"Aw, you know what I mean alrighty, Mae, only you ain't sport enough to
take things as they come. You knew all these years it had to come sooner
or later. I 'ain't never quizzed into your old life, but if you didn't
learn that, you--well you ought to. There never was a New Year came in,
Mae, that I didn't tell you that, if you got the chance, for you to go
out after better business. I never stood in your light or made no bones
about nothing!"
"My God! Max, you--you're kidding!"
"All these years I been preaching to you, even before I joined
Forest Park Club out there. 'Don't get soft, Mae. Keep down. Use the
dumb-bells. Hustle around and do a little housework even if I do give
you a servant. Walk in the park. Keep your looks, girl; you may need
'em,' I used to tell you."
"Oh you--You!--"
She clapped her hands over her mouth as if to stanch hysteria.
"Another let-out like that, Mae, and, by gad! I'll take my hat and--"
"No, no, Max, I--I didn't mean it. I'm all right. I--Only after all
these years you wouldn't do it, Max. You wouldn't. You wouldn't throw me
over and leave me cold, Max. What can I do after all these years? I--I
'ain't got a show in a chorus no more. You're kidding, Max. You're a
white man, Max, and--you--you wouldn't do it, Max. You wouldn't. You--"
"Now, now, you can't say I 'ain't been as white as silk, girl, and I'm
going to be just as white as I've been, too. Don't worry, girl. For six
years there 'ain't been a better-stocked flat than this in town, has
there?"
"No, Max."
"The best none too good, eh?"
"No, Max."
"Just the same stuff comes here that I send up to my mother's flat, eh?
All the drinks and all the clothes you want and a servant in the house
as good as my mother's own, eh? No kick coming, eh, girl?"
"You--you wouldn't, Max--you wouldn't ditch me. What could I do?
Nothing--nothing. I--I can't hire out as a scrubwoman, I--"
"Come, come now, girl, you're pretty slick, but you--you don't quite
slide. What about that thirty-five hundred you got down in your
jeans--eh? Them thirty-five hundred in the Farmers' Savings Bank--eh?
Eh?"
"Max!"
"Hah! Knocked you off your pins that time, didn't I? I found your
bank-book one morning, kiddo--found it on the floor right next to the
dresser--"
"Max, I--Out of my checks I--I saved--I--"
"Sure! Gad! I ain't kicking about it, girl. Glad for you! Glad you got
it, girl, only don't try to tell me you can't take care of yourself in
this world alrighty, girl. Any old time you can't! Gad! thirty-five
hundred she snitches out of her allowance in six years, lives on the
fat of the land, too, and then tries to bamboozle me that she's flat.
Thirty-five hundred in six years. Gad! I got to hand it to you there,
kiddo; I got to hand it to you!"
"You can have it back, Max. I--I was going to surprise you when I had
five thousand. I--"
"Gad! I don't want your money, girl. It's yours. You're fixed for life
on it. I'm even going to hand you over a couple of thou extra to show
you that I'm no cheap sport. I won't have a woman breathing can say I
ain't white as silk with her."
"Max, you--you're killing me! Killing me! Killing me!"
"Now, now, Mae, if I was you I wouldn't show my hand so. I don't want to
hurt you, girl. It ain't like I got any but the finest feelings for you.
You're all right, you are. You are."
"Then, Max, for God's sake--"
"But what are you going to do about it? What the hell is anybody going
to do about it? You ain't no baby. You know what life is. And you know
that the seams has got to show on one of the two sides and it ain't your
fault you got turned on the under side. But you should worry, girl!
You're fixed. And I'm here to tell you I'm going to hand you on top of
the two thou this here little flat just as it stands, Mae. Just as it
stands, piano and all. I just guess you got a kick coming!"
Her hands flew to her bosom as if the steel of his words had slipped
deep into the flesh. "You don't mean what you're saying, Max."
"Sure, I do! Piano and all, girl."
"No, no, you don't. You're just kidding me, Max, like you used to when
you wanted to tease me and throw a scare in me that your mother was wise
about the flat. Quit your kidding, Max, and take me in your arms and
sing me 'Maizie you're a Daisie' like you used to after--after we had a
little row. Lemme hear you call me 'Maizie,' dear, so I'll know you're
only kidding. I'm a bum sport, dearie. I--I never could stand for
guying. Cut the comedy, dear."
She leaned to him with her lips twisted and dried in their frenzy to
belie his words, but with little else to indicate that her heart
lay ticking against her breast like a clock that makes its hour in
half-time.
"Quit guying, Max, for God's sake! You--you got me feeling sick clear
down inside of me. Cut it, dear. Too much is enough."
Her dress rustled with the faint swish of scything as she moved toward
him, and he withdrew, taking hold of the back of his chair.
"Now, now, Mae; come, come! You're a sensible woman. I ain't stuck on
this business any more than you are. You ought to have let me stay away
and just let it die out instead of raking up things like this. Come,
buck up, old girl! Don't make it any harder than it's got to be. These
things happen every day. This is business. There, there! Now! Now!"
The sudden bout of tenderness brought the tears stinging to her eyes
and she was for ingratiating herself into his embrace, but he withdrew,
edging toward the piano with an entire flattening of tone.
"Now, now, Mae, I tell you that you got to cut it. It would have been
better if you had just let the old cat die, You oughtn't to tried that
gag to get me here to-night. You'll get a lot more out of me if you do
it dry, girl. A crying woman can drive me out of the house quicker 'n
plague, and you ought to know it by now."
She sat down suddenly, feeling queasy.
"Now, now, old girl, buck up! Be a sport!"
"Gimme a drink, Max. I--Just a swallow. I--I'm all right." And she
squeezed her eyes tight shut to blink out the tears.
He handed her a tumbler from the table, keeping his head averted, and
after a bit she fell to sobbing and choking and trembling.
"It's her! It's your old woman. She's been chloroforming you with a lot
of dope talk about hitting the altar rail with a bunch of white satin
with a good fat wad sewed in the lining. It's your old--"
"Cut that!"
"It's your old woman. She--she don't know you like I do, Max. She--"
"Now, now, Mae! You knew this had to come sooner or later, I 'ain't
never lied, have I? Right here in this room 'ain't you told me a dozen
times you'd let me go quietly when the time came? 'Ain't you?"
"I never thought you meant it, Max. You don't mean it now. Don't let
your old woman upset you, dear. What she don't know won't hurt her.
Stick around her a little more if you think she's got a hunch about me
and the flat. But she 'ain't, dearie; there ain't a chance in the world
she's got a hunch about me. Don't let her make a mollycoddle out of you,
Max. That old woman don't know enough about life and things to--"
"You cut that and cut it quick! I'm a decent fellow, I am. For six years
I been tipping you off to leave my mother's name out--out of your mouth.
There's a place for everything and, by gad! your mouth ain't the place
for her name! By gad! I ain't no saint, but I won't stand for that! By
gad! I--I won't!"
"Oh-h-h-h-h! Oh-h-h-h! Oh-h-h!"
She struck her breast twice with the flat of her hand, her voice so
tight and high that it carried with it the quality of strangulation.
"Ain't fit to mention her name, ain't I? Ain't fit to mention her name?
My kind ain't fit to mention her name, eh?"
"No, if you got to know it. Not--like that! My old mother's name. Not
like that!"
"Not fit, eh? What are we fit for, then, us that only get the husks of
you men and nothing else?"
"I--"
"What am I fit for? Fit to run to when your decent friends won't stand
for you? Fit to run to when you get mixed up in rotten customs deals?
Fit to stand between you and hell when you got the law snapping at your
heels for--for smuggling? Who was fit to run to then? Her whose name I
ain't fit to mention? Her? Naw, you was afraid she'd turn on you. Naw,
not her! Me! Me! I'm the one whose mouth is too dirty to mention your
old lady's name--"
"By gad! you got to cut that or--"
"Just the same, who was it you hollered for when you woke up in the
hospital with your back like raw meat? Who was it you hollered for then?
Her whose name I ain't fit to mention? Naw, it wasn't! Me! Me! I was
good enough then. I was good enough to smuggle you out of town overnight
when you was dodging the law, and to sleep in my clothes for two weeks,
ready to give the signal."
"That's right, dig up! Dig up! You might forget something."
"I been good enough to give you free all these years what you wasn't man
enough to pay for. That's what we women are; we're the free lunch that
you men get with a glass of beer, and what the hell do you care which
garbage-pail what's left of us lands in after you're done with us!"
"Cut that barroom talk around here if--"
"Good enough for six years, wasn't I, to lay down like a door-mat for
you to walk on, eh? Good enough. Good enough when it came to giving up
chunks of my own flesh and blood when your burns was like hell's fire
on your back and all your old woman could do to help was throw a swoon
every time she looked at you. Good enough to--"
"Gad! I knew it! I knew it! Knew you'd show your yellow streak."