Confederacy of Dunces, A - John Kennedy Toole [116]
“Oh, if I weren’t so glad to see him back on the beat, I’d telephone the police and have him arrested immediately for soliciting. You don’t know the wonderful expression that man used to get on his face when the squad car arrived to take him off. And the arresting officers. It was too priceless. But we’ll all be so grateful to have him back. No one will dare mistreat him now. So long, Gypsy Mother.”
Dorian skipped off down the alley to find the decadent mariner. Ignatius looked toward Royal Street and wondered what had happened to the women’s art guild. He lumbered over to the passageway where his cart was hidden, prepared a hot dog, and prayed that some customers would happen along before the day was over. Sadly he realized how low Fortuna had spun his wheel. He had never imagined that he would one day be praying that people buy hot dogs from him. At least he had a magnificent new scheme ready for launching against M. Minkoff. The thought of the kickoff rally cheered him greatly. This time the minx would be totally confounded.
IV
It was all a matter of storage. From almost one to three every afternoon George was stuck with the packages. One afternoon he had gone to a movie, but even there in the dark watching a double bill of two nudist colony films he wasn’t comfortable. He was afraid to put the packages down on an adjoining seat, especially in a theater like that one. Holding them in his lap, he was reminded of the burden throughout the three hours of tanned flesh that filled the screen. On the other days he had carried them around with him during boring wanderings through the business district and the Quarter. But by three o’clock he was so tired from the marathon of strolling that he hardly had the enthusiasm to negotiate his day’s business; and in two hours of being carried, the wrapping on the packages got damp and started to break. If one of those packages broke open on the street, he could plan to spend the next few years in a juvenile detention home. Why had that undercover agent tried to arrest him in the rest room? He hadn’t done a thing. That agent must have had some sort of detective ESP.
Finally George thought of a place that would at least guarantee him some rest and a chance to sit down, St. Louis Cathedral. He sat in one of the pews next to a bank of vigil lights and decorated his hands, his packages stacked beside him. When his hands were done, he picked a missal from the rack before him and looked through it, refreshing his dim knowledge of the mechanics of the Mass by studying the drawings of the celebrant as he moved through the devotions. The Mass was really very simple, George thought. Until it was time to leave he flipped back and forth through the missal. Then he gathered up his packages and went out onto Chartres Street.
A sailor leaning against a lamppost winked at him. George acknowledged the greeting with an obscene gesture of his tattooed hands and slouched off down the street. As he passed Pirate’s Alley, he heard screaming. There in the Alley the crazy hot dog vendor was trying to stab a fairy with a plastic knife. That vendor was really far out. George paused for a second to look at the earring and scarf that were heaving and bobbing while the fairy shrieked. That vendor probably didn’t know what day it was or what month or even what year. He must have thought today was Mardi Gras.
Just in time George saw the rest room undercover agent coming down the street behind the sailor. He looked like a beatnik. George ran behind one of the arches of the ancient Spanish governmental building, the Cabildo, and dashed through the arcade out onto St. Peter Street, where he continued running until he reached Royal and headed uptown to the bus lines.
Now the undercover agent was prowling around the Cathedral. George had to give it to the cops. They were really on the ball. Christ. A guy didn’t have a chance.
So his mind returned to the matter of storage. He was beginning to feel like some escaped convict hiding out