On this post I will provide updates whenever I add to LOH.

UPDATE 03 Jan – First Draft now through chapter two posted. Chapter 2 will shortly be revised into standard 3rd person.

Clanging his bell, the conductor shouted Lovejoy.  Willie Welsh pardoned through the press of ashen faced business men who lined the isle with dangling briefcases and underarm-tucked newspapers. From one paper he glimpsed a partial banner of the Daily Oregonian:

18 May 1915

Lusitania Torp–

Foot to brick and finally free, he checked his pocket watch, offering the silver case a quick breath and rub of the sleeve before the open flip. Twenty-till-five P.M. Time enough. The wire above spat current as the trolly clanged again and then clicked away. He tried to conjure the missing appendage: Lusitania Torp. It made him think of strong coffee or detergent, though he couldn’t account for why.  Torp, torp, torp.  Something to do with the war most likely. Lusitania Torp.

Giving up the game for now, he gauged the bookshop route, pausing to consider the whirl of downtown Portland busybodyness that he’d need to navigate: women admiring large feathered sun hats through windows, workmen stacking unwieldy wooden boxes with up-pointing arrows, Model T’s honking like sickly impatient geese behind slow clip-clopping horse drawn trucks.

A pleasant day at least. Rare enough for May in Portland. Even a year here hadn’t accustomed him to a rain that that never seemed to know its proper time and place. He missed the seasons back home with their rough divisions. They knew their time and have you know it too. Like when Old Sally froze to death in the winter of twelve. A sorry sight to see that dried up sow standing there like a statue with icicle lashes hanging from her eyes. Dead as dead could be. Or the summer following when he suffered heat stroke and ma nursed him with cool rags on the forehead and the gentle humming of Wesleyan hymns.

To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven. Ecclesiastes Three-One.

But not in the Willamette Valley, with its hicchuping seasons. With a deep breath and a tug of  his pledge pin he determined himself forward. Lusitania Torp.

At last he reached the place, checking the name on his receipt against the swirling script on the shop window. Sam’s Books. His hand hovered on the knob. Torp Torp Torp. A jingle announced him and he deep inhaled the comforting smell of musty old bookness glad to be safe from the stifling streets.

The bookshop was empty save for a somewhat taller boy who leaned in the corner against a towering shelf and intently winked at an open book. Willie estimated his age at seventeen: the oval face of youth framed along the jaw and upper lip by sparse whiskers prefacing man. He seemed an unlikely one for such a place, with his torn trousers, a sullied shirt only haphazardly half-tucked, and a cap precariously cocked over a short, clay-brown mop that looked ready at any moment to leap out and scurry away like some wild thing. Willie watched the boy’s lips as they slowly played and replayed some word or phrase. Waiting until the lick of  finger and turn of page announced a good moment for interrupting, Willie cleared his throat.

“Sam ‘ill be back in a bit,” the boy said still eyeing the page. His accent was thick. Irish.

“I’ve a book. On order.”

“Like I said, Sam ‘ill be back in a bit.” The boy snapped closed his book and looked up. He cocked his head and, still winking, gave Willie a drawn out once over. “You’re welcome to wait for him if you like.”

Willie nodded, offering a weak thank you. He looked about the store, the boy’s scrutiny making him anxious. “What are you reading?” He wanted to break the silence and that disconcerting stare. “If I may ask, that is.”

“It ain’t my place to keep you from asking what you will,” the boy answered. “I wouldn’t keep a soul from asking a thing sure. Me answering is another matter. Though I think in this case it’s safe ’nuff to say I’d answer should you ask.”

It sounded like a riddle, and Willie wondered if he was being teased. He cleared his throat. “Well what is it you’re reading then?”

“William Butler Yeats, Selected Poems.”

Willie tried not to look surprised.

“Think I look the type to read Penny Dreadfuls, and not the finer stuff eh? And there’s none finer than this.” He held the book up as though it were some kind of prize trophy or rare artifact. “Or maybe you thought me not to read at all?”

“No.” Though the thought had crossed Willie’s mind.

“I’m right literate I’ll have you know. Best not to judge the book by it’s cover. That’s called a metaphor, where it’s me that’s the book. But I suspect you knew that, having the schooled look about you. A clean fancy new book with all it’s pages snug between hard leather you’d be, to metaphorize you. A book with color prints in it. And not an ear dogged, from the fresh look of your jack and knickers. Not me, I admit it.  But, like I said, never judge a book.”

Again Willie suspected mockery, but mustered courage enough to speak his thought: “And aren’t you judging me the same way?”

A large grin stretched the boy’s face. “Right so you are.” He strode over, and thrust out his hand. “Name’s Jaffey. Jaffey O’Malley.”

“Willie Welsh.”

“Pleasure Willie Welsh. Said you had a book waiting did you?”

Willie nodded.

“I guess I can take a look.” Behind the sales counter he worked through a stack of books reading off the names until finding Willie’s. “Says you already paid for it?”

Willie handed him the receipt.

“So you have.” He handed Willie the book. “Need your John Hancock saying you picked it up. Sam likes everything in good order.”

As Willie signed the ledger, the door opened, briefly filling the shop with the jarring loudness of the city streets.

“What in heaven’s name do you think you’re doing, Jaffey?” It was a lanky, narrow nosed man wearing a tan frock and shiny matching two-tone Madisons. In a moment he was behind the counter, shooing Jaffey out of his way.

“Calm yourself, Sam.”

“I only said watch the place–”

“This here’s a customer. I was only helping him find his book.” He handed Sam Willie’s receipt.

Sam’s snatched the receipt, eyes darting between the paper, Willie and Jaffey. Taking a bright red kerchief from his breast pocket he offed his hat and wiped his brow. “The theology book. Hefty reading for one so young.”  He still sounded suspicious.

“I’m fifteen,” Willie said.

“I don’t recall seeing you before.”

“My Aunt ordered it for me, but I took your call this morning.”

Jaffey gave Willie a playful wink. “Don’t you worry about old Sam here. He’s peculiar.” His smile lingered as if waiting for some response–as if they were indeed in cahoots somehow.

Willie tugged at his collar, feeling suddenly warm. “If there’s nothing else … I must go.”  Without waiting for an answer, he was out the door where he nearly collided with a younger boy who spat a warning that he’d be more careful in the future if he knew what was good for him. Willie gave a hurried pardon, and rushed on in the direction of his trolly stop. All around, the thickness of sounds and people assaulted him. He wanted to shut his ears against it. A sudden retreating cloud threw down light that seemed to rest on on him alone. He felt as thought the countless cruel and judging eyes of the crowd were massed against him. He feared the gait of his step might reveal a thing, so he walked even quicker. And the terrifying thought he’d had many times before: what if one or more among these has a rare gift to discern the thoughts of others?

Quick-rounding the corner, he stopped short with a startle. There on the ground lay a horse. On the street its body, with one foreleg broken and twisted into some perverse supplication. On the sidewalk its neck and head, looking like a content, day-dreaming thing unto itself, oblivious to the contorted dead brown mass to which it belonged.  It starred up at him with glossed, half-lidded eyes.

An ugly man with pockmarked face and something-stained overalls noosed the horses neck with a chain running from a crank-wheel on the bed of a motor truck. He acknowledged Willie with broad yellow grin. “No more deliveries for this son-a-bitch,” he said.

Willie couldn’t move.

The man mounted the ramp onto the truck-bed and pulled a lever . With a cough of smoke the crank-wheel came to life. The horse jerked and then began a steady truckward slide. “Ain’t natural, working horses in the city,” said the man. “Always thought so. Just ain’t natural.”

Willie ran.

Only when safely on trolly did Willie’s breathing finally calm. But his mind refused to rest. Opening his new book to the index he scanned the list of words.

Angels … Baptism … Devil …

Ecstasy … Faith … Gluttony …

Healing … Heart … Hell. He paused.

Jesus … Logos … Man …

Sin … Silence. His finger hovered between these last two, until touching the page: decision sealed. From his brown leather book bag he took a pencil and, steadying his hand against the rhythmic shake of the trolly, he wrote in delicate letters the words:

The black of his eyes like polished boots.

Closing the book he returned the pencil to the bag. It is fine now, he thought. You are fine. Fine to think on something else.

Lusitania Torp.

Torp. Torp. Torp.

#

“What a nervous boy,” Sam said after Willie had left.

“You makes them nervous that doesn’t know you,” Jaffey answered, going to the shelf and taking again the book he had been reading. He slapped it on the counter. “Five dollars. Not a penny more.”

Sam frowned, shaking his head. “You’re a regular thief, Jaffey.”

“You know better than most my money’s well earned, but you ain’t getting a penny more than five of it either way. Look here at these pages—they’re all eared-over and some’s ready to fall out.”

“Maybe because you’ve worn it through, always looking and never buying.”

“Well I’m offering now.”

“Perhaps you can save your money and have the book. I’ve a mind to close shop for an extended lunch.”

Jaffey gave him the evil eye. He slapped the bill on the counter.

“Very well then. But before you go …” He took a business card from the counter and scribbled something on the back and handed it to Jaffey.

“And whose address is this then?”

Before Sam could answer a bell jingled announcing a customer: A stretch-necked woman wearing a purple hat plumed with peacock feathers. She acknowledged Sam’s welcome with a terse smile and nod. Jaffey raised his cap, causing her terse smile to turn terser frown. As though any linger on the sight of him might filthify her eyes, she quickly turned her attention to a nearby shelf and began examining spines with delicate strokes of her finger.

“She won’t buy a thing,” Jaffey whispered. “Them’s all predicable and alike.”

“She ought at least consider buying a new hat,” Sam whispered back.

Jaffey stifled a laugh, trying to straighten face when the woman shot an irritable glance. Shortly, the bell jingled her exit.

“Like I said. All predictable and alike, them kind.”

Sam humphed. “If by them kind you refer to people of means, their stinginess is predictively more acute when you loiter about. You are a bane to business. And speaking of which, that address should serve your particular business quite well indeed.”

“Some well off one needing company, eh?”

“Better for you by far. A gaggle of the same. A private gathering of a select group of businessmen and professionals with equally select tastes.”

It was Jaffey’s turn to hmpf.

“Come now. You’ll have your pick of the lot, rough that you are. What gentleman could resist the temptation. And some speak of a classless society. Where would be the thrill in that? For either side.”

“I’ll consider it.”

“It is one month from today.”

“I said I’ll consider it.” He pocked the paper. “For now I’ve other business..”

“Very well.” Same gestured towards the window. “But for heavensake do take him with you. I don’t need urchins loitering about and scaring away even more business. I’ve a reputation.”

Jaffey glanced outside. There, hands in pockets and pebble-kicking, stood Jack. He looked up and gave Jaffey a meek smile.

“You’ve a reputation, sure” Jaffey said. “No arguing that.” Broad smile, he waited for the sink of  his meaning to contort Sam’s face, and then flew from the building chased by a flurry of curses.

#

Outside, Jack greeted Jaffey as he always did: with a “Top-o-da-morning-to-ya” in feigned Irish accent.

Pinching Jacks nose Jaffey gave the expected response: “And the rest of the day to yourself.” Jaffey couldn’t recall what had begun this little ritual, their own particular familiarity, since he’d never once used the phrase before meeting Jack, and didn’t recall once hearing it used back home. But the play delighted Jack, so it pleased Jaffey well enough to let it continue. Like a chick under the wing, Jaffey had taken him, and it felt good to feel responsible for the boy. It made him think of Shamus, before the typhus took him. And tried to model himself on his brother, just like Jack modeled himself on Jaffey. Not yet fourteen Jack hadn’t known a thing, not a thing at all, so Jaffey took to himself the task of knowing him the ropes. “And this deck’s a slippery one,” he had told Jack early on. “You could slip and tumble overboard in a flash and be swallowed up and lost. And there’s some who wouldn’t think twice about pushing you over, laughing all the while at your going under. He’d prevent them from Jack though; he’d keep the boy safe in his going about the business.

“Where we going?” Jack asked after they’d walked a spell.

“The old lady. I’ve something needed attending.”

Jack cyphered the something of the something from Jaffey’s expression. “I’m sorry.”

“So am I,” Jaffey answered with an uncomfortable shifting about of his trousers. He threw Jack a serious look. “But it’s the price to be paid sometimes. Don’t you forget that.”

“I won’t,” Jack answered with earnest shake of the head.

“Life has its price no matter how its lived,” Jaffey said. “And it always comes a’collecting, especially when you least expect.”

“Okay, Jaffey.”

“And this one’s a small’nuff price, really. Could cost more. Likely will when all’s said and done.”

Jack uh-hmd his agreement, not sure he really understood but suspecting so.

“So you gotta be careful, understand Boy O?”

“Yes, Jaffey.”

“Lamb’s among wolves, we are. And wolves among lambs. Take old Sam back there.”

“I don’t like him. Always driving me off like he does and giving me that mean look of his.”

Jaffey refused the inclination to tell Jack the whole of it. To tell him that Sam had once said a thing, and that Jaffey had warned him off Jack. In no uncertain terms he’d warned him. “That mean look’s hunger,” he answered instead. “Hunger of the kind that it makes you turn vicious when you can’t feed it.”

Once again Jack thought he understood, but wasn’t quite certain. He nodded, saying nothing.

“So you gotta out-smart them. You gotta show them you have a bite too. That you ain’t no little, bleating lamb.” Jaffey triumphantly patted his new book, “That’s just what I did here. Never let them think they have you. Not in anything. You’re the one that does the having. Make sure they know that.”

“I’ll try.”

Jaffey gave him an examining look. “I reckon you will. One way or the other. I’ll keep you sharp.”

Jack smiled.

They had reached the place. An old sandstone three story block of a thing with a small sign above the door that read:

Women’s Free Clinic

Marie D. Equi, Medical Doctor.

“Damn but it’s still open,” Jaffey said, taking a seat on the steps. “She’ll have her a fit if I call before closing.”

Jack sat next to him. “I’ll wait with you.”

“But you can’t come in so.”

A woman asked pardon as she exited the building. A whore by the look of her, Jaffey thought. Her dress was in places threadbare, the floral pattern long since faded into a dull, sickly un-color. Jaffey tipped his hat to her with a friendly nod as she brushed by.

Jack followed suit.

“Not long for this world, that one.” Jaffey said.

Jack looked at him dumbly.

“She’s got the jaundice. Her eyes was yellower than piss.”

Jack looked again at the woman, who by now was halfway down the block and already being swallowed by the crowed.

“Sure’nuff, life comes a’collecting. And you can’t escape it when it does. Don’t you forget, Boy O.”

#

Aunt Clara greeted Willie with a kiss to the forehead. “Why, whatever is the matter dear?”

“Nothing ‘s the matter, Aunt Clara. I’m just tired.”

She examined him with a suspicious eye.”

“Honestly. My lessons kept me up last night.”

“Well, the Reverend may know  best how to prepare you for seminary, but it won’t do having you waste away in the process. Look at you. Skin and bones. And pale.” She felt his forehead.

Willie forced a smile and gave her a kiss on the cheek. “I really am fine. I could use a bite though.”

That did the trick. She sat Willie down at the kitchen table and busied herself in preparing a sandwich. “No time to cook a proper supper this evening, unfortunately,” she said.

“I don’t mind. You know how I love your sandwiches Aunt Clara.” He said it to appease, for he knew the real reason was not a deficit of time, but of money.

“You are a darling. So much like your mother, God rest her.”

He smiled, though the words secretly stung. His private lessons with the Reverend, his books, his new clothes, and even his stomach made him feel a burden. Bills arrived and once treasured items soon vanished–never again to be mentioned but made conspicuous by their absence. The first to go had been jewelry, each ring the gift of one one admirer or another from her performance days. With each subtraction she’d rub the naked finger and pretend at arthritis. Next, the good china, bought in London and said to have been once owned by a duke. Then her prized collection of porcine figurines with their pink cheeks and white wigs–the gift of a young Parisian Tenor who later threatened to throw himself from a bridge when she refused his proposal of marriage.  And most recently, the the small gilded table clock, given to her by the Kaiser himself as a token of esteem after a performance of Mozart’s Queen of the Night aria. He’d delighted in hearing these tales. But like her pantry and display cabinets, his Aunt was being slowly emptied of her stories on his account. He felt himself a despoiler of memories.

“I love you Aunt Clara,” he said.

“Sweet angel. So very much like your mother.”

That night , kneeling at the side of his bed, Willie prayed. He prayed for the souls of his father and mother. He prayed for his aunt and for the Reverend. He prayed, If it is Thy will, to be admitted to Seminary that he might save souls for the sake of his own. He prayed forgiveness for sins past and future. Earnestly he prayed: against the temptation that sometimes came when the brush of sheets and nightshirt forced him to remember how dangerous, how close, was the nakedness of his own flesh. And though he knew it an unwilled sin, he prayed too against wicked dreams startling him awake, and the sticky defiling of nightshirt proving that a naked flesh, even when righteously scorned, remains fallen.

Under sheets and blankets he finally climbed, knowing already he’d surrender to the turn of mind. A pair of eyes, it whispered. Black, like polished boots.

His hand no more his hand, made its slow reach. How close, came the whisper. How close and good the nakedness of this flesh.

Chapter Two

Fourth street plaza, the boy on the bench watches two silhouettes converge on the footpath just beyond the reach of dull lamplight. Not so much as a whisper between them, and off they go: one silhouette, two heads.

Dandies both by the swagger of them, he thinks. The dark don’t hide it. Balls of steel, the sissies, got to give them that. More than the passers with their red ties and hankies. Like polis is color blind. Like they won’t figure on it soon enough.

Two hours now, easy, and nothing to show but a fiver for a quick fetch in The Block. Pissed bastard trying to force a kiss, breath like the Devil. Deserved a punch in the mouth for that one, sure. And hardly worth a fiver for all the work it took to wake the ugly, limply thing. Them’s all predictable and alike: drink to hard the nerves, forgetting that it softs the cock. No, not worth a fiver, but work’s work.

He  considered again waiting in The Block, but then thought better of it: nowhere to run should a polis happen in and say you was showing off at the pisser. And damned if I’ll wear steel bracelets on my seventeenth. Few close calls, sure, but I plan to keep my record. Like I told him, you gotta be sharp Boy ‘O. Couldn’t keep him sharp weren’t I sharp myself–And here we go, about time.

A man approached and sat next to him. He pulled a cigarette from a case and after a few taps lit, then offered one to the boy.

“Don’t smoke.”

“Pity. You’d displease Marlowe by half.”

Neither understanding or caring for the meaning, the boy took his measure: forties by the look of him. Fancy suit. Spats. Leaning back without a care. Adds up: money to spare. “You looking for company, eh?”

The man laughed. “You’re a bold one.”

Not even trying to be quite, like nothing can touch him. No doubt about it, money to spare. “You wouldn’t be here elsewise, sure.”

“You inductive reasoning is impeccable as well.” He threw back his head and let go a long exhale. His eyes rolled over the boy as though only somewhat interested, as though considering some curiosity.

The boy, though, read the look’s underneath. The man had already chosen. Before sitting down he’d chosen. Just like that pissed limpy in The Block, this man needed it, had determined on having it, had dressed in his fancy suit and spats and come here to find it. And that bored look couldn’t hide the fact. Not from one sharp. Not from one who knew better than to let them think they had you in anything. Never let them think they have you. “Best decide because I ain’t waiting.”

“Very well then, why not?”

“Thought so.”

“But not here. I’ve a mind for a full night. I deserve to indulge myself.”

“It will cost you.”

“Obviously.”

“Your place then?”

“Obviously.”

The man stood. “It’s my birthday you know.

The boy followed. “You don’t say.”

“I do. How old are you, by the way?”

“We won’t be kissing. Don’t get it in your head we’ll be kissing, because I won’t.”

Laughter. “Quite old enough it seems.”

“I mean it, not so much as one kiss.”

“Not so much as one.”

Together they walked. One silhouette, two heads.