Эптон Синклер - Oil!

Paul went away to a training-camp, and after that paleness and silence became the dominant notes of Ruth’s character. She went back to her father’s home to stay at night, which meant that on Sundays she had to go to church with them, and sit and bite her lips while Eli preached. For Eli was a prophet after the old testament model, calling down judgment upon the enemies of the Lord, smiting them hip and thigh, leaving not one alive, not even the little ones, the “spawns of the devil.” Eli, being a preacher, did not have to do this killing himself; he was exempt, and so was his sister Meelie, who solved the war problem for herself by marrying a young derrick man and getting Dad to make him a foreman and have him kept at home. Meelie, who was a chatterbox and a fresh young thing, said to Bunny that Ruth ought to find herself a husband instead of mourning over Paul; maybe the day would come when Bunny would want to be exempted, and they might both solve the problem at the same time!

That was a feverish summer in Bunny’s life, between the war and his raptures with Eunice. He spent a great deal of time at Beach City, because he had the excuse of the military work, and because the girl was so imperious in her demands. Indeed, the first rift in their happiness came because he would persist in paying visits to Paradise, where Eunice could not very well come. She took up Bertie’s phrase that Bunny was a “little oil gnome.” “What do you want with so much money?” she would argue. “My God, let me get some from Papa, if you need it!” Tommy Hoyt, it seems, had made a huge killing, buying old hulks down at the harbor just before the country entered the war; it was reported he had cleared a cool three million. There had been a lot about it in the papers—all very complimentary, since that was everybody’s dream of glory.

How could Bunny explain that it wasn’t the money, but the fact that the country had to have oil, and he wanted to do his share; what kind of preternatural solemnity was that for a youth of eighteen? He put the blame on Dad, who wasn’t very well and needed his son; and so it became an issue, which did Bunny care for most, his Dad or his sweetheart? Eunice would grab him by the shoulders and shake him; she had to have some one to take her to a dance, and if he went off and buried himself in the desert, she would get another fellow.

She was insatiable, ravenous for pleasure; she never knew when to stop, whatever it might be. “One dance more! Just one!” she would plead; and then it would be one kiss more, or one drink. She was always pleading with Bunny to drink, and having her feelings hurt because he refused. How could he count his promise to his father more than his promise to be her pal? And how could she take him out with her crowd if he played the part of a skeleton at a feast?

Not for long was she content to lose themselves in the sand-dunes, and share their secret with the moon. Eunice loved the bright lights, the free and conspicuous spending of Papa’s sudden wealth. They would drive to Angel City, where in fashionable hotels were palatial dining-rooms, with jazz-orchestras, and crowds of revellers, celebrating new contracts and new financial coups. The rooms were decorated with the flags of all the allies, and the men wore the uniforms of all the services. This was what the war meant to Eunice, to be in this shining company, and stand up while the orchestra played the “Star-spangled Banner,” and after that to dance all night while it played, “Kiss me, honey-baby,” or “Toodle-ums too,” or whatever amorous cajolement the saxophone might present. She was an aggressive little dancer, clinging to her partner, her body fitted into his as if it had been moulded there. Bunny would not have thought it quite decent to behave like that in public, but it was the mood of the time, and no one paid any attention to them, especially after the hours had passed and the drinks had taken effect.

There was always the problem of getting Eunice away from these excitements. She never wanted to go, not even when she was exhausted; he would half carry her out, and she would fall asleep on his shoulder on the way home, and it was all he could do to keep from falling asleep himself. There was a boy in their crowd who would carry a broken nose about for the rest of his life, because he had dozed at the steering-wheel on a crowded boulevard; another had spent ten days in jail because, after a smash-up, the police had smelled liquor on his breath. It was the etiquette of parties that the man who had to drive must drink only gin—not because that would not make him drunk, but because it left no odor on his breath!

The time came when Eunice decided that it was silly to take that long drive to Beach City after dancing. She found a hotel where you could register as Mr. and Mrs. Smith of San Francisco and no one would ask any questions; you paid in advance, because of your lack of baggage, and in the morning you slipped out separately, and no one was the wiser. You told the folks at home that you had spent the night with a friend, and they did not pursue the matter—being afraid of what they might find out.

All this made a great difference in Bunny’s life, and before long it began to show in his appearance; he was not quite so rosy, and Dad took notice, and was no longer embarrassed to speak. “You’re making a fool of yourself, son; these late hours have got to stop.” So Bunny would try to get out of going to some dance, and Eunice would fly into his arms, and sob, and cling to him, moulding her body into his in that terrible, breath-taking way she had; all Bunny’s senses would be filled with her, the delicate perfume she used, the feeling of the filmy stuffs she wore, her tumbled hair, her burning, swift, persistent kisses. He would have to stand and argue and plead, trying to keep his reason while his head went round.

Sometimes there would be embarrassment mingled with his other emotions, because these scenes took place in the drawing-room of the Hoyt home, with either of the parents present. But what could they do? They had raised this wild young creature, giving her everything in the world, half a dozen servants to wait on her, to answer her every whim. She had always had what she wanted, and now she wanted her lover, and all that poor Mrs. Hoyt could say was, “Don’t be hard-hearted, Bunny”—really seeming to blame him for these tantrums in her presence! As for poor “Tommy,” when he happened in on a tantrum, there came a frightened look on his rosy, rather boyish face, and he turned and skedaddled. He had troubles enough of his own making, and the next time he met Bunny, he set forth his point of view in one pregnant sentence, “There’s no such thing as a normal woman in the world!”

Just before school opened, Bunny took the bit in his teeth and went to Paradise to spend a week with Dad, and found that Paul was there on a three days’ furlough. Paul was not going to get overseas, it appeared; the army had put him to work at his old job—building barracks—only now, instead of ten dollars a day he was getting thirty a month “and beans.” That was what it meant for a workingman to be patriotic! It was quite a contrast with Tommy Hoyt’s three millions, and the hundred and twenty thousand a week of Dad’s oil-contracts! But nobody thought about that, because of the eloquence of the President’s speeches, and the concentrated ardor of the four minute orators.

Paul looked big and strong in his khaki uniform; and Ruth was happy, because Paul wasn’t going to be killed. Meelie was happy, because there was a baby on the way, and Sadie because there was a young rancher “keeping company” with her. Dad was happy, because he had brought in another gusher, and proved up a whole new slope of the Paradise tract; he was putting in pipe lines and preparing a colossal development—the bankers couldn’t keep him down, he would finance himself with oil!