Jane Bowles - My Sister's Hand in Mine - The Collected Works of Jane Bowles

“Young man,” she said to him, “would you mind telling me if you are all actually going on some lark together in a group or if it’s a coincidence?”

“We’re all going to the same place,” said the boy, “as far as I know.”

“Well, could you tell me where that is?” asked Miss Goering.

“Pig Snout’s Hook,” he answered. Just then the ferry whistle blew. He hastily took leave of Miss Goering and ran to join his friends on the foredeck.

Miss Goering struggled up the hill entirely alone. She kept her eye on the wall of the last store on the main street. An advertising artist had painted in vivid pinks a baby’s face of giant dimensions on half the surface of the wall, and in the remaining space a tremendous rubber nipple. Miss Goering wondered what Pig Snout’s Hook was. She was rather disappointed when she arrived at the top of the hill to find that the main street was rather empty and dimly lighted. She had perhaps been misled by the brilliant colors of the advertisement of the baby’s nipple and had half hoped that the entire town would be similarly garish.

Before proceeding down the main street she decided to examine the painted sign more closely. In order to do this she had to step across an empty lot. Very near to the advertisement she noticed that an old man was bending over some crates and trying to wrench the nails loose from the boards. She decided that she would ask him whether or not he knew where Pig Snout’s Hook was.

She approached him and stood watching for a little while before asking her question. He was wearing a green plaid jacket and a little cap of the same material. He was terribly busy trying to pry a nail from the crate with only a thin stick as a tool.

“I beg your pardon,” said Miss Goering to him finally, “but I would like to know where Pig Snout’s Hook is and also why anyone would go there, if you know.”

The man continued to bother with the nail, but Miss Goering could tell that he was really interested in her question.

“Pig Snout’s Hook?” said the man. “That’s easy. It’s a new place, a cabaret.”

“Does everyone go there?” Miss Goering asked him.

“If they are the kind who are fools, they go.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Why do I say that?” said the man, getting up finally and putting his stick in his pocket. “Why do I say that? Because they go there for the pleasure of being cheated out of their last penny. The meat is just horsemeat, you know. This size and it ain’t red. It’s a kind of gray, without a sign of a potato near it, and it costs plenty too. They’re all as poor as church mice besides, without a single ounce of knowledge about life in the whole crowd of them. Like a lot of dogs straining at the leash.”

“And then they all go together to Pig Snout’s Hook every single night?”

“I don’t know when they go to Pig Snout’s Hook,” said the man, “any more than I know what cockroaches are doing every night.”

“Well, what’s so wrong about Pig Snout’s Hook?” Miss Goering asked him.

“There’s one thing wrong,” said the man growing more and more interested, “and that’s that they’ve got a nigger there that jumps up and down in front of a mirror in his room all day long until he sweats and then he does the same thing in front of these lads and lassies and they think he’s playing them music. He’s got an expensive instrument all right, because I know where he bought it and I’m not saying whether or not he paid for it, but I know he sticks it in his mouth and then starts moving around with his long arms like the arms of a spider and they just won’t listen to nothin’ else but him.”

“Well,” said Miss Goering, “certain people do like that type of music.”

“Yes,” said the man, “certain people do like that type of music and there are people who live together and eat at table together stark naked all the year long and there are others who we both know about”—he looked very mysterious—“but,” he continued, “in my day money was worth a pound of sugar or butter or lard any time. When we went out we got what we paid for plus a dog jumpin’ through burning hoops, and steaks you could rest your chin on.”

“What do you mean?” asked Miss Goering—“a dog jumping through burning hoops?”

“Well,” said the man, “you can train them to do anything with years of real patience and perseverance and lots of headaches too. You get a hoop and you light it all around and these poodles, if they’re the real thing, will leap through them like birds flying in the air. Of course it’s a rare thing to see them doing this, but they’ve been right here in this town flying right through the centers of burning hoops. Of course people were older then and they cared for their money better and they didn’t want to see a black jumping up and down. They would rather prefer to put a new roof on their house.” He laughed.

“Well,” said Miss Goering, “did this go on in a cabaret that was situated where the Pig Snout’s Hook place is now situated? You understand what I mean.”

“It surely didn’t!” said the man vehemently. “The place was situated right on this side of the river in a real theater with three different prices for the seats and a show every night and three times a week in the afternoon.”

“Well, then,” said Miss Goering, “that’s quite a different thing isn’t it? Because, after all, Pig Snout’s Hook is a cabaret, as you said yourself a little while ago, and this place where the poodles jumped through the burning hoops was a theater, so in actuality there is really no point of comparison.”

The old man knelt down again and continued to pry the nails from the boards by placing his little stick between the head of the nail and the wood.

Miss Goering did not know what to say to him, but she felt that it was pleasanter to go on talking than to start off down the main street alone. She could tell that he was a little annoyed, so that she was prepared to ask her next question in a considerably softer voice.

“Tell me,” she said to him, “is that place at all dangerous, or is it merely a waste of time.”

“Surely, it’s as dangerous as you want,” said the old man immediately, and his ill humor seemed to have passed. “Certainly it’s dangerous. There are some Italians running it and the place is surrounded by fields and woods.” He looked at her as if to say: “That is all you need to know, isn’t it?”

Miss Goering for an instant felt that he was an authority and she in turn looked into his eyes very seriously. “But can’t you,” she asked, “can’t you tell very easily whether or not they have all returned safely? After all, you have only if necessary to stand at the top of the hill and watch them disembark from the ferry.” The old man picked up his stick once more and took Miss Goering by the arm.

“Come with me,” he said, “and be convinced once and for all.” He took her to the edge of the hill and they looked down the brightly lighted street that led to the dock. The ferry was not there, but the man who sold the tickets was clearly visible in his booth, and the rope with which they moored the ferry to the post, and even the opposite shore. Miss Goering took in the entire scene with a clear eye and waited anxiously for what the old man was about to say.

“Well,” said the old man, lifting his arm and making a vague gesture which included the river and the sky, “you can see where it is impossible to know anything.” Miss Goering looked around her and it seemed to her that there could be nothing hidden from their eyes, but at the same time she believed what the old man said to her. She felt both ashamed and uneasy.

“Come along,” said Miss Goering, “I’ll invite you to a beer.”