The Death Ship (5 page)

“Won’t you tell me what I can do?”

“Since you have no papers and no proof of your American citizenship, there is nothing I can do for you. I am only an official. I have to obey rules. It certainly is not my fault. I didn’t make the law. By the way, have you had something to eat?”

“No, sir. I told you I have no money, and I haven’t gone begging yet.”

“Wait just a minute.”

He rose from his chair and went into another room.

After a few minutes he came back and gave me a sort of ticket.

“With this ticket you will be provided for three full days with three meals each day and lodging. The address of the boarding-house is printed here. After this ticket has expired, if you are still without a berth, you may drop in here again for another one. You are welcome. Why don’t you try some ship sailing under a different flag? There are a good many ships nowadays that are not so very particular as to papers. Some even go across to the Canadian coast. Of course, you understand I make no suggestions. Find out for yourself. My hands are bound in a case like yours. After all is said and done, I am nothing but a servant of the government. Really sorry, old man. Good-by and good luck!”

I was almost convinced that that man was right after all. Maybe he was not to blame. Why, he has no reason to be that way with me. I never saw him before. I never did him harm. Why should he harm me? He was only a servant of that soulless beast called the state. He had every answer ready for me before I spoke. They must have been part of his education, and they had to be memorized before he could pass the examinations for his diplomatic career.

However, when he asked me if I was hungry, he really forgot for a second or two that he was nothing but a servant of the state. Then he became quite human and showed that he still had some soul left. Nothing strange about that. To be hungry is human. To have papers or not to have papers is inhuman. It is against nature’s laws. That’s the point. There is a good reason for being the way he is. The state cannot make use of human beings. It would cease to exist. Human beings only make trouble. Men cut out of cardboard do not make trouble. Yesser. Excuse me, I mean: yes, sir.

6

Three days are not always three days. Some three days are very long, some very short. But no matter how short three days really are, the three days for which I had a meal ticket were over before I had had time to realize how short three days can be.

I had made up my mind that, regardless of how hungry I might feel, I would not go again to my consul. I thought it silly to listen to his memorized sermon once more. He would not provide me with a ship. So what was the use of giving him the pleasure of having a man sit in front of him listening with attention to his speech? There would be no change in his way of explaining how helpless he was and how sorry he felt for being unable to do something for me, except to give me another meal ticket but this time with a sour look. No, before I would go again to see him, I would prefer to look for itching pockets.

I had another reason for not wanting to see him. His eyes, when he had asked me if I were hungry, had a look almost like my mother’s used to have when she said: “Like that pie, Gerry? Have another cut.”

This time he might tell me what my mother would never have said: “Sorry, but it is the last time. There are too many asking for help. You understand.” No.

Oh, you forgotten goldfish, with the folks all off for a long vacation! Was I hungry? Bet your life I was. And tired. Migud, So tired from sleeping in gateways, in corners, in nooks. Always chased and hunted by policemen, striking matches or flashing their search-lights at me.

A civilized country means a country that sends to jail a man found asleep in the streets without evening clothes on. You have to have a house, or at least a room to sleep in. How you get it is of no concern to the police.

No ship in port short of hands. And if there was a ship that needed a man, fifty sailors, natives of the port, and all with excellent papers, came to apply for the job. A hundred jobless to one job. And none for a foreigner. Taking on a man whose papers were not in good shape, who was not in the country legally, was punishable with a big fine. It was punishable even with a prison sentence. It was the law that protected the jobless of their own country. If you don’t belong to a country in these times, you had better jump into the sea. No other way out.

Each protects his own kind. Internationalism is just a word that sounds fine from a soap-box. Nobody ever means it; not the Bolshevists either. Stay with your own tribe. Or with your clan. The chiefs need you. If for some reason or other you cannot belong, you are an outcast. You cannot even stay with the dogs of the tribe. Any papers to identify you? No? Out you go and stay out; hell, we’ve got enough of your kind, get out of here. What’s that? Don’t let any more workers in. Keep wages up. What do I care if the workers of the other clan cannot even buy dry bread. That’s why we call ourselves Christians because we love our neighbors dearly; so let them go to hell or heaven, wherever they want to, so long as they don’t try to eat their daily bread with us. We haven’t got enough for ourselves; that’s why we have to burn it to raise prices. When you are hungry, and chased when you want to sleep, you easily fall for the wrong religion.

So it happened.

A dame and a gent were standing in front of a shop-window. Said the lady: “Look, Fibby, how lovely these kerchiefs are!” Fibby, apparently knowing nothing about kerchiefs and thinking about lunch, mumbled something that could be taken for an affirmation or for something concerning the stock market.

The lady again: “No, bless me, I’ve never seen anything so cute and so lovely. Must be old Dutch peasant art.”

“Yep. Right you are,” Fibby said, entirely uninterested. “Genuine. Genuine old Dutch. But, in old English, it’s probably copyright nineteen hundred and twenty-two.”

“Aw,” said the fine lady, “zatso? Let me tell you something.”

I didn’t wait to hear her tell him something, for now I was convinced that it was Forty-second or Times Square or Park Row. And it was music to me.

I went about the job rapidly and very cunningly. That’s what I thought. But Fibby knew all the tricks. He must have been in the trade before he got into magazines. So we had a lively argument, and the lady, bored to death all day long, liked it immensely.

Fibby got interested in the story far more than did his wife, or his lady friend, or his — well, what do I care what she means to him — they’ve got their passport in fine shape and are unmolested sharing a double stateroom. As I was saying, Fibby got interested in my story far more than his wife or his lady friend — oh, hell, what do I care? — well, more than his lady could make him interested in old Dutch shawls.

He seemed to have a great time listening in to my story. He smiled, then he laughed, then he roared with laughter. People passing by thought another couple of Americans had gone crazy about nothing at all, as they usually do. He found no other expression to comment on my story with but “Zat so! Zat so? Gee, zat so? Man, zat so!”

There may be stories that have no end, but mine had one. When I had finished, he was still roaring and bellowing.

“The greatest comedy in all of this lousy Europe couldn’t have made me laugh like you did. Oh, boy; oh, boy! What a story! A whale of a story. That’s what I’ve been looking for.

What I came over for. Man, you don’t know what you mean to me.”

On he went, laughing and laughing.

And I, ass that I was, I had thought he would weep about my sad tale and my hopeless fate. Of course, he only had to listen to it, not live it. He saw only the humor of it; he wasn’t hungry, and he had an elegant room in a swell hotel where no policeman would ever kick him in the ribs.

“Listen, Flory,” he said to his lady friend. “What do you think about the story that boy just told us? Isn’t that story great? A birdy dropped out of its little nest. And says he was hungry. Imagine, Flory, here in Holland, where they throw cheese and butter in the ash-cans, and where the people have so much spare time that they haven’t got anything else to do but grow flowers instead of cotton or wheat. What a country!”

“Oh, his story is wonderful! It’s marvelous. It’s peachy. I think it’s the greatest, cutest little story I have ever heard.” That’s what Flory, the lady friend, said. She went on: “Wonderful. Just too wonderful for words. Where are you from? From New Orleans? My, my! What a town! Still French and Blackies there? Why, isn’t that interesting? It’s really thrilling. Why, Fibby, did I ever tell you I still have an aunt living there, down in Dixie, in New Orleans, I mean? Have I ever told you about Aunt Sophronia of New Orleans? Haven’t I? Oh, I must tell you all about her. You know, the one that starts every sentence with: `When gran’pa, the colonel, you know — was still living in South Carolina.’ “

Fibby didn’t listen to Flory. He had become accustomed to putting down the phone any time she called him up and letting her talk until he was sure it was time to hang up or to say: “Yes, honey, I am listening.”

He fumbled about his pockets and fished out a bill. He gave it to me and said: “Here, take this. It’s not only for your story, but for your having told it so splendidly. It’s a great gift, my boy, to tell a story the way you did, a story that is not true, but that sounds true. That’s the point in story-telling. Making people believe the story is true. You are a great artist, you know. I feel it. A pity that you are bumming your way ‘through the world. But some people, I think, have to do it this way. Can’t help it. You know, my boy, you could make quite a pile of dough, the way you tell stories. You are an artist.” He turned round to Flory: “Isn’t he an artist, sugar?”

“He is a great artist,” the lady friend admitted, happy that she could say something again after such a long silence. “He is a great artist. Why, I feel sure he is the greatest artist I have ever seen. Listen, Fibby, won’t you ask him for dinner? Dear me, we would show those Penningtons something worth while. Calling themselves The Penningtons. Upstarts. The! I could just scream out loud. The! What were they anyway, only five years ago? The! I’m just waiting for the day when they say the word
Mayflower
. I’m only waiting for that day.”

They are married. With a license, wedding march, church bells, and everything.

Fibby paid not the slightest attention to the onrush of Flory’s eloquence. He kept on smiling and then again fell into heavy laughter. Once more he fished in his pocket and produced another bill.

He handed this one also to me, and now he said: “Get that, my boy; one is for having told your story so very well; the other one is for having given me a most excellent idea for my money-making machinery; I mean my paper. You see, it’s like this: in your hands your story is worth just one dime. In my hands your story is worth in the neighborhood of five grand cold cash. I am paying you your dime with full interest. I am honest, you see; I do not steal plots, I pay what they are worth to the owner. Many thanks for your trouble. See me again some time. You may look me up in New York. Well, so long. Good-by and good luck. It was a real pleasure.

“That was the first cash I ever received for telling a story. Yes, sir.

I went to a money exchange. I reckoned this way: for one dollar I’ll get about two and a half gulden Dutch, so for two bucks I’ll get five gulden. Welcome, little smackers; I haven’t met you for a long time. I threw my two bills upon the counter. The man picked them up, looked at them quickly, and then began to pay me out gulden one after another. When I had five I wanted to leave, but the man said: “Wait a minute; won’t you take all with you?” So I stayed and let him pay and pay as long as he liked. What did I care? When he had finished, he said: “This makes it exactly twenty Americans.” Was I surprised! Fibby, may Wall Street bless his bank-account, had given me two tenners, and I had thought it was only two ones. I hope he makes a pile of money with the story I told him. He is a swell guy. Of course, he is from New York. People having New York for their home town are that way, not like the misers from Iowa.

It looked to me like quite a good bit of dough. But somehow, before I could realize what a good feeling it is to have some cash, it was gone. Only those people who have lots of money learn to appreciate the real value of money, because they have time to find out. On the other hand, how can people who have no money, or very little, ever find out what money really means? It is in their hands so short a time that they have no chance to see what it means. Certain people, however, preach that only the poor know the worth of a cent. This difference in opinion is the cause of class distinction.

7

Far sooner than I had expected came the morning which I knew to be the last one in a long time that would find me in a bed. I began already to hear the footsteps of policemen and night-watchmen.

I searched my pockets and found just enough coin to make possible a hasty breakfast. Hasty breakfasts are not at all to my liking, because they are but invitations to lunches and dinners that never come. Meeting a Fibby is not an everyday occurrence. Suppose I should have the good fortune to meet one again: I shall tell the same story, but this time I’ll make it funny. It may just happen that the gent I tell the story to in a way befitting a musical comedy will receive it weeping bitterly and will get an idea contrary to Fibby’s. And if this bird happens to have a magazine for railroad men and gas-station operators and girl stenos, he might easily be willing to spring another twenty bucks. Money can always be squeezed out of an idea, regardless of whether it makes somebody laugh or somebody else cry. In this world there are just as many people who like to weep and will pay two dollars for that pleasure as there are people who will pay for having lots of fun. Usually it costs more money to see a bad tragedy than to see a good comedy. People are like that, and nothing can be done about it. Anyway, I like people who prefer a good time better than —

A good time! What’s the matter now? Can’t a guy have his beauty nap for the last gulden he paid for a bed? I’d like to know where the next bed will come from.