Read Online And the Hippos Were Boiled in their Tanks by William S. Burroughs and Jack Kerouac - Free Book Online
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night, we pulled out with everybody accounted for, and I was one of the last of the stragglers. I was logged five bucks.
“We got to Boston three days later after a stopover in Halifax, and it started all over again. Here were these seamen with their thousand-dollar payoffs staggering drunkenly off the gangplank with all the things they’d picked up in Greenland: small kayaks, harpoons, fish spears, stinking furs, skins, everything. I had a harpoon. Me and a few other guys stashed all our stuff away in the baggage room of North Station and wired home most of our money. Then we started out on a binge.
“It was a Saturday night, I remember, and October. I drank at least forty-five or fifty glasses of beer that night, and that’s no lie. We were down in South Boston taking over joint after joint and singing over microphones on bandstands and banging on drums andall that. Then we sort of drifted toward Scollay Square and wound up in that joint of joints, the Imperial Café. Here were two floors and five rooms of sailors, soldiers, and seamen, women, music, whiskey, smoke, and fights.
“It was all a blur to me. I remember later on we were standing in a courtyard somewhere in midtown Boston and the seaman with me was calling up to a second-story window where a whore was supposed to live. The window opened and this big Negro stuck his head out and poured a bucket of hot water down on us.
“Well, finally, the sun came up, and I was lying on a City Department toolbox on Atlantic Avenue, right on the waterfront, and there were all these little fishing smacks docked right beside me with the red sun touching their masts. I watched that for a while, then I sort of dragged myself to North Station to get my gear, and then had to go across town in a taxi to South Station and buy a ticket for New York. I’ll never forget that glorious return to our fair shores.”
Phillip was smiling all the way through my story. It was almost dark outside, so cloudy and gray it looked like a rainy dusk. The old Swede had finished his sweeping.
“Let’s go to Dennison’s,” Phil said. “All this makes me want to get drunk and we haven’t any money.”
“Okay with me,” I said and we started out of the hall.
We were on the steps and suddenly I saw a familiar figure coming down 17th Street toward the hall.
“Look who’s coming,” I said.
It was Ramsay Allen, and he hadn’t seen us yet. He was hurrying in long, eager strides, and the expression on his face was like that of the mother of a lost child rushing to the police station to find out if the child they’re holding there is hers. Then he saw us. His face lit up instantly with recognition and joy, then the old affable and sophisticated expression readjusted itself.
“Well,” he said as he came up, “what’s been going on behind my back?” We all smiled as though we were proud of our separate achievements. Then Al looked seriously at Phillip: “You haven’t got a ship, have you?”
“Not yet,” said Phillip.
We started walking. Neither one of them said a word about anything of much point. Phil started to tell him about our new plan to jump ship in France and go to Paris, and Al said, “Do you think it’s safe?”
“We’re not worried about that,” Phil said.
We walked down to Dennison’s place and sat on his doorstep to wait for him to come home from work. We waited awhile, and then we walked over to Chumley’s, where he generally eats.
7
WILL DENNISON
T UESDAY NIGHT I MET H ELEN IN C HUMLEY’S . Helen was a hostess from the Continental Café. We had some vermouth and soda, and I drank the first one right down. I was so thirsty from running around all day, I felt like my mouth was going to jump right out at that vermouth like a Mexican drawing I saw once in a museum where a guy was represented with his mouth sticking out on the end of a long tube like it couldn’t wait for the rest of his face. In the middle of the second vermouth I felt a little better
“We got to Boston three days later after a stopover in Halifax, and it started all over again. Here were these seamen with their thousand-dollar payoffs staggering drunkenly off the gangplank with all the things they’d picked up in Greenland: small kayaks, harpoons, fish spears, stinking furs, skins, everything. I had a harpoon. Me and a few other guys stashed all our stuff away in the baggage room of North Station and wired home most of our money. Then we started out on a binge.
“It was a Saturday night, I remember, and October. I drank at least forty-five or fifty glasses of beer that night, and that’s no lie. We were down in South Boston taking over joint after joint and singing over microphones on bandstands and banging on drums andall that. Then we sort of drifted toward Scollay Square and wound up in that joint of joints, the Imperial Café. Here were two floors and five rooms of sailors, soldiers, and seamen, women, music, whiskey, smoke, and fights.
“It was all a blur to me. I remember later on we were standing in a courtyard somewhere in midtown Boston and the seaman with me was calling up to a second-story window where a whore was supposed to live. The window opened and this big Negro stuck his head out and poured a bucket of hot water down on us.
“Well, finally, the sun came up, and I was lying on a City Department toolbox on Atlantic Avenue, right on the waterfront, and there were all these little fishing smacks docked right beside me with the red sun touching their masts. I watched that for a while, then I sort of dragged myself to North Station to get my gear, and then had to go across town in a taxi to South Station and buy a ticket for New York. I’ll never forget that glorious return to our fair shores.”
Phillip was smiling all the way through my story. It was almost dark outside, so cloudy and gray it looked like a rainy dusk. The old Swede had finished his sweeping.
“Let’s go to Dennison’s,” Phil said. “All this makes me want to get drunk and we haven’t any money.”
“Okay with me,” I said and we started out of the hall.
We were on the steps and suddenly I saw a familiar figure coming down 17th Street toward the hall.
“Look who’s coming,” I said.
It was Ramsay Allen, and he hadn’t seen us yet. He was hurrying in long, eager strides, and the expression on his face was like that of the mother of a lost child rushing to the police station to find out if the child they’re holding there is hers. Then he saw us. His face lit up instantly with recognition and joy, then the old affable and sophisticated expression readjusted itself.
“Well,” he said as he came up, “what’s been going on behind my back?” We all smiled as though we were proud of our separate achievements. Then Al looked seriously at Phillip: “You haven’t got a ship, have you?”
“Not yet,” said Phillip.
We started walking. Neither one of them said a word about anything of much point. Phil started to tell him about our new plan to jump ship in France and go to Paris, and Al said, “Do you think it’s safe?”
“We’re not worried about that,” Phil said.
We walked down to Dennison’s place and sat on his doorstep to wait for him to come home from work. We waited awhile, and then we walked over to Chumley’s, where he generally eats.
7
WILL DENNISON
T UESDAY NIGHT I MET H ELEN IN C HUMLEY’S . Helen was a hostess from the Continental Café. We had some vermouth and soda, and I drank the first one right down. I was so thirsty from running around all day, I felt like my mouth was going to jump right out at that vermouth like a Mexican drawing I saw once in a museum where a guy was represented with his mouth sticking out on the end of a long tube like it couldn’t wait for the rest of his face. In the middle of the second vermouth I felt a little better
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