Page:Levenson - Butterfly Man.djvu/61

Rh she had joined him whole-heartedly in his ambition. He had only to mention his unwillingness to study longer at Buddy Nolan's. She had quit the ornate School of Terpsichore with him. She had even changed her mode of living to suit him. Day after day he had routed her out of her bungalow court apartment with a seven-o'clock-in-the-morning 'phone call. He had lived nearby, in a shabby apartment hotel absurdly named the Palacio del Oro, and they would meet at the Owl for coffee and cake.

Then, day after day, from nine until five, at Delaney's, they had struggled to overcome the inherent and rebellious unwillingness of their flesh, torturing their bodies in order to dance as they thought capricious booking agents and later the equally fickle public would prefer to see them dance.

Anita, it had been, Ken conceded, who drove away the fear that he had acted hastily and ungratefully toward Mr. Lowell. She had also prevented him from returning the one-hundred dollar bill in the same envelope in which Mr. Crofton had sealed it that day when Johnson had delivered Ken's clothes. Ken had wanted to write a note to Mr. Lowell, but Anita had advised him to send a single page of note paper upon which would be written only the word "Thanks" and his name.

Thus that episode ended. Gone were the fabulous glories of Star-ridge; gone the silk-covered bed, the exotic foods, vintage wines, the terrifying beauty of the organ. Gone that puzzling dread which had finally enveloped Ken and which was to be replaced by an almost equally puzzling restlessness until Anita restored his faith in himself. Anita included, of course, the dance. The dance blossomed and grew ripe. He was made for it. It transformed