Roughneck by Jim Thompson Read Free Book Online

and hypersensitive man. Fortunately, the right response came to me. I did not make the mistake of apologizing or sympathizing with him.
           As soon as I could get a word in edgewise, I told him he was a damned fool. A man might look like the Devil and talk like a baby, but he did not need to 'act' like either. "I'll tell you something," I said—and what I told him was quite true. "One of the best adjusted, happiest men I ever knew was a dwarf with club feet. He was one of the country's top corporation attorneys. He had a beautiful wife and four fine children. No one cared what he looked like. He was such a swell guy—and such a smart one—that no one noticed what he looked like. Oh, a few boobs might snicker at him, but what the hell did he care about them?"
           Carl brushed at his eyes—in his self-pity and fury he had actually started to weep. He suggested that his case was different. "It wouldn be tho bad if I could juth thpeak plainly. Thath the worth—"
           "It's always different," I said. "We've all got our own brand of trouble; I've had mine. If I'd acted like you do, I'd have died of tuberculosis or the d.t.'s long ago."
           "Yeth, but—"
           "You're beating yourself over the head," I said. "You'd rather feel sorry for yourself than do something. If you're ashamed of the way you talk, why are you talking all the time? You never miss a chance that I can see. You're shooting off your mouth, getting into arguments, from the time you get here in the morning until you leave. You make a spectacle out of yourself with your drinking. If you don't want to be laughed at, why do you give people so many opportunities?"
           I was pretty sore. My many failings do not include laughing at the infirmity of another, and the accusation that I had done so did not set well.
           Carl heard me out, looking rather sheepish toward the last. Finally, he grinned and said, "Well, fud oo, Tompn. Fordet it, will oo?" and we both went back to work.
           Well, it may have been wishful thinking, but it seemed to me that he did not get quite so drunk from then on. Also that he talked less to those outside the office, avoiding arguments where they could be avoided. Instead of mere working companions, we became quite good friends. Where before he had merely recited trite obscenities, he now conversed with me...Did I really think he might be able to land a good job and not be laughed out of it? Did I really think that one such as he could lead a normal life, with all that the word implied?...I said of course he could—'if' he would stop thinking about himself and straighten up. For a man as brilliant and talented as he was, people would overlook any handicap.
           "Oo weally mean at, don't oo, Tompn?"—studying me narrowly. "Oore not dus tiddin, are oo?"
           "You know I do," I said. "You know what I say is true. If you go on like you've been doing, you've got no one to blame but yourself."
           He thought about that, and a few days later it paid off.
           It was now nearing the fall of 1930, and the economic depression was tightening over Nebraska. But the nation's political and business leaders still proclaimed it a temporary recession. It was merely a readjustment period, and prosperity was just around the corner, et cetera. To reachieve prosperity it was only necessary to "tighten our belts," "overcome sales resistance" and so on.
           Well, the store tightened its belt—rather, by arranging salary cuts for the various concession employees, it tightened 'their' belts. And by way of overcoming the aforesaid sales resistance it began a series of vigorous campaigns. The clerks were given sales quotas—to be met or else. They were organized into competing "armies," with the winner receiving a blue ribbon or a plaque or some such prize. One "bargain" sale followed another. Every week the home office shipped us a huge batch