"Not yet," Marilyn said. "Of course, I'm not a jazz singer. I only do folk music, and I haven't found any place in this area where I can try out."

"There are lots of places," he smiled. "I can help you, if you want. Let's sit down. I admit it-I'm tired out." He laid a tense, bony hand on her arm and let it drop. They sat down on the couch. Jerry put his feet on the coffee table and shut his eyes for a moment.

"I sure do appreciate the offer," Marilyn said. "I'm pretty lost around here and I guess I will need help to get started."

"Everyone does. It's that kind of business. You smoke?" He pulled a package of cigarets from his pocket, shook it, and extended it to Marilyn.

And as she took a cigaret, she saw his arm. And she remembered the husky voice of her hygiene teacher, short-haired, athletic Miss Jenks, the day the class had discussed the mysterious, sinister terrors of narcotics, while flies had droned through the schoolroom and everyone had yawned from heat and the boredom of hearing endless hygiene book platitudes about healthy living and the unclean obscenity of using artificial stimulants. The bluish marks under the naked pale skin, the tiny lumps where the needle had given up its hold-there they all were. And before she realized she was staring, mouth open, shocked like a kid at her first horror movie, Bobbie's voice broke in:

"Drinks all around. Come on Marilyn-wake up!"

Her eyes met Marilyn's hard as Marilyn took a glass, and Marilyn blushed a little. She looked quickly away. And when she looked at Jerry she made up her mind, with all the resolution she could muster, not to look at his arm. But as she glanced back at him, she saw him coolly rolling his sleeves down, buttoning the

the

cuffs with nervous fingers, then picking up his cigaret from the ashtray and smiling at her.

"Can I try your guitar a minute?" he asked.

"Sure," she said, swallowing, "go ahead."

It leaned against the end of the couch. She picked it up and swung it high to avoid knocking the glasses off the coffee table, and he gripped it and brought it safely on to his knee.

"This is as big as you are," he grinned.

She watched his fingers. Their trembling and uncertainty vanished. The lean, sinewy beat of the blues walked from under them as though it was the only sound meant to exist. She sat transfixed. She just couldn't believe it. She remembered her ironhaired mother saying rigidly that musicians were stupid people, that dope addicts were even more stupid, that the combination was simply not to be associated with. And here she was, sitting with an addicted musician who was saying more with a pawnshop guitar than her mother would ever be able to say. Marilyn suddenly wanted to shout, to laugh: Who gives a good God damn? What difference does it make? And then the sick worry, combined with anger now: What if my goddam parents come and spoil this, break it up, take me out of here, away from Bobbie, away bie, away from Jerry? She got up from the couch and walked quickly into the bathroom, shutting the door quietly and firmly. She stayed a long time.

When she came out, her guitar rested against the couch again. "Where's Jerry?" she asked.

Bobbie shook her head. "Poor son of a bitch." She got up and went to the kitchen, switching on the glaring light that turned the white walls to yellow, and opening a cupboard above