The Studs Lonigan Trilogy - James T. Farrell [47]
Studs said Danny was a goof. The reason he could fight was that he was so goofy that he couldn’t be hurt. They sparred a little more, but Studs had lost interest in training Danny. They talked.
“Say, did you ever hear of Rube Waddell?”
“Sure, I got an autographed ball from him.”
“Don’t goof me. You’re too young to have got it.”
“Well, he gave it to my uncle for me when he was playing in the American Association, and I got it at home. He was the greatest left-hander in the game, and I know Stuffy McInnis, the greatest first baseman in the game. He gives me balls when the Athletics are here,” said Danny.
Studs said the Rube was no good. Danny didn’t have any right to have a ball from Rube Waddell. Studs walked away, sore. He walked down Fifty-seventh Street, furtively looked around to see if anyone saw him, and when the coast was clear he sniped a butt from the street. He walked back, smoking it. Then he met Lucy, returning from the store with an armful of groceries. He carted them for her. As they walked slowly back towards her house, Studs had some of the old feeling he had had on that March day. She asked him what he was going to do, and he said he didn’t know. hut he thought he might take a walk over to the Washington Park playground, and fool around if that old crab Mr. Hall didn’t kick him out. She told him it was a good idea, because she thought she’d go to the park, and they could walk over together. She said Mr. Hall was a mean old frog. Studs told himself that it was swell, and he was in luck. He told Lucy that he guessed they could walk together at that. He became suddenly leery and uncertain, because a guy could never be sure when he was, and when he wasn’t, saying the right thing to a girl; he felt that he should have said something different to her; he hoped that he hadn’t said anything that would make her sore and change her mind so she wouldn’t go to the park with him. He waited and worried while she went into the house, and it took a long time, so that he got nervous and was afraid she wasn’t coming, but he waited anyway. He heard some young kids in the Shires’ gangway, Helen’s kid sister, a couple of her girl friends, and a ten-year-old punk named Norman some-thing or other. They were talking about having a show party in one of the basements across the street. They enthusiastically agreed to, and they ran across the street, looking quite cute and innocent. Studs watched them skip, and said to himself with a quizzical look on his face:
Jesus Christ!
He scowled, scratched his head and asked himself if he should tell Helen Shires. He decided not to, because he hated any kind of a snitcher. He laughed to himself, thinking how funny it was, and what a knockout of a story it would be for Dan and the guys if they would promise not to pass it on. He thought of his kid sister, Fritzie, telling himself that she wouldn’t never do a thing like that. If he ever found her doing it, he’d certainly boot her tail around the block until she couldn’t walk straight. But then, he guessed there was something in Catholic girls that made them different from the other girls. Now, there was Helen Shires; she was fine, just like a pal or a guy’s best friend; but then, there was some-thing different and purer in a girl like Lucy which stopped her from talking about the things he and Helen talked about. Yes, sir, he was pretty certain about that something purer in Catholic girls. He laughed, because the little kids had been so funny. He thought about going over and peeking in on their party, but just then he saw Lucy.
She came out wearing a reddish-orange wash dress which looked nice on her, because she was dark, curly-haired, with red-fair skin, and the dress set her off just right. And she had on a little powder and lipstick, but it didn’t make her look like a sinful woman or anything of that sort. Studs didn’t usually pay attention to how girls looked,