Two Weeks in Another Town by Irwin Shaw Read Free Book Online

said, enjoying the suspense. Suddenly he stopped and squinted curiously at Jack. “What happened to your nose?” he asked.
    “A drunk hit me outside the hotel,” Jack said, feeling embarrassed.
    “When?”
    “A minute after you left.”
    “Did you know him?”
    “Never saw him before.”
    Delaney grinned. “It didn’t take you long to enter into the thrilling life of the Eternal City, did it? I’ve been here five months and I haven’t been hit yet.”
    “But you’ve been here long enough to get lipstick on your collar,” Jack said as they started toward the exit.
    Delaney’s hand moved guiltily toward his throat. “Now where in hell could that have come from?”
    “Is Clara eating with us?” Jack asked, as they got to the door.
    “No.” Delaney didn’t volunteer anything more.
    They got into the green Fiat, assisted by the military doorman, who stared mournfully at Jack’s nose, as though it reminded him of a sin of his youth.
    Delaney sat erect in his corner, glaring at the cars darting wildly past the street corners. “God,” he said, “the way Italians drive. Like kids out to make a new record in the soapbox derby.”
    “Well,” Jack said, “it’s better than the way Frenchmen drive. As though they’re all trying to get to the bank to get their savings out before the bank fails. I once asked a Frenchman why they drove that way and he thought for a moment and said, “‘Well, we lost the war.’”
    Delaney chuckled. “I guess by now you’re an expert on the French,” he said.
    “Nobody’s an expert on the French,” Jack said. “Now, Maurice, tell me—where’re we going?”
    “If ye have tears”, prepare to shed them now. Old Roman quotation,” Delaney said. “You’ll see soon enough.” He began to hum a song, smiling mysteriously. It was an old popular song, and Delaney had a croaking, almost tuneless way of hitting the notes, and Jack didn’t recognize it, although he had the feeling he should and that it carried some special significance for him.
    The car drove up to the front of a movie theatre and stopped. “Here we are,” Delaney said. He got out and held the door for Jack. “I hope you don’t mind waiting for dinner.” He watched Jack closely as Jack looked up at the poster in front of the theatre.
    “Oh, Christ,” Jack said softly, standing in front of the poster, which advertised a picture called The Stolen Midnight, directed by Maurice Delaney. In the list of actors on the poster was the name James Royal and in the small stills pasted up near the entrance there was a close-up of himself, twenty years younger, before the wound and the thickening of the jaw, thin, laughing, handsomer than he ever remembered himself.
    “What an idea,” Jack said.
    “I thought it might interest you,” Delaney said innocently.
    “So would a hanging.” Now Jack understood why Delaney had hummed the song in the car. It was a song of the thirties, “Walkin’ My Baby Back Home,” and it was played several times in the picture and had been used as a theme behind several of the key scenes by the composer of the incidental music.
    “The publicity department arranged it,” Maurice said. “Famous director doing picture in Rome, let the public see what he perpetrated when he was young.”
    “Have you seen it yet?” Jack kept staring at the photograph of himself on the glossy, brilliantly illuminated paper.
    “No,” Delaney said. “And anyway, I thought it would be a friendly idea to sit next to you while they were running it.”
    “Friendly,” Jack said. “There’s the word. When was the last time you saw it?”
    “Ten, fifteen years ago.” Delaney looked at his watch. “The hell with it,” he said. “The bastard’s late again. Let’s not wait for him. He’ll find us after the picture.”
    “Who’s that?” Jack asked, following Delaney to the ticket booth.
    “A French newspaperman who’s writing a piece on me for a Paris magazine,” Delaney said, shoveling