by Ed Lacy
“It is the only can for the five rooms,” I cut in. “We can not wait for the porter. Miguel, it is a sweaty night, I want to take a bath—now. Nor can I chance my boy getting sick from this unhealthiness.”
He blinked at me, started to fall back on the cot. I shook his bony shoulder. “Jose,” he said, in Spanish, “you have a beautiful son. He will be a big man, that I am sure of. I have two sons, but I see them not, nor my angel of a wife, for fourteen months now. A wonderful woman, a good wife, who keeps busy all the time. Never are her hands idle. I work hard, I try to save and save, to bring them up here, but who can hold on to money with these prices? I spend not one wasteful penny, but can not get ahead. How I long for my dear wife, with her pale white skin, a true child of Spaniards who …”
“Miguel, I am tired and hungry. Clean up the damn bathroom, now.”
“I can not. I am far too drunk. Nor is such dirty work for an Indio to …” The words became thick and his eyes closed.
The stink of the room became too much for me. I slapped him across the face, hard. Miguel not only came awake fast, he bounced off the cot like a cat—one hand racing for his back pocket I put a wrist lock on him. He grunted with pain as he bent double. I said, “I do not seek trouble, so let this not go any farther. I have had a hard day and want my bath.”
He moaned. I let go of him and he fell back on the cot, began to weep. “Do not complain, Jose, you have a good job, the warmth of your family about you. Today they cut me to three days work a week. How am I ever to send for my family? How will they live down there if I do not send money? And how much loneliness can one man endure? This lousy life is driving me crazy. I was better off in my hut, saving for an agregado on which to raise a few vegetables. The salt beds were slave work and the pay little, but I had my family with me. Here, all I have is this … filth.” His thin hand swept around the kitchen.
“Perhaps things will work out for you. In the meantime, since we must live so crowded, remember I must also use the bathroom you dirtied up.”
“All right, I am now sober. I will clean it.”
I started for the door. “Pehaps you can get other work?”
“Where? I had to buy even this stinking job from an agency. For the women there is a chance of high pay, a union job sewing dresses. For a man, there are no good jobs. Does that make sense? Ay, life now robs us of our due as a man, to head our own family. Is that just?”
“No. “I held out my hand. “We are still friends?”
He nodded and stood to shake my hand. “I tried to lose my lonelines in wine, which is impossible.”
“Have heart,” I said. “I am sorry I was hasty with my hands, but I have had trouble today, too.”
“Trouble is all about us. A woman from Yauco works in the restaurant. She has a soft body and likes me, asks I live with her, aware it may be another year before I see my poor family. I am a man, I am badly tempted, although I come from an ancient family, where such things are not considered. Yet her softness indeed tempts me …”
“Well, take it easy. Things will work out,” I cut in, knowing I sounded like un bobo. Such talk made me nervous, reminded me of my father, and mama once sending me—because I was the darkest child—to follow him, see if he had a mistress. (He had.)
Closing the door I heard Miguel say, almost to himself, “I try hard. Even at bingo I try to make money … but nothing works for me …”
Walking back to our room I knew I would have to keep an eye on Miguel His kind would never forget I’d slapped him. He was one of the recent arrivals who give the rest of us the bad name. Another drunken night … this same dark hall …
I heard him open his door, walk behind me with rags and a pail. I waved at him as I shut the door to our room, put my hand across my lips—for Helen not to talk. The walls are thin.
We sat down and ate, and then I told her why Miguel was high. She said, “But if he was a farmer in the island, why stay in New York City? There aren’t any farming jobs here….”
“Ah sweet, do not start that.”
“But all of … you, remain in the same tight circle. We could take my money and upstate open a garage of your own on the rest of my land. We may never be rich, but it will be a better way of life.”
“Better? Is that why you left it to come to the city? Upstate, what would I be but a Negro? At least in this house I am Spanish!”
“Joe, stop it. You are brown, the same as me. No matter what you call it, it all adds up to being colored I’m not sorry …”
“You know I am proud of my skin.”
“What I’m trying to say, where I come from is no heaven, and I left because an Indian girl has little future. But when I return with my husband, my baby; I’m bringing my future with me. At least go up and see the land. We can have our own life …”
“Sure, they’ll have a hot band at the station to welcome a Spic!”
“Joe, Joe, why must you always carry a chip on your shoulder? I don’t.”
“Do I carry my temper high without reason!”
“Joe, I don’t know what you want! I ask you to go to my home, you refuse. I’m willing to take the money and go to San Juan with you, but you don’t want that either. You … Let us change the subject on such a hot night. There is a letter from your mother.”
“Probably thanking me for the money,” I said, gently. I sent Mama $25 every month and a week later would receive a painfully written note of thanks. A formal note, which she had certainly copied from someplace. Writing was hard for Mama. I kept on eating, glad Helen had changed the subject, because a certain fierceness had come into her eyes, which meant a big fight. While I would never admit it to Helen, at times I am afraid of her. What I mean is, while she is a most intelligent girl, she can not understand—not being Spanish—some of my way of thinking. When she was swollen with Henry I once rubbed her belly with talcum powder, explained it would make Henry’s skin white. Louisa’s mother once told me that. Helen nearly tore my head off with the anger of her words. How could I explain that even if I do not really believe in such old customs and nonsense, still, what is there to lose for trying?”
Helen came around the table, walking tall and strong. Kissing my neck she said, “First Miguel upsets you, then I am shouting … and you must be so tired. But we have to move. Soon Henry will be walking and we will have more children … but not in one room.”
“There is time for another child.” (I never wanted a big family.)
“About that, we will see. Housing is so damn cruel and frustrating. An application for a project is like making a bet—nothing happens. The few vancancies advertised in the papers which we can afford …”
“Are always ‘taken’ when a Latin comes around,” I finished, fondling her hair.
“And you never report them to the housing authorities, or let me,” Helen said, stroking my neck. “You’re tired, and discouraged. Let us buy Harry’s house. It’s far too expensive but we can rent out the top floor …”
“So the neighbors can say, ‘See, Spanish move in and start the first rooming housing on the street?’ Is that what you want?” I was so excited it wasn’t until I saw the troubled look on her face I realized I had lapsed into Spanish. I asked in English, “Helen, is that what you want?”
“All I want is for us to get out of here, Joe. I don’t give a thick damn about any neighbors, or that May. I’ll get a job and together we can manage the rent.”
“You will not! I will take another job at night. I will not have my son dragged up by a strange woman.”
She closed my mouth with a kiss. “At the moment since we’ve neither the money or the house, why fight?” Helen asked, her wonderful lips moving against mine as she spoke, exciting me.
Kissing her back I said, “Here I talk my head off without even telling you what happened to Harry today. Also, what do you think of my becoming a policeman?”
“A cop?” She straightened up. “I don’t think I’d like it. I’d worry. Joe, whatever gave you such an i
dea?”
“Talking to a detective in the police station who told me …”
“Joe, you were in a police house?”
Reaching up, I ran a finger over her nose. “Take the worry from your angel face. With this stupid Miguel business, I’ve had no chance to explain about Harry’s disappearing,” I said, and told her all that had happened. I even drew a rough plan of the handball courts, the fence, and the entrance where I had waited … the empty street. My smart Helen began questioning me much as London had, proving what a fine head she has, for a woman.
She was sure there had to be a connection between the old man sunning himself and Harry. That the folded money had been some sort of signal. Then Helen decided Harry must have climbed the fence. She switched to a new theory—that he had done it to show off for “a passing girl.”
I knew she didn’t think much of Harry because he went with Louisa, and I countered with, “But like I told London, if he wanted to go with a girl, why not tell me? Why leave his wallet and keys behind?”
“Suppose a passing girl calls him fatso, says he’s too old to be playing ball? Wouldn’t he be the type to prove himself by climbing the fence after her, follow her right to her bed?”
I shook my head. “Even if had happened that way, in a half hour, an hour Harry would have been at the garage for his keys.”
“And what if in this girl’s room he found trouble—her husband?” Helen asked.
I agreed this was a new idea, but when I went on to tell her what London had said about the number goons, Helen changed her mind again, like a woman, was sure that was the answer. The goons saw us playing, climbed the fence, were waiting for Harry on the other court.
“No, no,” I said, patiently. “I had chased the ball over to the other court a few minutes before and it was empty. Secondly, if goons did see us, why did they not come through the playgrounds, knowing they had us trapped, unarmed?”
“They didn’t want you to witness it. In fact, perhaps this old sun-bather was a finger man for the thugs?”
“Honey, if somebody had attacked Harry, I would have heard it …”
“Over the noise of the drilling?” Helen cut in.
“Well, no, but if anything like that had happened, how did the gangsters get out with Harry? They certainly could not have climbed the fence holding him!”
We keep arguing, both of us love a good discussion, until Henry awoke for his bottle, and that ended it.
Changing his diapers, I asked Helen what was on TV for the night but she asked, “Joe, what are you going to do about Harry?”
“Me? I’ve already done what I can; reported it to the police.”
“You know I have no use for the slob, but he did go out of his way to offer us his house. Shows he has a decent side. Suppose he’s hurt and alone, or in trouble?”
“Honey, you know the old gag about two blancos who were killing each other and a Latino passing by who tried to stop the fight? When a cop came running up he immediately whacked the Latino across the head with his club and asked the other two, ‘What did he do to you?’ “Even if I did wish to be involved, I do not know what else I can do.”
“Why not phone his house?”
I tickled Henry’s tiny feet and he made a goo-goo noise of enjoyment. “Over the phone I might have to explain things to his wife and … I could go up there, see if Harry is home. Also I was thinking of seeing Louisa. She may know something that …”
“All she knows is to make babies!”
“You are too hard on her. She is trapped, like all of us.”
“Joe, the real troubles are real enough, so don’t make like only Puerto Ricans are getting their prat kicked! No blanco made Louisa knock out three kids in as many years, and nobody made that jerk she married leave her, or forced Louisa to get on her back for Harry Simmons!”
“You are right and you are also wrong, my moral fireball,” I said, giving Henry a final pat. He was going to be well built, very much a man. “Louisa is no puta, no whore. Nor do I defend her because she is my cousin, but you must not be too hard on her, either. I told you, she was practically born up here. Well, most Spanish men would rather marry a woman fresh from the island—they are not so independent, like you.” Helen tried to give me a mock slap. I grabbed her hand, kissed it. “Louisa was raised on a very bad street where all the girls had to join a branch of one of the gangs, or be beaten daily. Once a girl joined, a boy picked her for his sleeping partner. The girl had little choice. If the girl became pregnant, the boy married her. That was how Louisa married that no-good Leon.”
“Look, I’m sick of dumb girls having kids and then whining for pity, as if bringing a child into the world was the same as growing up. Her folks could have moved, or done something.”
“Moved where?” I asked, a little hurt and angry. At times, despite what the Indians have been through, with all her smartness Helen talked like a dumb blanco. True, not too often. “Honey, why are we arguing about it? Louisa is not asking us for money or help. The least we can give her is compassion—not yet 22 years old and having to give herself to a Harry to supplement the relief food.”
“Compassion won’t buy shoes for her kids!” Helen flared. Then she sighed. “You’re right, Joe, I am too smug. Okay, go and see Louisa tonight, ask about Harry. Maybe go up to Harry’s house, too. Make it seem as if you merely wanted to look at the house again. That is all we can do for him.”
“Go out … now?”
“Joe, all day I have been looking forward to seeing you, but this you should do. Harry is a friend … I think.”
“You are a wonderful girl,” I said, pulling her to me, cupping my hand over her breasts. Helen’s tetitas are as firm and round as oranges. For a moment she pushed the breasts against my palm until I felt the exciting hardness of her nipples through the thin dress.
I grinned and she kissed me fiercely, whispering against my lips, “You—! At times I think I have two children. Now stop the proud bull grin and go, so you will be back sooner.”
I had to ride the subway far downtown, then take a cross-town bus to reach Louisa’s place. The Relief had placed her and the kids in one room of a “hotel” even worse than our’s. It was crazy, the Relief was helping these flea-bags stay opened, it seemed, paying the hotel almost a $100 a month for her room. Seemed to me for that kind of dough they could have found a better place.
It was a muggy night and Louisa was sitting on the stoop, talking with other women. Louisa has a pretty tan face, plump and alive with life, and flashing dark eyes. The rest of her is short and solid and sexy: there is this air about her, like a pillow—you know she is made for bed. But she is really not a bad one, will make a good wife for Louisa does not like to be idle. Some days she worked a foot press in a crummy factory, under her maiden name. As she never told the Relief about the few bucks she made, I often warned her it might bring bad trouble. But Louisa would shrug her soft shoulders and answer, “Hungry kids are worse trouble.”
When I first came up to New York I had lived with Louisa and her mother, and we have always got along. Now she was delighted to see me, introducing me to the other mujures, in Spanish of course: “This is my cousin Jose, from Luquillo. He is married to a real Indian, like we see on TV. He is strong, a great wrestler, boxer, and …”
“My press agent,” I said, nodding to the others. I asked Louisa, “Can we take a walk? I want to talk to you.”
“I do not like leaving my babies alone, the rats might set this dump on fire. We go across the street and you can buy me a beer.”
“You shall have a refresco, sweetened with Tamarindos.”
“I want a beer, but knowing you and your male strictness, I’ll settle for a Coke. Don’t you ask for a pidequa—only Marine Tigers and other hicks go for that shaved ice bit.”
We crossed the street, Louisa asking about Helen and Henry. She loved to talk, going from one subject to another without pause. Even as we had our sodas she told me about practicing on a friend’s sewing machi
ne every morning, hoping to get into a small shop soon, then into the union. I cut off her words with, “Did you see Harry today?”
She made big eyes at me, her hot mouth mocking me with a grin, and shook her head. Louisa always keeps her hair very well brushed, sexy-looking. “Odd you ask, Jose,” she said, in English, so the others in the hot store might not understand us, “a policeman asked me the same thing a couple hours back. A large, handsome guy. You should have seen him look me over. I bet he goes for Spanish chicks. Left me his card. I’m to phone him at once if I see Harry. Got the card someplace in my bag …”
“Detective London?”
She nodded and sipped her drink “The coldness is refreshing, even if it brings on more sweat.” She raised her skirts to fan her legs. Louisa was always doing wild things like that.
I stared at my bottle, puzzled. How had London ever learned about Louisa? She must have guessed my thoughts for she said, “He told me he had asked around the remains of the old neighborhood. Some big cow-tongues told him about Harry and me. Is it so that a cop can find any person, Jose?”
“What did you tell him?”
“The truth—that I hadn’t seen fat Harry in days. For a cop, he was okay, didn’t make any dirty cracks. He told me Harry isn’t in trouble, merely missing and … Jose, you look worried.”
“Only because I made a point, while talking to this London, not to bring you into this. Now I must look the fool in his eyes.”
“Bring me into what?” she asked, cautiously.
“Harry and I were playing handball this afternoon and he practically vanished into space,” I said, and went on to tell her what had happened.
Louisa listened carefully, only breaking in to ask if I would buy her some cigarettes. When I finished she said, “I told him the same thing about the handball. That I happened to tell Harry about your Helen coming into this money and you wanting a house, and how he had looked you up in the playground, where I told him you went lunchtimes. I was careful only to tell the truth so …”
“But why see you? How are you in this?”