Page 132

By Jack Joseph Smith

he may see the pain to walk away from it. As I walked toward Daniel, I saw his lifted face take on an expreesion of a man alone in a field waiting for God to say, disappear. I knew it was myself I was seeing, as I walked to him. The time had come for me to go away from what I had thought myself to be. No one would recognize me. They would begin to look away as I walked between them. A change was coming hard and sheding light on my vision. I would have to look at it. No matter how unclear this moment might be. It must be followed. Later in the dreary morning of a drunken sleep, I had a dream. Daniel and I had stayed in the bar until closing, walked the street thinking, and then gone away from the growing silent street to our castle homes. I had been thinking about my father and his business friends. My so called Uncle Jackie had long ago left my father, because of political reasons. He had been more involved with the man named Hammerigan. Not that Hammerigan had given Uncle Jackie more power, than he had given my father. It was just that Uncle Jackie and Hammerigan were closer in their way of thinking. They were both power seekers and very tightly involved with the syndicate. My father was not. He had been set up by Hammerigan. This was certainly true. But he was not a wheeler dealer. He was a basicly honest man, whose honestly was used for profit. During the time when they were making gambling machines illegal my father was losing a great deal of money. His association with Hammerigan grew in distance. Hammerigan was being investigated by the Senate, for income tax evasion and asked my father to interchange properties with him for protection. When my father said no, Uncle Jackie quickly severed his association with my father. I lay in my bed thinking of the viciousness of that twisted world, and fell off to sleep. I was standing in my fathers office. It was very dark, with a single light

Original Scan

Page 132

AI Interpretation

GPT

Facing Daniel, the narrator recognizes himself in his friend's expression and anticipates a change in his identity. He recalls his father's losses as gambling machines become illegal and Uncle Jackie's departure after the father refuses Hammerigan's proposed property exchange.

The narrator portrays his father as an honest man whom Hammerigan used for profit. He connects his fear of becoming unrecognizable with a family history of syndicate ties and the Senate investigation of Hammerigan for tax evasion, then dreams of standing in his father's dark office.

Claude

Walking back toward Daniel, the narrator sees in his friend's face 'a man alone in a field waiting for God to say, disappear' and knows 'it was myself I was seeing'; after a drunken night he dreams, first recalling how Uncle Jackie and Hammerigan, 'both power seekers' tied to the syndicate, left his 'basicly honest' father when he refused to swap properties during Hammerigan's Senate tax investigation.

The page links a private turning point, 'A change was coming hard and sheding light on my vision', to an inherited story of corruption. The father is set apart from the power seekers as a man 'whose honestly was used for profit', which makes the coming dream feel like an inquiry into what the son has inherited.