Nathanael West - The Day of the Locust [59]
Tod stood up. During the ten minutes he had been sitting on the wall, the crowd had grown thirty feet and he was afraid that his escape might be cut off if he loitered much longer. He crossed to the other side of the street and started back.
He was trying to figure what to do if he were unable to wake Homer when, suddenly he saw his head bobbing above the crowd. He hurried toward him. From his appearance, it was evident that there was something definitely wrong.
Homer walked more than ever like a badly made automaton and his features were set in a rigid, mechanical grin. He had his trousers on over his nightgown and part of it hung out of his open fly. In both of his hands were suitcases. With each step, he lurched to one side then the other, using the suitcases for balance weights.
Tod stopped directly in front of him, blocking his way. “Where’re you going?”
“Wayneville,” he replied, using an extraordinary amount of jaw movement to get out this single word.
“That’s fine. But you can’t walk to the station from here. It’s in Los Angeles.”
Homer tried to get around him, but he caught his arm. “We’ll get a taxi. I’ll go with you.”
The cabs were all being routed around the block because of the preview. He explained this to Homer and tried to get him to walk to the corner.
“Come on, we’re sure to get one on the next street.”
Once Tod got him into a cab, he intended to tell the driver to go to the nearest hospital. But Homer wouldn’t budge, no matter how hard he yanked and pleaded. People stopped to watch them, others turned their heads curiously. He decided to leave him and get a cab.
“I’ll come right back,” he said.
He couldn’t tell from either Homer’s eyes or expression whether he heard, for they both were empty of everything, even annoyance. At the corner he looked around and saw that Homer had started to cross the street, moving blindly. Brakes screeched and twice he was almost run over, but he didn’t swerve or hurry. He moved in a straight diagonal. When he reached the other curb, he tried to get on the sidewalk at a point where the crowd was very thick and was shoved violently back. He made another attempt and this time a policeman grabbed him by the back of the neck and hustled him to the end of the line. When the policeman let go of him, he kept on walking as though nothing had happened.
Tod tried to get over to him, but was unable to cross until the traffic lights changed. When he reached the other side, he found Homer sitting on a bench, fifty or sixty feet from the outskirts of the crowd.
He put his arm around Homer’s shoulder and suggested that they walk a few blocks further. When Homer didn’t answer, he reached over to pick up one of the valises. Homer held on to it.
“I’ll carry it for you,” he said, tugging gently.
“Thief!”
Before Homer could repeat the shout, he jumped away. It would be extremely embarrassing if Homer shouted thief in front of a cop. He thought of phoning for an ambulance. But then, after all, how could he be sure that Homer was crazy? He was sitting quietly on the bench, minding his own business.
Tod decided to wait, then try again to get him into a cab. The crowd was growing in size all the time, but it would be at least half an hour before it over-ran the bench. Before that happened, he would think of some plan. He moved a short distance away and stood with his back to a store window so that he could watch Homer without attracting attention.
About ten feet from where Homer was sitting grew a large eucalyptus tree and behind the trunk of ‘the tree was a little boy. Tod saw him peer around it with great caution, then suddenly jerk his head back. A minute later he repeated the maneuver. At first Tod thought he was playing hide and seek, then noticed that he had a string in his hand which was attached to an old purse that lay in front of Homer’s bench. Every once in a while the child would jerk the string, making the purse hop like a sluggish toad. Its torn lining hung from its iron mouth like a furry tongue and a few uncertain flies hovered over it.