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I didn't let go, though. I had a pretty good half nelson on him. "Liberate yourself from my viselike grip." I said.

"Je-sus Christ." He put down his razor, and all of a sudden jerked his arms up and sort of broke my hold on him. He was a very strong guy. I'm a very weak guy. "Now, cut out the crap," he said. He started shaving himself all over again. He always shaved himself twice, to look gorgeous. With his crumby old razor.

"Who is your date if it isn't Fitzgerald?" I asked him. I sat down on the washbowl next to him again. "That Phyllis Smith babe?"

"No. It was supposed to be, but the arrangements got all screwed up. I got Bud Thaw's girl's roommate now... Hey. I almost forgot. She knows you."

"Who does?" I said.

"My date."

"Yeah?" I said. "What's her name?" I was pretty interested.

"I'm thinking... Uh. Jean Gallagher."

Boy, I nearly dropped dead when he said that.

"Jane Gallagher," I said. I even got up from the washbowl when he said that. I damn near dropped dead. "You're damn right I know her. She practically lived right next door to me, the summer before last. She had this big damn Doberman pinscher. That's how I met her. Her dog used to keep coming over in our--"

"You're right in my light, Holden, for Chrissake," Stradlater said. "Ya have to stand right there?"

Boy, was I excited, though. I really was.

"Where is she?" I asked him. "I oughta go down and say hello to

her or something. Where is she? In the Annex?"

"Yeah."

"How'd she happen to mention me? Does she go to B.M. now? She said she might go there. She said she might go to Shipley, too. I thought she went to Shipley. How'd she happen to mention me?" I was pretty excited. I really was.

"I don't know, for Chrissake. Lift up, willya? You're on my towel," Stradlater said. I was sitting on his stupid towel.

"Jane Gallagher," I said. I couldn't get over it. "Jesus H. Christ."

Old Stradlater was putting Vitalis on his hair. My Vitalis.

"She's a dancer," I said. "Ballet and all. She used to practice about two hours every day, right in the middle of the hottest weather and all. She was worried that it might make her legs lousy--all thick and all. I used to play checkers with her all the time."

"You used to play what with her all the time?"

"Checkers."

"Checkers, for Chrissake!"

"Yeah. She wouldn't move any of her kings. What she'd do, when she'd get a king, she wouldn't move it. She'd just leave it in the back row. She'd get them all lined up in the back row. Then she'd never use them. She just liked the way they looked when they were all in the back row."

Stradlater didn't say anything. That kind of stuff doesn't interest most people.

"Her mother belonged to the same club we did," I said. "I used to caddy once in a while, just to make some dough. I caddy'd for her mother a couple of times. She went around in about a hundred and seventy, for nine holes."

Stradlater wasn't hardly listening. He was combing his gorgeous locks.

"I oughta go down and at least say hello to her," I said.

"Why don'tcha?"

"I will, in a minute."