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Orpheus Emerged

Page 11

by Jack Kerouac


  Michael was sobbing with his face in his

  hands. “Michael!” cried Leo, with a look of

  consternation. “Now you’ve done it! You’re

  so drunk you can’t control yourself. I think

  I’d better take you home!” He put his hand

  on Michael’s shivering shoulder, but the

  other shook him off petulantly and contin-

  ued to sob.

  “Good Lord!” exclaimed Leo in some

  embarrassment. He stole a glance down the

  length of the bar to see if anyone was watch-

  ing this little scene. “Stop being a baby, will

  you?” Then he began to laugh nervously.

  “General lacrimae rerum is it? Is that why

  you’re crying, the tears of things? My God,

  you’re making a spectacle of yourself—some

  people are beginning to watch you. Stop it,

  Michael…”

  Michael didn’t seem to hear what Leo

  was saying.

  Leo curled his lip a bit scornfully: “You

  fool,” he said. “Stop being a pampered baby.

  I’ve never seen such stickish weakness,

  such drunkenness. It’s not like you at all;

  when I first knew you—”

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  ORPHEUS EMERGED 192

  “Good Lord!”

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  ORPHEUS EMERGED 193

  But Michael went on sobbing, with his

  face hidden in his trembling hands.

  “Everybody’s looking at you now,” Leo

  whispered. “Stop it! And do you think

  they’re sympathizing with you? Not on your

  life!! If you think that, you’re certainly a psy-

  chotic case—you’re just a foolish spectacle,

  that’s about all…”

  Leo began to be very embarrassed, sit-

  ting there with a man who wept into his

  hands like a woman. He picked up his

  books tentatively.

  “Well,” he said, after a pause. “I’m going

  now. You’d better stop this or they’ll throw

  you out. Come, now, aren’t you ever going

  to stop.” Leo rose from his seat. “I’m going

  now, Michael. Good-bye, Michael.”

  Michael didn’t answer.

  Leo hesitated another moment or two

  and then, bestowing a nervous pat on

  Michael’s quivering shoulder, he walked

  away somewhat self-consciously. A man

  was standing near the door as Leo

  approached it.

  He took Leo’s arm.

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  ORPHEUS EMERGED 194

  “What’s the mat-

  ter with him

  over there, that

  fellow you were

  sitting with

  who’s crying?

  Hey? Has someone

  stolen his lol-

  lipop, his itsy-

  bitsy lollipop?

  Hey? Is that

  it...”

  Leo didn’t answer, and, disengaging himself

  from the man’s grip, went out the door.

  “That’s what it is, isn’t it?” the man called

  after him, and turned back to watch

  Michael, laughing and shaking his head.

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  ORPHEUS EMERGED 195

  VII

  WALKING ALONG

  THE BOULEVARD,

  Paul was trying to decide where he

  should go in order to find Michael.

  Suddenly, he realized that he must go to

  his room. Would Michael be there? Most

  likely. And if not—it was time to go there

  in any event, and tidy up the room a bit,

  and perhaps pay another week’s rent in

  advance. Paul still had some of the

  money that Michael had given him the

  night of the party; he hadn’t spent much

  during his week in the country.

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  ORPHEUS EMERGED 197

  Although Michael had heretofore never

  visited Paul’s room, perhaps he would be

  there now, tonight. He might also be in some

  bar getting drunk, a habit of his when things

  went wrong. Paul decided to go to his room

  first.

  It was raining harder as he turned up M

  street and strode along beneath the dripping

  street lamp. Yes—Michael might want to talk

  to him at last, of that Paul was almost certain.

  With a mounting feeling of certainty, Paul

  hurried to his gate and descended the stone

  steps. Surely enough, the oil lamp was burn-

  ing in his room, its yellow light fell feebly on

  the dark puddles outside from underneath

  the drawn shade.

  Paul hastened along the damp hallway

  and flung open his door.

  “Helen!” he cried with joyous wonder.

  A tall dark-haired girl stood in the center

  of the room. She smiled and held out her

  hands.

  Paul, all beside himself with excitement,

  ran up to Helen and stopped just short of her

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  outstretched hands. He teetered there for a

  moment, looking incredulously into her face;

  then, with a sighing smile, he dropped down

  on his knees and took both of her hands in

  his and began to kiss them over and over

  again.

  “Get off your knees,” Helen cried, blush-

  ing. “Don’t be a fool.”

  “Helen darling! Helen darling! I knew I

  had to come here—I felt it! When did you

  arrive here?”

  “Just a few minutes ago,” she replied.

  “Please get off your knees,” and she blushed

  again charmingly.

  Paul rose and led Helen to the couch.

  Sitting her down slowly, and sitting beside

  her, he kissed her reverently on the brow,

  and then buried his face in her hair.

  “You’ve come at last,” he whispered. “It’s

  been so long. But I knew you’d come. Oh,

  God! I’m so happy, so damned happy! Look!”

  he cried suddenly, jumping up from the

  couch and pointing to a pile of books on the

  table. “Guess what? I’ve been studying and

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  ORPHEUS EMERGED 199

  learning all the while, and I’ve met all sorts

  of intelligent students, friends of Michael’s.”

  “Have you really been happy?”

  “No! No! That, to say that, is to defame

  this moment… Now I’m happy. Oh Helen,”

  he cried, changing his tone again impul-

  sively, and dropping on the couch beside

  her. “Now that you’ve come, now that

  you’ve come…it will all be over! Say that it

  will!”

  “We’ll wait,” she said slowly.

  “Wait? Wait? For what?… For Michael?

  He never comes here; he hasn’t once come

  to my room. Only once he spoke a friendly

  word, the night of a party to which I wasn’t

  invited, and he wanted to know if I was

  going to come anyway. I thought that was

  the moment then, but nothing happened.

  And later that night, he gave me money—he

  still has all that money left he took with

  him—but he gave it to me scornfully.

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  Helen,
it’s got

  to stop; it’s

  got to happen

  some time!”

  “He’ll come here tonight,” Helen said.

  “He may not.”

  “We’ll wait here for him.”

  “But how can you be sure? Do you feel it,

  Helen?”

  She was silent.

  Paul got up and began to stride around

  the room impatiently. Coming back to

  Helen, he fell on his knees again and began

  to kiss her wrists feverishly. “I don’t know,”

  he said, looking up at her fearfully, his face

  distorted in the lamplight. “I don’t know,

  Helen darling…”

  “Well,” Helen assured him, stroking his

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  ORPHEUS EMERGED 201

  hair, “I do.”

  Paul now lapsed into an ecstatic silence.

  Then he jumped up again and went over to

  the table. “All these books,” he said proud-

  ly. Then, taking out a sheaf of papers from

  his pockets, he threw them on the table.

  “And these are some of his writings. I think

  I understand most of them—I criticized

  them to Leo this afternoon.”

  “Who’s Leo?”

  “A very brilliant student we know here at

  Custos Nostrom University, one of my

  friends.”

  “And what have you been doing for a liv-

  ing?” Helen asked. “Give me those papers

  so I can look at them.” Paul brought the

  papers over. He looked down at his shoes

  and chuckled. “Well,” he said warily, “I

  started out all right, when I first got here. I

  had a job running an elevator, up and down,

  the little children coming home from school

  at noon, the old ladies with their dogs, the

  old gentlemen going out for their constitu-

  tionals, some of them retired savants…”

  “And?” Helen persisted.

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  ORPHEUS EMERGED 202

  “Well, after a while, I was so busy, I had

  to quit.”

  “Busy at what?”

  “Well, helping Anthony among other

  things—he’s another wonderful friend of

  mine, a drunkard but a wonderful soul—

  and attending classes. Did I tell you? I

  attended classes like a regular student for

  awhile, until one day the Professor had to

  put me out because I got mad over a theory

  that Arthur was propounding. Arthur is

  another friend of mine, a bit of a poet.”

  “Then what did you do for a living, after

  you quit your job?”

  Paul looked at Helen. “As I say… You

  know, he gave me money.”

  Helen shrugged her shoulders.

  “And why not?” Paul wanted to know.

  “But now!” he added triumphantly, “Now

  you’re here, and it will be all over at last,

  won’t it?”

  “I hope so,” Helen whispered. “Come, sit

  with me some more. Kiss me, you fool—you

  haven’t kissed me on the mouth yet.”

  Paul ran laughing to Helen and kissed

  her.

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  ORPHEUS EMERGED 203

  “We’ll go

  back,” he whis-

  pered savagely,

  “we’ll go back

  and bask by the

  river bank,

  won’t we? And

  you’ll pre-

  pare lunches...”

  “Oh,” Helen

  said, laughing,

  “I hate pic-

  nics. You and

  your picnics!”

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  ORPHEUS EMERGED 204

  “And I’ve thought of all kinds of wonder-

  ful new ideas. Here’s what I’d like us to do.

  We’ll spend the whole summer going

  around in our bare feet, somewhere among

  the pine trees, not far from the surf. I want

  to be up in the morning when the first ray of

  dawn makes the top of the pines crack!

  And—”

  “All right,” Helen interrupted happily,

  “that’s enough of your dreaming for now.”

  “As though these things were impossi-

  ble!” Paul cried wrathfully. “Who?” he

  asked. “Who is going to tell me it’s impossi-

  ble! Are you like those other people, like

  Michael—afraid of being happy?”

  “You’re talking gibberish,” Helen

  mocked, pulling at Paul’s sleeve playfully.

  “Don’t get mad!”

  “I am mad!” Paul cried. He paced the

  room. “I want to know where all this

  meanness of spirit comes from—the world’s

  crazy!” He went over to the table and

  banged it. Then, changing his attitude

  again in the flicker of a moment, he came

  back to Helen and buried his face in her

  hair. “Do you really think he’s coming?”

  “I think so, yes.”

  “You know, he hasn’t changed much—

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  he’s the same as when he left, only perhaps

  worse. He’s more miserable than ever. He

  tried to hit me with a floor lamp one night.

  Helen, this can’t go on.” They were silent,

  and they could hear the wind blow outside,

  and the rain spatter into the street.

  “Would you like a sandwich?” Paul asked.

  “No, not yet. And your bread is all mouldy.

  Let’s lie down and wait.”

  Helen and Paul embraced each other,

  with both their heads on the same pillow,

  and in a few moments, Paul was dozing fit-

  fully. Helen was watching him sadly. After

  several minutes of droning rain-sounds,

  Helen heard a step in the hall; there was a

  knock on the door. Paul jumped up, startled

  out of a half dream. He went to the door and

  opened it. Leo was standing in the hall.

  “Ah, here you are,” Leo said.

  Paul said coldly, “Well?”

  “I’ve been looking for you,” Leo began

  uncertainly, in the face of Paul’s morose

  reception. “I’m on my way to my room to

  study, and…well, I just wanted to tell you

  that Michael is in the Boulevard Bar, very

  drunk, and he’s weeping and making a com-

  plete show of himself…”

  “Weeping?” Paul cried anxiously. “Why?”

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  ORPHEUS EMERGED 206

  “I don’t know,” said Leo. “He’s just drunk,

  that’s all, and he looks as though he were com-

  ing down with an illness or something—”

  Helen came to the door and looked at

  Leo. The latter was startled out of his wits,

  but not quite enough to lose control of the

  situation.

  “Why,” he said politely, “how do you do?”

  “This is Leo, Helen,” Paul said sullenly.

  “Leo, Helen.”

  Leo bowed from the waist.

  “Goodbye,” said Paul, and closed the

  door in the other’s face. “Now,” he said,

  turning to Helen, “what are we going to do?

  Did you hear what he just said? — Michael’s

  sick, and drunk, and he’s crying in the bar.

 
I knew all this business would break him in

  time—just today he was cast out of his com-

  fortable little nook with a woman old

  enough to be his mother.”

  Helen went over to the table and stood by

  it reflectively. “What were you saying about

  a woman?” she asked presently.

  “He was living with Maureen. Then,

  when she found out of another affair, she

  threw him out.. And the other girl doesn’t

  want Michael, and he, like a fool, is taking

  everything seriously. Oh! He has done so

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  many stupid things lately, I’m ashamed of

  myself!” Paul sat on the couch. Again he

  asked, “What are we going to do?”

  “Do? We’ll just wait.” Helen sat down

  beside him.

  “I don’t see your logic!” Paul cried impa-

  tiently.

  “There’s no logic involved in it,” Helen

  replied calmly. “Let’s lie down and wait

  some more. Get some sleep; you look fear-

  fully worn out.”

  Paul smiled tenderly. “Oh Helen,” he

  said, “if you only knew how much I love

  you, if only! All right, I won’t be a pest. I’ll

  be quiet, and we’ll wait. Everything’ll be all

  right, won’t it?”

  “Yes, Paul.”

  Paul stretched out on the couch and

  placed his head in her bosom. “I’m going to

  sleep, yes,” he told her. “When I wake up, it

  will be all over, and we’ll be together and in

  love, like before… Helen, do you think that

  Michael’s change will affect us?… do you

  think it will be different?”

  “Perhaps.”

  “He wanted to be an artist,” Paul said

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  sadly, “and he left. It won’t be the same man

  any more,” he added gloomily.

  “It might be a better man,” Helen said, “if

  only…he will come.”

  They again fell into a long, peaceful

  silence. Helen was stroking Paul’s hair; her

  own long dark hair had disengaged itself

  and fallen loosely over her cheek. She

  watched Paul, as he began to fall asleep,

  and stroked his hair…for a long time…and

  waited. The rain drummed on the window.

  “Call our secret call from where you are,”

  she whispered softly, so as not to waken

  Paul, who was now asleep, “and I shall call

 

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