“Morning, Mr. Vitale,” I said.
“It don’t work for me,” the boss said ruefully. “I poured hot water through ten times already and it won’t turn dark. I have to use fresh coffee grounds after all.”
“Did you dry the old grounds on the stove first?”
“No, I been adding hot water.”
“That’s what’s the matter then. If you want to use coffee grounds two days in a row you have to dry them out on the stove in a shallow pan. Add a couple of handfuls of fresh coffee to the dried grounds and the coffee’ll be as dark as cheap coffee ever gets.”
I took off my jacket and lit the stove and checked on the groceries for breakfast. I wrapped an apron around my waist and stoned the grill while I waited for the coffee to be made, making a mental note to fix my own coffee the next morning before I left my room. By five a.m. I was ready for work and nobody had entered the cafe. I wondered why Vitale opened so early. I soon found out. All of a sudden the counter was jammed with breakfast eaters from the various office buildings and street, most of them ordering the Open Eye Breakfast Special: two ounces of tomato juice, one egg, one strip of bacon, one piece of toast and coffee extra. This breakfast was served for thirty-five cents and although it was meager fare it attracted the low income group. The night elevator operators, the cleaning women, the newsboys, the all-night movie crowd, and some of the policemen going off duty all seemed to go for it. Breakfast was served all day at Vitale’s, but at ten-thirty I checked the pale blue menu and began to get ready for the lunch crowd. I was so busy during the noon rush I hated to look up from my full grill when Tiny, my relief, tapped me on the shoulder at one on the head. I told Tiny what was working, wrapped up two one-pound T-bones to take home with me, and left the cafe with a wave at the boss.
On the long ride home I tried to think of ways to bring Helen out of the doldrums, but every idea I thought of was an idea calling for money. By the time I reached my corner my immediate conclusion was that all Helen needed was one of my T-bone steaks, fried medium rare as only I could fry a steak and topped with a pile of french fried onion rings. I bought a dime’s worth of onions at the delicatessen and hurried home with my surprise. I opened the door to my room and Helen wasn’t there. My note was still under the whiskey bottle, but now the bottle was empty. There was a message from Helen written under mine and I picked it up and studied it.
Dear Harry,
I can’t sit here all day waiting for you. If I don’t talk to somebody I’ll go nuts. I love you.
Helen
The message was in Helen’s unmistakable microscopic handwriting and it was written with the same piece of charcoal I had used and left on the table. It took me several minutes to decipher what she said and I still didn’t know what she really meant. Was she leaving me for good? I opened the closet and checked her clothes, the few she had. They were all in the closet and so was her suitcase. That made me feel a little better, knowing she wasn’t leaving me. I still didn’t like the idea of her running around loose, half-drunk, and with nothing solid in her stomach. She had killed the rest of the whiskey, which was more than a half-pint, and she had the remainder of the twenty-five bucks her mother had given her. She could be anywhere in San Francisco—with anybody. I had to find her before she got into trouble.
I opened the window, put the steaks outside on the sill, and closed the window again. If the sun didn’t break through the fog they would keep until that evening before they spoiled. I left the rooming house and walked down the street to Big Mike’s Bar and Grill. After I entered the grill I made my way directly to the cash register where Big Mike was standing. By the look in his eyes I could tell he didn’t want to talk to me.
“Have you seen Helen, Mike?” I asked him.
“Yeah, I saw her all right. She was in here earlier.”
“She left, huh?”
“That’s right, Harry. She left.” His voice was surly, his expression sour. There was no use to question him any further. How was he supposed to know where she went? It was obvious something was bothering him and I waited for him to tell me about it.
“Listen, Harry,” Mike said, after I waited a full minute. “I like you fine, and I suppose Helen’s okay too, but from now on I don’t want her in here when you ain’t with her.”
“What happened, Mike. I’ve been working since five this morning.”
“I don’t like to say nothing, Harry, but, you might as well know. She was in about eleven and drunker than hell. I wouldn’t sell her another drink even, and when I won’t sell another drink, they’re drunk. She had her load on when she come in, and it was plenty. Anyway, she got nasty with me and I told her to leave. She wouldn’t go and I didn’t want to toss her out on her ear so I shoved her in a booth and had Tommy take her some coffee. She poured it on the floor, cussing Tommy out and after awhile three Marines took up with her. They sat down in her booth and she quieted down so I let it go. After a while they all left and that was it. I’m sorry as hell, Harry, but that’s the way it was. I ain’t got time to look after every drunk comes in here.”
“I know it, Mike. You don’t know where they went, do you?”
“As I said, after a while I looked and they were gone.”
“Well, thanks, Mike.” I left the bar and went out on the sidewalk. If the Marines and Helen had taken the cable car downtown I’d never find them. But if they took a cab from the hack-stand in the middle of the block, maybe I would be all right. I turned toward the hack-stand. Bud, the young Korean veteran driver for the Vet’s Cab Company, was leaning against a telephone pole waiting for his phone to ring, a cigarette glued to the corner of his mouth, when I reached his stand. He had a pinched, fresh face with light beige-colored eyes, and wore his chauffeur’s cap so far back on his head it looked like it would fall off. I knew him enough to nod to him, and saw him often around the corner and in Big Mike’s, but I had never spoken to him before.
“I guess you’re lookin’ for your wife, huh, Jordan?” Bud made a flat statement and it seemed to give him great satisfaction.
“Yes, I am, Bud. Have you seen her?”
“Sure did.” He ripped the cigarette out of his mouth, leaving a powdering of flaked white paper on his lower lip, and snapped the butt into the street. “She was with three Marines.” This statement gave him greater satisfaction.
“Did you take them any place?”
“Sure did.”
“Where?”
“Get in.” Bud opened the back door of his cab.
“What’s the tariff, Bud?” I was thinking of the three one dollar bills in my watch pocket and my small jingle of change.
“It’ll run you about a buck and a half” He smiled with the left side of his face. “If you want to go. She was with three Marines.” He held up three fingers. “Three,” he repeated, “and you are one.” He held up one finger. “One.”
“We’ll see,” I said noncommittally and climbed into the back seat.
Bud drove me to The Green Lobster, a bar and grill near Fisherman’s Wharf. The bar was too far away from the Wharf for the heavy tourist trade, but it was close enough to catch the overflow on busy days and there was enough fish stink in the air to provide an atmosphere for those who felt they needed it. On the way, Bud gave me a sucker ride in order to run up his buck and a half on the meter. At most the fare should have been six-bits, but I didn’t complain. I rode the unnecessary blocks out of the way and paid the fare in full when he stopped at The Green Lobster.
“This is where I left ’em,” he said. I waited on the curb until he pulled away. I couldn’t understand Bud’s attitude. He might have been a friend of the guy I had a fight with in Big Mike’s or he might have resented me having a beautiful girl like Helen. I didn’t know, but I resented his manner. I like everybody and it’s always disconcerting when someone doesn’t like me. I entered The Green Lobster and sat down at the end of the bar near the door.
A long, narrow bar hugged the right side of the room for the full length
of the dimly lighted room. There were high, wrinkled red-leather stools for the patrons and I perched on one, my feet on the chromium rungs. The left wall had a row of green-curtained booths, and between the booths and the narrow bar, there were many small tables for two covering the rest of the floorspace. Each small table was covered with a green oilcloth cover and held a bud vase with an unidentifiable artificial flower. I surveyed the room in the bar mirror and spotted Helen and the three Marines in the second booth. The four of them leaned across their table, their heads together, and then they sat back and laughed boisterously. I couldn’t hear them, but supposed they were taking turns telling dirty jokes. Helen’s laugh was loud, clear, and carried across the room above the laughter of the Marines. I hadn’t heard her laugh like that since the night I first brought her home with me. After the bartender finished with two other customers at the bar he got around to me.
“Straight shot,” I told him.
“It’s a dollar a shot,” he said quietly, half-apologetically.
“I’ve got a dollar,” and I fished one out of my watch pocket and slapped it on the bar.
He set an empty glass before me and filled it to the brim with bar whiskey. I sipped a little off the top, put the glass back down on the bar. At a dollar a clip the shot would have to last me. I didn’t have a plan or course of action, so I sat stupidly, watching Helen and the Marines in the bar mirror, trying to think of what to do next.
If I tried a direct approach and merely asked Helen to leave with me, there would be a little trouble. Not knowing what to do, I did nothing. There was one sergeant and two corporals, all three of them bigger than me. They wore neat, bright-blue Marine uniforms and all had the fresh, well-scrubbed look that servicemen have on the first few hours of leave or pass. But in my mind I didn’t see them in uniform. I saw them naked, Helen naked, and all of them cavorting obscenely in a hotel room somewhere, and as this picture formed in my mind my face began to perspire.
Helen inadvertently settled the action for me. She was in the seat against the wall, the sergeant on the outside, with the two corporals facing them across the table. After a while, Helen started out of the booth to go to the ladies’ room. The sergeant goosed her as she squeezed by him and she squealed, giggled, and broke clear of the table. As she looked drunkenly around the room for the door to the ladies’ room she saw me sitting at the bar.
“Harry!” she screamed joyfully across the room. “Come on over!”
I half-faced her, remaining on my stool, shaking my head. Helen crossed to the bar, weaving recklessly between the tables, and as soon as she reached me, threw her arms around my neck and kissed me wetly on the mouth. The action was swift and blurred from that moment on. An attack of Marines landed on me and I was hit a glancing blow on the jaw, my right arm was twisted cruelly behind my back, and in less than a minute I was next door on the asphalt of the parking lot. A corporal held my arms behind me and another was rounding the building. The sergeant, his white belt wrapped around his fist, the buckle dangling free, waved the man back. “Go back inside, Adams, and watch that bitch! We’ll take care of this bastard. She might try and get away and I spent eight bucks on her already.” The oncoming corporal nodded grimly and reentered the bar. Under the circumstances I tried to be as calm as possible.
“Before you hit me with that buckle, Sergeant,” I said, “why don’t you let me explain?”
Businesslike, the sergeant motioned the Marine holding my arms behind my back to stand clear, so he could get a good swing at me with the belt.
“You don’t have to hold me,” I said over my shoulder. “If you want to beat up a man for kissing his wife, go ahead!” I jerked away and dropped to my knees in front of the sergeant. Hopefully, I prayed loudly, trying to make my voice sound sincere:
“Oh, God above! Let no man tear asunder what You have joined in holy matrimony! Dear sweet God! Deliver this poor sinner from evil, and show these young Christian gentlemen the light of Your love and Your mercy! Sweet Son of the Holy Ghost and—” That was as far as I got.
“Are you and her really married?” the sergeant asked gruffly.
“Yes, sir,” I said humbly, remaining on my knees and staring intently at my steepled fingers.
I glanced at the two Marines out of the corner of my eye. The youngest had a disgusted expression on his face, and was tugging at the sergeant’s arm.
“Let it go, Sarge,” he said, “we were took and the hell with it. I wouldn’t get any fun out of hitting him now.”
“Neither would I.” The sergeant unwrapped the belt from his hand and buckled it around his waist. “I’m not even mad any more.” There was a faint gleam of pity in his eyes as he looked at me. “If she’s your wife, how come you let her run loose in the bars?”
“I was working, sir,” I said, “and I thought she was home with the children.” I hung my head lower, kept my eyes on the ground.
“Then it’s your tough luck,” the sergeant finished grimly. “Both of you got what you deserved.” They left the parking lot and reentered the bar. I got off my knees, walked to the curb and waited. The sergeant brought Helen to the door, opened it for her politely, guided her outside, and as he released her arm, he cuffed her roughly across the face. Bright red marks leaped to the surface of her cheek and she reeled across the sidewalk. I caught her under the arms before she fell.
“That evens us up for the eight bucks.” The sergeant grinned and shut the door.
Helen spluttered and cursed and then her body went limp in my arms. I lifted her sagging body and carried her down to the corner and the hack-stand. She hadn’t really passed out; she was pretending so she wouldn’t have to talk to me. I put her into the cab without help from the driver and gave him my address. I paid the eighty-cent fare when he reached my house, and hoped he didn’t see the large, wet spot on the back seat until after he pulled away. Helen leaned weakly against me and I half carried her into our room and undressed her. She fell asleep immediately. Looking inside her purse, I found ninety cents in change. No bills.
I thought things over and came to a decision. I couldn’t work any more and leave her by herself. Either I’d have to get money from some other source, or do without it. Left to herself, all alone, Helen would only get into serious trouble. Already I noticed things about her that had changed. She let her hair go uncombed. She skipped wearing her stockings. Her voice was slightly louder and she seemed to be getting deaf in one ear.
We never made love any more.
TWELVE
The Dregs
I DIDN’T sleep all night. I sat in the chair by the dark window with the lights out while Helen slept. I didn’t try to think about anything, but kept my mind as blank as possible. When I did have a thought it was disquieting and ugly and I would get rid of it by pushing it to the back of my mind like a pack rat trading a rock for a gold nugget.
Vitale would be stuck again for a fry cook when I didn’t show up, but it couldn’t be helped. To leave Helen to her own devices would be foolish. When I thought about how close I came to losing her my heart would hesitate, skip like a rock on water and then beat faster than ever. I had a day’s pay coming from Vitale that I would never collect. It would take more nerve than I possessed to ask him for it. I decided to let it go.
The night passed, somehow, and as soon as the gray light hit the window I left the room and walked down the block to the delicatessen. It wasn’t quite six and I had to wait for almost ten minutes before Mr. Watson opened up. I had enough money with some left over for a half-pint of whiskey and Mr. Watson pursed his lips when he put it in a sack for me.
“Most of my customers this early buy milk and eggs, Harry,” he said.
“Breakfast is breakfast,” I said lightly and the bells above the door tinkled as I closed it behind me.
When I got back to the room, I brought the T-bones inside from the window sill, opened the package and smelled them. They seemed to be all right and I lit the burner and dropped one in the frying pan and sprinkl
ed it with salt. I made coffee on the other burner and watched the steak for the exact moment to turn it. To fry a steak properly it should only be turned one time. Helen awoke after awhile, got out of bed without a word or a glance in my direction and went to the bathroom. The steak was ready when she got back and I had it on a plate at the table.
“How’d you like a nice T-bone for breakfast?” I asked her.
“Ugh!” She put her feet into slippers and wrapped a flowered robe around her shoulders. “I’ll settle for coffee.”
I poured two cups of coffee and Helen joined me at the table. I shoved the half-pint across the table and she poured a quarter of the bottle into her coffee. I started in on the steak. We both carefully avoided any reference to the Marines or the afternoon before.
“This a day off, Harry?” Helen asked after she downed half of her laced coffee.
“No. I quit.”
“Good.”
“But I’m a little worried.”
“What about?” she asked cautiously.
“Damned near everything. Money, for one thing, and I’m worried about you, too.”
“I’m all right.”
“You’re drinking more than you did before, and you aren’t eating.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“Even so, you’ve got to eat.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“Suppose . . .” I spoke slowly, choosing my words with care, “all of a sudden, just like that,” and I snapped my fingers, “we quit drinking? I can pour what’s left of that little bottle down the drain and we can start from there. We make a resolution and stick to it, see, stay sober from now on, make a fresh start.”
Helen quickly poured another shot into her coffee. “No, Harry. I know what you mean, but I couldn’t quit if I wanted to.”
“Why not? We aren’t getting any place the way we’re going.”
“Who wants to get any place?” she said sardonically. “Do you? What great pinnacle have you set your eyes on?” She rubbed her cheek gently. It was swollen from the slap the Marine had given her.
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