Studs Lonigan (125 page)

“I'll be thirty this fall.”

“That, also, isn't so good. At thirty a man is still young. But we, you see, like to get our service-station men younger. Just out of college, especially, and train them in our own way. I can't hold out much hope for you, but I'll give you an application blank to fill out and mail in to me, and if there is an opening, I shall get in touch with you.”

“Well, thank you. And, oh, yes, I wanted to say, also, that I can give you good references.”

“Of that I don't doubt. I can see that you are an experienced man in your own line, and that you have undoubtedly made good at it.”

“Well, I can give references like Judge Dennis Gorman, and Mr. McCormack who's high up in the Democratic party.”

“Of course, there is no connection between the Nation Oil Company and politics. But then, of course, such references are worthy ones, references of men in public offices, and they will count for you favorably when your application is considered. Now here is an application blank. It is self-explanatory. You fill it out tonight and mail it to me.”

“Thanks, I'll do that,” Studs said, accepting the blank.

“I'm very glad to have met you, Mr. Lonigan,” Mr. Parker said, arising and offering a limp hand.

Studs hurried out past the waiting lineup on the benches. In the corridor, he looked at his watch, eleven-thirty, and pressed the button for an elevator.

From the entrance-way to the Nation Oil building he watched the rain sweep Michigan Boulevard like a broom. The damp atmosphere seemed to penetrate to his bones and he felt lousy enough as it was, without having to take any disappointments.

What now? He tried to make himself believe that he hadn't been dumb in the way he had talked upstairs, but he knew differently. Goddamn it, why did he have to go through this? Giving him the same kind of a go-by they would hand to a chump. It would just be a waste of time filling out the application and mailing it in. He wasn't a dummy, either, and if they'd only give him the chance, he'd show them. He saw himself getting the chance, working himself up, becoming a big shot in the Nation Oil Company. But things had gone too far for him to be kidding himself with such dreams.

That Parker was one cold and clammy bastard. A fake high-brow, lording it over every poor guy who came along looking for a job. What education? What the hell was college anyway? But still, he did wish he hadn't been such a muttonhead as to pass up the chance to get an education when he had had it. Just now, when he needed help most, an education would put him a long way ahead of many others.

Studs noticed a fellow who had been after him in the lineup waiting upstairs. He wanted the fellow to speak, but he passed out. He guessed the guy had gotten the same kind of crap that they'd given him.

A bum shambled by the building. A taxicab skidded on the wet street. Still, what next? He looked at the Help Wanted column of his newspaper, again figuring that he had time for one more attempt before lunch. Opportunity for a salesman. And the building was just over on Wabash Avenue. It didn't look any too hot, but a chance was a chance, and he couldn't afford to ignore anything if it looked at all likely. A green-slickered girl passed the doorway, and Studs thought how nice it would be to follow her, spend the day forgetting everything by fooling around with her. He wished to all holy hell that he didn't have to go through with all this, and he stood watching the splattering rain. He felt sorry for himself.

And maybe the ad for a salesman wasn't even worth trying. He stepped out onto the sidewalk and ran, hugging the building. He soaked his left foot and trouser cuff in a puddle, cursing as he hastened on. Turning a corner, breathless, he was forced to pause because of a stitch in his side and an aching heaviness in his back and arms. He jammed his hands into his raincoat pockets, gasped for breath, and began to worry over his wet feet. Rain beat off his hat and back, and a drop oozed inside his collar, slid coldly down his back.

On Wabash Avenue he found his number, a dirty, brownstone building, and he entered the gloomy cavern of the tile-floored entranceway. Reading the bulletin board, he was depressed by the general seediness of the building, and decided to follow up the ad only because it would keep him out of the rain. The iron-grilled elevator jerked and rattled upward, and Studs reflected that such a rickety elevator ought to fall, anyway, and smash itself at the base of the elevator shaft. Stepping out at the fifth floor, he shook his wet hat, and heard the elevator doors clanking shut and the creaking and straining of the car. He pulled a comb out of his pocket and quickly ran it through his dampened hair. Again he heard the slamming elevator doors as he searched for the right room number along a dim corridor with soiled, yellow calcimined walls.

He entered a small, dim office and found six others waiting on a bench to the left of the door. Same thing all over again with a line ahead of him, he thought spiritlessly. What time did one have to get out to be first in following a lead for a job? Was it necessary to bring a tent along and camp outside the building all night? There was certainly something wrong between seeing the lineups for jobs and listening to Carroll Dowson tell how times weren't so bad, the way he'd done last Sunday.

Studs timidly approached the flapper with thickly rouged lips, who sat before a typewriter at a desk in a corner. Shame came upon him, and his cheeks were hot. Coming here and going to this dame was admitting to her that he wanted a job, putting himself at a disadvantage because it was acknowledging a kind of failure.

“I saw your ad in this morning's paper,” he began with attempted casualness.

“What's the name?” she interrupted.

“Lonigan,” he answered, feeling as if the hostile eyes of those on the bench were boring into his back.

“Well, Mr. Lonergan, will you sit down and wait? Mr. Peters will see you just as soon as he gets through seeing those ahead of you.”

“Thanks,” he said, not bothering to correct her mispronunciation of his name.

He sat down at the edge of the stiff bench. He was wet and chilled. His trouser legs were soggy, and the rain had soaked through his shoes. He watched the girl at the desk chew gum as she typed rapidly. Hard and tough-looking baby, all right, the kind who knew what it was all about, he guessed.

“Nasty day,” the fellow beside him said.

“Damn rotten, and I'm soaked,” Studs replied, surprised.

He watched the stranger squeeze slimy bubbles of ooze from his shoes by pressing continually on the balls of his feet. Noticing the rip on the instep of the right shoe, he guessed that here was a guy who was plenty hard up, and he seemed at least forty, his face thin, wrinkles under the eyes, the cheeks sunken.

“Hell to be looking for something to do on a day like this,” the fellow said, revealing discolored teeth when he spoke.

“Damn right,” Studs said, telling himself that the fellow's teeth gave him the willies, they looked so ugly.

“But then, these are hard times. I've been through other depressions, but none of them can match this one.”

“Yeah, times are tough,” Studs said, holding back the impulse to talk about his own troubles.

“Me, maybe I don't look it, but I once was up in the class. I'm a college graduate. Michigan, and I've been up in the class. Maybe I don't look it, but I was a ten-thousand-dollar-a-year man, and I had my money tucked neatly in the bank. And the bank failed. So here I am, holding the sack. But I'll come back.”

Studs nodded agreement. The other went on, “Stranger, these are tough times. And don't I know it! It's quite a comedown from being a ten-thousand-dollar-a-year man to this, but I'll come back.”

Studs saw clearly that this fellow was full of bull, but the guy had a good line anyway, ought to make a good salesman.

“You know it's these rich louses who ruined the country. They want to take everything for themselves and leave nothing for anybody else. So all of us, even those like myself, who've been in the class, we're just underdogs to them. But they can't keep a man like myself down. I'm a college graduate, Missouri University, and I'll get back in the class.”

“Well, I was getting along. I studied to be a traffic manager, but things are bad and I had a set-back. I've got to get something for a little while to get back on my feet.”

“You and I, well, just to take a look at us, anybody could tell we're not the underdog or working-stiff type. And when we got to go out looking for something to do, and the breaks have gone against us, well, it only goes to show how hard times are.”

Studs nodded. He saw that the heavy fellow next to this guy was giving the two of them a fishy eye, and he wished this fellow would stop shovelling out so much crap.

“I'll tell you, stranger, it's a dirty shame when you and I and our type have to take it on the chin. Take myself now, I get pretty damn sore when I think of what I had. A swell apartment out on Wilson Avenue, gals, all the wine, women, and song my little heart desired, and a nice wad socked away. Nothing in the world to disturb my peace of mind, or my night's rest. And then, the firm goes bust, the bank closes its doors, so here I am. But I ain't through, not by a damn sight. I was in the class once, and that's where I'll be again.”

Studs turned away, not wanting to see any more of the fellow's teeth, hoping the others on the bench or the girl typing wouldn't take him to be the same type of crap artist.

The girl walked out of the office, wriggling with each step. The way they all gave her the once-over reminded Studs how the boys used to line up in front of the Fifty-eighth Street poolroom and undress every girl who passed. And this dame, he could see that she was a teasing bitch who liked to be looked at. Well, let her flaunt herself. He wasn't exactly hard up.

“Jesus Christ!” he heard a little fellow at the opposite end of the bench exclaim in an enthusiastic half-whisper.

“She's something that could make a man forget whether or not he had a job on a day like this,” the crap artist beside him said insinuatingly, slyly poking Studs as he spoke.

A wiry, nervous, bald-headed man came from an adjoining office, followed by a barrel-like fellow who walked out of the office, carrying a folded newspaper under his arm.

“Who's next?”

A tall lad arose and walked into the adjoining office after the bald-headed man.

The girl returned.

“Sticks what she's got right up into your face,” the crap artist whispered.

Sitting down, the girl flashed an annoyed glance at them, and Studs flushed. But how could a guy help getting het up when a dame did everything she could to tantalize him? She was crossing her legs, showing one leg above the knee. Ought to be a law forbidding broads to tease that way. She pulled the gum from her mouth, stretched it several feet, pulled it back into her mouth, resumed chewing it, and began typing as if the lineup on the bench were non-existent.

He looked toward the unwashed windows at the opposite end of the office and, staring at the heavy pall of gray sky, he became aware of traffic noises from the street below. He was damp, wet, and what would he do if there was nothing decent here? And how long would he have to wait? He looked at his watch: a quarter to twelve.

Two shabby men entered and walked to the girl. The tall lad came out of the inner office. Didn't look like he'd gotten anything. Maybe, then, it might be a good job. And if he got it, his troubles might be ended. If not, a whole morning wasted.

Studs saw the wiry, bald-headed man sitting at the littered desk of the cramped adjoining office, and beside him there were stacks of paper cups.

“How do you do, ah, Mar. . . .”

“Lonigan,” Studs volunteered, taking the chair opposite the man.

“Glad to meet you, I'm Mr. Peters. Now tell me, Mr. Lonigan, are you, or are you not, a live-wire?” the man said, giving Studs a penetrating look.

Too stunned to answer, Studs stared back, puzzled.

“I have here a proposition that is for live-wires, and for live-wires only. Slackers, slow-pokes, easy-going, unambitious fellows, I neither want nor can tolerate. I am not even interested in the kind of salesman who thinks that because he has made a few sales in the morning, his day's work is done and he can knock off. The reason I'm saying these things at the beginning of this interview is because if you are that type, we are both wasting our time in even discussing the proposition I have to offer you.”

“Well, I'd like to hear what your proposition is,” Studs said, not liking this oozy bastard, but trying to act up to him.

“I've got here the kind of proposition a genuine live-wire recognizes immediately for what it's worth when it is presented to him. He sees that it is a sure-fire proposition that he can make plenty of money out of. I can prove, too, that I've got a real money-maker here by showing you the reports of some of our salesmen.” Mr. Peters dug through the papers on his desk and found a blocked-off, criss-crossed sheet. “Here's a report from one of our salesmen who earned sixty dollars commissions last week.”

Studs' eyes opened widely, and his suspicion momentarily quieted. Sixty bucks in one week. If sixty, why not seventy or seventy-five? Leaning his elbows on the desk, his head bent forward.

“Here's another whose net was fifty-four dollars. And fifty-four dollars a week in these days is real money. It's big money for salesmen new at the game, who are selling a new product which is just being put successfully on the market. I can vouch for that. Our product is new, and anyone starting in with us at this stage of the game has boundless opportunities ahead. There's no telling where the limits are, and he can make, from his very first week, more money than thousands and thousands of men are earning today after years of work in one line. The opportunities are boundless.”