The White Beard Summary

Herb and Talbot are two of Bukowski's fellow laborers, assigned to fruit picking near a disputed border in a foreign land. Life in the infirmary is even worse, so men who get sick get better fast. Nurses deliberately fart in patients' faces. Enormous Herb amuses himself by drilling holes in watermelons, masturbating, and making Talbot tearfully eat the mixture. Talbot used to teach high school algebra in the U.S. Herb is farts worse than the nurses, loudly, and nauseatingly. Talbot resolves to some night kill Herb with his own knife. He never has liked watermelon.

An unnamed girl of 13-14 joins them for lunch. She is a tiny body attached to enormous white breasts. She knows that they make the men hot. A bomb falls nearby and while Herb retrieves the fallen candle, Bukowski kisses and fondles the...