John Toole - A Confederacy of Dunces

“Do I believe the total perversion that I am witnessing?” Ignatius screamed from the parlor. The music had a frantic, tribal rhythm; a chorus of falsettos sang insinuatingly about loving all night long.

“I’m sorry,” Patrolman Mancuso said, almost heartbroken over Mrs. Reilly’s financial quandary.

“Aw, it’s not your fault, darling,” she said glumly. “Maybe I can get a mortgage on the house. We can’t do nothing about it, huh?”

“No, ma’m,” Patrolman Mancuso answered, listening to some sort of approaching stampede.

“The children on that program should all be gassed,” Ignatius said as he strode into the kitchen in his nightshirt. Then he noticed the guest and said coldly, “Oh.”

“Ignatius, you know Mr. Mancuso. Say ‘Hello.’”

“I do believe that I’ve seen him about,” Ignatius said and looked out the back door.

Patrolman Mancuso was too startled by the monstrous flannel nightshirt to reply to Ignatius’s pleasantry.

“Ignatius, honey, the man wants over a thousand dollars for what I did to his building.”

“A thousand dollars? He will not get a cent. We shall have him prosecuted immediately. Contact our attorneys, Mother.”

“Our attorneys? He’s got a estimate from a contractor. Mr. Mancuso here says they’s nothing I can do.”

“Oh. Well, you shall have to pay him then.”

“I could take it to court if you think it’s best.”

“Drunken driving,” Ignatius said calmly. “You haven’t a chance.”

Mrs. Reilly looked depressed.

“But Ignatius, a thousand twenty dollars.”

“I am certain that you can procure some funds,” he told her. “Is there any more coffee, or have you given the last to this carnival masker?”

“We can mortgage the house.”

“Mortgage the house? Of course we won’t.”

“What else we gonna do, Ignatius?”

“There are means,” Ignatius said absently. “I wish that you wouldn’t bother me with this. That program always increases my anxiety anyway.” He smelled the milk before putting it into the pot. “I would suggest that you telephone that dairy immediately. This milk is quite aged.”

“I can get a thousand dollars over by the Homestead,” Mrs. Reilly told the silent patrolman quietly. “The house is good security. I had me a real estate agent offered me seven thousand last year.”

“The ironic thing about that program,” Ignatius was saying over the stove, keeping one eye peeled so that he could seize the pot as soon as the milk began to boil, “is that it is supposed to be an exemplum to the youth of our nation. I would like very much to know what the Founding Fathers would say if they could see these children being debauched to further the cause of Clearasil. However, I always suspected that democracy would come to this.” He painstakingly poured the milk into his Shirley Temple mug. “A firm rule must be imposed upon our nation before it destroys itself. The United States needs some theology and geometry, some taste and decency. I suspect that we are teetering on the edge of the abyss.”

“Ignatius, I’m gonna have to go by the Homestead tomorrow.”

“We shall not deal with those usurers, Mother.” Ignatius was feeling around in the cookie jar. “Something will turn up.”

“Ignatius, honey, they can put me in jail.”

“Ho hum. If you are going to stage one of your hysterical scenes, I shall have to return to the living room. As a matter of fact, I think I will.”

He billowed out again in the direction of the music, the shower shoes flapping loudly against the soles of his huge feet.

“What I’m gonna do with a boy like that?” Mrs. Reilly sadly asked Patrolman Mancuso. “He don’t care about his poor dear mother. Sometimes I think Ignatius wouldn’t mind if they did throw me in jail. He’s got a heart of ice, that boy.”

“You spoiled him,” Patrolman Mancuso said. “A woman’s gotta watch she don’t spoil her kids.”

“How many chirren you got, Mr. Mancuso?”

“Three. Rosalie, Antoinette, and Angelo, Jr.”

“Aw, ain’t that nice. I bet they sweet, huh? Not like Ignatius.” Mrs. Reilly shook her head. “Ignatius was such a precious child. I don’t know what made him change. He used to say to me, ‘Momma, I love you.’ He don’t say that no more.”

“Aw, don’t cry,” Patrolman Mancuso said, deeply moved. “I’ll make you some more coffee.”

“He don’t care if they lock me up,” Mrs. Reilly sniffed. She opened the oven and took out a bottle of muscatel. “You want some nice wine, Mr. Mancuso?”

“No thanks. Being on the force, I gotta make a impression. I gotta always be on the lookout for people, too.”

“You don’t mind?” Mrs. Reilly asked rhetorically and took a long drink from the bottle. Patrolman Mancuso began boiling the milk, hovering over the stove in a very domestic manner. “Sometimes I sure get the blues. Life’s hard. I worked hard, too. I been good.”

“You oughta look on the bright side,” Patrolman Mancuso said.

“I guess so,” Mrs. Reilly said. “Some people got it harder than me, I guess. Like my poor cousin, wonderful woman. Went to mass every day of her life. She got knocked down by a streetcar over on Magazine Street early one morning while she was on her way to Fisherman’s Mass. It was still dark out.”

“Personally, I never let myself get low,” Patrolman Mancuso lied. “You gotta look up. You know what I mean? I got a dangerous line of work.”

“You could get yourself killed.”

“Sometimes I don’t apprehend nobody all day. Sometimes I apprehend the wrong person.”

“Like that old man in front of D. H. Holmes. That’s my fault, Mr. Mancuso. I shoulda guessed Ignatius was wrong all along. It’s just like him. All the time I’m telling him, ‘Ignatius, here, put on this nice shirt. Put on this nice sweater I bought you.’ But he don’t listen. Not that boy. He’s got a head like a rock.”

“Then sometimes I get problems at home. With three kids, my wife’s very nervous.”

“Nerves is a terrible thing. Poor Miss Annie, the next-door lady, she’s got nerves. Always screaming about Ignatius making noise.”

“That’s my wife. Sometimes I gotta get outta the house. If I was another kind of man, sometimes I could really go get myself good and drunk. Just between us.”

“I gotta have my little drink. It relieves the pressure. You know?”

“What I do is go bowl.”

Mrs. Reilly tried to imagine little Patrolman Mancuso with a big bowling ball and said, “You like that, huh?”

“Bowling’s wonderful, Miss Reilly. It takes your mind off things.”

“Oh, my heavens!” a voice shouted from the parlor. “These girls are doubtless prostitutes already. How can they present horrors like this to the public?”

“I wish I had me a hobby like that.”

“You oughta try bowling.”

“Ay-yi-yi. I already got arthuritis in my elbow. I’m too old to play around with them balls. I’d wrench my back.”

“I got a aunt, sixty-five, a grammaw, and she goes bowling all the time. She’s even on a team.”

“Some women are like that. Me, I never was much for sports.”

“Bowling’s more than a sport,” Patrolman Mancuso said defensively. “You meet plenty people over by the alley. Nice people. You could make you some friends.”

“Yeah, but it’s just my luck to drop one of them balls on my toe. I got bum feet already.”

“Next time I go by the alley, I’ll let you know. I’ll bring my aunt. You and me and my aunt, we’ll go down by the alley. Okay?”

“Mother, when was this coffee dripped?” Ignatius demanded, flapping into the kitchen again.

“Just about a hour ago. Why?”