“Me for beer and somethin’ to eat,” he said, with heavy anticipation. “A day shust like this’ll take the guts outa any man. Come along, Jack, I’ll stand treat for the suds.... An’ say, lemme give ya a tip—don’t overwork yourself out on this job. It don’t pay. You won’t get a cent more at the end of the week. Do whatcha gotta do but take it kinda easy. Kinda easy. The boss is too busy most of the time to notice who’s doin’ the most work an’ unless you loaf on the job you can get by without killin’ yourself.”
The complacent roughness of his voice, divided by the shallow wisdoms of the underdog, destroyed the feeling of tired communion which Carl had been sheltering, and his exhaustion began to creep apart from the man, like a tottering aristocrat. He was once more a proudly baffled creator, shuffling along after a day of useless movements, and his hatred for human beings awoke from its short sleep and brandished a sneer on his loose and dirt-streaked face.
He walked into a corner saloon with Petersen and gulped down a glass of beer. Its cool interior kiss aroused a bit of vigor within him and he looked around at the men who were amiably fighting to place their elbows on the imitation mahogany bar. Their faces were relaxed and soiled, heavily betraying the aftermath of a day of toil, and an expression of brief elation teased their faces as they swallowed the beer and whiskey and licked their lips. After each drink they stood with blustering indecision, like generals striving to forget a menial dream and regain their command of an army, or quietly tried to erase the blunders and supplications of a day, seeking nothing save the solace of lazy conversation and weakly clownish arguments. The strained, corrupt clamor of voices debating over women, prize-fighters, and money swayed back and forth and was timidly disputed by the whir of electric-fans and the clink of glasses. A wave of sleepy carelessness stormed Carl as he watched these men. Inevitably thrown in with them, as a sacrifice to a dubious reality, he felt inclined to copy their actions and inanely insult his actual self, since at this moment all words and gestures seemed equally futile to him.
“What essential difference is there between a poet, boasting of his reputation, and a workman bragging about the women who have allowed him to molest their bodies?” he asked himself, forcing the question out of the drained limpness of his mind. “The poet has taught better manners to his vanity, with many an inquisitive artifice, while the other man is more natural and clumsy.”
Petersen’s voice interrupted the soliloquy.
“Come on, have another.”
“Make it whiskey this time,” said Carl to the bartender. “I’ll pay for this one, Petersen.”
“Keep your money, keep it,” answered Petersen, warmed by his beers to an insistent generosity. “I got plenty of it. But say, I’ll be a little shorter in kale tuhnight when Katie gets through with me. There’s no way of spendin’ money that that dame don’t know, but I guess all women are like that. They make you fly some to get ’em. Gonna meet her at eight tonight.”
“Who’s Katie?” asked Carl, drowsily amused after his whiskey.
“She’s a little brunette I’m goin’ with. I’m blonde myself so I like ’em dark an’ well-built. Fine-lookin’ girl she is. Some curve! She ain’t a fast dame by no means but I give her money so’s she can look decent. You know the wages they pay at them damn department-stores! I don’t wanna be ashamed of her when I take her out so I get her the best of everythin’—silk stockings, nice hat, swell shoes.”