Chicago (8 page)

Alleyness, you might say, is one of the things I remember best about Chicago. For all that some things were true of all alleys—narrowness, shabbiness, the occasional rat the size of a bear, a dank dark smell you knew had been there for a century and would be there for another century—there was a curious disparity in alleys according to sections of the city, and an odd inversion of expectations. Downtown in the Loop, and in the wealthy Near North sections of the city, where commerce was king and the brightest wealthiest residences and businesses held sway, the alleys were generally terrifying, and twice I barely evaded ruffians with knives and poor attitudes; whereas there were warm and alluring alleys in the toughest raggediest neighborhoods to the south and west, neighborhoods where no one spoke American at all except cops and bus drivers. I remember one great alley on the west side where two brothers had built a brick oven for roasting lamb right into the wall, designed in such a way that the glorious smell of roast lamb with garlic and onions drifted out of the alley and snared passersby who could not resist at all and entered the alley sometimes with their eyes closed, dimly remembering something from their childhoods, perhaps an aunt's kitchen, or a redolent church basement, or a grandfather roasting shish kebab in the back yard in the wild sunlight.

Several alleys I explored had people living in them, in lean-to shelters or even little sheds, though no domicile I saw was bigger than your average garden shed. One alley on the South Side had a tarpaulin ceiling and several hammocks strung deftly high in the air, accessible only by a fire escape ladder; that particular alley also had a beautiful little fire-pit, at which the residents cooked sausages for sale at a cart in the street. Another alley, to the northwest, had been bricked over so meticulously at either end that you could not easily tell the alley from the adjoining walls, unless someone pointed out the infinitesimal vertical line that betrayed a small door. I was curious to enter that alley but there was a deeper law at play there and the man who showed me the door walked another couple of blocks with me silently before he suggested that I forget the alley and especially the door, which I have done until now.

I suppose the one alley I think of first when I think of Chicago's alleys is one on the north side, a few blocks past the basketball court where I played with the Latin Kings and the Latin Eagles. I was walking home from a blues club one night and heard music coming from an alley and I poked in to see what was up and I found a small man playing a tiny piano the size of a suitcase. He was surrounded by children, a good seven or eight of them, and no one said a word or moved a muscle until he was finished with a long lovely song. He had a thin quavering voice and he murmured more than he sang but he played the piano beautifully and somehow the combination of his gentle voice and the clarity of the piano notes was mesmerizing. I didn't know the song but one couplet from it struck me forcibly and I sang it all the way home that night:
there's a song that will linger forever in our ears / o hard times come again no more
. Much later I discovered those were lines from a song by the American composer Stephen Foster, who died only with three cents in his pocket and a scrap of paper on which he had written the words
dear friends and gentle hearts
.

*   *   *

One day I sat with Edward and charted out who lived where in the building, from apartment 4F, which was Ovious and his mother, down to 2A, which was the guy across from me who'd invented children's propeller hats, and when I added up residents I realized the guy who had been a sailor but not in the Navy was missing. I knew he was a resident—I saw him occasionally getting his mail from the lobby, and he got a lot of mail, more than anyone except Miss Elminides—but according to my chart he didn't have an apartment.

I went over the chart again. Fourth floor: Edward and Mr Pawlowsky, little Azad and his family, the two young women from Arkansas, Ovious and his mom, Mrs Manfredi, and the Armenian librettist. Third floor: Miss Elminides in the bay apartment, the two hermit brothers in 3E and 3D, the four businessmen in apartments 3A and 3B, and the apartment in which Eugenia the movie actress had lived. Second floor: the inventor in 2A, the Scottish tailor and the detective together in 2B, old Mr McGinty in 2C closest to the back door, the man who had once raised cheetahs in 2D, the Trinidadian cricket player in 2E, and me in apartment 2F with the big windows over the street. No sailor.

I asked Edward about this and he stared at me with the oddest combination of emotions on his long face—something like guilt and sadness and hesitation all at once—and then he led me upstairs to the roof, where Mr Pawlowsky was sweeping snow toward the drainpipes. Mr Pawlowsky looked at Edward and then at me and then said, “Well, we trust you to keep the matter private. The man lives in the basement, in two of the stalls. We fixed up a sort of cabin for him exactly like a bunk on a ship. He uses the Young Men's Christian Association in winter and the lake in summer for bathing. The YMCA was started in America by a sea captain, you know, and they keep an eye out for sailors down on their luck. He has some problems. Miss Elminides knows but no one else does. Now
you
know, but we trust you to keep it confidential. He's not in a position to pay rent and his accommodation is not quite up to city code but he's a gentle guy and there's never been a problem. Miss Elminides is of the opinion that healing will come and he will someday make up what he owes. That would be great if it happens but if it doesn't happen sometimes you just do what needs to be done. It's probably best if you just leave him alone. He's friendly enough and he says hey if you see him getting his mail but other than that probably it's best just to leave him be. He's quite handy with tools and sometimes he helps me when there's a lot of repair work to be done. He's a very fine carpenter. I would guess that he has many fascinating stories and I can see you would love to listen to him but Edward has suggested and I agree that perhaps it would be best for now to just say hey in the lobby and otherwise leave him be. I can trust you in this matter, I'm sure. Are you as cold as me? Because I am absolutely freezing, and Edward can finish the sweeping later. Let's go get some hot tea and think about the White Sox. Pitchers and catchers report to training camp next week, and this year by golly they are going to have a decent team. Bill Veeck bought them a couple years ago and when old Bill is involved with a team you are sure to see some wild and wonderful things. I think they might have the best outfield in the league this year and old Wilbur Wood on the mound throwing that silly knuckleball is going to be entertaining and then some. They'll have a game where they score eighteen runs and a game where they give up eighteen runs, mark my words. Maybe it will be the same game, which would not surprise me. Nothing about the Sox surprises me. This will be fun. You'll see.”

 

9.

THE MATTER OF EDWARD'S
age began to absorb me greatly as February wore on, and one clear night on the roof, as we were looking for the constellations Auriga (the charioteer) and Columba (the dove), Mr Pawlowsky pointed out Canis, the great dog, with a smile, and then talked at some length about Edward.

“It is conceivable that he may have been Abraham Lincoln's companion,” said Mr Pawlowsky, leaning back in his lawn chair. “It is faintly possible. Edward has some serious mileage on his odometer, but he eats healthy, except when he gorges on alewives, and he gets his exercise, and he has moderate habits, and he handles things without undue stress. Lincoln loved dogs and if you read his journals carefully he was usually accompanied by a dog like Edward, of uncertain heritage. And Springfield, you know, is just downstate a little from Chicago—a dog with a sure sense of direction, like Edward, could easily make his way northward after Mr Lincoln took the train to Washington to become president. There would be no good reason for Edward to stay in Springfield after that and it would be only natural for him to migrate to the city as so many others have done, greatly to our civic benefit.”

I told Mr Pawlowsky that I had many times asked Edward directly about his age and previous adventures but had never gotten more than hints and intimations in reply, and Mr Pawlowsky said, “Well, that is Edward's way, of course; he is not much for boast or braggadocio, which is admirable, though it can also be a bit frustrating when you are genuinely curious and there are no answers in sight. However I believe there is much to be discerned about his past in his present, so to speak, and that is why I suggest he may be far older than we would think. He is awfully familiar with Lincoln's letters and speeches, for example. Now,
I
read the speeches fairly often, sometimes aloud, as an act of citizenship, and also for the clear thinking and dry humor and wry cadence of the man while speaking, but I cannot say that I know whole snatches of them by heart, or can distinguish one from another within a line or two of quotation from anywhere within the text, but Edward can, and I have seen him do it many times. He is the same way with the letters, although they are not such ringing things as the speeches, and many of them are workmanlike missives, of course, having to do with policy or persuasion. Still—it's interesting to note that Edward is most versed and most interested in the speeches and letters from Illinois, rather than from the presidential years, with the exception, of course, of the inaugural addresses and the Emancipation Proclamation. You wonder if Edward is more familiar with the Illinois work because perhaps he was present when those speeches were delivered and letters written. Improbable, perhaps, but not impossible. But I am afraid we will always be reduced to speculation in this matter, given Edward's character.”

*   *   *

I should say a bit more about my job at the Catholic magazine downtown, because of course in a real sense it was what allowed me to live in Chicago, and paid for my food and train tickets and basketball sneakers and small glowing whiskeys in small dark blues bars.

The editor-in-chief was a round beaming ebullient Irishman with the most glowing Irish face I had ever seen. He wore only beautiful glowing gray suits of the finest cut and cloth, an infinitesimally different shimmer and gleam of gray every day. He called me into his office at ten in the morning of my first day on the job and informed me tersely but cheerfully that we did not use the words
hopefully
or
unique
in the magazine, nor did we say such silly things as
it remains to be seen
or
on the other hand,
nor did we respect ostensible religious authority overmuch without cause to do so, nor did we take an unnecessarily confrontational attitude toward the hierarchy and its agents and minions, but rather we tried to walk a road in which clarity and humility were our recurring signposts. Also the office was not a drinking club, a fraternity, a lunch group, a refuge for the sleepy, a sinecure, a stepping-stone, a competition, a love-nest, a dating service, a source of free office supplies, a meeting-place for those with soaring literary aspirations, a coffee shop, a revolutionary cell, a nest of religious anarchy, a coven of apologists, a café for free telephone calls, or a place where such things as dungarees and shirts sporting the names and logos of colleges or athletic teams or musical ensembles were welcome. I was expected to bring my intelligence, diligence, honesty, creativity, and curiosity to work every morning by eight and wield those admirable and God-given tools until four. I could come in earlier and leave later if there was sufficient reason to do so but no undue credit would be given for extra hours when the coin of esteem was creative and trustworthy production. “You get two weeks for vacation and you must stagger your vacations around the vacations of the rest of the staff. See Mr Mahoney about vacation schedules. You get ten paid sick days a year. If you honestly require more than ten days to deal with illness or grief we can negotiate something depending on your trustworthiness and the nature of the affliction. See Mr Mahoney about that. We do not play radios or musical instruments in this office. We do not drink alcohol in this office. We try to maintain a professional appearance within reason. We often have visitors of every sort and stripe from cardinals to members of many other faith traditions in this office and we treat them all with respect and we do not make scurrilous remarks disguised as jokes. We once had a man who did exactly that and he did not last. As regards paychecks, monies withheld for tax and insurance purposes, pension funds if any, advice on commuting in and out of the city by train or bus, and any other matters of that sort, see Mr Mahoney. As regards ideas for the magazine, see me. As regards possible writers and photographers for the magazine, see me. We do not publish poets and we generally steer clear of artists. We do not publish fiction, knowingly. As regards complaints and diatribes about what you write, see Mr Mahoney about our form letters in response. If a personal response is required above and beyond our form response, I will handle that. We once had a woman who liked to write her own responses to complaints and diatribes about her work and you would be shocked at the language she used, and her a woman of the cloth, too. A Dominican sister. The Dominican sisters are a tough bunch, with skins like tree bark and a capacity for brawling, in my experience. We do not make jokes in print about the various charisms and characters of the Catholic religious orders, even the Jesuits. That Dominican, by the way, once punched out a cop who was beating a helpless drunk with his truncheon. This was right on the corner of Wells and Madison. He was a burly fellow, too, and she dropped him with a flurry of jabs that would have done a middleweight proud. Knocked him right out cold. He went down like rocks thundering from a truck. Remarkable woman. Do you have any questions?”

“About the nun?”

“About the magazine and your duties.”