!" I said to the cat. "Shake hands!"
     The cat just sat there.
     "That's funny, it always used to do it," I said. "Shake hands!"
     I remembered Shipkey had told Mr. Burnett that I talked to birds.
     "Come on now! Shake hands!"
     I began to feel foolish.
     "Come on! Shake hands!"
      I  put my head right down by the cat's head and put everything  I  had
into it.
     "Shake hands!"
     The cat just sat there.
     I went back to my chair and picked up my cheese sandwich.
      "Cats are funny animals, Mr. Burnett. You can never tell. Millie,  put
on Tschaikowsky's 6th for Mr. Burnett."
      We listened to the music. Millie came over and sat in my lap. She just
had  on  a negligee. She dropped down against me. I put my sandwich  to  the
side.
      "I  want  you  to notice," I said to Mr. Burnett, "the  section  which
brings forth the marching movement in this symphony. I think it's one of the
most beautiful movements in all music. And besides its beauty and force, its
structure is perfect. You can feel intelligence at work."
      The cat jumped up into the lap of the man with the goatee. Millie laid
her  cheek  against mine, put a hand on my chest. "Where ya been, baby  boy?
Millie's missed ya, ya know."
      The record ended and the man with the goatee took the cat off his lap,
got  up  and turned the record over. He should have found record #2  in  the
album. By turning it over we would get the climax rather early. I didn't say
anything, though, and we listened to it end.
     "How did you like it?" I asked.
     "Fine! Just fine!"
     He had the cat on the floor.
     "Shake hands! Shake hands!" he said to the cat.
     The cat shook hands.
     "Look," he said, "I can make the cat shake hands."
     "Shake hands!"
     The cat rolled over.
     "No, shake hands! Shake hands!"
     The cat just sat there.
      He put his head down by the cat's head and talked into its ear. "Shake
hands!"
     The cat stuck its paw right into his goatee.
     "Did You see? I made him shake hands!" Mr. Burnett seemed pleased.
      Millie pressed tight against me. "Kiss me, baby boy," she said,  "kiss
me."
     "No."
     "Good Lord, ya gone off ya nut, baby boy? what's eatin' at ya? Sompin's
botherin' ya tonight, I can tell! Tell Millie all about ut! Millie'd  go  ta
hell for ya, baby boy, ya know that. Whats'a matter, huh? Ha?"
     "Now I'll get the cat to roll over," said Mr. Burnett.
      Millie wrapped her arms tight around me and peered down into my upward
eye. She looked very sad and motherish and smelled like cheese.
     "Tell Millie what's eatin' ya up, baby boy."
     "Roll over!" said Mr. Burnett to the cat.
     The cat just sat there.
     "Listen," I said to Millie, "see that man over there?"
     "Yeah, I see him."
     "Well, that's Whit Burnett."
     "Who's that?"
     "The magazine editor. The one I send my stories to."
     "Ya mean the one who sends you those little tiny notes?"
     "Rejection slips, Millie."
     "Well, he's mean. I don't like him."
      "Roll over!" said Mr. Burnett to the cat. The cat rolled over. "Look!"
he  yelled.  "I  made  the cat roll over! I'd like to  buy  this  cat!  It's
marvelous!"
      Millie tightened her grip about me and peered down into my eye. I  was
quite  helpless. I felt like a still live fish on ice in a butcher's counter
on Friday morning.
     "Listen," she said, "I can get him ta print one a ya stories. I can get
him ta print alla them!"
     "Watch me make the car roll over!" said Mr. Burnett.
      "No,  no,  Millie,  you don't understand! Editors  aren't  like  tired
business men. Editors have scruples!"
     "Scruples?"
     "Scruples."
     "Roll over!" said Mr. Burnett.
     The cat just sat there.
      "I know all about ya scruples! Don't ya worry about scruples Baby boy,
I'll get him ta print alla ya stories!"
     "Roll over!" said Mr. Burnett to the cat. Nothing happened.
     "No, Millie, I won't have it."
      She was all wound around me. It was hard to breathe and she was rather
heavy. I felt my feet going to sleep. Millie pressed her cheek against  mine
and rubbed a hand up and down my chest. "Baby boy, ya got nothin' to say!"
      Mr.  Burnett put his head down by the cat's head and talked  into  its
ear. "Roll over!"
     The car stuck its paw right into his goatee.
     "I think this cat wants something to eat," he said.
      With that, he got back into his chair. Millie went over and sat on his
knee.
     "Where'd ya get tha cute little goaty?" she asked.
     "Pardon me," I said, "I'm going to get a drink of water."
      I  went in and sat in the breakfast nook and looked down at the flower
designs on the table. I tried to scratch them off with a fingernail. It  was
hard  enough to share Millie's love with the cheese salesman and the welder.
Millie with the figure right down to the hips. Damn, damn.
      I kept sitting there and after a while I took my rejection slip out of
my  pocket  and  read it again. The places where the slip  was  folded  were
beginning  to get brown with dirt and torn. I would have to stop looking  at
it and put it between book pages like a pressed rose.
      I  began  to  think about what it said. I always had that trouble.  In
college,  even,  I  was  drawn  to  the fuzzy  blackness.  The  short  story
instructress took me to dinner and a show one night and lectured  to  me  on
the  beauties of life. I had given her a story I had written in which I,  as
the  main  character, had gone down to the beach at night on  the  sand  and
began  meditating on the meaning in Christ, on the meaning in death, on  the
meaning  and  fullness and rhythm in all things. Then in the  middle  of  my
meditations, along walks a bleary-eyed tramp kicking sand in my face. I talk
to  him,  buy him a bottle and we drink. We get sick. Afterward we go  to  a
house of ill-fame.
      After  the dinner, the short story instructress opened her  purse  and
brought  forth the story of the beach. She opened it up about halfway  down,
to the entrance of the bleary-eyed tramp and the exit of meaning in Christ.
      "Up  to  here,"  she said, "up to here, this was very good,  in  fact,
beautiful."  Then  she  glared  up at me  with  that  glare  that  only  the
artistically intelligent who have somehow fallen into money and position can
have. "But pardon me, pardon me very much," she tapped at the bottom half of
my story, "just what the hell is this stuff doing in here?"

      I  COULDN'T stay away any longer. I got up and walked into  the  front
room.
     Millie was all wrapped around him and peering down into his upward eye.
He looked like a fish on ice.
      Millie  must  have  thought I wanted to talk to him  about  publishing
procedures.
     "Pardon me, I have to comb my hair," she said and left the room.
     "Nice girl, isn't she, Mr. Burnett?" I asked.
      He  pulled  himself back into shape and straightened his tie.  "Pardon
me," he said, "why do you keep calling me 'Mr. Burnett'?"
     "Well, aren't you?"
      "I'm  Hoffman.  Joseph  Hoffman. I'm from the  Curtis  Life  Insurance
Company. I came in response to your postcard."
     "But I didn't send a postcard."
     "We received one from you."
     "I never sent any."
     "Aren't you Andrew Spickwich?"
     "Who?"
     "Spickwich. Andrew Spickwich, 3631 Taylor Street."
     Millie came back and wound herself around Joseph Hoffman. I didn't have
the heart to tell her.
      I closed the door very softly and went down the steps and out into the
street. I walked part way down the block and then I saw the lights go out.
      I  ran  like hell toward mv room hoping that there would be some  wine
left  in  that  huge  jug on the table. I didn't think I'd  be  that  lucky,
though,  because  I am too much a saga of a certain type  of  person:  fuzzy
blackness, impractical meditations and repressed desires.