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By Root 10465 0

Threads Among the Gold, and After the Ball Is Over. With a gesture of despair, he downed his whisky. His head began to feel light, and he did not think that he could control himself any longer. And he ought to go home, but he didn’t want to. Those two young lads, talking of girls and whorehouses, forced Bill’s image back into his mind. What should he do, just sit down here and cry? He frowned. Goddamn it, he cursed, thinking how he had done nothing to merit these sorrows. He didn’t care now. He was beyond caring, and he was going to drown his sorrows in drink.

“Another.”

“Friend, you look glum. Why look glum? Why look glum and sour? Why so glum and dour? Sing, friend, sing. I always sing, and sing again, and sing. Listen!” McGuire babbled.

Since Maggie Dooley

Danced the Hooly-Hooly,

Ireland’s been fading away.

The Sweeneys and Dalys

Have sold their shillelaighs,

The fat Miss Kelly

Wiggles just like jelly

To that taunting sway.

And all the colleens on the street

Are all dressed up like shredded wheat

Since Maggie Dooley

Learned the Hooly.

McGuire, exposing his gums in a grin, acknowledged the applause he received.

“Have one on me,” Lonigan called to McGuire.

“Oh, ‘tis a pleasure to drink with a gentleman. Sir, what is your name? You are speaking with Timothy McGuire.”

“Lonigan.”

“Irish, too. Well, friend, drink to the dear old sod,” McGuire said, Lonigan smiling, proud to be Irish, trying to drag through his foggy brain remembrances of old days in saloons, when Paddy Lonigan was young, and free, and light-hearted.

“I’m a Kilkenney Irishman,” McGuire said, touching glasses with Lonigan.

“Let’s sit down,” Lonigan said, beginning to tire.

He walked unevenly to a vacant chair, and McGuire crashed into a chair opposite him. His eyes grew misty, and he looked at the figures at the bar in a semi-daze. The insides of his head spun like a top. He told himself that he was drunk and he didn’t give a good goddamn.

“My friend, these are hard times, and the world, oh, the world exists in a dreadful state of confusion. So smile, my friend, smile, smile,” McGuire slobbered, and Lonigan grinned foolishly. “Me now, I lost everything, I lost every red copper in this vale of tears. So what do I do? I drink, and I smile, and I sing, and I say,” his head tumbled forward, “I say, my friend, whisky is an Irishman’s best friend.”

“I’ve lost plenty, plenty,” Lonigan said, his chin sagging. He silently warned himself to hold his tongue. “I lost everything. Money. My building. And now my oldest son lies home, dead.”

“Condolences, friend, condolences,” McGuire muttered, extending a wrinkled and dirty hand.

“I don’t mind the money,” Lonigan said, weakly sighing. “But my boy. My oldest son, the best damn son a man ever had. He died today of pneumonia.”

“Friends,” McGuire called, arising, supporting himself against the table. “Friends, Romans, lend me your ears. My friend here, an Irish gentleman, they took all his money, and now his son is dead. Friends, Romans, lend him your sympathies.”

McGuire fell back into his chair. Lonigan slumped, his face puffed, his expression saddening, the fat bulging around his jowls. He arose and floundered blear-eyed toward the two young lads at the bar.

“Pardon me if I bother you, boys. You make me think of my own son lying home, dead. I’ve been a good father, and he’s been a good son to me and my old lady, and he’s dead. Dead! A good son, know him, Bill Lonigan? Everybody calls him Studs. Did you know my boy?”

“Where’s he from?”

“I raised him near here, down at Fifty-eighth Street.”

“No, sir, I don’t. How about you, Jack?” the lad in the blue suit said.

“Friend,” McGuire said, pawing at Lonigan’s coat sleeve.

“Boys, you’ll excuse me for troubling you, but you don’t know what it means to a father in his old age to lose his son.”

“Friend, here, take my sympathy,” McGuire said in tears.

“What was the trouble with your boy?” the bartender asked.

“Double pneumonia.”

“Tough. Here, friend, better have a drink on the house. It’ll brace you up,” the bartender said, pushing a whisky toward Lonigan.