Sexus (7 page)

I told him what had occurred the other night when I left the party abruptly. He shook his head from side to side, saying—“By God, those things never happen to
me.
If anybody but you were to tell me a story like that I wouldn't believe it. Your whole life seems to be made up of just such incidents. Now why is that, can you tell me? Don't laugh at me, I know it sounds foolish to ask such a question. I know too that I'm a rather cagey bird. You seem to lay yourself wide
open—I suppose that's the secret of it. And you're more curious about people than I will ever be. I get bored too easily—it's a fault, I admit. So often you tell me of the wonderful time you've had—
after
I've left. But I'm sure nothing like you related would happen to me even if I were to sit up all night. . . . Another thing about you that gets me is that you always find a character interesting whom most of us would ignore. You have a way of opening them up, of making them reveal themselves. I haven't got the patience for it. . . But tell me honestly now, aren't you just a bit sorry that you didn't get your end in with what's her name?”

“Sylvia, you mean?”

“Yes. You say she was a loulou. Don't you think you could have stayed another five minutes and had what was coming to you?”

“Yes, I suppose so . . .”

“You're a funny fellow. I suppose you mean to say that you got something more by not staying, is that it?”

“I don't know. Perhaps I did, perhaps not. To tell you the truth, I forgot all about fucking her by the time I was ready to leave. You can't fuck every woman you run into, can you? If you ask me, I was fucked good and proper. What more could I hope to get out of her if I had gone through with it? Maybe she'd have given me a dose of clap. Maybe I would have disappointed her. Listen, I don't worry too much if I lose a piece of tail now and then. You seem to be keeping some kind of fuck-ledger. That's why you don't loosen up with me, you bugger, you. I have to work on you like a dentist to extract a measly buck from you; I go round the corner and a stranger whom I speak to just a few minutes leaves a twenty-dollar bill for me on the mantelpiece. How do you explain
that?”

“You don't explain it,” said Ulric, making a wry grin. “That's why things never happen to me, I guess. . . . But I do want to say this,” he continued, getting up from his seat and frowning over his own cussedness. “Whenever you find yourself in a real pinch you can always rely on me. You see, I don't worry much about your privations usually because I
know you well enough to realize that you'll always find a way out, even if I happen to let you down.”

“You sure have a lot of confidence in my ability, I must say.”

“I don't mean to be callous when I say a thing like that. You see, if I were in your boots I'd be so depressed that I wouldn't be able to ask a friend for help—I'd be ashamed of myself. But you come running up here with a grin, saying—‘I must have this . . . I must have that.' You don't act as if you needed help desperately.”

“What the hell,” I said. “Do you want me to get down on my knees and beg for it?”

“No, not that, of course. I'm talking like a damned fool again. But you make people envious of you, even when you say you're desperate. You make people refuse you sometimes because you take it for granted that they
should
help you, don't you see?”

“No, Ulric, I don't see. But it's all right. Tonight I'm taking you to dinner.”

“And tomorrow you'll be asking me for carfare.”

“Well, is there any harm in that?”

“No, it's just cockeyed,” and he laughed. “Ever since I've known you, and I've known you a long while, you've been hitting me up—for nickels, dimes, quarters, dollar bills . . . why once you tried to bludgeon me for fifty dollars, do you remember? And I always keep saying no to you, isn't that so? But it doesn't make any difference to you apparently. And we're still good friends. But sometimes I wonder what the hell you really think of me. It can't be very flattering.”

“Why, I can answer that right now, Ulric,” I said blithely: “You're . . .”

“No, don't tell me now. Save it! I don't want to hear the truth just yet.”

We went to dinner down in Chinatown and on the way home Ulric slipped me a ten-dollar bill, just to prove to me that his heart was in the right place. In the park we sat down and had a long talk about the future. Finally he said to me what so many of my friends had already told me—that he had no hopes for himself but that he was confident I would
break loose and do something startling. He added very truthfully that he didn't think I had even begun to express myself, as a writer. “You don't write like you talk,” he said. “You seem to be afraid of revealing yourself. If you ever open up and tell the truth it will be like Niagara Falls. Let me tell you honestly—I don't know any writer in America who has greater gifts than you. I've always believed in you—and I will even if you prove to be a failure. You're not a failure in life, that I know, though it's the craziest life I've ever known of. I wouldn't have time to paint a stroke if I did all the things you do in a day.”

I left him, feeling as I often did, that I had probably underestimated his friendship. I don't know what I expected of my friends. The truth is I was so dissatisfied with myself, with my abortive efforts, that nothing or nobody seemed right to me. If I were in a jam I would be sure to pick the most unresponsive individual, just to have the satisfaction of wiping him off my list. I knew full well that in sacrificing one old friend I would have three new ones by the morrow. It was touching, too, to run across one of these discarded friends later on and find that he bore me no hatred, that he was eager and willing to resume the old ties, usually by way of a lavish meal and an offer to lend me a few dollars. In the back of my head there was always the intention of surprising my friends one day by paying off all debts. Nights I would often lull myself to sleep by adding up the score. Even at this date it was already a huge sum, one that could only be settled by the advent of some unexpected stroke of fortune. Perhaps one day some unheard-of relative would die and leave me a legacy, five or ten thousand dollars, whereupon I would immediately go to the nearest telegraph office and dispatch a string of money orders to all and sundry. It would have to be done by telegraph because if I were to keep the money in my pocket more than a few hours it would vanish in some foolish, unexpected way.

I went to bed that night dreaming of a legacy. In the morning the first thing I heard was that the bonus had been declared—we might have the dough before the day was over. Everybody was in a state of agitation. The burning question
was—
how much?
Towards four in the afternoon it arrived. I was handed something like three hundred and fifty dollars. The first man I took care of was McGovern, the old flunky who guarded the door. (Fifty dollars on account.) I looked over the list. There were eight or ten I could take care of immediately—brothers of the cosmococcic world who had been kind to me. The rest would have to wait until another day—including the wife whom I had decided to lie to about the bonus.

Ten minutes after I had received the money I was arranging to throw a little spread at the Crow's Nest, where I had decided to make the pay-off. I checked up the list again to make sure I had not overlooked any of the essential ones. They were a curious lot, my benefactors. There was Zabrowskie, the crack telegrapher, Costigan, the knuckleduster, Hymie Laubscher, the switchboard operator, O'Mara, my old crony whom I had made my assistant, Steve Romero from the main office, little Curley, my stooge, Maxie Schnadig, an old stand-by, Kronski, the intern, and Ulric of course . . . oh yes, and MacGregor, whom I was paying back merely as a good investment.

All told I would have to shell out about three hundred dollars—two hundred and fifty dollars in debts and a possible fifty for the banquet. That would leave me flat broke, which was normal. If there were a five-spot left over I'd probably go to the dance hall and see Mara.

As I say, it was an incongruous group I had gathered together, and the only way to unite them in fellowship was to make merry. First of course I paid them off. That was better than the best hors d'œuvre. Cocktails followed promptly and then we fell to. It was a staggering meal I had ordered and there was plenty to wash it down with. Kronski, who was not used to liquor, got tipsy almost immediately. Had to go out and stick a finger down his throat long before we came to the roast duckling. When he rejoined us he was pale as a ghost: his face had the hue of a frog's belly, a dead frog floating on the scum of a stinking swamp. Ulric thought he was a rum bird—had never met a type like that before. Kronski, on the other hand, took a violent dislike to Ulric, asking me on the
side why I had invited a polite fart like that. MacGregor positively detested little Curley—couldn't understand how I could be friendly with such a venomous little crook. O'Mara and Costigan seemed to be getting along best of all; they fell into a lengthy discussion about the relative merits of Joe Gans and Jack Johnson. Hymie Laubscher was trying to get a hot tip from Zabrowskie, who made it a point never to give tips because of his position.

In the midst of it a Swedish friend of mine named Lundberg happened to walk in. He was another one I owed money to but he never pressed me to pay up. I invited him to join us and, taking Zabrowskie aside, I borrowed back a ten-spot in order to settle accounts with the new arrival. From him I learned that my old friend Larry Hunt was in town and eager to see me. “Get him here,” I urged Lundberg. “The more the merrier.”

While the festivities were in full swing, after we had sung “Meet Me Tonight in Dreamland” and “Some of These Days,” I noticed two Italian boys at a nearby table who seemed eager to be in the fun. I went over to them and asked them if they would like to join us. One of them was a musician and the other was a prize fighter, it appeared. I introduced them and then made a place for them between Costigan and O'Mara. Lundberg had gone out to telephone Larry Hunt.

How he had gotten on to such a subject on such an occasion I don't know, but for some reason or other Ulric had gotten it into his head to make me an elaborate speech about Uccello. The Italian boy, the musician, pricked up his ears. MacGregor turned away disgustedly to talk to Kronski about impotency, a subject which the latter delighted to explore if he thought he could make his listener uncomfortable thereby. I noticed that the Italian was impressed by Ulric's glib flow. He would have given his right arm to be able to speak English like that. He was also flattered to think that we were talking so enthusiastically about one of his own race. I drew him out a bit and, realizing that he was getting drunk on language, I got exalted and went off into a mad flight about the wonders of the English tongue. Curley and O'Mara turned to listen
and then Zabrowskie came round to our end of the table and drew up a chair, followed by Lundberg, who informed me quickly that he hadn't been able to get hold of Hunt. The Italian was in such a state of excitement that he ordered cognac for everybody. We stood up and clinked glasses. Arturo, that was his name, insisted on giving a toast—in Italian. He sat down and said with great fervor that he had lived in America ten years and had never heard the English language spoken like this. He said he would never be able to master it now. He wanted to know if we talked this way ordinarily. He went on like this, piling one compliment upon another, until we were all so infected with a love of the English language that we all wanted to make speeches. Finally I got so drunk on it that I stood up and, downing a stiff drink at one gulp, I launched into a frenzied speech which lasted for fifteen minutes or more. The Italian kept wagging his head from side to side, as if to signify that he couldn't stand another word, that he would burst. I fastened my eye on him and drowned him with words. It must have been a mad and glorious speech because every now and then there was a salvo of applause from the surrounding tables. I heard Kronski murmuring to someone that I was in a fine state of euphoria, a word which touched me off anew. Euphoria! I paused the fraction of a second while someone filled my glass and then I was off, down the stretch, a gay mudlark flinging words in every direction. I had never in my life attempted to make a speech. If someone had interrupted me and told me I was making a wonderful speech I would have been dumbfounded. I was out on my feet, in the language of the ring. The only thing I had in mind was the Italian's hunger for that marvelous English which he would never be able to master. I hadn't the slightest idea what I was talking about. I didn't have to use my brain—I simply stuck a long, snakelike tongue into a cornucopia and with a felicitous flip I spooled it off.

The speech ended in an ovation. Some of the guests at the other tables came over and felicitated me. The Italian, Arturo, was in tears. I felt as if I had unwittingly let off a bomb. I was embarrassed and not a little frightened by this unexpected
display of oratory. I wanted to get out of the place, get off by myself and feel what had happened. Presently I made an excuse and, taking the manager aside, I told him I had to leave. After footing the bill I found I had about three dollars left over. I decided to beat it without saying a word to anybody. They could sit there till Kingdom Come—I had had enough of it.

I started walking uptown. Soon I was on Broadway. At Thirty-fourth Street I quickened my pace. It was decided—I would go to the dance hall. At Forty-second Street I had to elbow my way through the pack. The crowd excited me: there was always the danger of running into someone and getting diverted from one's goal. Soon I was standing in front of the joint, a little out of breath and wondering if it were the right thing to do. At the Palace opposite, Thomas Burke of the Covent Garden Opera was being featured as the headliner. The name “Covent Garden” stuck in my crop as I turned to ascend the stairs.
London
—it would be swell to take her to London. I must ask her if she would like to hear Thomas Burke. . . .