It was May before she even realized that he was no longer telling her about his interviews, or the companies he'd called. He seemed to have stopped looking for a job entirely, and was no longer as embarrassed to ask her outright to give him money. And he no longer called it a loan now. And the only thing that bothered her was that there had been a subtle change in their relationship, and he seemed to expect it. She found him going through her handbag more than once, and helping himself to whatever she had there. After that, she found that she had started hiding her money from him. She never told him what day she got paid. And on the first of June, she realized that she had paid his rent at Mrs. Boslicki's for six months, and she asked him how he felt about giving up his own room. Of the two, she liked hers better, though his was cheaper. But he didn't warm up to the suggestion.

“I think that would be embarrassing,” he said proudly. “Everyone would know you're supporting me. Besides, it's not good for your reputation.” But paying for his room every month was wreaking havoc with her budget. A salary that would have been adequate for her, though not overly generous, was vastly diminished by her having to pay his rent, his cab fare to appointments and interviews, and his daily food bills. She was ready to suggest he get a job waiting on tables, as she had. But when she tried to broach the subject with him after she'd paid his rent again, and couldn't afford to get her own clothes out of the dry cleaners, he got angry with her.

“Are you calling me a gigolo?” he accused her in a heated argument in her bedroom, and she was mortified that he would think so.

“I didn't say that. I'm just saying I can't afford to support you.” She had never covered this ground with anyone before, it was unfamiliar territory to her, and she didn't like it. It made her feel like a monster, and he seemed to feel she owed him something, and he was easily insulted.

“Is that what you think you're doing?” he shouted at her, wounded to the core. “Supporting me? How dare you!” But she was, no matter what he chose to call it. “All you're doing, Gabriella, is advancing me money.”

“I know, Steve… I'm sorry. It's just… I can't always manage it. My salary just isn't big enough. I think you have to get some kind of job now.”

“I didn't go to Yale and Stanford in order to learn how to wait on tables.”

“Neither did I, and I went to Columbia. That's a good school too, but I had to eat when I left the convent.” And he did too, but he had her to pay for it. And he made her feel guilty every time the subject came up, so eventually she stopped asking him, and decided to try to write some stories. But this time, when she did, every one of them got rejected. And the day the last rejection came in, she found Steve once again plundering her handbag. He had most of her salary in his hands when she came back from the bathroom.

“What are you doing with that?” she asked, looking panicked. “I haven't paid our rent yet.”

“She can wait. She trusts us. I owe someone some money.”

“For what? Who?” she asked, on the verge of tears. He was creating a situation she couldn't handle, and she had no other resources to draw on. It was rapidly becoming a nightmare, and when she tried to reason with him about it now, he got hostile, probably because he felt embarrassed, she explained to herself. But his answers had become vague, and this time he answered, “People.”

“What people?” she asked him. He didn't know anyone in New York. But then again, for a man who didn't know anyone, he sure got a lot of phone calls. For months, Mrs. Boslicki had complained that she felt like she was running a switchboard. There were a lot of things Gabriella realized she didn't know about him, and he wasn't anxious to share his secrets.

“I'm sick and tired of your questions,” he raged at her when she pressed him, and he had taken to slamming out of her room, banging the door behind him, and disappearing. Sometimes he vanished for hours, and she had no idea where he went to, but he always made her feel that his disappearances were her fault. He was good at that, and it was a role she had played for her entire lifetime. She was always willing to blame herself, and assume the innocence of others. And she knew he was under a lot of pressure. He had been in New York for eight months, and was mortified about not working, or so he told her.

And when she talked to Professor Thomas about it, she felt disloyal to Steve, and the professor always told her to be patient. He couldn't be out of work for much longer. “I'd hire him in a minute if he came to me for a job. Believe me, someone else will.” She hated to bother him with her problems, his health had been failing since the previous winter. He was beginning to look his age, and was very frail now. And that spring, they had discovered that Mrs. Rosenstein had cancer. They all had their troubles. And Gabriella's seemed small in comparison. She knew that her problems with Steve would end the moment he found employment.

But it was July when she realized that he was stealing her checks, and forging her name on them. He had cashed several by then, and her bank manager was going crazy. Steve had bounced checks all over town, and for the rest of the month, they were both out of money. It was only a week after that that Mrs. Boslicki took three phone calls in one afternoon from the Department of Probation in Kentucky. And not knowing what to make of it, she went to talk to the professor. But he was sure there was a reasonable explanation for it, and told her not to panic.

But it was by a series of strange coincidences that the professor opened some of Steve's mail after that and discovered that he had been using several other names, cashing checks everywhere, and was on parole in both Kentucky and California for being a forger. Professor Thomas made several phone calls of his own then, and what he uncovered was not a pretty story. Steve Porter was none of the things he had claimed. He had attended neither Yale nor Stanford Business School, and his name wasn't even Steve Porter. It was Steve Johnson, and John Stevens, as well as Michael Houston. He had a multitude of names and identities and a police record as long as his stories. He had come to New York on parole, not from Des Moines, but from Texas. And the professor felt terrible that he had been so wrong about him and had encouraged Gabriella to see him. The man was a monster.

Professor Thomas had no idea what to say to her, but after a great deal of thought and anxiety, he decided to confront Steve himself, and suggest he leave town immediately, or the professor would expose him. It seemed a simple plan, and in exchange for his rapid departure, the professor would agree to keep his secrets from Gabriella. He didn't want her to know that she had been used shamelessly, and the man she thought was so in love with her was a con artist and a liar. After all the grief she'd been through in her life, the professor felt that Steve could at least give her that much.

He waited for him in the living room, and when he heard Steve come in, he got up and went to meet him. The professor was wearing a clean shirt, his best suit, and he was coughing badly, but he wanted this to be a meeting between reasonable men, a kind of gentlemen's agreement to protect Gabriella. And he had no doubt whatsoever that Steve would agree to it.

But the moment he saw Steve come in, he knew there was going to be trouble. He looked as though he were in a dark mood, and the professor correctly suspected he'd been drinking. He'd made a small deal on the Lower East Side to buy some marijuana he wanted to resell, and the deal had gone badly. He'd been ripped off by the dealer, and had wasted the last of Gabriella's money.

“Steve, I'd like to speak to you for a moment, if I may,” the professor said politely, and Steve nearly snarled at him as he walked past him. His manners were no longer quite so impressive.

“Not now, Professor, I've got some things to take care of.” He wanted to go through her room carefully, sometimes she hid money from him, and he knew all her hiding places. He wanted to get to them now before she did.

“This is important, Steve,” the professor said, looking stern. It was an expression that used to terrorize his students, but they were outclassed by Steve Porter, and so was the professor.

“What is it?” Steve turned and looked at the old man, as the professor handed him a stack of letters. They were the incriminating documents that the professor had used to begin his investigation. And he had done his homework. He had called Stanford and Yale, and the Department of Corrections in four states. He had the goods on Steve Porter, and glancing at the letters he handed him, Steve knew it. And he didn't like it. “Where did you get these?” He advanced on the old man slowly, but the professor looked anything but frightened.

“They came to me by mistake, and I opened them in all innocence. But I think we'd both prefer Gabriella not to see them.”

“I'm not sure I understand you,” Steve said clearly. “Are you planning to blackmail me, Professor?”

“No, I'm asking you to leave, so I don't have to tell her.” Everyone else in the house was out. Even Mrs. Boslicki had gone to her doctor. The two men were alone in the house, and Steve knew it.

“And if I don't leave?” He looked at the old man through narrowed eyes. But the professor knew he had the winning hand now.

“I expose you. It's that simple.”

“Is it?” Steve asked, giving the professor a gentle shove, which sent him reeling backward, but he regained his balance quickly. “You expose me? I don't think so. I think you say nothing to Gabriella, my friend, or you have a serious accident the next time you walk down the street, and I don't think you or Gabriella would enjoy that. You know, one of those nasty little things that end up in a broken hip, or a crushed skull, or a hit and run. I have very effective friends here.”