U.S.A_ - John Dos Passos [443]
Next to Charley at the bar stood a couple of fattish dowdylooking women. They were with a redfaced man
who was pretty drunk already. The women were talking about clothes and the man was tel ing about Bel eau Wood. Right away he and Charley were old buddies from the A.E.F.
"The name is De Vries. Profession . . . bon-vivant," said the man and tugged at the two women until they faced around towards Charley. He put his arms
around them with a flourish and shouted, "Meet the wife." They had drinks on Bel eau Wood, the Argonne, the
St. Mihiel salient, and the battle of Paree. The women said goodness, how they wanted to go to Hoboken to the hofbrau. Charley said he'd take them al in his car. They sobered up a little and were pretty quiet crossing on the ferry. At the restaurant in the chil y dark Hoboken street they couldn't get anything but beer. After they'd finished supper De Vries said he knew a place where they could get real liquor. They circled round blocks and blocks and ended in a dump in Union City. When they'd drunk
enough to start them doing squaredances the women said wouldn't it be wonderful to go to Harlem. This time the ferry didn't sober them up so much because they had a bot-tle of scotch with them. In Harlem they were thrown out of a dancehal and at last landed in a nightclub. The bon--233-vivant fel down the redcarpeted stairs and Charley had a time laughing that off with the management. They ate fried chicken and drank some terrible gin the colored waiter sent out for, and danced. Charley kept thinking how beautiful y he was dancing. He couldn't make out why he didn't have any luck picking up any of the high-yal ers. Next morning he woke up in a room in a hotel. He
looked around. No, there wasn't any woman in the bed. Except that his head ached and his ears were burning, he felt good. Stomach al right. For a moment he thought he'd just landed from France. Then he thought of the Packard, where the hel had he left it? He reached for the phone. "Say, what hotel is this?" It was the McAlpin, goodmorning. He remembered Joe Turbino's number and phoned him to ask what the best thing for a hangover was. When he was through phoning he didn't feel so good. His mouth tasted like the floor of a chickencoop. He went back to sleep. The phone woke him. "A gentleman to see you." Then he remembered al about Doris. The guy from Tur-bino's brought a bottle of scotch. Charley took a drink of it straight, drank a lot of icewater, took a bath, ordered up some breakfast. But it was time to go out to lunch. He put the bottle of scotch in his overcoat pocket and went round to Frank and Joe's for a cocktail. That night he took a taxi up to Harlem. He went from joint to joint dancing with the highyal ers. He got in a fight in a breakfastclub. It was day when he found himself in another taxi going downtown to Mrs. Darling's. He didn't have any money to pay the taximan and the man insisted on going up in the elevator while he got the money. There was nobody in the apartment but the col-ored maid and she shel ed out five dol ars. She tried to get Charley to lie down but he wanted to write her out a check. He could sign his name al right but he couldn't sign it on
-234-the check. The maid tried to get him to take a bath and go to bed. She said he had blood al over his shirt. He felt fine and was al cleaned up, had been asleep in a barberchair while the barber shaved him and put an ice-bag on his black eye, and he had gone back to Frank and Joe's for a pickup when there was Nat Benton. Good old Nat was worried asking him about his black eye and he was showing Nat where he'd skinned his knuckles on the guy, but