William Gaddis - The Recognitions

— What happened to her?

— I don't know.

— I mean Chrahst what happens to people. You know? I mean, like Anselm, did you hear about him? He joined a monastery Max told me. I mean Chrahst I'd just as soon be dead. Look out, you're spilling your beer.

— Did he… is that true? Stanley asked.

— I mean Chrahst how do I know? Ed Feasley said impatiently. — It's what Max told me. Some silent order out west.

— I always thought he was queer, said Hannah.

— But… is that true? Stanley repeated, staring at Ed Feasley.

— How do I know! Ed Feasley burst out at him. — I mean, I told you. . I'm sorry but, Chrahst, I mean haven't we all had enough of all this? They looked at him with surprise, because his voice was that different, it almost broke; and then he recovered without looking up at them mumbling, — Because Chrahst I mean you can't just you know I mean Chrahst. .

— I heard you bought an airplane, Stanley said after a moment.

Ed Feasley nodded but did not look up. And then Hannah asked him,

— Was that true? what we saw in the paper? Was that your father in the Times this morning?

— How do I know, I don't read the Times. Chrahst. I suppose it was. Then he looked up. — Have you got a cigarette? They both looked blank. — What do you mean? he broke out again. — About all this. . these charges of collusion with a foreign government, and the whole works going to hell, and then my old man has a stroke on top of that? Is that what you mean? I mean Christ say what you mean.

— She. . she didn't mean anything, Stanley said putting a hand out.

— Well Chrahst nobody means anything, Feasley drew away muttering, and stood rubbing the floor with his shoe.

— But you. . you're all right, about money? you did have plenty of money, if you could buy an airplane. .?

— That thing, it crashed in Florida. Were you ever in Tampa? I mean to Chrahst what a lousy town that is, Tampa. They were nasty as hell about it.

— You crashed? in a plane crash?

— I was taking off, I hit this flock of lousy birds.

— But you got out all right? you weren't hurt?

— Chrahst no, I never knew what happened after I saw those white birds right in front of me. I was drunk. I mean Chrahst, what a Chrahst-awful mess everything is, everything at once.

Ed Feasley stood watching his toe rub the floor board, grinding a cigarette stub there into the wood, and would not look up until their continued silence provoked him. He looked up, and they looked down.

— I mean, my old man, Chrahst I never liked the old bastard, but I… I hate like hell to see him like this, just. . just sitting there and he can't move a thing, he just sits there.

When Hannah started to speak, Stanley looked at her apprehensively as though he expected some note of acid triumph (and she had, at that, been referred to in a news item on her arrest the night she was doing her laundry in the subway washroom, as a Stalinist, or Trotskyite, or the parent that combined them both, some such); for each of these two seemed to feel that they had suddenly lost a friend, or at the least an affluent acquaintance upon whom they could call in some moment of extremity, as indeed they had: or say that someone of those dimensions had simply gone out of their lives, and someone else, bearing superficial resemblances, come in. So Stanley was surprised to see the same expression on Hannah's face that he felt on his own; and her tone, which could not help but be bitter, perhaps the more so for all this, was a relief for she changed the subject abruptly with, — Do you remember that fucking faggot that knocked me down at Max's party that night? Have you heard about him?

— Herschel. . what?

— He's a movie star.

— Him?

— He's a movie star. He's the new most eligible bachelor in Hollywood.

— Good Chrahst.

— He's going to be Saint Sebastian in a movie about the Virgin Mary.

— But he was. . Saint Sebastian was third century. . Stanley complained feebly.

— Good Chrahst. I mean, this is like a post mortem, like the night that Otto and I… Chrahst. I don't know. Ed Feasley looked round him. — I mean when I come down here all these people remind me of parts of me that never grew up.

— We live in a country that never grew up.

— We live in a whole God damn world that never grew up, said Ed Feasley. — And everybody's leaving. I mean, he looked round again, — everybody's gone. Where are they going? What are they going to do when they get over there?

— Bildow's going over to get laid, said Hannah.

— I mean Chrahst, I almost don't blame him. You know? The only use I ever found for a condom was to fill it up with water and roll it around on the floor. We used to do that in college. I mean you'd be surprised how tremendous they get. It's like a big piece of water with nothing around it rolling around.

— Do you think there would be so many queers around if there were a few good whorehouses in town? Hannah demanded sharply. — No, here they'd rather see their boys go to bed with a picture of some movie star with big boobs, and go on a five-fingered honeymoon like Anselm used to say, with a movie star.

— I know. I mean Chrahst, every time I've gone out to bars looking for a girl I end up drunk talking to some old man.

All three of them stood staring at the floor.

Don Bildow left, looking as vengeful as plastic rims would allow. He had just learned that someone he knew had been arrested trying to charge a three-hundred-dollar suit to the account of someone neither of them knew. Someone else discovered that the old man in black coat, black hat, black rubbers, and black umbrella, was not the art critic for Old Masses at all, but had been hired to go round to galleries because he looked the part (and could keep warm this way); the columns were written by someone in Jersey City, who mailed them in because she never came to New York. The old man left, carrying a glass of beer with him. And down the bar, the Big Unshaven Man was offered a job writing the lonely-hearts column for a newspaper in Buffalo.

— What I get a kick out of is these serious writers who write a book where they say money gives a false significance to art, and then they raise hell when their book doesn't make any money.

— Here, put this in the juke-box. Play Return to Sorrento.

— That's what's playing.

— Play it again.

— Chrahst I wish they'd stop playing that and play On the Sunny Side of the Street.

Stanley had been simply standing there dumbly, staring at the dirty floor, until Hannah asked him what he was going to do next day.

— Well first I, I guess I'll go over to Bellevue, he said. — Why?

— I thought maybe you'd go with me to get a passport.

— But you, you're going too? To Rome?

— Rome, for Christ sake? I'm going to Paris. All he could say was, — But. . looking at her. Hannah looked straight up into his face; and then as suddenly as he had turned, she stood on her toes and kissed him. — Because I may not see you again, she said, and was gone. He stood there, his mustache trembled, and he pressed a finger against it where she had kissed him.

— You know? said Ed Feasley beside him, — I mean I feel like I've left little parts of me all over the place. Like I could spend the rest of my life trying to collect them and I never could. These pieces of me and pieces of other people all screwed up and spread all over the place. I mean there are people you… do something with and then you never see them again. Like Otto, you know? Where the hell is he?

— I don't know, Stanley said clearly, but he continued to stare at the floor.

— I mean he's probably raising hell and having a good time somewhere, you know? But Chrahst, a good time! I mean like the night we went to that party up in Harlem with all the queers, that seems like ten years ago, that little nigger in the lavender dress standing at the next urinal. And then there was this blonde, a woman, I mean I can still hear her singing, If you can't get Maxwell House coffee by the can get Lipton's tea by the balls, I mean Chrahst I can hear it now. I never got over that night somehow, it got me somehow, I even remember what the soap smelled like, this kind of medical smell, I mean why does the soap always have a medical smell in a place like that? You'd think it would be scented. Where you going, you leaving already?