John Kennedy Toole - A Confederacy of Dunces (Chap 6.1) lyrics

MATTIE'S RAMBLE INN was on a corner in the Carrollton section of the city where, after having run parallel for six or seven miles, St. Charles Avenue and the Mississippi River meet and the avenue ends. Here an angle is formed, the Avenue and its streetcar tracks on one side, the river and levee and railroad tracks on the other. Within this angle there is a separate little neighborhood. In the air there is always the heavy, cloying odor of the alcohol distillery on the river, an odor that becomes suffocating on hot summer afternoons when the breeze blows in from the river. The neighborhood grew haphazardly a century or so ago and today looks hardly urban at all. As the city's streets cross St. Charles Avenue and enter this neighborhood, they gradually change from asphalt to gravel. It is an old rural town that has even a few barns, an alienated and microcosmic village within a large city. Mattie's Ramble Inn looked like all the buildings on its block; it was low, unpainted, imperfectly vertical. Mattie's rambled slightly to the right, tilting toward the railroad tracks and the river. Its facade was almost invulnerable, covered as it was with tin advertising posters for a variety of beers and cigarettes and soft drinks. Even the screen on the door advertised a brand of bread. Mattie's was a combination bar and grocery, the grocery aspect limited to a sparse selection of goods, soft drinks, bread, and canned foods for the most part. Beside the bar there was an ice chest that cooled a few pounds of pickled meat and sausage. And there was no Mattie; Mr. Watson, the quiet, tan, cafe au lait owner, had sole authority over the restricted merchandise. “The problem come from not having no vocation sk**,” Jones was saying to Mr. Watson. Jones was perched on a wooden stool, his legs bent under him like ice tongs ready to pick up the stool and boldly carry it away before Mr. Watson's old eyes. “If I had me some training I wouldn be mopping no old who*e flo.” “Be good,” Mr. Watson answered vaguely. “Be well behave with the lady.” “Wha? Ooo-wee. You don understand at all, man. I got a job working with a bird. How you like working with a bird?” Jones aimed some smoke over the bar. “I mean, I'm glad that girl getting a chance. She been working for that Lee mother a long time. She need a break. But I bet that bird be making more money than me. Whoa!” “Be nice, Jones.” “Whoa! Hey, you really been brainwash,” Jones said. “You ain got nobody to come in and mop your flow. How come? Tell me that.” “Don't get yourself in no trouble.” “Hey! You soun just like the Lee mother. Too bad you two ain met. She love you. She say, ‘Hey, boy, you the kinda fool old timey n******g I been looking for all my life.' She say, ‘Hey, you so sweet, how's about waxing my floor and painting my wall? You so darling, how's about scrubbing my tawlet and polishing my shoe?' And you be saying, ‘Yes, ma'm, yes, ma'm. I'm well behave.' And you be bustin your a** falling off a chandelier you been dustin and some other who*e friend of her coming in so they can compare they price, and Lee star throwing some nickel at your feet and say, ‘Hey boy, that sure a lousy show you putting on. Han us back them nickel before we call a po-lice.' Ooo-wee.” “Didn that lady say she call a po-lice if you give her trouble?” “She got me there. Hey! I think that Lee got some connection with the po-lice. She all the time tellin me about her frien on the force. She say she got such a high cla** place a po-lice never stick a foot in her door.” Jones formed a thundercloud over the little bar. “She operatin somethin with that orphan crap, though. As soon as somebody like Lee say, ‘Chariddy,' you know they somethin crooker in the air. And I know they somethin wrong cause all of a sudden the Head Orphan stop showin up cause I'm axing plenty question. sh**! I like to fin out what goin on. I tire of bein caught in a trap payin me twenty dollar a week, workin with a bird as big as a eagle. I wanna get someplace, man. Whoa! I want me a air condition, some color TV, sit aroun drinkin somethin better than beer.” “You want another beer?” Jones looked at the old man through his sungla**es and said, “You tryina sell me another beer, a poor color boy bustin his a** for twenny dollar a week? I think it about time you gimme a free beer with all the money you make sellin pickle meat and sof drink to po color peoples. You sen you boy to college with the money you been makin in here.” “He a schoolteacher now,” Mr. Watson said proudly, opening a beer. “Ain that fine. Whoa! I never go to school more than two year in my life. My momma out washing other people clothin, ain nobody talkin about school. I spen all my time rollin tire aroun the street. I'm rollin, momma washin, nobody learnin nothin. sh**! Who lookin for a tire roller to give them a job? I end up gainfully employ workin with a bird, got a boss probly sellin Spanish fly to orphan. Ooo-wee.” “Well, if conditions really bad...” “‘Really bad'? Hey! I'm workin in modren slavery. If I quit, I get report for bein vagran. If I stay, I'm gainfully employ on a salary ain even startin to be a minimal wage.” “I tell you what you can do,” Mr. Watson said confidentially; leaning over the bar and handing Jones the beer. The other man at the bar bent toward them to listen; he had been silently following their conversation for several minutes. “You try you a little sabotage. That's the only way you fight that kinda trap.” “Wha you mean ‘sabotage'?” “You know, man,” Mr. Watson whispered. “Like the maid ain bein paid enough to throw too much pepper in the soup by accident. Like the parkin lot attendant takin too much crap skid on some oil and crash a car into the fence.” “Whoa!” Jones said. “Like the boy workin in the supermarket suddenly get slippery fingers and drop a dozen aigs on the floor cause he ain been pay overtime. Hey!” “Now you got it.” “We really plannin big sabotage,” the other man at the bar said, breaking his silence. “We havin a big demonstration where I work.” “Yeah?” Jones asked. “Where?” “At Levy Pant. We got this big old white man comin in the factory tellin us he like to drop a atom bum on top the company.” “It sound like you peoples havin more than sabotage,” Jones said. “It sound like you havin a war ?” “Be nice, be respectful,” Mr. Watson told the stranger. The man chuckled until his eyes filled with tears and he said, “This man say he prayin for the mulattas and the rats allover the world.” “Rats? Whoa! You peoples got a one-hunner-percen freak on your hand.” “He very smart,” the man said defensively. “He very religious, too. He built him a big cross right in the office.” “Whoa!” “He say, ‘You peoples all be happier in the middle age. You peoples gotta get you a cannon and some arrows, drop a nuclear bum on top this place.'” The man laughed again. “We ain't got nothin better to do in that factory. He always interestin to listen to when he flappin his big moustache. He gonna lead us in a big demonstration he say make all the other demonstration look like a ladies' social.” “Yeah, and it sound like he gonna lead you peoples right into jail,” Jones said, covering the bar with some more smoke. “He sound like a crazy white mother.” “He kinda strange,” the man admitted. “But he work right in that office, and the manager in there, Mr. Gonzala, he think this guy pretty sharp. He let him do whatever he want. He even let him come back in the factory any time this guy want to. Plenty peoples ready to do demonstrate with him. He tell us he got permission from Mr. Levy hisself to have a demonstration, tell us Mr. Levy want us to demonstrate and get rid of Gonzala. Who know? Maybe they raise our wage. That Mr. Gonzala afred of him already.” “Tell me, man, what this white savior cat look like?” Jones asked with interest. “He big and fat, got him a huntin cap he wearin all the time.” Jones's eyes widened behind his gla**es. “This huntin cap green? He got him a green cap?” “Yeah. How you know that?” “Whoa!” Jones said. “You peoples in plenty trouble. A po-lice already lookin for that freak. He come in the Night of Joy one night, star tellin this Darlene gal about a bus.” “Well, whaddya know,” the man said. “He tell us about a bus, too, tell us he go ridin into the har of darkness on a bus one time.” “He the same one. Stay away from that freak. He wanted by a police. You po color peoples all get your a** throwed in jail. Whoa!” “Well, I gotta ax him about that,” the man said. “I sure don wanna get led on no demonstration by a convic.”