The Day of the Locust

by Nathanael West

  Still without unfolding the napkin, he wiped himself. Faye ordered another brandy. When it came, she held it to his lips again, but this time he took it and drink it himself, fighting the stuff down.

  “That’s the boy,” Faye laughed. “Well done, sloppyboppy.”

  Tod asked her to dance in order to give Homer a moment alone. When they reached the floor, she made an attempt to defend herself.

  “That guy’s superiority is driving me crazy.”

  “He loves you,” Tod said.

  “Yeah, I know, but he’s such a slob.”

  She started to cry on his shoulder and he held her very tight. He took a long chance.

  “Sleep with me.”

  “No, baby,” she said sympathetically.

  “Please, please…just once.”

  “I can’t, honey. I don’t love you.”

  “You worked for Mrs. Jenning. Make believe you’re still working for her.” She didn’t get angry.

  “That was a mistake. And anyway, that was different. I only went on call enough times to pay for the funeral and besides those men were complete strangers. You know what I mean?”

  “Yes. But please, darling. I’ll never bother you again. I’ll go east right after. Be kind.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Why…?”

  “I just can’t. I’m sorry, darling. I’m not a tease, but I can’t like that.”

  “I love you.”

  “No, sweetheart, I can’t.”

  They danced until the number finished without saying anything else. He was grateful to her for having behaved so well, for not having made him feel too ridiculous.

  When they returned to the table, Homer was sitting exactly as they had left him. He held the folded napkin in one hand and the empty brandy glass in the other. His helplessness was extremely irritating.

  “You’re right about the brandy, Faye,” Homer said. “It’s swell! Whoopee!”

  He made a little circular gesture with the hand that held the glass.

  “I’d like a Scotch,” Tod said.

  “Me, too,” Faye said.

  Homer made another gallant attempt to get into the spirit of the evening.

  “Garsoon,” he called to the waiter, “more drinks.”

  He grinned at them anxiously. Faye burst out laughing and Homer did his best to laugh with her. When she stopped suddenly, he found himself laughing alone and turned his laugh into a cough, then hid the cough in his napkin.

  She turned to Tod.

  “What the devil can you do with a slob like that?”

  The orchestra started and Tod was able to ignore her question. All three of them turned to watch a young man in a tight evening gown of red silk sing a lullaby.

  “Little man, you’re crying, I know why you’re blue, Someone took your kiddycar away; Better go to sleep now, Little man, you’ve had a busy day…”

  He had a soft, throbbing voice and his gestures were matronly, tender and aborted, a series of unconscious caresses. What he was doing was in no sense parody; it was too simple and too restrained. It wasn’t even theatrical. This dark young man with his thin, hairless arms and soft, rounded shoulders, who rocked an imaginary cradle as he crooned, was really a woman.

  When he had finished, there was a great deal of applause. The young man shook himself and became an actor again. He tripped on his train, as though he weren’t used to it, lifted his skirts to show he was wearing Paris garters, then strode off swinging his shoulders. His imitation of a man was awkward and obscene.

  Homer and Tod applauded him.

  “I hate fairies,” Faye said.

  “All women do.”

  Tod meant it as a joke, but Faye was angry.

  “They’re dirty,” she said.

  He started to say something else, but Faye had turned to Homer again. She seemed unable to resist nagging him.

  This time she pinched his arm until he gave a little squeak. “Do you know what a fairy is?” she demanded.

  “Yes,” he said hesitatingly.

  “All right, then,” she barked. “Give out! What’s a fairy?” Homer twisted uneasily, as though he already felt the ruler on his behind, and looked imploring at Tod, who tried to help him by forming the word “homo” with his lips.

  “Morro,” Homer said.

  Faye burst out laughing. But his hurt look made it impossible not to relent, so she patted his shoulder.

  “What a hick,” she said.

  He grinned gratefully and signaled the waiter to bring another round of drinks.

  The orchestra began to play and a man came over to ask Faye to dance. Without saying a word to Homer, she followed him to the floor.

  “Who’s that?” Homer asked, chasing them with his eyes.

  Tod made believe he knew and said that he had often seen him around the San Berdoo. His explanation satisfied Homer, but at the same time set him to thinking of something else. Tod could almost see him shaping a question in his head.

  “Do you know Earle Shoop?” Homer finally asked. “Yes.”

  Homer then poured out a long, confused story about a dirty black hen. He kept referring to the hen again and again, as though it were the one thing he couldn’t stand about Earle and the Mexican. For a man who was incapable of hatred, he managed to draw a pretty horrible picture of the bird.

  “You never saw such a disgusting thing, the way it squats and turns its head. The roosters have torn all the feathers off its neck and made its comb all bloody and it has scabby feet covered with warts and it cackles so nasty when they drop it into the pen.”

  “Who drops it into what pen?’

  “The Mexican.”

  “Miguel?”

  “Yes. He’s almost as bad as his hen.’

  “You’ve been to their camp?”

  “Camp?”

  “In the mountains?”

  “No. They’re living in the garage. Faye asked me if I minded if a friend of hers lived in the garage for a while because he was broke. But I didn’t know about the chickens or the Mexican…Lots of people are out of work nowadays.”

  “Why don’t you throw them out?”

  “They’re broke and they have no place to go. It isn’t very comfortable living in a garage.”

  “But if they don’t behave?”

  “It’s just that hen. I don’t mind the roosters, they’re pretty, but that dirty hen. She shakes her dirty feathers each time and clucks so nasty.”

  “You don’t have to look at it.”

  “They do it every afternoon at the same time when I’m usually sitting in the chair in the sun after I get back from shopping with Faye and just before dinner The Mexican knows I don’t like to see it so he tries to make me look just for spite. I go into the house, but he taps on the windows and calls me to come out and watch. I don’t call that fun. Some people have funny ideas of what’s fun.”

  “What’s Faye say?”

  “She doesn’t mind the hen. She says it’s only natural.”

  Then, in case Tod should mistake this for criticism, he told him what a fine, wholesome child she was. Tod agreed, but brought him back to the subject.

  “If I were you,” he said, “I’d report the chickens to the police. You have to have a permit to keep chickens in the city. I’d do something and damned quick.”

  Homer avoided a direct answer.

  “I wouldn’t touch that thing for all the money in the world. She’s all over scabs and almost naked. She looks like a buzzard. She eats meat. I saw her one time eating some meat that the Mexican got out of the garbage can. He feeds the roosters grain but the hen eats garbage and he keeps her in a dirty box.”

  “If I were you, rd throw those bastards out and their birds with them.” “No, they’re nice enough young fellows, just down on their luck, like a lot of people these days, you know. It’s just that hen…”

  He shook his head wearily, as though he could smell and taste her.

  Faye was coming back. Homer saw that Tod was going
to speak to her about Earle and the Mexican and signaled desperately for him not to do it. She, however, caught him at it and was curious.

  “What have you guys been chinning about?”

  “You, darling,” Tod said. “Homer has a t.l. for you.”

  “Tell me, Homer.”

  “No, first you tell me one.”

  “Well, the man I just danced with asked me if you were a movie big shot.”

  Tod saw that Homer was unable to think of a return compliment so he spoke for him.

  “I said you were the most beautiful girl in the place.”

  “Yes,” Homer agreed. “That’s what Tod said.”

  “I don’t believe it. Tod hates me. And anyway, I caught you telling him to keep quiet. You were shushing him.” She laughed.

  “I bet I know what you were talking about.” She mimicked Homer’s excited disgust. “‘That dirty black hen, she’s all over scabs and almost naked.’”

  Homer laughed apologetically, but Tod was angry. “What’s the idea of keeping those guys in the garage?” he demanded.

  “What the hell is it your business?” she replied, but not with real anger. She was amused.

  “Homer enjoys their company. Don’t you, sloppyboppy?”

  “I told Tod they were nice fellows just down on their luck like a lot of people these days. There’s an awful lot of unemployment going around.”

  “That’s right,” she said. “If they go, I go.”

  Tod had guessed as much. He realized there was no use in saying anything. Homer was again signaling for him to keep quiet.

  For some reason or other, Faye suddenly became ashamed of herself. She apologized to Tod by offering to dance with him again, flirting as she suggested it. Tod refused.

  She broke the silence that followed by a eulogy of Miguel’s game chickens, which was really meant to be an excuse for herself. She described what marvelous fighters the birds were, how much Miguel loved them and what good care he took of them.

  Homer agreed enthusiastically. Tod remained silent. She asked him if he had ever seen a cock fight and invited him to the garage for the next night. A man from San Diego was coming north with his birds to pit them against Miguel’s.

  When she turned to Homer again, he leaned away as though she were going to hit him. She flushed with shame at this and looked at Tod to see if he had noticed. The rest of the evening, she tried to be nice to Homer. She even touched him a little, straightening his collar and patting his hair smooth. He beamed happily.

  21

  When Tod told Claude Estee about the cock fight, he wanted to go with him. They drove to Homer’s place together.

  It was one of those blue and lavender nights when the luminous color seems to have been blown over the scene with an air brush. Even the darkest shadows held some purple.

  A car stood in the driveway of the garage with its headlights on. They could see several men in the corner of the building and could hear their voices. Someone laughed, using only two notes, ha-ha and ha-ha, over and over again.

  Tod stepped ahead, to make himself known, in case they were taking precautions against the police. When he entered the light, Abe Kusich and Miguel greeted him, but Earle didn’t.

  “The fights are off,” Abe said. “That stinkola from Diego didn’t get here.”

  Claude came up and Tod introduced him to the three men. The dwarf was arrogant, Miguel gracious and Earle his usual wooden, surly self.

  Most of the garage floor had been converted into a pit, an oval space about nine feet long and seven or eight wide. It was floored with an old carpet and walled by a low, ragged fence made of odd pieces of lath and wire. Faye’s coupe stood in the driveway, placed so that its headlights flooded the arena.

  Claude and Tod followed Abe out of the glare and sat down with him on an old trunk in the back of the garage. Earle and Miguel came in and squatted on their heels facing them. They were both wearing blue denims, polka-dot shirts, big hats and high-heeled boots. They looked very handsome and picturesque.

  They sat smoking silently, all of them calm except the dwarf, who was fidgety. Although he had plenty of room, he suddenly gave Tod a shove.

  “Get over, lard-ass,” he snarled.

  Tod moved, crowding against Claude, without saying anything. Earle laughed at Tod rather than the dwarf, but the dwarf turned on him anyway.

  “Why, you punkola! Who you laughing at?”

  “You,” Earle said.

  “That so, hah? Well, listen to me, you pee-hole bandit, for two cents I’d knock you out of them prop boots.” Earle reached into his shirt pocket and threw a coin on the ground.

  “There’s a nickel,” he said.

  The dwarf started to get off the trunk, but Tod caught him by the collar. He didn’t try to get loose, but leaned forward against his coat, like a terrier in a harness, and wagged his great head from side to side.

  “Go on,” he sputtered, “you fugitive from the Western Costume Company, you…you louse in a fright-wig, you.”

  Earle would have been much less angry if he could have thought of a snappy comeback. He mumbled something about a half-pint bastard, then spat. He hit the instep of the dwarf’s shoe with a big gob of spittle.

  “Nice shot,” Miguel said.

  This was apparently enough for Earle to consider himself the winner, for he smiled and became quiet. The dwarf slapped Tod’s hand away from his collar with a curse and settled down on the trunk again.

  “He ought to wear gaffs,” Miguel said.

  “I don’t need them for a punk like that.”

  They all laughed and everything was fine again. Abe leaned across Tod to speak to Claude.

  “It would have been a swell main,” he said. “There was more than a dozen guys here before you come and some of them with real dough. I was going to make book.” He took out his wallet and gave him one of his business cards.

  “It was in the bag,” Miguel said. “I got five birds that would of won easy and two sure losers. We would of made a killing.”

  “I’ve never seen a chicken fight,” Claude said. “In fact, I’ve never even seen a game chicken.”

  Miguel offered to show him one of his birds and left to get it. Tod went down to the car for the bottle of whiskey they had left In a side pocket. When he got back, Miguel was holding Jujutala in the light. They all examined the bird.

  Miguel held the cock firmly with both hands, somewhat in the manner that a basketball is held, for an underhand toss. The bird had short, oval wings and a heart-shaped tail that stood at right angles to its body. It had a triangular head, like a snake’s, terminating in a slightly curved beak, thick at the base and fine at the point. All its feathers were so tight and hard that they looked as though they had been varnished. They had been thinned out for fighting and the lines of its body, which was like a truncated wedge, stood out plainly. From between Miguel’s fingers dangled its long, bright orange legs and its slightly darker feet with their horn nails.

  “Juju was bred by John R. Bowes of Lindale, Texas,” Miguel said proudly. “He’s a six times winner. I give fifty dollars and a shotgun for him.”

  “He’s a nice bird,” the dwarf said grudgingly, “but looks ain’t everything.”

  Claude took out his wallet.

  “I’d like to see him fight,” he said. “Suppose you sell me one of your other birds and I put it against him.”

  Miguel thought a while and looked at Earle, who told him to go ahead.

  “I’ve ‘got a bird I’ll sell you for fifteen bucks,” he said. The dwarf interfered.

  “Let me pick the bird.”

  “Oh, I don’t care,” Claude said, “I just want to see a fight. Here’s your fifteen.”

  Earle took the money and Miguel told him to get Hermano, the big red.

  “That red’ll go over eight pounds,” he said, “while Juju won’t go more than six.”

  Earle came back carrying a large rooster that had a silver shawl. He looked like an ordinary barn
yard fowl. When the dwarf saw him, he became indignant. “What do you call that, a goose?”

  “That’s one of Street’s Butcher Boys,” Miguel said. “I wouldn’t bait a hook with him,” the dwarf said. “You don’t have to bet,” Earle mumbled.

  The dwarf eyed the bird and the bird eyed him. He turned to Claude.

  “Let me handle him for you, mister,” he said. Miguel spoke quickly.

  “Earle’ll do it. He knows the cock.”

  The dwarf exploded at this.

  “It’s a frameup!” he yelled.

  He tried to take the red, but Earle held the bird high in the air out of the little man’s reach.

  Miguel opened the trunk and took out a small wooden box, the kind chessmen are kept in. It was full of curved gaffs, small squares of chamois with holes in their centers and bits of waxed string like that used by a shoemaker. They crowded around to watch him arm. Juju. First he wiped the short stubs on the cock’s legs to make sure they were clean and then placed a leather square over one of them so that the stub came through the hole. He then fitted a gaff over it and fastened it with a bit of the soft string, wrapping very carefully. He did the same to the other leg.

  When he had finished, Earle started on the big red. “That’s a bird with lots of cojones,” Miguel said. “He’s won plenty fights. He don’t look fast maybe, but he’s fast all right and he packs an awful wallop.”

  “Strictly for the cook stove, if you ask me,” the dwarf said.

  Earle took out a pair of shears and started to lighten the red’s plumage. The dwarf watched him cut away most of the bird’s tail, but when he began to work on the breast, he caught his hand.

  “Leave him be!” he barked. “You’ll kill him fast that way. He needs that stuff for protection.”

  He turned to Claude again.

  “Please, mister, let me handle him.”

  “Make him buy a share in the bird,” Miguel said.

  Claude laughed and motioned for Earle to give Abe the bird. Earle didn’t want to and looked meaningly at Miguel. The dwarf began to dance with rage.

  “You’re trying to cold-deck us!” he screamed.

  “Aw, give it to him,” Miguel said.