Read Online Abbeville by Jack Fuller - Free Book Online

sounded.
    â€œYou’ll just have to wait till tomorrow to lose your virginity, sport,” Mallory said. “Do you want to have a drink? Or are you a temperance man like your uncle?”
    Karl did not drink, but he did not want to say so. Mallory’s face had a glow that indicated he didn’t mind anyone knowing how he was inclined. They went to a stand-up place around the corner where Karl saw a dozen familiar faces in the mirror behind the bar, as expressionless as the bottles.
    â€œThose are the bulls,” said Mallory. “They were counting on harvesting the fruits of their corner, but the price ended up within an eighth of where it started. They were expecting to get filthy rich, but they’ll get filthy drunk instead. Sir, bring us two Pilsners. The lad here has just spent his first day dealing grain.”
    They had left their linen jackets behind, and Mallory in his suit looked as though he could work at the Fair. A bright yellow silk handkerchief stood out against his gray double-breasted jacket like a beacon in a gathering fog.
    One beer led to another, and then a third. Karl savored the taste of the fields in it.
    â€œTomorrow you will make money, sport,” Mallory said with an expansive wave of his hand. “Or else you will lose it.”
    He lifted his glass and Karl touched it with his. The beer was edgy, and the bubbles stung his nose.
    â€œI don’t have much money to lose,” said Karl.
    â€œDon’t you worry about that,” said Mallory. “The funds will be the firm’s, and I will be there to catch it if it starts sliding through your fingers.”
    Later, when Karl got back to his room, he was exhausted but could not sleep. He blamed the muggy weather, what had happened to Luella, the bilious liquid backing up into his throat. At some point his head began to throb. The simple fact was that he could not wrest his mind from the swirling, addictive chaos of the trading floor.
    The next day the opening bell approached, and Karl began to panic. Mallory wasn’t there. When he finally did arrive, he looked more than a little ill.
    â€œI don’t imagine you went right home,” said Karl.
    Mallory put his hand in his pocket and pulled out a box of matches with the silhouette of a can-can dancer and the name of a club.
    â€œI guess I went there,” he said.
    â€œWhat did your wife say?”
    â€œI didn’t wake her up to find out,” said Mallory.
    Just then a runner brought an order. Mallory nodded him toward Karl.
    â€œAs you can see,” Mallory explained to the runner, “I am a mite under the weather. My understudy here will be at the tiller.”
    For the next several hours Karl felt as if he were fighting to keep from capsizing. At some point, though, he began to get the sense of the waters. He filled so many orders he lost count of how much corn had moved through his hands. When the closing bell sounded and the dial above the trading floor stopped moving, his whole body felt as if it might collapse.
    â€œWell, sport,” said Mallory, “by my count you’ve made your uncle two thousand dollars richer.”
    â€œTwo thousand dollars,” said Karl.
    â€œNow let’s go give ourselves a reward,” said Mallory.
    This time Karl came a little closer to keeping up with his mentor at the bar, goaded on by a honky-tonk piano like nothing Karl had ever heard. Mallory wanted to take Karl to another place and introduce him to some can-can dancers, but Karl had a different idea.
    He got his mentor into a carriage, then hailed one for himself. He did not know Luella’s address, so he offered to direct from up front.
    â€œI’ve driven a lot of buggies,” he confided.
    â€œAy,” said the driver, “and I’ve driven a lot of drunks.”
    Row after row of tenements lined the street, which teemed with vendors. The clamor was like an open-air version of the corn pit, if you could call