Harriet Daimler - Darling

Gloria stepped across the cement barrier and walked toward McDougal Street. He might be in El Remo, sitting with the junkies and asking if anyone knew where to get some pot. Conrad or Maurice may recognize him if I describe him. They know everybody who steps below Fourteenth Street. He' s as good as dead. I' ll buy a knife and keep it in my bag. I' ll exchange knives with him. See which cuts deeper.

El Remo was ablaze with lights. The jukebox was trembling with Ella Fitzgerald' s pained voice; its bright fluorescent lights bubbled in changing colors. Three boys leaned against the jukebox, worshipping the distant voice coming out of it.

Gloria pushed hard toward the bar. Everyone was balancing bottles of beer in one hand and a half- filled glass in the other. A beer could last all night. An uptown couple, the boy in Madison Avenue gray and the girl in an English tweed suit, were drinking martinis. A wandering artist offered to draw the girl' s portrait. For a beer, for the pleasure of studying that cool face. The boy said, " No thanks." No one was going to take him in. The girl, out of habit, out of confusion about who she was, flirted with the shabby demented artist. Girls like that had to see the same look in every man' s eyes. She was lovely and safe and arrogant and stupid and empty. A refrigerated cunt

… an automatic ice cube machine. The cooler they are, the harder they fall. Maybe ice cubes feel good against a prick. Soothing, like alcohol against a fevered brow. Lovely. All we have to do is freeze and we can live forever.

The girl looked at her, and her eyes gleamed with competition. She' s capable of a less aloof expression. But a man never sees it. They have no idea who she is. I know in a glance. We' re sisters. We' re both losing the game. But she doesn' t know that there' s no way to win. All you can do is not play. I guess she thinks she' s smart. But her score is blank. Mine was blank yesterday morning. I wish I could wipe it clean again. I' ll kill him. That' s how I' ll keep score; I' ll cheat.

Before she reached the bar, she saw Jules sitting half drunk in a booth. He had a dish of cold spaghetti in front of him. No one had ever seen him eat, and the bones in his face gave him a stark dramatic look. He caught her eyes.

" Gloria, out at this hour… come have a beer." That meant sit with him, but pay for your own.

" Have you seen Maurice or Conrad?"

" They' re trying to round up some pot," he slurred. " We' re going to have a party if they score."

" Any chance of scoring?"

" Yeah. There' s this guy who just arrived from Mexico. If he doesn' t have marijuana, he' s sure to have something."

" Christ, Jules, you should never have left the church. You even look like a Jesuit."

" I never left the church. The church left me."

" Jules, do you know a man with white eyes?"

" I don' t know anyone."

" Jules, please, I' m serious. I must find him."

" Why? Did he admire one of your paintings? You should never let an enthusiastic critic go."

" He never saw my paintings."

" Lucky chap."

" Don' t be a bastard, Jules."

" No, Gloria. You' re good in the best decadent tradition."

" Mercy."

" The bourgeoisie gets more paint on canvas than ever before in history. It follows."

" You don' t know anyone with white eyes?" she persisted. " He has a kind of a husky voice and a wide thin mouth, and he' s slim, wearing a black jacket, I think."

" He sounds like Hamlet."

" Help me," she said, and her eyes filling with tears.

Jules looked crestfallen. " Baby, what' s the matter? You know I' m not good when someone is depressed. I consider depression a personal assault on my male ego. If a woman is with me, she must be happy."

" Could you make me happy, Jules?"

" Well, I' ve always wanted to try."

" I think you' re going to get your chance."

" Hmm. Have you finished with that loser who drives a car as big as the Trump Tower?"

" Yes. I' m finished with him."

" I suddenly see something in your paintings that I never dreamed was there. Real feeling. Good old Bourgeoisie romantic feeling. Also, you look less like Joan of Arc every minute."

Conrad and Maurice pushed their way to the booth.

" Man, we scored. We scored. We blew some of this shit with this cat and it is too much. I am now in a heaven shared only by my erstwhile degenerate associate, Maurice le Clair. Come romp with me, you two earthbound people."

Jules' face lit up. His cheekbones glistened through his pale face. " Let' s go to my place."

" Gloria, are you coming?" asked Maurice

" Maurice, do you know a guy with white eyes?"

Jules shook his head with mock dismay. " The girl is a monomaniac. Maurice, do you know anyone who looks like Hamlet and has white eyes?"

" You are speaking," said Maurice, from his elevated high, " of my alter ego."

" Not to speak," added Conrad, " of the collected unconscious."

" You are both so educated, it pains me," said Jules, " right in my ass."

Gloria felt herself growing dizzy with the vacuum hidden in her. " Let' s go smoke some pot. I know I could use something."

Conrad smiled suggestively at her. " Between us, we have everything that you can possibly want."

" Ahh…" said Jules, " but have you got white eyes?"

" I' ll close my eyes and you can picture anything you want."

" But," said Jules, with his Jesuit precision, " there is a special attitude… a kind of white hot prick that goes with white eyes."

" I' ll match my prick against any man' s."

" Well, Gloria, you couldn' t have a more noble offer than that."

" Let' s go, Jules," she said. " They don' t allow fucking on the tables."

" Is this the dedicated artist of yesterday I see before me?" murmured Maurice.

" Look, do you want to smoke, or do you want to sit here and philosophize?"

" Psychologize, my dear."

" We are going," said Jules, seeing the frustrated fury in Gloria' s eyes, " to my apartment. From there, we are going to a land unknown to common man, or woman."

" It is fortunate that we are exceptional people."

They paid the bad- mannered waiter for Gloria' s beer and Jules' congealed spaghetti.

" The spaghetti was superb as always."

" The chef will faint with joy when I tell him," said the waiter with unreserved contempt.

" Shall we walk or taxi to heaven?" said Maurice.

" Let' s walk," said Jules. " The night air will cool our ardor."

" It won' t touch mine," said Gloria, with hopeless resignation.

" Your ardor isn' t supposed to cool. It' s supposed to mount as we wind our way to Horatio Street."

They turned up McDougal Alley and Gloria searched the bars as they passed. She walked between Conrad and Jules as they strolled past Sixth Avenue, then along store- lined Greenwich Avenue.

" Should we roll one now? This is an endless walk," groaned Maurice.

" No, let' s wait until we get to the house. The cops have learned how to smell tea."

They walked silently to the door of 92 Horatio Street. Jules stuck his key into the front door and they climbed the three flights of steps to his two room flat. He snapped on a lamp that cast a faint yellow glow over his couch. The room was otherwise dark, and the faint reds of a Modigliani nude glistened at them.

" Man, this is a cool place."

" My wife had excellent taste."

" Where is she now?"

" She ran off with a swimming instructor."

" Great taste."

" He swam like a bird."

" Let' s smoke like a fish."

Maurice took a discreet tin of aspirins out of his pocket. He flipped the lid open and a mound of greenish, brownish, yellowish tobacco curled in the box.

" Oh, what a beautiful sight. If only I could paint those spiritual weeds."

" Who' s got the paper?"