“Railroad Train to Heaven”, Part 229: the idiot

To sum up the events of the past year or so (or the past few days in “Arnold Schnabel Time”) The Evil Trickster has taken his revenge on our hero by transforming him into “Porter Walker” a handsome if preposterous young poet in a now-obscure novel called Ye Cannot Quench, by Gertrude Evans (author of over fifty other bestsellers of yesteryear, notably The Sweet Song of the Pigeon; Billy Budd’s Best Buddy; My Cousin Cletus; High Heels and Low Morals; and A Lady Never Belches), and Arnold (or Porter) is now attempting to make his way back to his own world...

(Click here to review our previous episode; anyone with way too much time on his or her hands may go here to return to that nearly forgotten first chapter of this Gold View Award™-winning 63-volume memoir. “Arnold Schnabel -- the very name seems to open up a vast world so much more rich and less boring than the one in which we mere mortals toil and and moil our various and sundry ways to the grave.” -- Harold Bloom, in Collier’s.)

I waited. The fly waited. Nothing happened. There was a speaker grill on the wall next to the buzzers, but no sound came out of it.

“Give it another buzz,” said the fly.

I pressed the button again.

Nothing. Silence except for the sound of the falling rain.

“Press it again,” said the fly.

“What if they’re sleeping?”

“Press it again.”

“I’d hate to wake them up. They have kids and all.”

“Just press the button, pal.”

“But I don’t want to be obnoxious.”

“Jesus Mary and Joseph, is it going to kill you to press the buzzer just one more time?”

“No, but --”

“Christ --”

“Hey, you know what? We could go back to that Valhalla bar. Probably Pat and Carlotta are still there --”

“There’s no cabs. You wanta walk all the way back to Bleecker and MacDougal in the rain?”

“Well, no --”

“Me either. Button. Press. It."

“Or, wait, I know -- how about --”

“How about you just press the fucking buzzer again? Christ almighty --”

“Look, what if we go to that Bob’s Bowery Bar around the corner? You wanted to go there anyway, right? We could have a beer.”

“Hmmm, y’know, now that I think about it, that’s not a bad idea, not a bad idea at all --”

“Good,” I said. “We’ll get a couple beers --”

“One beer.” He was excitedly bobbing up and down in the air again now. “It’ll look weird if you buy a beer for a fly.”

“Okay, one beer.”

“And you can just splash a little on the bar top for me.”

“Sure,” I said. “And I’ll ask the bartender for a pencil and paper.”

“Yeah, whatever. Maybe a shot of whiskey, too.”

“Okay, we can get a whiskey --”

“What are we waitin’ for?”

“Right, then,” I said, “Let’s --”

The entrance door opened.

It was Mrs. Morgenstern, wearing an old grey corduroy bathrobe.

“Porter? Who you talking to?”

“Oh, no one.”

“No one.”

“Just, you know, talking to myself.”

“Talking to yourself.”

“Yeah, heh heh, wondering why you didn’t you know, uh --”

I pointed at the speaker.

“You know that thing don’t work,” she said.

“Oh, right, heh heh, I forgot --”

“Meshuggenah. You forget your keys again?”

“Yes. Yes I did. I hope I didn’t wake you.”

“I was awake. Come on, get in out of the rain.”

She held the door open and I came into the vestibule. The fly did too, of course.

She drew the door shut and turned to me.

“Look at you,” she said. “All wet. Why you didn’t take your umbrella?”

“I, uh, forgot.”

“Forgot your keys. Forgot your umbrella. You drunk?”

“Well, I’ve had a few, but I wouldn’t say I’m drunk --”

“Did you eat dinner?”

Dinner. No, I had forgotten all about that bacon-cheeseburger I had ordered and never gotten. And the french fries. And I was hungry, too.

“You didn’t eat, did you?” she said.

“No,” I confessed.

“What I’m gonna do with you?”

“I don’t know,” I confessed.

Suddenly she put her arms around my waist, and she looked up into my eyes.

“What I’m gonna do with you, Porter?”

“I -- um --”

“And me a happily married woman with two beautiful kids.”

“I -- uh --”

She drew herself closer to me, and laid her head against my chest. She had a good smell. She smelled like a warm Sunday in autumn, like roasted chestnuts, like laundry right after it’s come off the clothesline --

She looked up at me again.

“But I can’t help myself,” she said. “Jake works so hard all day in his cobbler shop, saving up his money so we can move out to a nice home in Long Island, he’s so tired at the end of the day all he wants to do is sit in his undershirt and watch Jackie Gleason, Red Skelton. I can’t blame him. I blame myself.”

“Don’t blame yourself --” I hesitated, because I wanted to address her by her first name, but I didn’t know what that was, and it seemed absurd to call her Mrs. Morgenstern under the circumstances, especially as I, despite my best intentions, was beginning to suffer an erection.

“Who I’m gonna blame then? You?”

“Sure,” I offered. “Blame me.”

“Your book,” she said. “They really gonna publish it?”

“Apparently,” I said.

“And here I never read even one of your poems.”

“You’re not missing much.”

“You’ll probably be moving out. You’ll be making good money. You won’t wanta stay in this dump and I don’t blame you.”

“Yes,” I said. “I might be leaving.”

“I knew you’d leave someday.”

“Well --” I said.

“Well what?”

Actually I had nothing in mind. I had only said “well” just to say something.

She continued to stare up into my eyes.

“Everybody leaves eventually,” I said.

“Everybody?”

“We all leave life eventually.”

“That’s true,” she said.

She continued to look into my eyes, as if she were looking for something.

“Y’know, Porter, for an American, you can be really depressing.”

“I know.”

“I like it though. It’s the poet in you.”

“Maybe,” I said. “Or maybe it’s just the depressed person in me.”

“We can’t stand here in the vestibule all night,” she said.

“No.”

“Jake and the kids are sleeping. Sound asleep.”

“Oh?”

There was a pause here.

“But still I guess we better not,” she said.

Even I could tell what she meant we’d better not do.

“No,” I said. “It’s probably better that we don’t.”

The fly buzzed around our heads.

“Verkakte flies,” she said. “What a dump. It’s good you’ll be moving from here. Kiss me one time, you lug.”

What could I do?

I kissed her.

It lasted a minute or so, maybe longer. I know I shouldn’t have, even if I was only in someone else’s novel, but I couldn’t help myself, and I didn’t want to disappoint Mrs. Morgenstern.

Finally she pulled her face away from mine.

She was breathing heavily. I suppose I was too.

“Hoo boy,” she said.

She still had her arms around my waist. We were still standing in the vestibule, with its old wooden moldings, its cracked and stained ceramic-tiled floor, the worn rubber welcome mat.

“I think we better go up now,” she said.

“Yes, we’d better,” I said.

She let go of my waist, she opened the inner door and went through, and I followed her.

I followed her up the stairs, walking slowly, as I was now possessed of a full-fledged erection. She seemed to be wearing a nightgown under her robe, and threadbare corduroy slippers.

At the second floor we walked to my door, she took a big ring of keys out of her robe pocket, separated one from the rest, opened the door.

I went in, turned around, she was standing in the open doorway, still holding the keys.

“You want me to fix you some food?” she said. “A sandwich? Glass of milk?”

“No, please,” I said, even though I was terrifically hungry now.

She stood there looking at me.

She looked both ways up and down the hall, and then she stepped just inside the doorway.

“Them three times we made love, when Jake was at synagogue. They were the best, Porter. But I can’t do it no more. It ain’t right.”

“You’re right,” I said.

“You go on with your life. I’ll go one with mine.”

“Yes,” I said.

The fly buzzed around my ear. I brushed him away.

“I wish you the best of luck with your poetry. Someday I bet I see you on Jack Paar, Edward R. Murrow.”

“Maybe,” I said.

“I’ll see your picture on the back of a book. Your handsome face. I’ll think, ‘That’s Porter. I knew him.’ I’ll always have that.”

I didn’t know what to say to this. I said nothing.

Suddenly I remembered the money that the boy Mickey had given to me for Mrs. Morgenstern. I took the wad out of my inside jacket pocket.

“What’s that?” she said.

“I ran into your nephew, Mickey?”

“That hoodlum?”

“Yes. He asked me to give you this money. For helping him out with legal expenses.”

“It’s probably stolen.”

“Well, he asked me to give it to you,” I said.

“Okay, I’ll take it.”

She took the roll, and without counting it she put it in the pocket of her old bathrobe. Then she looked at me.

“I want to kiss you again,” she said, “but I think maybe I shouldn’t.”

She glanced down at the bulge in my pants.

“We probably shouldn’t,” I said.

“Goodnight, Porter.”

I wished I knew her first name, but I didn’t, so I simply said goodnight.

She turned and walked off back towards her own apartment. I could hear her lightly jangling the set of keys, not continuously, but with a pause of a second or so between each jangle.

I closed the door.

“Idiot,” said the fly. I hadn’t realized it, but he was sitting in my ear again. “Idiot. You coulda had her, man. She was dying for it.”

I felt for the wall switch, found it, turned on the overhead light.

“Idiot,” repeated the fly.

“Look, just shut up, okay?” I said.

“Who the hell you talking to, Porter?”

I turned around.

It was Nicky, sitting at my kitchen table, his feet up on the table, on my papers, on Porter’s papers anyway. He lit a cigarette with his lighter.

He gestured to a jelly glass and an almost-empty bottle of Early Times bourbon on the table.

“Found your hooch under the sink. Hope you don’t mind I helped myself. Get yourself a glass. Porter.”

(Continued here, as is only meet and just.)

(Kindly refer to the right hand side of this page for a current listing of links to all other electronically-accessible chapters of Arnold Schnabel’s Railroad Train To Heaven©. This week’s episode sponsored in part by Uneeda Crackers™. “Feeling the economic pinch this holiday season? The kids will love an economical lunch of Uneeda Crackers™ and store-brand peanut butter -- delicious and nutritious!”)

“Railroad Train to Heaven”, Part 228: gangleader

A rainy summer’s night in 1957 finds our hero Arnold Schnabel near the corner of Bleecker and the Bowery (with his friend, a talking fly) trying to escape his exile in the sadly obscure novel Ye Cannot Quench, by Gertrude Evans (author of over forty other books, including such “cult classics” as Unsteady as She Goes; The Importunate Pigeon; Hashish Wednesday; and Tales of Rich Old Women).

(Click here to read our previous episode; those looking for a new obsession may go here to return to that faraway beginning of this Gold View Award™-winning 57-volume memoir. “Arnold Schnabel is more than an author, a poet, a memoirist -- he is indeed a way of life.” -- Harold Bloom, in The Saturday Evening Post.)

I felt the fly land on the porch of my ear.

“Okay,” I said.

I walked over to the curb, made a little jump to clear the water flowing in the gutter.

“Oh, but by the way, pal.”

“Yes?”

“What about beer?”

“Oh. Well, I might have some in the ice box --”

“Might?”

“Well, like I said --” I felt a slight urge to insert a personal name here, but I realized that I didn’t know the fly’s name, if he even had a name -- “uh, as I said, I’m not really planning on staying long.”

“If all goes well.”

“Yeah.”

We were standing at the entrance door of the tenement now. The fly flew out of my ear and hovered in front of my face.

“Your little plan to write a new plot twist in the picaresque novel of your life.”

“Yes,” I said.

The fly was staying close to the door, protected from the rain by the concrete overhang of the entrance.

“Okay, fine,” he said. “but here’s the thing: if your plan don’t work we’re gonna want beer. We’re definitely gonna need beer. So why not go pick up some now, round the corner. Just in case, like.”

“I don’t know.”

“What don’t you know?”

“It seems -- self-defeating somehow. As if I’m expecting to fail.”

“It is not self-defeating just to cover your bases, pal. That’s just common fucking sense.”

“But -- why can’t we just go out for beer, you know --”

“After you fail.”

“Well, I was going to say ‘if I do fail’.”

“Oh. Sure, we can do that. We can definitely do that. But. And hear me out now. But -- if we take just two minutes now to pick up a couple, three quarts -- two minutes mind you, maybe less -- just right round the corner there at that Bob’s Bowery Bar -- then -- then, my friend, we got something to drink while you’re writing.”

I didn’t say anything to this. The fly kept staring at me with his ten thousand anxious little eyes.

“I thought writers liked to drink. Lubricates the creative machinery. Helps to flush up that sometimes elusive whaddyacallit, le mot juste.”

He was flying up and down, about six inches up, six inches down, up, down, but always right in front of my face, and being careful to keep out of the rain, which by the way was still falling all over me.

“I think that’s what it’s called,” he said. “Flaubert. Le mot juste? Maybe I ain’t pronouncing it right.”

“You’re not going to let this go, are you?” I said.

“Hey, just say the word and I never mention it again.”

Yeah, sure, I thought.

“Look,” I said. I put my hand on the door knob, turned it. “I really just want to get this over with, okay? If my plan doesn’t work, then we can go around the corner and pick up a quart or two.”

“Okay, fine. I’m only thinking about you, pal, trying to save you the extra trouble and all --”

“No trouble for me,” I said.

The door was locked of course, and all my repeated turnings of the knob weren’t going to unlock it.

“Oh. Sure,” said the fly. “No trouble for you. But let me ask you something, what about me? Sittin’ around with not a tiny drop of beer to wet my lips with while his nibs merrily scribbles away. Writing your deathless literature. I guess I don’t count.”

“Of course you count,” I said.

I was still fiddling with the door knob, don’t ask me why.

“You gotta use your key, dummy,” said the fly.

“Oh, right.”

“But then what do I know.”

I started to pat my pockets, looking for my keys.

“I’m just a fucking fly, after all,” said the fly.

“Look, don’t say that,” I said. “It’s just --”

“Just what?”

“It’s just that --

“Hey, buddy, poet boy.”

I turned around. It was that John Saxon-looking kid from that other gang, the Cardigans. He was standing there in his pale blue cardigan, holding an umbrella up against the rain, and on the sidewalk behind him and around him was the rest of the gang with their umbrellas, including the little guy in the wheelchair.

“Oh,” I said. “Hi.”

“Who was you talking to? I don’t see nobody else here.”

“Just myself,” I said.

“Talking to yourself. You drunk?”

“He’s fucking drunk,” said the wheelchair kid.

“Well, I’ve had a few drinks,” I said. “Heh heh.”

The gangleader kid had been smoking a cigarette, but now he flicked it down toward my feet.

“Goin’ home now, huh?”

“Yeah,” I said.

“It’s still early.”

“Well, you know, gotta get up early.”

“Write your poems, huh?”

“Heh heh, yeah, you know how it is.”

“No, how is it?”

“Um, the early bird catches the, uh, the poetic worm?”

“Bullshit.”

“Pardon me?”

“You’re a fucking poet,” he said. “What, you gonna get up early like some working stiff, write your poetry like it’s some goddam office job you got?”

“Well, uh, I find that if I work on a regular schedule, that, uh, this actually frees up my, um, my creative process --”

“Bullshit. To be a poet you got to experience life. Live life to the fucking fullest. Experience the depths and heights of human existence.”

“Well -- I do that too, but, still, I find that --”

“Where’s your two girl friends?”

“Oh, Pat and Carlotta?”

“Them two stuck-up bitches.”

“Oh, they decided to stay out for a while, have a bite to --”

“They ditched ya, huh?”

“Well, no, I just wanted to, you know, go home --”

“Why don’t you come have a drink with us?”

“Right now?”

“Right now.”

“Well, maybe tomorrow night --”

“Maybe tomorrow never comes.”


“That’s, uh, always a possibility I suppose --”

“You said you’d tell me about bullfighting.”

“Right,” I said. “And I will. I will. Maybe we can meet for lunch sometime --”

“Maybe we can meet now.”

“But I really do have to get up early. I’m meeting my editor to work on my book.”

“Ha,” said the fly.

“What was that,” said the kid.

“What?” I said.

“It sounded like that fly flying around your head said ha.”

“Well, I doubt that,” I said.

“Ha ha,” said the fly.

“There it goes again,” said the kid.

“Yeah, I heard it too,” said the wheelchair kid, who had rolled up right next to the gangleader kid.

“Yeah, me too,” said the kid who looked like Russ Tamblyn.

“So also I,” said the little kid with glasses, the intellectual one. I hadn’t noticed it before, probably because of the glasses, but he looked kind of like Sal Mineo.

“Ha ha ha,” said the fly.


“I heard that,” said another kid, who looked like Troy Donahue.

“It’s just a fly making noises,” I said.

“No fly makes a laughin’ noise like that,” said the boss kid. What was his name? Jerry?

“Ha ha fuckin’ ha,” said the fly.

The leader stepped back one step.

“Jesus Christ,” he said. “Dizzy, gimme the gat.”

“Sure thing, Terry,” said the crippled kid.

The little crippled guy reached under the crocheted cushion he was sitting on and brought out a revolver.

“What’re you starin’ at, poet boy?” he said.

“Well, nothing --”

“You’re thinking this must not be very comfortable, me sitting on this gat.”

“Well, I -- uh --”

“Ever occur to you maybe I got no feeling in my ass?”

“Oh, sorry --”

“Just don’t stare. Maybe someday you’ll be in a wheelchair. Like maybe someday very soon.”

He pointed the gun at me.

“Give me the goddam gat, Dizzy,” said the gangleader kid.

“Sure, Terry.”

Yes, Terry, that was the one kid’s name, not Jerry.

Terry took the pistol from the crippled kid, and, awkwardly balancing the shaft of his umbrella between his chin and his shoulder, he checked to see that the gun was loaded, spinning the cylinder.

“Um, Terry?” I said.

“Yeah?”

“You’re not going to shoot that gun, are you?”

“I’m gonna shoot that fucking fly,” he said. He was holding his umbrella in his left hand now, and wielding the pistol in his right.

“But, Terry, it’s just a fly.”

Suddenly the fly dived at Terry’s face, and he stumbled backwards, swatting in front of his face with the gun.

“Jesus Christ!” he shouted.

“Careful with the gat, Terry,” said the crippled kid, Dizzy I guess his name was.

“Motherfucker!” Terry was rubbing his eye with the back of the hand that held the gun. “Little fucker run straight in my eye.”

“Self-preservation is the first instinct of every species,” said the Sal Mineo kid.

“Shut the fuck up, Four-Eyes,” said Terry. “Fuck.”

He continued to rub his eye.

“Careful with the gat,” said the Troy Donahue kid.

“I’m gonna kill that fucking thing,” said Terry.

“That might prove rather hard to do,” said Four-Eyes.

“I think he fucking flew away, Terry,” said Dizzy.

“Hey, guys,” said the Russ Tamblyn kid.

“Where is the little bastard?” said Terry, blinking broadly. “I’ll murder him.”

“I believe he has absconded,” said Four-Eyes.

“Terry,” said the Russ Tamblyn kid.

“What?” said Terry. “What?”

“The fuzz is comin’. Down Bleecker.”

True enough, a police car was cruising down the street in our direction.

“Shit,” said Terry. “Here, Dizzy, stash the gat.”

Dizzy took the pistol and stuck it under his seat cushion.

“Let’s blow,” said Terry. He pointed finger at me. “You,” he said.

“Yes?”

“You oughta watch out what kinda flies you hang out with.”

Without another word the gang took off through the rain, marching off at double-time around the corner, beneath their umbrellas, Four-Eyes pushing Dizzy’s chair at the rear of the group and making the turn on one wheel.

I started to turn around toward the door again, but the cop car drew up and stopped. There were two policemen in it. The one in the driver’s seat rolled down his window.

“Hey, buddy, was them kids bothering you?”

“Not really,” I said.

“You were lucky. You live here?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Let’s go after them punks, Pat,” said the other cop.

“Okay, Mike,” said the driver. To me he said, “All right then. Good night, sir.”

“Good night.”

I turned around, put my hand in my pocket for my keys.

I heard the car take off behind me.

“You believe that kid, throwin’ down on me like that?” said the fly. He was back, buzzing in front of my face again. “Little punk.”

I checked my other side jeans pocket.

“Hey, pal, you see me fly into that punk’s eye. Ha ha. I showed him, the little --”

“Oh, shit,” I said.

“What? What’s the matter now?” said the fly.

With a sinking heart I checked the pockets of my seersucker.

“What is it?”

“My keys,” I said.

“Your keys.”

“I can’t find them. I lost my keys.”

“You lost your keys?”

“What did I just say?”

“Hey, don’t get testy, pal. I ain’t the one who lost them.”

“I know you didn’t. I lost them. Christ.”

“Oh. Wait. Pal.”

“What?”

“You didn’t lose them.”

“I didn’t?”

“No -- remember, back in your flat, I said, ‘You got your keys?’. And you says, ‘Oh, they’re in the saucer on the little table next to the door.’ I remember distinctly you saying that. ‘Saucer on the little table.’ But you never grabbed them. I remember now. You just went right out past them.”

“Well why didn’t you say something?”

“Why didn’t I say something? ‘Cause I didn’t really notice it. At the time.”

“Great.”

“Look, buzz the lady.”

“The lady?”

“Yeah. Mrs. -- what -- the one you been schtupping apparently --”

“Mrs. Morgenstern?”

“Yeah, buzz her.”

“You think I should?”

“Oh, no, just stand out here in the rain all night. What the --”

“Okay,” I said. “I’ll buzz her.”

To the right of the door there was a double row of buzzers with hand-written name-cards in metal slots, and, sure enough, one of them said “Morgenstern”.

I pressed the button.

(Continued here, despite the dictates of common sense.)

(Please turn to the right hand side of this page to find an up-to-date listing of links to all other available chapters of Arnold Schnabel’s Railroad Train To Heaven©. Be sure to tune in to “An Arnold Schnabel Christmas” next Friday at 9 PM (EST), with your host John Cameron Swayze, starring Art Carney as Arnold Schnabel, and featuring the voice of Mickey Rooney as “the fly”; teleplay by Rod Serling; musical numbers by Betty Comden and Adolph Green; featuring the June Taylor Dancers and the Mabel Beaton Marionettes; presented by Bell of Pennsylvania for the DuMont Television Network.)

“Railroad Train to Heaven”, Part 227: haunted

It’s been a long day’s journey into God only knows what kind of dark night of the soul for our hero Arnold Schnabel, transformed by the Evil Trickster into a laughably bad but devilishly handsome poet named Porter Walker, the second male lead of Ye Cannot Quench, a sadly long-deleted novel of 1950s New York City by Gertrude Evans (the author of over fifty other books, including The Tacky Shop Assistant; The Buck Does Not Stop Here; A Penny For My Thoughts: Essays on Literature and Culture; and The Noisy Neighbor and Other Stories).

(Go here to read our previous chapter; curious students of abnormal psychology may click here to return to the beginning of this Gold View Award™-winning 62-volume memoir, “The ne plus ultra of American literature; read Schnabel and you can just forget about Melville and Whitman and Hawthorne and the rest of those tired old bore-asses.” -- Harold Bloom, in Criterion.)




“So, uh, Mickey –” I started to say, nervously, but he interrupted me.

“What’dja say your name was, pal?”

“I don’t think I ever did,” I said, “but it’s Arnold. No, I mean Porter.”

“Arnold or Porter, huh?” He kept his motorcycle-booted foot on the gas pedal, and I watched the silvery speedometer arrow inexorably rising. “So which is it, Arnold or Porter?”

“Porter,” I said. “Porter Walker. Arnold is just – oh, forget it – Porter, Porter Walker.”

“Porter Walker?” said the Richard Jaeckel guy in the back seat. He was shouting, but then the jazz music on the radio was very loud. “Sounds like a fag name to me.”

“You got no room to maneuver when it comes to faggy names, Sidney,” said Mickey.

“Sid!” said Sidney. “My name is Sid! Sid!”

“Sidney,” said the Vic Morrow guy. “That is kind of a fag name, ain’t it?”

“Oh, and like Howard ain’t a fag name neither?” said Sidney.

“Howie!” said Howard, “You know I don’t like bein’ called Howard. Howie, ya little asswipe!”

“You both got fag names,” said the Timothy Carey guy. “Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha –”

“Shut the fuck up, Herschel,” said Mickey.

“Herschel’s a fag name,” said Sidney.

“Alla yez, shut the fuck up! Jesus Christ!” said Mickey.

He was doing at least sixty now, and he’d just blown through another red light. Fortunately there hadn’t been any other traffic on the street. Not yet, anyway.

“Ya see what I got to deal with,” said Mickey, turning to look at me as the car flew along the rainy street. “Buncha morons. Almost enough to make me wish I hadn’t dropped out of high school. So, ‘Porter’ –”

“Fag name,” said Sidney.

“Porter,” continued Mickey, “you on the run?”

“Pardon me?”

“You on the lamski?”

“What?”

“From the cops. Is that why you got two different names?”

“No,” I said. “No. No.”

“You AWOL from the service?”

“No.”

“You can tell us. We ain’t gonna drop a dime on ya.”

“I’m not,” I said. “I’m not on the, uh –”

“Lamski.”

“Yes,” I said. “That. I’m not on the run.”

“Then why you got two different names?”

The car was up to seventy miles an hour now. I had one hand on the dashboard, another one gripping the rounded edge of my leather-upholstered seat.

Mickey had been watching the road but now he turned to look at me.

“You’re sweating, Porter. This car’s got air-conditioning, y’know. You want me to put the air-conditioning on?”

“What?”

“Air-conditioning. Ya want it on so you ain’t spritzin’ all over?”

“Um, listen, Mickey, I don’t care, but, look, do you think you could slow down?”

“I’m only doin’, what, seventy-two, no, seventy-three now --”

“Mickey, you’re going to get stopped by a cop.”

“No I ain’t. Not in this jalopy, baby. You see this speedometer? Goes up to one-forty. How much you wanta bet I can’t push it to one-fifty?”

“Listen, I’m sure you probably can, Mickey, but –”

“But what?”

“I don’t want to die.”

“Oh.”

The arrow now was approaching the number 80 on the dial.

The stoplight down the block had just turned red. Was this crazy kid going to run it? Was he just going to keep his foot on the gas pedal until we went soaring off into the middle of the East River?

Suddenly he switched his foot to the brake, miraculously the car decelerated and by the time we got to the red light the car stopped without even a mild jolt.

“Jesus Christ,” muttered the fly in my ear.

“What?” said Mickey.

“Jesus Christ,” I said.

The guys in back all burst out laughing.

“You all right now?” said Mickey.

“Yes,” I said. I took my one hand off the dashboard and the other one off the edge of the seat and I rubbed my wet palms on my jeans. “Thank you.”

“Here,” said Mickey, and he flicked a switch on the dashboard. Cool air flowed out from vents in the footspace. “That better?”

“Yes,” I said.

“It’s okay, y’know,” he said. “Whatever you’re on the run from. We don’t give a shit.”

“I’m not on the run.”

“Then why do you look hunted?”

“I do?”

“Yeah.”

“Haunted he looks,” said Herschel. “Haunted like.”

“He does look kinda haunted,” said Sidney. “But hunted, too.”

“Yeah,” said Howard. “Kinda like a man caught in a whirlpool of deadly obsession. Hunted. Haunted.”

The light had changed, but instead of taking off again Mickey stared at me.

“So, Porter,” he said. “You hunted, or haunted, or both?”

“Both I suppose,” I said. We couldn’t be far from my building now. A couple more minutes of this.

“So, what do you do, exactly,” said Mickey. “For like a living?”

“I’m a railroad brakeman. No I’m not, I was a cab driver, but I lost my job. But I’m a – oh, forget it.”

“No, spill.”

He put his foot on the accelerator, crossed the intersection, but now he drove at a reasonable speed, or anyway a more reasonable speed.

“It’s embarrassing,” I said.

“Spill.”

“I’m a poet.”.

“No kidding.”

“Yeah,” I said. “I mean, no, I’m not kidding.”

“Poets is fags,” said Sidney.

“Shaddap, Sidney,” said Mickey. He turned to me again. “A poet, huh?”

“Yes,” I said.

“Could you, like, recite a poem for us?”

“I don’t have any poems on me at the moment.”

“Don’t you got none memorized?”

“I’m not sure.”

“Give us a poem, daddy-o,” said Herschel.

“Yeah, give us a fucking poem,” said Sidney.

“I don’t wanta hear no fucking poem,” said Howard.

“Give us a poem,” said Mickey. “Otherwise I run this baby up to one-fifty.”

“Jesus Christ,” whispered the fly in my ear, “give him a goddam poem!”

“Okay,” I said.

I tried to draw inspiration from the soaring jazz music on the radio. I took a deep breath, and spoke:

Driving through night-time streets of doom
Through this warm and dirty rain
Past buildings fraught with gloom
In a car more powerful than pain,
Driving through a life filled with death
With a brain filled with madness
Through a world filled with the breath
Of the forgotten and the hopeless,
I drive through a narrow tunnel reeking
Of the stale odor of human piss,
Racing into a future I am not seeking
Out of a past that no longer exists;
To return to my home was all that I wanted
But instead I drive on: haunted, hunted.

I fell silent. The poem was as finished as it was ever going to be.

The jazz music played on. The windshield wipers wiped, not in time to the music.

No one said anything. We drove on down the rainy empty street, this street that had been filled with human beings both on foot and in motor vehicles when I walked along it earlier today, what seemed like a year ago.

“Sorry,” I said.

“Hey, we asked for it,” said Mickey. He stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray. “So, Porter,” he continued, “how well you know my aunt, Mrs. Morgenstern?”

From what I had picked up from Carlotta’s and Pat’s insinuations I was afraid I might know that lady quite well indeed, but I decided on the spur of the moment to play my cards close to the vest.

“Oh, you know,” I said, “just sort of, uh, she lives down the hall, and, uh, she lets me use her phone, and – um –”

“So you know her pretty well.”

“Well, uh, um –”

“You’re friendly with her?”

“Friendly?”

“Friendly.”

“Uh, yes, yes, I’m, uh –”

“Friendly.”

“Yes,” I said.

“Good. I want for you to give her something for me.”

“Um. Okay.”

He reached inside his jacket and brought out a wad of cash folded into a rubber band.

“Here, take this.”

What could I do? I took it.

“There’s two hundred fifty bucks there. I want you to give it to her and tell her her nephew Mickey says thanks for helpin’ me out with my lawyer fee.”

“Okay.”

“I appreciate it, buddy.”

“You’re welcome.”

“You better put it away now.”

“Okay.”

I put the wad into the inside pocket of my seersucker.

“Well, here we are,” he said.

He pulled the car up to the curb on the left.

I didn’t recognize it at first, but it was the entrance to my building, between the grocery and the shoe-repair shop.

“That’s my uncle’s shoe-repair shop,” said Mickey. “You believe that guy, leaning over a bench, fixin’ shoes all day? Not for me, pal. Coupla more good scores and I’m gonna set myself up in my own business. Whatta ya think of that?”

“That’s good,” I said. I really just wanted to get out of the car. “A business is good.”

“I’m thinkin’ reefer.”

“Reefer?”

“Yeah. Sellin’ reefer. Always gonna be a market for reefer, right? And the beauty of it is, because it’s illegal I don’t gotta pay no taxes. Then with my profits I start buyin’ property. This shitty neighborhood, someday, who knows, it might be like fuckin’ Park Avenue, fuckin’ Sutton Place. Fuckin’ stockbrokers livin’ here. So I buy now while it’s still a slum and then by the time the neighborhood changes I’m a goddam millionaire.”

“Well, that’s uh –”

“Okay, see ya later, Porter.”

I tentatively held out my hand, but he kept both hands on the steering wheel. He was staring straight ahead into the rainy street, the windshield wiper wiping, the jazz music playing.

“Well, good night,” I said. “Thanks for the ride.”

Still staring straight ahead he took a pack of Camels out of the side pocket of his red windbreaker.

“Yeah, sure,” he said. He popped a cigarette into his mouth. “Anytime.”

He pocketed his cigarettes, then punched in the dashboard cigarette lighter.

I opened my door, got out of the car and into the rain.

“Leave the door open, fag,” said Howard. He pushed the back of the front passenger seat forward, climbed out, then got in the front seat. “Awright, you can close it now,” he said.

I closed the door, and Mickey pulled the car out, making a right turn on the Bowery.

I was alone again, in the misty rain, breathing in that thick slum air.

“C’mon pal, let’s get in out of this rain.”

I was almost alone.

(Continued here, and to the crack of doom and possibly beyond.)

(Kindly look to the right hand side of this page to find an up-to-date listing of links to innumerable other chapters of Arnold Schnabel’s Railroad Train To Heaven©. Make sure to pick up as many copies as you can of “A Schnabel For All Seasons: The Wit and Wisdom of Arnold Schnabel”, edited by Bennett Cerf, with an introduction by Oscar Levant; a Gold Medal Original Permabook, $.75; the perfect stocking-stuffer for the more literate of your familial and social circle; available at better drug stores and bus stations everywhere.)

“Railroad Train to Heaven”, Part 226: waiting

Our memoirist Arnold Schnabel, after myriad adventures in the fictional universe of the regrettably long-out-of-print novel Ye Cannot Quench (by Gertrude Evans, popular author of Diary of a Morgue Attendant; The Fisherman’s Wife’s Cousin; Cast a Very Wide Net; and The Return of Jane Eyre), now finds himself alone on this warm rainy night in 1957, in an areaway off Greenwich Village’s MacDougal Street, alone but for his friend a talking fly...

(Click here to read our previous episode; go here if you must to return to the very beginning of this Gold View Award™-winning 49-volume memoir. “With the holiday season approaching, now might just be the perfect time to pre-order my Planet Schnabelia: A Reader’s Guide to Arnold Schnabel.” -- Harold Bloom, on The Home Shopping Network.)

I turned my jacket collar up and started to head up the steps to the sidewalk.

“Yo, pal.”

I turned. The fly was hovering in the dry air beneath the awning.

“C’mon,” he said, “you know I don’t like to fly around in the rain.”

“Oh, sorry,” I said.

“I mean to you they might just be tiny raindrops, but to me each one is like getting dumped on with a barrelful of cold water, for Chist’s sake.”

“Do you want me to carry you in my hand again?”

“You are gonna grab a cab, right?”

“Yeah, sure, I guess.”

“I mean now is not the time to be cheap and walk home in the rain, maybe catch your death.”

“Yes, you’re right.”

“Okay, open your hand up.” I held my open left hand out into the space under the awning and the fly landed in my palm. “Okay, close ‘er up, but gently! gently now!”

I closed up my hand, turned and went up the steps to the sidewalk. The rain came down. I should have taken Emily the waitress’s offer of an umbrella, but it was too late now. There were no cabs in sight, no moving cars at all. I walked down towards Bleecker a couple of doors and got in under the awning of a closed tattoo parlour.

I felt a buzzing in my hand and I brought it up next to my ear.

“What’s goin’ on, no cabs?”

“No, I’m standing under another awning.”

“Okay, let me out, then.”

I did as he asked, and he buzzed merrily around my head. Well, maybe not merrily.

“They’re never around when ya want ‘em,” he said. “’Specially in the rain. So, what’s the plan, anyway, pal?”

“Well, first I’m going to go back to my apartment, then I’m going to try to write myself out of this world I’m in and back to my own world.”

“Okay. Whatever.”

“What do you mean?”

“Nothing,” he said. “Whatever.”

“Yeah, but what do you mean by whatever?”

“Nothing. Nothing at all.”

“You don’t think it’s a good plan?”

“Good in what sense?”

“Good in the sense that, uh, it’ll get me back to my own world.”

“Oh. In that sense.”

“Yeah.”

“Well, in the sense of is it a reasonable plan, uh, yeah, sure, sure it's reasonable. Provided it works.”

“You don’t think it’ll work?”

“Hey, who am I to say, I’m just a fly, but let me say only this, if I were able to write myself out of being a fly, don’t you think I would have tried it?”

I thought about this for a second.

“But how would you write it?” I asked.

“I beg your pardon?”

“How would you write yourself out of being a fly. You’re too small to hold a pen, or a pencil.”

“Oh. You got a point; a very valid point. Sometimes I forget. I don’t have opposable thumbs. Or fingers, for that matter. So, yeah, your point is well taken I suppose. So, you know, be my guest, write away.”

“But you don’t think it will work.”

“I did not say that.”

“My friend Josh seemed to think it would work.”

“And perhaps if your friend Josh said you should jump off the Brooklyn Bridge then that would work.”

“Look, it’s worth a try,” I said.

“Oh, yeah, sure, worth a try, but look, you want to pick up some beer first?”

Just then I saw Nicky Boskins coming up the steps from the Valhalla bar.

“Yo, pal --” said the fly.

“Ssshh.”

“What?”

I held up my hand.

“Just like a quart, y’know?” said the fly.

I ducked into the entrance area of the tattoo parlor.

“What the fuck’s the matter with you?” said the fly.

“Quiet,” I whispered. “It’s this guy Nicky, my PR man.”

“So what?”

“I don’t know.”

“What don’t you know?”

“I’m afraid he might be the Devil,” I whispered.

“Oh, for crying out loud,” said the fly.

“Look,” I whispered, “fly out a little ways and see what he’s doing?”

“Why?”

“Just do it, okay?”

“Awright, awright. Sheesh.”

He flew out beyond the edge of the entrance way and hovered.

“It looks like he’s waiting for a cab,” he said.

“Good.”

“And sure enough, here comes one.”

“Is it empty?”

“Yeah, it’s stopping. Come on, we’ll ask him to drop us off.”

“No!”

“No? It’s raining, pal, come on!”

He buzzed up and down.

“No,” I whispered, firmly.

“But who knows when the next one will come along?”

“Is he getting in the cab?”

“Of course he’s getting in.”

I turned around, away from the street, trying to look inconspicuous, or as inconspicuous as anyone can look staring into the glass-paned door of a closed and unlighted tattoo parlor.

“Tell me when he’s passed,” I whispered.

“Christ,” said the fly.

I heard a car going by, making a shooshing sound on the wet street.

“He’s gone,” said the fly. “You can come out of hiding now.”

I turned around, took a step forward. I saw a Yellow Cab making the left turn on Bleecker Street in the rain.

“You happy now?” said the fly.

“I just don’t want to take any chances,” I said. “And why did he leave right after we left?”

“Gee, I don’t know. Maybe because it’s late and he has to work in the morning?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Maybe.”

The street was empty now. No cars, no pedestrians.

“Okay,” said the fly, “so look, what do you say we go across to the San Remo for one or two, just till the rain lets up.”

“No, I want to get home and write this thing.”

“Oh, right. Your little plan. Okay, so we pick up a couple quarts to go.”

“Look, I’m really not planning on sticking around long enough to drink a couple of quarts of beer.”

“Okay, one quart. We can drink it while you’re writing.”

“You just passed out from licking the whiskey off a cocktail cherry, and now you want beer?”

“Flies have a very rapid metabolsm, so, yeah, I could go for a drop of beer or two, I mean, you know, if it’s okay with you, I mean.”

“Okay, if we see an open store or a bar I’ll pick up a quart.”

“There’s like six bars just on this block.”

“I don’t want to go into any of these bars.”

“Oh. Afraid of who you’ll run into, huh?”

“Yes, I am, actually.”

“I know that feeling, pal. This is the problem with bars, ya know what I mean? They let anybody in. But whatta ya gonna do? Spend your whole life holed up in your pad?”

“No.”

An old green De Soto came down the street, I think it was one of those De Luxe Business Coupés, a 1948 or so, its grillwork made it look like a grimacing beast. It drove on by.

“Hey, ya gotta get out sometimes,” said the fly.


“That’s true,” I said.

“You take your chances.”

“That’s true also.”

“But you just can’t hide in your room, like a monk. Like a goddam hermit. Right?”

“No, I guess not.”

“That way madness lies.”

“Possibly.”

“No possibly about it. So, ya wanta stop somewheres for a nightcap? I mean somewheres in your neighborhood maybe? I like them Bowery bars, not so pretentious --”

“No.”

“No?”

“No. Sorry.”

“Okay, just askin’. But we can still pick up a quart or two, right?”

“Yeah, we’ll pick up a quart,” I said, just to shut him up, but also because -- I realized just as I was saying it -- what if I failed? What if Josh had been wrong? What if I remained trapped in this universe? Then I would need a quart, and probably more than a quart.

We stood there silently. The fly came to rest on my shoulder. The rain continued to fall.

A couple of cars passed by. Then, after a minute, a meat truck. Then a little bit later a cop car. But no cabs.

“I can’t believe it,” said the fly. “We really should’ve just asked your buddy there if we coulda shared his cab.”

“He’s not my buddy.”

“You said he’s your PR man.”

“Look, let it go, okay?”

“Sure, fine.”

We waited. The street was empty now. Absolutely empty. Except for the rain, and for us.

“Unbelievable,” said the fly. “If I hadda known it was gonna take this fuckin’ long to find a cab I would’ve never let you talk us out of sharing your buddy’s cab. Never.”

I said nothing. I stepped out a bit from the awning to look up the street, as if this would somehow make a cab appear.

“Why’s it taking so long?” asked the fly. “I mean I know it’s raining, but. This is supposed to be Manhattan we’re in, not goddam Ohio or someplace, fucking North Dakota.”

I stepped back under the awning. The fly flew right up into my face.

“Why?” he asked.

“It’s a Tuesday night,” I said. “At least I think it’s a Tuesday. And it’s late.”

“Yeah, and raining,” he said. “But still.”

We waited.

“Oh, wait, I see one,” I said.

The fly buzzed forward to take a look.

“Nah, he’s occupied,” said the fly.

We waited. A few more cars came by, another pause, then a big Mack truck. All of a sudden two cabs came down the street, one after the other. Both occupied.

“Unbelievable,” said the fly.

Another minute, then another car. Then another occupied cab. Then a garbage truck.

The rain had lessened by now. It was still coming down, but it was much lighter, almost misty.

I was on the verge of asking the fly if he minded if I walked home. He could travel in my ear, or in my pocket if he preferred.

A white Lincoln Continental came down the street, I think it was the 1956 Mark II.

“Look at these rich bastards,” said the fly. “Slumming. Guys like that, you know what I do? I leave droppings in their caviar, that’s what I do. They should get sick and die. Rich bastards. Go back to Park Avenue, ya bums!”

The car stopped, a little bit ahead of us, then it backed up so that it was nearly in front of us.

“Oh, come on,” said the fly. “What’ve they got, Superman hearing? Okay, look, if there’s any trouble we hightail it back to that last bar, okay?”

“Quiet,” I whispered.

A young blond-haired guy who looked a little like Vic Morrow was looking out of the front passenger window. He turned and it looked like he said something to the driver. Then he turned back again and rolled down the window. I could hear loud jazz music from inside the car. The driver leaned over, looking out the window, at me. I couldn’t see his face clearly, but I saw the glow of a cigarette in his mouth. He backed up the car another foot or so and I saw his face in the light of a streetlamp. He reminded me of James Dean, and for a second I wondered if it was James Dean. But then I remembered that James Dean was dead in 1957. Not that his death necessarily precluded his presence in this universe. The driver pressed a button, the jazz music stopped, he took the cigarette out of his mouth.

“Hey,” he yelled. “Mrs. Morgenstern’s neighbor!”

“Yes?” I said.

“It’s me, Mickey, her nephew.”

A guy who looked like the actor Timothy Carey had partially rolled down the near rear window.

“It’s us, the Windbreakers, daddy-o. Remember, we was gonna roll you earlier today.”

“Oh, right,” I said. “Hi, guys.”

“What’re ya doin’ standin’ there,” yelled Mickey.

“Waiting for a cab.”

“You goin’ home?”

“Trying to.”

“Get in, we’ll give ya a lift.”

The fly was in my ear again now and he whispered, “Go ahead, pal, let’s get this show on the road.”

I went out across the sidewalk in the misty rain.

“Herschel,” said Mickey, “get in back.”

“I called shotgun,” said Herschel.

“Get in back.”

“Awright, awright awready.”

The blond-haired guy opened the door, the interior light came on, he got out. The Timothy Carey guy in back moved over to make room, and I could see the little Richard Jaeckel guy next to him on the other side. Herschel climbed in the back. All four of the guys were wearing different-colored windbreakers now over their t-shirts.

“Come on,” said Mickey. He was wearing a red windbreaker. “You’re gettin’ the new upholstery all wet.”

I went over and got in, closed the door, the inside light went off.

“Nice car,” whispered the fly in my ear.

I had never ridden in a fancy car like this before. Despite the fact that all four of the young fellows had lit cigarettes going the car smelled of clean new leather.

“Roll the window back up, willya?” said Mickey. “You too, Herschel.”

I looked for the window handle, running my fingers along the smooth pale leather-covered interior of the door.

“It’s power,” said Mickey. “Just press that button there.”

I found the button, put my finger on it, the window-pane rose silently.

“So whaddaya think?” said Mickey.

“Think?”

“Yeah. About the wheels.”

“Oh,” I said.

I touched the ivory-smooth leather of the dashboard. It felt warm to the touch, like a living thing. The windshield wipers stroked silently and efficiently. The lights on the dashboard glowed.

“So?” said Mickey.

“Nice car,” I said.

“Ha,” said Mickey.

The other three young guys all said ha too.

“Nice car I got, huh?” said Mickey.

I’ve noticed many times in my life that when you’re talking to guys about their cars that it’s usually necessary to say things two or three times at least, and with increasing emphasis.

“Really nice,” I said.

“Yeah,” said Mickey. He had his cigarette back between his lips now. “Real nice.”

He poked a button on the dashboard and the loud jazz music came back on.

“It’s a nice car all right,” he said. He put the car in gear. “But it ain’t my car.”

He put his foot on the gas and pulled out. The three guys in back all whooped and hollered.

The light up ahead was red, but Mickey ignored it and turned left on Bleecker.




(Continued here, indefatigably.)

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