Free The Day the Rabbi Resigned by Harry Kemelman Page A

evening. And she might answer, “Oh, I went into Salem to look for shoes to go with my beige dress.” Sometimes he might ask if she had been successful. More often, he merely grunted; question asked, answer given. Transaction completed.
    When she asked about his day, he was no more explicit. He might reply, “Just the usual.” Or, “We had a dumb department meeting where nothing was decided as usual.”
    She assumed his reserve and taciturnity were due to the difference in their interests. She could understand that he might chafe at her idle talk of shoes and dresses. So she began to read, selecting the books she thought he would approve of, the books on the suggested reading list in her course in literature. Her attempts met with little success, however.
    â€œI’ve just finished reading Pride and Prejudice ,” she announced one evening. “Do you like Jane Austen?”
    â€œNot my period,” he said shortly.
    â€œWell, it’s about this awfully rich young man who is terribly stuck-up—”
    â€œI know what it’s about. I read it way back when. Look, I’ve a bunch of papers I have to correct and a lecture to prepare. Do you mind?” And he would repair to the little back parlor he had made into a study.
    When she tried a writer who was in his period, he was no more encouraging. “Look, I had to read so much Bernard Shaw for my dissertation that I got heartily sick of the old faker.”
    So she sat in the living room and watched TV while he remained in his study. Sometimes she wondered if he was really working in his study, or if it was just an excuse to get away from her chatter. He would usually join her for the ten o’clock news, after which he would announce that it was time to go to bed, by which he meant not that he was sleepy, but that he wanted sex. And this, too, had changed. During the honeymoon, although the act was distasteful to her, she had felt that it was due to his consuming desire to become one with her. She had thought, hoped, that she would get used to it at least, even if she never expected to enjoy the experience. But now she felt that it was not her he wanted, but it, and she felt dirty and cheapened by each episode.
    When her infertile period ended, she told him that she was now vulnerable and that the doctor had recommended that she wait a while before becoming pregnant.
    â€œYeah, your aunt told me,” he said.
    â€œWell, don’t you think we should move the beds apart, so you know …”
    â€œAw, c’mon Peg, I’m no teenager. I know what’s involved. I can control myself.”
    And he did—at first. But after a week of abstinence, it was going on far too long; he knew it, she knew it. And he tried to take her. She managed to push him away and jumped out of bed.
    Instantly he was contrite. “Gee, Peg, I don’t know what got into me. I’m sorry. Please come back to bed.”
    She finally came back to bed, but the next day when he came home, he found that the beds had been separated and pushed apart so that there was a yard or more of floor between them.
    â€œI suppose I deserve that,” he said, “and it’s probably best that way, but when you’re not vulnerable, can we put the beds together again?”
    â€œWe’ll see,” she said.
    A few days later, on one of the days when he had evening classes, he called and said he would be home late. “Some of the evening courses end tonight, and a few of the guys thought we ought to celebrate.”
    â€œWell, what time do you expect to get home?” she asked.
    â€œMaybe not until after midnight. Certainly not much before. Don’t wait up for me. You go to bed.”
    She went to bed at her usual hour, half past ten, and fell asleep almost immediately. She was awakened by hearing his car turn into the driveway. She glanced at the clock on the night table and found it was after one. She heard him