“Yeah. Wanna talka Sally. Very important. Put her on.”
“Sally’s asleep, young man. Call her tomorrow. Good night.”
“Wake ’er up! Wake ’er up, hey. Attaboy.”
Then there was a different voice. “Holden, this is me.” It was old Sally. “What’s the big idea?”
“Sally? That you?”
“Yes — stop screaming. Are you drunk?”
“Yeah. Listen. Listen, hey. I’ll come over Christmas Eve. Okay? Trimma goddam tree for ya. Okay? Okay, hey, Sally?”
“Yes. You’re drunk. Go to bed now. Where are you? Who’s with you?”
“Sally? I’ll come over and trimma tree for ya, okay? Okay, hey?”
“Yes. Go to bed now. Where are you? Who’s with you?”
“Nobody. Me, myself and I.” Boy was I drunk! I was even still holding onto my guts. “They got me. Rocky’s mob got me. You know that? Sally, you know that?”
“I can’t hear you. Go to bed now. I have to go. Call me tomorrow.”
“Hey, Sally! You want me trimma tree for ya? Ya want me to? Huh?”
“Yes. Good night. Go home and go to bed.”
She hung up on me.
“G’night. G’night, Sally baby. Sally sweetheart darling,” I said. Can you imagine how drunk I was? I hung up too, then. I figured she probably just came home from a date. I pictured her out with the Lunts and all somewhere, and that Andover jerk. All of them swimming around in a goddam pot of tea and saying sophisticated stuff to each other and being charming and phony. I wished to God I hadn’t even phoned her. When I’m drunk, I’m a madman.
I stayed in the damn phone booth for quite a while. I kept holding onto the phone, sort of, so I wouldn’t pass out. I wasn’t feeling too marvelous, to tell you the truth. Finally, though, I came out and went in the men’s room, staggering around like a moron, and filled one of the washbowls with cold water. Then I dunked my head in it, right up to the ears. I didn’t even bother to dry it or anything. I just let the sonuvabitch drip. Then I walked over to this radiator by the window and sat down on it. It was nice and warm. It felt good because I was shivering like a bastard. It’s a funny thing, I always shiver like hell when I’m drunk.
I didn’t have anything else to do, so I kept sitting on the radiator and counting these little white squares on the floor. I was getting soaked. About a gallon of water was dripping down my neck, getting all over my collar and tie and all, but I didn’t give a damn. I was too drunk to give a damn. Then, pretty soon, the guy that played the piano for old Valencia, this very wavyhaired, flitty-looking guy, came in to comb his golden locks. We sort of struck up a conversation while he was combing it, except that he wasn’t too goddam friendly.
“Hey. You gonna see that Valencia babe when you go back in the bar?” I asked him.
“It’s highly probable,” he said. Witty bastard. All I ever meet is witty bastards.
“Listen. Give her my compliments. Ask her if that goddam waiter gave her my message, willya?”
“Why don’t you go home, Mac? How old are you, anyway?”
“Eighty-six. Listen. Give her my compliments. Okay?”
“Why don’t you go home, Mac?”
“Not me. Boy, you can play that goddam piano.” I told him. I was just flattering him. He played the piano stinking, if you want to know the truth. “You oughta go on the radio,” I said. “Handsome chap like you. All those goddam golden locks. Ya need a manager?”
“Go home, Mac, like a good guy. Go home and hit the sack.”
“No home to go to. No kidding — you need a manager?”
He didn’t answer me. He just went out. He was all through combing his hair and patting it and all, so he left. Like Stradlater. All these handsome guys are the same. When they’re done combing their goddam hair, they beat it on you.
When I finally got down off the radiator and went out to the hat-check room, I was crying and all. I don’t know why, but I was. I guess it was because I was feeling so damn depressed and lonesome. Then, when I went out to the checkroom, I couldn’t find my goddam check. The hat-check girl was very nice about it, though. She gave me my coat anyway. And my “Little Shirley Beans” record — I still had it with me and all. I gave her a buck for being so nice, but she wouldn’t take it. She kept telling me to go home and go to bed. I sort of tried to make a date with her for when she got through working, but she wouldn’t do it. She said she was old enough to be my mother and all. I showed her my goddam gray hair and told her I was forty-two — I was only horsing around, naturally. She was nice, though. I showed her my goddam red hunting hat, and she liked it. She made me put it on before I went out, because my hair was still pretty wet. She was all right.
I didn’t feel too drunk any more when I went outside, but it was getting very cold out again, and my teeth started chattering like hell. I couldn’t make them stop. I walked over to Madison Avenue and started to wait around for a bus because I didn’t have hardly any money left and I had to start economizing on cabs and all. But I didn’t feel like getting on a damn bus. And besides, I didn’t even know where I was supposed to go. So what I did, I started walking over to the park. I figured I’d go by that little lake and see what the hell the ducks were doing, see if they were around or not, I still didn’t know if they were around or not. It wasn’t far over to the park, and I didn’t have anyplace else special to go to — I didn’t even know where I was going to sleep yet — so I went. I wasn’t tired or anything. I just felt blue as hell.
Then something terrible happened just as I got in the park. I dropped old Phoebe’s record. It broke into about fifty pieces. It was in a big envelope and all, but it broke anyway. I damn near cried, it made me feel so terrible, but all I did was, I took the pieces out of the envelope and put them in my coat pocket. They weren’t any good for anything, but I didn’t feel like just throwing them away. Then I went in the park. Boy, was it dark.
I’ve lived in New York all my life, and I know Central Park like the back of my hand, because I used to roller- skate there all the time and ride my bike when I was a kid, but I had the most terrific trouble finding that lagoon that night. I knew right where it was — it was right near Central Park South and all — but I still couldn’t find it. I must’ve been drunker than I thought. I kept walking and walking, and it kept getting darker and darker and spookier and spookier. I didn’t see one person the whole time I was in the park. I’m just as glad. I probably would’ve jumped about a mile if I had. Then, finally, I found it. What it was, it was partly frozen and partly not frozen. But I didn’t see any ducks around. I walked all around the whole damn lake — I damn near fell in once, in fact — but I didn’t see a single duck. I thought maybe if there were any around, they might be asleep or something near the edge of the water, near the grass and all. That’s how I nearly fell in. But I couldn’t find any.
Finally I sat down on this bench, where it wasn’t so goddam dark. Boy, I was still shivering like a bastard, and the back of my hair, even though I had my hunting hat on, was sort of full of little hunks of ice. That worried me. I thought probably I’d get pneumonia and die. I started picturing millions of jerks coming to my funeral and all. My grandfather from Detroit, that keeps calling out the numbers of the streets when you ride on a goddam bus with him, and my aunts — I have about fifty aunts — and all my lousy cousins. What a mob’d be there. They all came when Allie died, the whole goddam stupid bunch of them. I have this one stupid aunt with halitosis that kept saying how peaceful he looked lying there, D.B. told me. I wasn’t there. I was still in the hospital. I had to go to the hospital and all after I hurt my hand. Anyway, I kept worrying that I was getting pneumonia, with all those hunks of ice in my hair, and that I was going to die. I felt sorry as hell for my mother and father. Especially my mother, because she still isn’t over my brother Allie yet. I kept picturing her not knowing what to do with all my suits and athletic equipment and all. The only good thing, I knew she wouldn’t let old Phoebe come to my goddam funeral because she was only a little kid. That was the only good part. Then I thought about the whole bunch of them sticking me in a goddam cemetery and all, with my name on this tombstone and all. Surrounded by dead guys. Boy, when you’re dead, they really fix you up. I hope to hell when I do die somebody has sense enough to just dump me in the river or something. Anything except sticking me in a goddam cemetery. People coming and putting a bunch of flowers on your stomach on Sunday, and all that crap. Who wants flowers when you’re dead? Nobody.
When the weather’s nice, my parents go out quite frequently and stick a bunch of flowers on old Allie’s grave. I went with them a couple of times, but I cut it out. In the first place, I certainly don’t enjoy seeing him in that crazy cemetery. Surrounded by dead guys and tombstones and all. It wasn’t too bad when the sun was out, but twice — twice — we were there when it started to rain. It was awful. It rained on his lousy tombstone, and it rained on the grass on his stomach. It rained all over the place. All the visitors that were visiting the cemetery started running like hell over to their cars. That’s what nearly drove me crazy. All the visitors could get in their cars and turn on
