Glass Cell by Patricia Highsmith Read Free Book Online Page A

arranged before he graduated. It had all been so easy for him. All his life he had simply fallen into lucky, comfortable spots—until now. His parents had died, first his mother shortly after his birth and then his father when Carter was five, but there had been his affectionate, childless, and well-to-do Uncle John to take him in in New York. John’s wife Edna had been even more indulgent than a mother, Carter felt, because she had no children of her own and because he was a handsome, bright little boy related to her husband. The money of his parents had been put into a fund for him, and had been more than enough to see him through school, to provide him with plenty of clothes, a car when he was eighteen, money for dates. He had never had to work during summers. There had been many girls, once he was out of school and had his own apartment in Manhattan, affairs which now seemed very juvenile to him and which he realized had done nothing to him but feed his vanity. Then he had met Hazel Olcott, who had been engaged then to someone called Dan, an exporter with a plantation in Brazil. Carter had met her at a party given by a friend in New York, he had immediately noticed her and asked his host about her and learned about the exporter named Dan, who in fact was at the party, a very self-confident fellow of about thirty. Then Hazel the same evening had asked him if he would like to come to a surprise birthday party that she was giving for her mother, and Carter with his usual good cheer had accepted, thinking the fiancé was going to be there, too, the mother, too, and that it was the most unpromising of invitations. But the fiancé had not been there, and Carter had got along very well with Hazel and her mother and her mother’s middle-aged friends. One meeting had led to another, because her fiancé always seemed to have business engagements, though they were supposed to be married in August and it was then July. And though Carter felt that Hazel was giving him some encouragement, he had been afraid to tell her that he was in love with her, because for the first time in his life he felt he was going to be unlucky. And Hazel, he thought, would have considered such a declaration in poor taste, since he knew she was engaged. Then as July came to an end, and Carter thought he had nothing to lose, he had stammered out that he was in love with her, and Hazel, not at all surprised, had said, “Yes, I know, but don’t worry, because I broke it off with Dan three weeks ago.” The incredible ease of it, the miracle! Carter had begun to be really happy for the first time in his life. His happiness had lasted exactly seven years and two months, until the month Wallace Palmer had fallen off the scaffold.
    Carter and his Aunt Edna wrote to each other only about twice a year now. Since Uncle John died, Aunt Edna had lived with a sister in California. He had not written to her since before the trial had begun. For one thing, he had thought the nightmare would pass, would be straightened out somehow, and he had not wanted to burden and confuse Edna with it. She was now in her seventies. But the nightmare was not blowing over. Carter supposed he ought to write to her. There were several New York friends who had seen small items in the paper and written him friendly notes that he should have answered, but hadn’t. The prospect of writing them now was dreary indeed. And yet not to write, he felt, was like an admission of guilt.
    Carter awakened from a dream, tense with anxiety. He half raised himself in bed and looked at the clock over the door. 10:20. He lay down again. A light sweat covered his face, and he was breathing rapidly. He swallowed, twisted to reach his water glass and found it empty.
    A movement in the corner of the room caught his eye. Dr. Cassini stood up from a straight chair and came toward him, smiling, his dark eyes distorted and enlarged by his glasses.
    “No, I don’t need another shot,” Carter said.
    “Oh, I