“You mean he don’t like our profession?”
“No, I don’t mean that at all. He probably figures a girl that’s workin’ has got a different attitude.”
They had another small snort.
In her office Dora poured herself one more, swallowed it and locked the drawer again. She fixed her perfect hair in the wall mirror, inspected her shining red nails, and went out to the bar. Alfred the bouncer was sulking. It wasn’t anything he said nor was his expression unpleasant, but he was sulking just the same. Dora looked him over coldly. “I guess you figure you’re getting the blocks, don’t you?”
“No,” said Alfred. “No, it’s quite all right.”
That quite threw Dora. “Quite all right, is it? You got a job, Mister. Do you want to keep it or not?”
“It’s quite all right,” Alfred said frostily. “I ain’t putting out no beef.” He put his elbows on the bar and studied himself in the mirror. “You just go and enjoy yourself,” he said. “I’ll take care of everything here. You don’t need to worry.”
Dora melted under his pain. “Look,” she said. “I don’t like to have the place without a man. Some lush might get smart and the kids couldn’t handle him. But a little later you can come over and you could kind of keep your eye on the place out the window, How would that be? You could see if anything happened.”
“Well,” said Alfred. “I would like to come.” He was mollified by her permission. “Later I might drop over for just a minute or two. They was a mean drunk in last night An’ I don’t know, Dora — I kind of lost my nerve since I bust that guy’s back. I just ain’t sure of myself no more. I’m gonna pull a punch some night and get took.”
“You need a rest,” said Dora. “Maybe I’ll get Mack to fill in and you can take a couple of weeks off.” She was a wonderful madam, Dora was.
Over at the laboratory, Doc had a little whiskey after his beer. He was feeling a little mellow. It seemed a nice thing to him that they would give him a party. He played the Pavane to a Dead Princess and felt sentimental and a little sad. And because of his feeling he went on with Daphnis and Chloe. There was a passage in it that reminded him of something else. The observers in Athens before Marathon reported seeing a great line of dust crossing the Plain, and they heard the clash of arms and they heard the Eleusinian Chant. There was part of the music that reminded him of that picture.
When it was done he got another whiskey and he debated in his mind about the Brandenburg. That would snap him out of the sweet and sickly mood he was getting into. But what was wrong with the sweet and sickly mood? It was rather pleasant. “I can play anything I want,” he said aloud. “I can play Clair de Lune or The Maiden with Flaxen Hair. I’m a free man.”
He poured a whiskey and drank it. And he compromised with the Moonlight Sonata. He could see the neon light of La Ida blinking on and off. And then the street light in front of the Bear Flag came on.
A squadron of huge brown beetles hurled themselves against the light and then fell to the ground and moved their legs and felt around with their antennae. A lady cat strolled lonesornely along the gutter looking for adventure. She wondered what had happened to all the torn cats who had made life interesting and the nights hideous.
Mr. Mallow on his hands and knees peered out of the boiler door to see if anyone had gone to the party yet. In the Palace the boys sat restlessly watching the black hands of the alarm dock.
Chapter XXX
The nature of parties has been imperfectly studied. It is, however, generally understood that a party has a pathology, that it is a kind of an individual and that it is likely to be a very perverse individual. And it is also generally understood that a party hardly ever goes the way it is planned or intended. This last, of course, excludes those dismal slave parties, whipped and controlled and dominated, given by ogreish professional hostesses. These are not parties at all but acts and demonstrations, about as spontaneous as peristalsis and as interesting as its end product.
Probably everyone in Cannery Row had projected his imagination to how the party would be — the shouts of greeting, the congratulations, the noise and good feeling. And it didn’t start that way at all. Promptly at eight o’clock Mack and the boys, combed and clean, picked up their jugs and marched down the chicken walk, over the railroad track, through the lot across the street and up the steps of Western Biological. Everyone was embarrassed. Doc held the door open and Mack made a little speech. “Being as how it’s your birthday, I and the boys thought we would wish you happy birthday and we got twenty-one cats for you for a present.”
He stopped and they stood forlornly on the stairs.
“Come on in,” said Doc. “Why — I’m — I’m surprised. I didn’t even know you knew it was my birthday.”
“All tom cats,” said Hazel. “We didn’t bring ’em down.”
They sat down formally in the room at the left. There was a long silence. “Well,” said Doc, “now you’re here, how about a little drink?”
Mack said, “We brought a little snort,” and he indicated the three jugs Eddie had been accumulating. “They ain’t no beer in it,” said Eddie.
Doc covered his early evening reluctance. “No,” he said. “You’ve got to have a drink with me. It just happens I laid in some whiskey.”
They were just seated formally, sipping delicately at the whiskey, when Dora and the girls came in. They presented the quilt. Doc laid it over his bed and it was beautiful. And they accepted a little drink. Mr. and Mrs. Malloy followed with their presents.
“Lots of folks don’t know what this stuff’s going to be worth,” said Sam Malloy as he brought out the Chalmers 1916 piston and connecting rod. “There probably isn’t three of these here left in the world.”
And now people began to arrive in droves. Henri came in with a pincushion three by four feet. He wanted to give a lecture on his new art form but by this time the formality was broken. Mr. and Mrs. Gay came in. Lee Chong presented the great string of firecrackers and the China lily bulbs. Someone ate the lily bulbs by eleven o’clock but the firecrackers lasted longer. A group of comparative strangers came in from La Ida. The stiffness was going out of the party quiddy. Dora sat in a kind of throne, her orange hair flaming. She held her whiskey glass daintily with her little finger extended. And she kept an eye on the girls to see that they conducted themselves properly. Doc put dance music on the phonograph and he went to the kitchen and began to fry the steaks.
The first fight was not a bad one. One of the group from La Ida made an immoral proposal to one of Dora’s girls. She protested and Mack and the boys, outraged at this breach of propriety, threw him out quiddy and without breaking anything. They felt good then, for they knew they were contributing.
Out in the kitchen Doc was frying steaks in three skillets, and he cut up tomatoes and piled up sliced bread. He felt very good. Mack was personally taking care of the phonograph. He had found an album of Benny Goodman’s trios. Dancing had started, indeed the party was beginning to take on depth and vigor. Eddie went into the office and did a tap dance. Doc had taken a pint with him to the kitchen and he helped himself from the bottle. He was feeling better and better. Everyone was surprised when he served the meat. Nobody was really hungry and they cleaned it up instantly. Now the food set the party into a kind of rich digestive sadness. The whiskey was gone and Doc brought out the gallons of wine.