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Show DUFFY/Dussol Every so often Mrs. Duffy's concern for John would get on his nerves and he'd arrange to have her spend some time away from home for a few days. She was always reluctant to go. In a day or so he'd feel guilty, and to ease his conscience he'd think of something nice to do for her while she was away. One time he sent me down to the linoleum store on his corner to select a new pattern for her kitchen floor. "When you see Mrs. Duffy tell her John himself was in to pick it out," I told the man. On another occasion while she was away, upon my arrival at the studio one morning there was a message on my desk: "Duffy called. Says for you to go down to his place and feed Betsy. He'll phone you there at 9:30." So I hopped in a cab and went down. Betsy was a fat, brown hen John had won at a shindig and brought home to his mother as a "present." She kept it in a little orange crate shed out in the back yard, and had made John swear he wouldn't forget to feed it while she was away. Promptly at 9:30 the phone at Duffy's house rang. A familiar, thick, somewhat furry voice said, "Hello, Niece, you sweet little thing, you. This is your Uncle John. Did you feed Betsy?" I wanted to say, "Why aren't you home to feed her yourself? She's your chicken." But, after, all, he was my boss, sober or not. "Yes, Mr. Duffy, I fed her." "Heh, heh! I don't believe you. How do I know you fed her? You're at the studio, aren't you?" "Didn't you call here at your house, Mr. Duffy? I'm right here in your kitchen; honestly." "Heh, heh, heh! I don't believe you. Put Betsy on I want to talk to Betsy. There was no reasoning with him. "Well, hold on a minute," I said. "I'll get Betsy to the phone." Immediately I realized my predicament. How do you get a chicken to talk over the telephone? I opened the kitchen door to the yard but was afraid to pick up the thing. Every time I made an attempt to grab her she'd give me her beady eye, jump up and flap her dusty wings at me and make me sneeze. Her claws looked ferocious. "Boss or no boss, this is just too much. You're not going to peck my eyes out!" I marched back into the kitchen and pounced on the phone, but then stopped short. A bright idea came to me. "Sorry to keep you waiting, Mr. Duffy. Betsy will be right here!" I put the phone on the floor, with the big old-fashioned mouthpiece facing the ceiling. Then I took a fistfull of yellow corn and enticed Betsy across the kitchen, kernel by kernel, to the phone. She slipped and slid over the waxed linoleum, like a child on roller skates for the first time when he has nothing to hold on to, but finally she reached the phone. "Here's Betsy now, Mr. Duffy," I called into the mouthpiece, and dropped some kernels into it. While Betsy and Duffy clucked and cooed, I pranced around shutting the doors to the other rooms, then grabbed another handful of corn so I'd be able to get the fussy fowl out into the shed again. I had to find Mrs. Duffy's floor mop, too. See what I mean about John Duffy? Alcholics Anonymous would have been been his ruination. I wonder what old John's doing now. He was more than a personality. He was an era. 22 NIGHT/Camille Ramnarace Night comes swiftly, stealthily Like a stalking cat; Enveloping my world in black velvet. Warmly, thickly, Absorbing the day Like liquid tar on a gray pavement. Softly, carressingly, Like the eyes of a Polynesian youth Seducing me with its gentleness And I must keep looking. Cigarette burns in my velvet shawl: The headlights of a passing car. Shadows on a wall, Shapeless bulk of an empty chair. Low moaning from the room next door, The chirping of crickets, the hooting of owls The honking of automobiles, a juke box blaring; Sinatra's voice from an immobile stereo. Girlish gilles in the back seat; Flashing red light of a police car, Siren screeching... A fighting couple under the street lamps. Night, unaware, indifferent; seeing everything and nothing Moves on, untouched from day to day. A rooster crows, my lover flips on a light My shawl is threadbare and worn. 23 |