Some Came Running (80 page)

Dr Pirtle nodded. “Quite so,” he said. “Well, perhaps the next fellowship.”

As she shut the door, he had already commenced the ritual of relighting his pipe.

Walking back to the library she tried hard to control her wild feeling of elation, but it was hard to do. Wally Dennis needed that money. But more than that, he needed the prestige the fellowship would give him locally for his morale. He had already begun to get a complex about being a bum who lived off his poor widowed mother. And now he would have a little money and a little prestige, too. And, by God, she had got it for him. The kind of wild, tigerish elation threatened momentarily to carry her away. It didn’t matter a damn what they did to her about it, she thought, she had got it for him. And anyway, they couldn’t do much; just give her hell and pick themselves another judge; and that would be a year from now. Hell, his book might even be done by then.

She remained in a state of high elation the rest of the day, and that night as soon as she got home, called Wally up to come over so she could tell him the news. He arrived in his mother’s old car, and when she told him about the fellowship, with a kind of stuttering surge of outrage Wally blew his top completely and swore he would refuse it, and he would write them a letter saying so tomorrow.

“Nobody’s going to tell me what to write! Christian principles, indeed! I’ll write what I goddam please! And I’ll tell them to their face that my whole goddam life is
dedicated
to showing
all
of them up for what they are and their goddamned Christian principles! No, sir! I refuse!”

“Wally! WALLY!!” Gwen said. “Shut up a minute. Let me talk a minute.”

“They’re not gonna muzzle
me,
by God! Not Wallace French Dennis. Anyway, I don’t need their money. If they think they can buy me off, they’re mistaken!” Then he stopped suddenly and pointed his finger at Gwen as if it were a loaded pistol, so tensely his whole arm quivered. “Why, I wouldn’t be surprised if that wasn’t what the whole thing was cooked up for. An attempt to muzzle me and buy me off. They all know about my book. They don’t want the truth told! And you, Gwen, you let them suck you into it! I thought you were my friend!” He jammed his fists down in his pockets and stood before her. “Well, they won’t get away with it. I’ll write what I want to write! I’ll write the truth! There never was a novelist who was worth a damn if he let other people tell him what and what not to write!”

“Wally!” Gwen shouted. “Sit down.” But he wouldn’t, and so she got up and placed herself in front of him, legs apart, her hands on her hips. “Wally, sit down and listen to me!”

Grudgingly, he sat down at the big table and looked at her, outraged, raped. “I know what they’re trying to do!” he started.

“Wally!” she said, and he stopped. “Wally, do you think I would let you ruin your book?”

“No,” he said; “no, but—”

“And I certainly would not let anyone else ruin it,” Gwen interrupted. “Have I ever told you what to write?”

“No.”

“Have I ever insisted that you write something you didn’t believe in?”

“No, but—”

“No buts, please!” she said. “You’ve had your say. And said it quite well, running around here like a chicken with its head off. Now, I think you owe me an apology.”

“Oh, nuts!” Wally said. “All right, “I apologize. But if you let them suck you in—”

“No buts, please! You’ve had your say. Now you listen to mine. I went out on a limb to get you this damned fellowship. It might even cost me my job. Dr Pirtle and I awarded you this fellowship. And we did it because you are the best student in the novel that we have. Nobody else had any sayso in it. Nobody—neither the committee nor Dr Pirtle nor me—is going to tell you
what
to write. You and I will go right on with your book just like we always have.”

“All right,” Wally said, “okay; but why all this damn Christian principles stuff then. I’ve had Christian principles stuffed up my rear since I was big enough to crap!” he said. “I
hate
Christian principles!”

“Because the people who did it don’t know any better, that’s why.”

“Then tell them to give their goddamned fellowship to Lloyd C Douglas!”

“He already has enough money,” Gwen said. “They mean well. They just don’t know anything about literature. They’re trying to formulate something that is good, and that’s the only way they know to do it.”

“They won’t think so when they see my book,” Wally said, glowering at her. “At least, I hope not.”

“Perhaps not. But then again, perhaps they will. But even if they don’t, it won’t matter. You will have had the fellowship, and you will have had the thousand dollars. So they will have done
some
good. Your book isn’t bad. It’s a very good and a very moral book. Whether it fits in with these people’s idea of Christian principles or not. If it doesn’t, that’s their fault, not the book’s.”

“All right,” Wally said. “All right, I see that. But I’m not going to take it anyway.”

“And why not?”

“I don’t know,” he said, not looking at her. “Because it’s charity, that’s why! And I don’t need their charity. I get along.”

“Oh, you fool!” Gwen said. “Oh, you poor, vain, ignorant, egotistical fool!”

“Okay,” Wally said sullenly. “Maybe so. But I still ain’t going to take it.”

“I’m sorry I ever wasted my time with you!” Gwen said. “I thought you were a
writer!
A writer takes everything he can get, from everybody he can get it from, and he uses it and he’s grateful for it. It’s his right, because he gives up everything else to be a writer. He gives up his possessions. And, Wally, the greatest of his possessions is his pride.”

Wally sat glowering and said nothing.

“All right,” she said. “If you don’t take it, I’m through and you write the rest of your goddamned book yourself.”

Wally looked up startled. “You really mean that?” he croaked.

“I most certainly do. Take it. Take it and use it, in the best way you know how to use it, for the good of your work. Or else I’m through.”

“I won’t take it,” Wally said. “God
damn
them, I won’t take it.” But he was wavering.

Gwen could see that he was wavering, and in the end she went out to the workshop and called Bob in to her support, not so much because she needed him as because in that way she could save Wally a modicum of his pride in what had become a silly ridiculous battle of wills between them, and thus make it easier for him to accept.“I think you would be making the biggest mistake of your life, Wally,” Bob said, “if you refused it.” That was enough. He could take it, from a disinterested third party—and, Gwen thought bitterly, because it was a damned man.

“All right,” Wally said finally. “I’ll accept it.”

Immediately, Gwen heaved a profound inward sigh of relief, and after Wally left and Bob had gone back out to his workshop, had herself another mild case of hysterics, the first since the evening at the Country Club.

It was almost a month before all the details were arranged and Wally called her up to say he’d got his check. One thousand dollars! he said. Hot damn!

“By the way, have you heard the latest news?” he said after the congratulations. “Dave Hirsh is back.”

“Yes, I’d heard,” Gwen said.

“Have you seen him?”

“No. He hasn’t been over.”

“I don’t wonder,” Wally said. “Wait’ll you hear the
latest
news! Him and ’Bama have leased themselves a house out in the west end of town.

“Looks like you’ve lost yourself a potential novelist,” he said maliciously.

I
T TOOK THEM
two full weeks of the most hectic kind of activity—first to get their house, and then to get it adequately furnished and get moved in; and that was the reason Dave had not been over to see Gwen sooner. At least, it was part of the reason. The other part was that he was so deliciously savoring his triumph—when he would descend upon her with the finished draft of “The Confederate” and, more or less claim his reward, so to speak—that he was almost reluctant to give up the savoring for the fact. The first thing he had learned when he got home—home it was now, oddly—and went to the hotel, was that Gwen had paid his bill and picked up his clothes and stored them for him. (The hotelman said Bob; but Dave knew it was Gwen who had been behind it.) And just this one fact had opened his eyes up to a great many things that he had not seen even before leaving for Florida. If he had, he might never have gone. But he could see now where she had been in love with him all along. The reason she hadn’t slept with him wasn’t because she found him less attractive than all those other guys she’d had love affairs with, it was because she was trying to get him settled down and back to work and help him make something of himself. She probably wanted to as bad as he did. But she was making him do the work first. Probably, she was saving herself for him all this time. Ah, Gwen. Triumph and gratitude seized him, and he promised himself that he would never do anything to hurt her or make her regret her choice; and he cherished triumphantly their coming relationship—when he would show her “The Confederate.” Also, he felt it would do her good to let her sweat a little. And anyway, there was the house.

They had come home loaded. After ’Bama had made up his mind to leave Miami, he had decided to spend two extra days collecting funds. They had played poker all night both nights, sleeping in the day, and drifting from one game to another. And as always that strange, occult partnership of theirs worked, and they won consistently. It was hard, poker-playing work, not stimulating at all, but it paid well. The good thing about gambling, ’Bama said, was that it allowed you to cheat so much on your income tax. In fact, he went on after a moment, gambling was about the only profession left anymore that had any individuality and freedom left and that was one reason he liked it. “Except for yore writin, of course,” he added. They were still dividing their winnings sixty-forty, but ’Bama had said that from now on he thought they ought to split fifty-fifty, Dave had learned enough about how to play poker now that he was earning it; and Dave, his wallet fat with bills on his hip, felt that he had almost forgotten what it was like to live without money. They had not won
every
time they had gone out to play in Miami, but they had won damn
near
every time.

The first thing when they got home, ’Bama went to see his “ol’ buddy” Judge Deacon about the house. Dave did not go along, and was in fact already occupied in doing his own chores and in discovering Bob French had picked up his clothes and that his car was gone, but ’Bama told him about it later. Since everything was gone from the Douglas, and he had plenty of money again, at ’Bama’s suggestion he reoccupied his suite at the Hotel Francis Parkman, and that was where they talked about it. It seemed strange, to have ’Bama sitting there (with his perennial water glass of whiskey) where Frank had sat so very long ago when they had signed the contract for the taxi service. But then the whole town looked different now, newer, and at the same time older, different, to him.

Ol’ Judge was more than glad to help them out. He would start looking for them a house right away, he had said, and since money was no object as ’Bama had said, he would see if he couldn’t get them one of the best in town, maybe right on East Wernz Avenue, the main street, in the middle of the snobs. That ought to burn their tails. But here, ’Bama said explaining it to Dave, he had put his foot down. There was going to be disturbance enough wherever they got a house probly, and there was no use asking for more. Rather reluctantly, Ol’ Judge had agreed with this; so he was only going to look for an ordinary, nice house.

“He’s a funny old duck,” ’Bama drawled. “He hates this town worse than poison, even though he was born here. And yet he wouldn’t leave it for nothin. Apart from the fact that he’s got all his money tied up here. He wouldn’t leave it if he didn’t have any. I guess that’s why he took a likin to me; I don’t fit in nowhere with the ‘respectable’ elements.”

It would take several days for Ol’ Judge to find a suitable house and lease it. He himself was going to take a run down in the country to see his wife and kids and see how his cropper was making out with his crops. Dave was welcome to come along with him if he wanted, but he really thought it would be better if Dave stayed in town and got his affairs straightened up, especially if they were going to go into this gambling partnership deal. He would want to see about getting his clothes and his car back. And he’d want to see Frank about the taxi service. All of that would probably take him a couple of days, and by then ’Bama would be back and they could start in on the house.

“Now, I don’t know what you want to do about that taxi service,” ’Bama said; “but I’m assumin you don’t want to go back to work there.”

“No!” Dave said.

“Well, there’s nothin in that contract that says you have to work there. Now, as to whether you want to buy it all or sell your share, that’s something else again. If you want to buy it, I’ll advance you the money. I can get it here in a week.”

“What about you and me going into partnership with it?”

’Bama grinned. “That would shore scorch them, wouldn’t it?” He shook his head. “But I’d ruther not. I don’t much go for ownin things. My farm’s differnt; I keep my family there. But somethin like this, I guess I just ain’t interested in.”

“Then I guess I’ll sell,” Dave said. “That’s about the way I feel about it, too.”

’Bama nodded. “All right. Now here’s what you want to do, then. You want to pretend like you want to buy it. See? And you want to get to name the price. Flash a little of that green you got on you; and let him know there’s more where that come from. Not in no obvious way; but in a way that’ll make him think he’s figured it out. See? Now here’s what you do,” he said carefully, as if speaking to a child. “You got to make him mad, see? Mad enough to ask to dissolve the pardnership. Because that’s the only way you’ll get to name the price, see? And you make it a high one.
Then
you flash your money, see? and he’ll decide to buy instead of sell, and you’ll get yore price.”