Louise Fitzhugh - Harriet the Spy

“Don’t you want to be a writer, Sport? Gee, your father could even help you.”

Sport almost collapsed at the sink. “Are you kidding? You know I want to be a ball player. And if I’m not a good ball player, I’ll tell you something, I’m going to be a C.P.A.”

“What’s that ?”

“You don’t know what a C.P.A. is?” Sport screeched.

“No,” said Harriet. She never minded admitting she didn’t know something. So what, she thought; I could always learn.

“Well, I’ll show you what that is. Come with me.” Sport put the dishtowel down, took Harriet by the hand, and led her into his room. You would have known it was Sport’s room because it was as neat as a pin. There was a little cot, made up army fashion, one straight chair, and a little desk. The desk was absolutely bare. Sport took a ring of keys out of his pocket and started unlocking the drawers to the desk. “You see these books? These are my books.” He stepped back proudly. Harriet looked. Each drawer was filled with large ledgers. One drawer held a cashbox, which was also locked.

“My, my,” she said, because she didn’t know what else to say.

“A C.P.A. is an accountant, for your information,” Sport said pompously, pulling back Harriet’s hand sharply because she had started to reach for one of the ledgers.

“What’s in all those?” asked Harriet, suspecting that they were empty.

“Our FINANCES. What do you think?” Sport was getting irritated.

“I hate money,” Harriet said.

“Well, you’d jolly well like it if you didn’t have any,” Sport said arrogantly. Harriet considered this. It was true. She’d never had to think about it.

“Well, gee, Sport, do you like to do that? Isn’t it just a lot of math?”

“Well, the math isn’t hard; that’s not it. I can’t explain. Don’t you know what I mean? Then you know where everything is .”

“Oh,” said Harriet, who did not understand at all.

“I mean, see, my father gets a cheque, and if I don’t take it, then the next day it’s gone and he just throws up his hands and goes in his room and shuts the door. Then we don’t eat.”

“Really?”

“Really. This way I take the cheque and I cash it and I plan what to do with all the money piece by piece and then we have enough to eat. See?”

“Yeah. That’s very sensible.”

“Well, I don’t know what would have happened to us if I hadn’t started doing that.”

“Yeah. Gee, I never knew this about you, Sport.”

Sport kind of kicked a foot around on the floor. Then they both felt embarrassed, so Sport went back into the kitchen, and Harriet, in the living room, seized this opportunity to try to see through the keyhole into Sport’s father’s room. She saw nothing but an old gym sock lying on the floor. Sport came into the living room and Harriet jumped back, then said quickly, “Well, I got to get back to my spy route. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“OK, I’ll see ya,” said Sport as he opened the door for her.

When the door closed behind her Harriet stood a minute thinking. Then she ran down the steps. When she got outside, she sat on the steps and wrote in her notebook:

SPORT’S HOUSE SMELLS LIKE OLD LAUNDRY, AND IT’S NOISY AND KIND OF POOR-LOOKING. MY HOUSE DOESN’T HAVE THAT SMELL AND IS QUIET LIKE MRS PLUMBER’S. DOES THAT MEAN WE ARE RICH? WHAT MAKES PEOPLE POOR OR RICH?

She walked along a little way, then was suddenly struck by another idea.

ARE RICH PEOPLE EVER GOING TO GROW UP TO BE WRITERS OR ARE WRITERS ALL LIKE MR ROCQUE WITH NO MONEY?

MY FATHER IS ALWAYS SAYING STARVINGARTIST OR STARVINGWRITER. MAYBE I BETTER REDUCE.

Harriet headed towards the Dei Santis’ grocery, the first stop on her regular spy route. The grocery was on York Avenue, and there was a little alleyway beside it that provided three vantage points from which Harriet could watch. One was a window facing the alley, affording a view of the rear of the counter at which Papa Dei Santi stood. The other window on the alley showed the back of the store with the table around the back, in the courtyard, and showed the storeroom where Little Joe Curry worked all day.

She crept into the alley. Nothing was doing at the first window. She kept her body low and scooted to the second window. Suddenly she saw the whole family. She had to duck her head quickly in order not to be seen. Luckily the window was open a fraction, so she could hear what was being said.

Mama Dei Santi was speaking, “ Accidente!! He take the truck, get killed!”

Harriet knew she must be talking about Fabio. Fabio was always wanting to take the truck somewhere. She peeked over the sill.

Fabio leaned against a packing case. A cigarette dangled from his mouth. He was tall, very thin, and had a gloomy look. He shifted slightly in irritation at his mother’s remark.

His mother caught his mood and raised both hands high above her head. “What did I do to God to deserve to come to a country like this that should come down on my head to raise a son like you?”

“Oh, Mama.” That was Maria Elena. She looked in the mirror all day and said dumb things. She was seventeen and very beautiful.

“Don’t you Mama me. Look at Bruno, all day, all night, work in the store. That’s a son.” Mama Dei Santi spewed forth these words in a hiss.

Harriet peeked over the sill. Franca, who was fourteen and a complete blank of a person, leaned against the wall as though she had been propped there. Dino, who was six, travelled a toy car with his hand along one of the shelves. Papa Dei Santi turned slowly to Fabio. “ Mio figlio ,” he began in a tired patient voice, “I work my life away for you. I come here with nothing. I get a pushcart. I sell vegetables. You know what makes a man that sells vegetables?”

Fabio frowned. The cigarette hardly moved in his mouth as he spoke. “You now got the store, Papa. You now got the truck. Can I borrow the truck?”

“No good . No good ,” Papa Dei Santi screamed with all his might.

There was a moment of strange silence as Fabio and his father stood staring at each other. Bruno walked heavily into the room. He was a thick, strong man with thick, strong thoughts in his head. He spoke slowly as though the thoughts had to come from a long way back in his head. “Let him take the car, Papa. Let him have a little fun. He’s eighteen. He just wants a little fun.”

“Fun, fun. Eighteen too old for fun. What fun you have, Bruno?”

“We’re different, Papa. Let him go. You make him bad if you stop him.”

“Bad? Bad? He’s already bad. Flunk out the school. Hang around, lazy bum, all day. How I make him bad?”

“Oh, Papa,” Maria Elena breathed softly as she leaned towards the mirror.

“Buzz, buzz, buzz,” Dino whispered, having turned the car into an airplane.

The bell on the door of the shop rang, breaking into their anguish. Papa Dei Santi started towards the front. “Customer,” he said under his breath, “no more talk. Everybody to work.”

“Papa.” It was only one word, but it took Fabio an enormous effort to get it out.

“No truck.” Papa Dei Santi didn’t even turn around. The words came out like bullets.

Fabio slumped, took a long drag on the cigarette without putting his hand to it. Maria Elena tried her hair a new way in the mirror. Mama Dei Santi walked heavily towards the front, following Bruno. No one looked at Fabio. Harriet squatted under the window and wrote out everything she had seen. Then she wrote:

THAT FABIO MAY BE BAD BUT I DON’T BLAME HIM. I WOULDN’T WANT TO BE LIKE BRUNO EITHER. BRUNO LOOKS LIKE A BIG DUMB BEAR.

ONCE I THOUGHT I WANTED TO BE FRANCA AND LIVE IN THAT FAMILY. BUT SHE’S SO DULL IF I WAS HER I COULDN’T STAND MYSELF. I GUESS IT’S NOT MONEY THAT MAKES PEOPLE DULL. THERE IS A LOT I DON’T KNOW ABOUT THIS THING OF BEING DULL. I BETTER FIND OUT BECAUSE I MIGHT BE IT.