a tree that grows in brooklyn

A Tree Grows In Brooklyn

PERENNIAL LIBRARY

Harper & Row, Publishers, New York

A TREE GROWS IN BROOKLYN

Copyright 1943, 1947 by Betty Smith.

BOOK ONE

SERENE was a word you could put to Brooklyn, New York. Especially in the summer of 1912.

Somber, as a word, was better. But it did not apply to Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Prairie was lovely

and Shenandoah had a beautiful sound, but you couldn't fit those words into Brooklyn. Serene

was the only word for it; especially on a Saturday afternoon in summer.

Late in the afternoon the sun slanted down into the mossy yard belonging to Francie Nolan's

house, and warmed the worn wooden fence. Looking at the shafted sun, Francie had that same

fine feeling that came when she recalled the poem they recited in school.

This is the forest primeval. The murmuring pines and the hemlocks,

Bearded with moss, and in garments green, indistinct in the twilight,

Stand like Druids of eld.

The one tree in Francie's yard was neither a pine nor a hemlock. It had pointed leaves which

grew along green switches which radiated from the bough and made a tree which looked like a

lot of opened green umbrellas. Some people called it the Tree of Heaven. No matter where its

seed fell, it made a tree which struggled to reach the sky. It grew in boarded-up lots and out of

neglected rubbish heaps and it was the only tree that grew out of cement. It grew lushly, but

only in the tenements districts.

You took a walk on a Sunday afternoon and came to a nice neighborhood, very refined. You

saw a small one of these trees through the iron gate leading to someone's yard and you knew

that soon that section of Brooklyn would get to be a tenement district. The tree knew. It came

there first. Afterwards, poor foreigners seeped in and the quiet old brownstone houses were

hacked up into flats, feather beds were pushed out on the window sills to air and the Tree of

Heaven flourished. That was the kind of tree it was. It liked poor people.

That was the kind of tree in Francie's yard. Its umbrellas curled over, around and under her

third-floor fire-escape. An eleven-year-old girl sitting on this fire-escape could imagine that she

was living in a tree. That's what Francie imagined every Saturday afternoon in summer.

Oh, what a wonderful day was Saturday in Brooklyn. Oh, how wonderful anywhere! People

were paid on Saturday and it was a holiday without the rigidness of a Sunday. People had

money to go out and buy things. They ate well for once, got drunk, had dates, made love and

stayed up until all hours; singing, playing music, fighting and dancing because the morrow was

their own free day. They could sleep late-until late mass anyhow.

On Sunday, most people crowded into the eleven o'clock mass. Well, some people, a few, went

to early six o'clock mass. They were given credit for this but they deserved none for they were

the ones who had stayed out so late that it was morning when they got home. So they went to

this early mass, got it over with and went home and slept all day with a free conscience.

For Francie, Saturday started with the trip to the junkie. She and her brother, Neeley, like other

Brooklyn kids, collected rags, paper, metal, rubber, and other junk and hoarded it in locked

cellar bins or in boxes hidden under the bed. All week Francie walked home slowly from school

with her eyes in the gutter looking for tin foil from cigarette packages or chewing gum wrappers.

This was melted in the lid of a jar. The junkie wouldn't take an unmelted ball of foil because too

many kids put iron washers in the middle to make it weigh heavier. Sometimes Neeley found a

seltzer bottle. Francie helped him break the top off and melt it down for lead. The junkie

wouldn't buy a complete top because he'd get into trouble with the soda water people. A seltzer

bottle top was fine. Melted, it was worth a nickel.

Francie and Neeley went down into the cellar each evening and emptied the dumbwaiter

shelves of the day's accumulated trash. They owned this privilege because Francie's mother

was the janitress. They looted the shelves of paper, rags and deposit bottles. Paper wasn't

worth much. They got only a penny for ten pounds. Rags brought two cents a pound and iron,

four. Copper was good-ten cents a pound. Sometimes Francie came across a bonanza: the

bottom of a discarded wash boiler. She got it off with a can opener, folded it, pounded it, folded

it and pounded it again.

Soon after nine o'clock of a Saturday morning, kids began spraying out of all the side streets on

to Manhattan Avenue, the main thoroughfare. They made their slow way up the Avenue to

Scholes Street. Some carried their junk in their arms. Others had wagons made of a wooden

soap box with solid wooden wheels. A few pushed loaded baby buggies.

Francie and Neeley put all their junk into a burlap bag and each grabbed an end and dragged it

along the street; up Manhattan Avenue, past Maujer, Ten Eyck, Stagg to Scholes Street.

Beautiful names for ugly streets. From each side street hordes of little ragamuffins emerged to

swell the main tide. On the way to Carney's, they met other kids coming back empty-handed.

They had sold theirjunk and already, squandered the pennies. Now, swaggering back, they

jeered at the other kids.

"Rag picker! Rag picker!"

Francie's face burned at the name. No comfort knowing that the taunters were rag pickers too.

No matter that her brother would straggle back, empty-handed with his gang and taunt later

comers the same way. Francie felt ashamed.

Carney plied his junk business in a tumble-down stable. Turning the corner, Francie saw that

both doors were hooked back hospitably and she imagined that the large, bland dial of the

swinging scale blinked a welcome. She saw Carney, with his rusty hair, rusty mustache and

rusty eyes presiding at the scale. Carney liked girls better than boys. He would give a girl an

extra penny if she did not shrink when he pinched her cheek.

Because of the possibility of this bonus, Neeley stepped aside and let Francie drag the bag into

the stable. Carney jumped forward, dumped the contents of the bag on the floor and took a

preliminary pinch out of her cheek. While he piled the stuff on to the scale, Francie blinked,

adjusting her eyes to the darkness and was aware of the mossy air and the odor of wetted rags.

Carney slewed his eyes at the dial and spoke two words: his offer. Francie knew that no

dickering was permitted. She nodded yes, and Carney flipped the junk off and made her wait

while he piled the paper in one corner, threw the rags in another and sorted out the metals. Only

then did he reach down in his pants pockets, haul up an old leather pouch tied with a wax string

and count out old green pennies that looked like junk too. As she whispered, "thank you,"

Carney fixed a rusty junked look on her and pinched her cheek hard. She stood her ground. He

smiled and added an extra penny. Then his manner changed and became loud and brisk.

"Come on," he hollered to the next one in line, a boy. "Get the lead out!" He timed the laugh.

"And I don't mean junk." The children laughed dutifully. The laughter sounded like the bleating

of lost little lambs but Carney seemed satisfied.

Francie went outside to report to her brother. "He gave me sixteen cents and a pinching penny."

"That's your penny," he said, according to an old agreement.

She put the penny in her dress pocket and turned the rest of the money over to him. Neeley was

ten, a year younger than Francie. But he was the boy; he handled the money. He divided the

pennies carefully.

Eight cents for the bank." That was the rule; half of any money they got from anywhere went

into the tin-can bank that was nailed to the floor in the darkest corner of the closet. "And four

cents for you and four cents for me."

Francie knotted the bank money in her handkerchief. She looked at her own five pennies

realizing happily that they could be changed into a whole nickel.

Neeley rolled up the burlap bag, tucked it under his arm and pushed his way in Cheap Charlie's

with Francie right behind him. Cheap Charlie's was the penny candy store next to Carney's

which catered to the junk trade. At the end of a Saturday, its cash box was filled with greenish

pennies. By an unwritten law, it was a boys' store. So Francie did not go all the way in. She

stood by the doorway.

The boys, from eight to fourteen years of age, looked alike in straggling knickerbockers and

broken-peaked caps. They stood around, hands in pockets and thin shoulders hunched forward

tensely. They would grow up looking like that; standing the same way in other hangouts. The

only difference would be the cigarette seemingly permanently fastened between their lips, rising

and falling in accent as they spoke.

Now the boys churned about nervously, their thin faces turning from Charlie to each other and

back to Charlie again. Francie noticed that some already had their summer hair-cut: hair

cropped so short that there were nicks in the scalp where the clippers had bitten too deeply.

These fortunates had their caps crammed into their pockets or pushed back on the head. The

unshorn ones whose hair curled gently and still babyishly at the nape of the neck, were

ashamed and wore their caps pulled so far down over their ears that there was something

girlish about them in spite of their jerky profanity.

Cheap Charlie was not cheap and his name wasn't Charlie. He had taken that name and it said

so on the store awning and Francie believed it. Charlie gave you a pick for your penny. A board

with fifty numbered hooks and a prize hanging from each hook, hung behind the counter. There

were a few fine prizes; roller skates, a catcher's mitt, a doll with real hair and so on. The other

hooks held blotters, pencils and other penny articles. Francie watched as Neeley bought a pick.

He removed the dirty card from the ragged envelope. Twenty-six! Hopefully Francie looked at

the board. He had drawn a penny penwiper.

"Prize or candy?" Charlie asked him.

"Candy. What do you think?"

It was always the same. Francie had never heard of anyone winning above a penny prize.

Indeed the skate wheels were rusted and the doll's hair was dust filmed as though these things

had waited there a long time like Little Boy Blue's toy dog and tin soldier. Someday, Francie

resolved, when she had fifty cents, she would take all the picks and win everything on the board.

She figured that would be a good business deal: skates, mitt, doll and all the other things for fifty

cents. Why the skates alone were worth four times that much! Neeley would have to come

along that great day because girls seldom patronized Charlie's. True, there were a few girls

there that Saturday ... bold, brash ones, too developed for their age; girls who talked loud and

horseplayed around with the boys-girls whom the neighbors prophesied would come to no

good.

Francie went across the street to Gimpy's candy store. Gimpy was lame. He was a gentle man,

kind to little children ... or so everyone thought until that sunny afternoon when he inveigled a

little girl into his dismal back room.

Francie debated whether she should sacrifice one of her pennies for a Gimpy Special: the prize

bag. Maudie Donavan, her once-in-awhile girl friend, was about to make a purchase. Francie

pushed her way in until she was standing behind Maudie. She pretended that she was spending

the penny. She held her breath as Maudie, after much speculation, pointed dramatically at a

bulging bag in the showcase. Francie would have picked a smaller bag. She looked over her

friend's shoulder; saw her take out a few pieces of stale candy and examine her prize-a coarse

cambric handkerchief. Once Francie had gotten a small bottle of strong scent. She debated

again whether to spend a penny on a prize bag. It was nice to be surprised even if you couldn't

eat the candy. But she reasoned she had been surprised by being with Maudie when she made

her purchase and that was almost as good.

Francie walked up Manhattan Avenue reading aloud the fine-sounding names of the streets she

passed: Scholes, Meserole, Montrose and then Johnson Avenue. These last two Avenues were

where the Italians had settled. The district called Jew Town started at Seigel Street, took in

Moore and McKibbenand went past Broadway. Francie headed for Broadway.

And what was on Broadway in Williamsburg, Brooklyn? Nothing-only the finest nickel and dime

store in all the world! It was big and glittering and had everything in the world in it ... or so it

seemed to an eleven year-old girl. Francie had a nickel. Francie had power. She could buy

practically anything in that store! It was the only place in the world where that could be.

Arriving at the store, she walked up and down the aisles handling any object her fancy favored.

What a wonderful feeling to pick something up, hold it for a moment, feel its contour, run her

hand over its surface and then replace it carefully. Her nickel gave her this privilege. If a

floorwalker asked whether she intended buying anything, she could say, yes, buy it and show

him a thing or two. Money was a wonderful thing, she decided. After an orgy of touching things,

she made her planned purchase-five cents worth of pink-and-white peppermint wafers.

She walked back home down Graham Avenue, the Ghetto street. She was excited by the filled

pushcarts-each a little store in itself-the bargaining, emotional Jews and the peculiar smells of

the neighborhood; baked stuffed fish, sour rye bread fresh from the oven, and something that

smelled like honey boiling. She stared at the bearded men in their alpaca skull caps and

silkolene coats and wondered what made their eyes so small and fierce. She looked into tiny

hole-in-the-wall shops and smelled the dress fabrics arranged in disorder on the tables. She

noticed the feather beds bellying out of windows, clothes of Oriental-bright colors drying on the

fire-escapes and the half-naked children playing in the gutters. A woman, big with child, sat

patiently at the curb in a stiff wooden chair. She sat in the hot sunshine watching the life on the

street and guarding within herself, her own mystery of life.

Francie remembered her surprise that time when mama told her that Jesus was a Jew. Francie

had thought that He was a Catholic. But mama knew. Mama said that the Jews had never

looked on Jesus as anything but a troublesome Yiddish boy who would not work at the

carpentry trade, marry, settle down and raise a family. And the Jews believed that their Messiah

was yet to come, mama said. Thinking of this, Francie stared at the Pregnant Jewess.

"I guess that's why the Jews have so many babies," Francie thought. "And why they sit so

quiet ... waiting. And why they aren't ashamed the way they are fat. Each one thinks that she

might be making the real little Jesus. That's why they walk so proud when they're that way. Now

the Irish women always look so ashamed. They know that they can never make a Jesus. It will

be just another Mick. When I grow up and know that I am going to have a baby, I will remember

to walk proud and slow even though I am not a Jew."

It was twelve when Francie got home. Mama came in soon after with her broom and pail which

she banged into a corner with that final bang which meant that they wouldn't be touched again

until Monday.

Mama was twenty-nine. She had black hair and brown eyes and was quick with her hands. She

had a nice shape, too. She worked as a janitress and kept three tenement houses clean. Who

would ever believe that mama scrubbed floors to make a living for the four of them? She was so

pretty and slight and vivid and always bubbling over with intensity and fun. Even though her

hands were red and cracked from the sodaed water, they were beautifully shaped with lovely,

curved, oval nails. Everyone said it was a pity that a slight pretty woman like Katie Nolan had to

go out scrubbing floors. But what else could she do considering the husband she had, they said

They admitted that, no matter which way you looked at it, Johnny Nolan was a handsome

lovable fellow far superior to any man on the block. But he was a drunk. That's what they said

and it was true.

Francie made mama watch while she put the eight cents in the tin-can bank. They had a

pleasant five minutes conjecturing about how much was in the bank. Francie thought there

must be nearly a hundred dollars. Mama said eight dollars would be nearer right.

Mama gave Francie instructions about going out to buy something for lunch. "Take eight cents

from the cracked cup and get a quarter loaf of Jew rye bread and see that it's fresh. Then take a

nickel, go to Sauerwein's and ask for the end-of-the-tongue for a nickel."

"But you have to have a pull, with him to get it."

"Tell him that your mother said" insisted Katie firmly. She thought something over. "I wonder

whether we ought to buy five cents worth of sugar buns or put that money in the bank."

"Oh, Mama, it's Saturday. All week you said we could have dessert on Saturday."

"All right. Get the buns."

The little Jewish delicatessen was full of Christians buying Jew rye bread. She watched the man

push her quarter loaf into a paper bag. With its wonderful crisp yet tender crust and floury

bottom, it was easily the most wonderful bread in the world, she thought, when it was fresh. She

entered Sauerwein's store reluctantly. Sometimes he was agreeable about the tongue and

sometimes he wasn't. Sliced tongue at seventy-five cents a pound was only for rich people. But

when it was nearly all sold, you could get the square end for a nickel if you had a pull with Mr.

Sauerwein. Of course there wasn't much tongue to the end. It was mostly soft, small bones and

gristle with only the memory of meat.

It happened to be one of Sauerwein's agreeable days. "The tongue came to an end, yesterday,"

he told Francie. "But I saved it for you because I know your mama likes tongue and I like your

mama. You tell her that. Hear?"

"Yes sir," whispered Francie. She looked down on the floor as she felt her face getting warm.

She hated Mr. Sauerwein and would /70/tell mama what he had said.

At the baker's, she picked out four buns, carefully choosing those with the most sugar. She met

Neeley outside the store. He peeped into the bag and cut a caper of delight when he saw the

buns. Although he had eaten four cents worth of candy that morning, he was very hungry and

made Francie run all the way home.

Papa did not come home for dinner. He was a free lance singing waiter which meant that he

didn't work very often. Usually he spent Saturday morning at Union Headquarters waiting for a

job to come in for him.

Francie, Neeley, and mama had a very fine meal. Each had a thick slice of the "tongue," two

pieces of sweet-smelling rye bread spread with unsalted butter, a sugar bun apiece and a mug

of strong hot coffee with a teaspoon of sweetened condensed milk on the side.

There was a special Nolan idea about the coffee. It was their one great luxury. Mama made a

big potful each morning and reheated it for dinner and supper and it got stronger as the day

wore on. It was an awful lot of water and very little coffee but mama put a lump of chicory in it

which made it taste strong and bitter. Each one was allowed three cups a day with milk. Other

times you could help yourself to a cup of black coffee anytime you felt like it. Sometimes when

you had nothing at all and it was raining and you were alone in the flat, it was wonderful to know

that you could have something even though it was only a cup of black and bitter coffee.

Neeley and Francie loved coffee but seldom drank it. Today, as usual, Neeley let his coffee

stand black and ate his condensed milk spread on bread. He sipped a little of the black coffee

for the sake of formality. Mama poured out Francie's coffee and put the milk in it even though

she knew that the child wouldn't drink it.

Francie loved the smell of coffee and the way it was hot. As she ate her bread and meat, she

kept one hand curved about the cup enjoying its warmth. From time to time, she'd smell the

bitter sweetness of it. That was better than drinking it. At the end of the meal, it went down the

sink.

Mama had two sisters, Sissy and Evy, who came to the flat often. Every time they saw the

coffee thrown away, they gave mama a lecture about wasting things.

Mama explained: "Francie is entitled to one cup each meal like the rest. If it makes her feel

better to throw it way rather than to drink it, all right, /think it's good that people like us can

waste something once in a while and get the feeling of how it would be to have lots of money

and not have to worry about scrounging."

This queer point of view satisfied mama and pleased Francie. It was one of the links between

the ground-down poor and the wasteful rich. The girl felt that even if she had less than anybody

in Williamsburg, somehow she had more. She was richer because she had something to waste.

She ate her sugar bun slowly, reluctant to have done with its sweet taste, while the coffee got

ice-cold. Regally, she poured it down the sink drain feeling casually extravagant. After that, she

was ready to go to Losher's for the family's semi-weekly supply of stale bread. Mama told her

that she. could take a nickel and buy a stale pie if she could get one that wasn't mashed too

much.

Losher's bread factory supplied the neighborhood stores. The bread was not wrapped in wax

paper and grew stale quickly. Losher's redeemed the stale bread from the dealers and sold it at

half price to the poor. The outlet store adjoined the bakery. Its long narrow counter filled one

side and long narrow benches ran along the other two sides. A huge double door opened

behind the counter. The bakery wagons backed up to it and unloaded the bread right on to the

counter. They sold two loaves for a nickel, and when it was dumped out, a pushing crowd

fought for the privilege of buying it. There was never enough bread and some waited until three

or four wagons had reported before they could buy bread. At that price, the customers had to

supply their own wrappings. Most of the purchasers were children. Some kids tucked the bread

under their arms and walked home brazenly letting all the world know that they were poor. The

proud ones wrapped up the bread, some in old newspapers, others in clean or dirty flour sacks.

Francie brought along a large paper bag.

She didn't try to get her bread right away. She sat on a bench and watched. A dozen kids

pushed and shouted at the counter. Four old men dozed on the opposite bench. The old men,

pensioners on their families, were made to run errands and mind babies, the only work left for

old worn-out men in Williamsburg. They waited as long as they could before buying because

Losher's smelled kindly of baking bread, and the sun coming in the windows felt good on their

old backs. They sat and dozed while the hours passed and felt that they were filling up time.

The waiting gave them a purpose in life for a little while and, almost, they felt necessary again.

Francie stared at the oldest man. She played her favorite game, figuring out about people. His

thin tangled hair was the same dirty gray as the stubble standing on his sunken cheeks. Dried

spittle caked the corners of his mouth. He yawned. He had no teeth. She watched, fascinated

and revolted, as he closed his mouth, drew his lips inward until there was no mouth, and made

his chin come up to almost meet his nose. She studied his old coat with the padding hanging

out of the torn sleeve seam. His legs were sprawled wide in helpless relaxation and one of the

buttons was missing from his grease-caked pants opening. She saw that his shoes were

battered and broken open at the toes. One shoe was laced with a much-knotted shoe string,

and the other with a bit of dirty twine. She saw two thick dirty toes with creased gray toenails.

Her thoughts ran. ...

"He is old. He must be past seventy. He was born about the time Abraham Lincoln was living

and getting himself ready to be president. Williamsburg must have been a little country place

then and maybe Indians were still living in Flatbush. That was so long ago." She kept staring at

his feet. "He was a baby once. He must have been sweet and clean and his mother kissed his

little pink toes. Maybe when it thundered at night she came to his crib and fixed his blanket

better and whispered that he mustn't be afraid, that mother was there. Then she picked him up

and put her cheek on his head and said that he was her own sweet baby. He might have been a

boy like my brother, running in and out of the house and slamming the door. And while his

mother scolded him she was thinking that maybe he'll be president some day. Then he was a

young man, strong and happy. When he walked down the street, the girls smiled and turned to

watch him. He smiled back and maybe he winked at the prettiest one. I guess he must have

married and had children and they thought he was the most wonderful papa in the world the

way he worked hard and bought them toys for Christmas. Now his children are getting old too,

like him, and they have children and nobody wants the old man any more and they are waiting

for him to die. But he don't want to die. He wants to keep on living even though he's so old and

there's nothing to be happy about anymore."

The place was quiet. The summer sun streamed in and made dusty, down-slanting roads from

the window to the floor. A big green fly buzzed in and out of the sunny dust. Excepting for

herself and the dozing old men, the place was empty. The children who waited for bread had

gone to play outside. Their high screaming voices seemed to come from far away.

Suddenly Francie jumped up. Her heart was beating fast. She was frightened. For no reason at

all, she thought of an accordion pulled out full for a rich note. Then she had an idea that the

accordion was closing ... closing ... closing. ... A terrible panic that had no name came over her

as she realized that many of the sweet babies in the world were born to come to something like

this old man some day. She had to get out of that place or it would happen to her. Suddenly she

would be an old woman with toothless gums and feet that disgusted people.

At that moment, the double doors behind the counter were banged open as a bread truck

backed up. A man came to stand behind the counter. The truck driver started throwing bread to

him which he piled up on the counter. The kids in the street who had heard the doors thrown

open piled in and milled around Francie who had already reached the counter.

"I want bread!" Francie called out. A big girl gave her a strong shove and wanted to know who

she thought she was. "Never mind! Never mind!" Francie told her. "I want six loaves and a pie

not too crushed," she screamed out.

Impressed by her intensity, the counter man shoved six loaves and the least battered of the

rejected pies at her and took her two dimes. She pushed her way out of the crowd dropping a

loaf which she had trouble picking up as there was no room to stoop over in.

Outside, she sat at the curb fitting the bread and the pie into the paper bag. A woman passed,

wheeling a baby in a buggy. The baby was waving his feet in the air. Francie looked and saw,

not the baby's foot, but a grotesque thing in a big, worn-out shoe. The panic came on her again

and she ran all the way home.

The flat was empty. Mama had dressed and gone off with Aunt Sissy to see a matinee from a

ten-cent gallery seat. Francie put the bread and pie away and folded the bag neatly to be used

the next time. She went into the tiny, windowless bedroom that she shared with Neeley and sat

on her own cot in the dark waiting for the waves of panic to stop passing over her.

After awhile Neeley came in, crawled under his cot and pulled out a ragged catcher's mitt.

"Where you going?" she asked.

"Play ball in the lots."

"Can I come along?"

"No."

She followed him down to the street. Three of his gang were waiting for him. One had a bat,

another a baseball and the third had nothing but wore a pair of baseball pants. They started out

for an empty lot over towards Greenpoint. Neeley saw Francie following but said nothing. One

of the boys nudged him and said,

"Hey! Your sister's followin' us."

"Yeah," agreed Neeley. The boy turned around and yelled at Francie:

"Go chase yourself!"

"It's a free country," Francie stated.

"It's a free country," Neeley repeated to the boy. They took no notice of Francie after that. She

continued to follow them. She had nothing to do until two o'clock when the neighborhood library

opened up again.

It was a slow, horseplaying walk. The boys stopped to look for tin foil in the gutter and to pick up

cigarette butts which they would save and smoke in the cellar on the next rainy afternoon. They

took time out to bedevil a little Jew boy on his way to the temple. They detained him while they

debated what to do with him. The boy waited, smiling humbly. The Christians released him

finally with detailed instructions as to his course of conduct for the coming week.

"Don't show your puss on Devoe Street," he was ordered.

"I won't," he promised. The boys were disappointed. They had expected more fight. One of

them took out a bit of chalk from his pocket and drew a wavy line on the sidewalk. He

commanded,

"Don't you even step over that line."

The little boy, knowing that he had offended them by giving in too easily, decided to play their

way.

"Can't I even put one foot in the gutter, fellers?"

"You can't even spit in the gutter," he was told.

"All right." He sighed in pretended resignation.

One of the bigger boys had an inspiration. "And keep away from Christian girls. Get me?" They

walked away leaving him staring after them.

"Gol-/e , e i /"he whispered rolling his big brown Jewish eyes. The idea that those Goyem thought

him man enough to be capable of thinking about <9/?ygirl, Gentile or Jew, staggered him and he

went his way saying golVee over and over.

The boys walked on slowly, looking slyly at the big boy who had made the remark about the

girls, and wondering whether he would lead off into a dirty talk session. But before this could

start, Francie heard her brother say,

"I know that kid. He's a white Jew." Neeley had heard papa speak so of a Jewish bartender that

he liked.

"They ain't no such thing as a white Jew," said the big boy.

"Well, if there was such a thing as a white Jew," said Neeley with that combination of agreeing

with others, and still sticking to his own opinions, which made him so amiable, "he would be it."

"There never could be a white Jew," said the big boy, "even in supposing."

"Our Lord was a Jew." Neeley was quoting mama.

"And other Jews turned right around and killed him," clinched the big boy.

Before they could go deeper in theology, they saw another little boy turn on to Ainslie Street

from Humboldt Street carrying a basket on his arm. The basket was covered with a clean

ragged cloth. A stick stuck up from one corner of the basket, and, on it, like a sluggish flag stood

six pretzels. The big boy of Neeley's gang gave a command and they made a tightly-packed run

on the pretzel seller. He stood his ground, opened his mouth and bawled, "Mama!"

A second story window flew open and a woman clutching a crepe-paperish kimono around her

sprawling breasts, yelled out,

"Leave him alone and get off this block, you lousy bastards."

Francie's hands flew to cover her ears so that at confession she would not have to tell the priest

that she had stood and listened to a bad word.

"We ain't doing nothing, Lady," said Neeley with that ingratiating smile which always won over

his mother.

"You bet your life, you ain't. Not while I'm around." Then without changing her tone she called to

her son, "And get upstairs here, you. I'll learn you to bother me when I'm taking a nap." The

pretzel boy went upstairs and the gang ambled on.

"That lady's tough." The big boy jerked his head back at the window.

"Yeah," the others agreed.

"My old man's tough," offered a smaller boy.

"Who the hell cares?" inquired the big boy languidly.

"I was just saying," apologized the smaller boy.

"My old man ain't tough," said Neeley. The boys laughed.

They ambled along, stopping now and then to breathe, deeply of the smell of Newtown Creek

which flowed its narrow tormented way a few blocks up Grand Street.

"God, she stinks," commented the big boy.

"Yeah!" Neeley sounded deeply satisfied.

"I bet that's the worst stink in the world," bragged another boy.

"Yeah."

And Francie whispered yeah in agreement. She was proud of that smell. It let her knew that

nearby was a waterway, which, dirty though it was, joined a river that flowed out to the sea. To

her, the stupendous stench suggested far-sailing ships and adventure and she was pleased

with the smell.

Just as the boys reached the lot in which there was a ragged diamond tramped out, a little

yellow butterfly flew across the weeds. With man's instinct to capture anything running, flying,

swimming or crawling, they gave chase, throwing their ragged caps at it in advance of their

coming. Neeley caught it. The boys looked at it briefly, quickly lost interest in it and started up a

four-man baseball game of their own devising.

They played furiously, cursing, sweating and punching each other. Every time a stumble bum

passed and loitered for a moment, they clowned and showed off. There was a rumor that the

Brooklyn's had a hundred scouts roaming the streets of a Saturday afternoon watching lot

games and spotting promising players. And there wasn't a Brooklyn boy who wouldn't rather

play on the Brooklyn's team than be president of the United States.

After awhile, Francie got tired of watching them. She knew that they would play and fight and

show off until it was time to drift home for supper. It was two o'clock. The librarian should be

back from lunch by now. With pleasant anticipation, Francie walked back towards the library.

II

THE library was a little old shabby place. Francie thought it was beautiful. The feeling she had

about it was as good as the feeling she had about church. She pushed open the door and went

in. She liked the combined smell of worn leather bindings, library paste and freshly-inked

stamping pads better than she liked the smell of burning incense at high mass.