Listen, Jim, I heard that Chevvy’s rear end. Sounds like bustin’ bottles. Squirt in a couple quarts of sawdust. Put some in the gears, too. We got to move that lemon for thirty-five dollars. Bastard cheated me on that one. I offer ten an’ he jerks me to fifteen, an’ then the son-of-a-bitch took the tools out. God Almighty!
– John Steinbeck
The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 7. This entire chapter is about the theme of deception. It is a masterclass in how to cheat vulnerable families fleeing the Dust Bowl. Used car lot owners dupe desperate migrants into buying overpriced defective cars. A crooked business owner instructs his salesman to sell a "lemon" of a car with engine filled with sawdust to hide noisy transmissions.