Free Yellow Mesquite by John J. Asher Page A

the mercenaries, materialistic women. They’re attracted to power, to money. Look at all the beautiful women married to ugly little runts with fat pockets. They won’t teach you this at Harvard, but as a young man just stepping out into the world, be aware.”
    “That’s not true with men, too?”
    Sidney threw his hands up in a hopeless gesture. “Men? Ha! We have two heads, the big one and the little one. When it comes to women, the little one renders the big one totally useless.”  
    “I know a lot of good women, married to ordinary men,” Harley said.
    “Some, I suppose,” Sidney said with a dismissive shrug. “But everyone, both men and women, have one ear cocked toward the whisper of opportunity—a fatter wallet, a finer ass.”
    Harley looked at Beaver Trap again. Though there wasn’t the least resemblance, he was reminded of de Kooning’s Woman series, the little animal teeth and big buglike eyes. It was the same view of women as predatory. It was a view he found unsettling.
    He gazed around the room. There were rectangles of black roofing paper zigzagged with chalk and iridescent cartographer’s tape, and repetitious Xerox copies colored with crayons and dyes. In a baby’s coffin, a convoluted piece of filigreed driftwood had been painted black and lay half-buried in white plaster edged in old lace. There were shallow boxes with an assortment of unrelated objects placed in strange juxtaposition, each in its own cotton-padded cubicle under glass. And drawings—piles of drawings on shelves and tables and on the walls, finished drawings and drawings in progress and drawings cut up and taped together.  
    “This is…” He trailed off, finding no words. He knew instinctively that while the guy might be a kook, he was also truly inventive.
    “Ah, yes,” Sidney said reverently. “This is art.”
    “You can draw better than anybody I ever seen. It's just so…so…”  
    Sidney cocked his head to one side. “Yes? Just so…so what?”
    “So different .”
    “From what?”
    “From anything I've ever seen…or what I thought art was…” He realized he was babbling like an idiot.
    Sidney watched him, amused. “The question of what art is seems to occupy a lot of your thinking.”
    Harley gave Sidney a long, searching look. “If I'm going to be good, really good, I have to first determine just what art is. I know there's more to it than what I know. And things seem to be changing so fast. I want to learn everything I can, the sooner the better.”
    Sidney peaked his eyebrows. “Ah? So you're going to be good, eh?”
    “Well, yes. Yes, I am.”
    “Good! Good! Good! And what makes you think so?”
    “I like to draw. And I'm good at it.”
    Sidney hunched his shoulders and made a face. “Hoo! He likes to draw and he's good at it. So? What else?”
    “What do you mean, ‘what else’?”
    “I mean what else? You know, what else?”
    “I have a feeling for the way things are.”
    “Hoo,” Sidney cooed again. “My friend, there are bums in the gutters who can draw better than either of us. There are little old grandmothers and dishwashers in flophouses who know more about ‘the way things are’ than you and I both together.” Sidney tapped his temple with his finger. “The difference is, most people who can draw can't think .” He leaned forward, squinting. “They can't see .” He let his face go slack. “They haven't an intellectual point of view. No opinions, no all-encompassing world vision.” Sidney's face lit up. His eyes gleamed. “Ideas! Point of view! Concept! Now, that's where we can begin to talk about art!”
    “You've got to teach me,” Harley said, hearing his own voice, desperate.
    Sidney arched his neck, drew his shoulders up. “Oh, I do now, do I?”
    “I'll do whatever you say, help out around here, clean up, sweep out, whatever you say. I want to study with you. I've got to.”
    Sidney did a quick-footed shuffle around the table. “You think you can just