"I said
to myself, Wow! What'll Denver by like! I got on that hot road,
and off I went in a brand-new car driven by a Denver businessman of about
thirty-five. He went seventy. I tingled all over; I counted
minutes and subtracted miles. Just ahead, over the rolling wheatfields
all golden beneath the distant snow of Estes, I'd be seeing old Denver
at last. I pictured myself in a Denver bar that night, with all the
gang, and their eyes I would be strange and ragged and like the Prophet
who has walked across the land to bring the dark Word, and only World I
had was "Wow!" The man and I had along, warm conversation about our
respective schemes in life, and before I knew it we were going over the
wholesale fruitmarkets outside Denver; there were smokestacks, smoke, railyards,
red-brick buildings, and the distant downtown graystone buildings, and
here I was in Denver. He let me off at Larimer Street. I stumbled
along with the most wicked grin of joy in the world, among the old bums
and beat cowboys of Larimer Street (35)."
