U.S.A_ - John Dos Passos [68]
time . . . I'm goin' to close up an' go home."
-171-One of the guys from Chicagothe
lee of the recruiting tent. Joe felt lousy. He went down into the subway and waited for the Brooklyn train.
At Mrs. Olsen's everything was dark. Joe rang and in a little while she came down in a padded pink dressing gown and opened the door. She was sore at being waked up and bawled him out for drinking, but she gave him a flop and next morning lent him fifteen bucks to tide him over til he got work on a Shipping Board boat. Mrs. Olsen looked tired and a lot older, she said she had pains in her back and couldn't get through her work any more. Next morning Joe put up some shelves in the pantry
for her and carried out a lot of litter before he went over to the Shipping Board recruiting office to put his name down for the officer's school. The little kike behind the desk had never been to sea and asked him a lot of dam-fool questions and told him to come around next week to find out what action would be taken on his application. Joe got sore and told him to f --k himself and walked out. He took Janey out to supper and to a show, but she
talked just like everybody else did and bawled him out for cussing and he didn't have a very good time. She liked the shawls though and he was glad she was making out
-172-so wel in New York. He never did get around to talking to her about Del a. After taking her home he didn't know what the hel
to do with himself. He wanted a drink, but taking Janey out and everything had cleaned up the fifteen bucks he'd borrowed from Mrs. Olsen. He walked west to a saloon he knew on Tenth Avenue, but the place was closed:
wartime prohibition. Then he walked back towards Union Square, maybe that fel er Tex he'd seen when he was walking across the square with Janey would stil be sit-ting there and he could chew the rag a while with him. He sat down on a bench opposite the cardboard battle-ship and began sizing it up: not such a bad job. Hel , I wisht I'd never seen the inside of a real battleship, he was thinking, when Tex slipped into the seat beside him and put his hand on his knee. The minute he touched him Joe knew he'd never liked the guy, eyes too close together:
"What you lookin' so blue about, Joe? Tel me you're gettin' your ticket." Joe nodded and leaned over and spat careful y between his feet.
"What do you think of that for a model battleship, pretty nifty, ain't it? Jez, us guys is lucky not to be over-seas.fightin' the fritzes in the trenches."
"Oh, I'd just as soon," growled Joe. "I wouldn't give a damn."
"Say, Joe, I got a job lined up. Guess I oughtn't to blab around about it, but you're regular. I know you won't say nothin'. I been on the bum for two weeks, somethin' wrong with my stomach. Man, I'm sick, I'm tel in' you. I can't do no heavy work no more. A punk I know works in a whitefront been slippin' me my grub, see. Wel , I was sittin' on a bench right here on the square, a fel er kinda wel dressed sits down an' starts to chum up. Looked to me like one of these here sissies lookin' for rough trade, see, thought I'd rol him for some jack,
-173-what the hel , what can you do if you're sick an' can't work?" Joe sat leaning back with his legs stuck out, his hands in his pockets staring hard at the outline of the battleship against the buildings. Tex was talking fast, poking his face into Joe's: "Turns out the sonofabitch was a dick. S --t I was scared pissless. A secret service agent. Burns is his big boss . . . but what he's lookin' for's reds, slackers, German spies, guys that can't keep their traps shut . . . an' he turns around and hands me out a job, twentyfive smackers a week if little Wil y makes good. Al I got to do's bum around and listen to guys talk, see? If I hears anything that ain't 100 per cent I slips the word to the boss and he investigates. Twentyfive a week and servin'
my country besides, and if I gets in any kind of jam, Burns gets me out. . . . What do you think of that for the gravy, Joe?"
Joe got to his feet. "Guess I'l go back to Brooklyn."
"Stick around . . . look here, you've always treated me white . . . you belong, I know that Joe . . . I'l put you next to this guy if you want. He's a good scout, edu-cated fel er an' al that and he knows where you can get plenty liquor an' women if you want 'em." "Hel , I'm goin' to sea and get out of al this s --t," said Joe, turning his back and walking towards the subway station.