Ye lie! said Mrs. McCaskey, without anger. Me brother was worth tin dozen bog-trotting McCaskeys. After him would the bye be named. She leaned over the window-sill and looked down at the hurrying and bustle below.
Ye lie! said Mrs. McCaskey, without anger. Me brother was worth tin dozen bog-trotting McCaskeys. After him would the bye be named. She leaned over the window-sill and looked down at the hurrying and bustle below.
Jawn, said Mrs. McCaskey, softly, Im sorry I was hasty wid ye.
Twas hasty puddin, as ye say, said her husband, and hurry-up turnips and get-a-move-on-ye coffee. Twas what ye could call a quick lunch, all right, and tell no lie.
Mrs. McCaskey slipped her arm inside her husbands and took his rough hand in hers.
Listen at the cryin of poor Mrs. Murphy, she said. Tis an awful thing for a bit of a bye to be lost in this great big city. If twas our little Phelan, Jawn, Id be breakin me heart.
Awkwardly Mr. McCaskey withdrew his hand. But he laid it around the nearing shoulder of his wife.
Tis foolishness, of course, said he, roughly, but Id be cut up some meself if our little Pat was kidnapped or anything. But there never was any childer for us. Sometimes Ive been ugly and hard with ye, Judy. Forget it.
They leaned together, and looked down at the heart-drama being acted below.
Long they sat thus. People surged along the sidewalk, crowding, questioning, filling the air with rumours, and inconsequent surmises. Mrs. Murphy ploughed back and forth in their midst, like a soft mountain down which plunged an audible cataract of tears. Couriers came and went.
Loud voices and a renewed uproar were raised in front of the boarding-house.
Whats up now, Judy? asked Mr. McCaskey.
Tis Missis Murphys voice, said Mrs. McCaskey, harking. She says shes after finding little Mike asleep behind the roll of old linoleum under the bed in her room.
Mr. McCaskey laughed loudly.
Thats yer Phelan, he shouted, sardonically. Divil a bit would a Pat have done that trick. If the bye we never had is strayed and stole, by the powers, call him Phelan, and see him hide out under the bed like a mangy pup.
Mrs. McCaskey arose heavily, and went toward the dish closet, with the corners of her mouth drawn down.
Policeman Cleary came back around the corner as the crowd dispersed. Surprised, he upturned an ear toward the McCaskey apartment, where the crash of irons and chinaware and the ring of hurled kitchen utensils seemed as loud as before. Policeman Cleary took out his timepiece.
By the deported snakes! he exclaimed, Jawn McCaskey and his lady have been fightin for an hour and a quarter by the watch. The missis could give him forty pounds[37] weight. Strength to his arm.
Policeman Cleary strolled back around the corner.
Old man Denny folded his paper and hurried up the steps just as Mrs. Murphy was about to lock the door for the night.
The Skylight Room
First Mrs. Parker would show you the double parlours. You would not dare to interrupt her description of their advantages and of the merits of the gentleman who had occupied them for eight years. Then you would manage to stammer forth the confession that you were neither a doctor nor a dentist. Mrs. Parkers manner of receiving the admission was such that you could never afterward entertain the same feeling toward your parents, who had neglected to train you up in one of the professions that fitted Mrs. Parkers parlours.
Next you ascended one flight of stairs and looked at the second-floor-back at $8. Convinced by her second-floor manner that it was worth the $12 that Mr. Toosenberry always paid for it until he left to take charge of his brothers orange plantation in Florida near Palm Beach[38], where Mrs. McIntyre always spent the winters that had the double front room with private bath, you managed to babble that you wanted something still cheaper.
If you survived Mrs. Parkers scorn, you were taken to look at Mr. Skidders large hall room on the third floor. Mr. Skidders room was not vacant. He wrote plays and smoked cigarettes in it all day long. But every room-hunter was made to visit his room to admire the lambrequins. After each visit, Mr. Skidder, from the fright caused by possible eviction, would pay something on his rent.
Then oh, then if you still stood on one foot, with your hot hand clutching the three moist dollars in your pocket, and hoarsely proclaimed your hideous and culpable poverty, nevermore would Mrs. Parker be cicerone[39] of yours. She would honk loudly the word Clara, she would show you her back, and march downstairs. Then Clara, the coloured maid, would escort you up the carpeted ladder that served for the fourth flight, and show you the Skylight Room. It occupied 7×8 feet of floor space at the middle of the hall. On each side of it was a dark lumber closet or storeroom.
In it was an iron cot, a washstand and a chair. A shelf was the dresser. Its four bare walls seemed to close in upon you like the sides of a coffin. Your hand crept to your throat, you gasped, you looked up as from a well and breathed once more. Through the glass of the little skylight you saw a square of blue infinity.