“We all are, aren’t we?”
In the mirror, in the enormous baggage of the rough coat, I looked like a defector, someone running for his life.
“Boswell? Are you still there?”
“Yes. I’m here.”
“Do you want me to come back?”
“Nah,” I said, and hung up.
Roger had not found a cab for me. “It’s the rain,” he said. “If you’ll wait here, sir, I’ll go around to the avenue again and try to get one.”
“I’m late,” I said. “I’d better start walking.”
“You’ll ruin your clothes.”
“No, it’s letting up.” When I walked out from under the striped canopy, the rain had let up. Even if I saw a cab I would not want it now.
I walked toward Nate’s. I was a little calmer but still depressed. I came out on Broadway into the light, within easy range of the exploding signs, the excitement of neon like a kind of war. As I continued toward Nate’s I became aware of the crowds almost congealing round me, seemingly increased at every side street and doorway. We moved slowly, thickly, in a single direction. I had caused this, I thought; I had invented The Club and caused this.
Across Broadway Nate’s red sign flared like the name of a boat above the heads of people looking up at it from a pier. I tried to move faster, using the last of the old great strength, pushing past people who looked up at me resentfully. “Excuse me,” I said. “Will you please get out of my way?” I said.
I made my way toward the curb. There were yellow barricades lining my side of the street; the other side had been roped off and it was clear except for photographers, doormen and police. On this side policemen on horseback patrolled the curbs. Other policemen leaned back into the crowds.
I was surrounded by a sort of incredible democracy. There were lovers, tourists, children, salesmen down from their hotel rooms, students, old people; there were adolescents, strangely brutalized, already unrespectable (I wondered if the boys carried knives, if the girls laid). All of them, jammed together in an anonymous intimacy, glared with a kind of solemn envy into every car that pulled up. Their feelings mixed, their faces showed the surprise and controlled resentment of people watching something which had nothing to do with themselves.
“There’s one,” a man next to me said.
“Can you see who it is?” another asked.
“Some movie star, I think. Jesus, look at all them jewels.”
“A studio paste job,” someone else said expertly.
“That’s the Secretary of State getting out of that limousine,” a man said.
“Where? No, that isn’t him.”
“It is so. That’s the Secretary of State.”
“Look at Nate Lace. He doesn’t know who to shake hands with first. Hi ya, Nate.”
“I never got my invitation,” a large young man said.
“Why’s that?”
“I’m incognito,” he said.
People laughed.
“Listen, plenty will be happening in there tonight. Don’t kid yourself.”
“There’s the millionaire, whatsisname. Look at that Rolls he’s in.”
“It’s like a goddamn housing project.”
“That’s the Governor with him.”
“Something’s up,” a woman said. “I don’t like it.”
“Nah, they’re just going to get each other’s autographs and go home.”
“Excuse me,” I said, “I’ve got to get through.”
“Don’t shove, will you. We’re all trying to see.” o
“Let me by, I’ve got to get over there.”
“He’s representing the old soldiers,” someone said.
“Get out of my way.”
I was about to step between two barricades when a policeman pushed me back. “It’s blocked off, Charley,” he said. “The big shots are throwing a party.”
“I’ve got to get through.”
“Not here you don’t.”
“Look,” I said, “this is ridiculous. I’m supposed to be over there.”
“Oh, you are, are you?” he said. “Who in hell do you think you are?”
“I started it all,” I said.
“He’s Adam,” said the young man who had told us he was incognito.
“There’s one in every crowd,” the policeman said good-naturedly. “I’ve been working these affairs fifteen years and there’s one in every crowd. Gate crashers! If it’s a parade there’s always some nut who thinks he ought to be marching.”
I tugged at my raincoat to show him the dinner jacket beneath it. “There,” I said, “does this look as if I didn’t belong there?”
Clearly I had surprised him. “Well, I don’t know,” he said, rubbing his jaw. “Who are you?”
It was like old times. Only the doormen were backed up now by cops with guns. It made it a contest. I felt giddy. “You wouldn’t know my name,” I said.
The policeman grinned. “Nice try, Charley, you had me there for a minute.”
“I’m a gentleman of the press.”
“Take my picture,” he said.
“I’m the caterer.”
“Give me a sandwich,” he said.
“I’m the entertainer.”
“Sing me a song,” he said.
“You don’t believe I belong over there, do you?” I said.
“No, sir, I don’t. Now quiet down. These folks are trying to get a look at the big shots.”
“So you don’t think I’m a big shot?”
“All men were created equal, fella. Just quiet down, now.”
“You’re an idiot,” I said. In a minute I could tell him who I was and it would be all over.
“What’s that?”
In a minute I could tell him who I was, but I felt a weird pressure, as though at last I was about to do something infinitely mad, press a claim infinitely untenable. “I said you’re an idiot,” I said.
The policeman turned away. “I’m having trouble with a guy,” he said to another policeman. “Signal the wagon.”
“You still don’t know who I am?” I said.
“I only know what you are,” he said.
“Then look!” I shouted. I thrust my face to within inches of his own, holding it like a fist before his eyes.
He backed off uncertainly, startled. “Listen,” he said uneasily, “if you really are with that crowd, why don’t you just tell me who you are and we can check? Then I’ll guide you personally across the street.”
I turned to the people around me and winked. “He wants to know who I am. Fifteen years he’s been working these affairs and he wants to know who I am.”
They laughed, in, they thought, on the gag. “Shall I tell him, sir?” the young man asked.
“Not yet,” I said. “Give him another chance.” I turned back to the policeman and stared at him. I would do it with my eyes, I thought; I would use my vision as a battering ram. In the gym, in the old days, it had been a mistake to lift bar bells, pull against heavy springs. People need people to work out against. I held my face in front of him, balancing it as steady as a weapon.
“Look,” he said nervously, “let’s stop all this. Just tell me your name.”
Across the street cars continued to discharge the famous onto the sidewalk in front of Nate’s, the men and women like secular gods — imperious, flattered, giving nothing. All that stood between us was my name. It was incredible that anyone should ever get what he wanted, and I experienced, sharp as pain, deep as rage, a massive greed, a new knowledge that it was not enough, that nothing was ever enough, that we couldn’t know what was enough or want what was enough. It wasn’t even a question of deserts. Everybody deserved everything.
I had been working these affairs for fifteen years myself, I thought. In all that time I never once used a false name. It had been an incredible burden, a useless loyalty.