OCR Text |
Show -193 I had forgotten. "Sit down and finish your beer," the bartender said, not without kindness. He was a large man with hairy arras and a short neck, one of those efficient characters created on purpose for the exact spot they fill in this world. There are one-function men, as precise as typewriters. "This man's asking a serious question," I said, indicating the drunk, "but I've forgotten the answer. What does anybody want?" "Don't give me trouble," the bartender said. "Finish your beer and get out of my bar. I don't like wise guys." "Do you know Ralph Waldo Emerson?" the drunk said. "He preached that the world of appearances was a mockery and a deceit. He was right, too." His chin rested on his hand and the top of his head had to move up and down when he talked, a comic effect. He had a gray face with unhealthy traces of red under the cheekbones. He looked curiously like Jack Lemmon. "The old mask of nature," I said. "I don't believe in it. What would be underneath? Nothing, in my opinion. A tree is a tree is a tree." "That's simplistic," Jack Lemmon said. The word fell clearly off his tongue and he looked pleased with himself. The bartender sighed. "It's not an either-or proposition," I said. "Things |