Honeymoon for Three

and studied it. He figured that sometime tomorrow they would show up at Paradise, a village inside the park. Although the park was large, it didn’t have many roads. He should be able to spot them there easily.
    He had mixed feelings about finding them. On the one hand, he wanted to see Penny again. On the other hand, if they did make it here, it meant that they were still together and getting along all right. It meant that Penny hadn’t yet seen the light.
    ***
    The food served in the rustic dining room of the lodge was delicious, and there was plenty of it. The walls were dark wooden logs, just like the walls of the cabin he was staying in. That was a real log cabin, albeit with modern conveniences. From what Alfred had learned about the original log cabins in school, they were dark, cold places, and he wouldn’t want to live in one.
    He was chowing down on a healthy hunk of meat when out of the corner of his eye he saw a young couple come into the dining room. He looked directly at them and then jerked his head away. They were supposed to be camping. He hadn’t seen a campground in the vicinity. Did that mean they were staying here?
    He became petrified, not able to move for several seconds. Then he turned his head slightly and peeked at them. A waitress escorted them to a table on the far side of the room. Good. They were seated with their profiles toward him, meaning that they probably wouldn’t notice him.
    With Gary, it didn’t matter anyway, because he no longer looked like the person who had probably been described to them by the woman at the chapel. Penny hadn’t seen much of him for six years. Well, she had undoubtedly seen him at the restaurant in Lomita when he had eavesdropped on her conversations with her roommate. She couldn’t have recognized him.
    His current short hair and hairless face resembled his yearbook picture a lot more than his previous look did, but she would still have a problem recognizing him at this distance. Especially if he didn’t let her get a good look at his face.
    Breathing easier, he finished the main course and ordered apple pie a la mode. Since he didn’t dare call attention to himself by getting up to leave until they were gone, he might as well enjoy himself. He looked at them from time to time—casually, ready to turn his head away if they glanced in his direction.
    His precautions were unnecessary. They only had eyes for each other. They bantered; they laughed; sometimes they reached across the table and held hands. They were obscene.
    Alfred finished his pie and drank coffee. The dining room wasn’t full, so he wasn’t pressured to give up his table. He grew impatient, waiting and watching what he didn’t want to see. Fortunately, they didn’t linger over dinner, which would have increased his agony. Any time spent watching them together was too much. He didn’t know how much longer he could stand it when they finally finished eating and left.
    Now what? He had gotten his glimpse of Penny. She was obviously happy. Now he should do what he had planned—go home, get his job back, and rebuild his life.
    But first, he hastily paid his bill, put on his new winter jacket, and left the dining room. Outside it was dark, but he heard a tinkle of laughter coming from among the evergreen trees. Walking swiftly and silently on a blanket of pine needles, he followed the laughter and was just in time to see them enter one of the cabins.
    He returned to his own cabin. It was roomy, with a living room, bedroom, and a small kitchen at the end of the living room. Once inside, he turned up the heat and turned on the television set. A movie called Man on Fire was playing, with Bing Crosby and Inger Stevens. The movie didn’t grab him. He kept the sound on to provide background noise while he took out his sketchpad. He extracted the sheets containing the sketches of Penny and placed them on a coffee table in front of the couch where he sat.
    He opened the pad to a blank sheet and started drawing Penny in profile, the way she looked tonight. He knelt on a throw rug in front of the table and concentrated on his work. He had trouble getting it right. He ruined one drawing, turned the paper over, and tried drawing her on the other side. That didn’t look good, either.
    He crumpled the paper into a ball and threw it across the room. Then he retrieved his jacket. He went outside and pulled the hood over his head. He didn’t like the cold. That’s why he’d left Connecticut.