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By Root 10414 0

milled about them reiterating the cry of “Let’s go!” Clubs and sticks were brandished. Three Star Hennessey gritted his teeth, and slashed the air with a straight razor. Weary Reilley casually and publicly examined a twenty-two revolver. Kenny Kilarney put on a pair of brass knuckles, and permitted the punks to examine them. Studs Lonigan gripped a baseball bat, and swung as if stepping into a pitch. He said that when he cracked a dinge in the head, the goddamn eight ball would think it had been Ty Cobb slamming out a homer off Walter Johnson. Red Kelly unsheathed a hunting-knife, and vowed that he was ready. Andy Le Gare tried to tell everyone that in close fighting they should kick the niggers in the shins. Tommy Doyle said the niggers were never going to forget the month of July, 1919. Studs said that they ought to hang every nigger in the city to the telephone poles, and let them swing there in the breeze. Benny Taite said that for every white man killed in the riots, ten black apes ought to be massacred. Red said that the niggers had caught Clackey Merton, from Sixty-first Street, down in the black belt, and slashed his throat from ear to ear, and plenty of niggers had to be slashed to pay for the death of Clackey. They lamented that Clackey was a victim of the riots. Fat Malloy started telling how the Regan Colts were marching into the black belt and knocking off the niggers. Andy said well the Fifty-eighth Street guys were going to do the same thing.

Young Horn Buckford suddenly appeared and breathlessly said that there was a gang of niggers over on Wabash Avenue. Studs, Red, Tommy, Weary, Kenny, and Benny Taite led the gang along Fifty-eighth Street, over to Wabash. For two hours, they prowled Wabash Avenue and State Street, between Garfield Boulevard and Fifty-ninth Street, searching for niggers. They sang, shouted, yelled defiance at the houses, and threw bricks into the windows of houses where they thought niggers lived. They were joined by other groups, men and kids. The streets were like avenues of the dead. They only caught a ten-year-old Negro boy. They took his clothes off, and burned them. They burned his tail with lighted matches, made him step on lighted matches, urinated on him, and sent him running off naked with a couple of slaps in the face.

Back around the corner at six o’clock, Studs and Red talked of how they would get a bigger gang together after supper, and go north of Garfield Boulevard until they found niggers. They described what they would do to them. They walked down to the el station and bought a paper. The headlines said that with the militia out, peace and order were being restored in the riot-stricken black belt. They cursed, and said they would get the niggers in spite of even the whole United States Army. They would avenge Clackey Merton, the kid from Sixty-first Street, who had been killed down in the black belt.

CHAPTER FIVE

Studs walked with Paulie and his Eileen towards the park, and he and Paulie gassed about the good old days. But it seemed stiff with her there, smiling politely at everything they said, even the things they kept exaggerating and making more than they actually had been, in order to make her think that they’d been great guys.

They talked about what the boys from Fifty-eighth Street had done in the race riots last month, and she acted horrified, but Studs guessed it was only put on. They told each other that the niggers needed a couple more riots.

Crossing South Park Avenue, Paulie took her elbow. Studs envied him, because she was his girl, his woman, and she slept with him, undressed in front of him, and he could do whatever he wanted with her body. It was something, having a woman all the time. When you walked down the street, with her on your arm, everybody could see she was yours and gave it to you whenever you wanted it. And you could bring her around to meet your friends, and let them see you got it, and they’d look her over, and envy you, seeing she had nice legs, a swell figure, enough meat on her in the right places. Maybe he did kind of wish he had