Rules of Civility - Amor Towles [123]
—May I?
He studied me for a second as if I’d roused him from a dream-filled sleep. I could see now that he was as high as the Himalayas.
—I’ve seen you before, he said matter-of-factly.
—Really? From what distance?
—You were a friend of Hank’s. I saw you at The Lean-To.
—Oh. Right.
I vaguely remembered him now as one of the WPA types who had sat at the adjacent table.
—Actually, I was kind of looking for Hank, I said. Is he here?
—Here? No . . .
He eyed me up and down. He rubbed his fingers across the stubble on his chin.
—I guess you aint heard.
—Heard what?
He studied me a moment more.
—He’s gone.
—Gone?
—Gone for good.
For a moment I was startled. It was that strange sense of surprise that unsettles us, however briefly, in the face of the inevitable.
—When? I asked.
—A week or so.
—What happened?
—That’s the twist. After spending months on the dole, he had a windfall. Not nickels, you understand. Real money. Second-chance money. Build yourself a house of bricks money. But Hank, he takes the whole wad and throws himself a riot.
The jackal looked around as if he’d suddenly remembered where he was. He waved his beer bottle at the room with distaste.
—Nothin like this.
The motion seemed to remind him that his bottle was empty. With a rattle, he dumped it in the sink. He took a new one from the icebox, closed the door and leaned back.
—Yeah, he continued. It was somethin. And Hank was ring-leadin the whole thing. He had a pocketful of twenties. He was sendin the boys out for tupelo honey and turpenteen. Dolin out the dough. Then around two in the morning he had everyone drag his paintings to the roof. He dumped em in a pile, doused em with gas and set em on fire.
The jackal smiled, for all of two seconds.
—Then he threw everybody out. And that’s the last we saw of him.
He took a drink and shook his head.
—Was it morphine, I asked.
—Was what morphine?
—Did he overdose?
The jackal gave an abrupt laugh and looked at me like I was crazy.
—He enlisted.
—Enlisted?
—Joined up. His old outfit. The Thirteenth Field Artillery. Fort Bragg. Cumberland County.
In a bit of a stupor, I turned to go.
—Hey. Didn’t you want a beer?
He took a bottle from the refrigerator and handed it to me. I don’t know why I took it. I didn’t want it anymore.
—See ya round, he said.
Then he leaned against the icebox and closed his eyes.
—Hey, I said rousing him again.
—Yeah?
—Do you know where it came from? The windfall, I mean.
—Sure. He sold a bunch of paintings.
—You’ve got to be kidding.
—I don’t kid.
—If he could sell his paintings, why did he enlist? Why did he burn the rest of them?
—It weren’t his paintings he sold. It was some Stuart Davises he come into.
When I opened the door to my apartment, it looked unlived-in. It wasn’t empty. I had my fair share of possessions. But for the last few weeks, I had been sleeping at Dicky’s, and slowly but surely the place had become orderly and clean. The sink and the garbage cans were empty. The floors were bare. The clothes lay folded in their drawers and the books waited patiently in their piles. It looked like the apartment of a widower a few weeks after he’s died, when his children have thrown out the trash but have yet to divvy up the dross.
That night, Dicky and I were supposed to meet for a late supper. Luckily, I caught him before he’d headed out. I told him that I was back at my place and ready to pack it in. It was obvious enough that something had spoiled the evening for me, but he didn’t ask what it was.
Dicky was probably the first man I’d dated who was so well raised that he couldn’t bring himself to pry. And I must have acquired a taste for the trait—because he was far from the last.
I poured myself a gin that was sized to make my apartment seem less depressing and sat in my father’s easy chair.
I think it had surprised the jackal a little that