Page:Jay Little - Maybe—Tomorrow.pdf/289

 "Come up soon and I'll buy you a drink. You know the address."

"I'll do that, bye …"

"Bye …"

Gaston's a good Joe, he thought. Maybe I should have gone with him … we've had a good time together … he's nice … Oh, well, some other night.

He shrugged his shoulders and from under an iron balcony, looked down the street. His eyes searched it bit by bit and section by section. It all seemed dismal and lonesome, almost as lonely as himself.

Where did you come from, he questioned, looking down at the large slabs of slate. Did you really come from France? Who brought you here to this miserable street? What things have happened to you … over you? Did the cart that carried a queen to the guillotine roll over you, or were you still buried happily in the deep earth?

They beamed back at him and looked almost alive, glared in wet changing colors. They were secretive and silent as they had always been. They would not tell their past to anyone … Why should they? No one would believe a stone could talk.

Paul had been drinking for hours but the wonderful glow that always came, that glow that made him forget, had also forsaken him.

He plodded patiently through the rain, and his whole life was spread out before him. And the walk before him stretched like a sheet of silver, placid under the lights, like a lake undisturbed by wind or storm. No waves would come to ruffle this dream water, and no bulk of cloud, wind-driven from the gulf, obscure the clarity of this pale sky.

The different doors, verandas, signs, were all part of him. All around were things he had lived with as a child and a young man. He looked at a certain red door and remembered the older man who had lived there. It was such a long time ago, and now, he wondered what had ever become of him. What did happen to "gay" men as they grew older? What happened to those that did not have the normal fulfillment of love and companionship and sometimes even when they did? He thought of Gene Limbeaux, alone and old now. Did Gene deserve this? This way of life that had only doom for an ending? He must have had lovers, many of them. In fact he had known several, but today he was alone too. Just like himself. And 279