by Jaimy Gordon
I stood well back from the stall door, my overalls down around my ankles, breathing hard and locked in a staring duel with this monster to whom I’d offered only love. The ears I’d boxed were still flattened in fury against her head. In a way I liked her all the more now that I saw in her a marooned and exasperated individualist like myself. What ungettable thing was she hungry for, I wondered, and blushed for my puny and insulting green lifesaver. I cringed to think I’d had to punch her in the eye, the great rolling right eye which she was winking now like a boxer in need of a plaster. I knew how she felt. Tough titty that she couldn’t know me… Then again, who knew what she knew? “I’m the Bogeywoman,” I whispered, and, to help her over any gaps in her education, I pointed at myself. I was a sight to make a mother weep, good thing I had no mother. On the round pad of my bicep was a full equine dental impression in red and blue, four inches across; farther down, my forearms were crusted with brown blood, and fuzzy on top of that with a pale gray fungal growth of sweatshirt fleece.
Broomstick was unimpressed, or anyway she relapsed into that queer sewing motion from foreleg to foreleg, full of crammed-in violence. Then suddenly down they came again like a clanging portcullis, the piano key teeth on the stall gate and the belch of a drainpipe sucking air in the wrong direction. “Godzillas sake what’s eating you girl!” I asked her, and heard from above me a weird juicy chortle in reply, “She-e-e-e, she-e-e-e, she-e-e-e,” somebody’s laugh that slimied up the feminine pronoun by sucking it over bare wet gums-an embarrassing noise that seemed in the family with Broomstick’s belch, but human. I looked up and saw a face sniggering down at me from a hayloft. I yanked up my overalls and tried to make out this person.
It was a fuddy in a mustache, primly clipped. He was undersized down to his bones, and he had all over a kind of fallen-in spruceness and good looks, of the finger-artist type-piano tuner, radio repairman, or pickpocket. A miniature, dandefied, mahogany brown fuddy, then, but old: When he sniggered, his jaw had that collapsed frogginess at the corners, like an old doctor’s bag, that comes of having no teeth, or hardly any. He leaned on an elbow at the edge of the hayloft, his chin in his hand, his shirt-cuff shiny black with gold threads in it, one foot dangling over the edge in a glittering black reptile pump, with a rhinestone horseshoe over the toes.
“Ahem, is this your horse?” “Maybe this my horse and maybe she ain’t, what you gimme to know?” The big brown mare banged her teeth on the gate again and sucked in air with a fearsome croak. “What’s wrong with her?” “She common.” “Excuse me?” “She hungry.” “Hungry! Why don’t you give her sumpm to eat?” The fellow stared down at me, like who was I to ask. “Ain’t feel like it,” he finally said. “What! Why not?” “What she ever did for me, that old cow Cowpea, she-e-e-e, she-e-e-e, she-e-e-e,” he chortled to himself, and now I saw he had two gold teeth left in his mouth.
“What’s so funny?” I had to ask after a time. “Has I said sumpm was funny? I never hear nobody round here say nothing was funny, young woman, lessen maybe you mean Cowpea here be acting like she seent a ghost cause you done show her your ugly chest. What you wanna scare my horse for? Oughta call the po-lice on you, bare nekkid like you is. But I take pity on you, I do bidness with you, for a nucka note I give you some very fine threads…”
He was fixing me in his little eyes and right away I got this queer feeling that I was turning into a five-dollar bill, with the face of Abraham Lincoln printed on my belly button. Some people have noses that can find a crumb of cheese in the dark, a Bushman’s eyes can pick out the lost sisters of the Pleiades without a telescope, and I got that magical mercury in my veins for detecting whatever somebody thinks I am, especially when it’s nothing. Sumpm about that grin with its ravaged neatness and two gold teeth in front told me this fuddy was more indifferent to me poisonally than anyone I’d ever met. Not that I was a Unbeknownst to him, I was Unbeknownst to him, period; when he looked at me he saw a bill, a five-dollar bill, or nothing. I was transfixed.
“Say, are you an ayrabber?” “Maybe I is and maybe I ain’t. Who want to know?” “I bet she works like a dog for you-the horse I mean.” “Maybe she do and maybe she don’t.” “She tried to take a bite outa me. You oughta feed her.” “I feed her. I feed her if you gimme a nucka. Gimme a nucka to feed her, young woman, I take cay it.” “A nickel?” “Fi dollar. You got fi dollar on you?” “I, er, uh, I forgot my wallet,” I muttered, “but… I can get it. You feed her and I’ll, er, pay you later.” “Later! What you ever did for me, young woman? You come in here and tell me who I be and what I feed, you thank you better’n somebody, muss be rich, muss be the mayor’s daughter. I tell you what. You gimme fi dolla to feed Cowpea here and I give you sumpm to cover up that ugly chest. You so ugly my glass eye broke, she-e-e-e, she-e-e-e, she-e-e-e. Wonder could it make a poor man blind looking at sumpm like that. You need sumpm to cover yourself up, for the good of the public. That could scare a rattlesnake off a rock, looking at sumpm like that…”
“So quit staring at em if they’re so ugly,” I said. “They comical, that’s why I look at em, wooo, them is bad enough but say what is that white cottony mess sticking on you arms, look like some kinda mold that grow on dead people…” “None of your beeswax,” I said through my teeth, “anyhow you got a nerve, what’s your name?”-borrowing Merlin’s voice for zeroing in on cheeky menials, bellhops who won’t hop, private secretaries who blab all over. The ayrabber stared me down sideways again: “My name bop de bop,” he said, “where your money at? Check yourself, young woman, you ain’t decent. Gimme a nucka I get you a nice pink dress and stomps to go with it.”
Now, one of my ancient beefs with fuddies, from rubes to slickers, from Merlin to Foofer to this ayrabber here, has been the tendency of this brotherhood to advise me on my clothes. “You owe me that pitiful dress,” I therefore hollered, “cause your horse ate my shirt. I’ll take it for nuttin! which is what I got, nuttin… cause you owe me… though I’d… er… prefer a pair of pants… if you got em…” I trailed off at the sight of his lip curling back from his two gold teeth in a sneer.
“O you would like a pair of pawnties,” he echoed in falsetto. “O you would like some nice silk draws… Well I fancies eye-talian vines myself but I don’t get em. Who is you to get em? Muss be the mayor’s daughter. What you gimme for a nice pair green work pants hardly broke in seffa little old bloodstain in the, er, uh, groin era?” “You peeled em off somebody’s dead body I bet,” I said, beginning to understand the type of person I was dealing with. “She-e-e-e, she-e-e-e, she-e-e-e, nemmind where I got em, that’s a professional secret,” and just then Cowpea brought her choppers down, thwack, on the wooden gate again and sucked air with the noise of a python being throttled. And after she was through doing that she tossed herself like a banana peel on the cement floor and paddled her legs in the air. Come to think of it, I don’t remember any slinky ribs sticking out of Cowpea, or protruding clothes-hanger haunches either, in fact she looked pretty well fed. All the same:
“Are you gonna feed this horse and gimme some clothes?” “Soon’s you good for a nucka.” “What was that name?” I asked haughtily (Merlin’s voice). “You been forgot my name already, young woman?” (Had he told me his name? I racked my dreambox.) “Who you thank you is? Muss be the mayor’s daughter or somebody.” “Well, I’ll tell you what. I’ll tell you my name if you tell me yours.” “You do what? You gimme what? What you want my name for? Way you leave your name at? Muss thank you somebody, thank Ima give you my name. What you ever did for me, young woman? Muss be the mayor’s daughter or somebody.”
“Ahem, I am… er… the Princessa Abrahama Lincona. And you sir are…?
“Mr. Tuney T. Turpentine, Escrow. Where my nucka, young woman?”
“Charmed I’m sure.” I sank down on a gray straw bale in exhaustion. He was stronger than me, this little ayrabber, I would have liked to cheat him out of his name or beat him for the pink dress or make him feed his horse or sumpm, anything, but becau
se of his indifference to me I was stymied. He had the most complete immunity to me of any human I’d met who had actually bothered to spoon me to his lips-
And that’s how I knew what I had fallen into here, a humble soup that was boiling me down to a five-dollar bill, to pay God back for Emily, whether she lived or died. “Say,” I said, “gimme a pair of pants, I don’t care how big, I’ll roll em up, or even a dress and I’ll leave you my shoes, see, and I’ll be back in five minutes with five dollars, I swear I will.” Tuney peered down at my shoes. “I wouldn’t touch them raggedy shoes if you gave me fi dolla, go head, gimme fi dolla and find out. Fi dolla on the barrelhead, young woman, ante up or I never tell you who you is. Say, you ain’t have to buy a pig in a poke”-he crawled off into the darkness of the loft-“I show you what I got.” He dragged into view a box overbrimming with clothes, marked in red letters:
UNLAWFUL TO TAMPER WITH THIS BOX
PROPERTY OF THE SALVATION ARMY
– and hung over the edge wrinkled green work pants, and a purple satin warmup jacket from Carlin’s Park Ice Rink, lavishly ripped in the armpit. “They you is, mayor’s daughter, one nucka note buy you all that.” “You stole that stuff,” I pointed out, “why should I give you good money for it?” “I ain’t the one walking round nekkid,” Tuney pointed out. “You better give me sumpm out of that box,” I threatened, “or I’ll… I’ll rat to the Salvation Army. And the SPAC. And the cops, and tell em your horse ate my duds…” “Say, I invite you in this barn, young woman? I guess you bettern somebody, you the mayor’s daughter, can go any way-at you want. Well I got news for you, you trespassing, ain’t you see that sign on the door, NO WOMENS ALLOWED? Why you thank they ain’t no womens in this barn? Case you ignorant, which I see you is, lemme tell you it’s certain places way-at for science reasons it ain’t right for womens to go. Can’t have no stanky womens in no horse barn, horses sniff that stank and they go wild, what happens then be your own lookout, she-e-e-e, she-e-e-e, she-e-e-e.” “Whaddaya mean, Cowpea’s a girlgoyle just like me,” I barked, feeling all the same the blood rise in my cheeks, “and what was that highly suspicious last name again?” I asked frostily (Merlin’s voice). “What you gimme to know that?” he said but then he announced proudly: “Turpentine. Tuney T. Turpentine, Escrow.” “Turpentine? What the hump kinda name is that?”
“Cause that alley rat so starved he eat the paint off you wall, ho ho ho,” came another voice, and I turned to see a stockier, fuddier man standing there, dusty black like a noon shadow on a dirt road, bald head not very well lidded in a pinchfront houndstooth stingy brim a bit too small for it, and heavy jowls hanging down under. Also a straight dense mustache across his upper lip like a piece of electrical tape. “Say there, Chug, what’s kicking,” Tuney asked him, and he replied: “Same old same old, just like yesday. This your new partner? She do you any good?” “Sho is, sho is, she do everything for me, and very tasty too.” “What yall got for me today? Cash for your trash.” “Ain’t been out, Chug. Can’t pay the nut and you know that Itchy so tight, he scream he so tight. He want to see fi dolla or no horse, no wagon.” “Aw Itchy front you a horse if he think you square. You musta stiffed him. You back drankin that screech?” “Unh-unh,” Tuney said. Chug shook his head in puzzlement. “Well I know you ain’t tomcatting,” he sighed.
Now it all fell into place. “I get it-he’s a homo,” I said, pottishly calling the kettle black. “Naw, what it is, Tuney too cheap to run after wimmins,” Chug said, “this sucka so cheap he steal the nuckas from his dead gramma’s eyes, ho ho ho.” “She-e-e-e, she-e-e-e, she-e-e-e,” Tuney joined in, “I don’t waste no wimmins on my lowdown self. I ain’t one of you hoppagrass here-today niggers. Soon’s I have a old lady I sublet her ass.” “Ain’t you say this young lady do everything for you?” “Everything I let her. Right now I ain’t got fi dolla for a wagon and she for rent.” “What you say to that, young lady?” “Well…” I cleared my throat, not exactly sure what I was getting into here. “Five dollars, some clothes and feed Cowpea,” I said without conviction. “Who Cowpea?” Chug said, looking at me strangely. “This Cowpea,” Tuney explained, “my horse, you know how hungry she get-this young woman taken pity on her.” “This horse here? This Ugga! Ugga be hungry all right. Hungry for human blood…”
“So what you say, Chug? This all I got today-a nucka-note to you, brother, she-e-e-e, she-e-e-e, she-e-e-e,” Tuney pointed down at me, and Chug joined right in, a long, slow, sticky “Ho ho ho ho. This lamb? Where her mother? I don’t know if I can trim a gal that skinny. She go long with it?” “Sho is, sho is. She want to see old Cowpea greasing, don’t you, young woman? Her mama far far away,” Tuney said, “in Californ-eye-ay.” “My mother’s dead,” I corrected, “I’m… without funds at the moment.” “Cheap,” Tuney pointed out, “fi dolla to you and she can have these dry goods here, she owe me a Abe for the lot.”
“Are you two ayrabbers?” I asked Chug. Compared to Tuney, he seemed like an honest sort. “We junkers,” Chug replied. “We junk.”
But then he was looking hard at me, blinking his heavy-lidded honey-yellow eyes. “Say, this a he-she?” he asked suddenly. “Aw who can say with these june-eye delinquents, all them got that greasy straight hair in a ponytail and no chest up front. She ain’t far long enough yet to tell. What difference do it make?” “You sho this down with you, young lady?” “I’m ready,” I said. “Ima give you fi dolla, you hear?” Chug said kindly, “you do what you want with it, pay this fool or not, don’t make me no nemmind.” “It’s a old mattress over they in stall nine,” Tuney assisted discreetly. I closed my eyes and followed Chug’s slow scraping step through the straw.
I was ready to swap guessing for knowing and to join O in the pot where teenage girls get hard-boiled, to expose my flesh on that cold Alp where Heidi herself grows hard as a year-old kaiser roll and learns to think of all men, even her dear old fuddy Opa, in that way. I deserved it for burning Emily, I’d have said yes to anything, even five cents. But I didn’t want to look around, for fear of busting out in hives and puking. After I stumbled over a concrete block and like to busted my shin I opened my eyes a crack and then it wasn’t so bad: a bum’s hideout, the mattress an old navigational map of stains, seasick archipelagos of bodily effluvia on blue-ticking latitudes and longitudes, a pink plastic portable radio with chipped case in the straw, a bucket in the corner to pee in, haybales for a living room suite.
After four or five minutes Tuney piped up: “Well, bro? What’s going on?” “Not much,” Chug growled. “What’s wrong? Your wagon done broke down?” “Can’t get in her.” “Aw go on, Chug, she ugly but she ain’t that ugly. I guarantee it, under them stank clothes it’s as good a thang as ever said good morning to a slop jar.” “She froze up like a bad drain, that’s what.” “She-e-e-e, she-e-e-e, she-e-e-e, you not the man you was, Chug, they it is.”
“You inex-spare-inced?” Chug whispered to me, “you got your cherry?” “Never mind, it’s just in the way,” I hissed back. I had thought this would be easy, all I had to do was hold my nose and jump, gravity or sumpm would do the rest and tomorrow or next week I could tell O I was as lost as she was. “That’s okay, baby, I don’t want it,” Chug said, rearing back so his wide gingerdough belly rose over me like a moon and his open brown work pants made like a bread-basket in his lap. “Wait, gimme a chance,” I started to protest, when I felt his big, dry, warm hand at the back of my neck. And next I knew my eye was going down and that thing was coming up, that thing sticking out of the bottom of his belly like a cute-ugly valve, or not so much cute-ugly as an eighth world wonder of ugliness, and I opened my mouth and resolved to be Marie Splendini walking over Niagara Falls on a tightrope and not lose my nerve or gag.
Well-that’s what I was worth, now that I had burned up Emily. Back in Rohring Rohring I had cost a hundred dollars a day-anyhow that’s what Merlin had to pay the dreambox mechanics to keep me there, and I got my candy and coddy allowance on top of that. Out here I was worth five
bucks, and I’d have taken five cents and a bucket of oats for Cowpea. I was low as a cockroach now, as a cockroach I saw the world as food, and I was food myself. Five bucks’ worth-a cockroach doesn’t finick. I ate what I saw, what saw me ate me. Where the tablecloth never relents, you eat till you die. I ate. I gagged. I ate.
Chug pulled his pants up and at the sound of the zipper, Tuney called out from his loft: “How you like that?” “She all right,” Chug said gallantly, “onliest thing I can’t figga what she want with a mean old ugly old mose like you.” “She-e-e-e, she-e-e-e, she-e-e-e…” Tuney liked that. My new clothes came flying over the top of the stall: like-new green work pants, just that one egg-sized bloodstain near the fly, and the torn purple satin warmup jacket from the burned-down old ice rink at Carlin’s Park, whose red lining hung out of the armpit like a tongue. Chug was counting dollars off a frayed roll. “Don’t give that slicka more’n a dolla for that mess, y’hear?” Chug whispered. “You find this here young lady sumpm better than them old rags.” “I got better,” Tuney squeaked, “I got better for her right here, yessir”-a plastic bag came lofting over the stall wall. “It’s a pink party dress in they and high-heel stomps, but if I’s yall I wait till yall’s quit of them crabs yall taking home from that mattress, she-e-e-e, she-e-e-e, she-e-e-e, praise jesus! How you like your friend Turpentine? I done turn out the mayor’s daughter and give old Chug the crabs too,” and he exploded in phlegmy snorts of mirth. “You best be jiving bout them crabs,” Chug said without smiling. “Tomorrow will tell, yes it will, yes it will,” Tuney hissed joyously. “I hope you only jiving, nigger, I know way you live at if I pass my old lady crabs.” “Just what exactly are crabs?” I asked, a diadem of cold sweat tightening on my forehead. “You find out,” Tuney promised, “tomorrow will tell.”