U.S.A_ - John Dos Passos [160]
his feet were sore. There were crowds everywhere and lights and floats and parades and bands and girls running round in fancy dress. He picked up plenty of girls but as soon as they found he was flat they dropped him. He was spending his money as slowly as he could. When he got hungry he'd drop into a bar and drink a glass of beer and eat as much free lunch as he dared.
The day after Mardi Gras the crowds began to thin
The day after Mardi Gras the crowds began to thin
out, and Charley didn't have any money for beer. He walked round feeling hungry and miserable; the smel of molasses and the absinthe smel from bars in the French Quarter in the heavy damp air made him feel sick. He didn't know what to do with himself. He didn't have the gumption to start off walking or hitchhiking again. He went to the Western Union and tried to wire Jim col ect, but the guy said they wouldn't take a wire asking for money col ect.
The Panama woman threw him out when he couldn't
pay for another week in advance and there he was walking down Esplanade Avenue with Grassi's accordion on one arm and his little newspaper bundle of clothes under the other. He walked down the levee and sat down in a
-402-grassy place in the sun and thought for a long time. It was either throwing himself in the river or enlisting in the army. Then he suddenly thought of the accordion. An accordion was worth a lot of money. He left his bundle of clothes under some planks and walked around to al the hockshops he could find with the accordion, but they wouldn't give him more than fifteen bucks for it any-where. By the time he'd been round to al the hockshops and musicstores it was dark and everything had closed. He stumbled along the pavement feeling sick and dopy from hunger. At the corner of Canal and Rampart he stopped. Singing was coming out of a saloon. He got the hunch to go in and play Funiculi funicula on the accordion. He might get some free lunch and a glass of beer out of it. He'd hardly started playing and the bouncer had just vaulted across the bar to give him the bum's rush, when a tal man sprawled at a table beckoned to him.
"Brother,you come right here an'set down." It was a big man with a long broken nose and high cheekbones.
"Brother, you set down." The bouncer went back be-hind the bar. "Brother, you can't play that there accordeen no mor'n a rabbit. Ah'm nutten but a lowdown cracker from Okachobee City but if Ah couldn't play no better'n that . . ." Charley laughed. "I know I can't play it. That's al right." The Florida guy pul ed out a big wad of bil s. "Brother, do you know what you're going to do? You're going to sel me the goddam thing. . . . Ah'm nothin'
but a lowdown cracker, but, by Jesus
Christ . . ."
"Hey, Doc, be yourself . . . You don't want the damn thing." His friends tried to make him put his money back. Doc swept his arm round with a gesture that shot three glasses onto the floor with a crash. "You turkey-buzzards talk in your turn . . . Brother, how much do you want for the accordeen?" The bouncer had come back and was standing threateningly over the table. "Al right, Ben,"
-403-said Doc. "It's al on your Uncle Henry . . . and let's have another round a that good rye whisky. Brother, how much do you want for it?"
"Fifty bucks," said Charley, thinking fast. Doc handed him out five tens. Charley swal owed a drink, put the accordion on the table and went off in a hurry. He was afraid if he hung round the cracker 'ud sober up and try to get the money back, and besides he wanted to eat. Next day he got a steerage passage on the steamer
Momus bound for New York. The river was higher than the city. It was funny standing on the stern of the steam-boat and looking down on the roofs and streets and trol-leycars of New Orleans. When the steamer pul ed out from the wharf Charley began to feel good. He found the colored steward and got him to give him a berth in the deckhouse. When he put his newspaper package under the pil ow he glanced down into the berth below. There lay Doc, fast asleep, al dressed up in a light gray suit and a straw hat with a burntout cigar sticking out of the corner of his mouth and the accordion beside him. They were passing between the Eads Jetties and feeling the seawind in their faces and the first uneasy swel of the Gulf under their feet when Doc came lurching on deck. He recognized Charley and went up to him with a big hand held out. "Wel , I'l be a sonofabitch if there ain't the musicmaker . . . That's a good accordeen, boy. Ah thought you'd imposed on me bein' only a poa country lad an' al that, but I'l be a sonofabitch if it ain't worth the money. Have a snifter on me?"