Indeterminacy 177

Xenia never wanted a party to end.
Once, in Seattle,
when the party we were at was folding,
she invited those who were
still awake, some of whom we’d
only met that evening, to
come over to our house.
Thus it was that about 3:00 A.M.
an Irish tenor was
singing loudly in our living room.
Morris Graves, who
had a suite down the hall,
entered ours without knocking,
wearing an old-fashioned nightshirt
and carrying an elaborately made wooden
birdcage, the bottom of which
had been removed. Making
straight for the tenor,
Graves placed the birdcage over his head,
said nothing, and
left the room. The
effect was that of snuffing out a
candle. Shortly,
Xenia and I were alone.