Young Lonigan - James T. Farrell [286]
“I’m certainly glad to be the winner in this race,” he said, nasal-voiced, “and it was sure a hard one. When I entered it, I said to myself Oscar you got to win, you got to win. My mother, she said to me ‘Oscar you haven’t a long enough nose to win,’ and I said, ‘Maw, you wait and see.’ Well, I won, and it was a hard race, and I’m sure the happiest man in the world today”
BUSINESS LEADER PREDICTS BETTER TIMES AFTER VISIT TO WHITE HOUSE. OSCAR VAN GILBERT, BANKER, IN INTERVIEW
A stout, puffy, bald-headed man sat at a desk and mechanically read from a paper.
“A business depression is a reaction. For every action, there must be a reaction, and then a counter action, because that is the law of life and of economics. The business depression is a reaction to over-production. We are now through the worst of it, and have slowed down our processes of production in consonance with the law of supply and demand. We are again on a solid footing, and we shall see, in the next six months, another commercial upswing. In my recent visit to the White House, I found this same hope prevailing in official circles, and I concluded that what we all must do is to get behind our president and push upward, to the next period of prosperity. And when our next period does return, let us all be wiser than we were in the years of 1928 and 1929.”
“I’m glad that’s over,” Studs said.
“Now we’ll get the real stuff,” Pat said.
III
GRANDIOSE FILMS CORPORATION
Presents
DOOMED VICTORY
Studs yawned without reading the credit list or cast of characters, and slumped in his seat ready to let the picture afford him an interesting good time.
Two shabby boys walked nonchalantly along a street in a poor district, the boy on the outside carrying a beer can with the handle resting over his right wrist. His companion, his cap back on his curly head, stuck his hands in his pocket and whistled. A beer wagon passed with a crunching of wheels and a rattling of barrels. They paused to stare at a drunk lying in the gutter, and the boy with the beer can looked up from the intoxicated man to an advertising sign across the street.
THE WORLD IS YOURS
“Holy Moses!” the curly-haired boy exclaimed.
The boy with the beer can gestured knowingly, handed him the can, bent over, and forked two bills from the drunk’s pocket.
“This is for you, Spike, and this is for Joey Gallagher,” he said, handing Spike one of the bills and taking back his beer can.
“Gee, Joey.”
Whistling, they walked slowly along, past a row of wooden tenement houses.
“Joey Gallagher and Spike Malone, what are you rascals up to now?”
“Nothing, Mr. Kennedy. Just running an errand for the old man,” Joey Gallagher replied, looking up into the face of the benign policeman.
“You little divvils keep out of mischief or I’ll be running ye in.”
“Kennedy’s an old fool,” Joey Gallagher said, and they walked around a corner building with the sign above it:
O’BRIEN’S
Inside the saloon toughs and eccentrics lined the bar, some in caps and jerseys, others wearing plug hats, and sporty gray suits with narrow trouser cuffs. Full-rounded women with wide hats were scattered among the men at the tables. Waiters moved about with trays, and a thin-faced fellow tickled the piano keys.
The boys crept in by the side door, timidly walked to the edge of the bar, attracted the attention of the bartender with the florid mustaches, handed the can up to him. With the can filled, they turned to the door, and just before going out Joey Gallagher cast an admiring and wistfully boyish glance at the toughs lining the bar.
“So you’re tough! You’re tough!” a boy, huskier than Joey Gallagher, said, meeting them on the street, toying with Joey, like a cat playing with a mouse, by pushing him, pulling out his shirt, and jamming his cap half over his eyes.
Joey quickly shoved the can of beer to Spike and rushed into the bully, the two boys mauling back and forth. The bully plunked Joey’s eye, and Studs, watching Joey rush in again with flailing arms, remembered how he at Joey’s age had beaten