"Five Spot"

They followed John Henry through the barroom, past a crowded bar and towards the sounds of loud crashing music.

Mr. Whitman took Milford's arm again and spoke into his ear.

"Hey, Mel, you got another five in that poke of yours?"

"What?" said Milford.

"Let me have a five-spot, will you? All's I got is twenties on me."

"If you have twenties why do you need a five?"

"Come on, just let me have a fiver, okay? I'll pay you back just as soon as I break a twenty."

"Can't you just get change from a waitress or a bartender?"

"Look, buddy, don't bust my balls. Didn't I give you a signed first edition of my book?"

"I didn't ask for it."

"Mel, I'm asking you, just loan me a goddam fin and stop being such a noodge already."

"Well, all right," said Milford. He didn't really care, but on the other hand moochers had been taking advantage of him ever since he was a child, because of his family's supposed and actual wealth and their imposing old townhouse on Bleecker Street. He dug into the back pocket of his dungarees and brought out his wallet.

"Just a five," said Mr. Whitman. "I mean if you can spare it."

"I can spare it," said Milford, opening the wallet.

"Nice wallet, by the way," said Mr. Whitman, touching the crude rawhide stitching. "Very 'rustic'."

"Thank you," said Milford. "I made it myself, during my brief tenure as a Boy Scout."

"I like it."

"My mother insisted on buying me an expensive Horween billfold from Brooks Brothers, but I have a sentimental attachment for this one."

"May I feel the leather?"

"Okay."

Mr. Whitman took the wallet from Milford's hand and stroked its scuffed and worn surface.

"What's this strange symbol burnt into the side? Is it a rune, or some sort of Chinese character?"

"No, it's supposed to be my monogram. I was trying to use Spencerian capitals, but I was using this hot iron, and I've never been very dexterous, so –"

"So, it's like, what, MM?"

"Yes."

"I see it now," said Mr. Whitman. "MM, for 'Marion Milstein' – see I remember your name. Oh, wow, look at those Negroes dancing up there."

Milford turned and looked. Up ahead beyond some tables there was a crowded dance floor, with people dancing to the music of a small but loud combo.

"Such a gay and happy race," said Mr. Whitman. "Here, I see you got one five left."

Milford turned back and Mr. Whitman was holding a five-dollar bill up in the air.

"Appreciate it, Mel," he said, and he handed the wallet back.

Milford looked into his wallet. All he had left in it was two tens. He could have sworn there had been three tens there, but he let it go, closed up the wallet and put the wallet back in his jeans.

"Hey, let's catch up to the others, buddy," said Mr. Whitman, folding up the five-dollar bill, and he took Milford's arm and pulled him along.

They found Jelly Roll and Miss Blackbourne already sitting at a round table with four chairs at the edge of the dance floor, and John Henry was standing there talking to them.

"Hi, everybody," said Mr. Whitman.

John Henry turned.

"You get lost?"

"Oh, no, John Henry, we were just taking our time, heh heh. Oh, hey, what a nice table, right by the dancing. This is swell."

John Henry turned back to Jelly Roll and Miss Blackbourne.

"Polly Ann'll be right over to get your orders. If you're hungry the possum stew is to die for tonight, and I can always recommend the fatback and beans, with cornbread."

"Oh, wow, I love fatback and beans," said Mr. Whitman.

"That's great," said John Henry, "then you should order it."

He turned back to Jelly Roll.

"Looking forward to hearing you get up and jam, my man."

"Oh, I definitely will, John Henry," said Jelly Roll.

"Cool, I'll catch you all later."

"Oh, by the way, John Henry," said Mr. Whitman.

"What?"

"Just want to shake your hand, sir."

"Oh. Okay."

John Henry extended his massive hand and Mr. Whitman inserted his own large but much less huge hand into it.

John Henry disengaged his hand and opened it, knuckles downward. There was a greenback folded in eighths in the center of the pale callused palm.

"What's this shit?" he said.

"Just a little token," said Mr. Whitman. 

"What's that, five bucks?"

"Yes, I hope it's enough –"

"I don't want your five dollars, man."

"Oh."

"Take it back."

"Um."

"I said take it."

Quickly Mr. Whitman reached over and took the folded bill out of John Henry's palm.

"Sorry," he said, "I didn't mean to, uh –"

John Henry gave him a look, and Mr. Whitman said nothing. Then the big man turned again to Jelly Roll and Miss Blackbourne. 

"See you later, Jelly Roll. A pleasure, Miss Margaret."

"All mine, I assure you, John Henry," said Miss Blackbourne, who was smoking one of her ebony cigarettes with the silver tip.

John Henry seemed to notice Milford, standing a little behind Mr. Whitman.

"You okay, Milford?"

"Yes," said Milford, "thank you."

"You don't look okay."

"That's okay," said Milford. "I always look this way."

"Sit down and get a drink, maybe you'll feel better with a little corn liquor in you."

"Maybe."

John Henry glanced at Mr. Whitman again, still holding his folded-up five dollar bill, and then he turned and strode away, his enormous legs covering a yard with each pace.

"Sit the fuck down, Walt," said Jelly Roll. "You too, Milford."

Mr. Whitman took the chair to Jelly Roll's left, and Milford sat down to Miss Blackbourne's right.

"Fuck sakes, Walt," said Jelly Roll to Mr. Whitman, "I distinctly recall asking you to attempt to be cool."

"I just wanted to, uh, show my appreciation," said Mr. Whitman.

"Just put that fucking five-spot back into your pocket."

"Look, how about if I get the first round with it?"

"We're gonna run a tab, dipshit, now put that five away and stop trying to showboat."

"Well, okay," said Mr. Whitman, and he leaned to one side and stuck the five into his trousers pocket.

Milford considered asking for the five back, but he let it go, as he let so many things go, as he always had and would no doubt continue to do.

A pretty Negro woman with a black apron appeared, with a tray under her arm and a pad in her hand. 

"Hey, Jelly Roll," she said. "Whatta ya hear, whatta ya say?"

"Nothing much, Polly Ann," said Jelly Roll. "Just fixing to get my drunk on and get up and bang them eighty-eights, darling."

"Cool," said the lady. "What are you and your ofay friends drinking?"

"I wonder, miss," said Mr. Whitman, "do you have a nice hot grog?"

"No," said the lady.

"Perhaps a fine strong ale then, brewed in great oaken casks that are piled onto drays by sweaty men muscular and hearty, and then pulled by teams of stout horses through the wet cobblestone streets in the rose-dappled dawn?"

"We got Ballantine ale," said the lady, "if that's what you're talking about, you silly ass motherfucker." 

{Kindly go here to read the unexpurgated "adult comix" version in A FLOPHOUSE IS NOT A HOME, illustrated by the illustrious rhoda penmarq…}

"Steel Driving Man"

 

"I see you brought some honkies with you, Jelly Roll," said the huge Negro man.

"Yes, I have, John Henry," said Jelly Roll, "but I assure you they're cool, daddy-o."

"The lady looks cool," said the man.

"Why, thank you, kind sir," said Miss Blackbourne, "for the delightful compliment."

"You can come in," said the big man. "May I ask your name?"

"Blackbourne is the name, Margaret Blackbourne," said Miss Blackbourne, "but, please, call me Margaret."

"I shall call you Miss Margaret," said the huge man, with a slight bow.

"And may I call you John?"

"My friends all call me John Henry."

"And so, with your permission, I shall call you John Henry, sir," said Miss Blackbourne, and she horizontally extended her lily-white hand with its blood-red fingernails.

The man called John Henry placed his enormous fingers and thumb in a gentle touch on Miss Blackbourne's hand.

"Like a delicate flower," he said.

He disengaged his fingers and looked at Mr. Whitman.

"Who's this goofball, Jelly Roll?"

"Whitman's my name," said Mr. Whitman, extending his own hand. "Walt Whitman. Perhaps you have heard of me? I wrote a little book called Leaves of Grass?"

"Never heard of it," said John Henry.

"Oh," said Mr. Whitman. "Well –"

"You ever read anything by Horace P. Sternwall?" said the big man.

"Um, the name sounds vaguely familiar," said Mr. Whitman.

"That man can write like a motherfucker."

"Indeed?" said Mr. Whitman. "Which of his books might you recommend?"

"All of them, but just off the top of my head, Salt Chunk Mary and Her House of Blue Lights is pretty good."

"Salt Chunk?" said Mr. Whitman.

"Mary and Her House of Blue Lights," said John Henry. "Another good one was Rip Roaring Rip Riley, Range Rover."

"Okay," said Mr. Whitman, "I'll make a mental note of that one."

"He writes good poems too. A favorite collection of them is one called Christmas for the Doomed. The title makes it sound kind of gloomy like, but it's actually pretty uplifting."

"Okay," said Mr. Whitman. "I'm a poet myself, and so I always like to see what other people are doing in the discipline –"

"Then you'd probably like this other poetry book he wrote called A Bed of Cobblestones. That's a good one."

"Okay," said Mr. Whitman.

"Another one of my favorites from Sternwall is a book of inspirational essays, it's called, Pass That Bottle Over Here."

"Well, I'll certainly look out for any of his books, Mr., uh, Henry."

John Henry had ignored Mr. Whitman's outstretched hand, and so Mr. Whitman made a couple of grasping motions with his fingers, as though he were trying to loosen up a case of writer's cramp, and then lowered the hand and rubbed it in a nervous-seeming way on the front of his thigh.

John Henry now turned his impassive gaze on Milford.

"And who is this sad-ass looking pale little motherfucker?"

"You don't have to let me in," said Milford. "I don't mind."

"What's your name, boy?"

"It doesn't matter," said Milford. "I can go."

"His name is Melman," said Mr. Whitman, "but I call him Mel."

"His name is not Melman, Walt," said Miss Blackbourne. "It's Milford."

"I'm pretty sure it's Melmer," said Mr. Whitman. "Otherwise why would the diminutive be Mel?"

"What's your name, sonny?" said John Henry to Milford.

"Marion Milford, sir," said Milford. "But I prefer to be called simply Milford."

"Your first name is Marion?"

"Yes, but I didn't choose it."

"Milford, you say?"

"Yes, but you can call me anything. Most people do."

"I'll call you Milford."

"Thank you, sir."

"Call me John Henry."

"Okay, Mr. John Henry."

"Just John Henry will do."

"Okay, John Henry."

"Give me your lily white hand."

"I hope you're not going to crush it."

"I ain't gonna crush your hand," said John Henry. "Now give it to me."

Reluctantly, Milford extended his small white hand, the only kind of hand he had, and John Henry engulfed it in his own enormous black hand. His grip exuded strength and power, but he was as good as his word, and he refrained from squashing Milford's hand to a pulp, and in fact Milford felt a strange surge of puissance entering the flesh and bones of his hand, which ran up his arm all the way to his chest and through his lungs and into his sluggishly beating heart.

"Your hand, young fella, is even more delicate than that of the lady here, Miss Margaret," said John Henry.

"Yes," said Milford. "I have spent my entire life thus far avoiding physical exercise as much as possible."

"I'm a steel driving man myself, and have always gloried in the flexing and pulsing of my muscles," said John Henry.

"So also I," said Mr. Whitman. "I wonder if you have ever tried kettle balls?"

John Henry ignored Mr. Whitman, and released Milford's hand.

"Start with one push-up, pushing up very slowly, and coming down very slowly" he said to Milford. "Each day do another push-up, very slowly, and when you feel you're ready, go up to two push-ups, remembering to go up as slowly as you can, and down as slowly as you can. Incrementally, try to increase the number of slow push-ups until you have reached your absolute limit. Then take a break for a few days, and begin again, with as many slow pushups as you can manage. After a year of this régime you will have arms and shoulders and a chest of steel, with a stomach as hard as that of a medieval knight's suit of armor."

"Okay," said Milford, although he doubted he would really follow through on the suggestion.

"All right, then," said John Henry. "I like you, and you can come in. This place can get rough, but don't worry – what was your name?"

"Mel," said Mr. Whitman. "His friends call him Mel."

"Milford, actually," said Milford.

"Don't worry, Milford," said John Henry. "Anybody in here fucks with you, they fuck with me."

"Thank you, sir," said Milford. 

John Henry turned to Jelly Roll. 

"Okay, Jelly Roll, I guess your friends can come in." He glanced at Mr. Whitman. "Even him."

"Thank you, John Henry!" said Mr. Whitman. "We really appreciate it so much. And by the way, I have long been an admirer of the Negro race. I especially enjoy your folk music and dances, and I fancy I can clog out a passable black bottom or cakewalk myself –"

"Great," said John Henry. "All right, follow me."

The big man turned about face and went into the room, roaring as it was with music and shouting and laughter.

Miss Blackbourne and Jelly Roll followed, and Mr. Whitman whispered into Milford's ear, "I think you really impressed him, Mel!"

He took Milford's arm and guided him through the doorway into what was a large barroom, dark, smoky, loud, filled with dark-skinned people. 

John Henry turned his head and said in his booming voice:

"Close that door behind you."

Mr. Whitman let go of Milford's arm, and quickly backed up and closed the door.

{Please go here to read the unexpurgated "adult comix" version in A Flophouse Is Not a Home, profusely illustrated by the illustrious Rhoda Penmarq…}