A Walk On The Wild Side

by Nelson Algren

  He offered Dove his calling card, stained yellow at the edges. Dove pretended to read it and became so impressed that he owed the man a nickel, ‘Since it’s for the country,’ he explained.

  The St Charles Street trolley swung about the circle. ‘Have to ride that sometime,’ he promised himself.

  An Anglo girl in a white sailor tam and an over-the-shoulder bag sauntered into the shadow cast by Lee’s boot and paused to smile directly at Dove. He glanced back over his shoulder but saw nobody waiting for her there. She popped her gun smack at him – ‘Well?’

  Dove rose, bowed from the waist hand over heart, thus sweeping his straw skimmer almost to the earth.

  ‘Howdy, m’am.’

  The girl left without looking back.

  No matter. When he got that good old gee-tar and picked himself out a couple good old tunes he’d have his pick of the merry lot.

  And coasted, easily and unseeing, past broken men and breaking ones; wingies, dingies, zanies and lop-sided kukes; cokies and queers and threadbare whores. Ulcerous panhandlers lame and cancerous, tubercular pencil peddlers, staggering lushes. Old sick cats from everywhere yowling as they went.

  All was right with the world.

  Till he caught an unexpected glimpse of himself in a window and saw nothing was right after all. No wonder that girl had shied off.

  Who ever heard of a captain of anything going barefooty?

  From the Barracks Street wharf to Bienville, drydock to drydock, dead ocean liners lay like ruined whales, their great white hulls turning to rust. The whole town was in drydock.

  Over all, in a coffee-hued haze from happier years, one still smelled the big brown smell of coffee. The warehouse walls, like the hulls, were stained with it. The planks of the wharves were embedded with it. Below the planks ancestral sacks were rotting in the lap and wash.

  The whole town was in drydock, the whole country in hock, but the pit of the Depression, a secretary of labor announced, was past at last. The President’s stand on wages had averted an even worse slump, the secretary added, ‘Business is starting back.’

  ‘Nobody goes hungry,’ said Little Round Hoover, wiping chicken gravy off his little round chin. A man with the right stuff in him didn’t need government help to find work. That would make him lazy. He might even get sick. Self-reliance for the penniless and government help to the rich, the Old Guard was in again. Hoover patted the chicken inside his own pot. ‘I got it made,’ said Little Round Hoover.

  And in all those miles of wharves and docks the one boat still shipping water was a freighter under an Argentine flag and the proud Spanish title of Shichi-Fukujin.

  In his dizziest daydream Dove had never dared to dream up anything this big. All he could do was gape as the shallows slapped, a little man looking up at a little man looking down.

  The one looking down waved to him to come up. As soon as he got on deck Dove saw his help was needed here. For one thing, the sailors were too small to steer anything this big. With eyes too little to tell the difference between a lighthouse and a dock till they’d be right on top of it and then it would be too late.

  His friend who had done the waving began talking something neither English nor Spanish and pointing at the smoke stack with a paint brush. Dove had never seen a brush that big nor a stack that high. But if needed he could make that old chimbley look like new.

  He reached for the brush but the little man held it back, pointing now to a dock window at dock level:

  ‘Boss man.’

  ‘Wait for me,’ Dove warned the crew. He hurried down the gangplank, into the warehouse and up a spiral stair. Through an open door he saw a framed photograph of an ocean liner that took up half a wall. Below it a drydock foreman sat wishing he were rich.

  ‘Papers’ – the man held out his paper-taking hand without looking up.

  ‘Aint the newsboy,’ Dove explained.

  The man glanced up, then wished he hadn’t. Before him stood something in a pitch helmet off a Walgreen counter, share-croppers’ jeans, sunglasses, a dollar watch with a tick like grandfather’s clock, and butter-colored shoes.

  ‘You the bull-goose here?’ Dove asked, ‘I’m lookin’ for boat-work.’

  ‘There’s ship captain lookin’ for that, son,’ the foreman told him.

  ‘Didn’t reckon on bein’ no captain right off,’ Dove offered to compromise, ‘I’d be mightily satisfied just to swab the deck – or if by chance,’ – he added cunningly – ‘you happened to have a chimbley needs a fresh coat of paint I’d admire to try my hand.’

  ‘You have to have your able-bodied seaman’s papers.’

  ‘More able-bodied than most,’ Dove persisted. ‘Whatever you’d pay me I’d be mighty grateful and praise you most highly for. I’m a very light eater, I might add.’

  ‘Son you aren’t implying you’d scab, would you?’

  ‘Mister, I’ll cook, I’ll cuss, I’ll mend yer socks, I’ll stoke yer engines ’r catch you a damn whale barehand.’ N if you want me to scab somethin’ I’ll scab ’er fore to aft. For I want to learn the sailing trade ’n I’m strong enough for four.’

  ‘You do know that there is a seafaring man’s union?’ He gave Dove the benefit of a serious doubt.

  ‘Mister, I’m a Christian boy and don’t truckle to Yankee notions. Put my name in your ship’s dinner-pot and you’re my captain, I’m your hand. Just tell me ever-what you want done and I’ll ’tend it, for I’m bedcord strong. If I don’t turn you out what in your eyes makes a fair day’s work you can put me off at the first port of call. Aint that fair enough?’

  ‘Mighty fair, son. If more boys were willing to work for nothing there’d be just that many more millionaires.’

  ‘It’s how I figure it too, mister. You got to work for nothing or you’ll never get rich, that only stands to reason.’

  ‘You know,’ the foreman put a brotherly hand on Dove’s shoulder – ‘I liked your face the moment you came in here. Would you take off your glasses so I can see more of it?’

  Dove snapped off the sunglasses and snapped to attention.

  ‘I liked the way you entered, too,’ he assured Dove, ‘without bothering to knock.’

  ‘I judged you had time and to spare.’

  ‘And the intelligent way you stated your case.’

  ‘I reckon I measure up,’ Dove admitted modestly.

  ‘You measure up to something,’ the foreman thought, ‘but I’m not sure to just what.’

  What the foreman was actually measuring was the stack through the window that went sixty feet up from dock level; and the shaky union scale that rose every foot after twenty-five. An eight-hour day at two-seventy per hour for ten days, the foreman made a mental estimate of what he could claim on the books.

  ‘I’ll pay you a buck-fifty an hour to paint that stack, Son.’

  Dove came scurrying back up the gangplank like the flightless kiwi, a bird not built to fly. He heard the foreman holler from window to deck, ‘Put this man in the chair, boys!’ By the time he reached the deck the scrapers, brushes, paint and thinner were ready. Dove jumped right into the bosun’s chair and shouted, ‘Haul steady, maties!’ Then glanced down and found himself nearly twenty feet off the deck.

  ‘Okay, boys!’ he called down cheerfully, ‘I’ll start here ’n work up!’ But the chain kept going higher.

  Who would ever have thought such a fine breeze would be stirring here while other fellows had to sweat out the heat below? He was about to take a second look but the chair began to swing like a cradle and he changed his mind.

  Up and up. Above him leaned the rust-flaked stack, below the river tilted oddly. The hands of his watch seemed strangely bent, but seemed to say 10:55. Good – in five minutes he’d have his tools together so he could begin right on the hour. A full day’s pay for a full day’s work, that was the way to rise in the world.

  ‘Beginnin’, maties!’ he called over the side, ‘Beginnin’!’ That should show them he was no coward.


  Something tugged at the chair and he understood the foreman had had a change of mind – he could come down any time now. Dove whipped the rope fast around the stack, and knotted it with the last of his strength. By God, the man had sent him up, he wasn’t going to get him down without a day’s pay in hand.

  Once fastened, the chair steadied and so did Dove. Not enough to stand upright, but enough to get the lid off the paint can. Just as he got it off, the wind tilted the chair and the tinned oil spilled. He dabbed it off his jeans. ‘Lucky it didn’t get my shoes,’ he took the happier view.

  No use taking a chance on ruining his shoes altogether with a wind that tricky sneaking around. He clamped the lid back on and glanced at his watch: 11:04. By God, just because a man couldn’t read didn’t mean he couldn’t count. That was a dime he’d made already today or he’d know the reason why.

  That was when he looked right over the edge and down and saw the little circle of grinning faces looking up. He closed his eyes to keep from heaving. That would never do the first day on the job.

  When his stomach had steadied he remembered something and found, in the bottom of a Bull Durham sack, just what he was looking for: a palm-full of light green potoguaya and a couple of brown papers. ‘Wasn’t told nothin’ about not smokin’ on the job,’ he argued sensibly. And at the first drag felt the chair rise an inch.

  ‘Let her rise,’ he thought, ‘the higher we go the higher the pay.’

  Scraper, thinner, bucket and brush lay at his feet forgotten; as he had apparently been forgotten by those below. When he looked at his watch again it was almost two. My, how time did fly.

  ‘Lunch!’ he shouted over the side, ‘bring her up!’

  But saw no one climbing the rigging one-handed, tray in the other, to ask whether he took sugar and cream in his coffee.

  ‘Bunch of hogs are at chow,’ he thought sullenly, ‘stuffin’ theirselves like a set of sows. Struck me right off as a sorry lookin’ crew.’

  All through the treetop afternoon Dove dozed, and every time he woke, woke hungrier.

  ‘Chow!’ he tried for his dinner one more time. But all he got was a wave from a deck-hand far below.

  ‘I know your play,’ he finally informed the foreman aloud, ‘you’re tryin’ to starve me down. But you wont do it till I got a full day comin’, friend.’ And went right back on the nod.

  It was almost five when he wakened again, feeling a chill breeze pass. He unlooped the draw-rope. ‘Good thing I didn’t have lunch,’ Dove thought going down, and hopped out onto the deck, pale and swaying. Two of the crew had to hold him up and every man but the foreman looked pleased with his work.

  ‘Not a damn dime, boy!’ the foreman let him know right off. ‘Mention money and I’ll heave you right over the side!’

  Dove got his landlegs under him.

  ‘Mister, I went up in your fool chair like you asked me. We made a bargain.’

  ‘Now you listen here to me, son. I’m Chief-by-Jesus foreman of this everlastingly damned dry dock, I’ll have you under-goddamn-stand that. I’m not to be dic-hellfire-tated to by you or anyone. Is that the Christian-Killing-Moses clear or not? I can make it mother-murdering clearer if you want.’

  ‘A bargain, mister.’

  ‘Talk sense, boy.’

  ‘I’m a-talkin’ sense, mister,’ n you leave mothers out of this. I were aloft six hour, not chargin’ you for overtime because I realize I didn’t do too well my first day. But I tried six dollar worth.’

  The foreman took Dove by the arm, led him to one side and whispered, ‘Take this and get off my God-by-Jesus deck.’ Dove looked down. It was a two dollar bill.

  ‘I got six comin’, mister.’

  ‘As high as I go.’ He had changed it for a fiver.

  ‘I’ll settle.’ Dove took it. The foreman went wearily to the rail, looking downriver and out to sea.

  Down on the dock Dove took one last look up. The little man at the rail was grinning down. He waved the big brush at Dove. ‘Be work on time tomorrow, matey!’ he called. Dove waved back. Mighty mannerable fellow.

  Yet felt a lingering sadness as he left the big river to know he wasn’t going to sea after all.

  Later that day he discovered the door of the men’s room in the Southern Railway Station barred by a white-haired Negro porter. ‘Excuse me, pappy,’ Dove tried to get past.

  ‘Country boy, you got colored blood?’ Pappy demanded.

  ‘Naturally it aint white,’ Dove told him.

  ‘No funny business,’ the old Negro warned him, ‘I’m responsible here.’

  Dove didn’t know what was wrong. He just felt wrong. And left the REST ROOM FOR COLORED in retreat.

  He was bending above the water-fountain when he saw the porter coming at him again. The old man had been searching for someone like this in dreams for years.

  ‘You got colored blood, you caint drink this water.’

  ‘Aint everybody got colored blood, mister?’ By this time Dove really wanted to know.

  ‘You think you make a fool of me with fool questions,’ the old man answered, ‘but all you make a fool of is yourself. Boy, if you white, stay white. If you black, stay black and die. Now get out of my station and out of my sight.’

  ‘It purely wonders me,’ Dove brooded thoughtfully, ‘Why, a Christian don’t scarcely stand a chance for a drink of water in town no more. Looks like my crazy little pappy was right after all.’

  His throat felt parched and he turned into the first doorway he saw with a Coca Cola sign over it. Coca Cola signs went all around this shady nook with nothing on its shelves but empty cokes. He rapped the counter with a dime.

  A little brassiereless beauty, a real fence-corner peach all of nineteen appeared, opened a coke on a nail hooked to the counter, and let her shoulder strap slip to bare her left breast to its tinted nipple. Under the breast was tattooed the single word – Whiskey.

  ‘Aint this the By-Goddest weather you ever seen?’ Dove asked.

  ‘I’ve seen By-Godder,’ the fence-corner peach replied.

  ‘Now I reckon I got a nickel change comin’, m’am,’ Dove reckoned.

  ‘Reckon you awready got your change’ – and replaced the strap, looking bored.

  ‘You don’t feel maybe you made a slight errow, m’am?’

  ‘Right sure.’

  ‘How much fer a stror?’

  ‘Help yourself, country boy.’

  ‘Now there’s another funny thing,’ Dove marveled, taking four straws in an effort to get even, ‘you’re the second person in the past hour noted that. However do folks tell?’

  The peach merely looked blank. When the straws would draw no more he bent each carefully and put down another dime.

  This time she wiped the bottle with a counter cloth and slipped in a single straw. He took it from her with his eyes glued to that left strap.

  It didn’t slip an inch.

  But she rang up his dime and slammed the register so fast, just as the right strap fell away, that he thought she had punched the machine with the nipple. Now she merely leaned on the machine, resting the breast on the NO SALE sign.

  Underneath this one was tattooed – Beer. Dove studied the word solemnly. ‘Do you mind if I spend an opinion, Miss? Somethin’ a bit personal?’ he asked at last.

  ‘Nothing you could tell me could possibly be personal.’

  ‘Why it strikes me you got a mite too much whitenin’ on,’ he told her all the same, ‘it make you look plumb puny.’

  The blankness of her regard surpassed itself. She didn’t so much as blink. Just tipped the bottle’s last drop out, put the bottle away and replaced her strap.

  ‘M’am, I can’t help thinking there’s something dead up the tree.’

  She raised one pencilled brow in the mildest of inquiries.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Last night I bought a sody the other side of the station ’n it were only five cents.’

  ‘That’s the other side of the station. They got a pr
ice war there.’

  ‘Hope nobody got kilt,’ he hoped and put down a third dime.

  This time she opened the bottle, wiped it off, inserted the straw, rang up the dime, shut the register and stepped back all in a single motion. Yet the strap failed to fall. Dove drank slower.

  Nothing.

  ‘How many sodies you sell in a single day m’am?’

  ‘’Bout as many as there are crows at a hog-killin’,’ she made a close guess.

  ‘Why, that’s a good few,’ Dove decided.

  ‘What did you come in here for, mister?’

  ‘Got barred from the water-founting.’

  ‘I think you’re wasting your money.’

  ‘After all, it’s my money.’

  ‘And so long as it’s money, it’s a-plenty,’ she pointed out – ‘but when it’s all spent it can get right scarce.’

  ‘I’ve heard that sometimes money don’t hardly last till it’s gone, that’s true. Or so I’ve been told. You think my forty-dollar might last that long?’

  ‘You spend it all on cokes it wont, if you follow me.’

  ‘I don’t follow you too near. All I know is this coke tastus right fine.’

  ‘It what?’

  ‘Tastus right fine. But what if I should put a dollar down here?’

  ‘Try one.’

  Dove put it down and she had snapped it up before it touched the counter.

  ‘Now see if you can follow me.’

  Somewhere at the bottom of that narrow passage a girl was laughing mirthlessly like a girl laughing at herself, and all its doors were numbered.

  No light, no window, no sound. Dove stood lost in a burning blackout till he heard someone hooking a door. Then a little green light came up in a corner and the beer-and-whiskey beauty stood stripped to her slippers in a glow, a girl delicate as a deer.

  ‘Never did see such a purty girl afore even though you are a mite scarce-hipped,’ he told her. ‘I’m gittin’ a mighty urr to lewdle. Would you care to lewdle too?’