The Dollmaker by Harriette Simpson Arnow
“An they ain’t got no union,” Clovis said.
“But th work’s regular,” Gertie said pondering. They’d always looked so fine in their cars and uniforms, way finer than factory hands, so she had supposed they had more. “It wouldn’t be sich a bad callen,” she insisted, looking at Enoch. “Seems like some real nice men gits into police work.”
Clytie tossed her head. “All a same you’ve got to watch um. They’s a girl at school, she’s gotta sister, see.” She looked at Enoch, who had looked up quickly at mention of the word girl. “This big girl, she hadda work a three-tu-twelve shift; an one night walking home frum u streetcar she got scared, see. Then she seen a scout car driven slow behind her, an she told um she was scared, an they said: ‘Git in. We’ll take yu home.’ But they didn’t take her home—they—yu know—and then they says to her, ‘Girlie,’ they says, ‘yu better not start crappen around about what th cops has done tuyu. We’ll run yu in an lock yu up fer’—yu know, Mom. Wotta yu call it, soliciten?”
Gertie flushed, Enoch’s eyes had dropped to his plate, but Amos was looking at his sister, ready to ask questions. Clytie saw his curiosity, and said, “Want some more milk, honey?” and dumped the little bit in the bottle into his glass, quickly, so that a few drops splattered on the table.
Enoch cried, “Don’t waste milk.” And it seemed only a few days ago that he had been getting into the icebox for milk to feed an alley cat.
Gertie realized that when she told him of the money the policeman paid, he had said nothing of the dime he had always received from the sale of each of the other dolls. He asked now, cheerful, as if such things were an expected part of life, “Mom, how long doyu reckon we’ll have to live on beans?”
“We ain’t a liven on beans,” Clytie cried. “Whatcha crappen about? They’s potatoes an bread an cooked peaches an—an all kinds of things—Mom, ought I to start walken? Some a th kids has gotta, an when I bought my lunch today some girl, an boy, was she hateful—I hadn’t bought nothen but soup an a little candy bar—she was inu line ahead a me, an when I started past her she looked at wot I’d got an says, ‘Are you onu diet?’ ‘My pop’s onu strike,’ I says. ‘I can’t buy out u whole cafeteria,’ I says. ‘Huh,’ she says, ‘it must be some strike. You’ve still got lunch money. When I was little inu depression,’ she says, ‘we lived on nothen but stale bread fer six weeks. So quitcha beefen, kid,’ she says to me. An I hadn’t made one little beef,” Clytie said, looking persecuted.
“Aw, she was just shooten her lip, I bet,” Enoch said. “Some a th kids tells all kinds a tales. Gilbert said onct they didn’t have nothen but a sack a dry beans, an th water an th electric was all cut off, an Sophronie—”
“Miz Meanwell,” Gertie corrected.
“Anyhow, she was a setten an a cryen—Wheateye was a baby then—Gilbert don’t recollect it so good; he jist knows frum a hearen um tell it—his mom was a bawlen away a maken big tears, an Whit says tu her, ‘Put them beans under yer face, honey, an we’ll have biled beans stewed in tears.’ ‘We wouldn’t have no ketchup, nohow,’ Sophronie says, an kept on a cryen—Pop, is tales like that th truth?”
“Some a these people that has been up here a long time can tell some tall tales about th depression an layoffs an sitdowns an evictions an standen all night in th rain er th snow in front u employment gates so’s to be first in th mornen. An I’ve heared some tell how they’d seen great swarms a men hangen around behind restaurants an bars an sich, a waiten fer garbage to be put in th cans so’s they could git it. They’ve mebbe made their tales a heap bigger; an anyhow,” he added quickly, catching Gertie’s troubled eyes, “they warn’t no unions then.”
“The unions cain’t make jobs,” Gertie said.
They were silent, the same silence that came when something said brought back Cassie and her laughter, or when Clovis talked of back home as he often did here lately, with a wistfulness and a hopelessness strange for him. Now, as at such times, they seemed to draw closer one to the other, silent as if they listened to Detroit, sounding, as always, through the place. Tonight, supper was earlier than when Clovis worked, and the going-home traffic at its heaviest while they ate, so that it came from the through street in a long roaring growl, drowned at times by the scream of an airplane, or a louder blast from the steel mill. The sounds, as they often did, made Gertie think of some many-voiced beast out there, hungry, waiting for them all.
Next day she went early to the project office, carrying the Josiah basket with two of the brightest dolls. She hoped that someone might ask if they were for sale while she did her business, which was to put up a sign she had rewritten three times the night before while the others were in bed: “For Washing, Ironing, Cleaning, Gertie Nevels—18911 Merry Hill.” But her hands hesitated as they tacked it on the bulletin board near the rent-paying window; it was the last of several rows of such notices; she saw, “Sophronie Meanwell—Ironing, Wall Washing,” and further down, but from the looks of it put up some days ago, “Clytie Nevels, Baby-sitting, Housework—”
She turned away, her reading of the little sign unfinished, but still she lingered near the office. She held the Josiah basket on her arm, swinging it a little, as she looked hopefully past the rent-paying windows to the people who ran the project—two office girls, two young men, the gray-haired project manager, and his gray-haired secretary. None of them looked at her, for there was another woman on Gertie’s side of the rent-paying window. Gertie, like the office help, gave her a quick sidewise glance, then looked away as the old project manager talked to her in a low flat voice touched with impatience and weariness. “It’s a government rule. You had your hearing. There isn’t anything else I can do. I neither own the project nor make the rules.”
The others in the office were uncomfortable, fidgety because of the woman, and seemed relieved when she turned suddenly and rushed away. Gertie followed her, and wished she could say something; she looked so young, but had the large breasts and the largish stomach of a woman with a very young baby, and her crying was like that of a woman so tired she couldn’t care for much of anything, a wet and sloppy crying that had seemed out of place in the neat bare office with its adding machines and typewriters.
Gertie was halfway home before she remembered she had planned to walk to the closest big store, almost a mile away, and buy a beef heart and some pork liver. Zadkiewicz sometimes had such, but the big store was always cheaper on everything; it could afford to be; it never gave credit, never delivered, never waited on a body like Zedke.
She turned about and walked more slowly, holding the basket well out from her body so that the dolls would show. She lingered a moment by the tavern and bowling alley; there would be money in such a place. People came and went, but nobody noticed the dolls.
The big store, as always, made her head whirl; so many, many things in packages, but it wasn’t easy to tell what was behind the pretty pictures, and she thought of the money she’d wasted, letting herself be fooled by the pretty pictures. Today, though she rolled a cart slowly up and down the aisles, looking, she bought none of the packaged things. She bought only the beef heart, too big, with the little fat on it yellow like from an old cow; she knew it would be tough and that it wasn’t fresh, but it was the only one left. The pork liver was all gone, but she did buy two loaves of bread from the day-old pile—half price. Sixty-eight cents, the machine said, and then the tax; with the tax money she could have bought—What could she have bought? A sucker each for Enoch and Amos, but had there been no tax she wouldn’t have bought the suckers anyway.
She walked slowly home, swinging one of the dolls, jumping it at times. She hesitated where the path turned into the vacant land; she ought to walk on the sidewalk where people could see the swinging doll, but the walk alone through the swamp would be nice. The brush was leafless now, blighted by frost and smoke, for it was getting deep into November, and rent day close again. Clovis had kept the six dollars he’d earned; he had to have the money for gas to hunt a job.
Lingering among the leafless willows and the tin cans, she told herself that she was tired, just taking her time, resting herself with a few smoky twigs between her and the sky. She wasn’t staying away because it was Joe’s day to come into the alley. There was in her pocket enough for the rent and enough to pay him. The boy would be there, weighing vegetables, smiling at the customers. Two times now the truck had been by since the night Clovis had borrowed her knife to sharpen a pencil, and she had got so worked up she couldn’t sleep. Wasn’t that silly.
She hadn’t seen Joe’s nephew since that night; he was there, of course; she just hadn’t looked real close. If Joe had not already gone by the time she got home, she’d buy some little squashes from him—they were cheap.
Still, she took her time, and tried hard to think of nothing; but her feet kept coming under her glance, and gradually she fell to thinking of her shoes; she couldn’t buy new shoes—not now. But soon as the weather got bad, she could wear the high boots; they’d cover her shoes, and the holes in her stockings, too.
A child screamed, “Scab, scab,” and seemed like all at once a million little youngens, some smaller than Amos, were all around her. One swung onto the basket, two had her coattail, while half a dozen, looked like, jumped up and down in front of her, all pulling, pretending great anger, but many helpless with laughter, unable to cry with the others: “Scab, Scab. You’ve crossed a pickut line!”
She stopped, realizing that instead of the vacant land she walked through a corner of the project, and that she had got into a game the children played. “I didn’t see no signs,” she said, smiling. Cassie would have loved such a game.
“Yu gotta walk over there; yu’ve crossed u pickut line,” one, a little bigger than Amos, said. Another, slyly smiling, pointed to the empty air above the sticks he and the others carried that looked suspiciously like the missing slats from her fence. “Can’tcha read, lady? Don’tcha see our signs, these great big signs?” he asked; then, giggling, he pointed to the empty sticks and “read,” “Strike. Keep off,” and lastly in a very loud voice the sign above his own shoulder, “Ole man Flint is mean.”
She nodded. “It’s a fine big sign,” she said, “only Mr. Flint, he’s dead.”
“Quitcha kidden,” the child said, and she walked on.
If she’d only spent a minute longer with the children, Joe would have been gone. She didn’t honestly need squash, but he might think it funny if she paid him off and didn’t buy anything. He looked old, she thought, like John after he sold his timber. He did not even say “Nice,” as he held out three oranges for Mrs. Miller’s inspection.
Mrs. Miller nodded briefly over the oranges, her glance fixed mostly on the inside of the truck. “I’ll take um,” she said, “an three pounds a sweet taters.” She was silent while Joe climbed into the tuck and got the sweet potatoes, but when he had finished with her and was making change, she asked, “Where’s yu nephew, Joe?”
“California,” Joe said, turning to Gertie.
“He leftcha, huh?” Mrs. Miller asked, “after yu smug—got him over here, an taught him th fruit business. But,” she went on, as Joe held out a handful of the cheap little Irish potatoes for Gertie’s inspection, “people has allatime got tu be on the go, looks like.” She glanced at Gertie. “I reckon you know th Millers is leaven—early in th mornen.”
Gertie nodded, and the woman hurried away. Gertie’s wistful eyes followed her. Such luck the woman had had—all her children and ten thousand dollars. Her eyes dropped at last to the potatoes over which Joe was sing-songing, “Potatoes, cheap today.”
She shook her head, and bought only three little acorn squash, fifteen cents. She held out the one dollar bill and the change. “I better pay you,” she said. “I hate bein in debt.”
He studied her, not taking the money. “Credit’s good,” he said.
“I hate debts,” she said.
He considered, his glance falling below the outstretched money down to her shoes; there, it stopped an instant, then wandered up again to the basket on her arm. “How much?” he asked.
She had forgotten the dolls. She wanted only to pay him, to get away from the truck that, crammed as it was with baskets and crates of fruits and vegetables, still seemed empty. “Oh,” she said at last, “th dolls—why, two-fifty I’ve been gitten.”
He pulled out the greasy black book, counted, nodded over the squash, then reached into his pocket. He dropped a dollar bill, a quarter, a dime, and a penny into her lax cupped hand. “But yu credit’s good,” he said, and picked up a doll.
THIRTY-NINE
THE DAYS TICKED BY: Sunday—a nickel apiece for the children to take to Sunday school, money that came from Clytie and Enoch. Monday—the first rent day; she waited in line, gripping the two tens, the two fives with sweaty fingers. Ahead of her a woman paid for two weeks only. She considered—it would be good to have sixteen dollars for two weeks in her pocket—but suppose she lost it, or one of the youngens took bad sick and she had to have a doctor. Victor, somebody, would maybe let her have doctor money, but rent money was different; she fished slowly in her coat pocket and brought out the rest—the ones, the fifty-cent piece.
She paid and came away; there was still $1.36 in her pocket. Clovis was going to try for credit in one of the stores that sold clothing on time. Enoch had to have shoes, and Clytie, boots; any day now the weather could turn cold and snowy like last year when they came.
Clovis, working on another sanding gadget, looked quickly at her bleak face, and then away. “Look, Gert, it could be worse. When it’s all over I still won’t be in so deep as a heap. Whit an Sophronie, ’tween his pin setten an her unemployment money, they’re a keepen th rent paid, but they’re in debt fer most a th grub they’ve had since th changeover, an fer ever stitch a clothes they’ve hadda buy fer their youngens since school started.”
“But, look how they’ve wasted their money,” Gertie said, “all that beer fer Whit an cigarettes fer th two uv um, an her never a sewen a stitch, an—”
“So what?” Clovis interrupted, angry, more trigger-tempered lately than he had ever been. “Supposen they had a saved ever cent they could, never a penny fer cigarettes er beer. How long would it ha lasted now, through th changeover an a big strike like this? Th danged company called him back and let him work jist long enough to lose his unemployment; they done a heap that way, figeren a strike might maybe come.”
Gertie flicked a speck of dust from a shoulder of the man in the wood. She looked hard at Clovis, opened her mouth, then shut it. Why wouldn’t he speak first? He knew what he had to do. “Clovis, you’ll have tu see about gitten credit at a drygoods store; th youngens jist has tu have clothes if they stay in school.” She’d brought out all the words in a loud, breathless rush that, when ended, left the room strangely still.
Clovis bent his head over the contraption, and did not answer. She waited, and he turned to her at last. His hand came up to the scar; he noticed, frowned angrily, and dropped his hand. “Yeah,” he said. “I’ll git some—something to do. Th last two places where I asked about work—fillen station was one—they ast me had I been in a fight. Seems like now—with the war over, I mean—they look at a man mighty close.”
“But we need credit now,” she insisted. “An them ads in th paper, they claimed a factory worker didn’t need nothen but his badge to git credit.”
“Mebbe not,” he said, measuring sandpaper against the wheel. “I’m—I was behind in my car payments—jist five more an I’ll be out—that went—woulda—gone agin me asken fer credit, but I’m pretty certain I can git credit—now.”
“Now?”
He nodded, but would not meet her glance. “It ain’t like back home, Gert. They won’t wait if you git overdue on a car. I’ve heared a two strikers that had a let their cars go—company come an took em right out a th parken places beside their houses; they wasn’t a thing they could do. I knowed they’d want mine; it’s about paid fer an it runs good an—Oh, heck, Miller let
His voice trailed away. She tried to make him meet her eyes, but he would not, and sat guiltily with hung head as she said, “You’ve tried fer credit—an couldn’t git it, Clovis.”
He mumbled something at last about “th danged ads that lied,” but she never answered. She had suddenly begun working on a fold of the cloth where it lay above a forearm. Clovis after a while began talking again, and kept on talking and talking as if to kill his thoughts, mostly it was about the Meanwells: when times started getting good at the beginning of the war, they’d had nothing but debts and three little youngens; they couldn’t get credit, and were living in one furnished room on Grand River; but look at them now; their car paid for and plenty good enough for a down payment on a lot newer car, most of their furniture paid off, more clothes than they had ever had, plenty of credit, even credit with a doctor.
He ran out of words, and they had been for a long time silent, working, when someone knocked. She hurried to open the door—maybe it was a woman with a big ironing. It was, however, only a little Daly, asking if Mr. Nevels couldn’t come fix his mother’s washing machine; it wouldn’t work at all. Clovis hesitated, looking at Gertie, his hand jerking toward the scar. “They wouldn’t be any money in it,” he whispered, “and she’d be nosen around like them I ast fer jobs.”
“It’s him that’s the nosey one, an he ain’t home,” Gertie said; and Clovis crammed his hat low on his head and went, taking Amos, who had heard the knocking and wanted to see his daddy fix the machine.
Gertie continued to work on the block of wood; but the fold of cloth could not drive the boy away, for when she was alone he came between her and all the rest of the world—even trouble. Of course the boy was in California. Clovis was just jumpy from that fight, and worrying about money was why he seemed so afraid; he wasn’t afraid. He drove around town often—after dark; tomorrow or some time he was going to another tinkering job.