John Toole - A Confederacy of Dunces

Santa grabbed the picture on the mantelpiece, a photograph of an ancient and hostile-looking woman in a black dress and black stockings standing in a dark alley paved with oyster shells.

“Poor momma,” Santa said feelingly, giving the picture a loud, wet kiss. The grease on the glass that covered the photograph showed the frequency of these affectionate onslaughts. “You sure had it hard, kid.” The little black coals of Sicilian eyes glared almost animatedly at Santa from the snapshot. “The only picture of you I got, momma, and you standing in a alley. Ain’t that a shame.”

Santa sighed at the unfairness of it all and slammed the picture down on the mantelpiece among the bowl of wax fruit and the bouquet of paper zinnias and the statue of the Virgin Mary and the figurine of the Infant of Prague. Then she went back to the kitchen to get some ice cubes and one of the kitchen chairs. After she had returned with the chair and a little picnic cooler of ice cubes, she arranged her best jelly glasses on the mantelpiece before her mother’s picture. The proximity of the picture made her grab it and kiss it again, the ice cube in her mouth cracking against the glass.

“I say a prayer for you every day, babe,” Santa told the snapshot incoherently, balancing the ice cube on her tongue. “You better believe they’s a candle burning for you over in St. Odo’s.”

Someone knocked at the front shutters. In putting the picture down hurriedly, Santa tipped it over on its face.

“Irene!” Santa screamed when she opened the door and saw the hesitant Mrs. Reilly on the front steps and her nephew, Patrolman Mancuso, standing down on the banquette. “Come on in, sweetheart darling. You sure looking cute.”

“Thanks, honey,” Mrs. Reilly said. “Whoo! I forgot how long it takes to drive down here. Me and Angelo been in that car almost a hour.”

“Id’s the traffig is whad id is,” Patrolman Mancuso offered.

“Listen to that cold,” Santa said. “Aw, Angelo. You better tell them men at the precinct to take you out that toilet. Where’s Rita?”

“She diddit feel like cubbig. She’s got her a headache.”

“Well, no wonder, locked up in that house with them kids all day long,” Santa said. “Aw, she oughta get out, Angelo. What’s wrong with that girl?”

“Nerbs,” Angelo answered sadly. “She’s got nerbous trouble.”

“Nerves is terrible,” Mrs. Reilly said. “You know what happened, Santa? Angelo lost the book Ignatius give him. Ain’t that a shame? I don’t mind about the book, but don’t never tell Ignatius about it. We’ll really have us a fight on our hands.”

Mrs. Reilly put her finger to her lips to indicate that the book must forever be a secret.

“Well, gimme your coat, girl,” Santa said eagerly, almost tearing Mrs. Reilly’s old purple woolen topper off. She was determined that the ghost of Ignatius J. Reilly would not haunt her party as it had haunted so many evenings of bowling.

“You got you a nice place here, Santa,” Mrs. Reilly said respectfully. “It’s clean.”

“Yeah, but I want to get me some new linoleum for the parlor. You ever used them paper curtains, honey? They don’t look too bad. I seen some nice ones up by Maison Blanche.”

“I bought some nice paper curtains for Ignatius’s room once, but he tore them off the window and crumpled them up. He says they an abortion. Ain’t that awful?”

“Everybody to his own taste,” Santa observed quickly.

“Ignatius don’t know I come here tonight. I told him I was going to a novena.”

“Angelo, fix Irene here a nice drink. Take a little whiskey yourself, help out that cold. I got some cokes in the kitchen.”

“Ignatius don’t like novenas neither. I don’t know what that boy likes. Personally, I’m getting kinda fed up on Ignatius, even if he is my own child.”

“I fixed us a good potatis salad, girl. That old man tells me he likes a good potatis salad.”

“You oughta see them big uniforms he’s giving me to launder. And all the directions I get on how to wash them. He sounds like he’s selling soap powder on the TV. Ignatius acts like he’s really made good pushing that wagon around downtown.”

“Look at Angelo, babe. He’s fixing us a nice drink.”

“You got any aspirins, honey?”

“Aw, Irene! What kinda party pooper I got on my hands? Take a drink. Wait till the old man comes. We gonna have us a nice time. Look, you and the old man can dance right in front the phonograph.”

“Dance? I don’t feel like dancing with no old man. Besides, my feet swole up this afternoon while I was ironing them uniforms.”

“Irene, you can’t disappoint him, girl. You shoulda seen his face when I invited him out in front the church. Poor old man. I bet nobody ast him out.”

“He wanted to come, huh?”

“Wanted to come? He ast me should he wear a suit.”

“And what you told him, honey?”

“Well, I said, ‘Wear whatever you want, mister.’”

“Well, that’s nice.” Mrs. Reilly looked down at her green taffeta cocktail dress. “Ignatius ast me why I was wearing a cocktail dress to go to a novena. He’s sitting in his room right now writing some foolishness. I says, ‘What’s that you writing now, boy?’ And he say, ‘I’m writing about being a weenie vendor.’ Ain’t that terrible? Who want to read a story like that? You know how much he brought home from that weenie place today? Four dollars. How I’m gonna pay off that man?”

“Look. Angelo fixed us a nice hi-ball.”

Mrs. Reilly took a jelly glass from Angelo and drank half of it in two gulps.

“Where you got that nice high-fly from, darling?”

“What you mean?” Santa asked.

“That gramaphone you got in the middle of the floor.”

“That’s my little niece’s. She’s precious. Just graduated outta St. Odo High and she’s awready got her a good saleslady job.”

“You see that?” Mrs. Reilly said excitedly. “I bet she’s making better than Ignatius.”

“Lord, Angelo,” Santa said. “Stop that coughing. Go lay down in the back and rest up till the old man comes.”

“Poor Angelo,” Mrs. Reilly said after the patrolman had left the room. “He sure a sweet boy. You two sure been good friends to me. And to think we all met when he tried to arrest Ignatius.”

“I wonder how come that old man ain’t showed up yet.”

“Maybe he’s not coming, Santa.” Mrs. Reilly finished her drink. “I’m gonna make me another one, if you don’t mind, sugar. I got problems.”

“Go ahead, babe. I’m gonna take your coat back in the kitchen and see how Angelo’s making out. I sure got two happy people at my party so far. I hope that old man don’t fall down and break his leg on the way over.”

After Santa had left, Mrs. Reilly filled her glass with bourbon and added a jigger of Seven-Up. She picked up the spoon, tasted the potato salad, and, cleaning the spoon with her lips, put it back on the paper napkin. The family in the other half of Santa’s double house was beginning to stage what sounded like a riot. Sipping her drink, Mrs. Reilly put her ear to the wall and tried to filter some meaning out of the loud shouting.

“Angelo’s taking some cough medicine,” Santa said as she returned to the parlor.

“You sure got you good walls in this building, babe,” Mrs. Reilly said, unable to comprehend the gist of the argument on the other side of the wall. “I wish me and Ignatius lived here. Miss Annie wouldn’t have nothing to complain about.”

“Where’s that old man?” Santa asked the front shutters.

“Maybe he ain’t gonna come.”

“Maybe he forgot.”

“That’s the way it is with old folks, honey.”

“He ain’t that old, Irene.”