Place in the City (8 page)

The picture of life was as broad as it was amazing. Anna was there, always, but there were other things, so many things that a comprehensive view of it bewildered him. It was a force marching on to a triumphant finish. You knew why you lived, and you lived. It was like a wine glass, appreciated and drained deep to the bottom.

He spoke to himself, eagerly and rapidly, because he was amazed at himself. This John Edwards was a new man, flushed with living and good to know.

“Tonight,” he said quickly, “all tonight, the wedding night and the birth night. Everything happens tonight. Tonight we live.”

When he opened the door to go out, the blast of cold air struck him in the face like a living thing. For a moment, he wavered and swayed. It was a shock; it hit you and hurt you, and left you gasping for breath. But it was good and cold and clean. It struck deep, to the marrow.

At first, he stepped gingerly, put his head down, letting his hat take the force of the wind and the snow. But then, as he walked, the exercise sent the blood pounding through his veins, flushed his cheeks, and gave him a buoyant sense of exhilaration and well-being.

He tired easily. When he reached the corner, it seemed to him that he had walked a mile, and he stopped in the light of Meyer's cigar store to rest. When he took out a cigarette and held it to his lips, he saw that his hands were trembling. Well, that was only to be expected. He would have to find himself, put muscle where there was none, make a man's being out of his frail form. It was a big task, a tremendous task, but it didn't frighten him. He knew that he was capable of it, that he would do it, and come out of the struggle smiling. Striking a match, he made a small circle of light, in which his white hands with the blue veins standing up from the skin were clearly visible.

Blowing biting clouds of smoke through his nostrils, the poet smiled. They were clever hands, splendid nimble hands, and he could still clench them and feel the force of his grip. Yet the life in them had almost flickered out. He would have done it; he would have blown himself out, the same way you blow out a candle.

The deep puffs on the cigarette hurt his throat, but now all pain was good. He sent his laugh out into the night.

Crossing the avenue, he walked on into the night with long strides, and the night and the snow closed over him.

In his mind, he was making a song, and it seemed to him that the song kept time with his steps.

T
HOMAS O'LACY
went because some had told him to and some had dared him to. He was seventeen, and he knew that down in his heart he was afraid of nothing except his father. The double risk lay in the fact that the house was on his father's beat; and even if he had known another place, he wouldn't have known how to go about it. As it was, he knew Shutzey and he knew a few of the girls who worked for Shutzey.

Why tonight? The tale is like a web; the snow is a blanket in the darkness that binds everything together. When the snow falls at night in the city, people stay close to their homes, and those that have business in the street move furtively. The night in New York is a deep, silent master.

Thomas was glad of the snow. The snow made it hard to see for more than a few yards in front of you; it concealed you, like a long white robe: and anyway, why shouldn't he do what all his friends had done? It made a man of you, and, geesus Christ, he was a man in everything else.

When he came to Shutzey's house, he was trembling with nervousness and anticipation. In front of the house, he stopped and cast anxious glances up and down the street for his father. He jingled the money in his pocket, hunched his shoulders, and rang the bell. Minnie the storage vault opened the door. At first she couldn't recognize him, the way he was all bundled up in his overcoat, his hat pulled down over his face.

“Lemme in, Minnie,” he said.

Then she saw who it was. Closing the door, she turned around to look at him, her hands on her hips, smiling and shaking her head. The parlor was warm. It was the first time he had ever been in there, and he looked around curiously.

It was warm and cozy, not at all the way he had expected it to be. He took off his hat and coat, still shivering a bit, and then looked anxiously at the puddle that had formed around his feet. When he opened his mouth to speak, he realized that he was trembling. He had to get over that, act like a man and just the same as if this was an everyday business with him.

“I'm sorry,” he said to Minnie the storage vault.

“Awright, Tommy. That don't do no harm. Look, the other day I seen you on the street, an' I said, ‘Just any time now Tommy'll be around, just the same like any of the other young men.'”

“Yeah?” Tommy grinned.

“Sure.”

Thomas was a tall, thin boy with sandy hair, a nice smile, and the long, north-Ireland nose. When he grinned, he looked younger than he was. Minnie thought it was something of a shame; he wasn't tough, and you had to be tough. But still and all, everyone had to get it over with. She would see that he was treated right, and she wouldn't clean him out of all his money, the way some madams would have with a kid like that.

“Gimme your coat, sonny,” Minnie said, “and sit down on that couch. I'll hang 'em up, and be right back.”

He sat down, crossed his legs, and lit a cigarette. All in all, it wasn't bad; you just had to make out like you knew what it was all about.

Minnie came back, sat down next to him, and laid an affectionate hand on his knee. “Now you don't worry,” she told him, “because I'll fix it up for you. I know what you want, don't I, Tommy?”

“Yeah—I guess so.”

“I know how you feel, too. Geesus, I seen enough kids like you in my time to know just how you feel. So look, if I wasn't madam, I'd fix you up by myself. But I know like this you'd like to have some nice young girl. Ain't that right?”

“Yeah—”

“So now you sit here, and I'll get the girl, and then she can take you up to yer room, and it ain't like you got to be ashamed about anything. When you get through, I'll be sitting here, and you can give me a dollar and fifty cents, just like that.”

“Yeah.” He crossed his legs, uncrossed them, while she patted his knees with her hand. Her hand fascinated him, it was so plump and pink, with so many brilliant rings on it. There was one that looked like a diamond, only it couldn't have been, it was so big.

“Now make yourself comfortable,” she said.

While she was gone, he puffed upon his cigarette carelessly, trying to erase his mind of everything but the pleasures waiting for him. Then he thought of how he would tell about it the next day. Not all at once. He wouldn't boast, as if it were the first time he had ever done anything like it. During school, he'd let hints drop. Then, later, he might advise one or two of the boys to drop around the house and mention his name. Confession bothered him a little, but he knew such things were a commonplace at confession; you got it off your chest. He might even come around with a few of his friends.

When Minnie came back, he started, burnt himself with his cigarette. The girl with Minnie was a blond, very pretty, too, and smiling at him like she had always known him.

“This is Tommy,” Minnie said, “and this is Lillian.”

Thomas was sucking his finger, looking at her, and grinning at the same time.

“He's a nice boy, Lil, so you just see that you treat him right, like I told you.”

“Sure.”

“G'wan, Tommy, and don't you be ashamed of nothing you do. Go ahead.”

“Thanks, Minnie,” he managed to say.

“Don't mention it.”

Later, when he came down, Minnie was waiting for him. He grinned when she asked him whether he had enjoyed himself, and then he gave her the dollar and a half.

“There ain't no hurry for you to go,” Minnie told him. “Why don't you sit down and rest up before you go out into the cold.”

“No—I'd better get going.”

“Well, come again, Tommy. You know you're always welcome, don't you? You come again, and see if you don't like it better the second time.”

“Yeah—maybe.”

“I'll get your hat and coat.”

“Yeah.”

He was more sorry for the dollar and a half than for anything else. Now he wanted to get away from the house quickly, and without being seen. Minnie was fat; it sickened him when she patted his cheeks. He plunged out of the house and almost fell going down the steps.

Then he stopped abruptly. Out of the snow, a broad figure had come like a ghost, and now he was staring into the hard, red face of his father.

“Thomas!”

He whirled to run, brought himself up short, and stood there facing his father. Placing his hands in his pockets, he attempted to be defiant; but he knew he was making a mess out of it.

“Thomas!”

“Awright—everyone else does. Why shouldn't I?”

“Thomas, come here!”

Shambling close to his father, he expected any moment to feel his fist; he wanted to. He wanted to feel the blow smack against his flesh, carry him off his feet into the snow. That would be better than words. What was the use of standing there talking, when his father didn't understand?

“You were in that house?”

“Yes—”

“Knowing what I think of Shutzey and his place, you went in there. Knowing what I think of women of that ilk, you went in there. Jesus Christ, that I should have to call you my son! Now you're rotten with sin, and how do you know but that the maggots of disease are not crawling in your blood?”

“No—no—I didn't—”

“Don't stain your lips now with a dirty lie. It is bad enough that those lips should have to kiss your mother. It is bad enough that you should walk into my house with the tread of a decent man!”

“What'd I do?”

“—You dirty whoremonger, asking me what you have done! You dirty little cheap swine! You're my son. You're what I've worked for all these years. Sure—bow your head—it's not fit to look into the eyes of a decent man.”

All of a sudden, Thomas was calm; he felt that he was growing, becoming big, very big. He wanted to smile; later he would smile. Now he wanted to put his arms around his father, hold him tight and put his head on his shoulder. But he couldn't say anything.

“Well—answer me!”

“Why—you won't believe me.”

“Hold your tongue!”

“No—if I want to talk—”

O'Lacy's fist caught his son in the mouth. Thomas had been expecting the blow, and when it came he was glad for the hurt of it. Suddenly, his legs were unable to support him, and he crumpled into the snow; there was snow in his eyes, in his face and his mouth.

And while he lay there, he heard his father's footsteps vanishing into the night. Still, the thought in his mind was that he would like to put his arms around his father, hold him tight and close.

I
KNEW
you'd come,” Shutzey said, when he saw Jessica making her way toward his car. “I knew, beautiful. You wus afraid of me, but, Geesus, you ain't got no reason to be afraid of me. I'm goin' tu treat yu right.”

“No—I wasn't afraid.”

Not afraid, perhaps, because she was almost sure of herself. She could handle Shutzey. He was a wild beast-man, but she could handle him. And meanwhile, he represented a step on the ladder. She would go up. Shutzey had his place, and she knew how she could handle Shutzey.

When she dressed, she had looked at herself in the mirror. Her body was small and slim and very good to look at. And it curved and beckoned in the right places. Shutzey was a pimp. He bought and sold women; all his life was women: and he wouldn't fail to note how her body curved and beckoned in the right places. In front of the mirror, she danced and pirouetted, put fingers on the tips of her breasts, and bent her body forward and backward from the waist. Indeed, she was very, very lovely, and there was no denying that. She was the loveliest of the three sisters.

Shutzey would know it, but Shutzey was nobody's fool. She would have to be clever with Shutzey, too, step on him, like you step on one stone to get to another.

Shutzey said: “Awright, baby. Now yer here, hop in, an' we'll get going.”

“I like your car,” she smiled. It was a long, handsome red roadster, with lots of brass and nickel extras. It was the kind of a car she had always wanted to ride in.

“Baby,” Shutzey said, “it ain't half good enough for yer class. Without you, it don't look like nothing.”

She sat down, making herself comfortable, not too far from him and not too close to him. She crossed her legs, leaned back, and sighed. First he started the car, then glanced at her, looked back at the road, and offered her a cigarette.

“Thanks.”

He lit it for her with a deft motion of his hand, and again she saw how large and capable his hands were. Strong hands. One of those hands, if he desired, could snap her arm in two; or it could pinch her cheeks into her face until blood ran between her teeth. Why did she always think of things like that? He was a man, though, a great brute of a man. He was wasting himself with this petty business of whores. Right there she knew that he was wasting himself, and she decided she would tell him that later.

“I'm glad yu smoke,” he said. “I like a woman who'll do what she wantstu do.”

“But there's a limit to what I'll do.”

“Yeah?”

He laughed, bearing down on the accelerator, and she joined in his laugh. She loved the way the car swirled through the night, the way his capable hands grasped the wheel. He was so damned sure of himself, sure as any ruler-beast in the jungle. That was where he belonged, in a jungle. All his life was a jungle around him, and in that moment she had a fleeting vision of herself being borne into that jungle, carried away, and leaving behind her every vestige of her former life.

“I'm not afraid of you,” she told him. “If I was a fool, I might be afraid of you because you're a pimp. But don't you think I know you're a pimp? Just a cheap pimp, Shutzey. What's your real name?”