A Confederacy of Dunces Read Free

out running around all the time."
    "Why don't you shut up?" the policeman said to the old man.
    "Ignatius," Mrs. Reilly asked in a trembling voice, "what you done, boy?"
    "Actually, Mother, I believe that it was he who started everything." Ignatius pointed to the old man with his bag of sheet music. "I was simply standing about, waiting for you, praying that the news from the doctor would be encouraging."

    "Get that old man outta here," Mrs. Reilly said to the policeman. "He's making trouble. It's a shame they got people like him walking the streets."
    "The police are all communiss," the old man said.
    "Didn't I say for you to shut up?" the policeman said angrily.
    "I fall on my knees every night to thank my God we got protection," Mrs. Reilly told the crowd. "We'd all be dead without the police. We'd all be laying in our beds with our throats cut open from ear to ear."
    "That's the truth, girl," some woman answered from the crowd.
    "Say a rosary for the police force." Mrs. Reilly was now addressing her remarks to the crowd. Ignatius caressed her shoulders wildly, whispering encouragement. "Would you say a rosary for a communiss?"
    "No!" several voices answered fervently. Someone pushed the old man.
    "It's true, lady," the old man cried. "He tried to arrest your boy.
    just like in Russia. They're all communiss."
    "Come on," the policeman said to the old man. He grabbed him roughly by the back of the coat.
    "Oh, my God!" Ignatius said, watching the wan little policeman try to control the old man. "Now my nerves are totally frayed."
    "Help!" the old man appealed to the crowd. "It's a takeover.
    It's a violation of the Constitution!"
    "He's crazy, Ignatius," Mrs. Reilly said. "We better get outta here, baby." She turned to the crowd. "Run, folks. He might kill us all. Personally, I think maybe he's the communiss."
    "You don't have to overdo it, Mother," Ignatius said as they pushed through the dispersing crowd and started walking rapidly down Canal Street. He looked back and saw the old man and the bantam policeman grappling beneath the department store clock. "Will you please slow down a bit? I think I'm having a heart murmur."
    "Oh, shut up. How you think I feel? I shouldn't haveta be running like this at my age."
    "The heart is important at any age, I'm afraid."
    "They's nothing wrong with your heart."
    "There will be if we don't go a little slower." The tweed trousers billowed around Ignatius's gargantuan rump as he rolled forward. "Do you have my lute string?"
    Mrs. Reilly pulled him around the comer onto Bourbon Street, and they started walking down into the French Quarter.

    "How come that policeman was after you, boy?"
    "I shall never know. But he will probably be coming after us in a few moments, as soon as he has subdued that aged fascist."
    "You think so?" Mrs. Reilly asked nervously.
    "I would imagine so. He seemed determined to arrest me. He must have some sort of quota or something. I seriously doubt that he will permit me to elude him so easily."
    "Wouldn't that be awful! You'd be all over the papers, Ignatius. The disgrace! You musta done something while you was waiting for me, Ignatius. I know you, boy."
    "If anyone was ever minding his business, it was I," Ignatius breathed. "Please. We must stop. I think I'm going to have a hemorrhage."
    "Okay." Mrs. Reilly looked at her son's reddening face and realized that he would very happily collapse at her feet just to prove his point. He had done it before. The last time that she had forced him to accompany her to mass on Sunday he had collapsed twice on the way to the church and had collapsed once again during the sermon about sloth, reeling out of the pew and creating an embarrassing disturbance. "Let's go in here and sit down."
    She pushed him through the door of the Night of Joy bar with one of the cake boxes. In the darkness that smelled of bourbon and cigarette butts they climbed onto two stools. While Mrs.
    Reilly arranged her cake boxes on the bar, Ignatius