How much better times those than my own for such haphazard fellows as myself, I thought, and cursed the twentieth century and the fate that had thrown me into it. At that time in Chicago I knew a young Jew named Ben Hecht, not yet a well-known writer, and sometimes he and I went forth to do our cursing together. Outwardly he was a more adept curser than myself but inwardly I felt I could outdo him and often we had walked together, he cursing aloud our common fate and declaring dramatically that life was for us an empty cup, a vessel turned upside down, a golden goblet with cracks in the bowl, the largest crack being the fact that we both unfortunately had our livings to make, and I striving to cap his every curse with a more violent one. We went together into a street and stood under the moon. Before us were many huge ugly warehouses. “I hope they burn,” I said feebly, but he only laughed at the weakness of my fancy. “I hope the builders die slowly of a painful inflammation of the membranes of the bowels,” he said, while I envied. I had been walking alone on the streets of Chicago on that Saturday evening when I found the younger Berners and had crossed the river to the west side. I was gloomy and distraught and on a side street, off West Madison Street and near the Chicago River, went into a small, dark saloon. Several men sat at a small table at the back, among whom was Alonzo Berners and there was a red-faced bartender leaning over the bar and watching the group at the table. To all these I at the moment paid no attention.