John Steinbeck - Sweet Thursday

“I sure do, and I been there,” said Johnny.

“Give him the thirty-five cents,” said Mack.

What hidden, hoarded longings there are in all of us! Behind the broken nose and baleful eye may be a gentle courtier; behind the postures and symbols and myths of Joe Elegant there may be the hunger to be a man. If one could be, for only an evening, what ever in the world one wished, what would it be? What secret would come out?

To a certain extent the theme of the Palace Flop house raffle and engagement party was chosen because of Hazel. He was definitely dwarf material. But when he had reviewed the story, asked questions, and got as clear a picture as he ever got of anything, Hazel elected to be Prince Charming. He saw himself in white silk knee breeches and an Eton jacket, his left hand fondling the hilt of a small sword.

They offered him Grumpy, lovable old Grumpy, the prize part of all. They offered him Sweet Pea the Skunk, but Hazel stuck to his dream. It was Prince Charming or he wouldn’t attend. Friendships have foundered on less.

“All right,” said Mack, “you go ahead. I was going to help you with your costume, but I know when I’m stumped. Hazel, if you’re Prince Charming, you’re on your own.”

“Who cares?” said Hazel. “Who wants your help? I’ll bet you’re mad because you wanted to be Prince Charming.”

“Not me,” said Mack. “I’m going as a tree.”

“How do you mean?”

“It’s a forest, ain’t it?” said Mack. “I want a little anenmity. You can’t see the tree for the forest.”

Hazel went to sit under the cypress tree. He was gloomy and he was frightened because ideas did not come to him, and when he sought them they ran screaming away. But he was determined. He could not let the office down. A man sentenced to be President could not go as a dwarf. It wasn’t dignified. Later in the morning he went to the back door of the Bear Flag and called for help from Joe Elegant.

Joe smiled. “I’ll help you,” he said maliciously.

All over the Row trunks were being opened, and the smell of mothballs penetrated as far as the middle of the street. And all over the Row the story was being rewritten to fit the wardrobe. By unspoken agreement no one planned to be Snow White.

In Western Biological, Doc awakened wracked with pain from sleeping on the floor. He lay still for a moment, trying to isolate the part of him that hurt worst. Not the least of his agony was his memory of forcing Old Jingleballicks to take his bed. A crazy, alcoholic generosity, probably masochistic in origin, had prompted the sacrifice. He raised up on one shattered elbow and looked at the old bastard sleeping so sweetly—his halo of yellow hair surrounding his polished pink pate, his breath puffing in small comfortable snores.

“Wake up!” Doc shouted in fury.

The pale eyes flickered. “What’s for breakfast?” said Old Jay.

“Don’t you even have the decency to have a hangover?”

“Certainly I do,” said Old Jay with dignity. “How’s about some beer?”

“Does your head ache?”

“Yes.”

“Do your joints ache?”

“Yes.”

“Do you have low-blood-pressure depression?”

“Overwhelming.”

“Then I’ve got you,” said Doc. “You get the beer.”

The pale eyes rolled despairingly. “I’ll pay half if you get it.”

“No.”

“Tell you what I’ll do—I’ll loan you the money.”

“No.”

Old Jingleballicks’ eyes were bleak. “Reach me my pants,” he said, and he fished out a quarter and a dime and held them out.

“No,” said Doc.

“God in heaven! What do you want?”

“I want two dollars.”

“Why, that would be six bottles!”

“Exactly. You’re trapped, Old Jingleballicks, and you know it.”

Old Jay dug deep and found two one-dollar bills. “Maybe I can write it off to entertainment,” he said.

Doc pulled on pants and shirt and went across the street. He took his time. He drank a bottle of beer quickly and then sipped a second while he heard the news of the day from Joseph and Mary.

Back in the laboratory he put the four cold remaining bottles on the table.

“Where’s my change?” asked Old Jay.

“I drank your change,” said Doc. He was beginning to feel good. He saw the stricken look. “You cheap old fraud,” he said happily, “for once you’ve been had.” And he went on, “I wish I could understand you. You must have millions and yet you pinch and squirm and cheat. Why?”

“Please give me beer. I’m dying,” said Old Jingleballicks.

“Then die a little longer,” said Doc. “I love to see you die!”

“It’s not my fault,” Old Jay said. “It’s a state of mind. You might call it the American state of mind. The tax laws are creating a whole new kind of man—a psyche rather than a psychosis. Two or three generations and we’ll maybe set the species. Can I have beer now?”

“No.”

“If a man has any money he doesn’t ask, ‘Can I afford this?’ but, ‘Can I deduct it?’ Two men fight over a luncheon check when both of them are going to deduct it anyway—a whole nation conditioned to dishonesty by its laws, because honesty is penalized. But it’s worse than that. If you’ll just hand me a bottle I’ll tell you.”

“Tell me first.”

“I didn’t write the tax laws,” Old Jay said, trembling. “The only creative thing we have is the individual, but the law doesn’t permit me to give money to an individual. I must give it to a group, an organization—and the only thing a group has ever created is bookkeeping. To participate in my gift the individual must become part of the group and thus lose his individuality and his creativeness. I didn’t write the law. I hate a law that stifles generosity and makes charity good business. Corporations are losing their financial efficiency because waste pays. I deplore it, but I do it. I know you need a microscope, but I can’t give it to you because with taxes a four-hundred-dollar microscope costs me twelve hundred dollars—if I give it to you—and nothing if I give it to an institution. Why, if you, through creative work, should win a prize, most of the money would go in taxes. I don’t mind taxes, God knows! But I do mind the kind of law that makes of charity not the full warmness of sharing but a stinking expediency. And now, if you don’t hand me a beer, I shall be forced—”

“Here’s your beer,” said Doc.

“What’s for breakfast?”

“God knows. The party at the Palace Flop house tonight is a masquerade. ‘Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.’ ”

“Why?”

“I don’t know.”

“I shall go as a red dwarf,” said Old Jingleballicks.

“A dying star,” said Doc. “It kind of fits you with that hair.”

When the beer was gone they decided that beer made breakfast redundant. Doc went back for six more bottles, and in a burst of generosity he brought back the Bohemia.

“Now there’s beer for you,” said Old Jingleballicks. “The Mexicans are a great and noble people. The Pyramid of the Sun and this beer—whole civilizations have produced less. You started to tell me about your paper last night but you got deflected by a girl. I’d like to see that girl.”

“I’d like to tell you about my paper. I want to draw some parallels between emotional responses in cephalopods and in humans, and I’d like to observe the pathological changes that go with these responses. Now the body walls of octopi are semitransparent. With proper equipment it might be possible to observe these changes as they happen. Sometimes the simpler organisms can give us a key to the more complex. Dementia praecox, [101] Dementia praecox: Any of several psychotic disorders, such as schizophrenia, characterized by distortions of reality, disturbances of thought and language, and withdrawal from social contact. for example, was considered purely a psychotic manifestation until it was observed that there were physical symptoms as well.”