Bright Orange for the Shroud by John D. MacDonald

against my bare chest.
    “Oh God, God!” she whispered. “He can’t do it. He tried and tried and tried. I helped and helped and helped. Then he was no damn good at all, and he started crying, and I had to get out of there. Oh God, Trav, my nerves are shot, shot, shot.”
    “Steady, girl.”
    “That damn bitch might just as well have cut them off,” she said, and sobbed again, and got the hiccups. She hicked and gasped and ground her face into my throat, held me in an iron grip, and, with each hick, gave me a little thud with those powerful hips. I was not unresponsive. Hell, a bronze statuethree thousand years old would have made its reaction as evident to her as I did.
    “God, darling—hic—be a dear—hic—and take me off—hic—the hook.”
    “And you know it wouldn’t stop there, and wouldn’t that do Arthur a lot of good, though? Wouldn’t that brighten his hours, improve his morale?”
    “But you—hic—want me, darling. Please—hic—”
    “Okay, Chook.”
    “Bless you!” she said. “I love you so. Hic.”
    “I’ll help you out,” I said. I bent to get one arm behind her knees. She went loose, thinking, perhaps, I was going to tote her topsides to the sun pads on the upper deck. I swung her up and out and over the rail and let go.
    Shriek. Ka-swash. Then some coughing, and then some strident and bitter abuse from the dark water. I strolled back to the boarding ladder, bent and gave her a hand, hauled her up onto the after deck and told her to stay right there. I brought her a towel and a terry robe.
    “After
all
!” she said in a cold and level voice. “Really!”
    “Your language is improving.”
    As she belted the robe, she said, “You’re all bastard, aren’t you?”
    “Listen. Did it or did it not cure the hiccups?”
    Suddenly we were laughing, and in laughing we were friends again, and went topsides to the big padded bench at the topside controls. I went and checked the anchor line, came back with cigarettes for her, a pipe for me. The running light dimmed the stars, but not entirely.
    “You were absolutely right, of course,” she said. “And let me believe, damn it, that it cost you something too.”
    “More than I care to think about.”
    “So maybe failure finished him off. We don’t know that. But I damn well do know that I would have moved into your bed for the duration of the voyage, captain, and that certainly would finish him.”
    “Like that little knife they use when the matador hasn’t been able to kill with the sword. Some stocky little guy, like a butcher, moves in and gives it to old bull right behind the ears. And he goes down as if he’d been dropped off a roof.”
    “Then those damned mules pull him all the way around the ring instead of right on off stage. Why do they have to do that?”
    “A tribute, maybe.”
    “Trav, how in the
world
am I going to act toward Arthur tomorrow? He felt so … wretched about everything.”
    “Open and obvious affection, Chook. All the little pats and smiles and kisses. Little hugs. Just as if it
had
worked.”
    “But why in the world should … Oh, I think I get it. No penalty for failure. Encouragement to try again. No social disgrace. But if it ends up the same way, I don’t think I can endure it. Oh hell, I suppose I can always run out and jump overboard, screaming.”
    “And hiccuping.”
    “Honestly, and you have to believe me, I never got in such a state before in my life. It’s something about a boat, I guess. And the phase of the moon. And Frankie gone for years. And feeling … so
damned
sorry for Arthur. And, of course, being so bloody awful healthy. Poor lamb. He was
so
apologetic and crushed. Well, thanks for practically nothing, McGee. Night.”
    I made the pipe last. I sat up there, bare feet braced on the wheel spokes, and wondered why Chook should bring out themartyr in me. Twice now, with her, I had gone so noble it semi-sickened me. And such a glorious package. But was she? Maybe she was