(Annals of The Bend)

Why, yes,” responded Chucky readily enough, “there's choiches of all sorts, same as there's folks, see! Some does good an' then ag'in there's others that ain't so warm.”

It was rude, cold weather. Because of the bluster and the freezing air without, Chucky had abandoned his customary ale for hot Scotches. These and the barroom's pleasant heat, in contrast with the chill and gusts of the street, served to unfold Chucky's conversational powers. He even waxed philosophical.

“For that matter,” continued Chucky, critically, “there's lots of good lyin' 'round loose. Sometimes it's dead hard to find, but it's there all d' same, if youse is fly enough to pipe it off. An' it ain't all in d' choiches neither. As I states, I'm d' last mug to go knockin' d' choiches, but dey ain't got no corner on d' good of this woild. There is others. D' choices ain't d' only apple on d' tree. Nor yet d' onliest gas jet on 'd chandelier.

“Say!” Chucky went on, after a further taste of the hot Scotch, “on d' level! I'm onto achoich what's got nex' to a bakery, an' what do youse t'ink? Each night d' bakery don't do a t'ing but give every poor hobo who fronts up to d' window a loaf of bread. That's for fair! an 'd' gezebo who runs d' bakery is a Dutch Sheeny at that. Would youse get bread if you was to go chasin' nex' door to d' choich? Nit; t'ree times nit! If you was to go slammin' 'round d! choich makin' a talk for a hand-out, all youse would get would be d' collar, see!

“Onct a week that sanchewary would fill youse to d' chin on chimes; oh, yes! but no buns; not on your life! Chimes is d' limit wit' that choich. An' say! it's got money to boin! Bread at d' bakery! chimes at d' choich! that's how dey line t'ings up at that corner. An' I'm here to say as between d' brace of 'em, when it gets down to d' cold proposition, 'W'ich does d' most good?' d' bakery can lose that temple of worship in a walk. I strings me money on d' bakery. An' don't youse forget it!”

Chucky was quite exhausted after this outburst. He revived, however, with the hot Scotch, which restored him mightily.

“Onct,” resumed Chucky, “about ten years ago, this is, I was where a w'ite choker was takin' up a c'llection. An' what do youse figure he wants it for? I'm a black Republican if he didn't break it off on us that he was out to make up a wad so his congregation could cel'brate d' fortieth birt'-day of gold in Californy. Don't that knock youse silly? D' w'ite choker says as how he comes from Californy an' him an' his push is goin' to toin themselfs loose, see! an whoop it up because dey found gold forty spaces back. It made me tired, honest!

“'Why!' I says to this pulpit t'umper, just like that, 'Why! don't youse preach that gold is d' roots of evil? An' now youse is framin' up a blow-out over findin' it! It looks like a dead gauzy bluff to me.'

“What does d' w'ite choker mark do? Just gives me d' dead face an' ignores me.

“Youse permits yourself to be amazed at me pickin' this guy up about gold bein' d' seeds of evil,” observed Chucky, with a touch of severity. This was in response to some syllable of admiration I'd let fall. “Youse needn't mind. I'll give youse a tip that in me yout' I was d' star peeple of d' Sunday school dey opens long ago at d' Five Points. That's straight goods, see! I was d' soonest kid at me lessons that ever comes down d' pike, an 'd' swiftest ever. I has all d' other kids on d' blink. I win a test'ment onct from d' outstretched mits of d' entire push, bar d' Bible class, for loinin' more verses be heart than anybody. I downs every kid in d' bunch. I made 'em look like a lot of suckers!” and Chucky paused in approving meditation over the victories of boyhood days.

“Still d' choiches does dead lots o' good,” asserted Chucky, coming back to the subject. “There's d' case of Bridgy McGuire. She makes two or t'ree trips to d' Cat'lic joint over on Mott Street, an' all she loins, so it sticks in her frizzes, is: 'Honour dy father an' dy mother,' see! An' Bridgy says herself it's that what brings her back after she's been run away from home for six years. Bridgy shows up just in time to straighten out d' game for d' McGuires at that. D' fam'ly was on d' hog for fair when Bridgy gets there.

“Nixie, d' yarn ain't so long, nor yet so scarce; for that matter, there's lots more like 'em. In d' foist place, this mark, McGuire, Bridgy's dad, ain't so bad. Mac's a bricklayer; but d' loose screw wit' him was that he ain't woikin' in d' winter; an' as durin' d' summer he gen'rally lushes more whiskey than he lays bricks, an' is more apt to hit d' bottle than a job, d' McGuire household's more or less on d' bum, see!

“I remembers Bridgy when she's so little a yard makes a frock for her. She was a long, slim, bony kid, wit' legs on her like she's built to pick hops; an' if Bridgy shows anyt'ing in her breed when young, it's a strong streak of step-ladder.

“In her kid days I wasn't noticin' Bridgy much; d' fact was, then as now, I'm havin' troubles, of me own. Her mommer, who was pretty near an even break wit' Mac himself when it comes to hittin' up d' booze, every now an' then t'run back to d' religious days of her own yout', an' it's durin' one of these Bible fits of d' old woman that she saws Bridgy off on d' choich, where I speaks of her gettin 'd' hunch from d' priest, or somebody, that it's d' fly caper if youse is out to finish wit' d' heavenly squeeze, to honour your father an' mother.

“As I relates, I ain't dead clear about Bridgy when she's young an' little, except it does come chasin' back to me that she's dead gone on dancin' an' knock-about woik. Onct when me an' d' McGuires is livin' on d' same floor, I hears a racket in d' hall like some sucker is tryin' to come downstairs wit' a tool chest. Naturally, I shoves me nut outside me door to tell him to go chase himself. But it's only Bridgy—mebby she's twelve at d' time—practyesing. I keeps me lamps onto her awhile, an' she never tumbles I'm there; for I don't say nothin', but lays dead. Bridgy is doin' han'-stan's, cartwheels, backbends, fallin' splits an' all sorts of funny stunts.

“'Is this an accident, or does you mean it?' I asts at last, as Bridgy winds up a cartwheel wit' a split that looks like it's goin' to leave her on bot' sides of d' passage way.

“'I'm doin' a spread,' says Bridgy, 'same as d' Boneless Wonder at Miner's, see!' An' here she lays her little cocoa down on her knee to show she's comfortable, an' dead easy in her mind.

“Wit'out keepin' exact tabs on Bridgy, I'm able to state that as soon as she's big enough she goes to woik; an' at one time an' another she sells poipers, does a toin in a vest factory, or some other sweat shop; an' at last, when she's about seventeen, she's model in a cloak joint. She gets along all right, all right for a space or so, when one day d' old grey guy who owns d' woiks takes it into his nut he'll float into Bridgy's 'fections.

“'Love youse!' says Bridgy, to this aged stiff; 'old gent, you're dopey! If youse give way to a few more dreams like that, your folks 'll put you in d' booby house. Yous'll be in Bloomin'dale cuttin' poiper dolls d' foist news you know.'

“At this d' wicked old geezer makes a strong talk—makes d' speech of his life. But Bridgy won't stand for him, nor his game.

“'Come off your perch!' she says at last. 'Either you corks up or I quits. You don't make no hit wit' me at all.'

“But d' old mucker don't let up none, an' keeps on givin' Bridgy a song an' dance about his love for her; so at last she makes her bluff good an' walks out of d' joint an' goes home.

“McGuire was hot in d' collar at Bridgy t'runnin' down her job; but d' old woman, she says Bridgy does dead right; an' for a finish Mac an 'd' old woman goes on a drunk an' has a fight over it; after which d' subject's dropped, see! an' that's d' end of it. I only sees Bridgy onct after that, before she screws her cocoa. That's at d' Tugman's Ball; where she's d' Queen spieler of d' bunch, an' shows on d' floor as light an' graceful as so much cigar smoke. It's right on d' heels of this that Bridgy fades from d' Bend for fair, an' no one has d' least line on her or knows where she's at.

“It runs on for t'ree or four spaces, an 'd' McGuires keeps gettin' drunker an' harder up. More'n onct d' neighbors has to bring in d' grub, or dey wouldn't have done a t'ing but starve. Dey's jumpin' sideways for food to chew, I'll tell youse that right now, as much as half d' time. Durin' all this no one hears a woid about Bridgy.

“Of course, no one's makin' much of a roar. There's a good deal doin' about d' Bend, see! An' d' comin' or d' goin' of a skirt more or less don't cut much ice.

“It's in d' winter, an 'd' McGuires has been carryin' on bad. No woik, no money, no grub! On d' dead! it's a forty-to-one shot dey bot' finishes at d' morgue, or d' Island before d' spring comes 'round. For d' winter is bad in d' Bend, an' while everybody is on, that d' McGuires is strikin' it hard, d' most of us is havin' all we can do runnin' down t'ree feeds a day, so d' McGuires ain't what*d' poipers calls 'much in d' public eye,' after all. One evenin', however, Mac comes sprintin' to me, an' he's fair sober for him.

“'Nit!' he says, when I asts him, 'nit; none of d' ellegunt for me!'

“Then I tumbles there's a cochin on. McGuire's t'runnin' off on a drink was a new one on d' Bend.

“'Come wit' me,' he says, 'to Roster & Bial's.'

“'Come wit' youse to Koster's!' I retort. 'That's a dandy idee; youse ought to sew buttons on it! Come to Koster & Bial's! Who's got d' price?'

“'Here's d' pasteboards,' says Mac.

“An' I'm a liar' if he ain't got 'em. So we goes, see!

“D' fift' toin on d' programme is a 'Mamselle Fleury from Paris.' She's down on d' bills as a singer, dancer an' high kicker. I'm leanin' back in me seat feelin' sore on meself for not makin' Mac hock d' tickets for beer, when all at onct Mac gives me a jolt in d' slats wit' his elbow, an' pointin' one of his main hooks at this French tart, where she's singin' on d' stoige—an' say! she's a boid an' a Kokobola—an' says:

“'Be youse on?'

“I focuses me peeps on this Fleury, all pink tights an' silks an' feathers, where she's doin' her toin. I'm a lobster if she ain't Bridgy McGuire!

“'What th' 'ell! what th' bloomin' 'ell!' is all I can say; an' on d' square! Mac has to drag me out an' lay an oyster on me before I'm meself ag'in. It comes mighty near stoppin' me in d' foist round.

“You sees d' finish. Bridgy's took to d' stoige. She's been over in London an' Paris; an' say! she's got d' game down fine as silk. She'd come back an' was beatin 'd' box for t'ree hundred plunks a week.

“Sure! Bridgy had been up to find her folks. Foist she said she t'ought she'd pass 'em up. Dey had given her d' woist of it when she's a kid; why should she bother! But she tells us herself, talkin' it over, how when she struck d' old town ag'in, an' old sights begins to toin up old mem'ries, it starts to run in her wig about d' Bend an 'd' old days. An' what stan's out clearest is d' little old Cat'lic choich, an 'd' guff dey gives her d' onct or twict she shows up there, about honourin' her father an' mother. I s'pose what youse would call Bridgy's conscience gets a run for its money. Anyhow, somet'ing inside of her took to chewin' d' rag, an' showin' Bridgy's she's wrong, an' at d' last, she can't stand for it no longer, an' so she sends a tracer out for her mother an' dad, an' lands 'em.

“D' McGuires live in Harlem now. Dey drinks better whiskey then dey did in d' Bend, an' less of it. Bridgy is a wonder an' a winner; in it wit' bot' feet an' has dough to back every needful racket. Yes, d' choich does it, give it d' credit; an' youse can gamble your last chip d' McGuires crosses themselfs every time dey sees one. An' dey's dead flossy so to do.”