“Well, I was born in North Dakota.” Charley talked over his shoulder to the Jap. “Taki, Mr. Benton wants another drink.”
“We got a nice sociable crowd out there,” said Farrell.
After they’d gone Charley called up Doris and asked her right out if she’d like to live in Detroit after they were married. She gave a thin shriek at the other end of the line. “What a dreadful idea… and who said anything about that dreadful… you know, state… I don’t like even to mention the horrid word… Don’t you think we’ve had fun in New York this winter?” “Sure,” answered Charley. “I guess I’d be all right here if… things were different… I thought maybe you’d like a change, that’s all… I had an offer from a concern out there, see.” “Now, Charley, you must promise not to mention anything so silly again.” “Sure… if you’ll have dinner with me tomorrow night.” “Darling, tomorrow I couldn’t.” “How about Saturday then?” “All right, I’ll break an engagement. Maybe you can come by for me at Carnegie Hall after the concert.” “I’ll even go to the damn concert if you like.” “Oh, no, Mother’s asked a lot of old ladies.” She was talking fast, her voice twanging in the receiver. “There won’t be any room in the box. You wait for me at the little tearoom, the Russian place where you waited and got so cross the time before.” “All right, anyplace… Say, you don’t know how I miss you when you’re not with me.” “Do you? Oh, Charley, you’re a dear.” She rang off.
Charley put the receiver down and let himself slump back in his chair. He couldn’t help feeling all of a tremble when he talked to her on the telephone. “Hey, Taki, bring me that bottle of scotch… Say, tell me, Taki,” Charley went on, pouring himself a stiff drink, “in your country… is it so damn difficult for a guy to get married?” The Jap smiled and made a little bow. “In my country everything much more difficult.”
Next day when Charley got back from the plant he found a wire from Doris saying Saturday absolutely impossible. “Damn the bitch,” he said aloud. All evening he kept calling up on the phone and leaving messages, but she was never in. He got to hate the feel of the damn mouthpiece against his lips. Saturday he couldn’t get anyword to her either. Sunday morning he got Mrs. Humphries on the phone. The cold creaky oldwoman’s voice shrieked that Doris had suddenly gone to Southampton for the weekend. “I know she’ll come back with a dreadful cold,” Mrs. Humphries added. “Weekends in this weather.” “Well, goodby, Mrs. Humphries,” said Charley and rang off. Monday morning when Taki brought him a letter in Doris’s hand, a big blue envelope that smelt of her perfume, the minute he opened it he knew before he read it what it would say.
CHARLEY DEAR,
You are such a dear and I’m so fond of you and do so want you for a friend [underlined]. You know the silly life I lead, right now I’m on the most preposterous weekend and I’ve told everybody I have a splitting headache and have gone to bed just to write to you. But, Charley, please forget all about weddings and things like that. The very idea makes me physically sick and besides I’ve promised George I’d marry him in June and the Duquesnes have a publicrelations counsel — isn’t it just too silly — but his business is to keep the Duquesnes popular with the public and he’s given the whole story to the press, how I was courted among the Scotch moors and in the old medieval abbey and everything. And that’s why I’m in such a hurry to write to you, Charley darling, because you’re the best friend [twice underlined] I’ve got and the only one who lives in the real world of business and production and labor and everything like that, which I’d so love to belong to, and I wanted you to know first thing. Oh, Charley darling, please don’t think horrid things about me.
Your loving friend [three times underlined]
D
Be a good boy and burn up this letter, won’t you?
The buzzer was rattling. It was the boy from the garage with his car. Charley got on his hat and coat and went downstairs. He got in and drove out to Long Island City, walked up the rubbertreaded steps to his office, sat down at his desk, rustled papers, talked to Stauch over the phone, lunched in the employees’ lunchroom with Joe Askew, dictated letters to the new towhaired stenographer and suddenly it was six o’clock and he was jockeying his way through the traffic home.
Crossing the bridge he had an impulse to give a wrench to the wheel and step on the gas, but the damn car wouldn’t clear the rail anyway, it would just make a nasty scrapheap of piledup traffic and trucks.
He didn’t want to go home or to the speakeasy he and Doris had been having dinner in several times a week all winter, so he turned down Third Avenue. Maybe he’d run into somebody at Julius’s. He stood up at the bar. He didn’t want to drink any more than he wanted to do anything else. A few raw shots of rye made him feel better. To hell with her. Nothing like a few drinks. He was alone, he had money on him, he could do any goddam thing in the world.
Next to Charley at the bar stood a couple of fattish dowdylooking women. They were with a redfaced man who was pretty drunk already. The women were talking about clothes and the man was telling about Belleau Wood. Right away he and Charley were old buddies from the A.E.F. “The name is De Vries. Profession… bonvivant,” said the man and tugged at the two women until they faced around towards Charley. He put his arms around them with a flourish and shouted, “Meet the wife.”
They had drinks on Belleau Wood, the Argonne, the St. Mihiel salient, and the battle of Paree. The women said goodness, how they wanted to go to Hoboken to the hofbrau. Charley said he’d take them all in his car. They sobered up a little and were pretty quiet crossing on the ferry. At the restaurant in the chilly dark Hoboken street they couldn’t get anything but beer. After they’d finished supper De Vries said he knew a place where they could get real liquor. They circled round blocks and blocks and ended in a dump in Union City. When they’d drunk enough to start them doing squaredances the women said wouldn’t it be wonderful to go to Harlem. This time the ferry didn’t sober them up so much because they had a bottle of scotch with them. In Harlem they were thrown out of a dancehall and at last landed in a nightclub. The bonvivant fell down the redcarpeted stairs and Charley had a time laughing that off with the management. They ate fried chicken and drank some terrible gin the colored waiter sent out for, and danced. Charley kept thinking how beautifully he was dancing. He couldn’t make out why he didn’t have any luck picking up any of the highyallers.
Next morning he woke up in a room in a hotel. He looked around. No, there wasn’t any woman in the bed. Except that his head ached and his ears were burning, he felt good. Stomach all right. For a moment he thought he’d just landed from France. Then he thought of the Packard, where the hell had he left it? He reached for the phone. “Say, what hotel is this?” It was the McAlpin, goodmorning. He remembered Joe Turbino’s number and phoned him to ask what the best thing for a hangover was. When he was through phoning he didn’t feel so good. His mouth tasted like the floor of a chickencoop. He went back to sleep. The phone woke him. “A gentleman to see you.” Then he remembered all about Doris. The guy from Turbino’s brought a bottle of scotch. Charley took a drink of it straight, drank a lot of icewater, took a bath, ordered up some breakfast. But it was time to go out to lunch. He put the bottle of scotch in his overcoat pocket and went round to Frank and Joe’s for a cocktail.
That night he took a taxi up to Harlem. He went from joint to joint dancing with the highyallers. He got in a fight in a breakfastclub. It was day when he found himself in another taxi going downtown to Mrs. Darling’s. He didn’t have any money to pay the taximan and the man insisted on going up in the elevator while he got the money. There was nobody in the apartment but the colored maid and she shelled out five dollars. She tried to get Charley to lie down but he wanted to write her out a check. He could sign his name all right but he couldn’t sign it on the check. The maid tried to get him to take a bath and go to bed. She said he had blood all over his shirt.