A Lost King: A Novel (9 page)

“Yes, sir. Thank you very much.”

He studied me.

“Wait a minute,” he said.

He went back into the cooler. He came out with a white package.

“Here's some stew meat for you,” he said.

I thanked him and we shook cold hands.

I stopped at the coffee house to tell Theodore about the job. He leaned on the cracked marble counter and listened to me. Brown strands of hair went all astray on his swollen egg of a head. Smoky brown eyes were buried behind the bloom of nose. His sunken cheeks were pitted like peach stones.

The card players kept calling to him.

“A cup of coffee, Theodore,” said Regas. “One more thing. Take off your mask when you bring it.”

“They say Socrates was an ugly man, too,” said Poulos.

“Socrates is dead,” said Regas. “We listen to him but we don't have to sit and look at him. Theodore is a slap in the face to every living Greek. A man could look and look at that face. He could think for a thousand years and never guess that a Greek ever had a dream about a beautiful thing.”

Theodore was waiting for me to continue my story. I finished it and showed him the package of stew meat and the bandage around my thumb. He started to laugh. He cupped his hand over his mouth to hide the gap of two missing front teeth. He laughed tears into his eyes. He told the gamblers about my experience in the cooler. They filled the coffee house with bursts of laughter. It sounded like a triumph for me. Some of those Greeks nodded and waved welcome to me. They took delight in things going wrong.

After a moment of silence we heard the bubbling laughter of Marko who sat alone in the corner. It seemed the news had just reached him. His hands were on his knees and he leaned forward to laugh and laugh.

“Was it that funny?” I said. “Maybe he should go over and tell my father about it. I wish he would, Theodore.”

“He's not laughing at you. Marko's a little loose.”

“Loose?”

“Someone said he's got the limit. He fell off a bridge while he was painting. He broke almost every bone in his body. They say he remembers falling all the way. And now he laughs and laughs.”

“But why?”

“Who knows? I asked him once and he laughed harder. Listen, Paul, don't worry about that job. Go back on the wagon till you find something you like to do. And take your father a
baclava
. Sweeten him up before you tell him what happened.”

My father was sitting in the kitchen. To alert him I put the package of stew on the table and kept my hand on it a moment so that he would get a good look at the bandage. He was looking at that bandage as though at a little crushed white bird in my hand. I found myself turning my hand so that he could see it from all sides.

“Don't tell me,” he said. “Don't tell me.”

“The thumb is going to be all right.”

“I'm not talking about your thumb. I'm talking about the job.”

“It's just about over.”

“Just about? Then it's not over?”

“Well, Pa, I guess it is.”

“They fired you?”

“He didn't fire me.”

“You mean you quit?”

“I didn't quit.”

“What the hell do you mean?”

“I mean he sort of let me go. He was sorry to do it.”

“You mean he kissed you good-by?”

“They fire you when you do something wrong, Pa. I just wasn't doing things exactly right. That's all there is to it.”

“What is this? Why didn't he show you how to do it?”

“He did. But he didn't have much patience.”

“Why not? You were new. Why didn't he?”

“How do I know? The same reason you don't.”

“I don't understand this,” he said. “I don't understand this.”

“What's there to understand? I tried my best. I couldn't handle the knife as well as the others.”

“What others?”

“The other men.”

“But when did they start on this job?”

“I think some of them started today.”

“Some of them?”

“Most of them,” I said.

“You mean all of them. And they're going back tomorrow.”

“Some of them.”

“You mean all but you!”

“I guess so.”

“What the hell is this? How could he see in one day that everyone could do it but you? How could he see it?”

“He looked. He was there every fifteen minutes.”

“But what is it to cut meat off a bone? By Christ, you get it off with your teeth quick enough!”

“Well, it's not so easy. You've got to work fast and there's a kind of trick to it.”

“Why didn't he show you the trick?”

“Well, he did. I don't know what happened. I was watching him and watching him. I saw where he started and where he finished. It's hard to explain. I couldn't remember what happened in between.”

“It's the same when you talk to me!”

“Why do you get so upset about such a little thing?”

“A little thing? Is it a little thing that you can't hold a job for one day? Is it?”

“I thought it was. But it's getting bigger every minute. I don't think that job was worth holding.”

“Don't you? The others thought it was.”

“Let them hold it then. It's different for me. I wasn't meant to be a butcher. I didn't belong there.”

“What were you meant for? Where do you belong?”

“It's something I have to find out. I'll look for another job and meanwhile I'll put in a couple of days a week on the wagon.”

“Let me tell you something,” he said. “If I see you walk in here with a watermelon I'll break it over your head! That job will be the ruin of you. I never heard anything like this in my life. One day on a job. One miserable day!”

“What difference does it make if it's one day or one week? They'd find out about me sooner or later. This way it saves time.”

“What's in that package?”

“The boss gave me some meat for stew. It's beef.”

“There it is. There it is in one word. It ends in stew. I can't believe it. All at once I remember myself at your age. I used to work all day in the mines and then study books half the night. I took hold of things and never let go!”

“Maybe that's your trouble, Pa.”

“Get out!”

“And another thing: did you play the harmonica?”

“Get out before I lay my hands on you!”

He put his hand on the package of stew. I turned and went out. His curses followed me. Peggy was coming down the street. I stood on the sidewalk and watched the slow free swing of her body. It was like a hidden bell. Her face and eyes were aglow within the swimming black of her hair.

“Let's go up to Lincoln Park,” I said. “I mean business.”

“What's all the noise inside?” she said. “Is your father arguing with someone? Is something wrong?”

“Nothing at all. He's taking target practice. There'll be a big thump against the wall in a minute and then it'll be over.”

The thump came. My father had thrown the stew against the wall.

“There it is,” I said. “Now how about a movie?”

“I'm sorry, Paul. I don't think you understand things.”

“Let's walk up to the Garden Theatre. We'll go by way of Lincoln Park. And then we'll come home by way of the park. Never mind the movie. Let's go right to the park. I'll play the harmonica and give you a ride on the swings. And then we'll get some ice cream.”

“Edmund is taking me for a ride down to Perkins Beach. He bought a new car, Paul. A brand-new Chevrolet. It's pink and black.”

Sudden jealousy like flame was leaping round inside me.

“Listen to your father,” she said. “He's really wild.”

“Why shouldn't he be? I lost my job.”

“You lost your job? You mean your new job?”

“The brand-new one. It was red and white. Meat and bone mostly.”

“How could you? How could you lose a job so fast?”

“It was easy. The boss said I was no good. Absolutely no good.”

“He didn't?” she said, as though she suspected it all along.

“But he did.”

“I'm sure he didn't mean it, Paul.”

“Why did he say it then? And in front of everybody? Why did he call the office girls in to hear it? Why did he rip my apron off?”

“I can't believe it. What happened to your hand?”

“I cut myself. That wasn't so bad. The trouble is, I cut the man working next to me. But I swear it was an accident. You've got to believe that. He was leaning over to tie his shoe and I got him in the shoulder. And then the boss made a grab for my knife and I got him. On the side of the wrist. It was a shock. He's what they call a master butcher. He didn't spill a drop of his own blood in twenty years. He sent me home in a taxi.”

A horn was blowing.

“Your new car's at the corner,” I said. “Is he afraid to drive it in the alley? Tell him Danny Poulos is a big boy. He doesn't throw rocks at new things any more.”

She went away from me as though going downhill.

I sat in the rocker on the porch. I was rocking and thinking about her with that boy. Surely she would whisper to him and kiss him. My father started to curse again. Now it was good to hear him. By the time he went to bed we were both at peace. I wished him sweet sleep.

Peace lasted as long as his sleep. First thing in the morning I called Sam Ross and then I made ready to go out on the watermelon wagon. My father sat looking away from me. His nose in profile hooked slightly and then pointed like a finger straight into hell. It was a dangerous time to tease him and yet that vengeful look was irresistible.

“I think I'll ask Sam for a raise,” I said. “Sometimes people want half a watermelon and Sam tells me to do the cutting. Now that I've got more experience with a knife he should pay me more.”

I jumped back as he turned the table over. He drove his hands into his pockets to keep from hitting me. He lunged into the bathroom and slammed the door so hard that plaster crumbled in the kitchen walls. I went to work and came home to find the table in the same place. He was lying on the bed and puffing his pipe.

“How about some supper?” I said. “Maybe we should have a buffet supper. Why should we let this table come between us?”

I kept talking while I put the kitchen in order. He said nothing. I went out to buy a loaf of bread and I stopped at the coffee house to tell Theodore about the situation at home.

“Your father's on edge, Paul,” he said. “It's a hard time for him. A man works hard all his life and then one day they tell him he's finished. It's a bad thing. And then he doesn't see you getting started in the way he wants. But he'll be all right. Keep after him. Keep him busy with things.”

I followed his advice. First of all I subscribed to eight magazines. My father watched for mail that never came and so now every week there would be new magazines for him. I was carried away by this idea of mail. Using his name, I wrote to inquire about correspondence courses in figure painting and vocabulary improvement and personality development. I called six travel agencies and told them to send folders with information about vacations in every corner of the world.

I played tricks to startle him out of black brooding moods. One windy night I removed the newspaper stuffing from three dining-room windows. Those rattling windows woke him at two in the morning. Late the next night I got out of bed to go to the bathroom. I turned the toilet handle straight up and went back to bed. I lay there listening to the water gurgling in the toilet and the deep harsh breathing of my father. Suddenly he snorted. Now there was only the big flooding noise of water as though from a burst pipe. With a cry he leaped out of bed and blundered into the kitchen where he ripped the chain off the kitchen light. He was cursing for half an hour. I had to bite the pillow to hold back laughter and a sudden wild cry of love for him in the night.

Next morning I was sipping coffee and watching him as he made preparations to go to the bathroom. He called it the high point of his day. He was wearing dungarees and brown slippers. He filled his pipe and put it beside the book of matches. He cut an orange in quarters and finished it in four bites. I poured coffee for him. Two sips were enough. His eyes flashed. He was just about to grab pipe and matches and lunge into the bathroom when I got up and slipped in ahead of him. I stayed in there. He was cursing and marching from room to room. I heard him in the bedroom. I slipped out of the bathroom. I closed the door and went out on the porch. Now he was in a dancing uproar. I started to play the harmonica. He came to the kitchen door and saw me sitting on the porch step. His mouth worked. No words came. He plunged into the bathroom and slammed the door.

I thought about him all day while selling watermelons. As always I was ashamed of myself for teasing him and yet I loved him even more because of it. I decided to buy a fine black hat for him on Saturday.

Next morning I filled his pipe and put it beside the matches. I sat waiting in the kitchen. There was no sound. I called out before going into his bedroom. He was lying in bed and staring at the cracks in the slant brown ceiling. His back and shoulders had stiffened in the night. Beads of sweat glistened on his brow. I stood over him for a moment and then moved away. I didn't want him to feel helpless.

“Is it your back again?” I said.

“Go away.”

“If I go away, Pa, you'll be alone. So will I.”

“Don't touch me.”

He took a deep breath and tried to lift himself on his elbows. His eyes went hot with pain. Muscles bulged in his neck. All at once he made a turning lunge for the chair beside the bed and he fell with a sharp crack of bone on it. My heart stopped when I saw his thin white body hanging out of bed. I lifted him back. He closed his eyes against me. I turned him over and massaged him.

“It's like a knife,” he said. “It's like a knife in my heart when I remember how strong I used to be. Life leads on to nothing.”

I helped him into his dungarees. He got up and shuffled into the kitchen. He ate an orange and sipped coffee. Off he went to the bathroom. I moved his chair under the light. I knew that his hands would be unsteady and so I waited to shave him. He came out and sat down. I found myself pinning the dishcloth too tight around his neck. Without a word he jerked it down and off and dropped it on the floor. Apologizing, I pinned the cloth again and started to lather him with the brush. I lathered and lathered him. Something was telling me to stop and stop and yet I kept lathering and lathering. At last nothing was left but those eyes gone small with fury in a foam white and rich as his hair. He gave me a terrible kick in the shin. He went into the bathroom and stayed there until I left the house.