He was like a grapefruit - you never knew what was going on inside. A couple of times he called me ‘Sonny Jim’. Another time he slit his arm, pulled out a long and purple vein and said ‘What’s this?’ Billy told me he’d seen Louie coming out of a manhole on Deal with a tub of ice cream. That’s the kind of thing I’m talking about. Louie missed whole weeks by walking behind them like they were the facade of a movie set. He claimed he could detect tiny pastoral scenes in his saliva. He robbed a drugstore disguised as a giant wren. He walked down the street while manifestly asleep. He spent every evening projecting The Magnificent Ambersons onto his own face. Confronted with the most serious news or sternest caution, Louie would crease with a hilarity that knew no earthly bounds. Without provocation he’d admire you through tears of mirth, shake your hand, and slap your back while you were facing the other way. When people saw him approaching they were filled with a strange, unwarranted guilt and a dread of the unexpected.
