The Amboy Dukes (11 page)

“We won’t,” Betty said. “Should we go back now and dance?”

“What time is it?” Ann asked.

Benny looked at his watch. “Almost twelve.”

“Maybe we better go,” Frank suggested. “You know we gotta be careful and stay outa trouble.”

“One more dance,” Betty pleaded. “You’re a good dancer, Frank. Just one more dance.”

Frank stood up and extended his hand. “Come on. You going on the floor?” he asked Ann and Benny.

Ann put her arms around Benny. “No, we’ll sit here and muzzle. Pick us up when you’re ready.”

“Isn’t she a character?” Benny asked admiringly, and kissed Ann while his free hand caressed her breast. “Don’t hurry,” he called after Frank and Betty. “I’m having a wonderful time.”

Crazy Sachs was feeling mean as he turned the corner from Pitkin into Amboy on Saturday evening after work. It really burned him to work a full day on Saturday when he didn’t want the overtime. And when he had told the boss that since the summer was coming he was willing to do without the overtime, the boss had told him that he only employed men who wanted to make an extra buck when they had the chance. He wished he were smart enough to be a welder or a calker or to run a machine in an airplane factory, where maybe he could hitch a ride in a bomber or one of those fighter planes.

Crazy shifted the package he held in his hands and made a whirring noise like a propeller. He could see himself in the cockpit of a fighter, with the transparent canopy closed above him, wearing a padded helmet to which were attached the biggest goggles in the world. Now Crazy trotted slowly as he picked up speed, and he extended his right arm as he was ready to take off. As he cleared the field, with the exhaust of his plane spitting blue flame, he heard a sneering voice break into his consciousness.

“Look at the crazy thing,” a housewife who was leaning out of the ground-floor tenement window called to her neighbor.

“Go to hell, ya bastard,” Crazy yelled at her.

“Go on.” The woman laughed at him.
“Meshugener!”

“You should drop dead, you—” Crazy stopped himself. “You should drop dead, you hooer.”

The woman stood up and held her kimono shut with one hand as she shook her other hand at Crazy. “Wait until my husband comes home! He’ll give you for calling me names, you
meshugener paskudnack!”

“Your husband!” Crazy spit in her direction and the woman drew back instinctively. “Who’s afraid of that
shmuck?
Just let him start something. Any time. He’ll wind up with a broken head.”

“I’ll tell your mother what a fine boy you are!” the woman screamed at him.

Now he felt better. He always felt better when he was cursing someone or slugging it out with a guy. And the times he cut a spick or a nigger, those were the times when he really felt swell. Crazy turned around to laugh at the woman, who was still screaming that she was going to tell his mother what kind of a boy he was, and he looked in the gutter for a stone to throw at her. The woman ducked back in the room, and Crazy juggled the package of meat he carried. Three thick steaks, tenderloins, weighing more than three pounds each, rich with blood and yellow fat—Crazy saw them served rare with french-fried potatoes and potato salad. Maybe he was a dummy when it came to thinking, but he and his family ate better than most of the people on Amboy between Pitkin and East New York.

Crazy spit as he passed the tenement in which Frank lived. The guy really had his guts to slug him just because he was kidding around last Monday with his kid sister. He hadn’t done anything. The kid was looking out of her window, and when she saw him he was only kidding around. What the hell would he want to bother with a skinny kid like Alice, who always looked scared and didn’t even wear lipstick, when Fanny Kane always winked at him when he saw her sitting on the stoop? He hurried across the street to Fanny, who was sitting on a wooden bench rocking her baby brother’s carriage. Crazy took off his cap, smoothed his long hair, and tried to think of something flip and smart to say. But his teeth seemed to stick together and his tongue became thick and immobile. Crazy waved his hand and stood nervously before Fanny.

“Hello,” he stuttered.

“What’ve you got in the bag?” Fanny asked him.

“Steaks.”

“Steaks!”

“Yeah. Three of them.”

“Give me one.”

“They ain’t kosher.”

“So what?” Fanny reached for the package, but Crazy held it behind his back. “Come on, give me a steak. My mom doesn’t care if it isn’t kosher. As long as it’s good. Don’t be a cheap skate.”

“I’m not a cheap skate.”

“Then give me a steak.”

Crazy winked at her. “What’ll you give me?”

Fanny looked at him boldly. “What d’ya want?”

Crazy looked about him to see whether anyone was approaching. “Meet me on my roof in a couple of minutes and I’ll give you a steak.”

Fanny shook her head and began to rock the carriage. “No.”

“You’re afraid,” Crazy challenged her.

Fanny stretched her arms so that her sweater was taut and revealed the outline of her young breasts. Slowly and tantalizingly she twisted about, enjoying the look of hunger and longing in Crazy’s eyes.

“Of you?” Fanny replied.

“Then meet me on the roof. I won’t do nothing.”

“I’ve got to mind the baby.”

“Take him in or get some kid to watch him. You want a steak? Then come up on my roof and get it.”

Crazy walked across the street, tossing the package in the air and whistling. He went up the steps of the stoop two at a time and kicked open the hall door. He was pretty sure that Fanny would meet him on the roof and he wasn’t going to scare her. After all, she was his girl because she was going to meet him, and when a guy had a steady girl he didn’t shove her around unless she were willing. Mitch believed him about Fanny, and Mitch was a good guy and smart and his best friend. Maybe he ought to give the steak to Mitch instead of Fanny, because what came first, a guy’s best friend or his girl? The problem was too difficult for Crazy to solve and he dismissed it.

Crazy scratched on the door of his apartment and mewed like a cat. His mother opened the door, smiled at him, and welcomed him with a cry of pleasure as she held out her hands.

“Nu, zindele,
what are you bringing home today?”

Crazy loved his mother. She was the only person who was never cross with him. Even less cross than Mitch. “Steaks. Big ones,” he said, and kissed her.

His mother sighed. “If they were only kosher.”

“They’re good, Momma, And they didn’t cost me anything. Not even points.”

“So give them here”—she pinched his cheek—“and we’ll have one for supper tonight.”

“With french fries and potato salad?”

“Only with french fries.” She slapped at him playfully and he dodged the blow.

Crazy unwrapped the package and handed his mother the two largest steaks. “I’m keeping one,” he said. “I promised it to a friend. I’ll be right back.”

“Hurry,” his mother said. “You’ll want to take a bath before eating, and supper’ll be ready in a half-hour.”

“I’ll be back,” Crazy promised.

Crazy ran down the stairs and entered Frank’s hall and went up to the roof. He thumbed his nose at Frank’s apartment door and wondered whether Fanny would be waiting for him. As he opened the door to the roof and saw her sitting on the ledge that divided the tenement roofs he felt like shouting and cursing to express his joy.

Crazy approached her shyly and gave her the steak. “See,” he said, “I’m keeping my promise.”

Fanny unwrapped the steak and stared at it. “What a beauty,” she finally said. “Thanks.”

“How about a kiss?”

“Sure,” Fanny said. “Go ahead.”

Hesitantly Crazy put his arms around Fanny and licked his lips before he kissed her. Fanny was the first girl he had kissed who was not a prostitute or a gang slut. Her lips were warm and soft, and she kissed him with the inexperience and simple ardor of a girl who was twelve years old. Her rouged lips were parted slightly and she did not protest as Crazy pressed her breasts with fumbling, awkward hands.

Crazy drew back, and there were tears in his eyes. “Gee, Fanny,” he choked, “I’m nuts about you. I want you to be my girl.”

“You’re kidding.” She laughed at him.

Crazy sniffed and for a moment he wanted to strangle her. “Can I kiss you again?” he asked her.

Fanny slipped her arms around his neck. “Sure.” Crazy felt as if he were rocketing to the moon. The clouds were pink, and he was dressed in white riding breeches and black patent-leather boots with a short red-sleeved shirt and a blue cape. He was a combination of Superman, Captain Marvel, and the Blue Beetle. These guys had girls, and even though they were always hanging around with cops, they sure could battle, and now he could identify himself with these heroes because he had a girl who smelled clean and held him as if she really liked him.

“I’m crazy about you,” he said as he fought for words to express his emotion. “Real nuts about you. I think about you all the time and I even told the Dukes that you were my girl. I’ll take you to the movies and rowing and to Coney Island and I’ll show you a swell time, just as good, even better, than anybody else. So you just be my girl and everything is gonna be swell. And another thing, you mustn’t let other guys kiss you.”

“How could I”—Fanny stroked his cheeks—“when I’m gonna be your girl?”

“That’s right,” Crazy agreed. “I wanta take you out tonight.”

“My mother won’t let me go out with you.”

“Why not?”

Fanny looked at him pityingly. “She thinks you’re—”

Fanny pointed her forefinger at her forehead and made a circular motion.

“That’s what everyone thinks,” Crazy admitted. “Maybe I’m not smart like other guys,” he went on bitterly, “but I’m working, ain’t I? I got just as much dough as they have. Look”—he took his wallet from his hip pocket and showed Fanny two ten-dollar bills and some miscellaneous other bills—“I can show you a good time like anybody else.”

Fanny’s eyes were greedy as she stared at the money. “I saw a sharp skirt in Adeline’s on Pitkin Avenue. It’s plaid and only five bucks.”

“I’ll buy it for you.”

“When?”

“Monday night. Am I gonna see you tonight?”

“Look,” she said to him. “I’ll tell my mother that I’m going to my girl friend’s house tonight and then I’ll go to see my girl friend. I’ll stay there till about nine o’clock and then I’ll meet you. Where?”

“In front of the Pitkin? Where do you wanta go?”

“How about a Broadway show?”

“The movies?”

“Yeah.”

“Sure.” Crazy nodded happily. “I like the movies. We’ll go see a war picture with plenty of fighting.”

“I like love pictures.”

“We’ll see what’s good,” Crazy compromised. “So you’ll meet me in front of the Pitkin about nine o’clock?”

Fanny jumped from the ledge and smoothed her skirt. “I’ll be there.”

Crazy pressed her to him and felt her young body, lush and supple, bend as he kissed and caressed her. “I’ll be waiting,” he said hoarsely, “nine o’clock.”

Like a torpedo Crazy raced down the steps to his apartment. He plunged into the tub and lay under the water, holding his breath and making believe he was an American submarine and sinking Japs. Wroosh, wroosh, the torpedoes left their tubes and roared through the water to their target. Wham! They tore into Jap battleships, and the sponge and nailbrush went up in flames and the oil slick grew larger as the cake of soap dissolved in the water.

He stood up and wrapped the bath towel around him, as his mother called to him that supper was ready. “Hey, Mom”—he opened the door and called to her—“can I eat with the towel around me?”

“Get dressed,” his father ordered him.

“You can come to the table in the towel,” his mother said, and turned to her husband. “You let him alone and don’t nag him. The boy looked tired when he came home.”

“Tired!” his father sniffed. “If he went to sleep on time like a decent boy would do he wouldn’t be so tired.”

“Enough,” his mother replied. “His life is not easy like other people’s.
Er ist ein Gott gestrafener,
afflicted by God. Let him alone and
genug.”

Mr. Sachs threw down his newspaper with exasperation. “Always genug! Do you know that people are complaining to me about the way he curses in the street and looks for fights?”

“Next time tell the
yentes
to let him alone,” his wife replied fiercely. “You hear me? Alone!”

Crazy had buckled his belt around the bath towel and approached the table. “I look like a sheik,” he said to his mother. “Don’t I look like a sheik, Momma?”

His mother lifted a corner of the towel and wiped his back. “Like a regular prince. And for a prince and a sheik I’ve made a big dish of french fries.”

“I wish I had potato salad too.”

His father looked at him with disgust. “Do you know that there are other vegetables besides potatoes?”

“Sure,” Crazy replied. “But I don’t like them. That’s a good one!” He pounded on the table with his knife and fork. “I was sharp then, Pop. Huh, Pop? Wasn’t I, Pop?” Mrs. Sachs placed the steak before her son. “Eat.” With his arms working like pistons and grunting as he chewed the meat with noisy smackings of his lips, Crazy shoveled the potatoes into his mouth as he drank glass after glass of bubbling seltzer. He belched loudly, sucked his teeth, and tore large chunks of bread from the half of the pound pumpernickel loaf which his mother had placed near his plate. He did not speak as he ate but looked at his mother with gratitude, pointed to the plate, and rubbed his stomach. His mother smiled at him encouragingly, and Crazy bent low over his plate and sopped up the steak juices with the pumpernickel. His father ate stolidly, deliberately staring at a fixed grease spot on the opposite wall to avoid looking at his son.

“I got a date tonight with my girl,” Crazy said proudly.

His mother placed her hands in her lap. “You got a girl? Only one?”

“I could have lots of girls,” he bragged.

“And why not?” his mother asked. “A son who can bring home such steaks would make any girl a good husband.”

Crazy blushed. “I’m not gonna get married yet, Mom. Gee”—he thought for a moment—“I’m only seventeen. Huh, Mom, seventeen, isn’t that right?”

“Who’s the girl?” his father asked suddenly.

“You don’t know her,” Crazy replied.

“I don’t believe you,” his father said.

“I got a girl,” Crazy insisted.

“And I don’t believe,” his father repeated.

“I have!”

“You haven’t.”

“I have! I’m telling you, I have! She’s my girl!”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” His father turned away from him.

Crazy trembled as he kicked back his chair and stood up. “You let me alone.” His voice rose to an idiot scream. “I got a girl! My girl! She likes me and I gotta date with her. And don’t you try to take her away from me or I’ll—” Crazy looked about and snatched the seltzer bottle from the table.