Gary said, not unmindful of Sebastian giving him the once-over twice-over. “Is there a clothing store close by?”
“Out the door, steer right and straight toward downtown. Follow your nose and you’ll come to it. Before you get to it is a second-hand store, if that suits your pocket book better. Should have most anything you want.”
“Thanks,” Gary said, heading out, his package firmly tucked under his arm.
Toby called after him. “I don’t know who this Greg Norman guy is, but I’ll be damned if I let anybody put his name on my shirt or anything else I paid for.”
Chapter 11
Two meager light bulbs did little to dispel the deep gloom of the store, and probably nothing could have masked the stuffy odor of old clothes jammed tight on floor racks so closely spaced you could barely move between them. A diminutive man barely five feet tall, with a gray mop of hair and a ragged mustache to match, seemed to materialize from nowhere.
“Yes, sir, can I help you?” he asked, shuffling up behind Gary and rubbing his hands together as if washing them.
“I need something presentable and cheap,” Gary said, a little dismayed by what he was seeing as he browsed through the clothes.
“I don’t have cheap but I do have inexpensive. There’s a difference, you know,” the old man said, his blue, marble eyes glistening behind his wire-rimmed glasses, and commenting on every article of clothing that Gary touched. “Guaranteed, like new… ahh, now that one is beautiful,” he said, dragging out the ‘beautiful,’ and gesturing with clasped hands toward a suit Gary was holding up to catch the light. “Just came in yesterday. So good I almost hate to sell it… but a good looking boy like you, such big shoulders… I give you a bargain price, special, you can’t beat it, if you take it right now.” His puckered mouth made his mustache droop when Gary squeezed the suit back into the rack.
Finally, after much pondering, Gary picked out a tweed jacket and dark brown trousers. He set his package aside and slipped on the jacket. “Looks all right to me,” he said, tugging at the sleeves. “What do you think?”
“Ahh, very nice, very nice. Fills your shoulders out, too. Perfect.”
Gary held the pants against his own. “I don’t think I have to try these on, do you?”
“Shirts you need now, too, to go with it. Over here,” he said, tossing the clothes over his arm and hobbling between the racks to a shelf along the wall. “Beautiful selection here, look yourself, you see.”
Gary selected two white shirts and the old man laid a yellow-and-brown striped tie across the jacket. “See how nice this goes with it? Very nice, but not as nice as with the suit over there you saw I would give you a good price on.” He shrugged.
“Maybe we better forget the whole--”
“No no no,” the old man said fairly jumping out of his shoes and grabbing up the shirts. “In these clothes you look like a duke, I guarantee it, a prince, even.”
“I don’t need two white shirts. How about one and a sport shirt?”
“I have just what you want right here,” he said, hopping to another counter and holding up a blue-and-red checked shirt.”
“Okay. How much for the shirts?”
“Twenty-five cents each.”
“Twenty-five cents!”
“All right all right,” he said irritably, “fifteen cents.”
“Good. How much for everything?”
“Pants and jacket--five dollars, two shirts, thirty cents, and fifteen cents for the tie. Altogether, five dollars fifty cents.”
“You sure you figured that right?” Gary said, turning sideways to the old man and the light as he pulled a twenty dollar bill from his wallet.
The man slapped his sweaty forehead. “What am I thinking-- five dollars forty-five cents, of course, not fifty cents,” he said, squinting at the bill and folding it over the top of the neat wad he took from his pocket. From the bottom, he counted out fourteen singles, squeezing each one between thumb and forefinger before releasing them. “And fifty-five cents,” he said, taking the change from his opposite pocket and dropping it in Gary’s hand. Packing the clothes neatly in a brown shopping bag he took from beneath the shelf, he handed it over.
“Any time you’re in the market,” he said, following Gary and bowing him out the door, “any time you need something first-class, I’m here, best prices in town.” He called after him. “That suit I was telling you about, believe me, I raise my right hand to God, the honest truth, it would cost you, I swear it, at least twenty-five dollars anyplace else….”
* * * * *
A block down on the opposite side of the street, Gary spotted a Greyhound bus depot sign. So much walking was making him puff, and making his ribs ache. Passers-by looked askance and gave him wide berth as he crossed over and made his way along, shifting the packages from one hand to the other.
Once inside the station, he found the men’s room, where he went inside a stall, stripped off his dirty clothes and stuffed them in the bag, and put on the pants and white shirt. The fit wasn’t perfect, but not too bad, either. The outfit wasn’t exactly color-coordinated, but from what he’d seen others wearing, it was better than most.
Hung high up on the wall above the toilet was a wooden box, just like the one Michael Corleone found the gun stashed behind in the Godfather movie. He couldn’t resist giving the dangling chain a yank and gave a start with the explosion of the flush. Relieving himself, he flushed again, ready this time for the explosion, washed his hands and face at the sink and ran wet fingers through his hair. He didn’t think he looked too bad, all things considered. A few lumps and bruises spoiled the smooth terrain of his face, but being freshened up and with his new clothes, he thought he could get by.
Chapter 12
The walk was hard and seemed especially long, but he found the boarding house without any trouble, climbed the porch steps and knocked on the front door. A hefty, square-faced woman chewing a wad of gum, and looking closer to sixty than fifty years old, opened the door and stepped onto the porch. Her pendulous breasts hung loose behind a baggy house dress with a red-and-black flower pattern. Her lipstick matched her bright-red toenails protruding from her torn slippers. “This better not be no sales pitch,” she said frowning.
Unabashedly looking him up and down and side to side, she seemed to be more interested in studying him like a laboratory specimen than in listening to what he had to say.
“…and he said to tell you your favorite brother sent me.”
“My ass. Come on, don’t let the cold in,” she said, holding the door open and leading him down the hall. The room had a single bed over which the bedspread undulated; a dresser; an overstuffed, velvety armchair;
