A Stone for Danny Fisher (1952) Read online

  Quickly I whirled. He was on his feet after me. Something shining in his upheld hand slashed down at me as I jumped aside. I could feel it ripping down my sleeve. Switch knife. He carried past me with the momentum of his swing and I rabbit-punched the back of his head.

  The crowd parted in front of him as he staggered against the side of the building. I followed him quickly. I couldn’t give him a chance to turn around.

  I gripped his knife hand and pulled it back toward me. He screamed. I pulled again and the knife fell clattering to the sidewalk. I kicked it away and turned him around. His face was contorted with pain and fear.

  A wild violence was running through me, a savage joy. For the first time in my life I liked fighting. My first punch flattened his nose. He screamed again.

  I laughed wildly and hit him in the mouth. When he gasped for breath I could see a hole where some teeth had been. I was happy. I had never been so happy before. Blood was running down the side of his face. A red haze settled over my eyes and I was laughing and hitting him and yelling for joy.

  Then I felt hands tearing at me, pulling me away from him. I fought them. There was sudden sharp pain at the back of my head and I felt curiously weak. I let him go and he fell forward to the ground at my feet. Arms pinioned my hands to my side. I looked up to see who was holding me. As the red haze began to lift, I saw the dark-blue uniforms of the cops.

  They took me to the station-house just off Williamsburg Bridge and threw me into a cell. A man came in to see me, a doctor, who put some adhesive tape on my arm where I had been cut. Then he left me.

  I sat there almost four hours before anyone came near my cell again. I was tired, but I couldn’t sleep. My eyes were heavy, but they wouldn’t close. All I could do was think. All I could see in front of my eyes was a little reddish-brown puppy trying to scramble up the side of a pit after me.

  The cell door clanked. A cop stood there. “Your father’s come to get you, son,” he said gently.

  I stood and picked up my coat from the bunk behind me. It was almost as if I had done this many times before, but I was past all feeling. Slowly I followed him down the grey-painted corridor and up the stairs. He opened a door and motioned me through it. My father and a man were sitting there in the room.

  Papa jumped to his feet. “I’ve come to take you home, Danny,” he said.

  I stared at him dully for a moment. Home? To that place? It would never be home to me.

  The man beside my father stood up and looked at me. “Lucky for you, kid, we found out what happened. That boy you beat up will be in the hospital for weeks. But he’s no good and maybe you did us a favour. Go along now and don’t give us any more trouble.”

  I didn’t answer him, but started out the door. My father’s voice behind me was thanking the man for what he had done. I walked through the station-house and out into the street, where my father caught up to me and fell into step beside me. At Delancey Street we waited for the traffic light.

  “Your mother and I were frightened, Danny. We didn’t know what happened to you.” His voice was husky, but he was trying to speak easily. His usually ruddy face was pale in the glow of the street lamp. It seemed to me that I had heard those words before. Another time, another place. I didn’t answer.

  The light changed and we crossed the street. On the other side he tried to speak again. “Why did you do it, Danny?” There was anguish on his face. Something had happened that he did not understand. “It’s not like you to do something like that.”

  Maybe it wasn’t before, but it was different now. I was in a different world and maybe I was a different Danny Fisher. I didn’t know. Again I didn’t answer.

  He tried to speak once more and then fell silent. We walked two blocks and turned up our street. At the corner we hesitated for a moment and caught each other’s eye and then looked quickly away.

  Up the block the street was empty now and dirty and filled with garbage left by the day. Our footsteps clattered on the sidewalk.

  It had begun to snow. I pulled the collar of my jacket up around my neck. From the corner of my eye I could see my father walking beside me. It was then I first caught a glimpse of what would be: my father and I were strangers as we walked silently through the night.

  BOOK TWO

  All the Days of My Life

  Chapter One

  PAPA looked at his watch as we came out of the dark hallway on to the street. He thrust it quickly back in his pocket and glanced at me awkwardly. “Quarter to three,” he muttered. “I gotta hurry or I’ll be late.”

  I looked at him without interest. Five months of living down here and it seemed as if years had separated us. Since the very first day we moved, nothing had gone right. Now Papa had a job, in a drugstore on Delancey Street. Twenty-three a week.

  “Walking my way?” Papa asked.

  I nodded silently. Might as well. I was going to meet the gang on the corner near the five-and-dime. My step quickened to match his as he hurried off.

  The memory of those five months were fresh in our minds. The days I came home from school and found him sitting in the kitchen of the dingy apartment, staring at the walls, an expression of hopelessness and despair painted on his face. I had tried to feel sorry for him but I couldn’t. He had brought it on himself. If only he had been a little smarter.

  Still there was something about his expression the night he had come home a few days ago and told us about the job he had just been offered. Twenty-three bucks a week for a registered pharmacist with twenty-five years’ experience. It wasn’t right. It was barely eating-dough.

  We turned the corner at Delancey and were in front of the store where Papa worked. He stopped and looked at me hesitantly. I could see he wanted to ask me what I was going to do the rest of the afternoon, but he was too proud. I didn’t offer to tell him.

  “Tell Mamma I’ll be home by two-thirty,” he said at last.

  I nodded.

  He opened his mouth as if to say more, then closed it as if he had changed his mind. Instead he shook his head slightly and, squaring his shoulders, walked into the store. The clock in the window showed exactly three as he walked in.

  I had some time to kill, so I leaned against the store window and watched the people walking by. A voice from inside the store came to my ears and I turned and looked in.

  A man was coming out from behind the drug counter, taking off his jacket. “There you are, Fisher,” he was saying in that quiet kind of voice that carries twenty yards in front and not one inch behind. “Am I glad to get out of here! The boss has got his tail up; he’s been giving me hell all day.”

  Papa took the jacket from him silently and looked up at the wall clock to check his time. An expression of relief crossed his face.

  A small, pompous man with an irascible face came out of the back room. He peered up through the store, his thick glasses shining in the light. “That you, Fisher?” he queried in a thin, irritating voice. He didn’t wait for an answer. “Snap it up,” he continued, “I got a couple Rx’s waiting for you.”

  There was a sound of fear and meekness in Papa’s voice. I had never heard it before. “Yes, Mr. Gold,” Papa answered. He hurried toward the back of the store. His hat and jacket were already in his hand as he turned toward the little man with an apologetic look. “I didn’t mean to keep you waiting, Mr. Gold.”

  The little man looked at him contemptuously. “You could get here early, you know. It wouldn’t hurt.”

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Gold,” Papa said abjectly.

  “Well, don’t stand there like a fool, Fisher,” Mr. Gold said, thrusting two slips of paper into Papa’s hand. “Put on your jacket and get to work!” He turned his back and walked away.

  Papa stared after him for a moment, with no expression on his face at all. Then he looked at the prescriptions in his hand and walked slowly to the prescription counter. He put his hat and jacket on a chair and slipped into the store jacket quickly.

  He placed the prescriptions on the cou
nter, smoothed them with his hand, and studied them again for a moment. Then he took a bottle and a measure from the shelf. I could almost hear the thin, rattling sound the bottle made against the glass measure as he poured some liquid into it with trembling hands.

  Suddenly he looked up and saw me staring at him. Embarrassment came into his eyes and a quick shame crossed his face. I let my eyes go vague and blank as if I hadn’t seen him and turned away casually.

  The gang was already waiting when I got there. Quietly we moved away from the corner. We didn’t want to drag any eyes. I didn’t waste any time with them.

  “You know what to do,” I said in a low careful voice. “We drift in easylike. Two at a time. Quiet. When we’re all in there, I’ll give the signal an’ Spit and Solly will start the fight in the back of the store. When everybody’s lookin’ that way, the rest of you get busy. An’ remember these things. Don’t grab no junk; only stuff we can sell. Don’t hang around to see how the other guy made out. As soon as you made your snatch, blow. Don’t wait for nothin’. Get out fast! You all know where we’re meetin’ afterwards. Kill an hour before you show up.”

  I looked around at them. Their faces were serious. “Understan’?” There weren’t any replies. I grinned. “Okay, then. I’m goin’ in now. Keep an eye on me an’ don’t do nothin’ till I give the signal.”

  The gang scattered and I walked away quickly. I turned the corner and went into the five-and-dime. It was crowded with people. Good, it would make things easier.

  I pushed my way through the aisle along the soda fountain to the end of the counter. There I climbed up on a seat and waited for the girl to come up and serve me. In the mirror behind the counter I could see Spit and Solly walking past me.

  The counter girl stood in front of me. “What’ll you have?”

  “What you got, baby?” I countered. I was stalling for time. Things weren’t ready yet.

  She looked at me tiredly, pushing some stray hairs back from her forehead. “It’s all on the signs,” she replied in a flat, bored voice. “You can read.”

  I pretended to read the signs pasted on the mirror behind her. Two of the other boys were coming in. “A double-dip chocolate ice-cream soda,” I said. “The dime special.”

  The girl walked down the counter and tossed the soda together with a careless, expert skill. So much syrup, so much carbonated water, then the ice-cream—two scoops, with the top of the scoop toward the customer so that he couldn’t see it was really half empty—then some more carbonated water. I looked around the store.

  The boys were all set up and ready to go. I waited for the soda, wishing she would snap it up. All at once I wanted to get this over with. It had been a bright idea when we were talking about it, but now I was jumpy. She came back down the aisle and put the soda on the counter in front of me.

  I pushed a dime toward her and she rang it on the register. The boys were watching me from the corners of their eyes. I put the straws into the soda, stirred it, and began to suck on the straws. The taste of the soda was sweet in my mouth when the noise of the fight broke out behind me.

  I was grinning to myself as I turned toward the sound. Solly was just falling into a display filled with canned goods. The crash roared through the store and people began running toward it. The boys were working smoothly. The counter girl spoke and I jumped, startled. She was looking past me curiously.

  “What’s goin’ on there?”

  “I dunno. A fight, I guess.”

  “Looks like a set-up to me,” she said.

  I felt my pulse quicken nervously. “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “Those boys ain’t hurtin’ each other,” she said flatly. “I bet they got friends cleanin’ out the joint. It’s an old gimmick.” Her eyes were roving through the store. “Look over there, see?”

  She had spotted one of the boys stuffing his pockets at the cosmetic counter. Just then the boy turned and looked at me. He began to smile, but I shook my head quickly and he started out the door.

  I turned back to the counter. The girl was staring at me, her eyes wide. “You’re in on it,” she whispered.

  I reached across the counter quickly and grabbed her arm, smiling coldly. “What’re you gonna do about it?” I asked quietly.

  She stared at me for a moment, then smiled back. “Nothin’,” she answered. “It’s none of my business. Barbara Hutton can afford it.”

  I let go of her hand and looked back at the store. All the boys had gone and Solly was just being pushed out of the door by a couple of men. Relief came over my face. Still smiling, I turned back to the soda and took a spoonful of ice-cream. I could taste the chocolate melting there.

  “You make a mean soda,” I said.

  She smiled again. She had thick black hair, and her eyes were a soft dark brown. Her lipstick was a startling red against her pale thin face. “You’re pretty smooth, all right,” she whispered.

  I felt a glow spread through me. I could see I had scored with this kid. “What’s your name, baby?” I asked.

  “Nellie,” she answered.

  “Mine’s Danny,” I told her. “Live in the neighbourhood?”

  “Over on Eldridge Street.”

  “What time you get through?”

  “Nine o’clock, when the store closes,” she replied.

  I stood up proudly. I was very sure of myself. “I’ll pick you up on the corner,” I said. “Maybe we’ll get some chinks.” I didn’t wait for her answer, but sauntered down to where the men were busy putting up the display that Solly had fallen into. I watched them for a few minutes, then walked back to the counter.

  The girl was still watching me. I grinned at her. “See you at nine, Nellie.”

  She flashed me a quick smile. “I’ll be on the corner, Danny.”

  I half waved my hand to her and walked toward the entrance. I could feel her eyes following me. As I passed the drug counter, I picked up a comb and idly ran it through my hair. Then I went out the door, dropping the comb into my shirt pocket.

  Chapter Two

  THE pedlar looked up at me wisely. “Where’d you get this stuff?” he asked.

  “Yuh wanna buy it,” I countered sarcastically, “or yuh want its pedigree?”

  He looked down at the small carton. His hand picked up a jar of Mum and he tossed it nervously from one hand to the other as he spoke. “I don’t want the cops should bother me,” he said.

  I reached for the carton meaningfully. “Then somebody else will buy it.”

  He grabbed at my hand quickly. “Wait a minute. I didn’t say I didn’t want the stuff.”

  I let go of the carton. “Then don’t ask so many questions. Fifteen dollars and it’s all yours.”

  He parted his lips over yellowed teeth. “Ten.”

  “Fourteen,” I said quickly. The ritual had begun. You bargained for everything on the East Side. It was expected.

  “Eleven.”

  I shook my head.

  “Twelve.” He was studying my face.

  “Nope,” I replied.

  He drew a sharp breath. “Twelve-fifty,” he almost whispered. “That’s the top.”

  I looked at his face for a moment, then I put out my hand. “Pay me,” I said.

  He reached into his pocket, took out a dirty old change purse, and snapped it open, revealing a small roll of bills. Carefully he counted the money into my hand.

  I counted it again, shoved the money into my pocket, and turned to walk away, but the pedlar called me back.

  “When you got some more stuff,” he said greedily, “bring it to me. I’ll treat you right.”

  I was looking at him, but I couldn’t see him. Twelve-fifty cut seven ways was less than two bucks apiece. It wasn’t worth the effort. “Sure,” I answered, turning away. “I’ll remember.” But he wouldn’t see me again. There was no percentage in it.

  I looked at my watch as I crossed Rivington Street. It was almost six o’clock. I didn’t have to pick up the gang at the candy store before s
even. I decided to stop by the house and pick up Papa’s supper. Every day Mamma sent his supper down to the store. It would save her a trip.

  The halls smelled. Disgustedly I noticed the paper bags of garbage stuck in front of the doors. The lousy super had been drunk again and forgotten to collect the garbage that morning. Much as I had seen of it, I couldn’t get used to it.

  I stumbled on a loose stair and cursed under my breath. I hated it here. I wished we had enough dough to get out. Some day I would get enough dough together and we would buy our house back and leave this stinking neighbourhood.

  I opened our door and walked in. Mamma was bending over the stove. She looked up at me wearily.

  “Papa said he would be home by two-thirty,” I told her.

  She nodded her head.

  “I thought I’d take him his supper,” I volunteered.

  She looked at me in some surprise. It was the first time since he’d had the job that I’d offered. “You want your supper first?” she asked.

  I shook my head. “I’m not hungry,” I lied. “A guy treated me to a couple of hot dogs at Katz’s.”

  “Some soup you’ll have, maybe?” she persisted.

  “No, Mamma,” I answered, “I’m full.” I could see from the pot there was barely enough to go around as it was.

  She was too tired to argue and took down a white enamel dinner-pail from the closet and began to fill it. When she had finished she carefully wrapped it in a paper bag and gave it to me. I started out the door.

  “Come home early tonight, Danny,” she called after me as the door closed.

  “Sure, Ma,” I called back as I started down the stairs.

  I stopped in front of the store and looked in. There were a few customers inside and a clerk was waiting on them. Papa must be in the back room. I walked into the store and waited at the counter.

  The high-pitched sound of a man’s shouting came from the back room. Involuntarily I listened, remembering it from earlier in the day.