_Dear Kate_:
I don't know how I'm going to tell you, so you won't feel too bad. Jim
is dead. He sent two or three times to me asking me for money, and I
wouldn't send it to him, cause I didn't have it, and when the last
fellow threatened to take the kid, I told him to go to the devil, that
the kid was where they couldn't touch it. Well, that night I just got
home from work and had taken my waist off and was starting to brush my
hair when I saw my door open sneaking like, and Jim crept in. I was
paralyzed for a minit and couldn't move, just stood there with the brush
on my hair. He had been drinking and looked awful. I said low like,
"Jim, for God's sake, Jim, why do you come here?" He said, "Where else
am I to go?" I said, "Jim, go--go--don't stay a minit." He didn't move,
just stood and looked at me. "But, Jim," I said, "the police, they're
watching the place." He come up to me and put his face close against
mine and I backed away, and said, "Jim, get out. You've been drinkin'."
Then he sort of got sore and he said, "What do you mean by sendin' me
the messages you have?" I said, "I mean just what I said, I ain't got no
more money to give you," and he sneered at me. "Oh, you ain't got no
money, and you ain't hauling down thirty a week, are you?" "Well," I
said, "suppose I am, it's mine, ain't it?" And then he said I ought to
divy up when a feller's in trouble, and at that I got mad. "Divy up?" I
said. "_Divy up._ What have I been doin' the last month but divy up.
I've give you all I got. Why don't you get out of the country, you'll be
pinched the first thing you know." And then he said fierce like and with
an awful look on his face, "You take it from me, Nan, they'll never
pinch Jim Sheridan. If the bulls git me it'll be because I can't handle
a gun." I didn't know what to do with him and I said again, "Get out,
Jim, I'm scared to death you've been seen." He said, "Gimme some money.
I got to have money." I asked him, "What've you done with all I sent
you. I've give you enough to take you to Australia." He said, "I've had
to pay for my hidin' and I got to put up some more." That kind of made
me sick and I said, "Well, you'll have to get it from some one else
then, I've give you the last dollar I've got. I'm busted." He kind of
saw it was true I think, cause he started looking around the room, then
he said, "Where's the kid?" I said, "Never you mind where he is," and he
got sore again and said, "Never mind my own kid. Well, believe me, he's
mine, and I've got an idea I want him. Where is he?" and I said, "He's
where you won't get him." Jim come over to me again and stood in front
of me and says, "He is, is he? Well, I'm going to have him," and then I
got mad clear through and said, "Well, you can't have him. So help me
God, Jim, if you try to touch Billy, I'll peach on you as sure as I'm
alive." Jim laughed and said, "Yes, you will, you ain't that kind," and
I said quick, "Oh, I ain't, ain't I. No, I ain't that kind. I been
brought up to believe that it's the last trick to peach, but I'll go
back on all I ever knowed, and put you behind the bars if you ever try
to touch that kid." Jim kind of sneered. "What do you want of him?" he
said; "he ain't no better off with you than with me." I said, "Perhaps
he ain't. But he won't be raised with crooks and grow up feeling that
crookedness is straight. He'll know decent people, not a lot of cheap
second story men and dips."
Jim laughed. "You're a nice one to talk, old Bill Lane's daughter." And
then Kate, oh I said awful things, and I remember every word and go over
it all at night. I said, "Yes, and Kate Lane's sister. I know, I've had
it rubbed in enough. No one ever says Nancy Lane, they always say Bill
Lane's daughter, Kate Lane's sister or Jim Sheridan's sister-in-law.
Hain't I had that to fight against all my life? Ain't I lost every good
chance that I ever had to work in the good places, just because I've
had to buck against the reputation of my family? And then when _you_
come in the family, I might a carried the others, but no one could carry
you. Why, you dirty crook, you're known from San Francisco to New York,
and I've had to work in cheap shows and dirty cabarets just because of
you always coming and queering me when I got started. Look at the crowd
I go with," I said. "Do you suppose I'm crazy about them? But I have to
go with that kind, the kind that don't fall dead, when they find out who
I am." Jim looked at me a minit, then he said, "You're getting dam nice
lately, what's the matter with you?" I thought a minit and then I said,
"Yes, I'm different, I know it, but I've had most two years of not
havin' to be scared to death, not having to look over my shoulder for
fear a cop was following me to find out about some of you. I've been
able to read the papers without being scared I'd see some of your names
in it, and I've been allowed to work in peace. And I've done good work
too, I've been able to leave the rotten joints and I'm workin' up, and
I'd get to the top if I was left alone. Why the only peace I've had in
all my life has been the last year when you and Dad and Kate was all in
jail. I been able to sleep nights knowing where you all was and that you
couldn't be doing nothing to get in trouble."
Jim said, "Oh, can the hot air. I want the kid, I'm going to get out,
but I'm going to take him with me." I said, "Yes, you are, _nit_." Jim
looked at me kind of curiously for a minit and said, "What are you so
crazy about him for, why do you want him?" I said, "I don't know what I
want him for. I don't know, but you won't have him. He's the first thing
I ever had in my life that's sweet and clean, and he's the first thing
that ever loved me without thinking what they could make out of me. Why,
when he was in the country and he'd come to the gate to meet me, with
his eyes shining with love and his face all dimpling with laughs, I'd
choke up and some times not be able to speak. Billy's made me _live_.
He's made something new come to me, he's made me see all life
different, and I'm going to pay him back for what he's done for me by
giving him a chance." Jim laughed, "You give him a chance," he said,
"what kind of a chance can you give him?" I said, "I don't know for
sure. I ain't got it all figured out, but he's going to have his chance
to grow up like other men." Jim acted sore again and said, "Ah--what's
the use of talking. We're wasting time. I want money and I'm going to
have the kid. If I can't find him I'll put the gang wise, and some of
them'll find him all right." At that I think I just went off my head,
and I didn't care whether the police heard me or not. I said, "Jim,
don't you _dare_ to try to take Billy. Don't you _dare_ to put any of
your dirty gang on to get him away from me. I tell you I'll peach on
you. I'll find out where you're hiding and I'll bring the police there
myself. I'll fight for Billy. I'll fight as any woman'll fight for a
baby. If you dare to touch him or let any of your sneakin' pals come
near him, I'll follow you till I see you behind the bars if I have to
follow you till Hell freezes over." Jim seemed as if he couldn't speak
for a minit, then his face got red and he come towards me. He said, low
and fierce like, "Tell me where that kid is." I said, and moved away
from him, "I won't tell you." He said again to me, "I say, tell me where
he is." I said again, "I won't tell you. He's planted where you'll never
find him." I was standing by the bed and he grabbed me by the throat,
and bent me over backwards, and his eyes just burned into mine. "Oh," he
said, "You won't tell me, you won't--we'll see if you won't, by--" and
just then the door opened and three plain clothes men and two cops
walked in. I don't know how it happened. I don't know nothing that
happened after Jim turned and knew the game was up, but there was three
quick shots all at once, and when the smoke cleared away, Jim was lying
on his back on the floor, one of the plain clothes men had a bullet
through his shoulder. They bent over and found that Jim was all in.
Pretty soon an ambulance come, and he was took away. The sergeant
talked to me, but I can't remember nothing he said. It all happened so
quick, that it seemed an awful nightmare, and I just sat there, saying
"yes and no" to the sergeant, not understanding nor caring. When they
all went away, Tom Cassidy stayed behind, and he come up to me, and put
his arms around my shoulders and said, "You poor little red head, you do
seem to be getting more than your share, don't you?" And at that I just
all broke up, and I put my head against his great big chest, and I cried
all down the front of his uniform. He just patted me quiet like, and let
me cry, and then when things quieted down a bit, he said, "Now, I will
tell you what you do. You just put on your bonnet and I will take you up
to the old lady's. You don't want to sit here alone, and Billy will be
tickled to death to see you." I said, I didn't want to be a trouble to
him, that having one of us was enough, and he said, "My grandmother's
grey cat's kittens, why you won't be no trouble, mother likes somebody
to wipe the dishes, and Jack likes somebody to talk onions to. We have
all heard it, but it will be new to you." Well, he helped me find my
hat, and he almost put the hat pin through my brains, and he helped me
find my blouse, I had been a setting all the time without a waist and
didn't know it, and he was awful nice, never showed by the bat of an eye
that I wasn't dressed in a mackintosh. Then when I had powdered my eyes,
we went over to the station. He wasn't on duty, but he had heard the men
talking about Jim being at my place, and he come along with them to see
that nothing happened to me.
I am going to stay here a week. I can't work and Tom went and saw the
manager and Fred Keeney, my dancing partner, and got me off for a week.
Mabel Sullivan is going to take my place. She dances a good deal better
than I have the last month since I have been so worried, so it'll be all
right. Billy is looking fine. He calls the old lady "granny" and talks
as Irish as she does. She is crazy about him, and says she will never
let me take him away.
Now, don't feel too broke up, Kate. I am afraid I haven't told you very
well about it, but I had rather have you hear it from me, so you will
get it straight. There is no use a telling you I am sorry, cause I
ain't. I always hated Jim's eyes, yet I wouldn't have peached on him,
nor done nothing to hurt him.
Yours,
_Nan_.