Roughneck

by Jim Thompson

  He would stagger up the stairs in the morning, bottles protruding from every pocket, and lurch wildly toward his desk. Sometimes he would make it on the first try, but more often than not he would wind up in a corner or sprawled on the floor. And once he almost went out the alley window. But whatever his difficulty before he gained his desk, he would never allow me to assist him.

  "Need the fuddin etertise," he would explain solemnly. "Dot to teep in tundishun. Always watch oor doddam skewin helf Tompn and oo be awright."

  Once seated, Carl seldom arose until the day was over...and the day we worked was never shorter than twelve hours. He didn't eat anything. He didn't go to the toilet. When he had to urinate, he simply scooted his chair around, hoisted himself up on the arms and let go out the alley window. Since the window opened on the store's parking lot, there were frequent and bitter complaints about this practice. Customers were constantly grumbling that Carl's urethral discharges had seriously damaged the paint on their cars, and one guy declared that several holes had been eaten in the hood of his vehicle. All the complainants got short shrift from Carl.

  Could they prove that he was guilty? Did they have witnesses who would swear to the fact in court? No? "Well, skew oo, mithter!" And if they did have proof, they still received no satisfaction.

  "Looky, mithter," he would explain. "Iss isn't any store—iss a doddam bookteepin tumpny. Oo uh hell oo donna sue, anyway? Oo dit anyfing out uh iss doddam outfit I'll split wif oo."

  Except for me, to whom he was always kind, Carl had not a pleasant word for anyone. But he was at his most insulting when dealing with the home office or its representatives. "Now, ess dit one fing straight," he would say, addressing some traveling auditor or supervisor. "I'm wunnin iss doddam place, an I don't need any fuddin assho like oo to tell me how. I do as I doddam pwease, see? Oo don't like at oo can skwew orself and I'll quit."

  The home office chose to like it. Very wisely. Carl worked for a pitifully low salary, and despite his drinking he was by far the best auditor in the chain. He could and did do the work of three men, and with an expertness, an unfailing accuracy, which surpassed genius.

  Day after day, I saw him so drunk that his eyes were glazed and his head jerked and rolled on his neck in alcoholic spasms; I saw him weave in his chair, tilt perilously backward and forward and from side to side. And with all that I never saw him hesitate in his work or make one single, solitary error! Sometimes I would have to put a pen in his hand, and place his other hand on the comptometer. But once that was done, he needed no further assistance. His left hand would flick over the keys of the machine, veritably playing a tune on it; his right hand would roam over the ledger, inscribing it with long columns of always accurate, excruciatingly neat figures. As often as I watched the miracle, I remained amazed by it.

  "Nuffin to it, Tompn," Carl would lisp, grinning at me devilishly. "Jus a matter of teepin in tundishun. Just dotta live wight, ats all."

  This "teepin in tundishun" and "livin wight" was (or so Carl advised me) only part of his formula for doing highly complex work while stumbling-blind drunk. The truly important thing, he said, was to "fine 'em, fud 'em and fordet 'em," or, perhaps, to "skwew 'em all an the easy ones twice."

  "Pith on 'em, Tompn," he declared a dozen times a day. "Hang it out uh window and skwew uh whole doddam world."

  He was such a wonderfully good accountant and had followed the profession for so many years that, I suppose, he could have done his job in his sleep. He didn't need to think about it, in the ordinary sense of the word. Too drunk to see straight, or even to see at all, he was carried through one intricate task after another by his subconscious mind.

  I wondered what he was doing in such a job as this one, why he drank as he did. Late one afternoon, some six weeks after the beginning of our association, I found out. I had been smiling about something, some joke one of the clerks had told me. Apparently I had been doing it for some time, and since our desks faced each other Carl got the notion that I was smiling at him.

  "Sumpn funny, Tompn?" he demanded, his normally flushed face turning white. "Whynt oo laugh out loud? Did it out uh oore doddam skwewin system!"

  "W-why, Carl," I stammered. "I was just—"

  "Do ahead!" he lisped angrily. "Evey one else does, doddam wotten son-a-bitsin bastuhds! Tant do anywhere, tant say anything, without some fuddin skwewball laughin his doddam head off...Look like uh Devil, don't I? Look like uh Devil and talk like a skewin doddam baby! Tant dit a doddam decent job. Tant even thay hello to a doddam woman..."

  He raved on, cursing and spilling out obscenities, inviting me to "do ahead an have a dood laugh." Thus, at last, I saw why things were as they were with him—that his arrogance was only a cloak for a shamed and hypersensitive man. Fortunately, the right response came to me. I did not make the mistake of apologizing or sympathizing with him.

  As soon as I could get a word in edgewise, I told him he was a damned fool. A man might look like the Devil and talk like a baby, but he did not need to 'act' like either. "I'll tell you something," I said—and what I told him was quite true. "One of the best adjusted, happiest men I ever knew was a dwarf with club feet. He was one of the country's top corporation attorneys. He had a beautiful wife and four fine children. No one cared what he looked like. He was such a swell guy—and such a smart one—that no one noticed what he looked like. Oh, a few boobs might snicker at him, but what the hell did he care about them?"

  Carl brushed at his eyes—in his self-pity and fury he had actually started to weep. He suggested that his case was different. "It wouldn be tho bad if I could juth thpeak plainly. Thath the worth—"

  "It's always different," I said. "We've all got our own brand of trouble; I've had mine. If I'd acted like you do, I'd have died of tuberculosis or the d.t.'s long ago."

  "Yeth, but—"

  "You're beating yourself over the head," I said. "You'd rather feel sorry for yourself than do something. If you're ashamed of the way you talk, why are you talking all the time? You never miss a chance that I can see. You're shooting off your mouth, getting into arguments, from the time you get here in the morning until you leave. You make a spectacle out of yourself with your drinking. If you don't want to be laughed at, why do you give people so many opportunities?"

  I was pretty sore. My many failings do not include laughing at the infirmity of another, and the accusation that I had done so did not set well.

  Carl heard me out, looking rather sheepish toward the last. Finally, he grinned and said, "Well, fud oo, Tompn. Fordet it, will oo?" and we both went back to work.

  Well, it may have been wishful thinking, but it seemed to me that he did not get quite so drunk from then on. Also that he talked less to those outside the office, avoiding arguments where they could be avoided. Instead of mere working companions, we became quite good friends. Where before he had merely recited trite obscenities, he now conversed with me...Did I really think he might be able to land a good job and not be laughed out of it? Did I really think that one such as he could lead a normal life, with all that the word implied?...I said of course he could—'if' he would stop thinking about himself and straighten up. For a man as brilliant and talented as he was, people would overlook any handicap.

  "Oo weally mean at, don't oo, Tompn?"—studying me narrowly. "Oore not dus tiddin, are oo?"

  "You know I do," I said. "You know what I say is true. If you go on like you've been doing, you've got no one to blame but yourself."

  He thought about that, and a few days later it paid off.

  It was now nearing the fall of 1930, and the economic depression was tightening over Nebraska. But the nation's political and business leaders still proclaimed it a temporary recession. It was merely a readjustment period, and prosperity was just around the corner, et cetera. To reachieve prosperity it was only necessary to "tighten our belts," "overcome sales resistance" and so on.

  Well, the store tightened its belt—rather, by arranging salary cuts for the various concession e
mployees, it tightened 'their' belts. And by way of overcoming the aforesaid sales resistance it began a series of vigorous campaigns. The clerks were given sales quotas—to be met or else. They were organized into competing "armies," with the winner receiving a blue ribbon or a plaque or some such prize. One "bargain" sale followed another. Every week the home office shipped us a huge batch of advertising matter—flamboyant placards and pennants and counter cards. It was my job, one of my many jobs, to "decorate" the store with these.

  In the midst of all this activity, Carl absented himself from work for two days on a plea of sickness. By the time he returned, I was virtually exhausted and he, incredibly, was 'sober!'

  He had brought two pint bottles with him—two bottles of good whiskey. He took a drink from one, passed it to me and waved me to a chair at his desk.

  "Oo dotta help me dwink at, Tompn. We finis at, at's all eres donna be. I'm tuttin out uh doddam tuff."

  "You've got another job," I guessed.

  "Doddam wight," he said proudly. "Tart in nex Monday. Chief auditor for big gwocwey chain in Tansas Tity. An I dot oo a job ath my athithtant."

  I congratulated him, and thanked him. I pointed out, however, that I would be returning to school the following week and could not take a job in another city.

  "I'll just go on working here part-time," I explained. "It's a sweat shop and they don't pay peanuts, but—"

  "Ats what ey tol you, huh?" Carl shook his head grimly. "Well, they tol me juth two dayth ago to fire you—inthithted on it. Thaid ey could dit a man full time for what eyd have to pay oo."

  "But they promised!" I protested. "They said if I'd accept eighteen dollars a week and work real hard this summer they'd keep me on at the same money when school started."

  "Oo dot it in writing?" Carl shook his head again. "Iss asho outfit! Work a manth ath off an en pith on him!"

  He declared that he was not going to do another "doddam lick of work" as long as he remained on the job and that I was not to do any either. That was an order, he said—"pothitively not a doddam sonofabitsin bit of work." We would just sit around until the end of the week and enjoy ourselves.

  I didn't dispute the order. After a time, by way of conserving his whiskey for him, I went out for a gallon of home brew. I returned to find Carl examining the week's batch of advertising matter.

  "Thith skwewin cwap," he said. "Let the bathturdth sthick it up ere ath." Contemptuously, he started to toss a placard aside. Then, a truly devilish grin spread over his face, and he picked it up again. "How about it, Tompn? Long ath oore dittin uh date, oo dus ath thoon dit it tomorrow?"

  "I suppose so," I said. "A couple of days won't make much difference."

  "Thath uh way I feel. Tho we'll both leave tomorrow. But we'll div iss doddam outfit thumpn to wemember uth by."

  "Yeah?" I said. "I don't see—"

  "How ith thingth in uh dwug department? Ey dot plenty of Totexth on hand?"

  "Totexth? Oh, Kotex," I said. "Why, yeah, I guess so. The inventory shows around five hundred boxes. What—?"

  "Wunnerful," said Carl. "Thwell! Loth of Totexth an iss fuddin meth of thigns. Who could ath for anyfing more?"

  That was the way, then, that it came about. Thus, the beginning of a joke which was to throw our employers into embarrassed fury and to keep the Lincoln area snickering for months to come.

  As soon as the store closed for the day, Carl and I gathered up the advertising matter and went downstairs. We requisitioned the drug department's entire supply of sanitary napkins. With these, and our placards and pennants and counter cards, we proceeded to "decorate" the store. It was after dawn before we finished. We unlocked the restaurant, helped ourselves to breakfast, and retired to the office to await results.

  We were hardly seated before the department heads began to arrive. And as soon as they arrived and got one startled look at the store, they came bounding up the stairs to confront Carl...What the hell was the idea, anyway? Was he trying to get the establishment laughed out of business? The display would have to come down immediately.

  Carl told them what they could do. If our decoration job was in any way disturbed he would personally see to it that their concession was yanked. "I'm uh doddam boss here," he pointed out. "Oo wun oor skewin concession my way or oo don't wun it!"

  One of two of the department heads accepted this dictum. The majority, however, headed for the nearest telephone and laid the matter before their concession owners. The latter called our home office. The home office called us. It was what Carl had wanted.

  He listened, grinning, to the outraged tirade which poured over the wire. Then, when there was a temporary pause for breath, he had his blasphemous and bloodcurdling say. He was "fuddin well twitting and Tompn was twitting." We had already paid ourselves to date, and now we were walking out. And since there would be no one around to carry out the management's orders, the decorations—or a large part of them—would stay right where they were. At least they would stay there until someone arrived from the home office.

  "At'll teath oo to skwew people!" he yelled. "Doddam dirty pithanth! Do on an skweam oor fudding lungth out—ith muthik to my earth!"

  He ended his remarks with a raucous raspberry—and if you have never heard a lisping raspberry, you have missed something. Then, he and I donned our hats, and left the office for the last time.

  It was raining that day. As usual, when the weather made agricultural pursuits impractical, the farmers had come into town to shop. It was not yet ten in the morning, but already the store was filling up with customers—or, I should say, people. For few of them were buying anything. They stood around in little groups, the men haw-hawing and pointing, the women giggling and blushing. Wherever they looked they saw the same thing, and each look brought a fresh outburst of amusement.

  "Well, Tompn," said Carl happily. "Ith at sumpn or ith at sumpn?"

  I said that it was, indeed, something. And it was.

  Throughout every department, throughout the store, boxes of the things were arranged in neat pyramids and piles, each forming a pedestal for some bit of advertising matter—a pennant, placard, or counter card.

  The pedestals were all of a kind, all made of boxes of sanitary napkins. The advertising matter all voiced the same slogan, the magic words-of-the-week intended to overpower sales resistance. That was all you saw, wherever you looked—stacks of s.n.'s, each crowned or draped with the same gaudily-lettered slogan:

  HAPPY DAYS ARE HERE AGAIN

  9

  My literal-minded friend Durkin, the ex-credit manager, had an outside sales and collection job with an installment store. On his recommendation, I got a job with the same firm. My hours were the same as they had been during our previous association, and permitted me to attend school in the morning. The pay was twenty dollars a week, plus car allowance, plus commission.

  On the surface, it seemed to be a very fine job and the manager a very cordial fellow. Durkin, who was assigned to breaking me in on my duties, advised me not to be too optimistic.

  "You wanted a job, Jim," he said, heading his car toward the shabbiest section of town, "so I helped you to get it. But I don't think you're going to like it. I don't, and I think I can take a lot of stuff that would throw you."

  "I don't understand," I said. "Mr. Clark seemed to be—"

  "Mr. Clark 'is' a nice guy. As long as you produce. That's all he asks of you, to get the money, and he doesn't care how you do it. But, brother, you'd sure as hell better get it."

  "Well," I shrugged, "that's our job. If a man doesn't do his job, he should catch hell."

  "It's not quite that simple," said Durkin. "But you'll see what I mean."

  We had crossed Salt Creek and entered a neighborhood of rutted dirt streets and unpainted shacks. Durkin stopped in front of one of them, took a collection card from the dashboard clip and got out. I followed him across the trash-strewn yard to the house.

  Durkin knocked; he pounded; he stood back and kicked the door. There was no r
esponse. All was silent behind the drawn shades of the place.

  "Well," I said uneasily, "it looks like there's no one home, Durk."

  Durkin gave me a pitying look. Drawing back his fist, he jammed it through the screen and lifted the latch. Then, he turned the doorknob and walked in.

  I tottered after him.

  Seated at a table made of packing boxes was a burly unshaven man in undershirt and trousers. As we walked in, he set down his tin cup of coffee and directed a string of curses at Durkin.

  "Ought to beat your goddamned head off," he swore. "Ought to call the cops on you. Breaking and entering—don't you know that's against the law?"

  "Let's have the dough," said Durkin. "Come on, snap into it!"

  "I ain't got any dough! I ain't been working."

  "Come through," said Durkin. "You worked two days and a half last week."

  "So I made a few bucks. I got to have something to eat on, don't I?"

  "You don't do any eating on our money," said Durkin. "Let's have it."

  The man ripped out another string of curses. Surlily, his eyes wavering away from Durkin's stern stare, he jerked a five-dollar bill from his pocket.

  "All right. There's your goddamned dollar. Give me four bucks change."

  Durkin put the five in his billfold, wrote out a receipt for it and tossed it on the table. "You were behind in your payments, Pete," he said evenly. "That brings you up to date."

  The man's face purpled. Fists clubbed, he started toward Durkin, and, almost absently, Durkin turned to me.

  "Jim, get that size forty-six coat out of the car—the sheep-lined. I want Pete to try it on."

  "But,"—I stared at him incredulously—"b-but he—"

  "That's right. I brought it along especially for Pete. Winter's coming on, and he's going to need a good warm coat."

  I got the coat out of the car, noting that it had cost six dollars wholesale according to the code number. Durkin slipped it on Pete, even as the big man glowered and grumbled threats.

  "Fit's you like a glove," he declared. "Isn't that a swell coat, Jim? Makes Pete look like a new man."