The Studs Lonigan Trilogy - James T. Farrell [253]
The dim light of a solitary farm house whisked before him, and again he heard the long, piercing engine whistle. Winter had never seemed so dreary to him as it did now, not even on some of those sunless days, when, as a kid, he had walked alone through Washington Park with the ground hard and chunky, the snow dirty and crusty, the trees and bushes stark and bare. From the train, the land here looked harder, the patches of snow dirtier, an ugly sight. He wondered how the people in these parts, cut off from the rest of the world, could stand looking at the earth on such days as this one, hearing nothing but silence or the wind, except for the passing trains and automobiles. He thought of how his father and mother would so often sit home in the evening, and not have a word to say, and asked himself how the farmers and their wives ever had anything to say to each other. Living like they did out here, their minds must, he felt, always be on such things as death.
He chuckled to himself thinking how glad he was that he lived in a big city like Chicago.
II
“What’s on your mind, Studs?” Joe Thomas, riding back-ward across the aisle, called over.
“Nothing much. I was just looking out at this Godforsaken country and wondering how the hick farmers around here can even manage to stay awake,” Studs replied, an apologetic strain in his voice.
Joe’s thin and sharply-featured face broke into a buck-toothed smile which annoyed Studs. But when he closed his mouth again, Joe seemed like a guy who had been kicked all over the lot and was, in everything he did, excusing himself for being alive. Poor bastard! Studs recalled how sore he had once gotten because Joe had cleaned him in a game of straight pool, and he was sorry now for that forgotten feeling of a long time ago.
“Taking in the scenery, huh, Studs?” Stan Simonsky said listlessly.
“I hope you don’t call that dreary stuff outside scenery. Now, if you want to talk about some real scenery, take Niagara Falls, where I went on my honeymoon. The way the water pitches down over the cliff! And you know, the spray comes up over a hundred feet where you stand by the railing, and you think it’s raining. Buckingham Fountain they got down in Grand Park looks like a piker alongside of it. That’s scenery and the glories of nature, and not these hoosier mole hills they got around here,” Muggsy said with mounting enthusiasm.
“McCarthy, you’d go over big on a rubber-neck bus,” Stan said.
“Monk McCarthy is a poet and he don’t know it,” Studs said.
“Studs may be kidding you, boys, but not me. He’s been mooning over that Jane of his,” Red said.
“I was just looking out the window,” Studs said, flushing guiltily.
“Well, fellows, say what you will, here’s something that’s got cards and spades on the joys of nature, and the joys of love also,” red-faced Les exclaimed, looking at Joe Thomas opposite him, and fishing out a partially filled bottle of moon-shine.
“All right, tank, give us break,” Red said as Les drank. Smacking his lips, Les handed the bottle to Joe.
“With mud in your eye, Irish!” Joe said, drinking.
Joe passed the bottle over to Red, and wiped his lips with a shiny blue coat sleeve. Watching Red drink, Muggsy exaggerated his impatience. Studs lit a cigarette while the bottle moved to McCarthy.
“Still smoking a lot, huh, Studs?” Red said, as if delivering a mild reprimand.
“I’ve cut down a lot,” Studs said, Muggsy distracting his attention by taking a drink as if he were putting on a vaudeville act.
Muggsy handed the bottle to Studs.
“I’m on the wagon these days,” Studs said with a note of piety in his voice.
“Not a lot here,” Stan said, eyeing the bottle he had taken from McCarthy.
“Kill it, Stan. That’s always an act of