Ironweed - William Kennedy [70]
“Oh my God,” Annie said. “We forgot all about George.” And she went to the living room and called upstairs to Peg: “You should call George and tell him he can come home.”
“Let her alone, I’ll do it,” Billy called to his mother.
“What about George?” Francis asked.
“The cops were here one night lookin’ for him,” Billy said. “It was Patsy McCall puttin’ pressure on the family because of me. George writes numbers and they were probably gonna book him for gamblin’ even though he had the okay. So he laid low up in Troy, and the poor bastard’s been alone for days. But if I’m clear, then so is he.”
“Some power the McCaIls put together in this town.”
“They got it all. They ever pay you the money they owed you for registerin’ all those times?”
“Paid me the fifty I told you about, owe me another fifty-five. I’ll never see it.”
“You got it comin’.”
“Once it got in the papers they wouldn’t touch it. Mixin’ themselves up with bums. You heard Martin tell me that. They’d also be suspicious that I’d set them up. I wouldn’t set nobody up. Nobody.”
“Then you got no cash.”
“I got a little.”
“How much?”
“I got some change. Cigarette money.”
“You blew what you had on the turkey.”
“That took a bit of it.”
Billy handed him a ten, folded in half. “Put it in your pocket. You can’t walk around broke.”
Francis took it and snorted. “I been broke twenty-two years. But I thank ye, Billy. I’ll make it up.”
“You already made it up.” And he went to the phone in the dining room to call George in Troy.
Annie came back to the kitchen and saw Francis looking at the Chadwick Park photo and looked over his shoulder. “That’s a handsome picture of you,” she said.
“Yeah,” said Francis. “I was a good-lookin’ devil.”
“Some thought so, some didn’t,” Annie said. “I forgot about this picture.”
“Oughta get it framed,” Francis said. “Lot of North Enders in there. George and Martin as kids, and Patsy McCall too. And Iron Joe. Real good shot of Joe.”
“It surely is,” Annie said. “How fat and healthy he looks.”
Billy came back and Annie put the photo on the table so that all three of them could look at it. They sat on the same bench with Francis in the middle and studied it, each singling out the men and boys they knew. Annie even knew one of the dogs.
“Oh that’s a prize picture,” she said, and stood up. “A prize picture.”
“Well, it’s yours, so get it framed.”
“Mine? No, it’s yours. It’s baseball.”
“Nah, nah, George’d like it too.”
“Well I will frame it,” Annie said. “I’ll take it downtown and get it done up right.”
“Sure,” said Francis. “Here. Here’s ten dollars toward the frame.”
“Hey,” Billy said.
“No,” Francis said. “You let me do it, Billy.”
Billy chuckled.
“I will not take any money,” Annie said. “You put that back in your pocket.”
Billy laughed and hit the table with the palm of his hand. “Now I know why you been broke twenty-two years. I know why we’re all broke. It runs in the family.”
“We’re not all broke,” Annie said. “We pay our way. Don’t be telling people we’re broke. You’re broke because you made some crazy horse bet. But we’re not broke. We’ve had bad times but we can still pay the rent. And we’ve never gone hungry.”
“Peg’s workin’,” Francis said.
“A private secretary,” Annie said. “To the owner of a tool company. She’s very well liked.”
“She’s beautiful,” Francis said. “Kinda nasty when she puts her mind to it, but beautiful.”
“She shoulda been a model,” Billy said.
“She should not,” Annie said.
“Well she shoulda, goddamn it, she shoulda,” said Billy. “They wanted her to model for Pepsodent toothpaste, but Mama wouldn’t hear of it. Somebody over at church told her models were, you know, loose ladies. Get your picture taken, it turns you into a floozy.”
“That had nothing to do with it,” Annie said.
“Her teeth,” Billy said. “She’s got the most gorgeous teeth in North America. Better-lookin’ teeth than Joan Crawford. What a smile! You ain’t seen her smile yet, but that’s a fantastic smile. Like Times Square is what it is. She coulda been on billboards coast to coast. We’d be hipdeep in toothpaste, and cash too. But no.