From Here to Eternity_ The Restored Edit - Jones, James [84]
Andy would not look at him. “Bloom said if it didnt work out to roll him, we could get drinks off him anyway, and carfare home. Whats the difference?”
“He lied to you. Thats the difference. Why would he lie to you? He knows nobody can roll a Honolulu queer. Whynt he tell you the truth? I wouldnt trust no guy that lied to me. Maybe he’s pimpin for this queer. You’re liable to end up gettin made, instead of gettin blowed. Theres somethin about Bloom I dont like.”
“So I should leave him alone, I guess?” Andy said, angrily, not meeting Prew’s eyes. “There aint no queer goin to make me. Who the hell are you to tell me how to run my life? You’re goin to town with Maggio, aint you?”
“Okay,” Prew said. “Suit yourself, buddy.”
“He ast me to go,” Andy said. “I dint ask him. And I’m goin. A guy can rot sittin around this goddam barracks. Cant even play the git-tars with the rain on. Be mad at me if you want to, I’m goin anyway.”
“Hell,” Prew said. “I aint mad at you. I just think you’re dumb, thats all. If you want to pick up a queer, go by yourself.” He sat down on the end of the bench and picked up the deck that Andy had collected up and stacked, and began practicing the old one-handed cut, remembering the time he’d learned it, in a boxcar, on the bum.
It was also on the bum, at the tender age of twelve, that he’d had his first experience with queers, when a fifty-year-old jocker had seduced him in a rolling boxcar. It was more a rape than a seduction, since another man had had to hold him.
He looked up at Andy, his lips drawn back very tight in a grin that was more a snarl, his eyes very flat and far away and glinty. It was also on the bum, at the not so tender age of fifteen, that he’d knocked another jocker off a steep downgrade in Georgia and later read about them finding the dead body and the resulting roundup of free labor for the State that he had escaped.
“You do whatever you want,” he said to Andy thinly. “If the guy turns out to be a jocker and you get pogued, go see the Chaplain. I’ll loan you my card; it aint punched out yet.”
“You tryin to scare me?” Andy scoffed. “Are you goin now?” he said to Friday. “I got to put my civvies on. I’m meetin Bloom in the Dayroom in fifteen minutes.”
“You better listen to him,” Sal Clark said. “You better not go with Bloom.”
“For Chris’ sakes, lay off of me,” Andy said. “A man cant sit on his can in these barracks all his life. Are you goin to the show or aint you?”
“I guess I will go to the show,” Sal Clark said. “I can practice dealin them cards tomorrow. Whynt you borrow a dime, Prew, and come on with me? You only need a dime. I got thirty cents.”
“No thanks, Friday,” Prew said, looking at the seriousness of the long thin olive face and feeling the sense of warmth again. “I promised Angelo I’d wait.”
“Whatever you say,” Sal Clark said. “You have a good time in town.”
“Okay,” Prew said. “Listen, dont you let Bloom talk you into goin queer huntin with him, hear me?”
“Not me,” Sal Clark said solemnly. “I dont like queers. They make me feel funny, they make me scared.”
“If you want to go queer huntin, go by yourself,” Prew said. He watched them leave, then laid out a hand of Sal’s and began to wait. He didnt have to wait long. The other two had not been gone ten minutes before little Angelo came bursting into the latrine, slamming back the doors so hard they banged.
“Well,” Prew said, looking up. “How much did you win?”
“Win?” Maggio said violently. “Win! I won about forty bucks, in one hand. You think that’ll be enough to go to goddam town?”
“Fair,” Prew said dryly. “How much did you lose?”
“Lose? Oh,” Maggio said vehemently. “Lose. I lost forty-seven dollars. Also in one hand, the second hand. God,” he said looking around for something he could throw and finding nothing, took his new-blocked hat and slammed it down on the floor. He kicked it viciously, putting a big muddy dent in the papier-mâché-stiff