From Here to Eternity_ The Restored Edit - Jones, James [385]
It was probably four miles to Kaimuki from here, then almost another mile up Wilhelmina Rise to Alma’s. And that was as the crow flies. You could add another mile for detours to keep on the side streets that were not lighted bright enough to show like the buses would. That made it about six miles to do, figuring liberally. And he would have to walk it. But if he could get to Alma’s he would be all right.
We want to figure this out right, he told himself, we want to be damn sure, we want all the percentages we can cluster. He might risk a taxi, provided he could find one on the side streets, if he thought he couldnt make it. We’ll keep that for the old ace in the hole. Some of them write to the old folks for coin, thats their old ace in the hole. Others have girls on the old tenderloin, thats their old ace in the hole. They tell you of trips they are going to make, from Frisco down to the South Pole; but their names would be mud, like a chump playing stud, if they lost their old ace in the hole. You’re already getting nuttier than a peach orchard boar, Prewitt. Pretty soon you wont know whether Christ was crucified or died with the screen door flux.
Sitting with his back against the wall of the alley he allowed himself time for one cigaret before starting, thinking it would clot up some if he held quite still. It was the best cigaret he had ever tasted. He smoked it slowly feeling cozily safe in the alley. Then he grinned again. Funny how the little things like a smoke seemed so wonderful and good when you were bad off and you thought if I ever get out of this one I’ll take more time to enjoy the little things. And then you never hardly noticed them when everything was going good in your favor again.
Well, he told himself, I guess we might as well go on and get started. The sooner we get started, you know, the sooner we get there.
It was hard to make himself leave the false security of the alley. He had to remind himself he would have to get moving before it started to stiffen up on him, now while it had not started to hurt bad yet. Already it was beginning to have the nightmarish quality of a dream where you know you will wake up pretty soon, and that was dangerous. You take it easy in dreams because you always know you will always wake up. But this wasnt a dream. This isnt a dream, Prewitt, he reminded himself, this you wont wake up from. And whatever else happened he did not intend to ever go back to the Stockade.
At the next corner he was very careful to check the street sign and make sure it was Vineyard, before he turned east. You’re really over the hill for good, this time, Prewitt. Your days as a thirty-year-man are over. When you dont show up tomorrow, and then they find old Fatso and start checkin, they wont be no doubt who it was done it. This time there wont be no getting back to the Post before you’re picked up, so as to get off with company punishment. This time its desertion. He did not know how far east Vineyard went, but it was the only street around here that went more than a block or two and he turned down it.
Below Beretania and King Streets toward the beach he knew the town like the back of his hand, but he did not know it up here. He knew enough to know that when you got out as far as the University all the east-west side streets stopped and then you had to either use Beretania or King to keep going east, or else cross over both of them to the beach side. That was going to be the hard part, crossing Beretania and King. The only chance was to find a straight street that ran down through both of them, so you would not have to walk along either one of them under the lights. They were not as populous out near the University as they were back in town, but they were still the main streets.
He followed Vineyard down to Punchbowl Street, then up Miller to Capt Cook, and back down Capt Cook to Lunalilo. There was a straight stretch on Lunalilo of over half a mile, but then it deadended at Makiki. From the corner he could see the Masonic Temple, so he knew there were no through cross streets here, because this was just a block from Kalakaua Ave that cut off toward Waikiki. Beyond Kalakaua there were wide streets on the beach side, but here there were only a few dead end lanes and then nothing, clear down to the KGHB radio station on Kapiolani Boulevard. He had to go up Makiki till he hit a street east and go clear across Punahou and then cut back down.
Complicated.