The Studs Lonigan Trilogy - James T. Farrell [39]
CHAPTER FOUR
I
Studs couldn’t stay in one place, and he kept walking up and down Indiana Avenue, wishing that the guys would come around. As he passed Young Horn Buckford and some punk he didn’t know, Young Horn said hello to him. He gruffed a reply. He heard Young Horn say, as he walked on:
“You know who that is? That’s STUDS LONIGAN. He’s the champ fighter of the block.”
Studs laughed to himself, proud.
He came back to Fifty-seventh, and sat on the curb watching two kids race each other up and down the street with barrel hoops. They pretended they were auto-racers. A little kid in a blue shirt kept saying he was Dario Resta; and the other called himself Ralph De Palma. Resta and De Palma raced back and forth, and at the conclusion of every race there was an argument between the two winners. He would have liked to play in such a game, but it was too young for him. He smoked a butt.
“H’lo, Studs!”
“Hello, Half-Wit,” said Studs to snotty-nosed, Jew-faced, thick-bodied, thirteen-year-old Andy Le Gare.
“Studs, can I feel your muscle?”
“I will if you will show me how you can bat your head against a brick wall.”
“G’wan,” said Andy.
“Say, Wilson’s gonna get skunked,” Studs said.
“He won’t. My father said so; and he knows,” said Andy.
“Listen! Wilson’s a morphidite,” Studs said.
“What’s that?”
“A guy that’s both a man and a woman at the same time, like fat Leon,” said Studs.
Andy looked at Studs, hurt, puzzled, betrayed.
“I don’t believe it. I’ll bet you ten bucks,” said Andy.
“Where’d you get the ten bucks?” sneered Studs.
“Never mind, I’ll get ten bucks,” said Andy.
“Boushwah!”
A pause. Andy again asked Studs if he could feel his muscle. Studs consented if Andy would show his stuff. Andy said it was a bargain. Andy felt Studs’ muscle, and said: Gee! He again gripped Studs’ hard-fibered right arm, and repeated his exclamation of admiration. Studs then made Andy carry out his part of the bargain; so Andy went over to the corner building, and, laughing idiotically, he snapped his head against the brick wall six times. Studs watched him open-mouthed, and said:
“Your bean must be made of iron. Watch out they don’t take it some day to use on the elevated structures.”
Andy went off. Studs watched him, laughing and muttering exclamations of surprise.
Studs hung around until the gang dribbled along. They sat on the grass in front of the apartment bui1dine on Indiana, where Danny lived. They whiled away the time with kid trivialities.
Danny O’Neill said that he had a good one on Three-Star Hennessey.
“Spill it,” said Dan Donoghue.
“Well, it’s funny; it’s a good one,” said Danny. Danny laughed like the goofy punk that he was.
“Well, for Christ sake, out with it before we take your pants down,” said Johnny O’Brien, who acted as if he were a big guy like Studs and Dan.
“Well, Hennessey was under the Fifty-eighth Street elevated station... and gee, it’s funny... !”
“Well, then, shoot it while you’re all together,” said Studs.
“Well, he was under the Fifty-eighth Street elevated station.”
“Yeh, we heard that,” said Johnny O’Brien... lookin’ up through the cracks to see if he could get an eyeful when the women walked up and down stairs
“Yeh, and we know what he was doing. That’s nothing new,” said Johnny.
“He once had a race with Paulie, and they both claimed the other had fouled,” said Studs, and they laughed.
“But this time it’s funny... You see, a dick caught him and shagged him down the alley. Three-Star got away, because nobody could catch him anyway, but the guys told me it was funny, him legging it, with his stockings hanging... and he didn’t even have time to button up,” said Danny.
They gabbed and laughed. Bill Donoghue interrupted the discussion on this latest of Hennessey’s exploits to say: “That’s a warnin’ for you, TB.”
“Say... I don’t do that,” said TB.
“No!” said Studs ironically.
“What you got them pimples on your forehead from?” asked Johnny O’Brien.
“Why, you’re gettin’ so weak that young O’Neill here can toss you,” Studs said.
TB and Danny were made to wrestle.