Junky Read Online Free

front. Any cop would do a double-take at sight of him, and he was well known to the subway squad. So Mike spent at least half of his time on the Island doing the five-twenty-nine for jostling.
    This night Herman was knocked out on “nembies” and his head kept falling down onto the bar. Whitey was stomping up and down the length of the bar trying to promote some free drinks. The boys at the bar sat rigid and tense, clutching their drinks, quickly pocketing their change. I heard Whitey say to the bartender, “Keep this for me, will you?” and he passed his large clasp knife across the bar. The boys sat there silent and gloomy under the fluorescent lights. They were all afraid of Whitey, all except Roy. Roy sipped his beer grimly. His eyes shone with their peculiar phosphorescence. His long asymmetrical body was draped against the bar. He didn’t look at Whitey, but at the opposite wall where the booths were located. Once he said to me, “He’s no more drunk than I am. He’s just thirsty.”
    Whitey was standing in the middle of the bar, his fists doubled up, tears streaming down his face. “I’m no good,” he said. “I’m no good. Can’t anyone understand I don’t know what I’m doing?”
    The boys tried to get as far away from him as possible without attracting his attention.
    Subway Slim, Mike’s occasional partner, came in and ordered a beer. He was tall and bony, and his ugly face had a curiously inanimate look, as if made out of wood. Whitey slapped him on the back and I heard Slim say, “For Christ’s sake, Whitey.” There was more interchange I didn’t hear. Somewhere along the line Whitey must have got his knife back from the bartender. He got behind Slim and suddenly pushed his hand against Slim’s back. Slim fell forward against the bar, groaning. I saw Whitey walk to the front of the bar and look around. He closed his knife and slipped it into his pocket.
    Roy said, “Let’s go.”
    Whitey had disappeared and the bar was empty except for Mike, who was holding Slim up on one side. Frankie Dolan was on the other.
    I heard next day from Frankie that Slim was okay. “The croaker at the hospital said the knife just missed a kidney.”
    Roy said, “The big slob. I can see a real muscle man, but a guy like that going around picking up dimes and quarters off the bar. I was ready for him. I was going to kick him in the belly first, then get one of those quart beer bottles from the case on the floor and break it over his sconce. With a big villain like that you’ve got to use strategy.”
    We were all barred from the Angle, which shortly afterwards changed its name to the Roxy Grill.
    â€¢
    One night I went to the Henry Street address to look up Jack. A tall, red-haired girl met me at the door.
    â€œI’m Mary,” she said. “Come in.”
    It seemed that Jack was in Washington on business.
    â€œCome on into the front room,” she said, pushing aside a red corduroy curtain. “I talk to landlords and bill collectors in the kitchen. We live in here.”
    I looked around. The bric-a-brac had gone. The place looked like a chop suey joint. There were black and red lacquered tables scattered around, black curtains covered the window. A colored wheel had been painted on the ceiling with little squares and triangles of different colors giving a mosaic effect.
    â€œJack did that,” Mary said, pointing to the wheel. “You should have seen him. He stretched a board between two ladders and lay down on it. Paint kept dripping into his face. He gets a kick out of doing things like that. We get some frantic kicks out of that wheel when we’re high. We lay on our backs and dig the wheel and pretty soon it begins to spin. The longer you watch it, the faster it spins.”
    This wheel had the nightmarish vulgarity of Aztec mosaics, the bloody, vulgar nightmare, the heart throbbing in