John Toole - A Confederacy of Dunces

“Listen to that!” Mrs. Levy cried happily. “And you want to throw her out in the snow? I’m just getting through to her. She’s like a symbol of everything you haven’t done.”

Suddenly Miss Trixie leaped up, snarling, “Where’s my eyeshade?”

“This is going to be good,” Mr. Levy said. “Wait till she sinks those five-hundred-dollar teeth in you.”

“Who took my eyeshade?” Miss Trixie demanded fiercely. “Where am I? Take your hands off me.”

“Darling,” Mrs. Levy began, but Miss Trixie had fallen asleep on her side, her creamed face smearing the couch.

“Look, Fairy Godmother, how much have you spent on this little game already? I’m not paying to have that couch re-covered.”

“That’s right. Spend all your money on the horses. Let this human flounder.”

“You’d better take those teeth out of her mouth before she bites off her tongue. Then she’ll really be stuck.”

“Speaking of tongue, you should have heard all that she told me about Gloria this morning.” Mrs. Levy made a gesture that indicated acceptance of injustice and tragedy. “Gloria was the soul of kindness, the first person in years who took an interest in Miss Trixie. Then out of the blue you walk in and kick Gloria out of her life. I think it’s given her a very bad trauma. The girls would love to know about Gloria. They’d ask you some questions, believe me.”

“I bet they would. You know, I think you’re really going out of your mind. There is no Gloria. If you keep on talking to your little protégé there, she’s going to take you with her right into the twilight zone. When Susan and Sandra come home for Easter, they’ll find you bouncing on that board with a paper bag full of rags in your arms.”

“Oh, oh. I see. Mere guilt about this Gloria incident. Fighting, resentment. It’s all going to end very badly, Gus. Please skip one of your tournaments and go see Lenny’s doctor. The man works miracles, believe me.”

“Then ask him to take Levy Pants off our hands. I talked to three realtors this week. Every one of them said it was the most unsalable property they’d ever seen.”

“Gus, did I hear correctly? Did I hear you say something about selling your heritage?” Mrs. Levy screamed.

“Quiet!” Miss Trixie snarled. “I’ll get you people. Wait and see. You’ll get it. I’ll get even.”

“Oh, shut up,” Mrs. Levy shouted at her and pressed her back to the couch, where she promptly dozed off.

“Well, one guy,” Mr. Levy continued calmly, “this very aggressive-looking agent, gave me some hope. Like all the others, he said, ‘Nobody wants a clothing factory today. The market’s dead. Your place is outmoded. Thousands for repairs and modernization. It’s got a railroad switch line, but light goods like clothes are going by truck today, and the place is badly located for trucks. Across town from the highways. Southern garment business folding. Even the land’s not worth much. The whole area is becoming a slum.’ And on and on. But this one agent said maybe he could interest some supermarket chain in buying the factory for a store. Well, that sounded good. Then the hitch came in. There’s no parking area around Levy Pants, the neighborhood’s living median or something is too low to support a big market, and on and on again. He said the only hope was renting it out as a warehouse, but again warehouse revenues are not high and the place is badly located for a warehouse. Something about highways again. So don’t worry. Levy Pants is still ours, like a chamberpot we inherited.”

“A chamberpot? Your father’s sweat and blood is a chamberpot? I see your motive. Destroy the last monument to your father’s accomplishments.”

“Levy Pants is a monument?”

“Why I ever wanted to work there I’ll never know,” Miss Trixie said angrily from among the pillows where Mrs. Levy had her pinioned. “Thank goodness poor Gloria got out of there in time.”

“Pardon me, ladies,” Mr. Levy said, whistling through his teeth. “You two can discuss Gloria alone.”

He got up and went into the whirlpool bath. While the water swirled and jetted around him, he wondered how he might somehow be able to dump Levy Pants in the lap of some poor buyer. It must have some uses. A skating rink? A gym? A Negro cathedral? Then he wondered what would happen if he carried Mrs. Levy’s exercising table to the seawall and dumped it into the Gulf. He dried himself carefully, put on his terry-cloth robe, and went back into the rumpus room to get his dope sheet.

Miss Trixie was sitting up on the couch. Her face had been cleaned. Her mouth was an orange smear. Her weak eyes were accentuated by shadow. Mrs. Levy was adjusting a coiffed black wig over the old woman’s thin hair.

“What in the world are you doing to me now?” Miss Trixie was wheezing at her benefactress. “You’ll pay for this.”

“Do you believe it?” Mrs. Levy asked her husband proudly, all traces of hostility gone from her voice. “Just look at that.”

Mr. Levy couldn’t believe it. Miss Trixie looked exactly like Mrs. Levy’s mother.

In Mattie’s Ramble Inn, Jones poured a glassful of beer and sank his long teeth into the foam.

“That Lee woman ain’t treatin you right, Jones,” Mr. Watson was telling him. “One thing I don like to see a colored man make fun of hisself for bein colored. That what she be doin with you fix up like a plantation darky.”

“Whoa! Color cats got it har enough without peoples bustin out laughin cause they color. Shit. I make my mistake when I tell that Lee mother a po-lice tell me to get a job. I shoulda tell her them fair employmen peoples sendin me over, scare that gal a little.”

“You better go to the po-lice and tell them you quittin at that place but you gonna fin you another job.”

“Hey! I ain walkin in no precinc and flappin my mouth at no po-lice. Them po-lice take one look at me, throw my ass in jail. Whoa! Color peoples cain fin no job, but they sure can fin a openin in jail. Goin in jail the bes way you get you somethin to eat regular. But I rather starve outside. I rather mop a whore floor than go to jail and be makin plenny license plate and rug and leather belt and shit. I jus was stupor enough to get my ass snatch up in a trap at that Night of Joy. I gotta figure this thing out myself.”

“I still say you go to the po-lice and tell them you be between job a little while.”

“Yeah. And maybe I be between job about fifdy year. I ain seen no peoples screamin for unskill color cats. Ooo-wee. Somebody like that Lee bastar know plenny po-lice. Otherwise that B-drinker, knockout drop cathouse be close down long ago. I ain takin no chance going to no Lee frien in the po-lice and sayin, ‘Hey, man, I jus be vagran a little while.’ He say, ‘Okay, boy, you be servin jus a little while, too.’ Whoa!”

“Well, how the sabotage comin along.”

“Pretty poor. Lee make me work overtime on the floor the other day, she see the crap gettin a little thicker so pretty soon her poor, stupor customer be up to they ankle in dus. Shit. I tol you I wrote a address on one of her orphan package, so if she still distributin for the United Fun maybe we be gettin some answer on that. I sure like to see wha that address bringin in. Maybe it’ll be bringin in a po-lice. Whoa!”

“It pretty clear you not gettin nowhere. Go talk to the po-lice, man. They understand your story.”

“I scare of the po-lice, Watson. Ooo-wee. You be scare, too, if you was jus standin in Woolsworth and some po-lice drag you off. Especially when Lee probly goin roun the whirl with half the po-lice on the force. Whoa!” Jones sent up what looked like a cloud, a radioactive one which gradually sent some fallout down onto the bar and the cooler filled with pickled meat. “Say, whatever happen to that dumb mother was in here that day, the one workin for Levy Pant? You ever seen him aroun again?”