P.S. (11 page)

STANLEY CYGAN was seeking Eden, too, when he came to Chicago in 1909, after long years of hard labor in the McKeesport steel mills. He had started at sixteen.

“The boys coming from Poland, my age, they all worked hard. My mother said the Poles were downgraded in McKeesport. ‘Go to Chicago,’ she told me.”

Here, through all his tough work years at the rolling mills, he dreamed of books and school and finding out. “I wanted to be smart.” He lost track of all the Hull-House lectures he attended, forgetting his aching muscles, listening hard.

“There was a professor lecturing on relativity.” As he pronounced the word slowly, rel-a-tiv-i-ty, enunciating every syllable, there was more than awe. It was a wanting to possess the idea. “Einstein.” He caressed the name. “I’d spend an hour and a half listening to the professor. But the worst of it was I didn’t understand half the words he used. I never did understand relativity. There’s a lot of things I don’t understand. If I had more schooling I would. I want to know what is going on.”

IT WAS THE FIRST TUESDAY in November. The year, 1934. FDR had been in the White House two years. Though the will of the electorate put him there, it was the lousy aim of a nut named Zangara that kept him there. The loony drew a bead on the president, but, Miami being Miami, the bullet went wild. Anton Cermak, our sainted mayor, took it instead. “I’m glad it was me instead of you” were his reputed last words to the Hyde Park squire. (Though his grammar left something to be desired, his heart, unfortunately for him, was in the right place.) Thus Big Ed Kelly became our high monkey-monk. Thus in his choosing Little Dick Daley as heir to this palatinate, the Hibernian line of succession was established. Were it not for an errant piece of lead, a Bohemian or a Pole might well have been “the greatest Mare any city ever had.” Of course, this is mere conjecture, having nothing whatsoever to do with the story. And yet . . .

November 1934. Though the goose hung low—the breadline beginning to resemble an endless, silent, gray snake dance—there was a salubrious note in the air. Flutelike. Something
around the corner. Not prosperity, no. That had always been around the corner, but never made the turn. No matter how many incantations were offered by a shaman named Hoover, the snakeline was sinuously growing. (WIN, the buttony bromide of Mr. Ford, has precedents equally banal, and equally effective.) No, it was something else. There was a deep Depression, true; but an elfin air pervaded, as insouciant as Roosevelt’s tilted cigarette holder. There was an unexplained gaiety that November, forty long, lopsided, cockeyed years ago.

Less than a year before, the Volstead Act had been repealed, much to the astonishment, though delight, of H. L. Mencken. The Sage of Baltimore thought it would take decades before the Temperance people would holler uncle. In less than one year after Roosevelt’s inauguration, the water of life flowed legally as well as freely. “Pour some my way” replaced “Benny sent me” as the folksay of the day. Which, of course, added just the right touch—a burst of creative energy, Bacchanalian, if not Dionysian—to the polling place on Ohio Street, just off Wells. It was on other days a fire station. But on this cool November day, it was a memorable place. At least, for me. It was to be my instant school, my seminar, my arena of Revelation.

What the village of Combray was to Proust, the Fortysecond Ward was to me. As the ever-lingering taste of his Aunt Melanie’s madeleine touched off his memory flow, so the sensation of a harsh dram of Chapin & Gore did it for me. Oh, remembrance of things past! In my mind’s eye, I see it now . . .

Red Kelly cornered me on the eve of that Election Day. (He was not related to Big Ed, though their forebears did come from that same poetic patch.) How can I describe, after forty years, one such as Red Kelly? Did he come out of some
strange head of cabbage? Or some crooked alley? Or perhaps arisen out of the waves, covered with seaweed? He appeared ageless. He could pass for sixty. He could pass for twelve. His wrinkled face and puny body told us he was undoubtedly a leprechaun who had migrated to the New World during one of those frequent potato famines. Life in the big city had transformed him from a brownie under the mushroom to a child of the streets. He was a gamin, or as his kind were called years ago, a street Arab. In one manner or another, he survived. It was not politic to ask how.

“Wanna make five bucks?” Red asked of me during that unforgettable twilight.

“Sure,” I replied without hesitation. Five dollars was no small potatoes in 1934.

“Okay. You be poll watcher for Mary Daley.”

“Who’s Mary Daley?”

Red Kelly looked at me with forbearance. “Mary Daley is the grievin’ widow of Johnny Joyce.”

“Who’s Johnny Joyce?”

“Who
was
Johnny Joyce.” Clearly, there was more here than met the eye.

“Who was Johnny Joyce?”

“Johnny Joyce,” Red patiently explained to me, “was our great state senator, may he rest in peace. And Republican ward committeeman. See ’at tavern across the street?” A bony finger pointed at Friendly John’s. “He owned it. Just across from where we’re standin’.”

We were, at the moment, standing near the alley, where many transactions of a sort took place. Where a small-time gambler named Froggy, by means of loaded dice, educated young newsboys in the truth of Horatio Alger. Where ladies of the evening met scores of the morning. Where, as the gold
of the day met the blue of the night, Red Kelly persuaded me to enter Chicago politics.

“Johnny Joyce don’t own the tavern now.” I volunteered this information.

“Of course not.” Red was fast becoming impatient with me. “He’s dead.”

“How did he die?” I was congenitally curious.

“You ast too many questions. You wanna make five bucks or don’tcha?”

“I wanna.”

“Okay. You’re poll watcher for Mary Daley.”

“What’s she runnin’ for?”

Red Kelly sighed, weary of it all. His new recruit was slower than he had bargained for. “She’s runnin’ for state senator.”

“Johnny Joyce’s job?”

“Johnny Joyce’s old job. He died four years ago, fer Chrissake! Charlie Peace is state senator.”

“Charlie Peace?”

“Must ya repeat everyt’ing I tell ya? Charlie Peace is the Republican state senator, and Mary Daley don’t think he’s clean. So she’s tossed her hat in the ring.”

“She’s turned Democrat?”

“No. Ed McGrady’s the Democrat. She’s runnin’ as a independent.”

“She’s not gonna win.” I ventured this well-considered opinion. Having been a devoted seventh-grade follower of Fighting Bob La Follette, the third-party candidate for president in 1924, I was profoundly knowledgeable in such matters.

Red Kelly took a deep breath. “Who said anything about winnin’? She’s runnin’ as a spoiler. Who do you think is payin’ her to pay you for the five bucks?”

“Ed McGrady?”

“You ast too many questions. Mary Daley is runnin’ in the name of clean politics.”

“Is Ed McGrady clean?”

“You wanna make the five bucks or don’tcha?”

“I wanna make the five bucks.”

“Okay.”

An understanding having been reached, my mentor laid his right hand on my shoulder. “Since yer my buddy, I’ll let ya in on a secret. Can you keep yer lips buttoned?” I nodded. Red cupped his left hand to his mouth. What followed was sotto voce. “Nobody knows how Johnny Joyce died. It’s a mystery. Know what I mean?”

I nodded, having not the faintest idea what he meant.

“Dere are rumors makin’ da rounds. They say somebody very, very close did it.”

“Did what?”

“Shhhh!” He looked around nervously, much like Elisha Cook Jr. in
The Maltese Falcon
. Now that I think of it, he looked like Elisha Cook Jr. Immediately, he cupped both hands to his mouth in the manner of a megaphone and bawled out, his voice carrying halfway down the alley, “It was prob’ly an accident.” To me, softly, “Accidents happen, don’t they?”

“Sure.” I knew he would not contradict me on that one.

“Ya know what slogan Mary’s runnin’ on? ‘Keep the Home Fires Burnin’.’ ”

“I like that.”

“Who don’t?”

Both hands were now on my shoulders. He was Coach sending me onto the field with a play. “Ya know what ya gotta do tomorrow at the pollin’ place?”

“Yeah, watch.”

“You got it. You be there first thing in the mornin’ and stick it out till all the ballots are counted.”

“What if I see somethin’ wrong goin’ on?”

He studied my face. Did I detect hurt in his own? “What did I tell ya yer supposed to do?”

“Watch.”

“Okay, watch. That’s what yer paid five bucks to do.” Suddenly he pulled away from me. His face was hard. He was no longer Elisha Cook Jr. He was Jimmy Cagney. “Hey, you ain’t one of dem reformers, are ya?”

It was my turn to be hurt. “Red! Do I look like one of dem?”

“No, ya don’t.” He smiled knowingly. He winked. I winked back.

So it was that on Election Day 1934, I was a watcher for Mary Daley. (As far as I know, she was no kin to Himself; no more than Red was to Big Ed. That she was a Daley and he a Kelly, you may chalk up to poetic continuity and the peculiar ethnic nature of Chicago politics.) From early that day, as by the dawn’s early light I saluted the Stars and Stripes, hanging outside that fire station on Ohio off Wells, until well past midnight—I watched.

There were five elderly men seated behind a long table: three clerks and two judges. They were each to receive $7.50 for their day’s labor. They were chosen by the precinct captains of the two major parties. I was acquainted with two of them. They had been guests at my mother’s hotel. They were bottle babies. Nor did their three colleagues appear to be friends of Mrs. Tooze of the WCTU. A carefree sort of bonhomie prevailed. And a faint whiff of sour mash.

Nothing too much was happening. There were a number of
familiar faces among the voters. That is, they had become familiar, having entered the polling place several times that day, having done their duty as Americans several times. In some instances, the
X
marked on the ballot was in the nature of a proxy vote on behalf of some dear departed, whose name was still among those registered. You could not help but be profoundly moved.

Who was to begrudge the familiar face a buck or two for each appearance? Outside, along the sidewalk, within saluting distance of the flag, the kindly precinct captain or an associate, whispering in reverence, was generous to a fault. And there were still fifty days till Christmas.

There were, as I recall, about a hundred more votes cast that day than there were on the official lists. How can this be interpreted other than as a tribute to the patriotic fervor of those citizens? What a sorry contrast today, with such voter apathy.

It was at nightfall, after the polls had closed, that things began to happen. Aside from me, the other watchers were: an earnest, pale young man who bore Republican credentials (no smile); an elderly woman who was a Democrat (a laughing Allegra); and a policeman in uniform.

The paper ballots were piled high on the long table. The counting began. A sweep was in the making for the Democrats. U.S. senator J. Hamilton Lewis was swamping his opponent, Ruth Hanna McCormick, the colonel’s cousin. The night before, Red Kelly let me know that J. Ham was his buddy, that J. Ham was one of the boys. Senator Lewis was renowned not only for his oratorical flourish, but for his attire as well. From his pink whiskers, lovingly curried (he was called, by his buddies, Doctor Brush), to his pince-nez, to his diamond stickpin, to his pearl gray spats, he was a portrait in elegance. He was, indeed, one of the most expensive servants our state ever had.
He bore a remarkable resemblance to Yellow Kid Weil, that most exquisite of confidence men. It was hard to tell where one left off and the other began.

It was a shoo-in for Doctor Brush. But what about the race between Charlie Peace, Ed McGrady, and Mary Daley? J. Ham may have been Red Kelly’s buddy and all that, but I was paid to watch for Ms. Daley.

It was about ten o’clock when he entered. He was the Himself of our precinct, Prince Arthur Quinn. To call him a precinct captain tells you nothing. That he was to become state representative and lots more may be of passing interest, but it tells you nothing. That he left this vale of tears quite suddenly may be tragic, but it tells you nothing. That glorious night, I remember Prince Arthur strolling in, as members of royalty have done for centuries in all monarchical societies.
He was regal
. His pink flesh, a royal baby’s. His green fedora, a crown. His was not the plump of a bartender. No, he was as round as Edward VII. We were all at attention. He was Upstairs to our Downstairs.

They called him Prince Arthur because he was the son of a kingmaker. Hot Stove Jimmy Quinn. Hot Stove Jimmy was called Hot Stove Jimmy because it was around the hot stove of his haberdashery shop that many were named but few were chosen. It is said that he was among the grand viziers who selected Carter Harrison the Younger as mayor. Prince Arthur came by his title rightfully.

On entering the polling place, Prince Arthur was greeted by his subjects as crowned heads usually are. The three clerks and two judges arose from their seats. It was a matter of reflex. With a benevolent smile and an airy wave of the wrist, he bade them down. He glanced at the rest of us, nodded; we bowed ever so slightly. Ever so slightly. No curtsies, no nothing. After
all, we were not subjects of the British Empire or of imperial Russia. No, by God, we were a free and independent race of Americans.

Genuflection came in the form of a greeting, an awed murmur:

“Hullo, Artie.”

“H’ya, boys. How’s it going?”

“Great, Artie. It’s a sweep.”

“That’s nice.” He looked toward the policeman. “Any trouble?” The officer shook his head. “Uh-uh.” Again. Prince Arthur said, “That’s nice.”