Ask the Dust by John Fante Read Free Book Online Page B

beer too, if I could afford it.”
    She pointed at my hand with a pencil. “You bite your fingernails,” she said. “You shouldn’t do that.”
    I shoved my hands in my pockets.
    â€œWho are you to tell me what to do?”
    â€œDo you want some beer?” she said. “I’ll get you some. You don’t have to pay for it.”
    â€œYou don’t have to get me anything. I’ll drink this alleged coffee and get out of here.”
    She walked to the bar and ordered a beer. I watched her pay for it from a handful of coins she dug out of her smock. She carried the beer to me and placed it under my nose. It hurt me.
    â€œTake it away,” I said. “Get it out of here. I want coffee, not beer.”
    Someone in the rear called her name and she hurried away. The backs of her knees appeared as she bent over the table and gathered empty beer mugs. I moved in my chair, my feet kicking something under the table. It was a spittoon. She was at the bar again, nodding at me, smiling, making a motion indicating I should drink the beer. I felt devilish, vicious I got her attention and poured the beer into the spittoon. Her white teeth took hold of her lower lip and her face lost blood. Her eyes blazed. A pleasantness pervaded me, a satisfaction. I sat back and smiled to the ceiling.
    She disappeared behind a thin partition which served as akitchen. She reappeared, smiling. Her hands were behind her back, concealing something. Now the old man I had seen that morning stepped from behind the partition. He grinned expectantly. Camilla waved to me. The worst was about to happen: I could feel it coming. From behind her back she revealed the little magazine containing The Little Dog Laughed . She waved it in the air, but she was out of view, and her performance was only for the old man and myself. He watched with big eyes. My mouth went dry as I saw her wet fingers and flip the pages to the place where the story was printed. Her lips twisted as she clamped the magazine between her knees and ripped away the pages. She held them over her head, waving them and smiling. The old man shook his head approvingly. The smile on her face changed to determination as she tore the pages into little pieces, and these into smaller pieces. With a gesture of finality, she let the pieces fall through her fingers and trickle to the spittoon at her feet. I tried to smile. She slapped her hands together with an air of boredom, like one slapping the dust from her palms. Then she put one hand on her hip, tilted her shoulder, and swaggered away. The old man stood there for some time. Only he had seen her. Now that the show was over, he disappeared behind the partition.
    I sat smiling wretchedly, my heart weeping for The Little Dog Laughed , for every well-turned phrase, for the little flecks of poetry through it, my first story, the best thing I could show for my whole life. It was the record of all that was good in me, approved and printed by the great J. C. Hackmuth, and she had torn it up and thrown it into a spittoon.
    After a while I pushed back my chair and got up to leave. Standing at the bar, she watched me go. There was pity for me upon her face, a tiny smile of regret for what she had done, but I kept my eyes away from her and walked into the street, glad for the hideous din of street cars and the queer noises of the city pounding my ears and burying me in an avalanche of banging and screeching. I put my hands in my pockets and slumped away.
    Fifty feet from the saloon I heard someone calling. I turned around. It was she, running on soft feet, coins jingling in her pockets.“Young fellow!” she called. “Oh kid!”
    I waited and she came out of breath, speaking quickly and softly. “I’m sorry, she said. “I didn’t mean anything—honest.”
    â€œIt’s okay,” I said. “I didn’t mind.”
    She kept glancing toward the saloon. “I have to get back,”