The Studs Lonigan Trilogy - James T. Farrell [59]
and many turned on and off of Prairie Avenue. It was a typically warm summer day. Studs vaguely saw the people pass, and he was, in a distant way, aware of them as his audience. They saw him, looked at him, envied and admired him, noticed him, and thought that he must be a pretty tough young guy. The ugliest guy in the world passed. He was all out of joint. His face was colorless, and the jaws were sunken. He had the most Jewish nose in the world, and his lips were like a baboon’s,, He was round-shouldered, bow-legged and knock-kneed. His hands were too long, and as he walked he looked like a parabola from the side, and from the front like an approaching series of cubistic planes. And he wore colored glasses. Studs looked at him, laughed, even half-admired a guy who could be so twisted, and wondered who old plug-ugly was, and what he did. Then Leon ta-taed along, pausing to ask Studs’ about taking music lessons. He put his hands on Studs’ shoulders, and Studs felt uncomfortable, as if maybe Leon had horse apples in his hands. Leon wanted Studs to take a walk, but Studs said he couldn’t because he was waiting for some guys to come along. Leon shook himself along, and Studs felt as if he needed a bath. Old Fox-in-the-Bush, the priest’ or minister or whatever he was of the Greek Catholic Church across from St. Patrick’s, walked by, carrying a cane. Studs told himself the guy was funny all right; he was Gilly’s bosom friend. Studs laughed, because it must be funny, even to Gilly, listening to a guy talk through whiskers like that. Mrs. O’Brien came down the street, loaded with groceries, and Studs snapped his head around, like he was dodging something, and became interested in the sky, so that she wouldn’t see him, not only because he was chewing, but also because if he saw her, he’d have to ask her if he could carry her groceries home for her. Hell, he was no errand boy, or a do-a-gooddeed-a-day boy scout. And there was old Abraham Isidorivitch, or whatever his name was, the batty old half-blind Jew who was eighty, or ninety or maybe one hundred and thirty years old, and who was always talking loud on the corners. Abraham, or whatever his name was, did repair work for Davey Cohen’s old man sometimes, and the two of them must be a circus when they’re together. Mothers passed with their babies, some of them brats that squawled all over the place. Helen Borax, with her nose in the air, like she was trying to avoid an ugly smell. Mrs. Dennis P. Gorman, with a young kid carrying a package of her groceries that was too heavy for him. Studs got the gob of tobacco out just in the nick of time. She stopped and asked him how his dear mother was. She said he should be sure and tell her and his father to telephone them sometimes, and to come over for tea. And she asked him how he was enjoying the summer. Dorothy was just doing fine. She was very busy with her music, and she was going to summer school at Englewood, because she wanted to do the four years high school in three. And she said that Mr. Robinson, head master of the troop of boy scouts in the neighborhood, had been over to her house the other evening, and he talked about getting more boys in his organization, because that kept them out of mischief. The boy scouts, she explained, were an excellent organization, which made gentlemen out of boys, gave them opportunities for clean, organized fun and sport, and they taught boys to do all sorts of kind deeds like helping blind ladies across the street. The little boy helping her with groceries was a boy scout, and his good deed every day was to carry her groceries home; and he wouldn’t take a penny for it. And her husband said that the boy scouts gave boys preliminary military training and discipline so that it would be easier for them later on in the army, if they were called to defend their country, as they might have to do with that old Kaiser trying to conquer the world. She expected to see Studs and all the other boys on Indiana Avenue join the boy scouts. She started to move on, and said in parting:
“Now, do tell your dear mother