she had, she could sort of scare you a little bit. If she’d been a big old prostitute, with a lot of makeup on her face and all, she wouldn’t have been half as spooky.
I went and got her dress for her. She put it on and all, and then she picked up her polo coat off the bed. “So long, crumb-bum,” she said.
“So long,” I said. I didn’t thank her or anything. I’m glad I didn’t.
14
After Old Sunny was gone, I sat in the chair for a while and smoked a couple of cigarettes. It was getting daylight outside. Boy, I felt miserable. I felt so depressed, you can’t imagine. What I did, I started talking, sort of out loud, to Allie. I do that sometimes when I get very depressed. I keep telling him to go home and get his bike and meet me in front of Bobby Fallon’s house. Bobby Fallon used to live quite near us in Maine — this is, years ago. Anyway, what happened was, one day Bobby and I were going over to Lake Sedebego on our bikes. We were going to take our lunches and all, and our BB guns — we were kids and all, and we thought we could shoot something with our BB guns. Anyway, Allie heard us talking about it, and he wanted to go, and I wouldn’t let him. I told him he was a child. So once in a while, now, when I get very depressed, I keep saying to him, “Okay. Go home and get your bike and meet me in front of Bobby’s house. Hurry up.” It wasn’t that I didn’t use to take him with me when I went somewhere. I did. But that one day, I didn’t. He didn’t get sore about it — he never got sore about anything — but I keep thinking about it anyway, when I get very depressed.
Finally, though, I got undressed and got in bed. I felt like praying or something, when I was in bed, but I couldn’t do it. I can’t always pray when I feel like it. In the first place, I’m sort of an atheist. I like Jesus and all, but I don’t care too much for most of the other stuff in the Bible. Take the Disciples, for instance. They annoy the hell out of me, if you want to know the truth. They were all right after Jesus was dead and all, but while He was alive, they were about as much use to Him as a hole in the head. All they did was keep letting Him down. I like almost anybody in the Bible better than the Disciples. If you want to know the truth, the guy I like best in the Bible, next to Jesus, was that lunatic and all, that lived in the tombs and kept cutting himself with stones. I like him ten times as much as the Disciples, that poor bastard. I used to get in quite a few arguments about it, when I was at Whooton School, with this boy that lived down the corridor, Arthur Childs. Old Childs was a Quaker and all, and he read the Bible all the time. He was a very nice kid, and I liked him, but I could never see eye to eye with him on a lot of stuff in the Bible, especially the Disciples. He kept telling me if I didn’t like the Disciples, then I didn’t like Jesus and all. He said that because Jesus picked the Disciples, you were supposed to like them. I said I knew He picked them, but that He picked them at random. I said He didn’t have time to go around analyzing everybody. I said I wasn’t blaming Jesus or anything. It wasn’t His fault that He didn’t have any time. I remember I asked old Childs if he thought Judas, the one that betrayed Jesus and all, went to Hell after he committed suicide. Childs said certainly. That’s exactly where I disagreed with him. I said I’d bet a thousand bucks that Jesus never sent old Judas to Hell. I still would, too, if I had a thousand bucks. I think any one of the Disciples would’ve sent him to Hell and all — and fast, too — but I’ll bet anything Jesus didn’t do it. Old Childs said the trouble with me was that I didn’t go to church or anything. He was right about that, in a way. I don’t. In the first place, my parents are different religions, and all the children in our family are atheists. If you want to know the truth, I can’t even stand ministers. The ones they’ve had at every school I’ve gone to, they all have these Holy Joe voices when they start giving their sermons. God, I hate that. I don’t see why the hell they can’t talk in their natural voice. They sound so phony when they talk.
Anyway, when I was in bed, I couldn’t pray worth a damn. Every time I got started, I kept picturing old Sunny calling me a crumb-bum. Finally, I sat up in bed and smoked another cigarette. It tasted lousy. I must’ve smoked around two packs since I left Pencey.
All of a sudden, while I was laying there smoking, somebody knocked on the door. I kept hoping it wasn’t my door they were knocking on, but I knew damn well it was. I don’t know how I knew, but I knew. I knew who it was, too. I’m psychic.
“Who’s there?” I said. I was pretty scared. I’m very yellow about those things.
They just knocked again, though. Louder.
Finally I got out of bed, with just my pajamas on, and opened the door. I didn’t even have to turn the light on in the room, because it was already daylight. Old Sunny and Maurice, the pimpy elevator guy, were standing there.
“What’s the matter? Wuddaya want?” I said. Boy, my voice was shaking like hell.
“Nothin’ much,” old Maurice said. “Just five bucks.” He did all the talking for the two of them. Old Sunny just stood there next to him, with her mouth open and all.
“I paid her already. I gave her five bucks. Ask her,” I said. Boy, was my voice shaking.
“It’s ten bucks, chief. I tole ya that. Ten bucks for a throw, fifteen bucks till noon. I tole ya that.”
“You did not tell me that. You said five bucks a throw. You said fifteen bucks till noon, all right, but I distinctly heard you—”
“Open up, chief.”
“What for?” I said. God, my old heart was damn near beating me out of the room. I wished I was dressed at least. It’s terrible to be just in your pajamas when something like that happens.
“Let’s go, chief,” old Maurice said. Then he gave me a big shove with his crumby hand. I damn near fell over on my can — he was a huge sonuvabitch. The next thing I knew, he and old Sunny were both in the room. They acted like they owned the damn place. Old Sunny sat down on the window sill. Old Maurice sat down in the big chair and loosened his collar and all — he was wearing this elevator operator’s uniform. Boy, was I nervous.
“All right, chief, let’s have it. I gotta get back to work.”
“I told you about ten times, I don’t owe you a cent. I already gave her the five—”
“Cut the crap, now. Let’s have it.”
“Why should I give her another five bucks?” I said. My voice was cracking all over the place. “You’re trying to chisel me.”
Old Maurice unbuttoned his whole uniform coat. All he had on underneath was a phony shirt collar, but no shirt or anything. He had a big fat hairy stomach. “Nobody’s tryna chisel nobody,” he said. “Let’s have it, chief.”
“No.”
When I said that, he got up from his chair and started walking towards me and all. He looked like he was very, very tired or very, very bored. God, was I scared. I sort of had my arms folded, I remember. It wouldn’t have been so bad, I don’t think, if I hadn’t had just my goddam pajamas on.
“Let’s have it, chief.” He came right up to where I was standing. That’s all he could say. “Let’s have it, chief.” He was a real moron.
“No.”
“Chief, you’re gonna force me inna roughin’ ya up a little bit. I don’t wanna do it, but that’s the way it looks,” he said. “You owe us five bucks.”
“I don’t owe you five bucks,” I said. “If you rough me up, I’ll yell like hell. I’ll wake up everybody in the hotel. The police and all.” My voice was shaking like a bastard.
“Go ahead. Yell your goddam head off. Fine,” old Maurice said. “Want your parents to know you spent the night with a whore? High-class kid like you?” He was pretty sharp, in his crumby way. He really was.
“Leave me alone. If you’d said ten, it’d be different. But you distinctly—”
“Are ya gonna let us have it?” He had me right up against the damn door. He was almost standing on top of me, his crumby old hairy stomach and all.
“Leave me alone. Get the hell out of my room,” I said. I still had my arms folded and all. God, what a jerk I was.
Then Sunny said something for the first time. “Hey, Maurice. Want me to get his wallet?” she said. “It’s right on the wutchamacallit.”
“Yeah, get it.”
“Leave my wallet alone!”
“I awreddy got it,” Sunny said. She waved five bucks at me. “See? All I’m takin’ is the five you owe me. I’m
