Young Lonigan - James T. Farrell [147]
A park cop grabbed Weary. He wriggled loose, slipped behind him, and gave him a rabbit punch. A bruiser, guard on the Monitors, slugged wildly at Studs. Studs ducked, in desperation at the guy’s size, and swung blindly, landing in the guts. The ham’s guard dropped, and he whittled down to Studs’ size. Studs let an uppercut go from his heels and caught the fellow under the chin. The bruiser fled. Slug Mason came into action, pumping with both fists. He caught two guys, and crashed their heads together.
“The cops!” somebody yelled.
The cry was taken up. The mob separated in all directions. Police reenforcements came across the park, and clubs were swung, as everybody ran. Studs, running, passed a group carrying Schwartz.
“You bastards, come down to Forty-seventh Street!”
Studs turned and thumbed his nose. An opened pocketknife zizzed by his ears. He ran.
“Swell work, Studs!” said Fat Malloy ranging alongside of him. Shots in the distance were heard.
Studs came out of the park at Fifty-sixth Street, out of breath, his side paining.
VI
The poolroom was crowded. Rumors spread quickly. Talk went of arrests, broken heads, people dead. Studs passed along from one excited group to another, liking it all, the praise, the talk, the excitement. He came upon Arnold Sheehan, who had a sprained ankle, a twisted knee, and a shiner. He had been sitting down, and when the fighting came close, he had arisen and hobbled along the ropes. It had been just his luck to get sloughed in the eye. Weary tried to stir Studs up to go down to Forty-seventh. Nobody was interested. Fifty-eighth Street had won the game and the fight anyway, they all said. Nate came to tell Studs how he’d gloriously gotten his shiner. Young Rocky Kansas interrupted to tell how he had mashed in a big baboon. Studs knew they were liars. Guys always lied like that about how they fought, how they drank, how they jazzed. He told of hitting the big guy, and lied, too, saying he had knocked the guy cold with a punch. It was like being on a glorious jag, a little bit like it had been on Armistice Day.
He heard Dan Donoghue near him ask Danny O’Neill what he thought of the game.
“Most of them don’t know how to play. They tackle high, can’t block, don’t even know how to play their positions.”
“Well, they are uncoached, but don’t you think it was a fair bunch for an uncoached team?” asked Dan Donoghue.
Studs frowned when O’Neill superciliously answered yes. Remembered the punk when he ran around with his stockings falling and snot running out of his nose. Uncoached! Ought to slap his teeth! Seemed to think his was gold, droopy punk!
“That Schwartz is a player. I never tackled anybody as hard to get in my high school career with Loyola and I played against some tough men,” Dan said.
“He was good. But some of the guys, Kelly, McAuliffe, and Klein, for instance, were jokes.”
“What do you think of Studs?” asked Donoghue.
Studs tensed. Waited. Oughtn’t to care what the punk thought. Waited.
“A bit slow, but he knows what to do, leaves his feet when he tackles, and handles himself well.”
“Studs is a natural-born football player,” Donoghue said.
O’Neill wasn’t so bad. Heard too that he was a high school star. Studs sidled to them.
“Now that you’re a star on the team at the Saint Stanislaus high school, what did you think of our . . . amateur game?” Studs asked, fatuously.
Before O’Neill could answer, the rumor spread that Schwartz had died on the way to the hospital. Everybody gabbed and shouted at the same time.
“Will anything be done about it?” Studs asked Kelly.
“They might hold us for manslaughter.”
“Why? We played a fair game. The fight was afterwards.”
“Well, they might, only, of course, we’ll get out of it,