Maggie Now

gave his wife a book. It was a beautiful book bound in

  smooth and supple blue leather, the pages were

  gold-edged and there was a fringed, blue satin page

  marker. The book was Sonnets from the Portuguese. Inside,

  in his fine hand, he had inscribed: Sonnets for my little

  Chinee and Love and Claude. At the bottom of the flyleaf

  he had w ritten:

  How do I love thee? Let one count the ways.

  Then Denny and Claude went out to buy the Christmas

  tree and Maggie-Now got out the ornaments. Denny was

  allowed to stay up and help trim the Christmas tree

  inasmuch as now he was too big to believe in Santa Claus.

  Pat sat in the kitchen with the boxed pipe in his hands. I

  le was very angry because the pipe was too cheap to pawn.

  It was as if the cardboard box was magic, because every

  time he opened the lid the word "bastid" came out of Pat's

  mouth. He promised himself that he'd find some way to

  get back at his son-in-law.

  Maggie-Now called bedtime on Denny and Pat followed

  his son into the boy's bedroom. "I'll swap you this new

  pipe for that old fountain pen Claude gave you."

  "I don't know what to do with a pipe," said Denny.

  [ 324 ]

 

  "Blow bubbles."

  "I'm too big to blow bubbles."

  "You can take this pipe on the street and swap it for

  something . . . marbles or a Daisy air rifle. It's a dear

  pipe."

  "I'll go out and ask Maggie-Nov should I," said Denny

  hesitantly.

  "Never mind! Never mind!" said Pat hastily. He went up

  to his room.

  As they were preparing for bed, Claude told her casually

  that he was out of a job; it had been merely a Christmas

  job. She said that was all right and he said he'd get

  another job and she said she knew he would.

  Claude didn't bother looking for another job. He again

  took to sitting at the window and at ten o'clock asking for

  a quarter for cigarettes and the paper. Maggie-Now didn't

  care. He'll be gone from me long eno?`g,'', she thought. I

  want him here with rile all day the f ew weeks he's home.

  One Monday morning early in February when

  Maggie-Now went up to wake her father, Pat said he

  wasn't going to work that day and not any day for two

  weeks.

  "I'm on me vacation," he announced.

  "Vacation?" she said aghast. "But you always take it in

  July."

  "What do I do when I take it in July? I just sit by the

  winder in me stocking feet. If I got to sit through me

  vacation, I might as well sit in winter when it's cold outside

  anyhow."

  "But . . . but Claude's Income."

  "I'll keep him company," said Pat.

  As soon as Claude took his chair by the wh~dov, Pat

  took the one at the opposite window. The pipe Claude had

  given him for Christmas was prominently displayed sticking

  out of Pat's shirt pocket, while Pat smoked his stubbed

  clay pipe. Pat said nothing. He sat there staring at Claude.

  Claude stared at Pat's left ear lobe, meaning to disconcert

  bin,. But Pat knew that trick too. He stared at Claude's

  right ear lobe.

  At ten o'clock, Claude signaled Maggie-Now to follow

  him into their bedroom. He asked for the usual quarter,

  explaining that he didn't like to ask her in front of her

  father.

  While Claude was outs Maggie-Now said: "Why don't

  you sit in your own nice room upstairs, Papa? "

  ~ ]21 ]

 

  "It's cold up there."

  "I'll put the little oil stove up there for you."

  "I like it down here better."

  Claude came back and resumed his seat. Pat resumed

  his staring. Claude got up and, without a word, went into

  the bedroom. When Maggie-Now went in t`, tell him lunch

  was ready, she found him lying on the bed, hands clasped

  under his head, staring up at the ceiling. He refused

  lunch. She sat on the side of the bed and patted his cheek.

  "Mister, did you know that two weeks ago eve had been

  married two years?"

  "I forgot again."

  "I forgot. Let's go out tonight and celebrate."

  "Fine!" He swung his feet over onto the floor and sat up.

  "Let's go to that chop suey place you took me to, when

  you were still Mister Bassett to me. We had so much fun!

  I did anyhow. Remember how it rained? "

  "Ho, hum." He tucked back a pretended yawn. "That

  was way back in my past. I can hardly remember."

  "I'll make Papa cook his own supper, just because he's

  such a pest. And Denny's supper, too."

  They had a wonderful time. After the chop suey dinner,

  they went to see the vaudeville show at The Bushwick.

  When they got out, it was nearly midnight.

  "Let's end the celebration with our usual champagne or

  its equivalent. "

  "You mad at me?" skit asked.

  "Why?''

  "Then don't use those dictionary words on me, hear?"

  They went into a cider store. To prove that it was a

  cider store and not a speakeasy, there were a jug of cider

  and a bowl of apples in the window. They went through

  the empty store to the back room and each had a glass of

  needle beer. It cost thirty cents a glass and Maggie-Nov

  thought that was a terrible price to pay and she liked

  champagne better, anyhow. And she wondered whether

  her father paid thirty cents for his weekly glass of beer,

  because he wasn't a person to throw his money around.

  Claude said Pat drank near beer and he drank it only

  when his little friend Mick Mack paid for it. Then they

  started to laugh about

  ~ ]~r 1

 

  Pat staring at Claude all morning the Christmas pipe in his

  pocket.

  "He was hinting," said iaggie-Now, "that he hadn't

  wanted a pipe for Christmas."

  "It was a nice, quiet hint, though," said Claude. And they

  laughed and laughed....

  But the next morning it was the same thing: Pat, pipe in

  pocket, smoking his blackened clay one, and staring silently

  at Claude's ear. At ten o'clock, Claude went out as usual

  for cigarettes and paper. An hour passed and he had not

  returned. Denny came home for hmch, ate, went back to

  school and still no Claude. Maggie-Now started to tremble

  inwardly. At two o'clock, she went in to her father. She

  addressed him with cold self-control.

  "All right, Papa. You did it! You drove him away with

  your mean, spiteful ways. A big, grown-up man like you!

  Sulking for two months nearly because you didn't like your

  Christmas present! Shame! Shame! If you weren't my

  father, I'd horsewhip you! If he doesn't come back, ['m

  going to get my money out of the bank and leave here and

  go all over the United States looking for him...."

  Then she broke down and burst into sobs. "I love him so

  much; I love him so much. And 1 have him for just these

  few weeks
and you have to drive him rut.... I just can't go

  on living this way," she sobbed. "I wish I was dead!"

  Pat was ashamed and a little frightened, too. "Aw, I was

  only fooling, girl, dear. I ain't on me vacation. I took

  meself two days' sick leave. I'm going back to me work

  tomorrow."

  She throttled oflf her sobs. "You have my vote for the

  meanest man in the world. And Denny takes after you.

  He's growing up mean, too. Just like you. (give me that

  pipe!" she shouted. Before he could hand it to her, she

  grabbed it out of his shirt, tearing the pocket. She pulled

  his clay pipe out of his mouth and smashed it on the floor.

  "Another word out of you," she said, "and I'll break this

  new pipe over your head!"

  Good girl! Good girl! he exulted to himself. Oh, the

  beautiful temper of her . . .

  He got dressed and went out looking for Claude. He

  found him right away in Brockman's store. Claude was

  sitting at the counter on a stool, a glass of seltzer water at

  his elbow. Brockman was

  1'27]

 

  leaning over the counter. His voice was hoarse. He had

  been telling the story of his life since ten o'clock that

  morning.

  "So . . ." he was saying as Pat walked in, "my old gent

  never did learn to speak English. So he had this farm in

  Hicksville out on the Island. Land was dirt cheap in those

  days and . . ."

  Claude saw Pat and polled out a stool for him. "Mr.

  Brockman," he said, "I'd like you to meet my father, Mr.

  Moore. Old sir, this is Mr. Brockman."

  Brockman and Pat clasped hands. "Seltzer water for all!"

  proclaimed Pat. "I'll treat." The seltzer water was served.

  Brockman resumed his saga.

  ". . . so my old gent use' to get up at four in the

  morning and wash the lettuce . . ."

  "Take a rest, me good man," said Pat. Pat settled

  himself on the stool, cleared his throat and began: "I was

  a boy in County Kilkenny . . ."

  They got home in time for supper. They walked in,

  mentally arm-in-arm. Maggie-Now had a grand supper

  ready for them.

  The house u as at peat e.

  ~ CHAPTER FORTY-FT VE ~

  THEN came that day in March, the day of false spring.

  While Claude sat in the kitchen eating breakfast in hi;

  pajamas, she slipped into their bedroom and pinned the

  gold piece in its cloth bag in his coat breast pot ket, and

  laid out a clean shirt and underwear and socks for him.

  I mustn't let him see me cry. I robust act as though it

  revere any other day.

  He dressed, all but his coat, and went in to sit by the

  window. Maggie-Now finished her kitchen chores quickly,

  took a piece of sewing and went in to sit with him as she

  did every once in a while. She spoke to him from time to

  time in a low, quiet voice and he answered with a look or

  a smile.

  He opened the window and leaned out. She leaned out

  next to

  ~ 328 1

 

  him and the south wind lifted a tendril of her hair and she

  put her cheek next to his.

  "It's a chinook wind," he whispered as though he didn't

  want her to hear.

  "Yes," she whispered bat k. He didn't seem to know she

  was there.

  She went out into the kitchen and came back walking

  heavily. He started at the sound of her steps and closed

  the window.

  "If you'll let me have a quarter . . ." he said.

  "Of course." She gave him the quarter and went in and

  got his coat. She helped him on with it and turned him

  around and buttoned it.

  "Come right back, hear? ' she said brightly.

  "I will." He kissed her and was gone.

  And this became the pattern of their lives.

  He'd come home with the first snow and bring her

  something and he'd work a week or two and then not

  work and she'd be happy treasuring each day of his being

  there, and he was always so tender toward her and so kind

  to Denny and so patient with her father. And it was all so

  u onderful because she knew it was for such a very little

  time.

  Then would come that day in March a day like no

  other day. The next day, there might be a blizzard, but on

  this day there would be that sweet south wind. And

  people would walk along the street with their coats

  hanging open and a newspaper on somebody's stoop

  would unfold itself and its sheets would swoop into the air

  like kites.

  And Claude would be restless and open the window and

  lean out and feel the wind on his face and close his eyes

  as though in ecstasy and listen as though he heard a

  faraway and well-beloved voice calling him. He'd whisper:

  Chinook, and bow his head as though making a promise.

  I-hat was the day he'd leave her.

  As he sat by the window in the winter, looking out on

  the street and UK, at the grey skies, was he waiting . . .

  waiting . . . for that day and that feeling he'd get that told

  him there was a chinook wind blowing over the mountains

  of Montana and that it was time for him to leave? And as

  he sat there, silent, waiting, watching, what was in his

  mind?

  [ 329 ]

 

  Did he dream great dreams of prairies with the wheat like

  bowing gold in the winds? Or how, where the great Rockies

  pierced the sky, you hall to believe in God because the world

  was so grand? Did he get lo the old Southwest and believe

  that he had walked into Spain? Did he think of a time he

  had followed a river to find out where it began or where it

  ended? Did he recall standing on a beach somewhere in

  southern Florida and looking out over the wide Atlantic

  Ocean and thinking that it was the same ocean that he

  mzelled in Brooklyn just before it rained? And if he started

  wall ing north along the beach, in time he'd come to

  Rockaway just an hour away from his dear love?

  Did he go because those great dreams led him on? Or

  was it, as Father Flynn had deduced when he first spoke

  to Claude, that he roamed the country trying to find a

  name, a place or a human soul who would tell him who

  he was, what he was, where he had come from? Was he

  looking . . . searching for his birthright? Did he think of

  that in his hours by the window in the winter?

  Or did he sit there all winter with no such thoughts, no

  such dreams waiting only for cogs within him to mesh

  and put into motion that slow, patient walk that would

  propel him across the country for no reason at all except

  that that was his destiny?

  No one knew. He told no one what his thoughts were.

  When her father lashed out as he did from tone to time

  and called Claude unspeakable names, Maggie-Now

  defended her love and tried to explain to her father that

  he roamed away because he was in love with the country,

/>   "Its rocks and rills," she quoted from a song she used to

  sing in school; because he was in love with rivers and

  mountains and cities....

  But Pat had his own version of where Claude spent his

  wandering months. He told no one but Mick black.

  "He's got me poor daughter fooled," said Pat. "The

  bastid! The innocent girl thinks he goes away to look at

  the sky and smell the flowers. But I knov. better. You see,

  I'm the one what knows what men is. I'm a man meself."

  He waited.

  "You are that!" said Mick Mack emphatically.

  "So I wouldn't be surprised a-tall if he had another

  woman over in Jersey or somewheres. And he lives with

  her until cold weather comes when he has to put coal in

  the furnace and carry out the

  ~ 33 ]

 

  ashes. Then he comes back to me ~laggie-Now and stays

  with her till it gets warm again and the furnace is out in

  Jersey. And I wouldn't be surprised either if he ain't got

  three or four kids by this here woman."

  "Ah, poor, poor Maggie- Now," said Mick Mack.

  "Me daughter don't want none of your sympathy," said

  Pat coldly.

  ~ ClIAPTI,R FORTY-SIX ~

  SHE missed him, as she would always miss him. But

  missing him had become part of her life now and she was

  able to stand it more or less . . . if she kept busy and

  didn't think about it too much. But she never adjusted

  herself to not going to bed with him. As far as sex went,

  her time with him was very wonderful. For a few months

  each year, she had a fulfilling and contented love life. The

  lack of it anguished her terribly physically, emotionally

  and mentally.

  She tried to fill her life with substitutes. The sewing

  class again; the bimonthly visits to Lottie and Annie;

  stopping in at his store to exchange gossip with Van Clees;

  scrubbing and polishing up her home; shopping carefully

  and economically for family food and necessities;

  preparing meals carefully; going to Mass every day; getting

  Denny ready for his Confirmation; seeing to it that Denny

  served as altar bov at half a dozen Masses because she

  thought every Catholic boy should have the high and

  humble honor of serving as an acolyte sometime during

  his youth.

  (Of course, Pat had something to say about that. "Don't

  try to make a priest out of the boy," he said.)

  Maggie-Now ran into Cdna on the street. Gina was

  pushing a beautiful white perambulator. Gina's baby was

  dressed like a valuable doll in lace and ribbons. The

  blanket, of fine angora wool, had been knitted on needles

  as thin as hatpins. The blanket cover was shell-pink silk

  topped with a pink satin bow. A pink rattle, with

  hand-painted blue forget-me-nots, hung by a pink

  [ ill' 1

 

  ribbon from a strut of ~ he perambulator hood.

  "How beautiful she is," said Maggie-Now, "and how

  beautifully you keep her."

  "You only have yot r first baby once in your life," said

  Gina. "My mother says wait ll I have three or four. I won't

  be so particular."

  "What's her name?"

  "Regina. After me. But Cholly you know how Cholly

  is? He calls her Reggie. Honest! My mother has fits!

  Reggie! And, oh! Ev's expecting in Octcber."

  "Ev? "

  "Evelyn. You know. Sonny's wife?"

  "Oh! "

  "You better catch up. Maggie. When you got married,

  I thought you'd have a baby every year, the way you're so

  religious and the way you're built for having children."

  "Yes. Well . . ." Maggie-Now could think of nothing to say.

  "Come see us sometime, Maggie. We often speak of you."

  "Thanks, I will." (But she knew she wouldn't.)

  Soon after that, she went to see Father Flynn about

  taking in some orphans to live w ith her.

  ". . . and it's been a year, Father, since I asked you."

  "The home has strict rules, Margaret. It will not give

  children to a family living in a flat or apartment. It has to

  be a house and yard. Of course you have that. And the

  child or children must occupy a separate room in the