I turned to my left and saw a young man with very long black hair and glazed, demonic eyes. He was snickering into his coffee, drops of which dribbled down his straggling beard. "Don't know! Don't know!" he mimicked nastily. He sniggered some more.
The T worker glared at him. Behind the counter the waitress asked the driver how he wanted his steak. "Christ, any way," he said, and wheeled his stool to show his back to both of us.
"Cheer up," the bearded man said. "Everyone makes mistakes."
"I don't know how the fucker could have done that," the man said. "I've been working on this line for 28 years, and I don't see how it could have happened." The old conductor's voice echoed in the tunnel between Copley and Auditorium. In the dimness before us the streetcar splayed incongruously across the width of the tunnel. Emergency workers hovered about it uncertainly, shook their heads, spat, conferred in short spurts of strategy. Occasionally they would seek advice from the telephones that seemed to grow out of the cave walls. In the dark unfamiliar tube the men spoke softly, as if not wanting to disturb an accident victim.
A supervisor came and hustled me back to the station platform. "We won't know why it went off until we get it back on," he said absent-mindedly. "Just tell your readers that service will resume in half an hour or so."
The orange line was quiet and people were glad to talk. A young black man had just come from heavyweight wrestling at the Garden, where he had been impressed by the performance of Bugsy McGraw. "The whole thing is phony," he told me, "But it's great entertainment. I go once a month, and never miss it on Saturday morning T.V."
Charlie, a stout, perspiring private cop who works at Logan, said that his job there was "to guard the stewardesses," and he winked. Then more soberly he said that most stewardesses are respectable married women and that "only 25 per cent or so are quote unquote The Stewardesses." Charlie would like to be a steward for Delta, but he said he is not sexy enough to get the job.
A polite, middle-aged, slow-talking gentleman cornered me to discuss his model train collection. I escaped off the train and down a long dark passageway which led to the red line and a Quincy train.
I got off at Quincy Center, last red line stop. Four or five blocks from the station I came to the Oyster House, fine food and drink. In the dimly-lit bar a dozen customers were enjoying the fine drink. No one ate oysters.
A color movie flickered unwatched across a large screen on the right-hand side of the restaurant. The drinkers sat with their backs to the film, while Al the bartender, a skinny man with tremendous ears, told stories and teased his regular customers. I squeezed onto a barstool between a large Lite drinker and a large Schlitz drinker and asked the name of the movie.
"More of the hippie bullshit," the bartender grinned. "Strawberry Statement, something like that. You ought to know all about it." His ears wagged as he laughed, and the Lite drinker on my left smiled appreciatively.
No offense intended, though. As a peace gesture the bartender gave me a story along with my Bud. "Six or seven years ago it was," he said, "I bet four bucks on the twin daily double at Rockingham. It came through, only for eleven dollars. Eleven goddam dollars! I know a guy who won five grand on a four-horse birdcage." Al said he was so disgusted he just tore the tickets up.
On the screen some clean-cut radicals were holding their arms up against a wall waiting to be frisked. Al and the Lite drinker on my right discussed Hank, an old jockey.
"Wasn't he in the hospital a while back?" Lite asked.
"Yeah, that's right," Al said. "Fell off his horse and got run over."
Lite shook his head. "Where is he now?"
"He isn't," Al chuckled. "He died a week later." Someone called for another Miller and Al strolled down the bar. Pasteurized rock music leaked from the screen.
I left Oyster House in time for the last train to Harvard. Between Wollaston and Park I had the train to myself. Now was the time for the punks to appear, but the train rollicked on peacefully. At Park Station the Cambridge couples began to fill the car, back from the movies, from dancing, from dining out. By the time we reached Harvard Square the train was quite full. The station's usual urine smell was mixed with marijuana and perfume, it being Saturday night.