Read Nothing That Meets the Eye for Free Online Page A

Street.
    Looking after him, the cripple saw perhaps two blocks away a lighted corner, and into this walked the man with the bag. The cripple pushed on faster, past the jutting stoops, past the ash cans and lids that his dragging foot struck occasionally with unpleasant noise.
    The light came from a modern, silver-plated diner which resembled a car from an electric train. The cripple approached this slowly as he had the bar and grill. The diner was perched high, brightly lighted. He could see through the steamy windows the row of black-and-white menus over the big shining coffee urns. Between the black watch cap and a sailor’s hat was the green hat. The cripple came to the long side of the diner, where he could see through the glass door. The khaki bag was on the man’s lap now, pressed against the underside of the counter. His wet, yellowish shoes were splayed on the footrest of the stool.
    The wind howled up from the river, slapped the rain against the metal side of the diner, and tore at the pale smoke that came from the whirling ventilator. He could catch whiffs of frying hamburger meat, bacon, eggs in butter. His stomach gave a thin, sick rattle. The fluted lips under the overhanging nose came together harder and the blue eyes blinked.
    A man behind the counter set, with generous swooping gesture, a plate of yellow eggs before the polo coat, the square shoulders bent forward. The right arm working fast forking the eggs in, poking the triangular pieces of buttered toast into the face behind the hat. When the eggs were gone, he pulled a napkin from the container and blew his nose so hard the man outside could hear it faintly. He dropped the napkin below the counter and started eating pie.
    The cripple was studying the bag, noticing how the end bulged with something, how the man paid no attention to it. Maybe it was dirty clothes, he thought, his heart contracting, or tin cans, or garbage. No, there must be something better inside, or why would the green-eyed man want it? Maybe it was something nice like oranges, or sandwiches, or socks, or maybe money.
    Finally the man at the counter shoved back his plate, and a puff of smoke broke under the brim of his hat. The cigarette was white and clean in the hairy hand. He tossed off the last bit of coffee and, getting up, swung the overcoat back and reached in his trousers pocket.
    The cripple felt a sudden desire to run away. He retreated to the end of the diner, where he could see a straight line down the front. He rested his left foot lightly on the sidewalk, poised to turn in any direction.
    The man with the bag under his arm came out the door smoking, down one step before he noticed the figure on the corner. The cripple twisted himself, embarrassedly.
    The man with the bag stood a long moment, motionless. Then he came down a step and started walking. The jolt of the step he had not seen took the cigarette from his lips. Rattled, he stopped short again, turned his eyes from the cripple and crossed directly over the street, going once more up Greenwich Street. He walked faster than before and in a few seconds was out of sight.
    Hearing the cripple in the darkness behind him, he felt the first stirrings of panic. He quickened his steps, and hitched the bag higher under his arm, his mouth twisted on one side, smiling, reassuring himself, because the bag wasn’t worth the trouble or the fear, or the man following him, and it would only be three minutes at most until he came to Fourteenth Street where he would turn off to go to the meeting.
    The cripple came on with much waste motion, paddling himself by the two long arms, in a gait that was more like falling and catching himself than walking. Seeing his gain, he felt more cheerful, began to think how he would climb the stairs with the bag and take it into his room and open it sitting on the bed. But first he must say to the man, “I was standing on the platform a long time before you was.” He tried this