Nothing to Fear (2 page)

Seems like the whole city went crazy after that crash. There were people killing themselves—jumping out of windows and off rooftops, throwing themselves into the river. I asked Pa why anyone would kill themselves over something like that. He said money does strange things to people. I guess he's right. Look what that stupid jar of pennies did to me today.

Sergeant Finnegan yanked me to a stop when he saw what was going on out in the street. He let go of my collar and said, "You wait right here, Danny, and behave yourself." Then he gave me a look that put any thoughts of making a break for it right out of my head. He walked on over to Luther's father, tipped his hat, and said, "Afternoon, Luther." Luther's pa is named Luther, too.

"Aftanooon Off'suh Finnegan," said Luther's pa.

He's from down south and he talks like that, kinda drawn out, soft, and slow. I love to hear him talk. Lots of black folks talk like that around here. They moved up from the South when I was little, some even before that. There were plenty of jobs then and the city was full of laughin' and music. I remember on warm summer nights Pa used to walk with me and Ma up to 125th and Lenox to watch the rich folks going into the Cotton Club, and listen to the jazzy sounds coming out. Ma won't let us go up to that part of Harlem at night anymore. She says it's an angry, desperate place now.

"What's the problem here, Luther?" Sergeant Finnegan was asking Luther's pa.

"Just what it 'pears off'suh," Luther's pa told him. "They's puttin' us out."

The sergeant and Mr. White went on talking for a bit. Meanwhile folks were kinda looking over the furniture and stuff on the sidewalk. Luther's ma sat in the middle of it on an old kitchen chair. Luther's baby sister, Rhetta, was on her lap, and Luther's other two sisters hung onto either side of her skirt. She held her chin high and stared straight ahead, ignoring the vultures that were picking through her worldly goods. She looked like she could've been having tea with the queen of England. It made me proud just to look at her.

"All right there, move along, move along!" shouted Sergeant Finnegan. He banged his club on the end of
the iron bed and the vultures stepped back and hovered, waiting for a chance to close in again.

"Go on down to St. Cecilia's," Sergeant Finnegan told Luther's pa. "They'll put you up for a day or two, until you can figure what to do."

Luther's pa nodded sadly to Sergeant Finnegan, and the two men shook hands. Then Sergeant Finnegan went over and gave his apple to little Rhetta. I guess maybe he ain't such a bad guy ... for a cop.

"Come on, Danny," he said, grabbing my collar again. "Let's get on with it."

Luther was just coming down the steps of his front stoop as we went by. He had a ratty old leather satchel in his hand. We looked at each other for a second, then we both looked away. I don't know which of us was more ashamed.

Pa wasn't down on the stoop, thank goodness, but a bunch of little Rileys were, watching the goings-on next door. At least they didn't have to worry about getting evicted. Their mother is the janitor and they get their rent free. They stared at Sergeant Finnegan with big eyes as we went by. Little Dotty grabbed her doll out of its shoe box and hugged it tight as if she was afraid he might arrest it or something. I said "Boo!" to her and she jumped about three feet.

Sergeant Finnegan yanked my collar.

"That make you feel like a big man, does it?" he asked. "Scaring little girls?"

"No sir," I mumbled, feeling even dumber than I did already.

"Get on with you then ... and mind your manners."

Inside, the front hall smelled of Lysol. Mrs. Riley
is forever swishing Lysol all over everything. I don't really mind, though. I been in a lot of buildings that smell like stuff I wouldn't care to mention. Our building may not be fancy, but it's always clean. Those Riley kids work like a little army, shining woodwork, washing windows, scrubbing floors. The only one in their family who don't lift a finger is their old man, and Marion, of course, but she's got an excuse. She's only a year and a half old.

I took a quick look at the mailboxes on the wall. The mail was still in 3B. That meant Pa wasn't home yet most likely. My heart gave a little leap. Maybe Sergeant Finnegan wouldn't be able to wait.

Sergeant Finnegan went to push the bell next to our box.

"You don't have to do that," I told him. "The lock's busted." I pushed the inside door open and we started up the steps. There was a big commotion overhead, and Maggie Riley and her sister Kitty came clattering down the steps swinging the coal bucket between them. They stopped short when they saw us and flattened themselves against the wall as we went by. Maggie rolled her eyes at me, then I heard her and Kitty whispering and giggling behind us as they started back down the steps. Girls!

Ma was singing. We could hear her clear down to the first landing. She sings real pretty. I read in a book once about this bird that could sing so beautiful that it made some Chinese emperor cry. It was called a nightingale. I think Ma must sing like a nightingale. Pa says her singing puts him in mind of the
green hills of home, meaning Ireland. He says that when our ship comes in we're gonna buy Ma a piano.

Ma sings while she does the ironing. She says it makes the hours fly—and she spends a lot of hours ironing. She takes in the washing for a fancy ladies' hotel down on Eighty-Ninth Street. She used to be the cleaning lady there before my baby sister, Maureen, was born. That's how she got the laundry job.

Pa's always teasing her about it. He says, "Molly, sure an' they'll be writin' on yer tombstone, Here Lies Molly Garvey and her Iron. We Couldna' Pry It from her Hand."

Pa talks like that on account of he's right off the boat, like I said. So is Mama. I was born here—in New York—but I used to talk like them, too, until I went to school and learned good English like I talk now.

When we got to our door, Sergeant Finnegan pulled his hat off and held it in his two hands kind of respectful-like. Then he yanked my cap off and made me hold it, too, like we were going to church or something. Mama has that effect on people.

There was some kind of ruckus going on in the Rileys' apartment across the hall. Sounded like old man Riley was spifflicated again. Somewhere upstairs somebody was cooking cabbage. I could tell because the cabbage stink was floating down and fighting with the Lysol stink for control of the hall.

Sergeant Finnegan didn't pay any attention to the ruckus or the stinks. He just went ahead and knocked on our door.

The singing stopped and Ma called out, "Aye, who is it?"

Sergeant Finnegan cleared his throat. "It's me, Miz Garvey," he called back, "Mike Finnegan. I brung Danny home."

There was a scuffling inside, then the door flew open and Ma stood there staring at me wild-eyed, like she expected to see me covered with blood or something. When she saw that I was all in one piece, she let out a big sigh and gave me a look like I had wounded her mortal soul.

"Oh, Danny," she said. "What've ya been up to now?"

I just stood there twisting my cap and staring at my shoes until Sergeant Finnegan escorted me in the door.

"Daniel home yet, Miz Garvey?" he asked.

"No," said Mama, "but I'll be expectin' him any minute. Won't ya sit down, Michael?"

Sergeant Finnegan pulled out a kitchen chair and sat down, one leg bent under the rungs, the other sticking straight out like it was made of wood. Obviously he meant to stay and talk to Pa, which didn't thrill me too much. I looked around the room. All the statues and crucifixes and pictures of Jesus and Mary seemed to be staring right at me, their eyes full of sorrow, like I'd broken their hearts. I felt really hot all of a sudden. I tossed my cap onto the icebox, then pulled off my jacket and threw it over a hook by the door.

Mama's ironing board was set up over by the stove
with a half-ironed tablecloth hanging off it. Behind that, in the tub, another load of wash was soaking in bluing, and outside the window, just beyond the fire escape, a bunch of sheets were flapping in the wind. Folks say nothing's sure in life but death and taxes, but Pa says in our house you can count on one more thing—laundry.

Maureen sat on a blanket in the middle of the floor taking the coffeepot apart. She was so interested in what she was doing, she hadn't even seen us come in. Her breath came out in little puffs, and a line of drool dripped from her bottom lip.

"Hey, Mo," I whispered.

She looked up and smiled a big grin when she saw me.

"Da!" she said, clapping her little hands together. That's what she calls me—Da, just like she's trying to say Dan, but she can't quite get the
n
out.

She decided to get up off the blanket. She just learned how to do it, so it takes her a while. She sort of leans forward on her hands, then gets her legs under her and pushes her little bottom up. Then she straightens up quick and sort of balances there a minute with a surprised look on her face. Sometimes she tumbles back down at that point and has to start all over again, but this time she made it.

"Da," she said, "Da...," toddling over and putting her hands up to me.

To tell the truth I was real glad to have something to do. I picked her up and gave her a hug.
She's a bonny little thing, and I love her a lot. I didn't think I was ever gonna have any brothers and sisters because Mama doesn't do too good at having babies. She lost a few between me and Maureen, but by the time Maureen came along we had money enough for a hospital. Mama was pretty sick for a while, but everything turned out okay.

I buried my nose in Maureen's neck. It smelled like the cotton candy they sell down at Coney Island. She giggled and stuck her finger in my mouth.

Mama was flitting around the kitchen like a canary with a cat peeking in its cage. She picked the blanket and the coffeepot up off the floor. She lugged the laundry and the ironing board back into the spare room. She pushed the irons to the back of the stove and put the kettle on, and she kept apologizing for the mess, which there wasn't any of. I know she was dying to know what I'd done, but I guess she was afraid to ask.

Sergeant Finnegan kept pulling on his collar like it was too tight as he tried to make small talk. Then he brought up the Whites.

Mama stopped flitting and dropped heavily into the chair across from him. She pulled a handkerchief from her housedress pocket and twisted it in her hands.

"Oh, Michael," she said, "what's to become of them?"

Sergeant Finnegan shrugged and shook his head. "Have they got family?" he asked.

"Not on Anna's side," Mama said. "Her folks have
had nothin' to do with her since she married Luther. I s'pose they could head back down south where Luther's from..."

Sergeant Finnegan snorted. "Not if they're smart," he said. "Luther'll get himself lynched looking for work down there. Just read in the paper today about a mob of whites that pulled some poor colored railroad worker off a train and shot him dead, just to get his job. And that ain't the first one I've heard of, either."

Mama's face went pale with horror. She shook her head.

"I feel so guilty," she said, "not offerin' to take them in. But what would I feed them ... and ... Lord only knows..."

She glanced up at me quick and didn't say anything more. I knew what she was thinking—Lord only knows how much longer we'll be able to pay the rent. With Pa out of work and the savings all gone, how much longer could we survive on Ma's ironing money and the little bit I bring in shining shoes?

The kettle started to whistle and Ma got up to fix tea. Downstairs I heard the heavy thud of the front door banging shut and my belly started to ache again. I hugged Maureen tighter and waited.

They were Pa's footsteps all right. I could just see him dragging his heavy feet up the stairs, his overcoat sagging from his shoulders, his eyes dark and broody like the sea before a storm.

Pa don't look like the rest of us, with his black, wavy hair and eyes to match. Me and Maureen take after Ma. I sure wish I did look like Pa, though. Not that Ma isn't pretty or anything, it's just that red hair and freckles look better on a lady, I think. Like Maureen. She's cute as the dickens, but me ... well, I just can't see that women are ever gonna look at me the way I've seen 'em look at Pa. "Handsome as the devil!" That's what they always say.

Usually Pa's footsteps grow quicker and lighter when they reach our landing. Just outside our door he stops and straightens up and plasters on a big smile. I watched him do it one day when I was sitting on
the fourth-floor landing and he didn't know I was there. Then he opens the door and walks in just like everything is hunky-dory. Then Ma and I plaster on big smiles and pretend everything's hunky-dory, too, even though it isn't.

It isn't like when Pa was working. He's a carpenter, and up until March of last year he was building the Empire State Building. He used to fly up the stairs two at a time then, whistling an Irish jig. He'd burst in all full of news and scoop Mama up and make her giggle. Then he'd run on and on at supper.

"Another story today," he'd say. "Would ya believe, a story a day? Three thousand men on one job! Ah, 'tis a glory ta see."

Then after dinner he'd light his pipe and sit back with his newspaper. When he first came to this country, he went to school nights to learn to read, and ever since then he's considered it his bounden duty to keep up with the news.

"Your daddy was a poor farm boy back in Ireland," he used to tell me, holding his pipe bowl in his hand and pointing the stem at me. "Couldna' even read! Now he's buildin' the tallest buildin' in the whole world. Ah, America—'tis truly the land of opportunity."

Pa doesn't say much about the land of opportunity anymore. He doesn't say much at all. He just gets up every morning, shaves and washes like always, then goes out and walks from one end of the city to the other, looking for work. Sometimes he goes down to the New York City Free Employment Bu
reau and stands in line, fighting with five thousand other guys for the handful of jobs that come in every day. Once in a while he even takes my shoeshine box and goes out on the streets. He doesn't want me to know that, but I saw him one day, down on his knees, shining some guy's shoes—my daddy, my strong, proud daddy that can read the newspaper and build the tallest building in the world, down on his knees in the gutter. I never let on to him that I saw.