Maggie Now

by Betty Smith

  "Likewise," said Mrs. Schondle. "So long, Iliz Moore.

  And girlie." She leaned over to pat Maggie-Now's cheek.

  She said a strange thing. "We're just ships that pass in the

  night."

  They watched her as she walked away from them down

  the street. She did look a licit like a ship with her hitching

  w all: and the veils floating out behind like black smoke.

  "Who is she anyhow, Mama?"

  "You know. Someone I met at the cemetery years ago?

  We're l)ecoration Day friends.'

  "Where does she live?

  "I don't know."

  "I)oes she have a little girl, home' '

  "If she has, she's never mentioned her."

  'Did she get a new husband after.Nlr. Schondle died' ~ //61

  "I never asked."

  "How can you be friends with somebody and you don't

  know where they live or anything?"

  "It's possible to be acquaintances without knowing much

  about the other person. We're passing friends."

  "Ha! Ships that pass in the night, hey, Mama?"

  A CHAPTER EIGHTEEN ~

  IN THE fifteen-odd years since Patrick Delmis Moore had

  landed in America, many changes had come about. The

  horsecars had given way to trolley cars. The completion of

  the subway, which changed into the elevated as soon as it

  crawled out onto the Williamsburg Bridge, did away with

  most of the East River ferries. Automobiles were no

  longer a curiosity, although some retarded kids still yelled,

  "Get a horse!" when one appeared, and all pedestrians

  were delighted when a car broke down. Most of the better

  stores had soldered off the gas pipes and put in electric

  lights. Some of the candy stores had phones in and you got

  your number by appealing to "Central." And some insane

  person went around the neighborhood saying he'd sat in

  a dark room somewhere and saw pictures that moved on

  a bed sheet. The ballad writers of the day started a new

  folk lore by acknowledging the inventions in their creative

  work.

  Come, .1 osephine,

  In my flying machine . . .

  And,

  . . . Lucille, In my merry Oldsmobile.

  Also,

  Call me up some rainy afternoon, And we'll arrange for

  a quiet, little spoon.

  1 ii7]

 

  Yes, there were changes. But Patsy never changed,

  except the he was getting too old to be called Patsy and

  the few people who had to speak to him called him Pat.

  He got to be sort of a character the way he smoked his

  stub-stemmed pipe upside down as he cleaned the streets.

  He smoked it that way so sparks wouldn't fly in his eyes

  on a windy day and to keep the tobacco dry on rainy days.

  He bet ame known as "reef Pat" because he wouldn't get

  out of the way for anybody or anything. Motormen would

  stamp down on the gong, motorists would squeeze the

  rubber bulb of the horn or grind the klaxon, bicycle bells

  would tinkle hysterically; teamsters cursed him and

  pedestrians threatened to sue the city because he swept

  dust on them when they crossed the street. But he ignored

  them all, pretending not to hear, and he wouldn't move

  out of the way until he had finished the place he was

  cleaning.

  People would say to each other: "He'll get run over yet."

  The answer: "Let's hope so."

  Out of boredom, Pat worked up a feud with a certain

  motorman. The motorman was a skinny, nervous little

  fellow and Pat was the one who could bring him to the

  brink of hysterics. When Pat saw the trolley coming, he'd

  go and stand on the tracks pushing his broom back and

  forth The car bore down with gong clattering. Pat paid no

  attention. Each time the motorman kept coming, thinking

  Pat w ould get off the tracks this time, and he wouldn't

  slow down. He was forced to put the brakes on at the last

  moment to bring the car to a screeching stop. Some

  passengers were knocked out of their seats, old ladies

  whimpered and the trolley pole slipped off the power line.

  The motorman would scream, scold, wave his arms and

  throw his cap on the ground and stamp on it but Pat

  wouldn't budge until he'd finished his leisurely sweeping.

  One day, Pat held up a brewery truck. It was loaded

  with beer kegs and pulled by two ]'ercherons, whose thick

  tails were braided and looped up to look like thick clubs.

  Pat stepped in front of the approaching truck, forcing the

  teamster to pull up and wait while he swept away

  non-existent dirt. Then he wanted the teamster to back up

  so he could sweep where the horses were standing. The

  teamster gave him an argument and Pat ~ 1181

  walked back to the truck. In talking and waving his broom

  for emphasis, he happened to hit one of the horses on the

  rump with the broom handle. The horse shifted his great

  weight from one hind foot to the other like a woman

  shifting her hips, and swung his clubbed tail in Pat's face.

  Pat's clay pipe was knocked out of his mouth and broke

  into bits on the cobblestones. The teamster laughed so

  hard he nearly fell off his seat. Pedestrians laughed as Pat

  ran down the street after his rolling helmet. All agreed

  that it served Deef Pat right. The vindicated teamster went

  on his way.

  Soon after, the trolley with the nervous motorman came

  into view. Pat had to take out his humiliation on the

  motorman. Other times, Pat had pretended there was

  debris on the tracks. This time he put it there. He emptied

  the entire contents of his trash can on the tracks. The

  motorman plowed into the trash before he could get the

  car stopped.

  A woman screamed, a child fell off the seat and, of

  course, the pole came off the line. The motorman did not

  act true to form. He was calm and collectecl. He soothed

  his passengers, swung oir the car, put the pole back on the

  line, walked slowly up to where Pat was standing and

  punched him right in the nose. The passengers cheered

  and bystanders applauded the brave motorman. Pat threw

  himself upon the man and grappled with him. They rolled

  in the horse manure and other debris of the can. They

  rolled almost under the car. Their faces were inches apart.

  Pat took a good look at the motorman.

  "Well, I'll be damned," he said. Click Mack!"

  "And 'tis you, me old night-school friend," said Mick

  Mack sadly. "And ain't you the one to torment an old

  friend so."

  "I didn't know it was you. 'Tis the teeth make you look

  different. You didn't have teeth in night school."

  "I bought them. Upper and lower and I'm still paying on

  them. Tell me this, Pathrick: Did you ever take out your

  first papers? "

  "I been a citizen these many years."

  In the meantime, a passing citizen, not having seen the

  beginning of the fight, ran and told a policeman that two

  men had been run over by a trolley car. The panting

  policeman, who had run
all the way, stooped and peered

  under the car to see how

  ~ /~91

 

  much they were mangled. He saw them Iying side by side

  in the muck talking amiably ho each other. He prodded

  Pat with his nightstick.

  "Come out of there, now, the both of yez," he ordered.

  They stood shamefaced before him. 'iI've a mind to run

  you in. Drunk on the job, the both of yea, and layin' in the

  gutter together. And you," he said to Pat, "working for the

  city, too!" He took their names and numbers.

  It ended up that Mick Mack was transferred to another

  run and Pat was suspended for two weeks without pay.

  During those two weeks, he roamed the streets of

  Williamsburg, Greenpoint and Maspeth, trying to find

  Mick Mack. He angered many a motorman by standing on

  a corner and holding up a finger as a signal that he

  wanted to board the car. When the car stopped, instead of

  getting on, he leered into the motorman's face and said,

  "Wrong car."

  I'll look till I find him, Pat vowed. Therl I'll give him the

  licking of his life for daring to punch me ire the nose.

  In truth, though, he wanted to find him because he was

  lonely for a friend and he remembered how the little

  fellow had looked up to him in the old night-school days

  when they were both so young.

  He must have looked into a hundred cars, but he never

  found Mick Mack.

  In spite of being warned by his superintendent that he'd

  be fired if he caused any more trouble, Pat did not change

  his ways. He continued to smoke his pipe upside down

  and to pretend to be deaf. He continued to hold up

  vehicles at whim. Teamsters and motorists took to going

  down other streets to avoid him and his nonsense. This

  lessened Pat's work but it made him very lonely. There

  were fewer to hare and to torment, now, on the streets he

  cleaned.

  Sometimes on a still summer afternoon, when the

  German band played on one of his streets, he'd lean on

  his broom handle and listen a while. The band played a

  German song, a popular song of the day and, invariably,

  an Irish song. When the tune had a lilt, Pat's feet twitched

  inside his heavy work shoes and his mind made a dance

  pattern and he thought again of County Kilkenny.

  ~ 120]

 

  One day, Maggie-Now happened to be with the group

  of chil-dren who followed the band from block to block.

  He watched his daughter waltz with another girl.

  She's got them all beat, he thought with a flare of pride.

  After the usual lugubrious "Blue Danube," the kids

  clustered around the musicians begging for "Rosie

  O'&rady." When the band complied, the kids made a

  circle and pushed .N1aggie-Nov into the middle of it. As

  soon as she got the beat of the song, she went into a solo,

  soft-shoe clog. The pipe nearly fell out of Pat's mouth. He

  was that astonished.

  Where does she get it 1rorr.~? he asked himself. From

  meself, he decided. that Echo learned' her? ale watched her

  a while. No, I couldn't do I,~et~er meself.

  She lifted her skirts and the ruffles on her drawers

  showed. A couple of passing boys slopped, stared,

  whispered to each other and snickered. Pat threw his

  broom down and stalked over to the dancers. When

  Mag.,ie-Novv saw him, she gave him a big smile.

  "Go on hon1e,'' he said tersely.

  She tossed her head, making her hangs bounce, put her

  hands on her hips and clogged away from him. He

  followed her around the circle, caught her and spanked

  her. He spanked her publicly before all her friencis.

  "That'll lear n you," he said, "to show everything on the

  street."

  She looked up at him, stricken. fie had never hit her

  before. "Papa! You didn't kiss n1e when you hit me! You

  didn't kiss me like cousin SneiTa! You meant it!"

  "You betcha life I meant it and there's more where that

  come from."

  He thou:,l1t of Big Red" ho\ be had said that and he

  wondered if Maggie-Now felt the same shame he had felt.

  He svas sorry he had spanked her. He had never hit her

  before. Neither had her mother. She was not a bad girl.

  The spanking didn't hurt her, he assured himself. It vvas

  the public humiliation that hurt her. She ran home,

  weeping all the was,-.

  The cornet player shook the spit out ot his horn. "I)IT'

  Hei'iZzel Mannchen!" he sneered at Pat.

  "Is that so? Well, Heinie, you go to your church and I'll

  go to

  1~ 1211

 

  niine." That was one `>f Pat's favorite retorts.

  Maggie-Now changed toward her father. The sunny

  child had always chattered to him endlessly, never noticing

  that he made no answer. She had liked to tease him and

  had been quick to hug him warmly. She had never noticed

  that he took all her loving Days with indifference. She had

  so much emotional steam that she could go a long svav on

  her own poNver without the encouragement of response.

  She changed after the whipping. Now she was quiet and

  restrained in his presence. She spoke to him only to

  answer him. She gave him respect and obedience and

  nothing more. SecretlN-. Pat grieved. He felt that he had

  lost his child.

  "Are you turning the girl against me?" he asked his wife.

  "I would not do that, Patrick. You are her father and

  she needs v ou and loves you."

  "She's still mulling over that spanking I gave her. I only

  gave her a tap or tVO but you'd think I licked her black

  and blue."

  "But why in front of her friends?"

  "She's got to learn," he mtlmbled.

  "Did you learn anything by Tim~ytlls Shaun thrashing

  your TN7o. You'll hold that agtinst him all the days of

  your life. MaggielNTow has some of your ways."

  Vlly don t you S`IN' IT]N,~ /7~1~1 N'a'S?

  She took his hand ill both of hers. "I loved you for N

  our ways. I never thought severe they good vays or bad

  ways."

  "Ah, 1/lary," he said, touched, and a moment tried to get

  born.

  I co?vid say I loved her, he thought. And it "would mean

  the . orl.l to her my saying it. And I do love her in a kind

  of way. But I never saicl it before. Linda late to start saying

  it norm. 1~1 feel foolisI.' ... we'd both {eel foolish....

  The moment died stillborn.

  He wanted the girl'. affection back. l o that end, he

  made plans to take her out on her birthday.

  "I will give her a good time like your father gave you

  when he bought the combs. I'll give her the same good

  time according to me means and hope she'll ~ emember

  it in the same wav you did," said Pat to his wife.

  No one sold violets on the Brooklyn streets. He bought

  her a pinwheel instead. When she ran ahead to mate a w

  ind to make it

 
~ ~ 1

 

  turn, he realised was too big to play with a pinwheel.

  Of course he didn't take her to a bar for a claret

  lemonade. There were no glarr orous bars in the

  neighborhood and he'd be sure to be arrested if he

  brought a little girl into a saloon. There was no fine

  restaurant. I hey ate hot pastrami sandwiches and honey

  cake and drank ten from glasses in a Kosher Delicatessen

  & Lunchroom. The men are with their hats on. Pat

  explained that was their religion. He took his hat oflf with

  the remark that they could go to their church and he'd go

  to his. The diners balled up their napkins and threw them

  on the floor when they were done. When Maggie-Now

  asked why, her father said they did that because they were

  very clean people. Maggie-Now thought that didn't seem

  clean. Oh, yes, her father told her. That was so the

  proprietor wouldn't serve the napkins again to later

  diners.

  They went to the "heater. They heard no prima donna

  raise a luscious voice in song. They went to The Folly and

  saw Marion Bent and Pat Rooney. And Rooney's waltz

  clog thrilled them more than the best soprano's aria.

  Afterward, he took her to a novelty store and invited

  her to choose a present. She u anted a wood-burning set.

  There was a tie rack with an Indian chief's head in a war

  bonnet just waiting to be burned and an envelope of

  "jewels" to paste on the bonnet's headband. Pat wanted

  her to have a rhinestone brooch. Both things cost a dollar

  each. She didn't want a brooch. She wanted to burn wood.

  Fat said she would take the rhinestone brooch or nothing.

  She said she wanted nothing. He bought her the brooch

  anyway.

  Yet it had been a happy evening and she held her

  father's hand all the way home and squeezed it happily

  from time to time, and once he squeezed back.

  1 ~ >. 1

 

  '4< (.'HA 1' TER NI NE TEEN ~

  ()NE night as they were eating supper (Maggie-Now was

  about twelve a': the time), a handsome young man

  knocked on the door and was admitted to the kitchen. I

  le was about twenty-three years old.

  "Do you remember Nile, Fir. .`vk~cJre? ' Ihe young

  man smiled engagingly, then his face sadrlened.

  Pat frowned, trying to rermetnber.

  "Nokomis. Daughter of the Noon, Nokor~is. Remember?"

  Pat remembered. "Big Red's boy, Widdy," he explained

  to his wife. lee thought: An,l what does the spawn want

  from brie?

  "1~7Iother sent tee," said Middy, turtling his hat

  around in his hands. Thet, he seemed to lose the

  continuity of what he wanted to say. "]: mean, you know

  Oad." E-Ze swallowed hard before he said: "God rest his

  soul . . ."

  "No!" said lent, put ing his talk dovtl. "No!"

  "Mother said, l mean, Dad had no relations in America,

  except ~Iother and me and Gr ~ndmotller. There's

  Gracie, too. We were going to get married in June, but

  now we'll have to wait a vear out of respect."

  Big Red had diccl in fled and lead not been killed on

  the streets by hoodh~ms as Lottie Ad always feared. A

  blizzard had tied up the city. :Big Red, like bland another

  cop, had worked two days and two nights without rest. He

  had had a cold, and just when Lottie hard thought he was

  getting well it turned into pneumonia.

  Yes, Widdy's mothe! was bearing up well. There was

  pride mixed with her grief. Her Timmy had died an

  honored man, Widdy told them. E-lis l euten.Znt w ould

  he one of the pallbearers, and Widely supposed they

  hadn't heard, but Big Red had been promoted to serge At

  a Feel; before he took sick. I.ottie had been so proud.

  "So llother said " concluded Widdy, "if you folks would

  come ro the funeral . . . the .Nk~ores and thie

  ShaNN7ns had been so close

  I loll

 

  back in County Kilkenny . . . had almost become relations .

  . ." Pat grieved. He didn't grieve for a friend; he grieved

  for a dear enemy. Although never a heavy drinker, he felt

  the need of going down to the saloon for a couple of

  beers.