Free The Houseguest by Thomas Berger

come up from the city to help with the problem. Molly was the only friend of Audrey’s never to have been the target of Doug’s advances, being candidly homosexual. Her friendship with Audrey was conspicuously nonerotic, to the degree that Molly eschewed all physical contact, even to the shaking of hands. If one accidentally collided with her, she could be felt to recoil. Yet morally she was the most comfortable of intimates: she was the unique friend whom nature had disqualified as a competitor.
    But Molly, an art dealer, was on the other side of the world, in quest of new work to sell in her gallery. Audrey was unlikely to purchase any of it, given Molly’s penchant for crazy, provocative mixed-material pieces, fur-and-copper, say, or ceramic-and-newsprint, which set Audrey’s teeth on edge. For her part, Molly no doubt despised Audrey’s predilection for geometric arrangements in the primary colors, on the one hand, and primitive daubs of barns and daisies on the other, if indeed she ever looked at a wall of Audrey’s, which in fact she had never been caught doing.
    After many summers on the island, Audrey had yet to meet a woman she liked, and she would sooner have shared the current scandal with one of the Finches than with anyone of, her summer acquaintance. That Marge Meers would cackle in triumph went without saying, and Jane DeHaven had an Old score to settle because of Doug.
    Audrey suddenly realized that she was thinking exclusively of her own embarrassment and not poor Bobby’s humiliation. To be cuckolded so soon must be especially devastating to a man. Was it therefore more humane to do what one could to keep him in the state of blissful ignorance? He seemed genuinely fond of Lydia, but fortunately he displayed no hint of passion for her, whereas Audrey had been really gaga for Doug and therefore was all but destroyed at the first evidence of his infidelity. She had actually put the razor blade to her wrist and was restrained only by aesthetic considerations, therefore overdosed on pills instead, gulping so many as to upset her stomach, and she threw up before coming anywhere near death. Nobody learned of this episode. She hadn’t even had to call a doctor.
    The screen slid back, and Lydia and Chuck, still embracing, boldly entered the wide doorway. Audrey flinched, having no idea of how to deal with such provocation.
    â€œI was dumb,” Lydia cried. “I almost drowned. Chuck saved my life.”
    â€œGood gosh,” said Audrey, feeling spiritually naked after having been so decisively disabused. She smiled brilliantly at the houseguest. “Our hero!”
    For a moment Chuck seemed modestly to hang his sleek head. Then he made a burlesque wink and said, with an assumed accent, but too light a one to be identified linguistically, “Wade till you get duh bill!” He released Lydia. “She should get some rest after that ordeal,” he said to Audrey, and to his patient: “You go lie down. Do you need help?”
    â€œI can walk all right,” said she. She lowered her head and carefully left the room, watching where she stepped, as if on a pathway of intermittent stones.
    Audrey was now alone with Chuck, and for an instant she was too frantic to find a topic of conversation. Then, “I gave in to my baser instincts a while ago and tried to call one of my so-called friends on the island. But the phone doesn’t work.”
    Chuck had those unusual blue eyes that are quite as warm as brown. “I’ll take a look at it.”
    â€œGolly,” she said with delight, “don’t tell me you can do that too? Chef, lifesaver, telephone techni—”
    He narrowed those remarkable blue eyes. “Are you making fun of me?”
    She was horrified by the possibility he might not be joking. “Oh, please—” And caught her breath, for Chuck had extended his right hand to cup her left breast. She felt more fear than