U.S.A_ - John Dos Passos [487]
peevishly on the tablecloth. "What a shame . . . I don't know who I could get to go now, it's so late. She's in the country."
"My, that's too bad. . . . I don't suppose I could pinchhit for the boss?"
"Of al the gal . . ." she began; then suddenly she found herself laughing. "But you're not dressed."
"Leave it to me, Miss Dowlin'. . . . You eat your sup-per and I'l come back in a soup an'
fish and take you to the show."
Promptly at eight there he was back with his hair
slicked, wearing a rustylooking dinnerjacket that was too short in the sleeves. When they got in the taxi she asked him if he'd hijacked a waiter and he put his hand over his mouth and said, "Don't say a wold, Miss Dowlin' . . . it's hired." Between the acts, he pointed out al the celebrities to her, including himself. He told her that his name was Clifton Wegman and that everybody cal ed him Cliff and that he was twentythree years old and could play the man-dolin and was a little demon with pocket bil iards.
"Wel , Cliff, you're a likely lad," she said.
"Likely to succeed?"
"I'l tel the world."
"A popular graduate of the New York School of Busi-ness . . . opportunities wanted." They had the time of their lives together. After the
-336-show Cliff said he was starved, because he hadn't had his supper, what with chasing the theatertickets and the tuck and al , and she took him to the Club Dover to have a bite to eat. He surely had an appetite. It was a pleasure to see him put away a beefsteak with mushrooms. They had home drinks there and laughed their heads off at the floorshow, and, when he tried to get fresh in the taxicab, she slapped his face, but not very hard. That kid could talk himself out of anything.
When they got to her door, he said could he come up and before she could stop herself she'd said yes, if he acted like a gentleman. He said that wasn't so easy with a girl like her but he'd try and they were laughing and scuffling so in front of her door she dropped her key. They both stooped to pick it up. When she got to her feet flush-ing from the kiss he'd given her, she noticed that the man sitting al hunched up on the stairs beside the elevator was Tony.
"Wel , goodnight, Cliff, thanks for seeing a poor little workinggirl home," Margo said cheerily.
Tony got to his feet and staggered over towards the open door of the apartment. His face had a green pal or and his clothes looked like he'd lain in the gutter al night.
"This is Tony," said Margo. "He's a . . . a relative of mine . . . not in very good repair." Cliff looked from one to the other, let out a low whistle and walked down the stairs.
"Wel , now you can tel me what you mean by hanging around my place. . . . I've a great mind to have you ar-rested'for a burglar." Tony could hardly talk. His lip was bloody and al
puffed up. "No place to go," he said. "A gang beat me up." He was teetering so she had to grab the sleeve of his filthy overcoat to keep him from fal ing. "Oh, Tony," she said,
"you sure are a mess. Come on in, but if you pul any
-337-tricks like you did last time . . . I swear to God I'l break every bone in your body." She put him to bed. Next morning he was so jittery she had to send for a doctor. The sawbones said he was suffer-ing from dope and exposure and suggested a cure in a sanatorium. Tony lay in bed white and trembling. He cried a great deal, but he was as meek as a lamb and said yes, he'd do anything the doctor said. Once he grabbed her hand and kissed it and begged her to forgive him for hav-ing stolen her money so that he could die happy. "You won't die, not you," said Margo, smoothing the stiff black hair off his forehead with her free hand. "No such luck." She went out for a little walk on the Drive to try to decide what to do. The dizzysweet clinging smel of the paraldehyde the doctor had given Tony for a sedative had made her feel sick.
At the end of the week when Charley Anderson came
back from Detroit and met her at the place on Fiftysecond