U.S.A_ - John Dos Passos [385]
Paul blushed, he looked as if he were going to cry; Charley wondered if Paul had thought of the same thing held thought of. "Wel , let's see; whose deal was it?" said Joe Askew briskly.
Round noon Major Taylor came into the smokingroom.
"Good morning, everybody. . . . I know nobody feels worse than I do. Commandant says we may not dock til tomorrow morning."
They put up the cards without finishing the hand.
"That's nice," said Joe Askew.
"It's just as wel ," said Ol ie Taylor. "I'm a wreck. The last of the harddrinking hardriding Taylors is a wreck. We could stand the war but the peace has done us in." Charley looked up in Ol ie Taylor's grey face sagging in the pale glare of the fog through the smokingroom win-dows and noticed the white streaks in his hair and mus-tache. Gosh, he thought to himself, I'm going to quit this drinking.
They got through lunch somehow, then scattered to
their cabins to sleep. In the corridor outside his cabin Charley met Mrs. Johnson. "Wel , the first ten days'l be the hardest, Mrs. Johnson."
"Why don't you cal me Eveline, everybody else does?" Charley turned red.
"What's the use? We won't ever see each other again."
"Why not?" she said. He looked into her long hazel eyes; the pupils widened til the hazel was al black.
"Jesus, I'd like it if we could," he stammered. " Don't think for a minute I . . ." She'd already brushed silkily past him and was gone down the corridor. He went into his cabin and slammed the door. His bags were packed. The steward had put away the bedclothes. Charley threw himself face down on
-7-the striped mustysmel ing ticking of the mattress. "God damn that woman," he said aloud.
The rattle of a steamwinch woke him, then he heard
the jingle of the engineroom bel . He looked out the port-hole and saw a yel ow and white revenuecutter and, be-yond, vague pink sunlight on frame houses. The fog was lifting; they were in the Narrows.
By the time he'd splashed the aching sleep out of his eyes and run up on deck, the Niagara was nosing her way slowly across the greengrey glinting bay. The ruddy fog was looped up like curtains overhead. A red ferryboat crossed their bow. To the right there was a line of four-and fivemasted schooners at anchor, beyond them a square-rigger and a huddle of squatty Shipping Board steamers, some of them stil striped and mottled with camouflage. Then dead ahead, the up and down gleam in the blur of the tal buildings of New York.
Joe Askew came up to him with his trenchcoat on and his German fieldglasses hung over his shoulder. Joe's blue eyes were shining. "Do you see the Statue of Liberty yet, Charley?"
"No . . . yes, there she is. I remembered her lookin'
bigger."
"There's Black Tom where the explosion was."
"Things look pretty quiet, Joe."
"It's Sunday, that's why."
"It would be Sunday."
They were opposite the Battery now. The long spans
of the bridges to Brooklyn went off into smoky shadow behind the pale skyscrapers.
"Wel , Charley, that's where they keep al the money. We got to get some of it away from
'em," said Joe Askew, tugging at his mustache.
"Wish I knew how to start in, Joe."
They were skirting a long row of roofed slips. Joe held
-8-out his hand. "Wel , Charley, write to me, kid, do you hear? It was a great war while it lasted."
"I sure wil , Joe."
Two tugs were shoving the Niagara around into the
slip against the strong ebbtide. American and French flags flew over the wharfbuilding, in the dark doorways were groups of people waving. "There's my wife," said Joe Askew suddenly. He squeezed Charley's hand. "So long, kid. We're home." First thing Charley knew, too soon, he was walking
down the gangplank. The transportofficer barely looked at his papers; the customsman said, "Wel , I guess it's good to be home, lieutenant," as he put the stamps on his grip. He got past the Y man and the two reporters and the member of the mayor's committee; the few people and the scattered trunks looked lost and lonely in the huge yel