Disturbing the Peace (Vintage Classics) Read Online Free PDF

like – legs like – legs that defy description.” Then came his sister, who had married a psychiatrist – and wasn’t that the God damnedest thing? His own sister, for Christ’s sake, actually married to one of these Sigmund Freud freaks? And then came the youngest and the favorite, himself.
    “… Ah, I had my share of suffering when we first came over; my mother died; they called me the Katzenjammer Kike in junior high and I got a few bloody noses, but don’t worry, I’m not trying to break your heart. I always knew I’d make it and I did. Never had any sex problems, either, don’t worry about that.Never thought I was a fag or anything. Lost my cherry at fifteen on the beach at Far Rockaway and I’ve been wallowing in pussy ever since.
Wallowing
in it. You married, Wilder?”
    “Yes.”
    “Well, maybe that takes care of it for some guys, but I’ll be a son of a bitch if any broad’s gonna hook me till I’m ready. What kinda work d’ya do?”
    “Sales.”
    “Yeah? That’s funny. You look smarter’n that. I always thought salesmen were slope-heads. Whaddya sell?”
    “Space.”
    The doctor reeled away in astonishment. “Christ, isn’t
any
thing free any more? You sell space? Which kind? Inner space or outer space? Huh?”
    “I think you know what I mean,” Wilder said. “Advertising space. For a magazine.”
    “Oh. Yeah, I get it. Advertising space. What magazine?”
    “
The American Scientist
.”
    “No kidding? Well, that’s impressive. They run some pretty abstruse, sophisticated material. If you understand that stuff you must be fairly—”
    “I don’t understand it. I just sell it.”
    “How can you sell something you don’t understand?”
    “Isn’t that sort of what psychiatrists do?”
    And that earned him another of Spivack’s painful punches and a bray of laughter. “You’re okay, Wilder,” he said. “Anyway, I always knew I’d make it and I did. Straight A’s all through college and med school, did my internship at Johns Hopkins and came here as a resident two years ago. Internal medicine. Thought it was an honor to work in Bellevue Hospital; family did too. And I was damned good. That’s not bragging: I happen to be an excellent physician, that’s all. Then,
wham!
The oldadministrative double-cross, and look where the hell I wind up. Talk about irony, huh?”
    Wilder wanted to hear more about the old administrative double-cross but thought better of asking; and when Spivack began talking again he had changed the subject.
    “Speaking of fags,” he said, “you notice how this ward’s crawling with ’em? Fags, junkies, fall-down drunks. Another thing: you notice all this ‘Save me’ talk? ‘Save me, buddy,’ and all that? It’s supposed to be about cigarettes – they want you to save ’em the butt when you’re done – but it’s really kind of a half-assed prayer: you hear guys say it that don’t even smoke. They want to be saved. Find a lot of religious nuts in here. There’s one guy thinks he’s the Second Coming of Christ. Probably more than one – it’s a common psychotic delusion – but this guy’s a riot. Keeps to himself most of the time, then once in a while he puts on a show. Stick around; you’ll see him. Hey, and another thing: you notice how they only hire spades here? You know why?”
    “No. Why?”
    “Why d’ya think? Because they’re so ‘gentle’ and so ‘kind’? Yeah, yeah, they’ve got a Natural Sense of Rhythm too. They’re scared of ghosts and they’re just plain crazy about watermelon. What the hell were you, born yesterday? It’s because no white man’d
work
here for the kind of money they get. You know what kind of money they get? Even Charlie there? Huh?”
    “Excuse me, Mr. Wilder,” Charlie said, blocking their path. “Those pajamas of yours don’t fit very well, do they?”
    “No, I – No, they don’t.”
    “Sometimes the night people are careless. We have Small, Medium and Large. A man of your size