Bread and Roses, Too Page 3

  Angelo yelled something, and one of the men in the back room opened a door out onto the balcony, which helped clear the air and made breathing a bit easier. Jake tucked his bare legs and feet up under Angelo's heavy shirt. Angelo handed him an oversized cup of very hot, very black coffee. Jake warmed his hands on the thick porcelain and occasionally took a sip, slurping air to keep the scalding liquid from burning his throat.

  The longer he sat, the sleepier he became—the warm room, the dry shirt, the boisterous clamor of the men gradually fading to a rippling murmur—Angelo must have added a slug of spirits to the coffee. That must be it. His head began to nod. With a leap, Angelo took the cup from his hands, put it on the table, and then carried him to a bed that felt like a cloud beneath his exhausted body

  When Angelo woke him, the room was already dark, though it must have been only late afternoon. He could smell food cooking on the coal stove. "Wake up, sleepy. We gotta eat and get to our meeting. You wanna come?" Angelo grinned. "Nobody but wops."

  "Is my shirt and britches dry?" Jake hated the thought of leaving this warm bed and taking off Angelo's wonderful shirt that covered him nearly to his ankles.

  Angelo checked the clothesline over the stove. "Wet as a bambino's bottom," he reported. "But Giuliano is short like a girl. We borrow his shirt and britches for tonight, yes?" The one named Giuliano seemed to protest, but it was in Italian, so Jake didn't know if it was because of being compared to a girl or having his clothes appropriated.

  They ate their supper of beans and bread, grumbling that it wasn't spaghetti. Jake finished his so quickly that Angelo gave him a second helping. He mopped up the last of the juice with the bread—the crusty bread was wonderful—and longed for a third helping, but the pot was empty and the men were getting up, signaling, alas, that the meal was done.

  He couldn't go home, not in Giuliano's clothes, so he went with them to Chabis Hall. He'd seen the plain frame building from the outside many times, but no one who wasn't Italian ever went in there. The hall was dimly lit and crowded. Many were smoking cheap cigars and cigarettes, which fouled the air more than Angelo's coal stove, but somehow the electricity in the room made up for everything. It wasn't the excitement Jake felt when he stole food from the grocer's and got chased down the street. That was thrilling, of course, since he always managed to outrun his pursuer. This was the excitement of being a thief in the middle of hundreds of thieves, all set to steal away the world of Mr. Billy Wood, with his mansion in Andover and more automobiles than even the blooming millionaire himself could count.

  That the talk was all in Italian was frustrating, but when the crowd quieted and began to listen to individual speakers, Angelo whispered a few words in English to Jake, so he could get an idea of what was being said.

  "Mr. Billy Wood don't understand when we speak soft, speak reason, tell him we are cold and hungry while he is fat and rich. So now we speak strike. That is language he will understand when he have no more profit."

  "Shh." A man, sitting in the row ahead, had turned around. He whispered something fierce in Italian, which made Angelo put his arm protectively around Jake's shoulders.

  "Joe Ettor say we are all Americans," he said. The man shrugged.

  "Who's Joe Ettor?" Jake couldn't help asking.

  "Come tomorrow night," Angelo said. "Then you see."

  Jake was beginning to believe that the meeting would go on forever when the men around him stood up and cheered and then began to talk noisily among themselves. Still jabbering, the crowd streamed out into the dark street. "Come on, Jake," Angelo said. "Time to celebrate our big strike."

  Soon, however, Angelo was so wrapped up in strike talk that he seemed to forget that Jake couldn't understand the blinking Italian gabble. He followed them to a tavern. Although there wasn't a single light burning, one of the Italians grabbed the door handle and yanked. It was locked. The second tavern was dark as well, but there was a crudely lettered sign on the door. "What it say, Angelo?" someone yelled.

  The crowd parted to let Angelo get to the door. He bent close to the sign. "It say—" he said, reading the English words—"it say, 'closed by order of the police.'"

  The men began to curse in language even Jake could understand. "The blasted police close down the taverns because we strike," Angelo said. "Come on, we go to Marco's. He always got home-made."

  But something held Jake back. He knew it was harder for Angelo and his friends to have him hanging on. He'd have to face his father sooner or later. So somewhere along the dark street, he slipped away from his noisy companions and headed down the hill.

  He was still wearing Giuliano's clothes, the waist tied with a string to keep the pants from falling down, as he made his way through the cold darkness of the night back to the shack. pa was waiting for him, pacing the dirt floor, spitting out curses against the world in general and Jake in particular. Too late Jake remembered that he'd meant to buy a bottle for pa. He tried to run as soon as he saw how furious the man was, but it was cold and he was tired and pa was too quick for him.

  He snatched Jake by the arm and held on like the devil himself, his long nails biting into Jake's flesh. "Where you been, you thieving bastard?"

  Jake knew better than to answer such a question.

  His pa pulled him close, his stinking breath in Jake's face. In the smoky light of the oil lamp, the man squinted at Jake's clothes. "Wop clothes!" he declared. "You been with those damn strikers, ain't you? Take 'em off!"

  Jake hesitated just long enough for the man to smack him across the face. Then he untied the string and dropped his pants.

  "Shirt, too."

  Jake obeyed.

  With a practiced motion, his father undid his belt and began to lash Jake's legs and then his back. The boy bit his lip to keep from screaming out. Finally, pa's arm tired, and he dropped the belt to the dirt floor.

  Holding Jake fast, pa picked up Giuliano's pants and felt the pockets until he found the pay envelope, still soggy from the earlier soaking. "Ha!" he said. In his greed, he let go of Jake's arm to pull out the envelope, and Jake took the chance to jump away from his reach. He grabbed the shirt and pants and started running. He never stopped until he was in the shade of the giant mill, where he dressed himself once more, tears of anger stinging his cheeks.

  The boy was too ashamed to go back to Angelo's, so he headed for a place he knew was never locked up—the Irish church, Saint Mary's, on Haverhill Street.

  He made his way through the dark sanctuary—the only light, the pale one above the altar—into the room to the left of the altar where the priests kept their robes. He knew from past experience that there was a toilet there and a basin. He fumbled his way in the dark until he found the basin. Standing before it, he stripped himself of Giuliano's clothes, now soggy with his blood. He turned on the water and, with the towel that was hanging next to the basin, washed the bloody stripes on his legs. They stung like fury. He swiped the towel across his back.

  Should he try to rinse the blood off Giuliano's clothes? And wear what? A priest's robe? He laughed out loud. He, Jake Beale, got up like a papist priest! In his father's eyes, that would be the only thing worse than a wop's shirt and trousers. So there in the dark, in the priests' private basin, he washed the blood from Giuliano's shirt and pants as best he could and hung them over the heavy chairs in the priests' room to dry. Then he opened the closet and found himself a nice wool robe with a sash and wrapped himself in it. It was warmer than Angelo's shirt had been.

  His eyes had grown accustomed to the dark room, so he investigated the cabinets, where he found a carafe of wine and funny little pieces of dry crackers. He stuffed handfuls of the round crackers into his mouth and washed them down with the wine. It was sweet and tasted a lot better than the wine Angelo had given him in the tavern. He sat down on the soft carpet and drank more of it until the pain in his back and legs dimmed and his head began to nod.

  "Holy Mother of God!"

  The bulb hanging from the ceiling was lit,
and Jake saw, standing above him, a burly Irishman, his raised eyebrows like woolly caterpillars, his blue eyes bulging.

  Jake jumped to his feet. He tried to run but tripped over the long robe and landed with a thud on the carpet. The man stepped on the hem of the robe, pinning him to the floor.

  Jake thought fast. priests have to forgive you if you sin. That's the rule. "Forgive me, Father," he whined.

  The big man began to laugh. "You take me for a priest, do you?" He lifted his foot off the bottom of the robe. "Then you don't belong around here, or you'd know I'm just the sexton. But you better get yourself into your own clothes and clear out before the father shows up for early Mass." He prodded Jake with his toe. "I mean it." He looked at the scattered wafers on the floor and the half-empty carafe of wine. "Hurry. Dress yourself. I got me work cut out for me here."

  Jake stood up and let the robe drop to the floor. The man ignored his nakedness and concentrated on picking up the mess the boy had made. Giuliano's clothes were still damp, but it couldn't be helped. Jake put them on though they were clammy and just the touch of them pained his back and legs. If the sexton had seen the marks on the boy's body, he didn't mention them, but he did say, "If you need something to eat, boy, go to the back door of the rectory. My wife is the cook here. She'll give you a bite."

  Tempted as Jake was by the mention of food, he thought it better not to hang around. No need to press his luck. He mumbled his thanks to the sexton and made his way out into the sanctuary and down the aisle. Just before he got to the huge wooden doors, he remembered the box where people dropped coins for the needy. Well, who was needier than he? The lock was flimsy and easily broken. The box was filled mostly with pennies, but he scooped up all the money and loaded it into his pockets. At least he'd eat for a few days.

  Joe Ettor Comes to Town

  It was Saturday morning, but the streets were quiet. By now, Jake was sure, if people were going to work, they would be up and stirring, even though the winter sun had not yet fully risen. He passed a grocer's shop with a dim light glowing. Inside, someone was sweeping the floor. He thought about going in, just to get out of the cold, but he'd been in that shop before and the owner had chased him away for stealing fruit. Even though he now had pennies jangling in his pocket, and he was freezing in his damp clothes, he didn't go in. Better to try someplace where he wasn't known. He headed on down Haverhill Street, past the wide common, where he often slept in summer. It was covered with an inch or so of dirty snow this morning. There should be something open on Jackson Street.

  He found a baker and tried the door. It was locked, but there was a clerk inside, arranging loaves on the counter. Jake banged on the door, and the girl looked up, annoyed. "Not open yet!" she called. He reached into his pocket and pulled out three pennies. Nobody in this town was ever closed if there was money to be made. Sure enough, as soon as she saw the money, she came over and unlocked the door.

  He pushed past her into the store. It wasn't very warm, but it was dry and out of the wind.

  The girl let out some expletive in a foreign language.

  "What?" Jake asked roughly.

  "You're wet and ... and..."

  "Bloody?"

  She looked frightened.

  "I was in the strike yesterday. I got beat by a cop."

  She shook her head sympathetically. "Come in the back where the oven is. It's warm."

  She got a bun from under the counter. Jake's stomach rumbled at the sight of it, but he made himself wait. Sometimes, if you were patient...

  She led him to a room filled with the sweet smell of bread baking and pulled a chair up to a huge brick oven. "Sit down," she said, handing him the bun. "Would you like some coffee, too?"

  "I can pay."

  "Later," she said.

  Polish, he decided. Although he could usually spot an Italian—working, as he did, with so many of them, and the Irish looked like nobody else—he had a hard time telling the rest of these foreigners apart. He stood up to drink his coffee and eat his bun, turning around so his backside could dry as well as his front. He would have been perfectly satisfied, warm room, fresh bread, except he knew how badly stained his borrowed garments still were, despite his attempts in the church. The girl had been kind, and the baker himself only grunted in his direction and kept on with his work. But he couldn't very well ask for soap and water and someplace where he could strip naked and try once more to wash out the rusty stains.

  Then he realized that if the police excuse had worked so well on a stranger, it was sure to work on Angelo and his friends, who expected nothing better of cops who would turn fire hoses on strikers in the freezing cold of winter.

  Now warm and dry, he thanked the girl for her kindness and left the bakery. He didn't offer to pay for the bun and coffee, but she hadn't asked, had she? No need to waste his little cache of pennies.

  The tenement where Angelo lived was just off union Street. Jake climbed the stairs and knocked on the door. Angelo answered. "Hey, Jake!" he said. "Where you been?" He pulled him into the apartment.

  "Hey, Giuliano," he yelled through to the kitchen. "Your clothes are back."

  Giuliano circled Jake suspiciously. "What the hell you do to my nice shirt?"

  "I—I got beat."

  "Those blasted cops! Beating a kid," Angelo said. "Come on, boys, it's late. We gotta go stop them scabs." The men jumped up from the kitchen table. "You stay here, Jake. Wash up. Get some rest."

  "And get that blood outa my good shirt!"

  When the apartment was empty, Jake found his own clothes, now dry, and exchanged them for Giuliano's stained ones. Like most of the tenement apartments, this one had the bedrooms at the front and back of the house, and the kitchen in the center. The men, having no families to feed, had money for coal, so the kitchen was warm. Jake lay down on the floor, close to the iron stove, and fell asleep. Let the others strike and carry on. He would take care of himself.

  He woke with a start. The fire in the stove had long since gone out, and he was stiff from lying on the wooden floor. Why hadn't he gotten into Angelo's bed? He must be crazy, passing up a good chance to lie in a comfortable bed. He examined Giuliano's clothes. He wouldn't get the blood out of the shirt if he scrubbed from now till Christmas. The pants were black, so the stain didn't show, but the white shirt was rusty with the blood he'd tried to wash out. He folded it up so the worst of the stain was underneath and hardly visible. Giuliano would be mad, but how could Jake help it? Maybe the man would blame the police more than he'd blame Jake. If not, so what? Giuliano was rich enough to buy himself another shirt, wasn't he? Still, maybe it would be better not to be here when the men returned. Angelo was good at explanations. Let him do it.

  He went down the rickety stairs to the outside door. While he slept, the city had come to life. union Street seemed to be crawling with people. He'd go north, he decided, away from the mills, away from the river and his father, away from Giuliano's unhappiness. The weather was bitter as he headed up union Street with no place to go. He had used up all the refuges he knew—the big Catholic church of the Irish, the bakery, Angelo's—better to just keep walking. He turned off into a narrow street lined with mill-owned tenement houses. Women were everywhere, talking excitedly in all their peculiar languages. The words "strike" and "scab" and the name "Ettor" popped out of the foreign words. Angelo had said that he should go hear Ettor speak at the Italian hall tonight, but Giuliano might still be mad. He'd better not go. Still, he was curious. Who was this guy the men all waited for so eagerly?

  Actually, he was bored. He had no desire to join the picket lines down by the mills, although he knew that was where the excitement was, if there was any to be had. He was tired of excitement—the kind that meant you got hosed down with freezing water, anyway. He'd steal something, but that seemed stupid when he had pennies rattling in his pocket. So he just walked around the Plains, winding in and out of the narrow alleyways where the garbage was piled. It didn't stink so much in winter. He watched the wo
men. His own mother, long dead ... would she have been like these foreign women, their heads wrapped in dirty shawls, talking so fast that spit came out of their mouths with the words? No, she was poor, but she was native-born. There was a huge difference, wasn't there? Some of these women carried infants tucked into their shawls and had toddlers clinging to their skirts—dirty kids, all of them, with chilblains and chapped faces. But at least they had mothers, which made him envy them, although he didn't recognize the feeling well enough to name it. He passed the tenement where he'd once spent the night. That funny little shoe girl—what was she doing now that the strike was on?

  "Hey, Jake!" He turned abruptly to see who in the Plains might have hailed him. This was foreigners' territory. He dimly recognized the face of the boy who had called out to him. Those few months when he'd been in and out of that awful school learning nothing—yes, it was someone from Newbury Street School. It wasn't one of the boys at work.

  "Saw that hose blow you down. Holy Mother, what a sight!"

  It was one of the Irish, Jake was sure of that. What was he doing in the Plains?

  "Don't you remember me? Joe o'Brien—from Newbury School."

  "Oh, yeah." Jake wasn't in the mood for schoolboys.

  "Are you still on strike?"

  "Well, I ain't no scab!"

  "Thatta boy."

  It made him furious. This shanty Irish schoolboy patting him on the head for striking. What did he know about slaving in the mill? Choking on the dust? Risking your limbs in the machinery and getting paid pennies to do it? He turned away and began to walk fast.

  "Hey, I'm talking to you." The boy skipped to catch up. "Where you going to picket today?"

  "I gotta go to the hall and get me orders," Jake growled.

  "Can I go, too?"

  "Strikes ain't child's play." He left Joe standing in the street staring after him with a look that could only mean respect on his wide face.