The Genius by Theodore Dreiser Read Free Book Online Page B

trunk
came, and a loving letter from his mother, and some money, but he
sent that back. It was only ten dollars, but he objected to
beginning that way. He thought he ought to earn his own way, and he
wanted to try, anyhow.
    After ten days his funds were very low, a dollar and
seventy-five cents, and he decided that any job would have to do.
Never mind about art or type-setting now. He could not get the last
without a union card, he must take anything, and so he applied from
store to store. The cheap little shops in which he asked were so
ugly they hurt, but he tried to put his artistic sensibilities
aside. He asked for anything, to be made a clerk in a bakery, in a
dry goods store, in a candy store. After a time a hardware store
loomed up, and he asked there. The man looked at him curiously. "I
might give you a place at storing stoves."
    Eugene did not understand, but he accepted gladly. It only paid
six dollars a week, but he could live on that. He was shown to a
loft in charge of two rough men, stove fitters, polishers, and
repairers, who gruffly explained to him that his work was to brush
the rust off the decayed stoves, to help piece and screw them
together, to polish and lift things, for this was a second hand
stove business which bought and repaired stoves from junk dealers
all over the city. Eugene had a low bench near a window where he
was supposed to do his polishing, but he very frequently wasted his
time here looking out into the green yards of some houses in a side
street. The city was full of wonder to him—its every detail
fascinating. When a rag-picker would go by calling "rags, old
iron," or a vegetable vender crying "tomatoes, potatoes, green
corn, peas," he would stop and listen, the musical pathos of the
cries appealing to him. Alexandria had never had anything like
this. It was all so strange. He saw himself making pen and ink
sketches of things, of the clothes lines in the back yards and of
the maids with baskets.
    On one of the days when he thought he was working fairly well
(he had been there two weeks), one of the two repairers said, "Hey,
get a move on you. You're not paid to look out the window." Eugene
stopped. He had not realized that he was loafing.
    "What have you got to do with it?" he asked, hurt and half
defiant. He was under the impression that he was working with these
men, not under them.
    "I'll show you, you fresh kid," said the older of the two, who
was an individual built on the order of "Bill Sykes." "You're under
me. You get a move on you, and don't give me any more of your
lip."
    Eugene was startled. It was a flash of brutality out of a clear
sky. The animal, whom he had been scanning as an artist would, as a
type, out of the corner of his eye, was revealing himself.
    "You go to the devil," said Eugene, only half awake to the grim
reality of the situation.
    "What's that!" exclaimed the man, making for him. He gave him a
shove toward the wall, and attempted to kick him with his big,
hob-nailed boot. Eugene picked up a stove leg. His face was wax
white.
    "Don't you try that again," he said darkly. He fixed the leg in
his hand firmly.
    "Call it off, Jim," said the other man, who saw the uselessness
of so much temper. "Don't hit him. Send him down stairs if you
don't like him."
    "You get to hell out of here, then," said Eugene's noble
superior.
    Eugene walked to a nail where his hat and coat were, carrying
the stove leg. He edged past his assailant cautiously, fearing a
second attack. The man was inclined to kick at him again because of
his stubbornness, but forebore.
    "You're too fresh, Willie. You want to wake up, you dough face,"
he said as Eugene went.
    Eugene slipped out quietly. His spirit was hurt and torn. What a
scene! He, Eugene Witla, kicked at, and almost kicked out, and that
in a job that paid six dollars a week. A great lump came up in his
throat, but it went down again. He wanted to cry but he could not.
He went downstairs, stovepolish on his hands and face and slipped
up