Theda threw back her head and laughed. “I haven’t seen Carl since. I had always been afraid of him until I saw him whitened. It was a cruel way to lose my fear, but that’s the way it happened.”

“You loved Simon?” Annie said with heedless emphasis.

Theda drank. “I was taller than Simon. But that was fortunate because he liked tall women. He liked all women. We must have been a strange couple. I desired Simon. I desired to be in the place where he was all the time. Look! Someone put out a cigarette in my rug!”

She got up and went to the white stub crushed in the rug pile and bent over. God, she was tall. She stood up, holding the butt in her hand. She caught Annie’s glance, its import. Annie flushed; Theda smiled. “Have another drink,” she said. “Love is not a subject any more than death is. I’m not especially vain about it, but I have yet to run out of men who want to make love to me. Make what? Love!” and she whirled and tossed the butt into the flower basket in the fireplace.

They drank a good deal more. Theda spoke as though she plucked her thoughts from some clear medium. It was not her judgment that so impressed the younger woman; it was the way she didn’t count the costs of what she said.

In her closet of terrors, Annie picked up words in the dark, hoping they would not turn out to be serpents. But Theda was uncongested. Annie asked her if she knew Fern Diedrich. Theda said that Fern was going mad—that it was not the party that had driven her mad, no, the party didn’t do that—in fact, it frequently kept madness at bay—“like religion,” Theda said. “She came here once with Max and Eva. I had a dog at the time. Jimmie, the dog. The dog jumped into Fern’s lap. She sat in a catatonic trance—Fern with dog on lap. We were all paralyzed, even Eva. Fern began to grin, her mouth stretched so, I thought her face would break. The dog licked her chin. She stood straight up, so quickly the dog fell on the floor. I never saw a dog do that before.”

“Max,” said Annie sadly, drunkenly. “Max.”

“No, no. Not Max.”

They stared across the table at each other.

“I didn’t mean anything…”

“It wouldn’t do any good. I, asked him once if he’d murdered old ladies in his youth. Oh, he’s hopeless. Taking on burdens that appall him. But he can’t refuse anything, anyone. You did too mean something. Listen, I’m years older than you. Going to bed with men is your idea of good manners—offering the executioner a cigarette before he chops off your head.”

“I think I’m going to throw up.”