I went back upstairs.
"I'll take the orchids, too, then," the officer said.
He checked his watch, looked toward the door.
I told him it would only take a little while
while I wrote up the orders.
While I was downstairs, he picked up
two vases, a big Waterford for the roses, a narrow one
for the orchids.
He wanted everything sent to address on Bayard,
two separate packages, same name on each one, a woman's.
I had to tell him there would be a delivery charge
because it was so late.
He shrugged, fine.
I knew he wouldn't care.
But he was just getting started.
A noble fir wreath and a tree, for heaven's sake,
to the same address.
I told him I'd have to call the greenhouse about that.
I explained to Charlie it was an officer in the Navy
who had just come home and was shopping late.
Charlie, weary but willing, said he guessed so.
I can hear his tired voice saying, "just under the wire."
Then the officer said he also had an FTD order, a telegraph
order.
He fished in his trouser pocket and brought out
a crumpled paper.
It was a California address, a woman's name
he had to spell for me because it was Spanish.
An officer in the Navy would naturally
have someone with a foreign name waiting in a port city.
It was Fresno on the coast.
Again, he wanted roses, three dozen if possible,
loose in a box, no arrangement.
I understood perfectly.
Arrangements were somehow domestic
but the instruction, loose in a box,
was romantic and, though I didn't have
the word at the time, erotic.
[LAUGHTER]
People sent arrangements on Mother's Day.
They sent roses loose in a box on Valentine's.
And the enclosure cards?
Sign them all Tom, love on everything.
We stood together by the big marble table
while I wrote out the orders.
As I copied the addresses from the order forms
to the delivery slips, I asked him out of politeness
what his rank was.
He was checking his watch and he looked up sharply.
He didn't answer right away.
"In the Navy," I said, confused myself.
Maybe rank was the word for the army.
Maybe the Navy had some other word.
Maybe it was impolite to inquire.
"Captain," he said.
"Nice to be home for Christmas," I offered, "on leave."
The lavish spenders like to make small talk.
All he told me, "yeah, great to be home on leave."
I asked where his ship was.
At this he did not pause.
"San Diego," he said.
"San Diego."
He said it twice.
Then, "I'm kind of in a rush."
He was sorry to have to rush me, he said,
but he had people waiting for him.
He turned toward the door.
"The holiday, you know," he said smiling that wonderful smile.
"The holidays are crazy," I said.
We smiled into each other's faces, almost friends.
And how would you like to pay?
He gave the usual formula.
"Put it on our account," he said.
"You have the address right there."
He pointed helpfully, reaching over to the delivery slips,
grazing my hands slightly with his own.
"Mrs. Thomas," he said, pointing to the last name
and the address on Bayard.
Ah, the wife.
I smiled a sophisticated Ollie smile, thinking of the woman
with the Spanish name in Fresno on the coast who
was getting three dozen roses loose in a box to the wife's
two arranged in a vase.
Well, the wife was also getting the orchids and the Waterford
vase, score even.
[LAUGHTER]
"And if California's out of roses?"
I asked at the last minute.
"Something nice," he said vaguely, the way all the best
customers talk, trusting everything to us.
Something nice.
He was already headed to the door.
People were waiting for him.
I thanked him.
I added sir.
This apparently pleased him because halfway to the door,
he turned as he pulled on his officer's hat
and gave me a little salute and a final Robert Mitchum smile.
The store was empty, the Dexter candy clerks
had shrouded the long glass case and turned off
the display lights.
Ollie and Mrs. B were putting on their overshoes at their order
desks behind the counter.
Ollie called to me to lock the front door.
My Navy officer, I saw, had gone across the street to Bullard's.
He was peering in the door.
He pounded on the glass.
I could see that the Bullard's cream satin windows
were already vacant, though.
He wouldn't get in under the wire at Bullard's as he
had so luckily with us.
Probably he was looking for diamonds,
whether for the wife on Bayard or the Spanish woman
on the coast, it was impossible to know.