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sentences. Please tell Mr. Shayne I am very grateful. I wish to transfer my entire fortune to
my parents in Indian Creek, Colorado. The name is Abednego Danner. Make all
arrangements.
A faint But followed him futilely through the door. In the space of a block he had
cut a pace that set other pedestrians gaping to a fast walk.
Chapter XVII
HUGO sat in Madison Square Park giving his attention in a circuit to the Flatiron
Building, the clock on the Metropolitan Tower, and the creeping barrage of traffic that sent
people scampering, stopped, moved forward again. He had sat on the identical bench at the
identical time of day during his obscure undergraduate period. To repeat that contemplative
stasis after so much living had intervened ought to have produced an emotion. He had gone to
the park with that idea. But the febrile fires of feeling were banked under the weight of many
things and he could suffer nothing, enjoy nothing and think but one fragmentary routine.
He had tried much and mode no progress. He would be forced presently to depart on a
different course from a new threshold. That idea went round and round in his head like a
single fly in a big room. It lost poignancy and eventually it lost meaning. Still he sat in feeble
sunshine trying to move beyond stagnancy. He remembered the small man with the g=huge
roll of bills who had moved beside him and asked for a cup of coffee. He remembered the
woman who had robbed him; silk ankles crossed his line of vision, and a gusty appetite
vaporized even as it steamed into the coldness of his indecision.
He was without money now, as he had been then, so long ago. He budged on the
bench and challenged himself to think.
What would you do if you were the strongest man in the world, the strongest thing in
the world, mightier than the machine? He made himself guess answers for that rhetorical
query. I would I would have won the war. But I did not. I would run the universe single-
handed. Literally single-handed. I would scorn the universe and turn it to my own ends. I
would be a criminal. I would rip open banks and gut them. I would kill and destroy. I would
be a secret, invisible blight. I would set out to stamp crime off the earth; I would be a super-
detective, following and summarily punishing every criminal until no one dared to commit a
felony. What would I do? What will I do?
Then he realized that he was hungry. He had not eaten enough in the last few days.
Enough for him. With some intention of finding work he had left Mr. Shayne s house. A call
on the telephone from Mr. Shayne himself volunteering a position had crystallized that
intention. In three days he had discovered the vast abundance of young men, the
embarrassment of young men, who were walking along the streets looking for work. He who
had always worked with his arms and shoulders had determined to try to earn his living with
his head. But the white-collar ranks were teeming, overflowing, supersaturated. He went
down in the scale of clerkships and inexperienced clerkships. There was no work.
Thence he had gone to the park, and presently he rose. He had seen the clusters of
men on Sixth Avenue standing outside the employment agencies. He could go there. Any
employment was better than hunger and he had learned that hunger could come swiftly and
formidably to him. Business was slack, hands were being laid off, where an apprentice was
required, three trained men waited avidly for work. It was appalling and Hugo saw it as
appalling. He was not frightened, but, as he walked, he knew that it was a mistake to sit in the
park with the myriad other men. Walking made him feel better. It was action, it bred the
thought that any work was better than none. Work would not hinder his dreams, meantime.
When he reached Forty-second Street he could see the sullen, watchful groups of men. He
joined one of them. A loose-jointed, dark-faced person came down a flight of stairs, wrote on
a blackboard in chalk, and went up again. Several of the group detached themselves and
followed him to compete for a chance to wash windows.
A man at his side spoke to him. Tough, ain t it, buddy?
Yeah, it s tough, Hugo said.
I got three bones left. Wanna join me in a feed an get a job afterward?
Hugo looked into his eyes. They were troubled and desirous of companionship. No,
thanks, he replied.
They waited for the man to scribble again in chalk.
They was goin to fix up everybody slick after the war. Oh, hell, yes.
You in it? Hugo asked.
Up to my God-damned neck, buddy.
Me, too. Guess I ll go up the line.
I ll go witcha.
Well
They waited a moment longer, for the man with the chalk had reappeared. Hugo s
comrade grunted. Wash windows an work in the steel mills. Break your neck or burn your
ear off. Wha do they care? Hugo had taken a step toward the door, but the youth with the
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Dobre pomysły nie mają przeszłości, mają tylko przyszłość. Robert Mallet
De minimis - o najmniejszych rzeczach.
Dobroć jest ważniejsza niż mądrość, a uznanie tej prawdy to pierwszy krok do mądrości. Theodore Isaac Rubin
Dobro to tylko to, co szlachetne, zło to tylko to, co haniebne.
Dla człowieka nie tylko świat otaczający jest zagadką; jest on nią sam dla siebie. I z obu tajemnic bardziej dręczącą wydaje się ta druga. Antoni Kępiński (1918-1972)
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