horror-stricken, and she put her arms around my knees and hugged me to her, hiding that crippled little foot, until I could endure it no longer, and with a shout I fell upon her and joyfully admitted my weakness while around me rose the rumble of a mob which gradually faded into a bleak oblivion.
And so it was. So it was that one by one I picked them up, remembered them, kissed them good-bye, and tore them to pieces. Some were reluctant to be destroyed, calling in pitiful voices from the misty depths of those vast places where we loved in weird half-dreams, the echoes of their pleas lost in the shadowed darkness of that which was Arturo Bandini as he sat comfortably in a cool bathtub and enjoyed the departure of things which once were, yet never were, really.
But there was one in particular which I was loath to destroy. She alone caused me to hesitate. She it was whom I had named the Little Girl. She it seemed was always that woman of a certain murder case in San Diego; she had killed her husband with a knife and laughingly admitted the crime to the police. I used to meet her in the rough squalor of early Los Angeles before the days of the Gold Rush. She was very cynical for a little girl, and very cruel. The picture I had cut from the detective magazine left nothing to imagine. Yet she wasn't a little girl at all. I merely called her that. She was a woman who hated the sight of me, the touch of me, yet found me irresistible, cursing me, yet loving me fabulously. And I would see her in a dark mud-thatched hut with the windows darkened, the heat of the town driving all the natives to sleep so that not a soul stirred in the streets of that early day of Los Angeles, and lying on a cot she would be, panting and cursing me as my feet sounded upon the deserted street and finally at her door. The knife in her hand would amuse me and make me smile, and so would her hideous screams.
I was such a devil. Then my smile would leave her helpless, the hand that held the knife finally growing limp, the knife falling to the floor, and she cringing in horror and hate, yet wild with love. So she was the Little Girl, and of them all she was easily my favorite. I regretted destroying her. For a long time I deliberated, because I knew she would find relief and surcease from me once I destroyed her, because then I could no longer harass her like a devil, and possess her with contemptible laughter. But the Little Girl's destiny was sealed. I could play no favorites. I tore the Little Girl to pieces like the others.
When the last had been destroyed the pieces blanketed the surface of the water, and the water was invisible beneath. Sadly I stirred it up. The water was a blackish color of fading ink. It was finished. The show was over. I was glad I had made this bold step and put them away all at once. I congratulated myself for having such strength of Purpose, such ability to see a job through to the end. In the face of sentimentality I had gone ruthlessly forward. I was a hero, and my deed was not to be sneered at. I stood up and looked at them before I pulled the plug. Little pieces of departed love. Down the sewer with the romances Arturo Bandini! Go down to the sea! Be off on your journey down the drain to the land of dead crabs. Bandini had spoken. Pull the chain!
And it was done. I stood with water dripping from me and saluted.
"Goodbye," I said. "Farewell, ye women. They laughed at me down at the cannery today, and it was the fault of ye, for ye hath poisoned my mind and made me helpless against the onslaught of life. Now ye are dead. Goodbye and goodbye forever. He who maketh a sap of Arturo Bandini, be he man or woman, cometh to an untimely end. I have spoken. Amen."
Chapter Thirteen
ASLEEP OR AWAKE, it did not matter, I hated the cannery, and I always smelled like a basket of mackerel. It never left me, that stench of a dead horse at the edge of the road. It followed me in the streets. It went with me into buildings. When
And so it was. So it was that one by one I picked them up, remembered them, kissed them good-bye, and tore them to pieces. Some were reluctant to be destroyed, calling in pitiful voices from the misty depths of those vast places where we loved in weird half-dreams, the echoes of their pleas lost in the shadowed darkness of that which was Arturo Bandini as he sat comfortably in a cool bathtub and enjoyed the departure of things which once were, yet never were, really.
But there was one in particular which I was loath to destroy. She alone caused me to hesitate. She it was whom I had named the Little Girl. She it seemed was always that woman of a certain murder case in San Diego; she had killed her husband with a knife and laughingly admitted the crime to the police. I used to meet her in the rough squalor of early Los Angeles before the days of the Gold Rush. She was very cynical for a little girl, and very cruel. The picture I had cut from the detective magazine left nothing to imagine. Yet she wasn't a little girl at all. I merely called her that. She was a woman who hated the sight of me, the touch of me, yet found me irresistible, cursing me, yet loving me fabulously. And I would see her in a dark mud-thatched hut with the windows darkened, the heat of the town driving all the natives to sleep so that not a soul stirred in the streets of that early day of Los Angeles, and lying on a cot she would be, panting and cursing me as my feet sounded upon the deserted street and finally at her door. The knife in her hand would amuse me and make me smile, and so would her hideous screams.
I was such a devil. Then my smile would leave her helpless, the hand that held the knife finally growing limp, the knife falling to the floor, and she cringing in horror and hate, yet wild with love. So she was the Little Girl, and of them all she was easily my favorite. I regretted destroying her. For a long time I deliberated, because I knew she would find relief and surcease from me once I destroyed her, because then I could no longer harass her like a devil, and possess her with contemptible laughter. But the Little Girl's destiny was sealed. I could play no favorites. I tore the Little Girl to pieces like the others.
When the last had been destroyed the pieces blanketed the surface of the water, and the water was invisible beneath. Sadly I stirred it up. The water was a blackish color of fading ink. It was finished. The show was over. I was glad I had made this bold step and put them away all at once. I congratulated myself for having such strength of Purpose, such ability to see a job through to the end. In the face of sentimentality I had gone ruthlessly forward. I was a hero, and my deed was not to be sneered at. I stood up and looked at them before I pulled the plug. Little pieces of departed love. Down the sewer with the romances Arturo Bandini! Go down to the sea! Be off on your journey down the drain to the land of dead crabs. Bandini had spoken. Pull the chain!
And it was done. I stood with water dripping from me and saluted.
"Goodbye," I said. "Farewell, ye women. They laughed at me down at the cannery today, and it was the fault of ye, for ye hath poisoned my mind and made me helpless against the onslaught of life. Now ye are dead. Goodbye and goodbye forever. He who maketh a sap of Arturo Bandini, be he man or woman, cometh to an untimely end. I have spoken. Amen."
Chapter Thirteen
ASLEEP OR AWAKE, it did not matter, I hated the cannery, and I always smelled like a basket of mackerel. It never left me, that stench of a dead horse at the edge of the road. It followed me in the streets. It went with me into buildings. When
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