I get drunk
instead."
He poured himself another long drink and sipped it slowly. "Everybody
knows," he said at last, "that prostitutes almost invariably take to
drugs or drink. But I know why they do."
That remark stung Rodney out of his long silence. During the whole of
Randolph's recital of his encounter with Rose, he'd never once lifted
his eyes from the gray ash of his cigar, and the violet filament of
smoke that arose from it. He didn't want to look at Randolph, nor think
about him. Just wanted to remember every word he said, so that he could
carry the picture away intact. Now that the picture was finished, he
wanted to get out of that room, with it; out into the dark and
loneliness of the streets, where he could walk and think.
There was something peculiarly horrifying to him in the exhibition
Randolph was making of himself. He'd never in his life taken a drink,
except convivially, and then he took as little as would pass muster.
He'd always found it hard to be sensibly tolerant of the things men said
and did in liquor, even when their condition had overtaken them
unawares.
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