The Studs Lonigan Trilogy - James T. Farrell [87]
“Well, Lee, give our regards to Kaiser Bill,” said Pat.
“And tell him the boys from Fifty-eighth Street want to throw a party in his honor, if he’ll drop around,” Slew said.
“Sure thing! And say, boys, since it’s my last night, how about having a blowout?”
“You said it. We’ll send you off to Berlin in the right way,” said Barlowe.
CHAPTER ONE
I
Studs Lonigan walked north along Indiana Avenue. His cap was on crooked, a cigarette hung from the corner of his mouth, and his hands were jammed into the pockets of his long jeans.
Warm sun sifted dozily through an April wind, making him feel good. He liked spring and summer. There were things in winter that were all right—ice skating, plopping derbies, with snowballs—but spring and summer, that was his ticket. Soon now, there would be long afternoons ahead, at the beach and over in Washington Park, where they would all drowse in the shade, gassing, telling jokes, goofing the punks, flirting with the chickens and nursemaids, fooling around and having swell times. Like last summer, only this one was going to be even better. He was a year older now, bigger, and he knew what it was all about. After June, he wouldn’t have that worry about school. It sure was a black cloud over his head. Gee, he didn’t know what night he would go home to supper and learn that his old man had found out. How would he face it? If only he hadn’t done it!
But he’d lied, and had had to go on telling more lies until now he was so damn mixed up in lies about it, that he didn’t know what to do. He hadn’t wanted to go to high school anyway. Well, it was the old man’s fault. And if the old man did find out, all right. Studs Lonigan would let him know that he was his own boss. It was a black cloud always hanging over his head.
He shrugged his shoulders, because Wilson was going to declare war any one of these days, and maybe the war would get him out of it. He might be able to go. In a few months he’d be sixteen. Next fall, he might be doing his bit for Uncle Sam, and then all his troubles about school would be forgotten kid worries.
Praying in church, at Stations of the Cross, he’d learned something about himself, and about praying. Whenever he prayed for something he really wanted, and he could see the thing he wanted clearly in his own mind, he could pray good, concentrating on God and holy things. But when he just prayed in general, with no particular intention in mind, he just mumbled out the prayer words, and his thoughts wandered over everything, and he couldn’t, not even to save his neck, keep them on God and holy things. Today, he’d asked God in his prayers to be on the side of America, if Wilson declared war, and let them fight and be a hero and not get killed or mortally wounded.
He remembered his history lessons from grammar school. We had, America had, the most glorious and bravest an noblest war record in all history. Old Glory had never kissed the dust in defeat. And now, maybe, yes, Old Glory would be flying victorious over the battlefields of the biggest war in history. But what would it be like in war times, because war times were the only important times in history? It was great to think that kids in the future might be reading about the times when Studs Lonigan had lived. They might even be reading of William Lonigan, the hero, just like he’d read about Hobson, the guy who had carried the message to Garcia in the war with Spain when America had set Cuba free from tyranny. He guessed he might still be too young, but he’d get there soon, somehow. He was prepared to fight, and, if necessary, die for his country. He paused under the elevated structure at Fifty-ninth and Indiana, and slowly, solemnly, as if