“How much?”
“For this one, fourteen dollars.” It was not a price so much as an endeavor to find out how much Danny had. And Danny wanted it, for it was large and shiny. No woman of Tortilla Flat had one. In this moment he forgot there was no electricity on Tortilla Flat. He laid his two dollars on the counter and waited while the explosion took place; the fury, the rage, the sadness, the poverty, the ruin, the cheating. The polish was invoked, the color of the bag, the extra long cord, the value of the metal alone. And when it was all over, Danny went out carrying the vacuum-cleaner.
Often as a pasatiempo in the afternoon, Sweets brought out the vacuum-cleaner and leaned it against a chair. While her friends looked on, she pushed it back and forth to show how easily it rolled. And she made a humming with her voice to imitate a motor.
“My friend is a rich man,” she said. “I think pretty soon there will be wires full of electricity coming right into the house, and then zip and zip and zip! And you have the house clean!”
Her friends tried to belittle the present, saying, “It is too bad you can’t run this machine.” And, “I have always held that a broom and dust-pan, properly used, are more thorough.”
But their envy could do nothing against the vacuum. Through its possession Sweets climbed to the peak of the social scale of Tortilla Flat. People who did not remember her name referred to her as “that one with the sweeping-machine.” Often when her enemies passed the house, [76] Sweets could be seen through the window, pushing the cleaner back and forth, while a loud humming came from her throat. Indeed, after she had swept her house every day, she pushed the cleaner about on the theory that of course it would clean better with electricity but one could not have everything.
She excited envy in many houses. Her manner became dignified and gracious, and she held her chin high as befitted one who had a sweeping-machine. In her conversation she included it. “Ramon passed this morning while I was pushing the sweeping-machine”; “Louise Meater cut her hand this morning, not three hours after I had been pushing the sweeping-machine.”
But in her elevation she did not neglect Danny. Her voice growled with emotion when he was about. She swayed like a pine tree in the wind. And he spent every evening at the house of Sweets.
At first his friends ignored his absence, for it is the right of every man to have these little affairs. But as the weeks went on, and as a rather violent domestic life began to make Danny listless and pale, his friends became convinced that Sweets’ gratitude for the sweeping-machine was not to Danny’s best physical interests. They were jealous of a situation that was holding his attention so long.
Pilon and Pablo and Jesus Maria Corcoran in turn assaulted the nest of his affections during his absence; but Sweets, while she was sensible of the compliment, remained true to the man who had raised her position to such a gratifying level. She tried to keep their friendship for a future time of need, for she knew how fickle fortune is; but she stoutly refused to share with Danny’s friends that which was dedicated for the time being to Danny.
Wherefore the friends, in despair, organized a group, formed for and dedicated to her destruction.
It may be that Danny, deep in his soul, was beginning to tire of Sweets’ affection and the duty of attendance it demanded. If such a change were taking place, he did not admit it to himself.
At three o’clock one afternoon Pilon and Pablo and Jesus Maria, followed vaguely by Big Joe Portagee, returned triumphant from three-quarters of a day of [77] strenuous effort. Their campaign had called into play and taxed to the limit the pitiless logic of Pilon, the artistic ingenuousness of Pablo, and the gentleness and humanity of Jesus Maria Corcoran. Big Joe had contributed nothing.
But now, like four hunters, they returned from the chase more happy because their victory had been a difficult one. And in Monterey a poor puzzled Italian came gradually to the conviction that he had been swindled.
Pilon carried a gallon jug of wine concealed in a bundle of ivy. They marched joyfully into Danny’s house, and Pilon set the gallon on the table.
Danny, awakened out of a sound sleep, smiled quietly, got up from bed, and laid out the fruit jars. He poured the wine. His four friends fell into chairs, for it had been an exhausting day.
They drank quietly in the late afternoon, that time of curious intermission. Nearly everyone in Tortilla Flat stops then and considers those things that have taken place in the day just past, and thinks over the possibilities of the evening. There are many things to discuss in an afternoon.
“Cornelia Ruiz got a new man this morning,” Pilon observed. “He has a bald head. His name is Kilpatrick. Cornelia says her other man didn’t come home three nights last week. She didn’t like that.”
“Cornelia is a woman who changes her mind too quickly,” said Danny. He thought complacently of his own sure establishment, built on the rock of the vacuum-cleaner.
“Cornelia’s father was worse,” said Pablo. “He could not tell the truth. Once he borrowed a dollar from me. I have told Cornelia about it, and she does nothing.”
“Two of one blood. ‘Know the breed and know the dog,”’ Pilon quoted virtuously.
Danny poured the jars full of wine again, and the gallon was exhausted. He looked ruefully at it.
Jesus Maria, that lover of the humanities, spoke up quietly. “I saw Susie Francisco, Pilon. She said the recipe worked fine. She has been out riding with Charlie Guzman on his motorcycle three times. The first two times she gave him the love medicine it made him sick. She thought it was no good. But now Susie says you can have some cookies any time.”
[78] “What was in that potion?” Pablo asked.
Pilon became secretive. “I cannot tell all of it. I guess it must have been the poison oak in it that made Charlie Guzman sick.”
The gallon of wine had gone too quickly. Each of the six friends was conscious of a thirst so sharp that it was a pain of desire. Pilon looked at his friends with drooped eyes, and they looked back at him. The conspiracy was ready.
Pilon cleared his throat. “What hast thou done, Danny, to set the whole town laughing at thee?”
Danny looked worried. “What do you mean?”
Pilon chuckled. “It is said by many that you bought a sweeping-machine for a lady, and that machine will not work unless wires are put into the house. Those wires cost a great deal of money. Some people find this present very funny.”
Danny grew uncomfortable. “That lady likes the sweeping-machine,” he said defensively.
“Why not?” Pablo agreed. “She has told some people that you have promised to put wires into her house so the sweeping-machine will work.”
Danny looked even more perturbed. “Did she say that?”
“So I was told.”
“Well, I will not,” Danny cried.
“If I did not think it funny, I should be angry to hear my friend laughed at,” Pilon observed.
“What will you do when she asks for those wires?” Jesus Maria asked.
“I will tell her ‘no,’ ” said Danny.
Pilon laughed. “I wish I could be there, It is not such a simple thing to tell that lady ‘no.’ ”
Danny felt that his friends were turning against him. “What shall I do?” he asked helplessly.
Pilon gave the matter his grave consideration and brought his realism to bear on the subject. “If that lady did not have the sweeping-machine, she would not want those wires,” he said.
The friends nodded in agreement. “Therefore,” Pilon continued, “the thing to do is to remove the sweeping-machine.”
[79] “Oh, she wouldn’t let me take it,” Danny protested.
“Then we will help you,” said Pilon. “I will take the machine, and in return you can take the lady a present of a gallon of wine. She will not even know where the sweeping-machine has gone.”
“Some neighbor will see you take it.”
“Oh, no,” said Pilon. “You stay here, Danny. I will get the machine.”
Danny sighed with relief that his problem was assumed by his good friends.
There were few things going on in Tortilla Flat that Pilon did not know. His mind made sharp little notes of everything that his eyes saw or his ears heard. He knew that Sweets went to the store at four-thirty every afternoon. He depended upon this almost invariable habit to put his plan into effect.
“It is better that you do not know anything about it,” he told Danny.
In the yard Pilon had a gunny sack in readiness. With his knife he cut a generous branch from the rose bush and pushed it into the sack.