Studs Lonigan (65 page)

P.S. Glad to hear all the folks are well as for me well I hope you can read this Miss Lady writing so small what say By the way when you see Stutz Lonigan do say I send hime my regards and hello because I like hime but not the other older guys By the way my new number is going to be R F D # 18
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or 869 Alhambra Calif no not in the country the city Ha Ha.

“HERE'S Shanty Irish Lonigan!” Barney Keefe said.

“Hello, False Face,” Studs retorted.

“Hey, Barney, why don't you go to work?” Shrimp Haggerty kidded, as the gang commenced strolling over to Washington Park. Barney did not reply, and Shrimp smiled. Shrimp spotted a baby-faced thing with bobbed hair hobbling along on the other side of the street on high heels, and he declared that it was a pretty nice beetle.

“Yoo-hoo!” Tommy Doyle called.

“You dropped something,” Les shouted.

Studs had an impulse to try picking her up, but he had been kidded so much because of what had happened the last time he had robbed the cradle and had made Nellie Cullen that he didn't. The sight of the flapper, the sight of any girl, even his sisters, drove Lucy back into his mind. Just before he had left the house, he had surprised Loretta in the hallway, when she dashed out of the bathroom in only a chemise, her left breast sticking out. Last week, by accident, he had seen Fran without a strip on. Such things were driving him almost cuckoo. He had just called Lucy up before meeting the guys and tried to get a date with her, and for the third time since the dance she had given him the go-by. All over again, he tried to convince himself that she was nothing in his young life. She did mean something to him. Goddamn it, he was going nuts without her, thinking of her all the time. He could see that she was only a teaser. It didn't matter what she was. He remembered dancing with her, talking to her, holding her in his arms, kissing her, their tongues touching, digging his hand under her dress and touching her breast. He loved Lucy. He wanted—yes—to marry her. Red asked Studs what was the matter, was he thinking hard, worrying about his dose, what? Studs said there was nothing and that the dose was cured. Red congratulated him. Shrimp suggested getting a bottle and celebrating. Les said it would be all right by him.

“Say, Les, don't you and Shrimp ever have the curiosity to find out how it would be to stay sober for one night?” Kelly asked.

“What the hell! All the tanks here couldn't get drunk on one measly bottle.”

“Sorry, Haggerty, but the Alcohol Squad is A.W.O.L. this evening,” Stan Simonsky said.

‟It's swell out,” Studs said, looking at the twilight sky, wanting to forget things by talking and looking at the sky; only the sky made him remember all the more. A song came to him. Blue and broken-hearted-Blue because we're parted.—There was a time I was jolly—You know the reason, I'm melancholy. The words only half-expressed his feelings. And he had had them ever since the dance. He had had them all his life.

“Say, you know, I think I'll join the Navy,” Shrimp said, looking pointedly at Barney.

“Last week, Shrimp was joining the Marines,” Doyle said.

“Hell, Haggerty, with that caved-in chest you got, and with your guts pickled in alcohol, and a leg and a half in the grave, the Navy wouldn't even take you for punkin',” Barney sourly said.

‟I'm organically all right. I'm just tired of hanging around here, without any job, so I thought I'd join up, see the world, building myself up physically so I wouldn't end up with a balloon belly and false teeth like Keefe,” Shrimp said.

‟I'm laughing,” Barney snapped.

Studs wasn't interested in the gassing and kidding.

“If I was like Studs now, with an old man who's well heeled, and gives him a good job, and has a business to leave him when he kicks the bucket. But, hell, all a guy can get is a thirty-five- or forty-dollar-a-week job. You won't find me wearing my can out that way,” Shrimp said, giving Barney the eye.

“Yeah, you should be a painter too, and in summer time climb a ladder so much that your pants rub blisters on your tail, the way it happened to me last summer,” Studs said. They laughed.

But Studs wished that Lucy would realize—see—that he could take care of her, give her things, make them . . . happy together. Why did he have to be such a goofy damn fool with sloppy feelings?

“Haggerty, better go back to that wife of yours, and let her take care of you. She might love you, even if her taste is all in her mouth,” Keefe said.

“Shrimp is right. Now take me, what have I got to look forward to but always wrestling freight for the Continental Express Company?” Les whined.

“Will you bastards quit singing the blues? You're young, and there's plenty of gash in the world, and the supply of moon goes on forever,” Simonsky said.

Studs wished he had someone to talk it over with. He had almost talked with Fran or Loretta. But he had never been able to talk about things like that with anyone. If only things were the same with him and Helen Shires as they used to be when they were kids. Then he could talk about it with her.

“Haggerty, if you get in the Navy, you'll end up like Mush Joss in the jug after deserting three times.”

“Mush was always a bum anyway,” Shrimp said, and he got the horse laugh.

“Mush was a funny guy. You know, he was a damn swell baseball player, and if he kept on he'd be in the big leagues now. He played a good game for one year with the Carmelites High School. Then he left school because the family didn't have the jack to send him, and he just went to hell,” Red said.

“Studs, you know, I'm pulling Keefe's leg. The bastard thinks he's getting a job as sewer-pipe layer down at Grant Park. And today I spoke to a guy I know who's assistant foreman and he told me I could count that job mine. Watch me get him,” Shrimp said in confidence.

“Yeah, I think I'll join the Navy. No flunkey job for me. If any comes along, Barney can have them,” Shrimp said, looking at Barney; Barney whistled.

“Well, I been thinking I'd get into the political game,” Doyle said.

“You goddamn Irishman. Because your brother is assistant precinct captain without pay, you think you'll be assistant to Brennan, or Barney McCormack, the state senator. Every election day they let you stand in front of the polls looking like Jesus Christ, and wearing a tag, begging everybody to vote for a bunch of Shanty Irish crook politicians, and you think you're an influence,” Keefe said.

‟Sic'em, Keefe!” Kelly said.

They crossed over to the park. The trees and grass were deep green, and they made Studs think of the trees on that day as a kid, when he licked Kelly. People were walking, they seemed contented, as if nothing was bothering them. The only way he would have that feeling was if he could get Lucy.

“Lonigan, that rat Haggerty can't kid me! He's pulling his own leg. That bastard thinks he's going to be sewer-pipe layer, and I was speaking to a friend of mine who's an assistant engineer down at Grant Park, and he told me I got that job sewn up. That skunk ain't puttin' nothing over on anybody but himself,” Barney quietly said.

Studs smiled. He wasn't able to appreciate things like he had used to. Goddamn Lucy! He shouldn't let her be bothering him; wasn't he young, healthy and tough, didn't he have something to look forward to, hadn't he even bought himself a couple of stocks that the old man said were hot stuff?

Only. . . .

“Well, what are we going to do?” Studs said, feeling restless.

Shorty Wolfson, a young chap the size of a bantamweight who worked as a lineman for the telephone company, boxed with Eddie Eastman on the grass in the park. He tore into Eastman and cracked his jaw. Eastman lay down white. Milt Rosensplatz, the referee, counted ten.

“You're pretty good. There's a yellow streak all the way down your spine,” Studs said.

Eddie tried to justify himself, and they told him to get away with that BS.

Wils Gillen and Swede Elston boxed like two clowns. Wils grimaced, swung, missed, fell on his face. He jumped up, rubbed his glove across his nose, hunched himself, cocked his hands. Swede toedanced backwards out of danger. They missed haymakers, and clinched. They made faces at each other for a three-minute round and didn't land a blow. Studs told them not to box another round, because they were liable to break their hands on a tree.

Rosensplatz, the husky, flat-footed Jewboy, and Big Nose Jerry Rooney, from Johnny O'Brien's class at St. Patrick's, put on the gloves.

“Let there be light and there was light! Let there be Louisa Nolan's, and there was Three Star Hennessey! Let there be nose, and there was Rooney!” Young Rocky said.

“What battlers these boys are,” Studs said, as they jabbed cautious gloves at one another.

“These punks are all the same. They can all fool around with fourteen-year-old girls, and not make the grade, but they got sawdust in their guts,” Kelly sneered.

“Hey, Rooney, when did you get so good?” asked Doyle.

“I feel like I might go a round with one of the punks,” Tommy said.

“Me too, but we don't want to hurt them,” Studs said.

“A good stiff punch might wake 'em up, and they'll quit flogging the dummy,” Doyle said.

“Hey, punk, I'll box a round with you,” Red said.

“No slugging,” O'Neill replied.

Red and O'Neill boxed. O'Neill fought defensively, jabbing with straight lefts, blocking Red's lunges. He caught Red on the nose with a left jab.

“Think you're tough!” Red said, his nose bleeding.

“It was an accident,” O'Neill apologized.

“Better cut it out, Red, you're getting sore, and you don't want to kill the punk,” Doyle said.

“Think you can fight me! Think you're tough!” Kelly bullied, while Wolfson unlaced his gloves, and Studs held a handkerchief to his nose.

“We were just boxing,” O'Neill said.

“You better say that,” Red said, walking over to the drinking fountain by the boathouse.

“That isn't anything. Red's nose always bleeds easy,” Studs said, thinking Red was slipping, remembering how he had given Red a bloody nose in their fight, feeling proud because he knew he was able to stand the gaff when Kelly couldn't, glad Red had been shown up.

Doyle boxed with O'Neill. Doyle rushed, and O'Neill again boxed defensively, jabbing with his left, blocking, trying an occasional jab to the guts with a right cross.

“Hey, for Christ sake, I said I'd box with you, not run a foot race,” Tommy beefed, stopping, hands at side, breathing rapidly.

“I am boxing.”

“You mean you're trying to win a track meet,” Doyle said, still winded, as he held his gloved hands up to be unlaced.

“Hey, I'll box with you!” Studs said to Rolfe.

“That's not my racket,” Rolfe said.

Rosensplatz and Morgan were going to box next, but Milt acceded to Studs.

Jack Morgan was an unassuming, well-built, twenty-year-old kid. He waited calmly while the gloves were laced on Studs' hands. Studs felt good. He decided that he'd go easy with Morgan, and just show them that he wasn't through like Doyle and Kelly, but was the old Studs Lonigan. Just let the kid know he had the gloves on with Studs Lonigan.

Morgan faced Studs with hands out in the classical boxing stance. Studs crouched low, and waved his arms in Jack Dempsey fashion. He heard encouraging words from Fat Malloy, and it made him more strongly confident. He thought of himself a little like he imagined Jack Dempsey would be when going into the ring. He circled and swayed, pulled two feints, frowned for effect, set himself to let go with a left, and was stabbed in the jaw by a left jab.

“The boy's fast,” Fat Malloy said professionally.

Studs lumbered in, and got stung with another left jab. He feinted, swayed, and let loose with a roundhouse right. Morgan stepped back and Studs looked foolish.

“Clever boy,” Doyle said.

Studs didn't like the way Morgan looked at him, calm, unafraid, never changing his expression. He frowned to scare him. He feinted with a left, and got another sharp left jab, and before he knew it a right cross that gave him a headache. He momentarily saw wavering black dots. He forgot trying to box like Jack Dempsey. He rushed, and hit Morgan with a solid right. They clinched, and he tried to shove Morgan around. His arms were pinned, and he got a snapping short one in the ribs. Studs rushed again, took and gave a punch, they clinched. Breaking, he got Morgan with a wild right on the side of the head, and everybody was pepped up and yelled. Morgan's face was unchanged, and he waited, poised on his toes, left out, right cocked. Studs realized the kid could take it. No more giving him a break. He had to show some stuff, or be shown up. He rushed, and got four jabs for the punch he landed. Coming out of the clinch, he got an uppercut. Studs missed two rights, and received another stiff jab. He lost his temper, and slugged, not knowing what he was doing. Morgan slugged back punch for punch, until Rosensplatz said time was up.

“How about another round, kid?” Studs said, trying to hold in his temper and appear unaffected.

He wanted more. He knew he had been outfought and outboxed, and he had to come back. Everybody was pepped up too, but it was dark, and anyway, O'Neill had to take his gloves home. Studs shook hands with Morgan and said patronizingly that he'd been given a good workout. Morgan smiled taciturnly.

The older guys walked off. Studs was winded. His arms were leaden. His back ached. He had a headache and cuts inside his lip and jaw. He hoped they'd suggest sitting down on a bench or in the grass.