“Poor unfortunate one, he is a man born to be laughed at. Some people pity him, but most of them just laugh at him. And laughter stabs that Tall Bob Smoke.
“Maybe you remember that time in the parade when he carried the flag. Very straight Bob sat, on a big white horse. Right in front of the place where the judges sat that big stupid horse fainted from the heat. Bob went flying right over that horse’s head, and the flag sailed through the air like a spear and stuck in the ground, upside down.
“That is how it is with him. Whenever he tries to be a great man, something happens and everybody laughs. You remember when he was poundmaster he tried all afternoon to lasso a dog. Everybody in town came to see. He threw the rope and the dog squatted down and the rope slipped off and the dog ran away. Oh, the people laughed. Bob was so ashamed that he thought, ‘I will kill myself, and then people will be sad. They will be sorry they laughed.’ And then he thought, ‘But I will be dead. I will not know how sorry they are.’ So he made this plan, ‘I will wait until I hear someone coming to my room. I will point a pistol at my head. Then that friend will argue with me. He will make me promise not to shoot myself. The people will be sorry then that they drove me to kill myself.’ That is the way he thought it.
“So he walked home to his little house, and everybody he passed called out, ‘Did you catch the dog, Bob?’ He was very sad when he got home. He took a pistol and put cartridges in it, and then he sat down and waited for someone to come.
“He planned how it would be, and he practiced it with a pistol. The friend would say, ‘Ai, what you doing? Don’t shoot yourself, poor fellow.’ Then Bob would say how he didn’t want to live any more because everyone was so mean.
“He thought about it over and over, but no one came. And the next day he waited, and no one came. But that [117] next night Charlie Meeler came. Bob heard him on the porch and put the pistol to his head. And he cocked it to make it look more real. ‘Now he will argue with me, and I will let him persuade me,’ Bob thought.
“Charlie Meeler opened the door. He saw Bob holding that pistol to his head. But he did not shout; no, Charlie Meeler jumped and grabbed that gun and that gun went off and shot away the end of Bob’s nose. And then the people laughed even more. There were pieces in the paper about it. The whole town laughed.
“You have all seen Bob’s nose, with the end shot off. The people laughed; but it was a hard kind of laughing, and they felt bad to laugh. And ever since then they let Tall Bob carry the flag in every parade there is. And the city bought him a net to catch dogs with.
“But he is not a happy man, with his nose like that.” Pablo fell silent and picked up a stick from the porch and whipped his leg a little.
“I remember his nose, how it was,” said Danny. “He is not a bad one, that Bob. The Pirate can tell you when he gets back. Sometimes the Pirate puts all his dogs in Bob’s wagon and then the people think Bob has caught them, and the people say, ‘There is a poundman for you.’ It is not so easy to catch dogs when it is your business to catch dogs.”
Jesus Maria had been brooding, with his head back against the wall. He observed, “It is worse than whipping to be laughed at. Old Tomas, the rag sucker, was laughed right into his grave. And afterward the people were sorry theylaughed.
“And,” said Jesus Maria, “there is another kind of laughing too. That story of Tall Bob is funny; but when you open your mouth to laugh, something like a hand squeezes your heart. I know about old Mr. Ravanno who hanged himself last year. And there is a funny story too, but it is not pleasant to laugh at.”
“I heard something about it,” said Pilon, “but I do not know that story.”
“Well,” said Jesus Maria. “I will tell you that story, and you will see if you can laugh. When I was a little boy, I played games with Petey Ravanno. A good quick little boy, [118] that Petey, but always in trouble. He had two brothers and four sisters, and there was his father, Old Pete. All that family is gone now. One brother is in San Quentin, the other was killed by a Japanese gardener for stealing a wagonload of watermelons. And the girls, well, you know how girls are; they went away. Susy is in Old Jenny’s house in Salinas right now.
“So there was only Petey and the old man left. Petey grew up, and always he was in trouble. He went to reform school for a while, then he came back. Every Saturday he was drunk, and every time he went to jail until Monday. His father was a kind of a friendly man. He got drunk every week with Petey. Nearly always they were in jail together. Old man Ravanno was lonely when Petey was not there with him. He liked that boy Petey. Whatever Petey did, that old man did, even when he was sixty years old.
“Maybe you remember that Gracie Montez?” Jesus Maria asked. “She was not a very good girl. When she was only twelve years old the fleet came to Monterey, and Gracie had her first baby, so young as that. She was pretty, you see, and quick, and her tongue was sharp. Always she seemed to run away from men, and men ran fast after her. And sometimes they caught her. But you could not get close to her. Always that Gracie seemed to have something nice that she did not give to you, something in back of her eyes that said, ‘If I really wanted to, I would be different to you from any woman you ever knew.’
“I know about that,” said Jesus Maria, “for I ran after Gracie too. And Petey ran after her. Only Petey was different.” Jesus Maria looked sharply into his friends’ eyes to emphasize his point.
“Petey wanted what Gracie had so much that he grew thin, and his eyes were as wide and pained as the eyes of one who smokes marihuana. Petey could not eat, and he was sick. Old Man Ravanno went over and talked to Gracie. He said, ‘If you are not nice to Petey, he will die.’ But she only laughed. She was not a very good one. And then her little sister ‘Tonia came into the room. ‘Tonia was fourteen years old. The old man looked at her and his [119] breath stopped. ‘Tonia was like Gracie, with that funny thing that she kept away from men. Old Man Ravanno could not help it. He said, ‘Come to me, little girl.’ But ‘Tonia was not a little girl. She knew. So she laughed and ran out of the room.
“Old Man Ravanno went home then. Petey said, ‘Something is the matter with thee, my father.’
“’No, Petey,’ the old man said, ‘only I worry that you do not get this Gracie, so you can be well again.’
“Hot-blooded, all those Ravannos were!
“And then what do you think?” Jesus Maria continued. “Petey went to cut squids for Chin Kee, and he made presents to Gracie, big bottles of Agua Florida and ribbons and garters. He paid to have her picture taken, with colors on the picture too.
“Gracie took all the presents and she ran away from him and laughed. You should have heard how she laughed. It made you want to choke her and pet her at the same time. It made you want to cut her open and get that thing that was inside of her. I know how it was. I ran after her, and Petey told me too. But it made Petey crazy. He could not sleep any more. He said to me, ‘If that Gracie will marry me in the church, then she will not dare to run away any more, because she will be married, and it will be a sin to run away.’ So he asked her. She laughed that high laugh that made you want to choke her.
“Oh! Petey was crazy. He went home and put a rope over a rafter and he stood on a box and put the rope around his neck and then he kicked out the box. Well, Petey’s father came in then. He cut the rope and called the doctor. But it was two hours before Petey opened his eyes, and it was four days before he could talk.”