Mohawk

length of time she required to seduce him might prove important later on, proof that he had not been utterlyreckless. Since that night at the lake when they had kissed and each had felt the flush of excited confession—yes, I do love you, I’ve loved you from the start, as you know, as you must’ve known—he had not seen her for days nor called nor written. Then, on Friday, Diana had come down with a severe cold, and when Dan went to see Dallas, he found him at the garage with the thousand or so parts of his Chevrolet laid out before him on the floor, glistening, promissory.
    Dallas himself hadn’t seen Anne in the week following his disgrace. For two days he didn’t see anyone, didn’t stir from the sofa where Dan had deposited him, didn’t go to work or even to the telephone. Now he was better physically, though still sick at heart. “To hell with her. She doesn’t love me.”
    No, Dan thought. She loves me. But he felt no personal triumph. “Sure she does,” he said. “She’ll come back.”
    “She’ll have to. I’m not going near Mountain Avenue, you can bet your ass.”
    “Give her time.”
    “She thinks she’s going to fall in love with some millionaire at college. Mohawk isn’t good enough.”
    “You’re wrong.”
    “She listens to her old man all the time, and that’s what he says. To hell with him.” He made a sweeping gesture that encompassed his scattered Chevrolet, the garage, the county. “I love this place.”
    Dan left him and drove over to the
Mohawk Republican
where Anne was working part-time until school started. He parked at the curb, three doors down, and sat there thinking about fate. Finally he made a deal. It was five o’clock and there was a good chance that Anne, who worked irregular hours, had already gonehome. There was an equally good chance that if she hadn’t already gone home, she wouldn’t notice him sitting there when she came out into the bright afternoon sun. She would head home in the other direction, or perhaps she’d be with someone. More likely still, she’d be angry with him for the long days, nearly a week, during which he hadn’t even telephoned. There was also the remote possibility that during the week she had concluded that no decent people could afford to indulge the feelings she and he had confessed.
    He waited until five-fifteen, slumped back against the door, smoking, watching the smoke crawl along the ceiling. Then the door on the passenger side opened and she got in. She didn’t look at him right away, didn’t move at all until he sat up straight and stubbed out his cigarette. Then she turned and smiled.
    “Diana—” he began.
    “Has the flu,” she finished. “And Dallas is making love to his car tonight.”
    “Are you expected home?”
    “Eventually. Not soon. If you don’t kiss me in about two seconds, I’m going to slap you.”
    He did as he was told.
    “And I want you to tell me you love me.”
    “I already have.”
    “I don’t want there to be any mistake. We were drinking.”
    “All right: I love you. How’s that?”
    “Wonderful. I might make you tell me every now and then. My only demand.”
    “Fine,” he said. “I just hope you won’t make too much of it.”
    She laughed. “It only means everything. It means that we aren’t bad people.”
    For her it was that simple, perhaps because she didn’t love Dallas. Perhaps, Dan thought, because her love for him was all the credo she needed. If so, he was both frightened and grateful.
    They drove to Albany and took a room in a small, out-of-the-way motel, and skipped dinner. He remembered thinking, as they made love,
I’m gone … too far gone to ever return
. He pictured himself breaking into the homes of all the respectable people he knew, and loading all their most valued possessions into a large canvas sack. He wouldn’t get caught, either.
    As he drove back to Mohawk, with Anne cradled against him, a twinge took his breath away.
    “What’s wrong?” Anne said.
    “Nothing.”
    “You just shivered.”
    “The night air,” he explained, rolling up his window. “There’s autumn in it.”
    “I’ve never felt warmer,” she said.
    Dan Wood smiles at the recollection. Wheeling over to the shed, he unlocks it and pulls out onto the pool deck the large bucket of golf balls he has collected. He picks one out at random, fingering its dimples. He knows something about golf balls, how tightly wound they are, a mass of rubber bands wrapped under great