"Goodis, David - Black Friday" - читать интересную книгу автора (Goodis David)

BLACK FRIDAY
by David Goodis



Copyright 1954 by David Goodis
Copyright renewed 1982 by the Estate of David Goodis

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Vintage Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and distributed in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. This edition published by arrangement with Scott Meredith Agency.

First Vintage Crime/Black Lizard Edition, October 1990

ISBN 0-679-73255-1





black friday





1

January cold came in from two rivers, formed four walls around Hart and closed in on him. He told himself an overcoat was imperative. He looked up and down Callohil Street and saw an old guy coming toward him and the old guy featured a big overcoat and big, heavy work shoes. The overcoat came nearer and Hart worked his way into an alley and waited. He was shivering and he could feel the cold eating into his chest and tearing away at his spine. He came out of the alley as the old guy walked past, and he was behind him. The street was empty. He moved up on the old guy and then noticed how the old guy was bent and the overcoat was old and torn. The old guy would have a hard time getting another overcoat.
Hart turned and walked down Callohill Street. He pulled up the collar of his chocolate-brown flannel suit and told himself a lot of good that did. He turned around again and walked toward Broad Street, and he was hating Philadelphia.
The cold was even worse on Broad Street. From the east it brought an icy flavor from the Delaware. From the west it carried a mean grey frost from the Schuylkill. Hart had been brought up in a warm climate and besides that he was a skinny man and he couldn't stand this cold weather.
He looked south on Broad Street and the big clock on City Hall said six-twenty. It was already getting dark and lights were showing in store windows here and there. Hart put his hands in his trousers pockets and continued north on Broad Street. Then he took his hand out of his left pocket and looked at three quarters, a dime, a nickel and three pennies. That was all he had and he needed an overcoat. He needed a meal and a place to stay and he could use a cigarette. He thought maybe it would be a good idea to walk across Broad and keep on walking until he reached the Delaware River and then take a fast dive and put an end to the whole thing.
He grinned, Just thinking about it made him feel better. It made him realize that as long as he was alive he'd get along somehow. He could hope for a break.
The cold hit again from four sides, got inside him and began to freeze there. He walked on fighting the cold. He passed a store window with a mirror border and stood looking at himself. The flannel suit was still in fairly good shape and that helped some. The collar of the white shirt was grey at the edges and that wasn't so good. He had a mania for clean white shirts. That was something else he needed, a few shirts and underwear and socks. It was a pity he had to get off that train in such a hurry. In a few months or so the railroad would be auctioning his suitcase and his things.
He stood there looking in the mirror, and the cold beat into his back. He needed a haircut. His pale blond hair was wisping around his ears. And he needed a shave. His eyes were pale grey and there were dark shadows under his eyes. He was getting older. In another month he'd be thirty-four.
He smiled sadly at the poor thing in the mirror, the poor skinny thing. Once he had owned a yacht.
It was really dark now and he told himself he better get a move on. He walked on another block and then stopped in front of a clothing store. A sign in the window announced a sale. A prematurely bald man was arranging garments in the window. Hart walked into the store.
The salesman smiled eagerly at Hart.
Hart said, "I'd like to see an overcoat."
"Why, certainly7 the salesman said. "We've got a lot of fine ones'
"I only want one," Hart said.
"Why, certainly," the salesman said again. He started toward a rack and then turned and stared at Hart. "How come you're stuck without an overcoat in this weather?"
"I'm careless," Hart skid. "I don't take care of myself."
The salesman was looking at Hart's turned-up coat collar.
Hart said, "Do you want to sell me an overcoat?"
"Why, certainly," the salesman said. "What kind would you like?"
"The warm kind."
The salesman took a coat from a hanger. "Just feel that fleece. Try it on. You never wore anything like that in all your life. Just feel it."
Hart got into the coat. It was much too large. He took it off and handed it back to the salesman.
"What's the matter?" the salesman said.
"It's too small," Hart said.
The salesman handed Hart another coat, saying, "Try that on and see how it fits'