Free Ida a Novel by Gertrude Stein, Logan Esdale

they said to her, and they did sometimes forget to say it to Gerald but Gerald was nice and always said, oh yes, do, oh yes do.
    She lived there and Gerald Seaton lived there, they lived in the same apartment and they talked to each other when they were dining but not much when they were resting and each in their way was resting.
    Ida knew a vacant house when she saw it but she did not look at it, would she be introduced to some one who did look at a vacant house. Never at any time did tears come to Ida’s eyes.
    Never.
    Everybody knew that Andrew was one of two. He was so completely one of two that he was two. Andrew was his name and he was not tall, not tall at all.
    And yet it did mean it when he came in or when he went out.
    Ida had not known that she would be there when he came in and when he went out but she was.
    Ida was.
    Andrew, there were never tears in Andrew’s voice or tears in his eyes, he might cry but that was an entirely different matter.
    Ida knew that.
    Slowly Ida knew everything about that. It was the first thing Ida had ever known really the first thing.
    Ida somehow knew who Andrew was and leave it alone or not Ida saw him.
    If he saw her or not it was not interesting. Andrew was not a man who ever noticed anything. Naturally not. They noticed him.
    Feel like that do you said Ida.
    Ida was busy resting.
    Ida when she went out did not carry an umbrella. It had not rained enough not nearly enough and once a week Ida went walking and today was the once a week when she went walking.
    Once a week is two days one following another and this was the second one and Ida was dreaming.
    So much for Andrew.
    There was hardly any beginning.
    There never could be with Andrew when he was there there he was. Anybody could know that and Ida well she just did not know that and Andrew looked about him when she was there and he saw her.
    She was married to Gerald and she and Gerald were just as old as ever but that did not bother them. They talked together at least some time every day and occasionally in the evening but that was all and when they talked she called out to him and he did not answer and he called out to her and mostly she did not answer but they were sometimes in their home together. Anyway they were married and had been for quite some time.
    Andrew did not notice Ida but he saw her and he went away to meet some one who had been named after a saint, this one was named after a saint called Thomas and so his name was Thomas and so Andrew met Thomas that is to say Andrew went out to meet that is to say he would meet Thomas who was out walking not walking but reading as he was walking which was his habit.
    Andrew was there and then Thomas came to him.
    Everybody was silent and so were they and then everybody went away. Andrew went away first.
    Ida went out walking later on and the rain came down but by that time Ida was at home reading, she was not walking any more. Each one reads in their way and Ida read in her way.
    Andrew never read.
    Of course not.
    Ida was careless but not that way. She did read, and she never forgot to look up when she saw Andrew.
    Ida went out walking instead of sitting in a garden which was just as well because in this way she often met everybody and stopped and talked with them, this might lead her to meet them again and if it did she sometimes met some one who cried for one reason or another. Ida did not mind anybody crying, why should she when she had a garden a house and a dog and when she was so often visiting. Very often they made four and no more.
    This had nothing to do with Andrew who in a way was never out walking and if he was then of course nobody did meet him.
    Andrew never disappeared, how could he when he was always there and Ida gradually was always there too. How do you do. That is what she said when she met him.
    She did not really meet him, nobody did because he was there and they were there and nobody met him or he them, but Ida did, she met him.
    Andrew, she called