J R (American Literature)

by William Gaddis

—And sixty-three cents, Mrs Joubert finished, a gentle bulge rippling from her knee as she shifted her weight in departure to disappear in the swirl of her skirt as the quarter bounding from the billowing trouser cuff drew Bast in a headlong lunge after the exhaust of Whiteback’s car shearing from the curb, rounding the corner into Burgoyne Street to course through the shrieks of saws and limbs dangling in unanesthetized aerial surgery, turning at last into the faculty parking lot and into Gibbs’ limited vista from a second floor classroom window watching Mrs Joubert alight and come toward the portal beneath him, knuckles gone white where he grasped the cold radiator staring down into the loose fullness of her approach till it was gone beneath the sill, and he turned back to the darkened