The four friends drifted out into the street from Ceccina’s. Linking
arms, they paraded towards Sixth avenue, singing. Binks had to be put in
the middle because he wobbled at the knees. Stanny and Jasper each had a
good edge on, too. Jasper was gloriously released. Wilfred observed them
enviously. I can drink like a fish, he thought, and it has no effect
whatever!
They made a round of their favorite resorts; the Grapevine; Maria’s;
Mould’s over on University Place. Wilfred tossed down more fiery
potations than the _vino de pasto_ of Ceccina’s. It only intensified his
self-consciousness. I’ll never be able to carry it through! . . . You
_shall_ go through with it! He was ceaselessly plotting how he could
shake his friends without exciting ribald comment. As they became really
drunk that offered no difficulty. But how dear they became to him! How
he hated to leave them! . . . I really ought not to leave them now. I’ve
got the only cool head in the party. They might get into serious
trouble. Some other night I’ll start out alone and . . . Come off!
You’ve _got_ to go through with it!
In the end he found himself alone without knowing exactly how it had
come about. I must be getting drunk! he thought hopefully. But no! the
surroundings were still bitten into his consciousness as with acid. The
trees of Union Square, misshapen like rickety children, and tragic in
the bareness of November; the ugly statue of Lincoln on the corner that
he had passed a thousand times without ever seeing it; the green
electric cars creeping like worms around the double curve; and that
endless, dingy press of people that shuffled back and forth on the south
side of Fourteenth street every night in the year. Such dulled and
flaccid faces! Why were they deader than the faces on other streets? Why
did they crowd together on the one sidewalk, leaving the other empty?
Wilfred went east on Fourteenth street. That stretch of Fourth avenue
between Union Square and Cooper Square was devoted after nightfall to
the traffic in which he was resolved to share. He turned into Fourth
avenue with a wildly beating heart. It was not crowded here; just a few
figures furtively veering and hauling on their way. The shop windows
were dark, except those of the dazzling saloons on every corner.
Wilfred’s tongue clave to the roof of his mouth. How can I choose when
I’m so shaky? he thought. What do you say to them at first, anyway? What
a pitiful fool I should appear if I tried to address one with a thick
tongue! I’ll never be able to go through with it! . . . You _shall_ go
through with it! Wilfred perceived a young woman approaching, with her
eyes fixed on him. In blind panic he stopped, and made believe to be
attracted by something in a shop window. It was a cobbler’s window,
quite dark, with nothing in it but a row of run-over shoes to be mended.
An arm was slipped through Wilfred’s arm, and a voice murmured in his
ear: “Hello, sweetheart!” Wilfred turned a pair of terrified eyes. She
was not bad-looking; a Greek girl perhaps; dark and opulent. Her face
was not painted. Her glance was fairly open—at least she had not the
leer that Wilfred so dreaded. He felt himself like putty in her
experienced hands, and was relieved. This is not as bad as I expected;
he thought. A price was named, and certain conditions laid down. This
part seemed very unreal.
The next thing Wilfred knew, he was being shepherded up a steep straight
flight of stairs over a saloon. There was a red carpet on the stairs,
sooty on the edges, and worn threadbare in the middle. At the top of the
steps stood a desk; a dog-eared hotel register lay upon it. A young
waiter appeared from somewhere; and collecting a dollar from Wilfred,
shoved the register towards him to be signed. Wilfred wondered about the
waiter. A fellow his own age. Though his white suit was much soiled, he
was not uncomely, with his stiff blond hair sticking up on his crown
like a schoolboy’s.
The waiter whisked them into a bedroom close at hand, and shut the door.
Wilfred drew a long breath to steady himself. There he was alone in a
bedroom with a woman he had never seen until five minutes before, and
who was already preparing to reveal herself. How amazing! One swift
glance around, and the common room was photographed on his brain
forever. The cheap yellow bureau just inside the door, where Wilfred
stood frozen, one hand resting upon it. He could see himself from the
outside as if the eyes of his soul were suspended under the ceiling.
Stretched across under the window, the bed, because there was no other
possible place for it; in the corner behind Wilfred, the washstand; two
chairs—all of the same ugly yellow wood. The bed was covered with a
soiled white spread which still bore a significant impress in the
middle. Wilfred wondered if the impress was still warm.
Wishing to do the thing in good style, he had ordered drinks; and they
were now brought; cocktails with a red cherry in the bottom of each
glass. Wilfred looked at the young waiter again. He put the tray on the
bureau, and departed without looking at Wilfred. He had an
extraordinarily inscrutable air; he had taught himself to see nothing;
to give nothing away. What a queer job for a lad, popping in and out of
the bedrooms! Wilfred wondered if he had ever been out in the country.
How many rooms were there in the place? All occupied no doubt. He
listened.
He indicated one of the drinks to his companion. He would not carry it
to her, for fear of betraying the trembling of his hand.
“Much obliged, fella,” she said politely, “but I don’t indulge. Drink
’em both yourself. You kin understand if I drank with every fella, I’d
be paralyzed before morning.”
Good God! thought Wilfred. “How many?” he asked involuntarily.
“Aah, fergit it!” she said, perfectly good-tempered. “What do you look
at me like that for?”
Wilfred, abashed, schooled his eyes, and started slowly to undress. He
had no feeling of shame; but only of strangeness.
His companion chattered away. She was rather a likeable sort. “It’s the
drink that does for girls. So I keep away from it. The rest don’t do you
no harm, if you take care of yourself. You kin depend upon me, fella. My
name’s Angela. I ain’t been at this long. I started it so’s I could help
me mutter out, and keep me young sister in school. She’s smart. We’re
gonna send her to college. You’re a nice lookin’ fella. Is this the
first time?”
“No,” said Wilfred quickly.
“Bet it is, though I kin tell. None of them wants to admit it. Well, you
might do worse than begin wit’ me. You look somepin like my fella. He’s
blond, too. But he’s got twenty pounds on you.”
Wilfred had heard that these girls always had a lover. That seemed
strange to him.
“He’s a deckhand on the steamboat _Albertina_. . . .”