J. Donleavy - Wrong Information is Being Given Out at Princeton

“Hey come on pal. Don’t dawdle.”

Max behaving as if it were his own private hotel announcing as he led me in a tour of its grandiose lobby that it was the Democratic party headquarters, pointing out the drugstore, the barbershop, beauty salon, travel bureau, florist, ticket agency, Turkish bath, cocktail bar, and, with a bow, inviting me to survey the splendor of the Palm Court. He seemed specially to be taken with an elegant brass clock. Two semiclothed figures stretching upward to support the round white dial. Max breaking out a couple of cigars.

“Here pal, have a Bolivar. Now pal, right here, right under this clock, is where people for better or worse, meet and make their assignations.”

Max guiding me back to the door to the “Men Only” bar. The wood-paneled room hung with oil paintings. Its comfortable red leather chairs. We sit up at the bar on stools, elbows on the shining mahogany. Tinkle of ice. Three other drinkers in the dim light. Two with their newspapers. The other in silent attendance, staring out over his drink into empty space. It’s said it’s a place where some men come to be in solitude to delay catching the train back to their wives and children. Or decide not to go at all.

“What can I do for you, gentlemen.”

Crew-cut bartender in his white jacket and bow tie attending and smiling upon this customer Maximilian Avery Gifford, who was puffing his cigar and who could pass, if this were a Saturday evening, for a rah-rah boy just arrived back at Grand Central after a college football game. At first nonplussed to be asked for a war-vintage bottle of Pol Roger champagne.

“Well sir, I don’t believe I know of that brand or if we have that available.”

“Well we’re just a couple of old buddies celebrating a bit of a reunion and it sure would be nice if we had the appropriate grape to do it with.”

The bartender gently humored by Max, and adjusting his bow tie, warming to his task, instituted a search down in the cellars of the hotel. Old Max ready to award those who give cheerful service, smiling his appreciation and putting his foot up on the bar rail, waiting with perfect patience over his vintage soda water and relighting his cigar which had gone out while reciting the minutiae of our surroundings.

“Hey, old pal, didn’t I tell you it was really something. Known to its customers as ‘the sanctum.’ Oyster stew, roast beef, sirloin steak, and apple pie. Four dollars at lunchtime, seven dollars and fifty cents at night. You see, old pal, this is where a guy could get away somewhere in peace on his workdays. Boy, I could have used a refuge like this back in ole Houston. To take a breather from the thoughtless, monumental, selfish meanness of that ole gal when she wanted to be mean. And over such goddamn trivial things. Impulsive irrationality was her middle name. Spoiled rotten by her father especially. Lavished every goddamn thing she ever wanted on her. I don’t think there was, but there were times you could almost think something funny had been going on there. She cleaned out everything she could, even the least little trinket or piece of crap of mine. Then poured gasoline on two of my best English suits and burned them up in the barbecue. Even mangled my tie pins. Gee, she sure wasn’t like the same girl you met back in my little ole apartment on West Thirty-fourth Street.”

“Here we go, gentlemen. As ordered. Pol Roger, vintage 1947, which I am told was a superlative year.”

The bartender deadly serious with his success, producing the bottle of Pol Roger champagne just beginning to gather dust. From the second year of peace after the war. Of three the hotel had left. Ten minutes to wait to chill. Glasses filled. Max ordering another bottle to be on the way and chilling and raising his present glass in a toast.

“Old pal, down the hatch. And to the future. And why don’t I now do a little organizing of your life for you. I sort of got a real goddamn beauty on the go right at this moment. A hatcheck girl in a good restaurant. But that’s only temporary work for her while she’s between modeling jobs. Used to be an air hostess. I know she’s got a couple of good-looking friends. What do you say I take us all on a double date. Come on, next Saturday. Motor uptown in the old chariot. We’ll have a workout together at the Athletic Club, play some squash and then dine in one of the most beautiful dining rooms in all of New York. From the eleventh floor looks right out and over the whole of Central Park.”

“Max, I don’t know right now. I might have enough on my plate for the moment as it is.”

“Pal, don’t miss opportunities. All you got to do is date the right girls and go to the right places.”

“Well I sure don’t mind knowing who the right girls are and what are the right places.”

“Well, it’s obvious. We’ll smell around a little in the Social Register. I know a few names and that little old volume got the telephone numbers listed. And even where some of these little old gals, the daughters, are matriculating at college.”

“Are you sure, Max, these matriculating girls at college are the best people.”

“Hey come on pal, don’t be obstructionist and a killjoy. And hey, and I don’t want to overcome you with flattery, old buddy boy, but you got what it takes. Charm. Talent. And let’s face it, how many people take you for a lighter shade of old Rudolph Valentino. Look where his looks got him. There’s a chance for everybody. I’ve seen the girls turn around to look when you go by. Hey, what about you take up a modeling career. Get your picture in the magazines.”

“Max, I’m a composer.”

“Sure, I know that. But the real facts are that this is a rough, tough city for artistically dedicated people. Unless you’re one of the lucky. Those who can fall back on big money and coast along on their enormous private incomes from inherited wealth. But nothing is stopping you, old buddy boy, from keeping your music composing going on the side. But now like me, you’re a free agent. Or at least I’ll remain one till they clamp me in alimony jail. Which if they do, that’s where I’ll stay. No kidding. You can be treated pretty well in there. I don’t see why I should have to support a previous poor wife and now on top of it a rich divorced wife. And buddy boy, I haven’t told you the whole story yet. But I will after another bottle of ole Pol Roger champagne from down in this good hotel’s cellars. Pal, this is the champagne old Winston Churchill drank winning the goddamn war when the sirens of the air raids were wailing over London and the goddamn bombs were falling. When the spirit of the British people was being severely tested. Ah, and here we go with this next bottle. Hold up your glass. Attaboy. Drink a toast. Hey bartender. Have a glass. Hey, we’re having a goddamn reunion. It must be getting to be at least five goddamn years after the end of the war. A toast to the U.S. Navy. Anchors now, goddamn away. You see, pal, someone in this city cares. To your good health, sir.”

Max sending a second drink down to the gentleman at the other end of the long oval bar, who was staring out into space but who now smiled, raised his glass, and said, “Skol” back up at Max, who toasted him in return. Max was getting gently merry. And as he did so, attempting as one remembered from the navy, to become a comedian and insisting with a sudden English accent that the barman join us in yet another toast.

“I say there, my good chap. It’s time off from hard work. This time a toast to my good buddies and my buddy here next to me, who served on the old Missouri. That’s right, fifty-seven thousand five hundred tons slicing through the waves at thirty-five knots. Go through a hurricane like a knife through butter. And those nine sixteen-inch guns, bam, bam , with my pal here in the turret, could hit a floating orange crate the other side of the horizon at a range of twenty-two nautical miles. Ain’t that right, ole pal.”