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raised them stiffly sideways, and said, “ Faggots! ”
    Raucous laughter, mild applause. “We love you too!”
    “OK, I know this guy and it’s out with him!” said a short, dark-haired man, getting to his feet. He came forward like a wrestler, took Willi by the elbows and thrust him toward the door.
    A cheer went up! “Good for you, Ernst!”
    Ernst had helpers. Willi was lifted off his feet. Someone held the door open.
    “Yee-hoo!”
    Wine bottles circulated, people sat down and relaxed and smiled. Philip started the water for wieners and spaghetti.
    When Ernst and his helpers came back, they got a roar of congratulation.
    “A taxi?”
    “No, we let him walk!”
    “If that bell rings again—don’t answer!”
    R ICKIE STOOD IN AN APRON , helping Philip in the narrow kitchen. It was as if Rickie had suddenly come awake, after perhaps twenty minutes of blackout, though he had been on his feet all the time. By now there was no one in the apartment but himself and Philip and a man whose name Rickie didn’t know. Philip was carefully putting back knives, forks, spoons in their compartments in a kitchen drawer.
    “So—I’ll be taking off!” said the tall blond young man, swinging a long scarf round his neck.
    “OK, Paul, and thanks again for all your help,” Philip said.
    “ Bitte! ” Paul and Philip kissed each other quickly on the cheeks. “See you soon.”
    He was gone.
    Philip smiled at Rickie, looking different, younger.
    “C’mon on, we’re finished here.”
    “True,” said Rickie, undoing his apron. They had even collected the ashtrays and washed them.
    Philip gave a shy squirm. “I—would you like to stay the night, Rick?”
    Rickie’s lips parted in surprise. “Me?” He smiled. “Do I look that pissed?”
    “You don’t look pissed at all.”
    Neither did Philip, looking straight at Rickie. Somewhere, deep in the core of him, Rickie was flattered. Philip—twenty-three at most, maybe not handsome but not bad-looking either, and above all young. Youth was the valuable thing, lasting such a short time! “Very kind of you,” said Rickie. “You know, I—”
    Philip spoke on Rickie’s hesitation. “I know. I know you’re thinking of Petey still. Everybody knows that. Perfectly normal. An unusually nice boy, he was.”
    “Yes,” replied Rickie, beginning to consider Philip’s invitation. But no: Rickie thought of his age again, and of his unattractive abdomen, bulging not just because of the surgical job, but because of a little embonpoint, softness, self-indulgence too. Then there was the other thing.
    “We’re both—you know—trying to forget someone, as Cole Porter says in—in—”
    “‘It’s All Right with Me,’” Rickie supplied in English and at once laughed, chuckled. “Funny. I mean the song.”
    “Rickie—” Philip shook his head. “You don’t realize that people like you. A lot, you know? Well—I can see you don’t know.” Philip looked at the floor.
    Sure, people liked him because he was a nice old uncle to them, ready to lend a hundred francs and forget about it. To listen to someone’s troubles, pour another drink, offer a bed in a crisis, and Rickie had a bed even in the studio where he worked. That didn’t mean he was an Adonis! Rickie stood taller, tightened his tie. “Um, well,” he said vaguely, not looking at Philip. “I must go. Maybe you can phone for a taxi, dear Philip.”
    “Nonsense, I’ll drive you!”
    Philip insisted, there was no dissuading him, his car was just downstairs in the garage, and so Rickie and Lulu went down with Philip in the lift. Philip opened the garage and backed the car up the steep slope to pavement level. The garage door closed automatically.
    Rickie had to direct Philip, who had been to his apartment before, but couldn’t quite recall how to get there. Philip parked at the curb, and turned off his lights.
    “Can I invite myself for a nightcap?”
    Rickie knew what that meant, but he could hardly say no,