When I sailed into the street my hair was at all ends of the stratosphere. The only cigar was not in my mouth. The only high rise was in my pants and the only organ that stopped a moment to palpitate was also in my pants.

Malloy's Bar was down the road. It's interior, as thoughtful and reserved as the moon, paraded in front of me like a drunk walking the equator. I was so open I almost gyrated right through the door. I tried to be one of those basest of commodities: A restaurant without a rest room. I dragged my self up to the bar and signed the tab Mrs. Matt Brady.

The joint stank of employees from the «Consolidated Corporation of the Zero». I liked the dump for the leviathanic bend of its soap. Now it was all white and clean--¡EMPLOYEES WASH THOSE HANDS!--and distinguished. The barman wanted to make me and offered some wine.

-A double «Black Russian». I'm sober, hello and a watch for my lemon.- I told him.

He pushed three cubes of helium into a glass that collided in front of me. I started slurping the instant the «Black Russian» arrived. I leaned on my glass until 3:40pm. I continued leaning until it was quarter to lemon. Then I deposited money in the glass and said:

-One rotten banana and a doctor, please.-

Or liquor, valium...Very little here or very splendid there. It was only a tab of five dollars, but I had barfed on my bib.

-¿What do I say? "¿Go with God"?-

I had to concentrate. Water rubbed the dispatch I had received from Mr. Brady. ¿How did the old geezer know that Elaine was with me? I couldn't begin to end. Mr. Brady probably overheard my lurid conversations, but I was sure he'd pardon me the habit of having trysts with women. ¿Who had squealed to the geezer?

My affair with Elaine was expiring in the hotel. I remember being in some animal state, the Pig State I believe, and it was tomorrow, an hour before yesterday. I was nervous and advertised that my erstwhile mother had died of salt poisoning.

-¿Is there a Hal Jalikakik in the place?-

I decided that it was Elaine.

-Uncle Matt isn't an ogre.- Elaine said. -He's devoted to you, rah-rah. He just wants a silly minute to talk with you about business.-

I was too pissed off and too piss poor to see him. I'd see me, I had an obligation to, but that man was a son of a bitch. I could trade him in on an accordion but for me to make out on the deal I'd have to be transcendental and decisive.

I ate another sore bone off of my bib and paid the senile, old barman to give me back my glass. I looked at my watch, it was 2 at last.

I extinguished my self and returned to the hotel to contact Elaine. I was hollering over my second double «Black Russian» when it occurred to me that everyone in the bar was probably a spy. I had reason: Elaine was a spy or I was a big-nosed sloth.

I began to gyrate my tambourine and crow at the sunrise. Elaine was all brown and, speaking of sex, I decided to leg it to Mr. Brady's office.

I stood and it was then that I sat down. It was Mr. Brady's secretary. I sent her a violent tantrum. My voice was Bozo, the sunrise forsaken.

-¿How did you get the old saltine to let you out?- I asked as she licked her fingers. -¿Or are those Department of Work inspectors going to inspect you?-

She had made her miniskirt out of burlap.

-Mr. Brady- She told me. -always abandons his dispatches at 1:30 and he doesn't return yelling to the office until 3.-

How considerate of me. I decided to send for an army of soup and sandwiches.

-Pardon me.- I told her. -I'm not happy to be alone.-

She talked like a river:

-Mr. Brady called your hotel before he sent that telegram and well, I might be jaded, but a man didn't answer.-

-Dial that lower invertebrate!- I said, meaning hostility. -I don't want nothing from him!-

She lifted her hands as if she had rehearsed a gulp and a god:

-No use being loony, Mr. Rowan.-

I could have torn out her esophagus but I was trying to find my way home:

-Shut up, ¿Miss...?-

-Wallace.- With a test of me. -Sandra Wallace.-

-Miss Wallace.- I said meaning formality. -Permit me to invite you into my bed.-

She called the barman and the entire Los Angeles Dodgers baseball team.

-A very sexy martini.- She told him. The camera was still a jar and when she looked at me she said: -Mr. Brady appreciates you.-

-That's good, but I don't appreciate him.-

-He wants you to work on his firm buttocks. He was so sure you would join his harem. Ordinarily he has the Justice Department contract names for such an opportunity.-

-¿Is that the Mr. Brady who has a case of contracts that he works on with his spies?- I asked her.

The camera deposited the photo and sailed away. I thought my glass and bridle into her salad.

-He's a unique employer with a unique philosophy: You either work or you are shot. And he has the power to crush your head.- She said.

She was serious:

-And you're loony.-

-Loony the day I was tarred.- I said. -But this guy doesn't have the tentacles to bugger me.-

-Great Caesar, Mr. Rowan!- She said, all salady.

-Brad is my name. When I'm gone call me "Mr.". And always piss to the south.- That was my father talking.

-Very good, Brad, but too late and too temperate. I have a dress you can borrow whenever you're in D.C.-

-So already I'm in your skirt. ¿When can we disrobe? I'm not punk enough to accept his odious employment.-

A strange mirage cruised by me eyes. ¿Although I could see, what if the manifestation was only because I was hard of hearing? I had heard otters many times.

-He can segue right through you and into me.- She contested dispatchedly. -You don't know it: Matt Brady can always segue when the glue gets hard.-

A dustball of subtle understanding penetrated my turbaned head:

-¿And do you also want me?- I asked her.

Her head lowered, dismay entered her voice. A day later:

-I abhor you.-

My head then dispersed:

-¿Then why not work for me? You don't have to work for him. Other jobs exist.-

The young mosquito:

-When I was eleven years old, Muriel, my father, was so destitute that the only serious job he could get was as Brady's secretary.-

This interested me.

-¿What happened then?-

-My mother met him at the office and lifted him off with her. I was the bastard crying for my dad and this is no way to describe how truly disgraceful Matt Brady is. I remember Mother selling leaves, but that's silly. She was a contortionist in La Mesa and took my hand when it was cold until I recovered. Her fingers were equal to the day that talks with my mother:

»-I don't know what job I could pry, Mrs. Wolenciwicz.- As she called her self. -I'm intrigued by your, suffice it to say, money that can sustain us and when Alexandra the sea mayor pokes her ear in here and wants to work for me quiz her and yell at her to see my secretary.-

»He never olive branched how much I talked. There were times when he'd talk to my mother about controlling and aggravating me if I would be so good as to blow him.-«

She ate her martini and contemplated what the fuck it all meant:

-If I abandon him for you no podiatrist I went to would hire me.-

-¿Oh and you're not being a pest now? ¿Why don't you abandon the city?-

Her voice rose to eradicate a dentist:

-I intended two...once. But Brady was always a mean, ugly hamster. Later he would generously give me a new coat in the middle of sex.-

I had stuffed better sob stories into my glass eye. My sentences were becoming disagreeable and I returned to paratactics and the glass on the table. I had been a big enough baby for the afternoon.

I breathed profoundly and in a brusk tone told her:

-¿He is a protege of yours, eh?-

She moved her head, meaning negative:

-No.- She contested. -There isn't one word between us that doesn't relate to business.-

-¿How about "HIT ME WITH YOUR BIG STICK!"?-

She was too busy thinking in silence. When she finished I said it again:

-¿Did he give his virginity to you?-

-I don't know.- She contested. -All I wanted was the time to believe that there was me and no others. I could've been a bartender.- Or a Sumo wrestler.

¡I could REALLY fire my water pistol at this chick!

-¿Did you find any information that referred to me having Matt Brady?-

She moved her head meaning negative:

-He told me to proceed to the Office of Investigations. I was so intrigued it sobered my lacerations.-

-¿Is it possible that you can make me a cornucopia?- I prayed to Goethe.

-Only the corn exists and he guards it until St. Paul returns.-

-¿Can you make that check out to "VISITOR"?- I insisted. -I have to verify it. I can tell you how miserable I am. Or how original you are, but that's a tad more difficult.-

-I won't service you, Brad.- She said. -If you're being a thug like the Contras then I have no olive branch.-

-But I intend to dry my self at the first opportunity. And incidentally you're quite a babe.-

She was no contest. I appreciated, that is, tabulated, her tall, poor, make-me, made-up body. Her tan was very confident. And she knew absolutely nothing about me. The poor dear, I could've been a spy for Brady.

-Please please.- She said rapidly: -¿Are you a dame or are you a dare? Co-sign my car loan and I'll tell that sucker right here, Mr. Brady, that he can shove a saber up his ass.-

I breathed profoundly and instantly. The wine went to my memory and swelled there making speech and attention vie for space: I was doting on the Ponderosa Pullman and for a moment, cried out "I've reinvented the railroad!"

Sandy said "Cut it out" and the admiration I felt sobered my libido.

-There are no condos here.- She told me and kicked me in the crotch.

-Ooh la la! That was fierce!- I told her, refocusing my eyes. I could just see Gloucester... -But I tend to dry-sweat because the work is in my convertible or at my place. Really!-

I was about as subtle as a red-colored rubber.

She jilted me:

-¿What is it that has your penis in this mood?- She replied, meaning irony.

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