Free Miss Lonelyhearts & the Day of the Locust by Nathanael West Page A

and anyway there was nothing much left in the house. But he pleaded with me for another chance so I thought seeing he is the father of my children I will and then he did more crazy things to many to write and I left him again. Four times we got together and four times I left. Please Miss Lonelyhearts believe me just for the childrens sake is the bunk and pardon me because I dont know how you are fixed but all I know is that in over three years I got $200 dollars from him altogether .
    About four months ago I handed him a warrant for his arrest for non support and he tore it up and left the house and I havent seen him since and as I had pneumonia and my little girl had the flu I was put in financial embarasment with the doctor and we had to go to the ward and when we came out of the hospital I had to ask the border to come to live with us again as he was a sure $15 dollars a week and if anything happened to me he would be there to take care of the children. But he tries to make me be bad and as there is nobody in the house when he comes home drunk on Saturday night I dont know what to do but so far I didnt let him. Where my husband is I dont know but I received a vile letter from him where he even accused his inocent children of things and sarcasticaly asked about the star boarder .
    Dear Miss Lonelyhearts please dont be angry at me for writing such a long letter and taking up so much of your time in reading it but if I ever write all the things which happened to me living with him it would fill a book and please forgive me for saying some nasty things as I had to give you an idea of what is going on in my home. Every woman is intitiled to a home isnt she? So Miss Lonelyhearts please put a few lines in your column when you refer to this letter so I will know you are helping me. Shall I take my husband back? How can I support my children?
    Thanking you for anything you can advise me in I remain your truly—
    Broad Shoulders
    P.S. Dear Miss Lonelyhearts dont think I am broad shouldered but that is the way I feel about life and me I mean .
    Miss Lonelyhearts and the Cripple
    Miss Lonelyhearts dodged Betty because she made him feel ridiculous. He was still trying to cling to his humility, and the farther he got below self-laughter, the easier it was for him to practice it. When Betty telephoned, he refused to answer and after he had twice failed to call her back, she left him alone.
    One day, about a week after he had returned from the country, Goldsmith asked him out for a drink. When he accepted, he made himself so humble that Goldsmith was frightened and almost suggested a doctor.
    They found Shrike in Delehanty’s and joined him at the bar. Goldsmith tried to whisper something to him about Miss Lonelyhearts’ condition, but he was drunk and refused to listen. He caught only part of what Goldsmith was trying to say.
    “I must differ with you, my good Goldsmith,” Shrike said. “Don’t call sick those who have faith. They are the well. It is you who are sick.”
    Goldsmith did not reply and Shrike turned to Miss Lonelyhearts. “Come, tell us, brother, how it was that you first came to believe. Was it music in a church, or the death of a loved one, or, mayhap, some wise old priest?”
    The familiar jokes no longer had any effect on Miss Lonelyhearts. He smiled at Shrike as the saints are supposed to have smiled at those about to martyr them.
    “Ah, but how stupid of me,” Shrike continued. “It was the letters, of course. Did I myself not say that the Miss Lonelyhearts are the priests of twentieth-century America?”
    Goldsmith laughed, and Shrike, in order to keep him laughing, used an old trick; he appeared to be offended. “Goldsmith, you are the nasty product of this unbelieving age. You cannot believe, you can only laugh. You take everything with a bag of salt and forget that salt is the enemy of fire as well as of ice. Be warned, the salt you use is not Attic salt, it is coarse butcher’s salt. It doesn’t