American Pie Read Online Free PDF Page B

from the street, hands thrust in his pockets, watching a mounted policeman attempt to unravel one of the ubiquitous traffic snarls that hourly paralyzed Broadway. The unrelenting heat frayed tempers and nerves, and the scene in front of him was punctuated by an eruption of shouts and curses and accusations.
    Ordinarily the tangled wheels and harness would have provided an interesting diversion, but at the moment all he could think about was the tantalizing fragrance of roast pork and fried potatoes that wafted from the doorway beside him.
    Counting his money by feeling the shape of the coins in his pocket, Jamie arrived at the same total he had a moment before. Sixty-two cents. The pork and potatoes, plus a slice of pie, the thought of which made his mouth water, cost twenty-five cents. He hadn't eaten since yesterday and he was tempted to step inside the hash house, out of the burning sun, and relieve the tightness cramping his stomach.
    Exerting a will of their own, his fingers separated two dimes and a nickel from among his coins and curled around them. The saliva that dampened his mouth at the thought of the pie dried in the curls of dust rising from the street and he thought how good a cool pint would taste, like a wee bit of heaven.
    The cost of a meal and a pint would leave him thirty-seven cents. Subtract ten cents for a bed at a lodging house, and he would start tomorrow with twenty-seven cents. If he settled for a doss house in the Bowery, he could save five cents. Even for a man brimming with optimism that cut the future too thin.
    Turning aside from the hash house doorway, Jamie made himself walk away from the scents and thoughts of food. As the crush of pedestrian traffic was as thick and bad-tempered as the street traffic, he stayed near the buildings, which was better anyway as he could watch for Help Wanted signs in the windows.
    And he could watch for the lovely lass he had met at Ellis Island, though he had almost abandoned hope of finding her again. A sigh lifted his shoulders and he thrust his hands deep into his pockets. Why hadn't he inquired where she was staying? Hell, he didn't even know her name. Her beautiful dark eyes had gazed into his and turned his brain to straw. Instead of asking the important questions, he had babbled like an idiot. Swearing softly, he turned a brooding expression toward the shop windows.
    A week ago Jamie had begun ignoring the Irish need not apply warning added to the Help Wanted signs, hoping he could pass for an Englishman, though the thought galled him. In the end it hadn't mattered as prospective employers recognized his accent and showed him the door. He was beginning to wonder how Irishmen, Chinamen and Africans survived in New York City.
    Fingering his coins, feeling the sweat that soiled his collar, he walked along Broadway, entering every door displaying a Help Wanted sign. And leaving again. It was just as well, he told himself, rejecting any thought of discouragement. A job in the establishments he had tried would only have offered a stopgap measure, something to provide the necessities until he could secure a position in construction or design.
    Pausing to mop his neck and brow, Jamie looked past the edge of the pavement into a construction pit and watched a crew of laborers excavating a basement for what he guessed would eventually be another Broadway shopping emporium. The men working the shovels were bare chested, sweating profusely in the boiling noon day sun. The work was brutal and the heat in the pit would be savage, but at least the men had a job and the satisfaction of knowing they were building something wonderful.
    After a moment the conversation around him focused and Jamie realized the foreman for the job site stood not three feet from him. Surely this was a sign. After dusting the tops of his shoes on the back of his trousers, he straightened his shoulders, removed his cap, and stepped forward.
    "Pardon the intrusion, sir, but are you the foreman