Under the Skin

the bouncer standing with them and looking disappointed. Then we were in the hallway and out of view of the parlor.

We went into her little room and she shut the door and glanced at a bedside chair holding a small stack of fresh hand towels. I set the briefcase down next to the bed and hung my hat on a bedpost and took off my coat and draped it on the chairback. She pulled off her camisole and tossed it on the chair, then stood naked in front of me and helped me unbutton my shirt, talking all the while, saying she’d been wondering what had become of me, had I got married or moved away or what, trying to sound casual but doing a poor job of concealing her eagerness to move things along and serve as many tricks as she could on this most lucrative night of the year. Then I was naked too and we got in bed and went at it.

I was surprised at how worked up I was. She said, “Oh yeah, honey, yeah,” as I hammered away at her. The whole thing didn’t take but a minute. Then she was squirming out from under me, saying “That was great, baby— wooo, yeah.”

She wiped herself with a towel and handed me one, then slipped her camisole back on and shook my foot by the big toe. “Hate to rush you, sweetie, but gosh, tonight it’s just busy-busy, you know?”

I put my pants and shirt on, then sat on the bed to tug on my boots, sensing a familiar sadness. I’d heard or read somewhere that the French called sexual climax “the little death,” which was a pretty good description for the way it always felt to me. I wasn’t sure what it was that died each time, but I’d often wondered if the strange sadness that came afterward might be some form of grief for it, some special sort of sorrow rooted so deep inside of us that we didn’t even have a name for it. This time, for some reason, the melancholy was more insistent than usual.

“Dream a Little Dream” was on the juke when we went out to the landing. Felicia gave me a so-long peck on the cheek, then turned to smile down at the guy in the derby hat who’d gotten up from the sofa and was heading for the stairs as I started down. Mrs. Lang was at the bar and looking at us. She cut her eyes to the bouncer, who was over by the juke, pointing out selections to a guy feeding coins into it.

The derby man’s face was as easy to read as a fist. I figured him for a sailorman treating himself to a New Year’s Eve on the town in his best suit and hat, and he’d obviously been sitting there seething about me buying a turn ahead of him. Maybe he was drunk or maybe he was one of those guys who took everything personally, or maybe it was something else, I didn’t give a damn. But everything about the way he was carrying himself as he came up the narrow stairway said he’d worked himself up for a scrap.

Mrs. Lang must’ve seen it too. She called out, “Hollis!” I caught a glimpse of her directing the bouncer’s attention to us, of other guys looking up to see what was going on.

We were in the middle of the staircase and almost abreast when the derby man pointed his finger in my face and said, “Lemme tell you something, you mongrel sonofa—”

I grabbed the finger and pushed it back so hard my knuckles touched his wrist, and even over the music the whole room probably heard the bone snap.

He screamed and fell to his knees. I gave him a knee to the chin that cracked his jaws together and his derby twirled off and he went tumbling down the stairs, his head banging the steps. He landed in a heap at the foot of the stairway and didn’t move.

Everybody in the parlor was on his feet. Some were gawking at me, some were clearing out fast. The bouncer hopped over the derby man and came up at me with his fists ready, happy for the chance at some action and in no mood to talk things over. Fine with me. But the fool should’ve waited for me to come down rather than give me the advantage of the higher stairs.

I raised the briefcase like I was going to throw it at him—and as his hands rose to defend against it I kicked him in the chest. He sailed down the stairs and on his ass and his momentum carried him in a complete somersault over the derby man and he slammed the floor on his back so hard the vibrations came up through my feet. He lay spread-eagled with his eyes and mouth open wide, one leg twitching slightly like it had an electrical short in it.

As I came down the stairs the only two guys still in the room sped for the front door. The derby man was on his belly and out cold. Blood was seeping from his nose and open mouth, and his broken finger jutted awkwardly on a knuckle that looked like a purple walnut.

The bouncer’s eyes were terrified. His mouth was working without sound and he probably thought he was going to die for lack of air. And then it came to him, a deep hissing inhalation, and he closed his eyes and gave himself over to the luxury of breath.

I stepped around them and went to the bar. Mrs. Lang was enraged but I knew she wouldn’t call the police. A fracas like this didn’t happen often and was anyway a hazard of the trade, an inconvenience that would cut into the evening’s profits but wasn’t as much of a problem for her as the cops would be.

“Beer,” I said to the old bartender. His morose expression hadn’t changed a bit. He drew a glass and put it in front of me and said, “Two bits.”

I grinned at Mrs. Lang as I dug a quarter out of my pocket. “Jesus, I pay enough for ten turns and I entertain the joint, and I don’t even get a beer on the house?”

Her mouth pinched tighter. Her good humor had fled with her customers. I flipped the coin to the old guy and he made a neat catch.

“That stupid man was spoiling for a fight,” Mrs. Lang said. “And that damned Hollis didn’t give you much choice, I know. But I can’t have fighting here, it’s terrible for business. I’m afraid you’re not welcome here anymore. Neither is he.”

I drained most of the glass in a swallow. One of the girls and her trick came slowly down the stairs. The man stepped carefully around the two guys on the floor and hustled on outside. The girl knelt beside the bouncer and helped him to sit up.

I finished the beer and wiped my mouth. “Well,” I said, “all right. I just hope to hell I can find me another whorehouse somewhere around here.”

The crack didn’t raise a smile from anybody but the skinny maid. I exchanged winks with her as I went out the door.

When I’d first arrived in Galveston I lived in an apartment on Seawall Boulevard. Sam had gotten it for me on the day after I arrived in town. I liked the gulf view from the front windows and the sea breeze that came through them. I liked the nearby dance halls with their swell bands, the restaurants, the entertainment joints with their indoor swimming pools and penny arcades and shooting galleries. During my first few weeks on the island I explored the rest of the city little by little. I grew acquainted with the downtown streets—I especially liked the Strand, with its large buildings and old-time architecture. I went to the theaters and moviehouses, patronized all the cafes to see which ones I liked best. I took my ease on benches in the city parks and the German beer gardens. I wandered along the railyards, the ship port, the shrimp docks. I bellied up to the bar in waterfront saloons full of sailors speaking a dozen different languages.

The main Negro quarter was just south of the red-light district, and in those early weeks I sometimes went there for barbecue and to listen to the blues and watch the couples dance to jazz. It was dancing to beat any I’d ever seen. One night I was in a place called the Toot Sweet Jazz Hall and a lean smoky girl with bloodred lipstick and an ass as round as a medicine ball asked me to dance. When I said I didn’t know how, not that way, she laughed and pulled me out on the floor and taught me.

A little while later we were in her apartment and going at it. But then while we were resting up and having a cigarette the door crashed open and a guy big as a gorilla came charging in, cursing her for a no-good bitch and holding a straight razor. I rolled to the floor so he’d have to stoop to try to cut me, but the fool only kicked me in the head and then went for the screaming girl—which gave me the chance to drive my foot into the side of his knee, breaking the joint and bringing him down with a pretty good holler of his own. I grabbed his blade hand and bit it, crunching bone and tasting blood, and he let the razor drop. I slapped it away under the bed and punched him in the neck and got to my feet and stomped my heel into his crotch. His eyes bugged out and he rolled onto his side and threw up.

She was sitting on the bed and pressing a hand to her cheek, blood running from between her fingers and down her arm and dripping on the sheets. “Kill him!” she said. “Kill that lowdown nigger!”

But since the lowdown nigger in question already had a busted knee and a chewed hand that would infect worse than a dog bite, not to mention a pair of swollen balls that would be hurting him for days, I didn’t see the need. I started getting my clothes on fast.