2

BLOOM LICKED HIS PENCIL AND CHECKED OVER HIS account sheets for the third time, not that there was any point to the exercise. Count on Harry to find an error, no matter what. Harry, the momzer. Recently, Bloom had come to think that Harry altered a figure here, a figure there, himself, for it sometimes seemed that there were more eraser marks when Harry returned the sheets for correction than there had been before. There was nothing Harry wouldn’t do for a little giggle. Hadn’t he seen him, with his very own eyes, on the day of the office picnic at Brighton, conceal Miss Pinsky’s handbag, when he knew she was having her monthlies, and not yield it until she had stained herself, fleeing in embarrassment? He hates me. Why? Because I’m kosher. Bloom had to lock his luncheon sandwiches in the bottom desk drawer ever since Harry, in one of his inspired moods, had substituted traifes for his chicken sandwich, not saying anything until Bloom had swallowed it. It made him choke that other Jews believed. Had respect.

“Tell me, Bloom, you’re such a devout little Jew, did you know it is written in the Talmud that we are supposed to charge Gentiles a higher interest rate than our brethren?”

“And why not?”

“And vy not? Lucky is the born ignoramus.”

“With you around, who needs Nasser? You’re no better than me.”

Above all, Harry exulted in tormenting Bloom about his daughter Aviva.

“I don’t understand you, Bloom, you’ve had no life at all. For all you’ve tasted of this world’s delights, and I willingly include your experience of la dolce vita at Bournemouth, you might as well not have been born. Married to a yachna. Pinching pennies all these years and for what, so that you can afford a wedding at the Grosvenor Hotel for Aviva?”

“It offends me to even hear her name from your filthy mouth.”

“Don’t you know sexy Jewish girls don’t marry doctors any more? Or go in for big weddings, with the guest list in the Jewish Chronicle? They go for the spades, Bloom –”

“Go to hell.”

“– and if they get married at all it’s at the registry office, because they’ve got one in the oven.”

“You know what I say? I say you’re around the bend. Paying girls so you can take filthy pictures of them. Some man about town. Look out, James Bond! Take care, Rex Harrison! Here comes little Harry Stein, can’t make a girl do it with him unless he pays her a flyer.”

“How much do you want to bet Aviva is on the pill?”

“Oh, look at him. Red in the face. I’ve got your number, haven’t I? Don Juan? More like Yosel Putz, if you ask me.”

Once more Bloom licked his pencil and worried over his account sheets, before Harry opened the door to his cubicle, and called, “Bloom!”

Harry contemplated the sheets, nodding, and suddenly smiled and said: “Congratulations.”

“What for?” Bloom asked guardedly.

“I hear Aviva has been accepted at the University of Sussex.”

“And Oxford. And Cambridge. Now that you’ve mentioned it, Mr. Stepney Grammar School.”

“But she’s going to Sussex.”

“Yes.”

“Smart kid. It’s the swinging university, you know. They screw each other black and blue there.”

“You know what I smell? I smell sour grapes.”

“You don’t believe me? Here,” and he passed him the clipping, “it was in the Sunday Telegraph. There’s plenty of pot smoking at Sussex, you know.”

“What?”

“Pot. It’s not for brewing tea. I speak of marijuana. Drugs. It makes the girls crazy for it.”

Bloom began to shake.

“You know what happened when the police gate-crashed the Rolling Stones party? They found a bloke sucking a chocolate bar out of a girl’s cunt. But at Sussex the girls are famous for another specialty. The human sandwich. Girl in the middle. Boys poking into either end.”

“One day I’ll kill you. I’ll pick up a knife and put it through you.”

Harry smiled benevolently. “Meanwhile, if you don’t mind, I’ll see how many mistakes I can find here,” and he started into the hall.

Where a man sat chain-smoking outside Father Hoffman’s confessional.

“I would like to take this opportunity to tell you,” Harry said to him, “how much I enjoyed your first film.”

“Oh, thanks,” Jake muttered preoccupied, shooting up to disappear through Hoffman’s door.

Sister Pinsky, too shy to ask, had left a note on Harry’s desk.

Well, why not, Harry thought.

“So,” Oscar asked Jake, “what’s the latest?”

“Well, today it looks like they may honor my contract and pay me in full.”

“Ah ha.”

“If that’s the case, Oscar, you’ve got to tell me how to take the money. I don’t want to pick it up in the morning and fork it out in surtax in the afternoon, you know.”

“There will be no need,” Oscar said, reaching for the phone, “to even bring the money into this country in the first place.”