U.S.A_ - John Dos Passos [273]
"He won't," said Webb, "he's up at Cold Spring for the weekend." Webb was moving around in his bare feet, putting on water to boil and making toast. "You'd better take your trousers off, Webb, I can see the water dripping off them from here." Webb blushed and pul ed them off, draping the blanket around himself like a Roman senator. For a long time they didn't say anything and al they could hear above the distant hum of traffic was the hiss of the gasflame and the intermittent purr of the kettle just beginning to boil. Then Webb suddenly began to talk in
-274-a nervous spluttering way. "So you think I'm yel ow, do you? Wel , you may be right, Anne . . . not that I give a damn . . . I mean, you see, there's times when a fel ow ought to be a coward and times when he ought to do the he-man stuff. Now don't talk for a minute, let me say something. . . . I'm hel ishly attracted to you . . . and it's been yel ow of me not to tel you about it before, see?
I don't believe in love or anything like that, al bourgeois nonsensei but I think when people are attracted to each other I think it's yel ow of them not to . . . you know what I mean."
"No, I doan', Webb," said Daughter after a pause. Webb looked at her in a puzzled way as he brought her a cup of tea and some buttered toast with a piece of cheese on it. They ate in silence for a while; it was so quiet they could hear each other gulping little swal ows of tea. "Now, what in Jesus Christ's name did you mean by that?" Webb suddenly shouted out.
Daughter felt warm and drowsy in her blanket, with the hot tea in her and the dry gasheat licking the soles of her feet. "Wel , what does anybody mean by anything," she mumbled dreamily.
Webb put down his teacup and began to walk up and
down the room trailing the blanket after him. "S --t," he suddenly said, as he stepped on a thumbtack. He stood on one leg looking at the sole of his foot that was black from the grime of the floor. "But, Jesus Christ, Anne . . . peo-ple ought to be free and happy about sex . . . come ahead let's." His cheeks were pink and his black hair that needed cutting was every which way. He kept on standing on one leg and looking at the sole of his foot. Daughter began to laugh. "You look awful funny like that, Webb." She felt a warm glow al over her. "Give me another cup of tea and make me some more toast." After she'd had the tea and toast she said, "Wel isn't it about time we ought to be going uptown?" "But Christ,
-275-Anne, I'm making indecent proposals to you," he said shril y, half laughing and half in tears. "For God's sake pay attention . . . Damn it, I'l make you pay attention, you little bitch." He dropped his blanket and ran at her. She could see he was fighting mad. He pul ed her up out of her chair and kissed her on the mouth. She had quite a tussle with him, as he was wiry and strong, but she man-aged to get her forearm under his chin and to push his face away far enough to give him a punch on the nose. His nose began to bleed. "Don't be sil y, Webb," she said, breathing hard, "I don't want that sort of thing, not yet, anyway . . . go and wash your face."
He went to the sink and began dabbling his face with water. Daughter hurried into her skirt and shoes and stock-ings and went over to the sink where he was washing his face,
"That was mean of me, Webb, I'm terribly sorry. There's something always makes me be mean to people I like." Webb wouldn't say anything for a long time. His nose was stil bleeding.
"Go along home," he said, "I'm going to stay here. . . . It's al right . . . my mistake." She put on her dripping raincoat and went out into the shiny evening streets. Al the way home on the express in the subway she was feeling warm and tender towards Webb, like towards Dad or the boys.
She didn't see him for several days, then one evening he cal ed and asked her if she wanted to go out on the picket line next morning. It was stil dark when she met him at the ferry station. They were both cold and sleepy and didn't say much going out on the train. From the train they had to run through the slippery streets to get to the mil s in time to join the picket line. Faces looked cold and pinched in the blue early light. Women had shawls over their heads, few of the men or boys had overcoats. The young girls were al shivering in their cheap fancy topcoats that had no warmth to them. The cops had already begun