U.S.A_ - John Dos Passos [195]
"Dod gast it, if this is their spring, I hate to think what
-40-their winter's like. . . . I'l give the coat back to you when I go in. Jeez, my feet are cold. . . . Say, did they search you?" Mr. Zentner rol ed up his eyes. "Outra-geous," he spluttered . . . "Vat indignities to a buyer from a neutral and friendly country. Vait til I tel the ambassador. I shal sue. I shal demand damages.""Same here," said Joe, laughing. The corporal appeared in the door and shouted, " Wil-liams." Joe gave back the coat and shook Mr. Zentner's fat hand. "Say, for Gawd's sake, don't forget to tel the consul there's another American here. They're talkin'
about sendin' me to a concentration camp for duration."
"Sure, don't vorry, boy. I'l get you out," said Mr. Zent-ner, puffing out his chest. This time Joe was taken to a regular cel that had a little light and room to walk around. The corporal gave him a pair of shoes and some wool socks ful of holes. He couldn't get the shoes on but the socks warmed his feet up a little. At noon they handed him a kind of stew that was mostly potatoes with eyes in them and some more bread and margarine. The third day when the turnkey brought the noonday
slum, he brought a brownpaper package that had been opened. In it was a suit of clothes, shirt, flannel under-wear, socks and even a necktie.
"There was a chit with it, but it's against the regulay-tions," said the turnkey. "That outfit'l make a bloomin'
toff out of you."
Late that afternoon the turnkey told Joe to come along and he put on the clean col ar that was too tight for his neck and the necktie and hitched up the pants that were much too big for him around the waist and fol owed along corridors and across a court ful of tommies into a little office with a sentry at the door and a sergeant at a desk. Sitting on a chair was a busylooking young man with a straw hat on his knees. " 'Ere's your man, sir," said the
-41-sergeant without looking at Joe. "I'l let you question him." The busylooking young man got to his feet and went
up to Joe. "Wel , you've certainly been making me a lot of trouble, but I've been over the records in your case and it looks to me as if you were what you represented your-self to be. . . . What's your father's name?"
"Same as mine, Joseph P. Wil iams. . . . Say, are you the American consul?"
"I'm from the consulate. . . . Say, what the hel do you want to come ashore without a passport for? Don't you think we have anything better to do than to take care of a lot of damn fools that don't know enough to come in when it rains? Damn it, I was goin' to play golf this afternoon and here I've been here two hours waiting to get you out of the cooler."
"Jeez, I didn't come ashore. They come on and got me."
"That'l teach you a lesson, I hope. . . . Next time you have your papers in order."
"Yessirree . . . I shu wil ."
A half an hour later Joe was out on the street, the cigar-box and his old clothes rol ed up in a bal under his arm. It was a sunny afternoon; the redfaced people in dark clothes, longfaced women in crummy hats, the streets ful of big buses and the tal trol eycars; everything looked awful funny, until he suddenly remembered it was Eng-land and he'd never been there before. He had to wait a long time in an empty office at the consulate while the busylooking young man made up a lot of papers. He was hungry and kept thinking of beef-steak and frenchfried. At last he was cal ed to the desk and given a paper and told that there was a berth al ready for him on the American steamer Tampa, out of Pensa-cola, and held better go right down to the agents and make sure about it and go on board and if they caught him
-42-around Liverpool again it would be the worse for him. Say, is there any way I can get anything to eat around here, Mr. Consul?""What do you think this is, a restau-rant? . . . No, we have no appropriations for any hand-outs. You ought to be grateful for what we've done al-ready.""They never paid me off on the Argyle and I'm about