Бетти Смит - Maggie-Now

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

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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-No\v 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 t\VO 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."