The Studs Lonigan Trilogy - James T. Farrell [153]
“Say, are you sure that was pop?” he asked, when he was again able to talk.
“Sure thing, Charley.”
“This guy’s a friend of ours, Vinc. He wouldn’t fool you,” Benny Taite said.
“Well, it’s awfully strong pop. Maybe I better have root beer.”
“Don’t handle it.”
Vinc asked for a glass of water. They paid up. Vine laid a dime on the bar. The bartender sneered, and said it was a half a buck. Vine drawled that was awfully expensive for pop. He asked Studs if it was right. Studs nodded. Curley paid reluctantly.
Slug led them to a door in the rear of the saloon, and rapped three times. A slide opened, and an eye peered out. The slit closed, and the door was opened. A greasy, pimply-faced fellow with hollow cheeks wished them a Merry Christmas out of the side of his mouth, and told them to have a good time. They heard music as they crossed a dim hallway, and entered another door which led them into a gaudy cabaret with colored lights. A miscellaneous assortment of males were scattered around the tables or belly-dancing with girls in teddies and chemises. They saw the guys who had come with Nate and there was confusion and kidding while two ham-faced waiters placed two tables together. Girls quickly clustered around.
“Say, let’s see the snake room first,” Slug suggested.
They ordered drinks, and Slug talked to one of the bouncers. He told the girls to wait, and they all said yes, dearie.
They followed a bouncer with cauliflower ears along an aisle of tables, out a doorway, and down a narrow, dim hall-way. They heard a mingled echo of moans, curses, indistinct sounds.
“It’s as soundproof as we can get it,” the bouncer said.
He opened a door. They were struck by an alcoholic stench, and drunken exclamations. The lights were shot on and they saw a bare room where drunks were crowded all over the floor.
The gang laughed at one drunk who snored in a corner, his belly rising and falling, his mouth wide open. Other drinks rolled on the floor, raved, and one sat playing with his toes, his shoes beside him.
“Like a booby hatch,” Slug said, with a smile.
“Say, are they sick?” drawled Vinc.
“Don’t mind that chump,” Slug said, when the bouncer looked curiously at him.
A thin guy crawled towards them on his hands and knees, bumping others, falling over one bloated fat fellow. He told them he had to crawl because he was having a terrible time with his feet; every time he tried to walk, his left foot got ahead of his right one. He braced himself along the wall, and with effort. He walked in zigzags, and then turned, and told them to judge for themselves if his right foot didn’t always keep getting ahead of his left one.
“Siddown!” the bouncer said.
The guy crawled away. A fellow who had been sleeping suddenly lifted himself from the hips, and heaved; he fell back in his own vomit. Two guys in a corner tried to drown out the room by singing She’s My Lulu.
“Jesus, let’s go. That odor will kill me,” said Studs.
A blond boy of about eighteen let out an insane shriek, and dashed towards them, stepping on the face of an unconscious drunk. He fell on his knees before them, and loudly begged that he be saved from the snakes. It was funny. He arose, clapped his hands to his ears, and yelled. He fell before the bouncer, and repeated his entreaties to be saved from the snakes; pointing dramatically in back of them. He crawled to the wall, still shrieking. The bouncer jerked out a blackjack and neatly put him to sleep. His face was pale and sickly in the artificial illumination.
A husky fellow rolled over to them, and yelled he’d been rolled.
“Fade!” the bouncer commanded.
“Give me my money back, you sonofabitches, or I’ll.. ..” The bouncer cracked him in the jaw; he fell on top of a sleeping Polack.
“Mother! Mama! Your little boy needs you. He’s sick. Mama in heaven, Mama,” a fat fellow moaned on his knees in a corner.
“Jesus, they’re blind,” Slug said with a laugh.
“We got to do something with them,” the bouncer said, turning off the light, and shutting the door. Two bouncers, with padded shoulders, passed, carting a drunk along the hallway.