Confederacy of Dunces, A - John Kennedy Toole [60]
“You want another beer?”
Jones looked at the old man through his sunglasses and said, “You tryina sell me another beer, a poor color boy bustin his ass for twenny dollar a week? I think i’ about time you gimme a free beer with all the money you make sellin pickle meat and sof drink to po color peoples. You sen you boy to college with the money you been makin in here.”
“He a schoolteacher now,” Mr. Watson said proudly, opening a beer.
“Ain that fine. Whoa! I never go to school more than two year in my life. My momma out washing other people clothin, ain nobody talkin about school. I spen all my time rollin tire aroun the street. I’m rollin, momma washin, nobody learnin nothin. Shit! Who lookin for a tire roller to give them a job? I end up gainfully employ workin with a bird, got a boss probly sellin Spanish fly to orphan. Ooo-wee.”
“Well, if conditions really bad…”
“‘Really bad’? Hey! I’m workin in modren slavery. If I quit, I get report for bein vagran. If I stay, I’m gainfully employ on a salary ain even startin to be a minimal wage.”
“I tell you what you can do,” Mr. Watson said confidentially; leaning over the bar and handing Jones the beer. The other man at the bar bent toward them to listen; he had been silently following their conversation for several minutes. “You try you a little sabotage. That’s the only way you fight that kinda trap.”
“Wha you mean ‘sabotage’?”
“You know, man,” Mr. Watson whispered. “Like the maid ain bein paid enough to throw too much pepper in the soup by accident. Like the parkin lot attendant takin too much crap skid on some oil and crash a car into the fence.”
“Whoa!” Jones said. “Like the boy workin in the supermarket suddenly get slippery fingers and drop a dozen aigs on the floor cause he ain been pay overtime. Hey!”
“Now you got it.”
“We really plannin big sabotage,” the other man at the bar said, breaking his silence. “We havin a big demonstration where I work.”
“Yeah?” Jones asked. “Where?”
“At Levy Pant. We got this big old white man comin in the factory tellin us he like to drop a atom bum on top the company.”
“It sound like you peoples having more than sabotage,” Jones said. “It sound like you havin a war.”
“Be nice, be respectful,” Mr. Watson told the stranger.
The man chuckled until his eyes filled with tears and he said, “This man say he prayin for the mulattas and the rats all over the world.”
“Rats? Whoa! You peoples got a one-hunner-percen freak on your hand.”
“He very smart,” the man said defensively. “He very religious, too. He built him a big cross right in the office.”
“Whoa!”
“He say, ‘You peoples all be happier in the middle age. You peoples gotta get you a cannon and some arrows, drop a nucular bum on top this place.’” The man laughed again. “We ain’t got nothin better to do in that factory. He always interestin to listen to when he flappin his big moustache. He gonna lead us in a big demonstration he say make all the other demonstration look like a ladies’ social.”
“Yeah, and it sound like he gonna lead you peoples right into jail,” Jones said, covering the bar with some more smoke. “He sound like a crazy white mother.”
“He kinda strange,” the man admitted. “But he work right in that office, and the manager in there, Mr. Gonzala, he think this guy pretty sharp. He let him do whatever he want. He even let him come back in the factory any time this guy want to. Plenty peoples ready to do demonstrate with him. He tell us he got permission from Mr. Levy hisself to have a demonstration, tell us Mr. Levy want us to demonstrate and get rid of Gonzala. Who know? Maybe they raise our wage. That Mr. Gonzala afred of him already.”
“Tell me, man, what this white savior cat look like?” Jones asked with interest.
“He big and fat, got him a huntin cap he wearin all the time.”
Jones’s eyes widened behind his glasses.
“This huntin cap green? He got him a green cap?”
“Yeah. How you know that?”
“Whoa!” Jones said. “You peoples in plenty trouble. A po-lice already lookin for that freak. He come in the Night of Joy one night, star tellin this