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“Hell, you guys are all hoods. I’m going,” Jim Doyle said.

“Sit down, Jim, and tell us about the political outlook for next fall,” said Studs.

“Democratic landslide.”

“What do you think of the mayor, Jim?” asked Red.

“He’s a Sunday School mayor,” Jim said.

“Bill Dever, oh, he’s all right, Bill is, if you know how to take him,” Timothy O’Shea said.

“You know him?” Jim asked hostilely.

“Sure, him and my old man is like that,” Timothy O’Shea said, crossing the second and third fingers on his right hand and holding them up in indication of closeness.

“Say, Jim, say?” Curley called.

“You in the political game?” asked Doyle.

“Sure! Me, I’m in everything. Christ, yes,” Timothy O’Shea said.

“Listen, Jim, I wanted to ask you if you wanted to go to the Tivoli with me some night this week?” Curley said.

“Hey, Curley, did anybody ever tell you that you were a pest?” said Jim; they laughed.

Fat Malloy arrived and glad-handed all the boys. Studs said he acted like he was a pupil of Jim Doyle’s.

“You know, fellows, I hate it, having to think that Arnold’s gone from us like this,” Les said.

“Yeah, Les, you’ll have to drink more to make up for what he won’t, huh?” said Tommy.

“Say, Kenny, where in hell you been keeping yourself?” asked Studs.

“Out of the pen,” Kenny said.

“Same old Kilarney. But tell me, are you working?” Red said.

“Sure, everybody.”

“Say, any drinks in the joint?” asked Timothy O’Shea. No one answered him.

“Hell, come on, Kilarney. I thought you said there’d be some sparkling waters here. Come on, this joint is a hell of a wake,” Timothy said.

“Brother, we got respect for the dead,” said Red.

“Sure, you run a wake like you were all Jews. If I hung around I’d have to drink noodle soup. Come on, Kilarney,” Timothy O’Shea said, leaving, his huge coat swinging after him.

Kenny followed him and left a roomful of soreheads.

“If it wouldn’t have been disrespectful, I’d have socked that ignorant ape of an Irishman,” Kelly said.

“Kenny was always cockeyed, and didn’t have sense about serious things,” Tommy said.

“Leave it to Kenny to find a guy like that for a wake where tragedy has occurred,” Kelly said.

“Same old Kilarney,” Studs said.

They talked. More came, and some went out. Finally, Studs and Red left, re-expressing their condolences before departing. “Studs, let’s get a drink.”

“I’m on the wagon, Red,” Studs said.

“How come?”

“I’m taking care of myself these days.”

“Come on, one drink won’t make any difference.”

“Nope, not tonight, Red.”

They walked silently towards Fifty-eighth Street. Across the street, the park seemed gloomy with its deserted tennis courts, and the bare, black trees and shrubbery behind them.

“Say, Studs, I think it was goddamn funny they didn’t ask any of us to be pall-bearers,” Red said.

“I suppose his old man is sore. Thinks we were always responsible for his drinking. Notice the old man didn’t say much to us?”

“Yeah, and the first time I met Arnold just after his family moved in the neighborhood, he was looking for a bottle,” Red said.

“It’s fluky, all right.”

“I feel sorry and I understand how his folks might be feeling, and I offered them my condolences. But Jesus Christ, we were Arnold’s best friends, and we’ll miss him too. I tell you, Studs, it’s an insult to all of us!” Red protested.

Studs wasn’t listening. He couldn’t get the memory of Arnold out of his head, and it gave him a feeling of awe and fear. He had just seen death, death with something terrible, final, about it. It made him suddenly leery of even living. He deter-mined all over again that he was going to take care of himself.

“I suppose old man Sheehan must feel bad. You know, he sees us living, and his son dead, and it must have hit him. But we didn’t kill Arnold. He shouldn’t act that way towards us. But then I suspect it might be Horace. Come to think of it, he hardly ever comes around the poolroom, and when he does, he doesn’t have a lot to say.”

“Yes,” Studs said, not feeling so badly that he hadn’t been asked to be a pall-bearer.