Catcher in the Rye: Sensitive Ernie

The Catcher in the Rye is a story by J.D. Salinger, partially published in serial form in 1945–1946 and as a novel in 1951. The novel's protagonist, Holden Caulfield, has become an icon of teenage rebellion. Catcher in the Rye pdf 

Holden begins his story in 1950 at Pencey Preparatory Academy, an exclusive boarding school in Hagerstown, Pennsylvania. At sixteen, he was expelled from Pencey due to poor work and won't return after Christmas break, which begins the following Wednesday.  Read more: Wikipedia

Pencey Preparatory Academy is the only boarding school to expel Holden. He is unmotivated and, frankly, unimpressed. He tries to say some 'Goodbyes,' revealing his disconnectedness from his classmates. His dorm roommate punches him and bloodies his nose. So he decides to catch a train early and spend a few days slumming around New York.

'Usually I like riding on trains, especially at night, with the lights on and the windows so black, and one of those guys coming up the aisle selling coffee and sandwiches and magazines. I usually buy a ham sandwich and about four magazines. If I'm on a train at night, I can usually even read one of those dumb stories in a magazine without puking. 

You know. One of those stories with a lot of phony, lean-jawed guys named David in it, and a lot of phony girls named Linda or Marcia that are always lighting all the g*ddam Davids' pipes for them. I can even read one of those lousy stories on a train at night, usually. But this time, it was different. I just didn't feel like it. I just sort of sat and not did anything. All I did was take off my hunting hat and put it in my pocket. 

All of a sudden, this lady got on at Trenton and sat down next to me. Practically the whole car was empty, because it was pretty late and all, but she sat down next to me, instead of an empty seat, because she had this big bag with her and I was sitting in the front seat. She stuck the bag right out in the middle of the aisle, where the conductor and everybody could trip over it. 

She had these orchids on, like she'd just been to a big party or something. She was around forty or forty-five, I guess, but she was very good looking. Women kill me. They really do. I don't mean I'm oversexed or anything like that-- although I am quite sexy. I just like them, I mean. 

They're always leaving their g*ddam bags out in the middle of the aisle.

Anyway, we were sitting there, and all of a sudden she said to me, "Excuse me, but isn't that a Pencey Prep sticker?"  She was looking up at my suitcases, up on the rack.  "Yes, it is," I said. She was right. I did have a g*ddam Pencey sticker on one of my Gladstones. Very corny, I'll admit. 

"Oh, do you go to Pencey?" she said. She had a nice voice. A nice telephone voice, mostly. She should've carried a g*ddam telephone around with her."Yes, I do," I said. "Oh, how lovely! Perhaps you know my son, then, Ernest Morrow? He goes to Pencey." 

"Yes, I do. He's in my class." Her son was doubtless the biggest bastard that ever went to Pencey, in the whole crumby history of the school. He was always going down the corridor, after he'd had a shower, snapping his soggy old wet towel at people's asses.  

That's exactly the kind of a guy he was. 

"Oh, how nice!" the lady said. But not corny. She was just nice and all. "I must tell Ernest we met," she said. "May I ask your name, dear?"

"Rudolf Schmidt," I told her. I didn't feel like giving her my whole life history. Rudolf Schmidt was the name of the janitor of our dorm. 

"Do you like Pencey?" she asked me. "Pencey? It's not too bad. It's not paradise or anything, but it's as good as most schools. Some of the faculty are pretty conscientious." 

"Ernest just adores it." 

"I know he does," I said. Then I started shooting the old crap around a little bit. "He adapts himself very well to things. He really does. I mean he really knows how to adapt himself." 

"Do you think so?" she asked me. She sounded interested as hell.  "Ernest? Sure," I said.  Then I watched her take off her gloves. Boy, was she lousy with rocks. "I just broke a nail, getting out of a cab," she said.  

She looked up at me and sort of smiled. She had a terrifically nice smile. She really did. Most people have hardly any smile at all, or a lousy one. "Ernest's father and I sometimes worry about him," she said. "We sometimes feel he's not a terribly good mixer." 

"How do you mean?" 

"Well. He's a very sensitive boy. He's really never been a terribly good mixer with other boys. Perhaps he takes things a little more seriously than he should at his age." 

Sensitive. That killed me. That guy Morrow was about as sensitive as a g*ddam toilet seat. I gave her a good look. She didn't look like any dope to me. She looked like she might have a pretty damn good idea what a bastard she was the mother of. But you can't always tell--with somebody's mother, I mean. Mothers are all slightly insane. The thing is, though, I liked old Morrow's mother. She was all right. 

"Would you care for a cigarette?" I asked her. She looked all around. "I don't believe this is a smoker, Rudolf," she said. Rudolf. That killed me. "That's all right. We can smoke till they start screaming at us," I said. 

She took a cigarette off me, and I gave her a light. She looked nice, smoking. She inhaled and all, but she didn't wolf the smoke down, the way most women around her age do. She had a lot of charm. She had quite a lot of sex appeal, too, if you really want to know. She was looking at me sort of funny. 

"I may be wrong but I believe your nose is bleeding, dear," she said, all of a sudden. I nodded and took out my handkerchief. "I got hit with a snowball," I said. "One of those very icy ones."  I probably would've told her what really happened, but it would've taken too long. I liked her, though. I was beginning to feel sort of sorry I'd told her my name was Rudolf Schmidt. "Old Ernie," I said. "He's one of the most popular boys at Pencey. Did you know that?"  

"No, I didn't." I nodded. "It really took everybody quite a long time to get to know him. He's a funny guy. A strange guy, in lots of ways--know what I mean? Like when I first met him. When I first met him, I thought he was kind of a snobbish person. That's what I thought. But he isn't. He's just got this very original personality that takes you a little while to get to know him." 

Old Mrs. Morrow didn't say anything, but boy, you should've seen her. I had her glued to her seat. You take somebody's mother, all they want to hear about is what a hotshot their son is. Then I really started chucking the old crap around.  "Did he tell you about the elections?" I asked her.  "The class elections?" She shook her head. I had her in a trance, like. I really did. 

"Well, a bunch of us wanted old Ernie to be president of the class. I mean he was the unanimous choice. I mean he was the only boy that could really handle the job," I said--boy, was I chucking it. "But this other boy--Harry Fencer--was elected. 

And the reason he was elected, the simple and obvious reason, was because Ernie wouldn't let us nominate him. Because he's so darn shy and modest and all. He refused. . . Boy, he's really shy. You oughta make him try to get over that." I looked at her. "Didn't he tell you about it?" 

"No, he didn't." I nodded. "That's Ernie. He wouldn't. That's the one fault with him--he's too shy and modest. You really oughta get him to try to relax occasionally." 

Right that minute, the conductor came around for old Mrs. Morrow's ticket, and it gave me a chance to quit shooting it. I'm glad I shot it for a while, though. You take a guy like Morrow that's always snapping their towel at people's asses--really trying to hurt somebody with it--they don't just stay a rat while they're a kid. 

They stay a rat their whole life. 

But I'll bet, after all the crap I shot, Mrs. Morrow'll keep thinking of him now as this very shy, modest guy that wouldn't let us nominate him for president. She might. You can't tell. Mothers aren't too sharp about that stuff.