the bedroom with trepidation. She was sitting up in bed in
her modest white nightgown and a braid over each
shoulder.
When she saw him, she smiled, stretched out both arms
to him and said: "Come to me."
~ CHAPTER FORTY-ONE ~
"IT AIN'T a home no more," complained Pat. "It's the
Long Island Railroad Depot where people come and go
all hours. It's a shortorder lunchroom where they throw
food at you, and," he concluded vaguely, "that's where all
me money goes."
It wasn't as bad as he said, even though all didn't sit
down to meals at the same time and all didn't sleep at the
same time. Claude came home from work as Pat and
Denny were leaving the house in the morning. Claude and
Maggie-Now had breakfast together, then she pulled down
the bedroom shades and they went to bed together. She
got up in time to fix Denny's noon lunch and didn't go
back to bed. She put in the afternoon attending to her
household duties.
Claude go,: up at six and had supper with Maggie-Now
and Denny. Pat got home for his supper just as they had
finished theirs. (This gave him the idea that he was served
leftovers.) MaggieNow left for work at seven and Claude
didn't have to leave until nine. He spent the two hours
talking with Pat; that is, listening
[29~ ]
to Pat talk, and helping Denny with his homework.
Weekends were different on account of Pat or Denny
being home, and Maggie-Now couldn't go to bed with her
husband. Pat complained bitterly that all ought to eat one
meal together at least once a week. Since the
Sunday-noon dinner was the only time in the week when
this could happen, contrary Pat chose to eat that meal at
Mrs. O'Crawley's house.
There was no religious friction. Claude stayed up
Sundays to go to eight o'clock Mass with Maggie-Now. He
got up an hour earlier Saturday evenings to escort
Maggie-Now to church for her weekly confession. He
waited outside for her or else sat quietly in a back pew.
When Maggie-Now apologised for having fish each Friday
instead of meat, he said he liked fish and that they ought
to have it twice a week. Denny was to make his First
Communion that spring and Claude helped him memorize
his Catechism. Lottie's old mother died in February and
Claude gave up an afternoon of sleep to go to the funeral
with his wife. He told her how much he had been moved
by the great and somber beauty of the Requiem Mass.
"I'm waiting the day," confided Pat to Mick Mack over
a beer, "when he'll show up in his real colors. He's too
good to be true, the bastid."
"Yeah, like me own son-in-laws," agreed the little man.
"Bastids Old sonsabitches, all of them!" (He didn't really
believe that. He just wanted to be in sympathy with Pat.)
"That I can believe," said Pat coldly, "seeing the
father-in-law what they got."
It was inevitable that changes came about. For one
thing, Claude stopped going to Mass. "I'll wait until I'm
accepted in the church as a convert," he told Maggie-Now.
"It's not right to go merely as an outsider; a spectator."
He asked her jokingly why she went to confession every
week; how in the world could she accumulate so many
sins in a week? She said she went weekly because she was
used to it, she guessed. He smiled and said that was
hardly an intelligent reason, was it? After that, she didn't
wake him up to escort her to the church. She went to
confession alone.
He no longer sat with Pat and Denny when she left for
her
[ 29~ ]
work. He went with her and either stood in the booth and
talked to her or else went directly to the hotel where he
worked. "I can sit in the lobby and read," he explained,
"until it's time to go on duty."
She surmised that Claude no longer spent the evenings
with Pat because her father asked too many questions. She
recalled a shred of conversation between them she'd
overheard.
"How'd t77OU come to get such a name like Claude?"
asked Pat.
When Claude answered, Maggie-Now noted he spoke in
that academic way which meant he was coldly angry. He
said: "Shall we say I had a romantic mother?" (Too
romantic, he thought bitterly.) "And she got the name out
of a Victorian novel?"
"I bet you know how tT7OU got your last name,
though," persisted Pat. "I guess your father's name was
Bassett."
"Your enunciation, old sir," said Claude icily, "is a little
'd' sound in the middle of the name Bassert."
"Yeah? And for your information," countered Pat, "there
ain't all the time a 'old' in front of that word 'sir' neither.
Especially when a man is still in his forties."
It was a morning in late March. They were in bed
together with the shades pulled down to shut out the
daylight. He was holding her and caressing her and talking
about nothing in the broken-sentence, murmuring way of
one who is content. Gently, she put his hand away from
her.
"Why?" he asked.
"I can't," she said. "It's My Time."
"What time?"
"You know."
Sure, he knew. But he liked to tease her. He knew she
had a queer distaste for the medical words of the woman
cycle, such as "menstruate,'' "pregnancy" and "menopause."
She substituted euphemisms for these terms: "My Time,"
"With Child," and "The Change." He liked to try to get her
to say the medical words by pretending he didn't
understand her words.
"I'm so disappointed," she said.
"You're disappointed! What about me?" he asked in
pretended anger.
1 '93 ]
Suddenly, she was weeping. Why can't I ever
ren~e~nber, he thought, that she takes everything so
literally?
"I didn't mean it, darling. I'm not mad. Of course, I
know you can't. It's all right. It's only for a few days. I
can wait." Then, hoping to change her tears to laughter,
he said sternly: "Only the next time see that it happens on
a weekend when I can't have you anyhow."
"It's not that," she sobbed.
He put his arms about her and said, "Then tell me what
it is' love."
"It's . . . it's . . ." she sobbed, "that I'm not going to have
a baby. This is the second time since we married that I'm
not going to have a baby." He gave a spurt of laughter.
"Don't laugh," she said piteously.
"But you're so funny, my little Chinee. Most women cry
their eyes out when they miss a period. You cry when you
don't."
"Because I want a baby. Because I need a baby so bad."
She continued to weep as though she
never would ~top.
He petted her as he would a child. "There, Margaret!
There, Maggie-Now, dear; my own dear, good girl. Don't
cry. A baby takes time. I mean when a girl has been a
good girl before her marriage, she doesn't get pregnant
right away. Now: When you're all over this period, we'll
try again. And this time, I'll put my mind on it."
This made her giggle through her sobs and soon she
had stopped crying. After a while he said: "Since you can't
sleep with me, would you brush-talk me to sleep, dear
one?"
Often Men he couldn't sleep, he liked her to brush her
hair and talk to him about her childhood. So now she
took her hair down, got her brush and sat on the bed
facing him. She started brushing her hair.
"All right. Now! What do you want me to talk about?"
she asked in her practical w ay. He howled with laughter.
"What did I say that struck you so funny?" she asked
indignantly.
"Nothing. Only you're such a practical darling; such a
dear little thing with your no sense of humor; your dear
no sense of humor."
"Anyhow, what do you want to talk about?"
"Tell me about the mln and the hair and the bird's nest."
"Well . . ." She started to brush her hair with slow,
rhythmic
[ 294 1
strokes. "When I was a little girl, Sister Veronica said:
'When you cut your hair, put the cuttings in the yard so
the birds can use them in building their nests.' So I had
bangs and Mama used to cut them every time she washed
my hair. So I told Mama to wash my hair first before she
cut my bangs. You see, I wanted the birds to have clean
hair for their nests...."
Watching the up-and-down motion of the brush,
listening to the rise and fall of her voice acted like a
hypnotic. Soon his eyes were closed and he slept
peacefully. She looked down on his face with love. With
her forefinger poised an inch above his face, she traced
the outlines. In this way, she conjured up the way he must
have looked as a little boy.
He is so cold to the outside world, she thought. And so di
jerent when he's alone with me. Oh, if only everyone knew
The next day, he was gone.
~ (CHAPTER FORTY-TWO ~
THE next morning was one of those rare ones that come
sometimes in early March when you had made up your
mind that the long winter would never end. Sunshine
burnished the hummocks of frozen slush in the gutters
and there was a warm breeze.
Claude was late getting home from work that morning.
Denny was leaving for school and still Claude hadn't come
home. MaggieNow went out on the stoop with Denny to
see if Claude was coming. She sniffed the air. It smelled
like freshly watered flowers. A breeze lifted a tendril of
her hair and let it drop back against her cheek. She
shivered in sensual delight. It felt like a lover's touch.
"Yes," she murmured.
"What?" asked Denny.
"It's a south wind."
1 Aft ]
"How do you know?"
"Because it's coming from South Brooklyn."
"Kin I stay home from school then?"
"I should say not! Get going." She gave him an
affectionate whack on the backside to propel him on his
way.
She put Claude's slowly frying bacon on the back of the
stove. She put his rolls in the warming oven and threw the
warming coffee away; she'd make fresh when he came in.
She told herself that, because it was such an unexpectedly
wonderful day, he was walking part way before he took
the trolley. She knew how excited he was about all
weathers.
When he comes home, she thought, we'll lie in bed and
talk about what a worzderfz~l day it is before we . . .
The day wore on slowly and she began to believe that
he wasn't coming home. She wished and wished that she
knew what hotel he worked at. Why didn't she make him
put the address in a sealed envelope and let her assure
him that she wouldn't open it ever except in a terrible
emergency?
From time to time, as she went about her routine
household duties, a whinnying sound came from her like
an animal in pain. And while she was washing Denny's
lunch dishes, her throat got dry suddenly and tightened up
and an ugly sound came from her: like an "ugh" when one
is kicked suddenly in the stomach. She leaned way over
and put her forehead down on the sink and sobbed loudly
and hoarsely until she was exhausted. She went about her
housework with violent tremblings in her stomach. If I was
going to have a baby now, she thought, I'd lose it. And she
started to cry again, knowing she was not going to have a
baby and Claude would never come back and there never
could be another man....
What d,;d I say to hires? What did I do? Was it Papa?
Denny? Was it the house? That we could never be i?Z bed
together all night like other husbands and wives and all we
had was a few hours in the morning? Corpse back, come
back, darling, she prayed, and we'll have our own home . .
. even if it's only one room somewhere....
Then she got the idea that he had died where he
worked or was deathly sick and they didn't know where he
lived because he never told people things like that. She
washed her face with shaking [2941
hands and got her hat on. She was halfway to the trolley
stop when she remembered that she didn't know where he
worked and could not go to get him if he was sick.
Denny came home from school. "I got nought in
arithmetic today," he announced, "and I got double
homework."
"Do it! "
"I want to go out and play first."
"Do your homework!" she screamed.
"It's too hard. You got to help me."
"Let me alone!" she screamed.
This frightened the boy. "I'm going to get Claude," he
said. He went to the bedroom.
"Claude's not here," she said.
"Where'd he go?" She didn't answer. She went into her
room. Denny went out on the street.
The three of them sat down to a haphazard supper that
night. "Hey, Papa," said Denny importantly, "Claude
N'`,ent away."
Pat put his fork down. "So," he said. "So. Three months
was all he could stand, hey? Well, if he thinks I'm going
to support his wife . . ." Maggie-Now pushed her plate
away and ran into her bedroom and closed the door.
"What did I say?" asked Pat of Denny. He sounded
genuinely bewildered.
Maggie-Now lay on her bed in the darkness. She did not
know how long she had been there. The house was quiet.
She heard someone knock on the door. She jumped up,
thinking it was news of Claude, but it was only a boy with
a message from the movietheater man
ager. It was
seven-thirty and the manager wanted to know why she
Noms late.
"Tell him I'm sick," she said. "Tell him I'm sick. I can't
come to work tonight."
She went into the kitchen to clear the table and wash
the dishes. She saw Denny's books still strapped up and
knew he had not yet done his homework. She looked in
his bedroom. He wasn't there. She surmised he had gone
out with his father.
Her father came in at eight-thirty. "Where's Denny? "
she asked.
"Why? Ain't 'he home? '
"I thought he was with you."
"Well, he ain't."
[297]
Without bothering to put on her coat, she ran out into
the night, which had turned cold after the warm day,
looking for her brother. She found him at last, three
blocks away. There was a corner candy store with a
newsstand outside. Denny, with two bigger boys, stood just
around the corner. As she waited to cross the street, she
saw a man pick up a paper, throw down some coins and
go on his way. One of the bigger boys, quick as a flash,
darted out, snatched the coins and went back to the
others. As she crossed the street, she saw another man
take a paper and put down the money. She reached the
stand in time to see Denny duck around and grab the
pennies.
When he saw her, he was petrified with fright. She
grasped his wrist tightly, held his clenched hand over the
newsstand and hammered at his hand until he opened it
and the pennies dropped back on the papers. The other
kids ran away. She dragged him home. He cried all the
way.
When she remembered the episode afterward, she was
always glad that the candy-store man had been too busy
with customers to notice what had been going on outside
his store. He was a mean man and would not have
hesitated at all to call the police.
Pat offered cruel reasons for why Claude had left her.
All the reasons were to Claude's discredit. From time to
time, Denny asked when Claude was coming home. There
was talk in the neighborhood. One woman spoke to her
bluntly.
"I don't see your husband around no more."
"No," said Maggie-Now.
Others, more considerate, said nothing to her but
discussed it with others. "He was never no good in the
first place," was the verdict, "and she's well rid of the
dirty, black Pratt-ess-stant."
One woman said to a neighbor: "Now I'm just as
broad-minded as the next one. But there's always two
sides to every story and I'd sure like to hear his side. The
way I look at it, a man just don't get up and leave his wife
for nothing."
Maggie-Now endured the gossip, real or imagined, and
it neither added to, took from, nor diverted her from her
grief.
On her monthly visit to Lottie, she had to tell her
Claude had gone. Lottie waited a long time before she
spoke. "You know what I think about him," she said. "But
that's got nothing to do
[ 298 ]
with the way you feel. I won't run him down. You get
enough of that from your father. But tell me this: Before
you married him and you had known for sure that he
would leave you, would you have married him anyhow?"
"Yes," whispered Maggie-Now.
"Well, so in a way, you bought it and now you have to
pay for it. Still and all, that don't make it easier. I felt the
same way, almost, when Timmy left me that time to go
back to Ireland. I thought maybe he wouldn't come back
and then I thought, anyways, I was lucky that I had him
for the time I did have him even if he never came back."
BUt I had a child, she thought. And where is her child?
Her children? She can't marry again while he lives. Not in
our religion. I don't wish him ally hard luck. God forgive
me, but . . .
Van Clees, the benevolent busybody, went to Annie
Vernacht and said: "Go by the poor girl's house and talk
to her."
"But what do I say, Jan?"
"Tell her she is a good girl and he comes back again."