Free Requiem for a Realtor by Ralph McInerny Page B

right?”
    â€œYes, of course. Turn on the light.”
    He blinked when she flipped the switch. He looked terrible.
    â€œHave you been here all night?”
    She actually looked around for signs that he had been drinking.
    â€œWhat a question,” he said, but his indignation died away, and he looked at her like a damned soul. She went swiftly to him and put her hand on his shoulder. To her surprise, he swung toward her and put his arms around her, laying his head on her breast. He burst into tears.
    She held him tightly against her, rocking him gently. This was the fulfilment of four years of fantasy. Silence seemed the most effective form of communication. She ran her fingers through his hair while he sobbed.
    How long did she hold him in her embrace, comforting him? Whatever was wrong with him, she could not believe that he was this upset over what had happened to Stanley Collins. She stepped back when he began to free himself. He looked up at her as if for the first time.
    â€œYou are a good, good woman,” he said.
    At the moment she wouldn’t have minded stepping out of character. But there was no need to force the moment beyond what it already was. This was the beginning of something new between them.
    â€œHave you had coffee?”
    â€œI’d love some.”
    Laura turned questioningly while Bridget poured the coffee.
    â€œEverything’s all right, Laura.”
    David was on his feet when she went back to him. He seemed to have rinsed his face. He avoided meeting her eyes when he took the coffee. Now she wished she had urged him to talk while she held him in her arms. He was becoming his professional self and she could not bring herself to ask him what was the matter.
    â€œSometimes I feel like a stranger to myself,” he said, his voice odd.
    â€œI know what you mean.”
    â€œOh, I doubt that.” He did look at her then, soulfully, and Bridget felt placed on a pedestal.
    â€œIt was on the news,” she said.
    He gave her a puzzled look.
    â€œStanley Collins’s accident.”
    â€œWhat accident?”
    Well, that answered her question whether he was upset because he had heard of the hit-and-run.
    â€œI didn’t get the details,” she lied. She did not want to talk about Stanley Collins because that would lead to talk of his silly wife.
    â€œWho’s my first patient?” he said, after a long silence.

5
    David Jameson pressed his unshaven face against the chaste and starched bosom of his nurse and felt that he had returned to innocence. For a mad moment he imagined telling Bridget everything, confessing his sins to her, seeking readmission to the ranks of the righteous. But how could he tell anyone of that dreadful scene at the Frosinone?
    He had been snatched from the jaws of serious sin. They both had. But Phyllis did not respond to his interpretation.
    â€œTake me home.”
    He took her home. When she did look at him he felt that he had sinned by not sinning, and that robbed him of the sense of relief.
    â€œI’m sorry, Phyllis.”
    â€œFor what?” She turned sideways on the seat. “For making me feel cheap? For treating me as if I were some…” Her voice had risen and she was out of air before she could complete the sentence. She struck him on the arm, hard. Then she began to cry. She cried all the way home.
    â€œWould you like me to come in?”
    â€œNo!”
    She got out of the car and he scrambled from his side, determined to walk her to the door like a good date. But she ran to the front door and was behind the screen when he got there.
    â€œPhyllis…”
    â€œGood night,” she hissed. “Good-bye.” And she shut the inner door with a bang.
    Going back to his rented car, he wavered between regret and the thought that this was a definitive breach, that the interlude of dalliance with Phyllis Collins was at last behind him, through no merit of his own. The second thought was