Chapter 3 Summary

Arturo feasts on fruit, buying fifteen or twenty oranges from a Japanese fruit vendor for a nickel. At one point he actually thinks he is getting fat from them. His writer's block is so severe that he prays to St. Teresa for an idea; he feels deserted and unloved, even by the resident mouse. Arturo thinks he is the most miserable, grief stricken creature on earth on one hand, and on the other, is arrogant enough to call himself a courageous, starved genius. He vacillates between his feelings for himself, all of them extreme.

Mr. Hellfrick, Arturo's neighbor, is an atheist, an alcoholic and an army veteran. Hellfrick, who has not paid the fifteen cents he has owed Arturo for a long time, comes with a plan. He tells Arturo how he can steal some milk from the back of a friend's milk...