A clinking obbligato by the cash registers. The poor are buying gifts.
This garish froth of merchandise is the back ground of their luxuries.
This noisy puzzle-picture store is their horn of plenty. A sad thought and
we'll dismiss it. What we want is plot.
Perhaps the jazz-song booster singing out of the side of his mouth with
tired eyes leering at the crowd of girls: "Won't You Let Me Love You If I
Promise to Be Good?" And "Love Me, Turtle Dove." And "Lovin' Looie." And
"The Lovin' Blues."
All lovin'. Jazz songs, ballads, sad, silly, boobish nut songs—all about love me—love me. All about stars and kisses, moonlight and "she took my man away." There are telephones all over the walls and the song booster's voice pops out over the salted-peanut section, over the safety-pin and brassware section. A tinny, nasal voice with a whine and a hoarseness almost hiding the words.
The cash registers clink, clink. "Are you waited on, madam? Five cents a package, madam." The crowds, tired eyed, shabbily dressed, bundle-laden, young, old—the crowds shuffle up and down, staring at gewgaws, and the love-me love songs follow them around. Follow them to the loose-bead counter where Madge with her Japanese puffs of hair, her wad of gum and her black shirtwaist that she keeps straightening out continually by drawing up her bosom and pressing down on her hips with her hands—where Madge holds forth.
Tum tum tum tum taaaa-tum—halto! Here is our plot. Outside the pizzicato of the crowds, the Great City, shining, dragon-eyed, through the mist—the City That Has No Heart. And here under our nose, twinkling up at our eyes, a huge tray full of 10-cent wedding rings. End of Act One.
Act Two, now—Madge, the sharp-tongued, weary-eyed young woman behind the counter. Love-me love songs in her ear and people unraveling, faces unraveling before her. Who buys these wedding rings, Madge? And did you ever notice anything odd about your customers? And why do you suppose they buy ten-cent wedding rings, Madge?
"Just a moment," says Madge. "What is it, miss? A ring? What kind? Oh, yes. Ten cents. Gold or platinum just the same. Yes."
Two giggling girls move off. And Madge, chewing gently on her wad of gum and smoothing her huge hair puffs out with the coyly stiffened palms of her hands, talks.
"Sure, I get you. About the wedding rings. Sure, that's easy. We sell about twenty or thirty of them every day. Oh, mostly to kids—girls and boys. Sometimes an old Johnny comes in with a moth-eaten fur collar and blows a dime for a wedding ring. But mostly girls.
"I sometimes take a second look at them. They usually giggle when they ask for the ring. And they usually pretend it's for somebody as a joke they're buying it. Or sometimes they walk around the counter for a half hour and get me nervous as a cat. 'Cause I know what they want and they can't get their gall up to come and ask for it. But finally they make the break and come up and pick out a ring without saying a word and hand over ten cents.