They looked under the lifted curtain at brightness.
They were knifed sharply away from it.
Then, gently, light melted across the land like dew.
The world was gray.
The east broke out in ragged flame.
In the car, the little waitress breathed deeply, sighed, and opened her clear eyes.
Max Isaacs fumbled his cigarette awkwardly, looked at Eugene, and grinned sheepishly with delight, craning his neck along his collar, and making a nervous grimace of his white fuzz-haired face.
His hair was thick, straight, the color of taffy.
He had blond eyebrows.
There was much kindness in him.
They looked at each other with clumsy tenderness.
They thought of the lost years at Woodson Street.
They saw with decent wonder their awkward bulk of puberty.
The proud gate of the years swung open for them.
They felt a lonely glory.
They said farewell.
Charleston, fat weed that roots itself on Lethe wharf, lived in another time.
The hours were days, the days weeks.
They arrived in the morning.
By noon, several weeks had passed, and he longed for the day’s ending.
They were quartered in a small hotel on King Street — an old place above stores, with big rooms.
After lunch, they went out to see the town.
Max Isaacs and Malvin Bowden turned at once toward the Navy Yard.
Mrs. Bowden went with them.
Eugene was weary for sleep.
He promised to meet them later.
When they had gone, he pulled off his shoes and took off his coat and shirt, and lay down to sleep in a big dark room, into which the warm sun fell in shuttered bars.
Time droned like a sleepy October fly.
At five o’clock, Louise, the little waitress, came to wake him.
She, too, had wanted to sleep.
She knocked gently at the door.
When he did not answer, she opened it quietly and came in, closing it behind her.
She came to the side of the bed and looked at him for a moment.
“Eugene!” she whispered.
“Eugene.”
He murmured drowsily, and stirred.
The little waitress smiled and sat down on the bed.
She bent over him and tickled him gently in the ribs, chuckling to see him squirm.
Then she tickled the soles of his feet.
He wakened slowly, yawning, rubbing sleep from his eyes.
“What is it?” he said.
“It’s time to go out there,” she said.
“Out where?”
“To the Navy Yard.
We promised to meet them.”
“Oh, damn the Navy Yard!” he groaned.
“I’d rather sleep.”
“So would I!” she agreed. She yawned luxuriously, stretching her plump arms above her head.
“I’m so sleepy.
I could stretch out anywhere.”