“Ah, quit —!”
“I’d still be ashamed, but at least I wouldn’t have so much to blame myself for.”
“You? You hypocrite, you’d never blame yourself in a thousand years. I know your type.”
“I am to blame. I know it. My darling!” He put the heel of his hand to his wet forehead, spread his mouth open crudely, and wept.
Leventhal regarded him with a kind of dismayed pity. He rose and stood wondering what to do.
“The thing to do is to make him coffee, I suppose,” he decided. He hurried to fill the pot and, striking a match, held it to the burner. The flames spurted up in the star-shaped rows. He tapped the jar with the spoon and measured out the coffee.
When he came back to the front room, Allbee was asleep. He shouted, “Wake up, I’m fixing coffee for you.” He clapped his hands and shook him. Finally he lifted one of his lids and looked at his eye. “Passed out,” he said. And he thought with grim distaste, “Can I let him stay here like this? He may slide out of the chair and lie on the floor all night.” The idea of spending the night like that, with Allbee on the floor and perhaps waking up, frightened him somewhat. Besides, he was beginning to be aware of the disgusting smell of alcohol that came from him. He hauled Allbee from the chair and began to drag him from the room. At the kitchen door he lifted him onto his back, holding him by the wrists, and he carried him to the dining-room and dropped him onto the day bed.
17
LABOR DAY was approaching; the coming week was shortened. Press time had been moved back and all copy had to be ready by Friday. Beard called a meeting of the editors to announce this. He was in a talkative mood and he swiveled back and forth, catching the red threads of the carpet in the casters of his chair. At every other sentence he lifted his hand and let it fall slackly. He made it an official occasion because of the holiday. He wouldn’t keep them long. They had their work and brevity was the soul of wit. But this had been a good year for the firm, and he wanted the personnel to know how much he appreciated their loyalty and hard work. When you said work you said decency. They went together. So he wasn’t thanking his people so much as complimenting them. It was better to wear out than to rust out, as was often quoted. He was a hard worker himself. He lived five miles as the crow flies from the office and he always allowed himself enough time so that if the subway broke down he could still walk the distance before nine o’clock. If a job was worth holding it was worth being loyal to. Life without loyalty was like — Shakespeare said it — a flat tamed piece. Leventhal in his white shirt, his face concealing his somber, weary annoyance, knew this was aimed at him. He kept his eyes on the image of the light striped window shade filling like a sail in the glass of the desk which was already cleared for the holiday.
“Grosser philosoph.” Leventhal, walking through the office, repeated his father’s phrase with all his father’s satire. Of all days to waste time. He got back to work even before the lamp over his papers had come to its full blue radiance. He had promised himself to take a breather today in order to think things over. But he was not really sorry to be too busy.
Mr Millikan, his face pale and his nostrils widened, strode through the office carrying galley sheets in each hand. Mr Fay stopped by to remind Leventhal about his manufacturer who wanted a spread.
“First thing next week, I’ll take care of it,” Leventhal said. “On Tuesday.”
“Say, I’m sorry to hear you had such bad luck in your family — bereavement.” Mr Fay’s lips thinned, his tone was formal, and the skin began to gather on his forehead. “Who was it?”
“My brother’s kid.”
“Oh, a child.”
“A little boy.”
“That’s awfully tough. Beard mentioned it to me.” The severity of his lips gave him a look of coldness bordering on suffering. Leventhal understood what caused it.
“Any other children?”
“They have another son.”
“That makes it a little easier.”
“Yes,” Leventhal said.
He let his work drift briefly while he gazed after Mr Fay. He at least was decent. Beard might have taken a moment off to say something. And Millikan rushed by and didn’t even have time to nod. It showed the low quality of the people, their inferiority and meanness. Not that it made any difference to him. This Millikan, when he finally did get around to ask a personal question, never listened to the answer, only seemed to. He was like a shellfish down in the wet sand, and you were the noise of the water to him. Leventhal glanced over his desk — the papers, the glassful of colored pencils, the thick inkstand, the wire letter tray. There were several messages on his spindle and he tore them off. One, dated yesterday, was from Williston; he wanted him to call. Leventhal held the slip of paper in his palm, against his chest, and looked down at it. He thought, “I’ll call him when the pressure’s off me. It couldn’t be so urgent or he would have tried to reach me at the shop or at home, last night.”
At noon the receptionist rang to say that there was a man in the waiting-room looking for him.
“What’s his name?”
“He didn’t give any.”
“Well, ask him, will you?” The phone went silent. There was no response when he tried to signal her a few minutes later. He walked into the aisle to look at the switchboard. Her place was vacant. He took his straw hat from the hook and put it on. It had been his first guess that the visitor was Max. Max, however, would have given his name. It was probably Allbee. So much for his promise not to bother him at work. The waiting-room was deserted. Leventhal, trying to force open the opaque glass slide to see whether she had returned to her switchboard by another entrance, heard her behind him. She was coming through the office door.
“Well, did you locate him?”
“Yes, he’s in the corridor, but he doesn’t want to give his name or come in.” She was laughing, perplexed, and her small eyes seemed to ask Leventhal what was up. He stepped into the corridor.
Allbee was watching the cables and the rising weight at the back of the elevator shaft. He was carrying his jacket wrapped around his arm; his face was yellow and unshaven, his soiled shirt open; he stood loose-hipped, one hand bent against his chest. His shoes were untied. He appeared to have dragged on his clothes as soon as he got out of bed and set out, without losing a second, to see him. No wonder the girl had laughed. But Leventhal was not really disturbed either by her laughing or by Allbee himself. The lower half of the red globe above the doors lit up and the elevator sprang to a soft stop. He and Allbee crowded in among the girls from the commercial school upstairs.
“Nice,” Allbee whispered. They were forced to stand close. Leventhal could scarcely move his arms. “Nice little tender things. Soon you and I, we’ll be too old to take notice.” Leventhal was silent. “Last night he was crying for his wife,” he was thinking as they sank slowly along the wall.
Allbee followed him through the lobby and into the street.
“I thought you said you weren’t going to come around?” said Leventhal.
“You’ll notice that I waited outside.”
“Well, I don’t want you around. I told you that.”
Allbee’s eyes shone at him with reproachful irony. They were quite clear, considering how drunk he had been. His voice was thick, however. “I promised you I wasn’t going to make trouble for you here. Since things are like this between us, you ought to have a little faith in me.”
“Yes?” said Leventhal. “How are things between us?”