images of spaghetti and some opera singer riffle past. “I don’t know,” Rabbit says. “She hits the bottle pretty well sometimes but then so do I.”

“Not you,” the old man tells him, “you’re no drinker, Harry. I’ve seen drinkers all my life, somebody like Boonie over in engraving, there’s a drinker, killing himself with it, and he knows it, he couldn’t stop if they told him he’d die tomorrow. You may have a whisky or two in the evening, you’re no spring chicken anymore, but you’re no drinker.” He hides his loose mouth in his beer and Harry taps the bar for another Daiquiri. The old man nuzzles closer. “Now Harry, forgive me for asking if you don’t want to talk about it, but how about in bed? That goes along pretty well, does it?”

“No,” he answers slowly, disdainful of this prying, “I wouldn’t exactly say well. Tell me about Mom. Has she had any of those breathing fits lately?”

“Not a one that I’ve been woken up for. She sleeps like a baby with those new green pills. This new medicine is a miracle, I must admit—ten more years the only way to kill us’ll be to gas us to death, Hitler had the right idea. Already, you know, there aren’t any more crazy people: just give ’em a pill morning and evening and they’re sensible as Einstein. You wouldn’t exactly say it does, go along O.K., is that what I understood you said?”

“Well we’ve never been that great, Pop, frankly. Does she fall down ever? Mom.”

“She may take a tumble or two in the day and not tell me about it. I tell her, I tell her, stay in bed and watch the box. She has this theory the longer she can do things the longer she’ll stay out of bed for good. I figure she should take care of herself, put herself in deep freeze, and in a year or two in all likelihood they’ll develop a pill that’ll clear this up simple as a common cold. Already, you know, some of these cortisones; but the doctor tells us they don’t know but what the side effects may be worse. You know: the big C. My figuring is, take the chance, they’re just about ready to lick cancer anyway and with these transplants pretty soon they can replace your whole insides.” The old man hears himself talking too much and slumps to stare into his empty beer, the suds sliding down, but can’t help adding, to give it all point, “It’s a terrible thing.” And when Harry fails to respond: “God she hates not being active.”