Studs Lonigan (11 page)

The guys haw-hawed, and the girls giggled modestly after stating that Bill's language was not exactly nice.

They talked on, and wondered what they would do. Bill goofed Tubby, because Connell looked like a smoke, and Bill said that now Tubby was graduated, he shouldn't find no trouble becoming a Pullman porter. TB said that every time he saw Tubby he thought it would rain because of dark clouds all around. Tubby hock-hocked in imitation of Muggsy, and the girls said Tubby was too frightful for words.

Jim Clayburn went to the baby grand, and Bill said that they would now listen to Good Old Stick-To-It-Iveness. Jim played, and they crowded around, singing, but they couldn't get any harmony because Bill bellowed and Tubby and Muggsy tried to be funny. They sang
Alexander's Rag Time Band, The River Shannon Flowing, It's a Long Way to Tipperary, Dear Old Girl, Dance and Grow Thin,
and
Bell Brandon
. Then Jim started
In My Harem
. Bill got in the center of the floor and did a shocking hula-hula that was so funny they nearly split laughing; he sang:

Jim played
When It's Apple Blossom Time in Normandy
, and just as they started the chorus Bill goosed Tubby, and Studs did the same with TB. The two victims jumped, yelling ouch. It broke up the singing and everybody laughed. Bill asked Rastus where the ghosts were, and Tubby replied by calling Bill snake Irish, so low that he crawled in the mud. Studs said that trying to decide which was the worst, an Irishman or a jigg, was like shooting craps for stage money with loaded dice; and he was proud of his crack even if they didn't laugh.

“Let's dance!” Helen said, interrupting all the tomfoolery.

The fellows who knew how foxtrotted with the girls while Lucy played. Studs, TB and Weary stood in a corner whispering dirty jokes. When the others tired of dancing, they sat down; this time the fellows weren't all on one side of the room and the girls on the other. They talked some more, and wondered what they would do, and Bill kept the party going by his clowning. Martin wandered in, looking oh-so-darling, and the girls made a fuss trying to pet him. Tubby finally grabbed him and said:

“Let's fight, you little rascal!”

Martin biffed Tubby, and Bill said:

“The kid takes after his big brother, only he's got it on him with the dukes.”

Tubby then grabbed Martin again, and the child said:

“Lemme go, you boob!”

The guys clapped, and the girls were taken by his cuteness. Fran said it was the wrong way for Martin to take after his brother.

Lucy pulled Martin toward her, tied him with her arms, said he was just too darling for words; she kissed him.

“Yeah, he's got it on his brother all around. As a Romeo, he's got Studs backed off the boards,” Bill said.

Studs blushed and got exceedingly interested in the stale joke with which Tubby was laboring.

Martin fought free, and as he rushed out of the room he yelled back:

“I wish to hell you'd lemme 'lone!”

They laughed; Fran Lonigan frowned.

The conversation went on; everybody wondered what they would do. Lucy set them at ease by boldly suggesting wink. The girls blushed and giggled while they were getting into their places. But the game went off stiffly because there were too many boys. They changed to kiss-the-pillow. Everyone got into the spirit of the game, even Weary. He found it wasn't so goofy kissing girls. And Helen Borax acted like she might have a crush on him. He'd never thought much of her, except that she was the kind of a chicken who never tried to act her age and who seemed to think she was a queen. But it wasn't hard to kiss her. And Studs got gay because he was getting his chance to kiss Lucy, and he didn't have to keep his liking for her under cover. He told himself he liked her, and repeated this; he liked her around him, liked to look at her, liked her laugh, liked her near him, liked to think of doing things for her, suffering, fighting, playing football, defending her against demons and villains, and anybody.

As they played, Fran Lonigan said: “Gee, what would Sister Bernadette Marie, what would she say if she saw us now?”

“I wonder,” smiled Helen Borax.

“Particularly you girls. She'd expect it of me, because she always said I was only a chicken, anyway, and not serious like Helen and you girls,” Lucy said.

Helen colored.

Bill smiled broadly, and said that if Bertha knew about it she'd get jealous and wish that she'd been around to play. He said she joined the convent because she'd been disappointed in love, and maybe if she got the chance she'd get a crush on TB or Tubby.

“What do you mean she's been disappointed in love?” asked TB.

“Sure. She acts just like an old maid,” Bill said.

“But what I want to know is who'd love her?” asked TB.

They laughed, and the girls thought it was horrid.

Bill kept the floor and said he knew the old battleaxe would like to play. He said he'd show just how she would play. He put on a sour pan, hunched himself a trifle, the way she was hunched, talked shrilly and goofily, and dropped the pillow in front of Muggsy. He kissed Tubby, who blushed with embarrassment, and they nearly all split their sides laughing.

The game went on. Studs dropped the pillow, by accident, in front of Helen. They looked meanly at each other, and neither moved until everybody yelled at them to play the game square, so. they knelt down, each at an edge of the pillow, peck-kissed each other, and deepened their mutual hatred.

They changed to post-office. Tubby was suggested as postmaster, but Bill demanded the job, saying he was the logical person to examine all transactions. Fran Lonigan, as hostess, started the ball rolling. As she walked into the bedroom, right off the parlor entrance, Bill grabbed her, and kissed her; it was his tax. She laughed and didn't get angry. Fran called Dan. Dan kissed Bill on the way of entry. It was funny.

Dan called Fran Reilley, and kissed her. She called her brother. She stamped his toe, and ran out saying it was for a special delivery letter. He got sore, but she had gotten away too quickly. He told Bill to call Borax.

Weary kissed her flush on the mouth. He held her there, and when he finally released her, she sighed deeply.

He kissed her again, and she powerlessly tightened against him. He forced her to the bed.

“Stop touching me there. Stop!” she whispered.

When he paused, breathless, she demanded an apology.

“Shut up!” he muttered.

He bent down and kissed her.

“Unhand me, you cur. Take your hands off!” she whispered. “Take your hands off there, or I'll scream!”

He pulled her to him and kissed her. She became limp in his arms. He kissed her again, and she pressed to him. He loosed her. She called him a cur and demanded an apology.

“Shut up!”

She bit her lips, fought back tears, and said in a low, strained voice:

“Apologize!”

“Kiss me!”

She was a girl suddenly baffled by a woman's impulses.

She flung herself around him. Then he walked out.

Regaining her composure and rearranging herself, she called in Jim. In the parlor they looked at Weary, surprised and over-curious. There was a tight silence, which Bill broke by saying that Weary had received a delayed letter. They laughed, and Weary's frown broke into a smile.

Jim, in the meantime, had called in Lucy; and she called Studs. She pursed her lips before she kissed him. It was so sudden, and her lips had such a sweet, candy taste that he was pleasantly surprised and stood there, not knowing what to do or say. He had never kissed sweet lips like that before. He faced her, and she was something beautiful and fair, with her white dress vivid in the dark room. She looked beautiful, like a flame. She pursed her lips, moved closer to him, flung her arms around him, kissed him, and said:

“I like you!”

She kissed away his surprise, looked dreamily into his eyes, kissed him again, long, and then dashed out.

Jesus Christ! he said to himself.

The game went on. Studs and Lucy, Helen and Weary kept calling each other into the post office. All the guys except TB and Tubby got their share of kisses. Tubby was called a few times for charity's sake, but TB was left out in the cold. He sat in a corner, wisecracking as if he didn't mind. He knew he didn't belong there anyway. Probably he did have the con, as everybody said and believed.

After all the guests had departed, the Lonigans sat in the parlor talking.

“Well, I'm tired,” Lonigan said yawning.

“I'm dead tired,” said the mother.

“It was hard work,” said Lonigan.

“Isn't Mrs. Reilley common, though?” yawned Mrs. Lonigan.

“But she's a nice, good, wholesome, sincere woman,” said Lonigan.

“She's green,” the wife said.

“She's ignorant; she's a greenhorn,” said Frances.

“Frances!” the mother said.

“Well, she is!”

“But you needn't say so . . . so . . . crudely.”

“Anyway, she and her old man are pretty old-fashioned, but they are nice people. They are too nice for that boy of theirs. If he were my son, I'd lambast the stuffings out of him; he's a real bad actor,” Lonigan said.

“I'm afraid no good will ever come out of him, and I'm so glad William here is not like he is. Did you hear the way he talked to his mother and father, so disrespectful, saying he'd do what he wanted to, and he wouldn't go right home with them. William, I don't want you to have anything to do with him. He's a bad one. He'll probably end up in the penitentiary,” she said.

Studs admired Weary, his enemy. Weary's parents had told him to come home with them, and Weary had wanted to walk home with Helen Borax; there had been a row and he had walked off. Studs was almost impelled to defend Weary, but didn't, because then his old man might have talked all night.

“Well, it's a good thing he isn't my son, or he'd get the stuffings lambasted out of him. I'd knock some good sense in his head,” Lonigan said with finality.

“Mrs. Reilley uses awfully bad grammar, too,” Mrs. Lonigan said.

“Well, I'd rather have people use bad grammar than have 'em be smart alecks like Dinny Gorman. Why, I knew him when he didn't have a sole on his shoe; and then him stickin' up his nose and actin' like he was highbrow, lace-curtain Irish, born to the purple. And all just because he's got a little booklearnin' and he bootlicked around until he became a ward committeeman. Why, he was nothin' but a starvin' lawyer hangin' around police courts until Joe O'Reilley started sendin' some business his way. What is he now . . . nothin' but a shyster. Maybe he might have a little more booklearnin' than I, but what does that mean? Look here, now: Is he a better and more conscientious father? Does he pay his bills more regularly? Has he got a bigger bank account than I got?” said Lonigan in heated indignation while no one listened to him.

When the old man had finished orating, Studs said:

“All the kids call him High Collars!” The old man laughed.

“And the crust of May! Won't you come to tea, but do call first, as we have so many, oh, so many, social engagements these days!” Mrs. Lonigan said.

“She can't hold a spoon up to you with all her damn society airs,” Lonigan said.

“I know her kind. She's just like a cat, all soft and furry, and with claws that would scratch your eyes out,” the old lady said.

There was a pause in the conversation; Martin looked mischievously at Studs and said:

“Studs got long pants; Studs got long pants.”

“Shut up!”

The old lady reprimanded Martin for using the nickname, and the old man admonished Studs that he shouldn't talk like that to his brother.

“But I do think William looks darling,” teased Fran.

“You look pretty slick, Bill. Don't let 'em get your goat,” the old man said.

“Yes . . . so cute. Even Lucy Scanlan thought that he looked so . . . cute,” said Frances.

Studs gave his sister a dirty look; the old man tried to kid Studs about having a girl; Studs shut up tight as a clam.

“Now, children,” the mother conciliated.

“They're not just children any more,” the old man said.

“Yes, they are. They are, too. They're my children, my baby blue-eyed boy and my girl. They can't be taken from me, either,” the mother said, tenaciously.

The old man looked at Studs as much as to say: What can you do with a woman?

“Now, Mary, you know that people have to grow up,” the old man said.

“Dad!” Studs said hesitantly.

“Yes,” responded the old man.

“How about my workin' with you now, instead of goin' to school? You'll want me to sooner or later, and I might as well start now,” said Studs.

“Well . . . I'll have to think it over.”

“Why, William!” protested the mother.

They had a discussion. Mrs. Lonigan kept wondering out loud what the neighbors would think, because it would look like they were too cheap, or else couldn't afford to send their boy to high school. She repeated, several times, that she would be ashamed to put her head in St. Patrick's Church again or to look Father Gilhooley or any of the sisters in the face if their boy were sent out into the cold world to work, with only a grammar school education, when all his classmates went on to high school. Lonigan kept nodding his head in thought, and soliloquizing that he didn't know what to say, because she was right, and yet a lot of this education was nothing but booklearning, nothing but bunk. He had some new thoughts, and these fed further soliloquizing. It was pretty true that in a way knowledge was power and a person could never know too much, as long as he was right-thinking. And then he didn't want nobody to think that he wasn't doing the right thing by his children; and maybe people would misinterpret it if the boy didn't try high school, at least for a while. And anyway, an education could never hurt you as long as you were right-thinking.