U.S.A_ - John Dos Passos [40]
slowly through the flat sunlight in the Botanical Gardens and look at the little labels on the trees and shrubs and see the fat robins and the starlings hop across the grass and walk up the steps and through the flat air of the rotunda with the dead statues of different sizes and the Senate Chamber flat red and the committee room and the House flat green and the committee rooms and the Su-preme Court I've forgotten what color the Supreme Court was and the committee rooms
and whispering behind the door of the visitors' gal-lery and the dead air and a voice rattling under the glass skylights and desks slammed and the long corridors ful of the dead air and our legs would get very tired and I thought of the starlings on the grass and the long streets ful of dead air and my legs were tired and I had a pain between the eyes and the old men bowing with quick slit eyes
may be somebody and big slit unkind mouths and
the dusty black felt and the smel of coatclosets and dead air and I wonder what the old major thought about and what I thought about maybe about that big picture at the Corcoran Art Gal ery ful of columns and steps and con-spirators and Caesar in purple fal en flat cal ed Caesar dead
-97-MAC
Mac had hardly gotten off the train at Goldfield when a lanky man in skhaki shirt and breeches, wearing canvas army leggins, went up to him. "If you don't mind, what's your business in this town, brother?""I'm travelin' in books.""What kinda books?
""Schoolbooks and the like, for Truthseeker, Inc. of Chicago." Mac rattled it off very fast, and the man seemed impressed. "I guess you're al right," he said. "Going up to the Eagle?" Mac nodded.
"Plug'l take ye up, the fel er with the team . . . You see we're looking out for these goddam agitators, the I Won't Work outfit."
Outside the Golden Eagle Hotel there were two sol-diers on guard, toughlooking sawedoff men with their hats over their eyes. When Mac went in everybody at the bar turned and looked at him. He said "Good evening, gents," as snappily as possible and went up to the pro-prietor to ask for a room. Al the while he was wondering who the hel he dared ask where the office of the Nevada Workman was. "I guess I can fix you up with a bed. Travelin' man?""Yes," said Mac. "In books." Down at the end a big man with walrus whiskers was standing at the bar talking fast in a drunken whining voice, "If they'd only give me my head I'd run the bastards outa town soon enough. Too goddam many lawyers mixed up in this. Run the sonsobitches out. If they resists shoot 'em, that's what I says to the Governor, but they're al these sonsobitches a lawyers fussin' everythin' up al the time with warrants and habeas corpus and longwinded rigmarole. My ass to habeas corpus.""Al right, Joe, you tel 'em," said the proprietor soothingly. Mac bought a cigar and sauntered out. As the door closed behind him the big man was yel -ing out again, "I said, My ass to habeas corpus." It was nearly dark. An icy wind blew through the ram-98-shackle clapboard streets. His feet stumbling in the mud of the deep ruts, Mac walked round several blocks look-ing up at dark windows. He walked al over the town but no sign of a newspaper office. When he found himself passing the same Chink hash joint for the third time, he slackened his steps and stood irresolutely on the curb. At the end of the street the great jagged shank of a hil hung over the town. Across the street a young man, his head and ears huddled into the col ar of a mackinaw, was loaf-ing against the dark window of a hardware store. Mac decided he was a squarelooking stiff and went over to speak to him.
"Say, bo, where's the office of the Nevada Workman?"
"What the hel d'you wanter know for?" Mac and the other man looked at each other. "I want to see Fred Hoff . . . I came on from San Fran to help in the
printin'.""Got a red card?" Mac pul ed out his I.W.W. membership card. "I've got my union card, too, if you want to see that."
"Hel , no . . . I guess you're al right, but, as the fel er said, suppose