I had one last question for Marty. “How’s the girls?” He lowered his eyes. “Ma’s doin’ fine. Still workin’—” That got me mad. “She knows she don’t have to do that. Ain’t Frenchy takin’ care of her and May?” “Yeah, but—”
“But what? Either they’re gettin’ the dough or they ain’t.”
“Oh they’re getting it all right. It’s just that—”
“Just that what?” My impatience was about ready to bust loose, and the guard was getting ants in his pants again.
“Just that May, well…she ain’t always around.”
I jumped up. “Whaddya talkin’ about, she ain’t always around? What’s she doin’?”
That was enough for the guard. “Okay, Madden, trusty or no trusty, that’s it for the day.”
But I wasn’t finished yet. “Where is she?”
Marty jumped back. The other collegians, their mouthpieces, their frails, their mothers, their brothers, the screws—everybody stopped yapping for a minute to see what was the matter.
Marty took a couple of quick steps back, stumbled over his chair and sat down hard. I guess the guards must’ve thought I’d clocked him or something, because they started in to runnin’. I put up my fists, ready to give as good as I got, almost.
My brother managed to get to his feet before the first club fell across my shoulders. “An accident!” he cried, and that slowed them down some. All but one screw, who must have been deaf or something.
His club was high over his head as I caught him right in the old solar plexus and most of his lunch went flyin’ as a direct result. I ducked as it decorated the tabletop, spattering Marty with green peas and some chicken. I caught his chin with my knee as he hit the deck.
Then the rest of the press-gang was on me. I held up my hands to show I’d acted in self-defense and the clobberin’ I got was relatively minor as a result.
My heels were dragging as I shouted to my brother. “Find out where she is,” were my last words to him, “if it kills her.”
Chapter Thirty-Six
You may have been surprised to learn that Sing Sing had a nine. It had an eleven too and a basketball team. There were races run on a more or less regular basis as well. Inside those quarried stone walls, we had ourselves some right regular sporting events, the better to make us sound in mind and body, as well as soul.
Shot up as I was, I was exempt from the strenuous life. The warden and I understood each other, and so I was left in peace to tend to a little garden he let me use, to raise a bird or two and spend my evening in the prison library, readin’ up on this and that. I’d never had much truck with formal learning, but after cracking a hardcover spine or two I got the hang of it, and pretty soon I was devouring those volumes like popcorn at the Bijou. The books had mostly been donated by well-meaning ladies, which meant that a lot of the tomes was concerned with manners and morals as their class defined ’em. But once you pushed past the etiquette and the religious tracts, there was plenty of useful stuff and I read it all.
I read one book about General Custer, who’d gone and got himself killed by the Red Indians in Montana. Since I’d been in an ambush myself, I felt a twinge for the numerous poor paddies who’d joined the Seventh, only to find themselves on a lonesome hill, water gone, horses dead, arrows and redskins everywhere, traveling all that way from Ireland just to die for nothing in the middle of nowhere. I learned that their favorite song was “Garryowen,” which means “Owen’s Garden” in Irish, and so I called my little prison plot Garryowen, a place where I could sit in the sun and watch the athletic goings-on around me.
Baseball I liked but didn’t quite understand; I’m told you have to be born to it. American football seemed to me a pansy imitation of British rugby and if there was one thing I didn’t have no time for, it was pansies. Basketball, throwing a big fat medicine ball through a peach bucket, didn’t make no sense, and as for running around in circles, well, I had enough of that in my regular life without wanting to make sport of it.
What I did like, though, was boxing.
Now, you may object that ’twas boxing that killed my old man and put the dent in Monk from which he never recovered. All of which was true. But it was also boxing that got me, Marty and May over this side of the ocean, for which we was more than grateful.
There was no finer place outside Madison Square Garden to see the manly arts than the Big House. First, you had plenty of mugs what liked to fight. Second, you had plenty of guards to make sure the rules was followed. Third, you had plenty of spectators, each to cheer, whistle and holler for their man. Prison was made to order for boxing, and it’s a wonder that they don’t hold legit prizefights there on a regular basis, for what better place to see two stout lads pounding away at each other, with no penalty to be paid?
Luckily, Warden Lawes was of the same mind as yours truly, the happy result of which was that weekly boxing matches were a part of the entertainment program during my time up the river. I made a point of attending as many of them as I could, duties and health permitting. Nor was I averse to the laying of one or two side bets, just to keep my hand in on doings various and illegal, in preparation for my return to civilization.
On one particular occasion, which I have cause to remember well, a big Negro named Washington was mixing it up with an Italian of particularly swarthy complexion, much to the savage delight of the assembly.
“Knock the nigger for six!” shouted one white man, who I recognized at once as a fellow English subject.
“Put him down, Giordano!” cried an olive-skinned dago, rooting for his own.
Me, I had the darky at 8 to 5, and pretty confident of the odds I was. I watched him with half an eye, putting the gloves to the guinea’s face on a consistent basis, until the Italian’s nose had listed to one side of his face and one of his brown eyes was no longer observing the world in quite the same way as heretofore.
I was mentally contemplating my tote board when a tug at my sleeve brought me ’round. “Mr. Owney?”
It was little Hiram, the Tammany shoeshine boy. Except that he wasn’t no boy anymore. I was glad to see him, but I was sorry to see him.
“What’d they nick you for?” I said, my gaze still fixed on the bout.
“Kill the nigger!” shouted one of the inmates.
Hiram paid him no never mind, as the coloreds say. Neither did Giordano, who took another one on the chin from Washington that buckled his knees.
“White boy ain’t got no talent,” observed Hiram calmly.
Washington followed up with a combination to the wop’s breadbasket. Down went Giordano. I backed away to avoid the spray of blood. “None whatsoever,” I agreed.
“I ain’t nicked,” said Hiram. I noticed then he was sporting street clothes. “I just visitin’.”
Giordano was pretty much down and out by now, so I sat back and waited for my wagers to come rolling in. Hiram and I shook hands, and I didn’t give a tinker’s damn whether some of the punks wouldna liked a white man shakin’ with a colored, because after all I had more in common with him than with them.
Hiram’s gaze was still fixed on the makeshift ring in the prison yard. “That’s my uncle,” he said, nodding in the direction of the victorious Washington.
I held out my hand as another loser slapped a pack of cigarettes into it. “What’s the trouble?”
“Murder One.”
“That’s trouble.”
“Chair.”
“He sure can fight, though.”
“That was the trouble. Killed him a man with his bare hands.”
I watched as they carted Giordano out of the ring feet first. “I bet.” Another couple of packets were slapped my way. “Such things happen.” I didn’t have to remind myself. “Seen it myself, once or twice.”
I counted my winnings in a flash. “How’s the champ?” I asked.
“You mean Mr. Jack?” asked Hiram. “He fine…”
“Heard about the Willard fight in Havana…tough break.” The s
crews were breaking down the ring, and two of them were already escortin’ Washington back to his cell. That was what he got for his talent—some fresh air. I saw him cast a rueful glance our way as he trundled back to confinement.
Hiram shook his head. “I seen the whole thing, ’cause I was in Mr. Jack’s corner, helpin’ out.”
I couldn’t wait to hear about it. Everybody was talking about the Johnson-Jess Willard fight. “Is it true what they say? That he threw the fight?”
I thought Hiram was going to smack me. “If Mr. Jack was goin’ ta throw dat fight, why he go twenty-six rounds in dat heat?”
“How did Willard put him down?”
Hiram sighed. “Mr. Jack went out ’cause he was tired and it was so hot down there in Cuba, Mr. Owney. So damn hot.”
“Did he quit? I can’t believe a man’d quit.”
Hiram spat hard, like he was shining some fancy dogs. “Hell no he don’t quit. He just walked away is all.”
“On his back?”
“You goes how you goes.”
The screws were clearing the yard. “Tell me,” I said.
“In the twenty-fifth Mr. Jack tole his white wife to leave the fight, and she done got up and left. You shoulda heard the crowd, Mr. Owney, the things they was yellin’ at her, callin’ her a nigger’s whore and suchlike, when all she done was love a man for bein’ a man, no matter the color of his johnson.”
“I wish somebody’d love me like that.”
“They was yellin’ at him too. ‘Kill the Black Bear! Put the damn nigger down!’ Oh, Mr. Jack had his fans too, but mostly it was white folks there and you know how they felt about Mr. Jack and his white girls.”
“He told his wife to leave?”
“I guess he didn’t want her to see what was comin’, ’cause in his heart he musta knowed.”
“What he was going to do.” I could see it.
“Then he went out there for the twenty-sixth and damn if that white man didn’t look huge—huger than Mr. Jack ever was, and Willard he chase Mr. Jack around the ring till he get him in a corner and he start in to whalin’ away on Mr. Jack, hittin’ him with everything he got, and Mr. Jack try to defend hisself, but he’s just too old and tired now, and then Willard hits him with a right cross that’s got two hundred forty-five pounds loaded behind it and it catches Mr. Jack flush on the button and down he go.”
“Hard?”
Hiram was still in Havana. “Down he go and as he hits the canvas he throws up his arms in front of his face and don’t you just know it, that’s when the flashbulbs go off, a million of ’em if there was one, and that’s the picture everybody see the next day, of the black man lyin’ on the deck, with his hands over his face like he was afraid or somethin’, except that we knew Mr. Jack weren’t afraid of nothin’, jes’ shadin’ his eyes from the sun is all, and the white man standin’ over him crowin’.” Hiram finally took a breather. “You know what he say when he come out the ring?”
I shook my head.
“ ‘Alone,’ he said. ‘At last, they will leave me alone.’ ”
We were pretty much by ourselves in the yard now. A couple of the screws clumped off in the distance, watching us. I was grateful to Lawes for the slack. “What’s he gonna do now?” I asked.
Hiram picked up a kit lying at his side. “I dunno. Fight a few exhibitions. Make some money. ‘The Great Black Hope.’ Mostly, though, he openin’ up another club, like the one he had in Chicago back there a while ago.”
“What kind of club?”
“Music, dancin’, a place for folks to disport theyselfs.”
“Sounds like a good business.”
“Folks need some fun in they lifes.”
“Tell me about it.”
We walked together into the main hall. Instead of leaving by the front gate, though, Hiram started to peel off in the direction of the Warden’s office.
“Where you going?” I shouted.
“To see the Man,” he replied. Then I noticed that his kit was his shoeshine works. Jack Johnson or no Jack Johnson, Hiram was back to earning a living.
“What about Jack?”
I think Hiram took the question as more of a remonstrance about Johnson’s straitened circumstances, but in truth I was only after asking about his well-being.
“Even champs got to work,” said Hiram with a shrug. He gave me an address uptown, Lenox Avenue. “Come see us when you out.”
“Count on it,” I said—an easy promise, for I always did love a fighting man.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
May finally showed up several months into my confinement, and I must say she looked great. I had forgotten how beautiful she was, and even in the short time I’d been gone she’d grown up even more. I suppose it was the burden of taking care of Marty and Ma that had matured her, but not aged her.
I was more than a little agitated, after what Marty had said, but she come bustlin’ into the chatter room so sweet and pretty that I didn’t have the heart to call her on the carpet. Marty was just as protective of her as I was, now that he was after bein’ a real brother again, and we were both long since men of the world. Sure hadn’t I often been out and unaccounted for myself, even if I was a fella; but this was modern times now, and girls was people too, or so they said.
I’d instructed Frenchy to give her whatever she needed and he must have taken both of us at our word. She was sporting a fancy new dress, very modish, one that bared her graceful arms and dipped down a little in the front to show a modest bosom. Her eyes were the same clear blue, and her skin was still west-of-Ireland pale.
“What kept ya?” were my first words to her. I suppose I coulda chose them better, but that’s what I said.
The screws were keeping their distance but were still giving me the weather eye after my late outburst. One or two of them, I noticed, was giving May the once- or twice-over, which got my Irish up, but there wasn’t nothing I could do about it, so long as they maintained their distance.
Then she gave me a smile that melted whatever hardness had formed on my heart, and in that smile was all the explanation she needed to give. “Ma, Marty…you know, Owen…” She gathered her thoughts a moment. “I can’t stand seeing you like this.”
I gave her a tough, bitter little laugh, to show it didn’t bother me none. “Part of the cost of doing business, sis,” I said.
“Speaking of which,” she said, relieved. May started fillin’ me in on what was happening back in town in that same matter-of-fact way she’d had since we were kids, no emotion, no sentiment, just the bald-faced chips fallin’ where they may. It wasn’t the first time I wished my sister had been born a guy, so she and me could have been proper partners.
May’s news wasn’t particularly good. Since I got canned, and with Art and Johnny up the river too and Chick and Billy workin’ a more respectable side of the street, and Eddie dead, the gang was pretty much leaderless. The cops managed to pick a lot of the boys off, one by one, and Tanner Smith, who was left alone to try to salvage things on the muscle end, couldn’t quite get the job done. It didn’t surprise me none when May told me he was dead.
“How?”
“Shot.”
“Where?”
“In the back.”
“Where?”
“The new Marginal Club.”
“Where?”
“Eighth Avenue, where else?”
“Who done it?”
“Nobody.”
“What for?”
“Who knows?”
“How’d it happen?”
“He was sitting with his back to the door…”
“I told him a million times never do that.”
“Mug sashayed in, clipped him, waltzed out.”
That was pretty much it for the Gophers, as I saw things. With me on ice, Tanner dead, it was down to Big Frenchy to hold things together while I figured a way out of here.
She must have read my mind. “Just you and me now, huh? In this thing together. The way we
always wanted it.”
Things was moving too fast for my taste. “I told you I don’t want you mixed up in the rackets.”
May never got mad, she just got cold, and I could feel the chill across the table. “There ain’t no more rackets. Isn’t that what you were just thinkin’? The gang is done, finished. All that’s left is us.”
“Lower your voice.”
“You and me.”
“There’ll be other gangs,” says I.
“But you won’t let me be in them either.”
“You don’t have to get sore.”
“Well, I am sore. Plenty sore. Sore about the way you’ve been treatin’ me.”
Now, that got me sore. “I’ve treated you swell, your whole life. Ain’t I took care of you when Ma couldn’t? Didn’t I buy you nice things as soon as I could? Don’t I love you? What more do you want from me, May?”
If I coulda reached across and touched her right then and there I would have, and hugged her and told her I was her own dear brother, put on earth to take care of her. I wouldn’ta cared if the screws had laughed, or talked about it like it was sissy or something. It was part of my promise to Da when he lay dying not to let him down, ever.
But I couldn’t, and I didn’t. “Get Shalleck up here pronto.”
Her face fell. “Sure. Whatever you say.”
“Sorry, sis,” I said. “C’mere, give us a kiss.”
I forgot that kissing wasn’t allowed, not even between a brother and his sister or a son and his mater, so I leaned forward and May leaned forward and I could smell her perfume now, our hands nearly touching.
And then I caught the looming presence of the guard over my shoulder, heading us off. We both pulled back. “Don’t make it so long next time, okay?” I asked her. I didn’t want to have to beg.
“Count on it,” she said.
Every man in the joint watched her leave. “Nice little number you got there, Madden,” said the screw.
I socked him right on the button, for which I did a short stretch in the hole. It was worth it.
And All the Saints Page 22
