Studs Lonigan (48 page)

“I'm going to Communion this morning. It's first Friday,” Martin whined, drawing back.

“You could have waited until I was washed. I got farther to go than you. Why didn't you wake me?”

“Yes, wake you! The last time I did, I got a clout in the ear.”

“One of these days, I'm going to slap some of that wiseness out of you, punk!”

“You do, and I'll . . . kill you,” Martin shrieked, almost in tears.

Studs advanced a step.

“Don't touch me, you big bully!” Martin hollered.

The mother rushed into the bedroom, and enfolded Martin in maternal arms.

“Is he hurting my darling little child?”

Martin fought to break free. He blushed. Studs busted out laughing.

“If I wasn't going to communion, and it wasn't a sin to lose my temper, I'd tell you what I think of you, you big bum! You just wait until tonight, and I'll tell you.”

The mother pressed a wet determined kiss on Martin's cheek.

“Can't there ever be any peace in this home?” Lonigan futilely protested, as he stood in the doorway with his suspenders hanging from his trousers, and his belly falling out.

Studs felt more awakened after he had doused his face in cold water. Shaving, he wished the day was over. He knew how pooped out he would feel in the afternoon, and how he'd only be able to get through his work by doping himself with cigarettes and coffee. Tonight he'd get some decent sleep.

A plate full of pancakes and a cup of black coffee were set before him on the kitchen table. He gulped the coffee down black and asked for another.

“Son, I don't want to nag you, but I'm worried about your health. You never get enough sleep and every morning you gulp down black coffee like that. Coffee is not good for your kidneys. You know the human body can stand only so much, and no more. A boy your age, doing the kind of work you do, has to get his proper rest. If you keep on like this, you'll be getting into consumption at twenty-five.”

Studs hadn't listened to her, and with his mouth stuffed with pancakes, said that he was all right.

“Bill, always remember that the wise guy knows that he can always have another night, and doesn't try to do everything in one evening,” Lonigan said.

The mother looked at the clock, and dashed in to awaken the girls.

“Bill, a man's health is like Humpty Dumpty. Once it is gone, nothing can repair it, not with all the money in the world, or all the king's men and horses. It can't be repaired like an automobile.”

Studs felt like throwing the plate of syrupy pancakes at his father.

An uproar started in the girls' bedroom, and Fran was heard threatening to pull Loretta's hair out if she ever again wore her stockings.

“This family will put me in the nut house yet!” Lonigan said, wincing. He arose and went to stop the quarrel.

Studs was almost finished when Lonigan returned.

“Bill, you know, girls and women have to be handled with kid gloves and jollied along. So when Frances comes out to breakfast, kid her a little. You know, say, Good morning! How is the charming slim queen on this bright and sunny morning?”

Studs' face sank. He arose from the table. His father told him that if he'd wait, he could ride to work with him in the Ford. Studs said it was no use of having to go out of the way, he could take the street car. He was glad to get out. But he was damn tired.

“Kid, I'll be damned if my old lady didn't go and get sick again,” Mort said, from the other side of the small vacant dining-room in an apartment building where they worked.

“Yeah,” said Studs, brushing over the cream-colored paint with measured strokes. He yawned.

“You know, a young chap like yourself who's footloose as the winds don't know how well off you are,” Mort said.

Studs yawned. He dipped his brush, tapped it against the side of the pail, drew it down the center of the wall.

“Sometimes when you get married, you don't know what you're being let into. You see a girl, a nice sweet kid, and she's cherry. You think, now I'll be happy with her, and we're just cut out for one another. Well, one thing and another happens, and first thing you know, you're married. You take her on a honeymoon, and there's nothing at all in life like those first nights. Now, take my wife. She was just as pretty as a picture. I'll show you a picture of her took when we was just married. And then our kids came along, and we thought things was going to be nice and smooth, and that we'd find comfort in the kids and someone to take care of us in our old age. And then eight years ago when our last youngster was born, my wife, she gets what they call a milk leg, you see, that's some kind of a clot that makes your leg swell up, all out of shape, and her heart goes back on her, and now the doctor says that she's got to be careful and any kind of excitement might be the finish of her.”

“That's tough,” Studs said, feeling that he had to say something.

Mort had told him the same story before, almost every day that they'd ever worked together. He went on painting, evening off the last coating. His arm was tired. He wasn't at all interested in the damn work. He liked to look at it when it was finished, and see that it was a good job, and he always took pains to do a good job because he couldn't stand to slop on paint and leave it any old way. But goddamn it, he hated to think of going on, painting walls day after day after day, risking lead-poisoning too, until he got old and a big belly like his old man, and then to go around bossing other guys who painted walls day after day after day. Goddamn it, yes, there was something more to life. There had to be. He jerked out a watch: a quarter to three.

“Every night when I go home, I don't know but maybe I'll find my wife dead. I tell you, kid, married life ain't all it's cracked up to be, and don't let anybody kid you that it is.”

“No danger,” Studs muttered with over-exaggerated confidence. He yawned.

“It's not that I'm complainin', because I ain't. My wife has been the best in the world, but it's just that life doesn't turn out the way you want it to.”

Their brushes swished and slapped as they worked. Studs yawned. Ten to three. Would it or wouldn't it be a good idea to get married? Everybody did, and had kids. He guessed that maybe you couldn't help yourself about it when the right broad came along. That was what love was. Five to three. Love was B.S. Suppose now he got married to Lucy and the same thing happened to her that had happened to Mort's wife. But it wouldn't. Things weren't going to happen to him that way. He had luck, a lucky star, four aces stacked for him in the cards. Well, he did. He had to have them. He did. Three o'clock. He yawned. He whistled.

“As I was sayin', I don't know why the Lord should of visited us with all the misfortunes he did. Sometimes, I fear maybe it's because I sown my wild oats when I was your age or else because I drank now and again. Oh, sometimes too it's maybe, I feel, because of something I done in a previous life. Say, kid, do you believe in reincarnation?”

Studs didn't hear, and Mort repeated the question. Studs thought it was all crap, but hell, he was too damn tired to argue, so he said he didn't know.

“Well, I sometimes wonder if that's why we were punished. But I tell you it isn't fair. I done the best I could. . . .”

Studs yawned. Seven minutes after three. He was going straight home for supper, and then, maybe, he'd read his newspaper and turn in early.

“But I always come to this conclusion. No matter how bad off you are, there's always somebody in a worse boat. Now take my brother. He's lived in poverty all his life, and would you believe it, he still has a place with the can in the backyard. I always tried to help him out, but charity begins at home. That's what I always figure, no matter how bad off you are, there's always somebody who's worse off. Now take him. About six years ago he was living in a place down on Bishop Street, and one night a rat bites the baby and it dies. Maybe I shouldn't be complaining. But goddamn it, when any night you come home to supper, and you might find a dead wife, it gets you.”

Three-fourteen.

“That's why I always say to a young fellow, look before you leap. You never know what's gonna happen, and when you got a wife and love her and got to sit day after day and see her grow old and lose her looks, yes, sir, look twice before you leap.”

Three-sixteen. Studs went to the can and smoked a cigarette. It knocked off twelve more minutes. He worked slowly. Mort's voice went on in an unpleasant drone, complaining that it wasn't enough for his wife to get sick, but that damn it if he didn't go and get lead-poisoning because he knew he had it.

“Well, I hope the old lady is feeling up to snuff,” Mort said, as he, Studs, and Al walked to the street car line.

“Tonight all I'm doing is sleep. I was playing poker till three this morning and I'm all pooped out,” Studs said.

“I know what I'm going to do tonight,” smiled Al.

“You ought to. You're a newlywed.”

“Wrong again, Mort. You guys noticed these crossword puzzles in the papers. They got a contest, and they give real dough to the winners, thousand bucks first prize. Well, I'm working them and trying to get me them prizes. They'll fix me up jake with a nice new Ford and something to spare,” Al said.

“They're goofy,” Studs said.

“Now wait a minute, Lonigan. There's money in them. And I won't be losing out. Suppose I don't get a sou out of it. Look at the self-improvement, the words and things you learn. Say, when I finish all the puzzles in this contest, I'll be knocking you guys for a row with tongue-twisters and the things I know. Take all I learned already. Now do you know the name of a battle fought in England in the year 1066. Well, there was one and it was called the Battle of Hastings. All kinds of things like that, knowledge, you learn. These puzzles are an education in themselves.”

“Well, I leave you boys here,” Mort said.

“Poor devil!” said Al, after Mort had gone his way.

“He got some tough breaks all right.”

“Yeah, he gets my sympathy.”

“He's white too,” said Studs.

“Don't I know it? I worked with him for five years now. You ask your old man. He knows Mort. Mort's worked for him for years. But, Jesus, he's a tank. He's got a crying jag on all the time. But then, with all his trouble, you can't blame the guy. He's got to drink to forget . . . but here's my car. So long,” said Al.

“Don't swallow that dictionary,” Studs yelled.

The street car was crowded with home-going workers, a swaying mob of begrimed Hunkies, foreigners, who jabbered in broken English and their own tongues, and smelled of garlic. Studs was relieved when he alighted at Fifty-ninth and State. On his way home, he paused at the corner of Fifty-eighth and Michigan, and decided that since he was a little early for supper, he might as well take a stroll over to the poolroom. He met Red Kelly at Fifty-eighth and Indiana.

“Tired, Studs?”

“I feel like a rag.”

“We played on after you left 'til daylight. I cleaned up twenty bucks.”

“I would have been better off going home.”

“Say, I'll be damned, Studs, if you ain't getting an alderman,” Red unexpectedly said, giving Studs a friendly poke in the belly.

“Only a little,” Studs said apologetically.

“Better look out, Studs, or you'll be getting like Barney Keefe.”

“I'll get it off before that happens,” Studs confidently replied.

He felt his belly; just a little bit fat, not any more than Kelly himself had. He was just afraid of getting fat himself. Studs knew he'd be able to watch himself and exercise the fat off before it got serious.

A noisy, excited crowd was talking in front of the poolroom. Studs saw a squad car parked at the curb, and a cop standing importantly by the doorway. He started to move out of the crowd and see what was up, but noticed Joe Thomas, dressed in his bricklayer's clothes, step before the cop and ask what was the matter. The cop grabbed Joe, and called inside. People edged forwards, and the cop told them to get back, while Joe crabbed that he hadn't done anything. A tough-mugged dick appeared from inside the poolroom and talked with the cop. He grabbed Joe by the arm and dragged him inside, heedless of Joe's protests. Studs guessed it must be serious, and edged back in the crowd. He kept asking what had happened, and nobody knew, people saying it was a raid, a murder, a fight, a stabbing, a shooting, a chase after a robber. If it was serious and he tried to get in, he might be held for questioning, and he might, by accident, find himself giving one of his pals away. But none of them ever violated the law, except by drinking or going to can houses. He wondered.

With an air of mystery and authority, six lantern-jawed detectives emerged from the poolroom, putting their guns away in holsters beneath their coats. Talking, they clambered into the car, and shot off. The cop walked on. Studs rushed with others of the curious crowd into the poolroom. Everybody talked at once, and amidst all the gabbing, he finally pieced together the fact that nothing had happened. The dicks had just suddenly showed up with drawn guns, and lined everybody against the walls, and asked them useless questions. Then they had left. Most of the guys took it as a joke. George the Greek crabbed, because he said his business was getting a bad name. He declared, with many reiterations, that from now on, no more drinking, and rough-housing would go in his poolroom.

When the place quieted down, Studs shot a couple of rounds of poker dice with George. He won six bits' worth of chips, good in trade. He moved away from the counter, and stood in a group of punks who were raking Rolfe over the coals. He looked at Rolfe's outfit, a darkish gray topcoat, opened to reveal a blue herring-bone suit with blue-bordered handkerchief showing from the pocket, a blue English broadcloth shirt with collar attached, brown tie and black brogans.