The Adventures of Augie March - Saul Bellow [117]
in the school building. He never did look warm enough, but chill and sickly and with primitive prohibition of anyone's approaching him. Smoking Mexican cigarettes, he went through the halls by himself, often with a comb, running it through his hair, which was beautiful, black and high. Well there had been some changes. He looked healthier, or at least didn't have that thistle-flower purple in his tinge, and he wore a better suit. Under his arm were heavy books. "Are you at the university?" I said. "I got a scholarship in math and physics. What about you?" "I wash dogs. Can't you tell I spend my time with dogs?" "No I don't notice anything. But what are you doing?" "That is what I'm doing." It greatly bothered him that I had such a flunky job, washing cages and sweeping up dogs' hair; and also that I was no longer a college man but trying to keep up on Helmholtz who was a dead number to him; in other words, that I should be of the unformed darkened-out mass. It was often that way with me, that people would feel the world owed me distinctness. "What would I do at the university? I'm not like you, Manny, with a special talent." "Don't tear yourself down," he said. "You should see the snots there are on campus. What special have they got, except the dough? You should go and find out what you can do, and then after four years if you aren't any good at any special thing, you at least have this degree, and it won't be just any sonofabitch who can kick you around." My aching back! I thought. There'd still be black forces waiting to give me the boot, and if I had a degree the indignity would be all the greater, and I'd have heartburn from it. "You shouldn't waste your time," he further said. "Don't you see that to do any little thing you have to take an examination, you have to pay a fee and get a card or a diploma? You better get wise to this. If people don't know what you qualify in they'll never know where to place you, and that can be dangerous. You have to get in there and do something for yourself. Even if you're just waiting, you have to know what you're waiting for, you have to specialize. And don't wait too long or you'll be passed by." It wasn't so much what he said that affected me, though that was interesting and probably full of truth; it was his friendship that I responded to. I didn't want to let go of him, and I clung to him. I was moved that he thought of me. '^How'm I supposed to go to school, Manny, if I'm broke?" "How do you think I do it? The scholarship isn't enough, it's only V tuition scholarship. I get a little dough from the NYA and I'm in a racket swiping books." "Books?" "Like these. I stole them this afternoon. Technical books, texts. I take orders even. If I pick up twenty or thirty a month and get from two to five bucks apiece, I make out all right. Texts cost. What's the matter, are you honest?" he said, looking to see if he had queered himself with me. "Not completely. I'm just surprised, Manny, because all I knew about you was that you were a wizard at math." "Also I ate once a day and didn't own a coat. You know that. Well, I give myself a little more now. I want to have it a little better. I don't go stealing for the kicks. As soon as I can I'll quit." "But what if you get nailed?" He said, "I'll explain how I feel about it. You see, I don't have larceny in my heart; I'm not a real crook. I'm not interested in it, so nobody can make a fate of it for me. That's not my fate. I might get into a little trouble, but I never would let them make it my trouble, get it?" I did get it, having been around Joe German, who looked at the same question another way. But Padilla was a gifted crook all the same and took pride in his technique. We made a date for Saturday, and he gave me an exhibition. When we walked out of a shop I couldn't tell whether or not he had taken anything, he was so good at maneuvering. Outside he'd show me a copy of Sinnott's Botany or Schlesinger's Chemistry. Valuable books only; he'd never take orders for cheaper ones. Handing me his list, he'd tell me to pick the next title and he'd