Would any sum the New York lawyers might be suggesting now be worth the loss of that friendship?
* * * * * * * * * *
Yes.
No wait! I mean no! You can't put a price on friendship! Although if your friend were really your friend, wouldn't they want you to make loads of money illegally so that they lose respect for you and stop being your friend? Isn't that what a true friend would do for a friend who really wanted to make a boat load of easy money?
Ray certainly didn't care for any it, and the boys today, even in their usual unworldliness, had regarded him with something like apprehension.
* * * * * * * * * *
"Ray certainly didn't care for any it"
This should probably read "Ray certainly didn't care for any OF it" but it doesn't and the reason it doesn't isn't because I copied the sentence wrong. I've checked like a dozen times. Even now when I was typing that I didn't copy it wrong, I had to check again, just to make sure. I didn't write any of this to make a comment about the editor missing a mistake; this was all to just stop people from thinking I made a mistake!
The Professor knows he's making a mistake working with Scarsdale. His own gut tells him so. His confidant Ray Ipsow tells him so. The guileless and naïve Chums of Chance seem to know it. But he probably feels he's in too deep to do anything about it.
The criminality in the room was almost palpable.
* * * * * * * * * *
"Almost"? I guess if it weren't almost palpable it would have to be palpable which would mean literally palpable although one of the literal definitions of palpable is "almost tangible" and one of the definitions is "tangible" so what was my point?
Oh yeah! Scarsdale Vibe is totally a criminal.
Should he even be here?
* * * * * * * * * *
Should he? How did the Professor find himself here? What led to this deal being proposed? Why doesn't he treat Ray Ipsow as a trusted confidant instead of just the pilot of the airship that transports him around the states?
I suppose whether or not he should be here depends on what goals the Professor believes this meeting can accomplish. If it's only to destroy Tesla's device and ruin his reputation, he probably shouldn't be there. If he thinks he can gain funding to create something beneficial in spite of where the money is coming from and its intended purpose, well, maybe?
Was this the right thing to do?
* * * * * * * * * *
It might be a little late for the Professor to have second thoughts. But at least he's having them so that the reader can see he is not a horse trader sans mercy. He's just confused like a headless hat.
More and more in recent weeks, he had found himself approaching likewise the condition of an empty cylinder, only intermittently occupied by intelligent thought.
* * * * * * * * * *
Well there you have it! No need to speculate if you can manage to read a book more than one sentence at a time! Pynchon gets right to the heart of the matter. The Professor is like a beat up old hat devoid of any sentience, only occasionally, these days, able to use his brain to suss out the variables and possibilities of his current situation. At the moment, the hat is off his head because he doesn't know what to think. He's an empty hat carried away by the winds of fate.
The Professor was left to stare into the depths of his ancient hat, as if it were a vestiary expression of his present situation.
* * * * * * * * * *
How does Pynchon know so many words? I bet he knows at least fifty more than I do.
"vestiary"
Vestiary means relating to clothes or dress. Which means the Professor sees his ancient, battered, empty hat as a metaphor for this terrible business meeting. The metaphor might simply stem from the emptiness of the hat. The entire prospect of working with Scarsdale Vibe is devoid of any virtue or pride. If the metaphor is any deeper than that, you can probably only visualize it if you're thinking the way Pynchon thinks. Maybe he'll explain it in more detail in the next sentence. "The deal was empty like how the hat was empty. And the terrible plot proposed by the evil Scarsdale as old and tattered as the material. The bent brim symbolized the Professor's impotence and inability to refuse a man of such means."
Earlier the hat was described as "a stovepipe hat whose dents, scars, and departures from the cylindrical spoke as eloquently as its outdated style of a long and adventuresome history." So maybe that will help determine how the hat is an expression of this current situation! Just think, "The Professor's current situation is like a stovepipe hat with dents, scars, and a significant departure from the cylindrical." See? Now you know the Professor is not in a good state of mind.
The call went through immediately, and Scarsdale, excusing himself, withdrew to an instrument in another part of the suite.
* * * * * * * * * *
By instrument, Pynchon means telephone. Maybe in 1893, rooms existed that were exclusively used for the telephone. So that you could have your conversations with your mistresses and evil business partners in private, away from the leering ears and prying eyes of your house staff and children. Although maybe, by instrument, Pynchon meant toilet and Scarsdale has gone off to take a crap. Who can tell?! If I can convince enough people to interpret it that way in some kind of academic paper, that's what it'll mean, right?! Man, I've got to go back and get my Masters! Look for my thesis in a few years: "Toilets in Literature, Movies, and Dirty Playground Jokes." Pulp Fiction will feature quite extensively in my thesis!
"Here I figured you fellows spend your time wandering around with your thoughts all far, far away, and Professor, why, you're just a damn horse trader without mercy's what it is. Guess I should summon the legal staff, before I find myself hanging in a poultry-shop window, two bits away from getting fricasseed. Foley, would you just crank us up long distance there on the telephone—get us Somble, Strool & Fleshway, if you'd be so kind? Could be they'd share some ideas on how best to 'spring' for a project of this scale."
* * * * * * * * * *
With the fish hooked, there's nothing left for Scarsdale to do but insult the Professor and get the lawyers on the horn.
"you fellows"
Probably said with derision, meaning "the people with the imagination to see how the universe works and the ability to find ways to use that to make it better." Probably seen as children by businessmen. If not children then as products, to be used and manipulated in any way that can increase profits.
You might have noticed, if you've been reading much of this blog, I despise certain types of people. I'm not against business people entirely. We do need them in the same way we need janitors and fast food servers and surgeons. But there's that type of businessman whose entire life is business and how they can make money with their business. They're like pot smokers whose entire personality is smoking pot. Look, guy in the pot leaf hat with the 420 tattoo and the bong strapped to his belt like a six shooter, I get it! You love the weed!
"your thoughts all far, far away"
Again, he's belittling scientific thinking. "You exist in an unreal world so far away from reality that you deserve to be exploited by those of us down here on Earth in the mud and shit. We make the money and the only way to improve the world is if there's some kind of payoff."
My dad once said to me, "Money is freedom." And I said, "Time is freedom." And he couldn't contemplate the ability to have time without money. He just didn't have the imagination to break himself out of the system.
"you're just a damn horse trader without mercy"
Most of us see in others what we are. The Professor is nervous and agitated and in way above his head. He's answering questions he was asked, not committing to a contract to sell his soul for a horse. Here, Scarsdale hears "however much Tesla needs to build his device is probably what I'll need, at least" as "Well, how much is the other guy getting? Because that's how much I want." But the Professor is just trying to get some variables to put into an equation, that's all.
"I should summon the legal staff, before I find myself hanging in a poultry-shop window, two bits away from getting fricasseed"
Here Scarsdale pretends that he might get swindled by this merciless horse trader, feigning weakness as an insult to the Professor, by pretending this scientist isn't being honest in his motivations. Is also a nice segue to get the lawyers on the phone, something he probably couldn't wait to do. He's desperate to lock the Professor into a contract that's one hundred percent going to be to the Professor's disadvantage.
"'spring'"
Knowing Pynchon's quirks by now, putting the term 'spring' in quotes must mean it's only recently come into fashion to use it as a means to pay for or fund something. Previously I've done research on each of the words he's used this way and it's panned out. So I'm just going to trust this one because I'm about 20 ounces into a Hamm's which isn't great for researching. It's also maybe not great for writing but what can you do?
"20 ounces into a Hamm's"
That might not sound like much but I really don't drink much. I can maybe finish a six pack in three months? I do enjoy this cheap beer though because it was the beer of my grandfather, the nicest person to ever exist on Earth (after his wife, my grandmother).
