Young Lonigan - James T. Farrell [107]
“Hell, lady, last week I had him down the block and you know what he did, he fell out of the buggy on his bean, right on the stone, and it didn’t hurt him none. Hell, lady, you can’t hurt that guy’s bean.”
Dick Buckford dragged his kid brother aside, and told him to shut up and take the baby home. He kicked Young Horn in the tail. Horn shrieked. He got his face slapped, and the cooing women were appalled. Horn wheeled the baby buggy off. He turned, a hundred yards away, and yelled at Dick:
“Wait’till I tell mother on you!”
The punks continued the battle, but the spirit of fun was gone.
Studs turned and walked down Indiana towards Fifty-seventh. He wished he’d see Dan Donoghue or some of the old Indiana bunch he’d gone with from St. Patrick’s. He felt like going over to Fifty-eighth and Prairie to see if any of the Fifty-eighth Street guys were around. But he waited for Lucy to come back, walking slowly down towards Fifty-seventh. He passed and re-passed, and re-passed her house, looking fourtively at the gray stone building. And last year, she’d stood on the porch and blown him a kiss. And he’d been a damn fool, and proud, and when someone had scrawled those things about him loving her, he’d been just dumb. She’d stood there as it was getting dark and thrown him a kiss. He belched. His stomach still felt like lead from those bananas. He came back to the prairie, but the punks had gone home for lunch. The twelve o’clock whistles blew, piercing the scene. They made Studs very lonesome. When would she speak to him again? He wanted to kiss her again too. He shook his head, thinking that he sure did have his troubles. He didn’t see her coming back either, and there was no one else around, and he couldn’t go home and eat. And if he’d only get into the war, he’d be a hero. And he’d sat in the tree with her, and the way she’d swung those legs that were now so pretty and had such shape, and her lips that were now redder, and then, she hadn’t hardly any breasts to notice, and now she was like ... like a growing flower . . . and he wanted to kiss her again. He glanced at the deserted trenches. He went over and looked down into them. He jumped into the nearer trench, and flung a can. He inspected the other trench. His troubles still weighted his thoughts. He was sore, goddamn sore at the world. He’d pay it back too. He got sorer. He kicked in the trench, and tore down the earthworks.
He heard a laugh. He looked towards the sidewalk. Lucy Scanlan stood there laughing at him, holding her head high.
His face a blazing red, he walked out of the vacant lot, past her, and on over towards Fifty-eighth and Prairie Avenue. He tried to think of himself as a hero. He was a hero in his own mind. He was utterly miserable.
II
KILLED IN ACTION, NOVEMBER 11, 1918 ... LESTER H. COLE.
Chapter Two
A DRUNK in the jammed elevated car sang The Star Spangled Banner. Studs tried to join in. The train rocketed along, and the song died feebly in the noise. A souse on the rear platform donged a cowbell. The train whistle emitted a piercing wah-wah. A powerful roar came from the front of the car:
“TO HELL WITH THE KAISER!”
Studs was swayed with the crowd as the train pulled into the Fifty-first Street station. The platform was crushed with people, and when the conductor refused to open the gates and admit additional passengers, they blared protests and loud-voiced jokes. There was another drunken bellow when the train pulled out:
“TO HELL WITH KAISER BILL!”
A female body pressed against Studs. From the corner of his eye, he lamped the woman; her face was wrinkling, and she must be forty or over, almost old enough to be his grandmother. But she excited him as much as if she was a young jane. Perspiration beaded his broad, planed face.
He again tried to sing and was toppled sidewise in a wave of goodnatured shoving. A fox-in-the-bush got his place beside grandma. Studs looked at the beard, lace curtains that must be dirty as a doormat. Hatred of fox-in-the-bush flared in him. He remembered his excited sensation as she wiggled against