Page 17
By Jack Joseph Smith
By Jack Joseph Smith
Original Scan
AI Interpretation
Stavorgin Bash and Michael O'Neill have driven a transport car from Pittsburgh to San Francisco with vodka. The narrator recounts their Goodman Institute connection, Bash's lawsuit money and O'Neill's scholarship and five sets of parents, then returns to a quarrel and a need to send for money.
The narrator contrasts Bash's fist-and-automobile adolescence with O'Neill's emotional jolts and pursuit of success. Memories of Carson City and money from Doctor O'Neill qualify the opening claim that the journey was unremarkable.
Numbered '2.', the page recounts that Bash and another man 'had driven / a transport car from Pittsburgh to San Francisco' with 'eight fifths of vodka', and traces Stavrogin's history with O'Neill from Chicago.
The page contrasts the two men, one whose 'teenage life had been smashing up with fist and automobile' and one with 'his head was clear', and begins a quarrel scene in San Francisco.