298
PARTISAN REVIEW
of the glass but he thought he didn't look too good. A wide wrinkle
like a comprehensive bracket sign was written upon his forehead,
the point between
his
brows, and there were patches of brown on
his dark blond skin. He began to be half amused at the shadow
of
his
own marveling, troubled, desirous eyes, and
his
nostrils and
his lips. Fair-haired hippopotamus! that was how he looked to
him–
self. He saw a big round face, a red mouth, stump teeth. And
the hat, too; and the cigar, too. I should have done hard labor all
my life, he reflected. Hard honest labor that tires you out and makes
you sleep. I'd have worked off my energy and felt better. Instead,
I had to distinguish myself . . . yet.
He had put forth plenty of effort, but that was not the same
as working hard, was it? And if as a young man he had got off to
a bad start it was due to this very same face. Early in the 1930s, be–
cause of his striking looks, he had been very briefly considered star
material, and he had gone to Hollywood. There for seven years,
stubbornly, he tried to become a screen artist. Long before that time
his ambition or delusion had ended but through pride and per–
haps also through laziness he had remained
in
California. At last
he turned to other things, but those seven years of persistence and
defeat had unfitted him somehow for trades and businesses, and then
it was too late to go into one of the professions. He had been slow
to mature, and he had lost ground, and so he hadn't been able to
get rid of
his
energy and he was convinced that this energy itself
had done him the greatest harm.
"I didn't see you at the gin game last night," said Rubin.
"I had to miss it. How did it go?"
For the last few weeks Wilhelm had played
gin
almost nightly,
but yesterday he had felt that he couldn't afford to lose any more.
He had never won. Not once. And while the losses were small they
weren't gains, were they? they were losses. He was tired of losing,
and tired also of the company, and so he had gone by himself to
the movies.
"Oh," said Rubin, "it was okay. Carl made a chump of him–
self yelling at the guys. This time Dr. Tamkin didn't let
him
get
away with it. He told him the psychological reason why."
"What was the reason?"
Rubin said, "I can't quote him. Who could? You know the
