The Studs Lonigan Trilogy - James T. Farrell [266]
“Well, for once we have the lights with us,” she said.
“Let’s get some candy,” he said, out of sudden impulse to talk, and nodding his head to a chain candy-store window piled with tempting chocolates.
“Now don’t tempt me. I’m dieting.”
“That’s right, and you’ve sworn off candy for Lent, haven’t you?”
“And mister, do you realize that this is going to be my first show in Lent, and the only reason I’m breaking my resolution on shows is because when you telephoned me, you seemed so anxious to see one!”
If a girl like Catherine didn’t like a fellow, she wouldn’t break a Lenten resolution to be with him, he prided himself.
“Of course, we could do something else, if you really don’t want to go,” he casually said, feeling that he should say something like that.
“Booby, of course I want to go. You men!” she said, treating him with an air of gratifying condescension. “And anyway, I’m doing other things, not eating sweets, I go to mass every morning, to services at church three nights a week, and I’m receiving Holy Communion every Sunday during Lent, so that a little celebration for your return won’t hurt a lot... Will it?”
“I guess not, since you’re doing so many other things,” Studs said as if he were seriously answering an important question with a valued answer.
“You don’t talk a lot, do you?” she remarked after they had walked on a few more paces.
“Well... I talk when I’ve got something to say, and when I haven’t,... what’s there to say. I don’t believe in talking just to hear my own voice like some fellows I know,” he said, enjoying a vision of himself as a strong man whose words always meant something, wanting her to catch that same impression of him. In an afterthought, he realized that she often did a lot of chattering, and he regretted his remark, fearing it would make her angry.
“But who, for instance?” she said, smiling.
“What?” he asked, not sure that he understood what she meant.
“What fellows talk to hear the sound of their own voices?”
“Well, lots of fellows. There are fellows like that who could sell you Lake Michigan or the Masonic Temple,” he said.
“For instance?”
“Oh, lots of fellows.”
“I know, but who?”
“Oh, well.” As he thought, Red Kelly’s name popped into his mind, and he did not want to be talking about a friend of his behind his back. “Well, Red Kelly does,” he said against his will.
“How does he do it?”
“Oh, well, he likes to talk a lot,” Studs said in a fidgety manner.
“About what, besides his wife?” she asked, and Studs felt that she was making a dirty dig.
“Oh, well, he likes to let everybody know he’s in politics and expects to be a big shot.”
“I always felt that,” she said, squeezing his arm. “And he isn’t so much as some people I know.”
Studs’ cheeks seemed to be hot, and he was both happy and nervous. He found it hard to look at her, and he was happy for the excuse to enter a cigar store and buy a package of cigarettes. He loitered in the store, finding change in his pocket and lighting a cigarette, and he was happy as he dallied.
“Bill, I do wish you wouldn’t smoke so much,” she said as he stepped out of the store.
“Yes, I guess I better cut down, but there’s no use in throwing one away after I just lit it.”
“But, Bill, you really do smoke too much and I know that it isn’t good for you. Now, why don’t you, for the rest of Lent, give up smoking as a sacrifice? It will be so good for your health, too.”
“It’s a good idea,” he said evasively.
“I do wish you would!”
“I will. But of course, though, after you’ve been smoking for years, it’s kind of hard to give it up all at once, and it’s much better