THE GREAT DEPRESSION

Picture a line. It's black and white time but somehow everything looks a shade of grey. A rainbow of greys. Men in long overcoats searching for their feet. Women in floppy hats gazing at the horizon - somewhere, anywhere far away. Children kicking cans. On the street, hear the rattle of passing trolley cars and the ringing of bells.

I was fourteen. There wasn't much to do in those days so I mostly stood in lines and listened. Funny what people will say in front of a kid. Marie always wanted to hold my hand. I know what you're thinkin', but it ain't like that. She 's my sister after all. Too strong to be pretty, too nice to be happy. But she had a gentle heart and a soft spot for me. She always treated me like I was ten - a kid forever. Imagine. Actually she was more my mother than my sister. Ever since pop moved out. The bastard. I guess that's why Marie and me were always standin' in some line. We had nobody to take care of us.

I ought to tell you about pop. Even now my teeth grind when I think about him. Oh I wasn't the only kid ever to be deserted by his father. There was Mike Cowles down the street. Course his old man was a drunk by trade. He used to enjoy coming home screamin' about the "damn depression" and "when the hell are they gonna wake up in Washington and do somethin" and the "goddamn FDR and his ugly wife". And before you knew it he'd be layin' his knuckles all over Mike's mom like it was her fault. Mike couldn't take it no more so he threw the old man out the window one night. No one's seen him since.

Once I asked Mike if he thought the old guy was dead.

"Hope so," spat Mike. And he meant it! I remember how often I wished the same fate on my father. I was thinkin' it was kind of strange. Mike and I became best friends after that united by our mutual lust for murder. We even liked the sound of the word: "Murder". The way it rolls off you lips like a dark whisper.

But my old man wasn't a drunk. A drunk I could understand. Whiskey rots your brain till you feel no pain . It was the depression and almost no work in Lackawanna. No work, no pride, no use. But my pop wasn't no drunk. He had work, and he had pride. Enough pride for a dozen men. That's why I hated him. He thought he was the Prince of Wales and there ain't nothing worse than a stiff necked Irishman who acts like the bloody Prince of Wales.

Everyday it was the same. He dressed in a clean white shirt, silk tie ( blue was his favorite color ) gold pin and a frayed charcoal suit. Since he only owned one good shirt, it was Marie's duty to iron it out every day so it always looked fresh, new. Funny. Every time I think about Marie even today I see her pushin' that hot iron over the old man's shirt. Don't know how she ever put up with it.

Not only did Marie play mother to our broken down family, she also worked at the Basilica playing organ for the Masses. The music was a left over from the old days when mother was alive. I wish I could remember that far back. Anything. A face, a sound, a voice. Anything. I guess she was like Marie, only softer somehow. I don't know. Marie is my mother now.

Once, when I was making my first Communion, Marie played the organ. I swear I was in heaven. Such sound bouncing all over those domes. We had no money, but we had all the beauty of the Italian Renaissance right in our own backyard. Since my father moved out I got no use for that church no more, though I still see him goin' in for High Mass on Sunday. Such a leering two - face smiling in his sin. While everyone else is praying, I 've seen him take book money right next to the statue of the Virgin.

Mike and me dreamed of killing my father. It would be easy. The plans we made. We spent many afternoons plottin' all sorts of things. Death by fire: we sneak up to his room, pour gasoline over everything, and drop a match. I could almost smell the dry wood burning. But we were scared we'd roast too many innocent people so we scraped that. Catholic conscience.

Death by drowning. We'd lure the old man down to the dock at Times Beach. Get him right to the edge and just one easy shove. The splash heard round the world. Mike figured he'd sink right to the bottom with all those quarters he got for makin' book bulging in his pockets.

Or, maybe more subtle. Just a little nudge by the railroad tracks. He was always down there pickin' up money for the horses. The 5 o'clock comes rollin' by. It makes me smile just to imagine those wheels grinding that smug face to powder.

"You know, there are worse things than death," said Mike. We were sitting on the corner of Ridge Road watching a panhandler try to pry money from the tight fists of the faithful as they came out of church. Worse than death?

"What's worse than death?" I asked.

"Life. Life can be worse than death."

I must have looked like a dog trying to climb a tree. Mike explained: "Think about it. We kill your old man. Bang. It's over. Too quick. Too painless. Suppose we do somethin' better."

"Like what?"

"Suppose we make it long and painful. Suppose we transform that high and holy father of yours into someone like that beggar over there. "

The panhandler was crouching on his haunches, his face a composite that spelled the great depression in a twisted alphabet of missing teeth, swollen lips and facial hair that look like it belonged to the vegetable kingdom. I fancied my father in such straits. For a flash I even felt pity. Just a flash and it was gone. This would be perfect, a fate worse than death for this minor league Prince of Wales. I couldn't wait to get started.

It's a known fact that two things happen to people during hard times. One: they go to Church. Two: they gamble. In Lackawanna, NY it's often hard to tell where the line between gambling and religion gets drawn. There's the Basilica sitting proud on the corner of Ridge Road and South Park Avenue. It's the highest spot in town. You can see the thing for miles. The domes, the angles, the trumpets poised on the brink of judgement day. You can sit over at the Limestone tavern and watch a procession of the faithful go in and out of the Basilica all day long. Any day. Not just Sunday.

These were hard times after all, and people needed a place to go, a shoulder to cry on. And if that shoulder belonged to a saint, so much the better. Yes. The church offered hope for the hopeless and help for the helpless. A beacon to the future. A real outpouring of faith, you might say. Even my old man, with a soul black as hell was in and out of there all the time.

But take another look. Harder. The morning trolly is coming down Ridge Road from the Steel Plant. A good number of riders run into church to pay their respects. And to pray.

You might wonder what exactly they are praying for: good health, forgiveness for sins. A fast horse. That's where the line gets blurry. More than one devout Catholic will bet on a long shot, say 30 - 1 and then spend a half - hour in the Basilica praying for a miracle.

He was on his knees. Praying. We watched as he wrung his hands together earnestly. His lips were moving. I wondered what words might spill from that mouth. There weren't many people in the Basilica that day. A few old woman working their beads through their fingers whispering "Hail Marys" for their unemployed husbands, their sick children. Hail Marys for everyone. Overhead "The Slaughter of the Innocents" frozen in a painting thirty feet above the floor. Imagine a mob of Roman Soldiers, weapons drawn. Already a few dead babies are sprawled along the street. One woman has her arms raised in anguish, her still child lay across the folds of her blood stained dress. Now, two thousand years later, you could almost hear her cries unnoticed by the angels hovering overhead. The heavens looked on as the last fingers of sunset spread along the enfolding blacknesses of night.

My father was still praying in happy oblivion. The slaughter of the innocents. Again and again. Dead children littered the ground. If heaven wouldn't take their part, who would? I had to work fast, but when I walked down that aisle, I felt small, innocent, but I would suffer even death just to lay in the folds of my mother's dress.

I slid into the pew along side my father. His lips still were moving, but no words seemed to come out. I slipped closer. He was intent on his prayers all right. Only now I could see that he was arranging money in the creases of his prayerbook. I knew that a pickup was imminent.

Suddenly, the old man looked up. Somehow he didn't look his usual dapper self. The lines off his face seemed deeper, more permanent. But when he saw that it was me, he seemed to relax a bit. He almost smiled, in fact.

"What are ya up to lad. Can't a man pray in peace?"

Lad. Not son? Did he even remember that he had a son?

"I've a message."

"Well. Be quick about it, boy. I'll be meeting someone any moment now right where you are sitting."

"It's from Doherty. On the hill. He even gave me a nickel to make sure you get it. " It was Mike's nickel. I flashed it briefly . That made everything seem true. A five cent lie. My father was growing impatient.

"What would Doherty want with me?"

"I don't know. What he said makes no sense to me."

"Go on boy. I haven't the time to be blathering with the likes of you all day long. I've got my prayers to finish."

"He said to lay everything on Kansas dream."

"Doherty said that?"

"I swear. Everything on Kansas dream."

"Swear on your mother's tomb"

He had me there. To lie in the Basilica was one thing. But to swear on my mother's tomb was something else. I looked at his face. I remembered my sister ironing his clean shirts while we paraded around Lackawanna in rags. I imagined my mother voice. Sweet. Soft. Her arms enfolding me like the mother in the painting thirty feet above my head. To even mention her grave was a cruel thing. I wanted to hurt him for that. I wanted to hurt him. For my mother. I swore. For my mother I swore.

A man approached from the opposite side of the pew. He walked deliberately without wetting his hands in the holy water font. I judged him to be my father's contact. I slid quickly from my seat and headed toward the South Park exit. Mike was waiting behind a statue in the shape of an angel. Maybe a guardian angel. Perhaps if I drank the sacred water it would renew my innocence.

From our position, we could see as my father spoke to the stranger. An envelope passed , a few words whispered. If my father believed me, he just sealed his doom. It was one thing to lose money on a bet, but to change a bet was the worst kind of sin. It was the kiss of Judas. If things worked out as I hoped, my father, the Prince of Wales, will be the most hated man in Lackawanna. A fate fare worse than death for the likes of him.

The next morning I spent an hour in line to get a half stale loaf of bread and a quart of milk. Mike kicked an old soup can in my direction, but my thoughts were elsewhere. Overhead, a squadron of B - 17's rumbled in and out of cloud cover. War rumors were everywhere. All I could imagine was the beating my old man would take when the Limestone gang realized he had lost their money. Maybe the son of a bitch would spend the whole day in Church hiding behind the Virgin's apron. But he'd have to come out eventually. And they'd be waiting.

Marie was frying the bread when we heard him on the stairs. I listened for any sound if weakness. Could his leg be broken. Would he drag himself up step by step? I started away from the table. "And where are you off to?" asked Marie.

"I have to go out. Me and Mike are cleaning the stables at the police station. They said we'd get paid." I lied. Already the lies were multiplying like maggots on the rotten meat of my soul.

"Stay put till after pop is gone. "

The steps seemed heavy. Slow. For the first time I realized that he would probably kill me with his last shreds and patches of strength . Maybe he'd kill Marie too. I'd stay put. Try to protect her. If I could

The door flew open. I expected anger. Curses. Blood. Instead there was a glow about his face. He beamed like a saint. "My children. Let me enfold you in my arms.!"

Enfold? Had to be a trick. We relax. Then he kills us. But before we could elude his arms, he had us wrapped and was enthusiastically kissing us both.

Marie struggled: " Pop's drunk. "

I smelled the whiskey mixed with his pious sweat. "You're the picture of your mother, Marie. A dear picture I carry in my broken heart. And Timothy here. Reminds me of myself when I was a lad. And I was a handsome lad. I was indeed!"

I didn't like the sound of that. It showed in my face.

"Don't look at me like that, boy. I'm a new man since yesterday. My prayers are answered. My faith has saved me."

It was too much. I looked for signs of violence. A swollen lip. A black eye. Nothing.

"I put all the Limestone money on Kansas Dream. I had a hunch, but lacked the nerve. Then Timothy here walked in and told me his story. Of course I knew he was lyin'. Doherty wouldn't send a boy to do a man's job. And Doherty wouldn't ever part with a nickel. But it was a sign. I knew it was a sign there in the Basilica. It was the Lord's voice. He was speakin' right to me. And I listened."

"What happened to the Limestone horse?" I mumbled in a whisper.

"It lost. Broke its leg fifty yards from the finish. They shot the animal before it was cold. Kansas dream came in at 40 -1. All the money belongs to me. It's a bloody miracle."

I was getting sick. To see him crowing like that. The man actually thinks that God has spoken to him like some kind of race track Moses. Next thing he'll be giving us his own version of the ten commandments. This was the worst kind of nightmare. Not only was the old man not in trouble. He was happy. And all because of me. Mike was right. There are worse things than death.

He was in the bathroom cleaning up. He had to buy a round for the boys at the Limestone for the sake of justice. Justice! No mention of anything for us. Not that I'd take a red penny from the man. He'd also allowed himself the luxury of a new white shirt as a proper investment of his new wealth.

Marie was silent as she heated the iron. He was singing a pious hymn as he stepped into the kitchen. "Hurry up with that shirt, girl. I want to be on my way."

She was laughing as she held up his prize. Fresh. White. Crisp. Except for a black hole in the middle. Right over where his wicked heart would beat.

Pop held up his fist. I moved. But Marie already had the hot iron three inches from his angry face.

"Go ahead", she said. And I'll iron a matching hole in your puss. Then you can run to the Basilica and pray for another miracle. I'd like to see it myself."

The smell of burnt cotton was filling the room. Pop took it in stride. "That's the last time I'll let you iron your father's shirt. What ever happened to the fourth commandment? Honor thy father?"

For a moment I thought Marie was going to ram the hot iron into his face. The lines looked deep. I wondered if she could iron those out.

Instead, she threw the shirt, it's blackened heart still smoking, on the floor. Pop bent to pick it up. Some loose change spilled to the floor. Pennies, nickels, dimes. He crawled on his knees for all of it. And I saw him for the first time. He was a pathetic figure, full of conceit and superstition. A ridiculous man in a tattered suit and a pocket full of quarters.

Even though I never succeeded in murdering my old man, I did succeed in killing my father. He never came back to us after that day because he knew that we saw him for what he really was. He couldn't stand that. To the world he was a charmer who could smooth talk a man into laying his last nickel on a broken down old horse. He was a race track prophet with a direct pipeline to God. In my father's heaven the horses are always running. It doesn't matter who wins. Just that they might win.

To me he will always be a scared little man. I almost could feel sorry for him as he prayed for the most improbable miracles. No. I don't begrudge him his prayers. It's just that when miracles did happen, he was always blind to them. I don't mean the miracle of a long shot horse winning a race. The real miracles that happen everyday - a father's love, a child's laugh, a mother's tear. My father was so busy with himself that these things would always be dead to him.

Yes, I killed my father. And when he died he stayed dead. Nothing of him came down to me. I knew in my heart I would be a different kind of man.

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