A Confederacy of Dunces Read Free Page A

spread his expansive nostrils and said, "My God, Mother, it smells awful.
    My stomach is beginning to churn."
    "You wanna go back on the street? You want that policeman to take you in?"
    Ignatius did not answer; he was sniffing loudly and making faces. A bartender, who had been observing the two, asked quizzically from the shadows, "Yes?"
    "I shall have a coffee," Ignatius said grandly. "Chicory coffee with boiled milk."
    "Only instant," the bartender said.
    "I can't possibly drink that," Ignatius told his mother. "It's an abomination."
    "Well, get a beer, Ignatius. It won't kill you."
    "I may bloat."
    "I'll take a Dixie 45," Mrs. Reilly said to the bartender.
    "And the gentleman?" the bartender asked in a rich, assumed voice. "What is his pleasure?"

    "Give him a Dixie, too."
    "I may not drink it," Ignatius said as the bartender went off to open the beers.
    "We can't sit in here for free, Ignatius."
    "I don't see why not. We're the only customers. They should be glad to have us."
    "They got strippers in here at night, huh?" Mrs. Reilly nudged her son.
    "I would imagine so," Ignatius said coldly. He looked quite pained. "We might have stopped somewhere else. I suspect that the police will raid this place momentarily anyway." He snorted loudly and cleared his throat. "Thank God my moustache filters out some of the stench. My olfactories are already beginning to send out distress signals."
    After what seemed a long time during which there was much tinkling of glass and closing of coolers somewhere in the shadows, the bartender appeared again and set the beers before them, pretending to knock Ignatius's beer into his lap. The Reilly’s were getting the Night of Joy's worst service, the treatment given unwanted customers.
    "You don't by any chance have a cold Dr. Nut, do you?"
    Ignatius asked.
    "No."
    "My son loves Dr. Nut," Mrs. Reilly explained. "I gotta buy it by the case. Sometimes he sits himself down and drinks two, three Dr. Nuts at one time."
    "I am sure that this man is not particularly interested," Ignatius said.
    "Like to take that cap off?" the bartender asked.
    "No, I wouldn't!" Ignatius thundered. "There's a chill in here."
    "Suit yourself," the bartender said and drifted off into the shadows at the other end of the bar.
    "Really!"
    "Calm down," his mother said.
    Ignatius raised the earflap on the side next to his mother.
    "Well, I will lift this so that you won't have to strain your voice. What did the doctor tell you about your elbow or whatever it is?"
    "It's gotta be massaged."
    "I hope you don't want me to do that. You know how I feel about touching other people."
    "He told me to stay out the cold as much as possible."
    "If I could drive, I would be able to help you more, I imagine."

    "Aw, that's okay, honey."
    "Actually, even riding in a car affects me enough. Of course, the worst thing is riding on top in one of those Greyhound Scenicruisers. So high up. Do you remember the time that I went to Baton Rouge in one of those? I vomited several times.
    The driver had to stop the bus somewhere in the swamps to let me get off and walk around for a while. The other passengers were rather angry. They must have had stomachs of iron to ride in that awful machine. Leaving New Orleans also frightened me considerably. Outside of the city limits the heart of darkness, the true wasteland begins."
    "I remember that, Ignatius," Mrs. Reilly said absently, drinking her beer in gulps. "You was really sick when you got back home."
    "I felt better then. The worst moment was my arrival in Baton Rouge. I realized that I had a round-trip ticket and would have to return on the bus."
    "You told me that, babe."
    "The taxi back to New Orleans cost me forty dollars, but at least I wasn't violently ill during the taxi ride, although I felt myself beginning to gag several times. I made the driver go very slowly, which was unfortunate for him. The state police stopped him twice for being below the minimum highway speed limit. On the third