“Oh-h!” She looked at me over again. “Will you just—What was your
name?”
She vanished. In a moment Meyer Wolfshiem stood solemnly in the
doorway, holding out both hands. He drew me into his office, remarking
in a reverent voice that it was a sad time for all of us, and offered
me a cigar.
“My memory goes back to when first I met him,” he said. “A young major
just out of the army and covered over with medals he got in the war.
He was so hard up he had to keep on wearing his uniform because he
couldn’t buy some regular clothes. First time I saw him was when he
came into Winebrenner’s poolroom at Forty-third Street and asked for a
job. He hadn’t eat anything for a couple of days. ‘Come on have some
lunch with me,’ I said. He ate more than four dollars’ worth of food
in half an hour.”
“Did you start him in business?” I inquired.
“Start him! I made him.”
“Oh.”
“I raised him up out of nothing, right out of the gutter. I saw right
away he was a fine-appearing, gentlemanly young man, and when he told
me he was at Oggsford I knew I could use him good. I got him to join
the American Legion and he used to stand high there. Right off he did
some work for a client of mine up to Albany. We were so thick like
that in everything”—he held up two bulbous fingers—“always together.”
I wondered if this partnership had included the World’s Series
transaction in 1919.
“Now he’s dead,” I said after a moment. “You were his closest friend,
so I know you’ll want to come to his funeral this afternoon.”
“I’d like to come.”
“Well, come then.”
The hair in his nostrils quivered slightly, and as he shook his head
his eyes filled with tears.
“I can’t do it—I can’t get mixed up in it,” he said.
“There’s nothing to get mixed up in. It’s all over now.”
“When a man gets killed I never like to get mixed up in it in any
way. I keep out. When I was a young man it was different—if a friend
of mine died, no matter how, I stuck with them to the end. You may
think that’s sentimental, but I mean it—to the bitter end.”
I saw that for some reason of his own he was determined not to come,
so I stood up.
“Are you a college man?” he inquired suddenly.
For a moment I thought he was going to suggest a “gonnegtion,” but he
only nodded and shook my hand.
“Let us learn to show our friendship for a man when he is alive and
not after he is dead,” he suggested. “After that my own rule is to let
everything alone.”
When I left his office the sky had turned dark and I got back to West
Egg in a drizzle. After changing my clothes I went next door and found
Mr. Gatz walking up and down excitedly in the hall. His pride in his
son and in his son’s possessions was continually increasing and now he
had something to show me.
“Jimmy sent me this picture.” He took out his wallet with trembling
fingers. “Look there.”
It was a photograph of the house, cracked in the corners and dirty
with many hands. He pointed out every detail to me eagerly. “Look
there!” and then sought admiration from my eyes. He had shown it so
often that I think it was more real to him now than the house itself.
“Jimmy sent it to me. I think it’s a very pretty picture. It shows up
well.”
“Very well. Had you seen him lately?”
“He come out to see me two years ago and bought me the house I live in
now. Of course we was broke up when he run off from home, but I see
now there was a reason for it. He knew he had a big future in front of
him. And ever since he made a success he was very generous with me.”
He seemed reluctant to put away the picture, held it for another
minute, lingeringly, before my eyes. Then he returned the wallet and
pulled from his pocket a ragged old copy of a book called Hopalong
Cassidy.
“Look here, this is a book he had when he was a boy. It just shows
you.”
He opened it at the back cover and turned it around for me to see. On
the last flyleaf was printed the word schedule, and the date September
12, 1906. And underneath:
Rise from bed 6:00 a.m.
Dumbell exercise and wall-scaling 6:15-6:30 ”
Study electricity, etc. 7:15-8:15 ”
Work 8:30-4:30 p.m.
Baseball and sports 4:30-5:00 ”
Practise elocution, poise and how to attain it 5:00-6:00 ”
Study needed inventions 7:00-9:00 ”