John Toole - A Confederacy of Dunces

I intend to draw Miss Trixie out rather shortly; I suspect that this Medusa of capitalism has many valuable insights and more than one pithy observation to offer.

The only sour note—and here I degenerate into slang to more properly set the mood for the creature whom I am about to discuss—was Gloria, the stenographer, a young and brazen tart. Her mind was reeling with misconceptions and abysmal value judgments. After she had made one or two bold and unsolicited comments about my person and bearing, I drew Mr. Gonzalez aside to tell him that Gloria was planning to quit without notice at the end of the day. Mr. Gonzalez, thereupon, grew quite manic and fired Gloria immediately, affording himself an opportunity at authority which, I could see, he rarely enjoyed. Actually, it was the awful sound of Gloria’s stake-like heels that led me to do what I did. Another day of that clatter would have sealed my valve for good. Then, too, there was all of that mascara and lipstick and other vulgarities which I would rather not catalogue.

I have many plans for my filing department and have taken—from among the many empty ones—a desk near a window. There I sat with my little gas heater at full force throughout the afternoon, watching the ships from many an exotic port steaming through the cold, dark waters of the harbor. Miss Trixie’s light snore and the furious typing of Mr. Gonzalez provided a pleasant counterpoint to my reflections.

Mr. Levy did not appear today; I am given to understand that he visits the business rarely, that he is actually, as Mr. Gonzalez puts it, “trying to sell out as soon as possible.” Perhaps the three of us (for I shall endeavor to make Mr. Gonzalez dismiss the other workers if they arrive tomorrow; too many people in that office will probably prove distracting) in the office can revitalize the business and restore the faith of Mr. Levy The Younger. I have several excellent ideas already, and I know that I, for one, will eventually make Mr. Levy decide to put his heart and soul in the firm.

I have, incidentally, made a very shrewd bargain with Mr. Gonzalez: I convinced him that because I had helped him save the expense of Gloria’s salary, he could respond by transporting me to and fro by taxi. The haggling that ensued was a blot upon an otherwise pleasant day, but I finally won my point by explaining to the man the dangers of my valve and of my health in general.

So we see that even when Fortuna spins us downward, the wheel sometimes halts for a moment and we find ourselves in a good, small cycle within the larger bad cycle. The universe, of course, is based upon the principle of the circle within the circle. At the moment, I am in an inner circle. Of course, smaller circles within this circle are also possible.

Ignatius gave the driver the clipboard and a variety of instructions upon speed, direction, and shifting. By the time they had reached Constantinople Street there was a hostile silence in the taxi, which was only broken by the driver’s request for the fare.

As Ignatius pulled himself angrily up and out of the taxi, he saw his mother coming down the street. She was wearing her short pink topper and the small red hat that tilted over one eye so that she looked like a refugee starlet from the Golddiggers film series. Ignatius noticed hopelessly that she had added a dash of color by pinning a wilted poinsettia to the lapel of her topper. Her brown wedgies squeaked with discount price defiance, as she walked redly and pinkly along the broken brick sidewalk. Even though he had been seeing her outfits for years, the sight of his mother in full regalia always slightly appalled his valve.

“Oh, honey,” Mrs. Reilly said breathlessly when they met by the rear bumper of the Plymouth, which blocked all sidewalk traffic. “A terrible thing’s happened.”

“Oh, my God. What is it now?”

Ignatius imagined it was something in his mother’s family, a group of people who tended to suffer violence and pain. There was the old aunt who had been robbed of fifty cents by some hoodlums, the cousin who had been struck by the Magazine streetcar, the uncle who had eaten a bad cream puff, the godfather who had touched a live wire knocked loose in a hurricane.

“It’s poor Miss Annie next door. This morning she took a little fainting spell in the alley. Nerves, babe. She says you woke her up this morning playing on your banjo.”

“That is a lute, not a banjo,” Ignatius thundered. “Does she think that I’m one of these perverse Mark Twain characters?”

“I just come from seeing her. She’s staying over by her son’s house on St. Mary Street.”

“Oh, that offensive boy.” Ignatius climbed the steps ahead of his mother. “Well, thank God Miss Annie has left for a while. Now perhaps I can play my lute without her rasping denunciations assailing me from across the alley.”

“I stopped off at Lenny’s and bought her a nice little pair of beads filled with Lourdes water.”

“Good grief. Lenny’s. Never in my life have I seen a shop filled with so much religious hexerei. I suspect that that jewelry shop is going to be the scene of a miracle before long. Lenny himself may ascend.”

“Miss Annie loved them beads, boy. Right away she started saying a rosary.”

“No doubt that was better than conversing with you.”

“Have a chair, babe, and I’ll fix you something to eat.”

“In the confusion of Miss Annie’s collapse, you seem to have forgotten that you shipped me off to Levy Pants this morning.”

“Oh, Ignatius, what happened?” Mrs. Reilly asked, putting a match to a burner that she had turned on several seconds before. There was a localized explosion on the top of the stove. “Lord, I almost got myself burnt.”

“I am now an employee of Levy Pants.”

“Ignatius!” his mother cried, circling his oily head in a clumsy pink woolen embrace that crushed his nose. Tears welled in her eyes. “I’m so proud of my boy.”

“I’m quite exhausted. The atmosphere in that office is hypertense.”

“I knew you’d make good.”

“Thank you for your confidence.”

“How much Levy Pants is gonna pay you, darling?”

“Sixty American dollars a week.”

“Aw, that’s all? Maybe you should of looked around some more.”

“There are wonderful opportunities for advancement, wonderful plans for the alert young man. The salary may soon change.”

“You think so? Well, I’m still proud, babe. Take off your overcoat.” Mrs. Reilly opened a can of Libby’s stew and tossed it in the pot. “They got any cute girls working there?”

Ignatius thought of Miss Trixie and said, “Yes, there is one.”

“Single?”

“She appears to be.”

Mrs. Reilly winked at Ignatius and threw his overcoat on top of the cupboard.

“Look, honey, I put a fire under this stew. Open you a can of peas, and they’s bread in the icebox. I got a cake from the German’s, too, but I can’t remember right off where I put it. Take a look around the kitchen. I gotta go.”

“Where are you going now?”

“Mr. Mancuso and his aunt, they gonna pick me up in a few minutes. We going down by Fazzio’s to bowl.”

“What?” Ignatius screamed. “Is that true?”

“I’ll be in early. I told Mr. Mancuso I can’t stay out late. And his aunt’s a grammaw, so I guess she needs her sleep.”

“This is certainly a fine reception that I am given after my first day of work,” Ignatius said furiously. “You can’t bowl. You have arthritis or something. This is ridiculous. Where are you going to eat?”

“I can get me some chili down by the bowling alley.” Mrs. Reilly was already going to her room to change clothes. “Oh, honey, a letter come for you today from New York. I put it behind the coffee can. It looks like it came from that Myrna girl because the envelope’s all dirty and smudged up. How come that Myrna’s gotta send out mail looking like that? I thought you said her poppa’s got money.”