out of hand. But people do not die of love. That’s the reason love and death in conjunction have such an undying appeal in books: they are never very closely associated anywhere else.
“But as for a broken heart in this day of general literacy and facilities for disseminating the printed word—” he made a sound of disparagement. “Lucky he who believes that his heart is broken: he can immediately write a book and so take revenge (what is more terrible than the knowledge that the man you just knocked down discovered a coin in the gutter while getting up?) on him or her who damaged his or her ventricles. Besides cleaning up in the movies and magazines. No, no,” he repeated, “you don’t commit suicide when you are disappointed in love. You write a book.”
“I don’t know about that,” repeated Fairchild stubbornly. “People will do anything. But I suppose it takes a fool to believe that and act on that principle.” Beyond the eastern horizon was a rumor of pale silver, pallid and chill and faint, and they sat for a while in silence, thinking of love and death. The red eye of a cigarette twelve inches from the deck: this was Mark Frost. Fairchild broke the silence.
“The way she went off with Da— the steward. It was kind of nice, wasn’t it? And came back. No excuses, no explanations—‘think no evil’ you know. That’s what these postwar young folks have taught us. Only old folks like Julius and me would ever see evil in what people, young people, do. But then, I guess folks growing up into the manner of looking at life that we inherited, would find evil in anything where inclination wasn’t subservient to duty. We were taught to believe that duty is infallible, or it wouldn’t be duty, and if it were just unpleasant enough, you got a mark in heaven, sure. . . . But maybe it ain’t so different, taken one generation by another. Most of our sins are vicarious, anyhow. I guess when you are young you have too much fun just being, to sin very
