God Came On Friday Read online

  God Came On Friday

  by

  Patrick O’Hara

  PATRICK O’HARA

  During his childhood, Patrick O’Hara was brought up by various people and in various establishments until he was old enough to run away to sea. At fourteen his first ship was a passenger-cargo liner out of London on the Latin-America run, on board which he washed crockery and polished silverware. Later he served as Quartermaster, Seaman and Fireman with Dutch, German and Danish ships — mostly in Far Eastern and Pacific waters — an area of the world with which he has formed a romantic and lasting attachment. He was introduced to books and writing by an East End priest whose father was a director of a well-known London publishing company.

  Patrick O’Hara’s previous novels are: The Wake of the Gertrude Luth; I Got No Brother; The Wohldorf Shipment; The Red Sailor; and The Yangtze Run. He now lives in Aberdeen, Scotland.

  1

  THE BAR WAS ON the corner of the long hill that went up into the city. Back along the street away from the hill, on the other side in the sun, was Freddy Shimokovak’s betting-shop. Out front of the shop were the bums against the wall in the sunlight with the form for the night meeting out at Longview Park. Nowhere was it busy, and the heavy all-night trunk service had not yet begun the long pull up-hill from the waterfront. All the Island was quiet and the dust settling in the warm evening and the smell of the river with the sun on it.

  Outside the bar were more bums standing around putting the touch on any soft-looking mark going by on the hill. There were some pretty tough-looking boys amongst them and the biggest was this Willi Bischof. Bischof was an ex-prize fighter, big and wide but thick through the middle now. Then the door of the bar opened and this boy Frankie came out. Bischof saw him put the bottle away.

  ‘Hey’ he said. ‘What you got there?’

  ‘You talking to me?’ this boy Frankie says.

  Bischof reached out and grabbed him by the front of his windjammer. Frankie went with it and let go a right-hand low to the belly. You could hear it land way down the other end of the street. Bischof looked if he been shot. Frankie stepped back and hit a long one with the left to the mouth. Bischof went down against the wall. Nobody moved. Frankie turned and started across the street, the bums out front of Freddy’s place watching him walk, sort of flat-footed, heels on the ground, his head a little to the right and his chin down; Frankie, white faced, and the sun on him now as he walked.

  Inside the shop there were more bums and it gloomy and the air bad. Freddy sat in his shirt sleeves at the table and saw him come in.

  Well, well, thought Freddy. What do we have now? Freddy was a thinker.

  Frankie put his money down and says: ‘Prince Cloud. To win.’

  What do you know? thought Freddy. Now we have one with money.

  Frankie watching him count it, says: ‘Well.’

  ‘Sure,’ said Freddy, and wrote out the ticket.

  Frankie put the copy in his pocket and went out. Freddy watched him go.

  Then Long John came in and said to Freddy: ‘Some boy.’ And standing in the doorway, watched Frankie walk down the street.

  ‘The living dead,’ said Freddy The Thinker.

  ‘Know what he just done?’ said Long John coming in from the doorway.

  ‘Shot himself,’ said Freddy.

  ‘Just flattened Bischof,’ Long John said, proudly.

  ‘Go on,’ Freddy talking up to him. ‘Bischof?’

  ‘One, two! Bang! Out!’ said Long John demonstrating with the long-arm stance.

  ‘Bischof?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  Freddy got up and took a look out the doorway. Across on the corner they were helping Bischof to his feet.

  ‘Well, isn’t that worth seeing now,’ said Freddy, smiling big.

  ‘Some boy,’ Long John said, proudly. ‘I’ve got to tell Madden about this one.’

  Frankie went on down the street, the bottle inside his windjammer cool against him through the sweat shirt. Most of the buildings in the street were warehouses, high and grey and their windows not reflecting the sun. He stopped and sat on a fire-hydrant out through the wall of a granary. Orma Clark’s place was across the street and somebody inside playing an out-of-tune piano. The smell of stale beer and damp sawdust carried out in the warm air. The smell of the river was strong too.

  He took a piece of Polish sausage from the pocket of his windjammer and unwrapped it. Further down the street, a number of bums stood outside The House of Nazareth waiting to go in to bed. Next door was a Chinese laundry. Two Chinamen squatted in the doorway eating rice, the bowls held high and pushing the rice with chopsticks directly into their mouths from the bowls. Down the end of the street on the waterfront, were stacked white-wood battens. Towering above the battens were the for’ard derricks of a freighter. He sat with his shoes off and the warm air feeling cool on his feet. The only sound was the piano-playing from the bar. His feet made damp marks on the dusty paving. It was very pleasant sat in the sun with your shoes off eating Polish sausage and listening to an out-of-tune piano.

  2

  THE HOUSE OF NAZARETH was damp-smelling and ill-lit. All of it was cement floored and the walls yellow-ochred. In the room were eight beds. When he came in, an old man was sitting up in the bed by the door talking to Long John. They stopped talking when they saw him. Long John smiling, and the old man watching him walk to his bed.

  ‘You done it all right,’ said Long John, smiling.

  Frankie undressed, then folded his clothes and put them under the pillow.

  ‘You done it all right,’ Long John said, louder this time and still smiling. Frankie swung his legs under the grey blanket, found the bottle, took a long one, then put the bottle back.

  ‘How are you?’ said Long John, giving it a last try.

  ‘You talking to me?’ says Frankie, his lips not moving and the words mumbled.

  That brightened Long John considerably because he gave that rare smile again, and said: ‘I never saw Bischof get his before.’

  Frankie stretched out full-length.

  The old man was still sitting up in bed following the one-sided conversation but not saying anything.

  ‘You done a good job. That right, Madden?’ said Long John, looking for help. Madden cleared his throat.

  ‘See?’ said Long John.

  It went quiet again and they watched him take another long one out the bottle.

  ‘I was just telling Madden here,’ said Long John, quietly and not sure of it any more. ‘Bischof was running this place. That right?’

  ‘You could say that,’ said Madden.

  Somewhere out in the hall water ran into a cistern. Frankie lay on his back with his hands behind his head, looking at the ceiling.

  ‘Just come in town?’ said Long John, now standing by the foot of the bed.

  ‘What you want to know?’ says Frankie still looking at the ceiling. Long John looked to Madden. It was quiet again and the water stopped running into the cistern.

  ‘Long John’s all right, boy,’ said Madden.

  Frankie took another long one with his head still on the pillow, then carefully corked the bottle and threw it up to Long John. ‘Now go talk to yourself,’ says Frankie, and turned onto his side.

  ‘Thanks. Thanks a lot,’ said Long John. Then to Madden, and smiling big, said ‘He’s a good one. I told you he was a good one.’

  Madden lay back and closed his eyes. The room was quiet again and no noise was coming in from outside; and only Long John sat on his bed with the bottle and smiling big to himself.

  3

  WHEN FRANKIE WOKE next morning it was raining. The air was bad and smelled of sweat and feet. Long John was awake and sitting on the edge of his bed pull
ing on an old pair of army trousers over long woollen underdrawers. Long John saw him awake and smiled. Frankie got up and dressed. The rain beat against the windows. Long John lit a hand-made cigarette and started coughing. When he finally stopped, he had to sit back down and rest. As Frankie went out he saw old man Madden’s bed empty.

  Standing in the doorway, he watched the rain falling out on the street. The wind blew off the river and brought the rain with it. Then he saw Madden come across the street, a newspaper folded under his raincoat and the raincoat blowing out in the wind.

  ‘That’s some day,’ said Madden as he came up the steps.

  ‘Yeah. Bad all summer,’ says Frankie. ‘That today’s?’ Madden reached the newspaper out to him.

  ‘Don’t read much,’ says Frankie. ‘Know what won the eight-thirty last night?’ Madden turned the newspaper to the sports page and found the race results.

  ‘Prince Cloud. Four to one.’

  ‘What you know?’ says Frankie. ‘Four to one.’

  ‘You caught it?’ asked Madden.

  Frankie nodded. Then he says: ‘Say, any place here you can eat?’

  ‘There’s a place on the dock that’s pretty good. It’s cheap too.’

  ‘You ate yet?’ Frankie says.

  ‘Never envy what you can’t have,’ said Madden.

  ‘You want to eat with me?’

  Madden looked up at the white face. ‘Thanks. But I don’t take hand-outs.’

  ‘This is no hand-out. I ask you want to eat with me.’

  Madden looked out at the rain falling.

  ‘Come on,’ says Frankie. ‘Take much longer make your mind up it going be dinner-time.’

  Madden smiled sadly. They went out into the rain. Madden only reaching to Frankie’s shoulder; one thin, the other big and wide-shouldered, and them walking with their heads down against the rain.

  They sat in the eating-house at a table in the window eating steak and fried eggs. Frankie ate steadily, his mind no further than the plate. Every so often Madden would stop like to say something, then change his mind. Next time he stopped, Frankie says: ‘What bothering you. Madden?’

  Madden cleared his throat. ‘Well seeing you asked – you going to be around long?’

  ‘In’t thought ’bout it,’ says Frankie, wiping egg-yolk up with bread.

  ‘You want a job? You don’t look a bum.’

  ‘You don’t look no bum neither,’ says Frankie.

  Madden shrugged and went back to eating.

  From the window Frankie watched a big freighter come through the lock-gates of the Jamaica Dock across the river. The freighter was old and rode high in the grey water.

  Madden watched him. ‘Thinking about going to sea?’

  ‘No. You ever go?’

  ‘I get sick looking at water.’

  ‘That Long John could use soap with his,’ says Frankie.

  ‘Oh, he’s all right.’

  ‘Sure,’ Frankie says, ‘Everybody’s all right.’

  It was still raining. They walked back along the waterfront, then turned left down a side-street. They came out onto the hill on the way up from the Island to the city. As they walked. Madden said: ‘Been up the city before?’

  ‘Only come in yesterday. All I see was the freight-yards.’

  The road up the hill was wide and plenty traffic using it. Three buses went by, close on each other, tyres hissing on the wet macadam and a fine spray rising under the wheels. The wind was warm, but the sky was low and grey and the rain falling that way made everything gloomy even on a steak and egg breakfast.

  ‘I know a place where we can sit out of the rain and drink tea,’ said Madden. ‘I can buy the tea.’

  They broke into a run and passed a big old-fashioned bar and a barman with a raincoat over his head washing the windows with a long-handled brush.

  ‘Scrambled,’ says Frankie.

  ‘Who?’ said Madden, jogging out front.

  ‘Washing windows in this.’

  ‘All publicans are scrambled. Knew a barman once who had nine kids to three barmaids.’

  ‘That isn’t scrambled,’ says Frankie, ‘That with eating garlic.’

  Madden led the way. He did not move well when he ran. His elbows were up and out, his feet at right-angles, and him moving much the same as a down-at-the-heel penguin.

  4

  IN AT WEINBERGER’S GYM the air was thick with smoke and smelling of sweat and rubbing-liniment. A muffled-up heavyweight was right-handing the heavy bag by the door, and coming through the smoke and noise, the quick bickety bickety backety, bickety bickety backety of the speed bag. The heavyweight was red-faced and sweating, and his waist hanging over the waistband of his track trousers. Holding onto the bag the other side and moving with it every time it was hit, was the heavyweight’s trainer; and him calling: ‘Hup! Hup! Lower – hup! No, higher, Al. Hup! This time – hup!’

  Two niggers skipped rope in middle of the floor. Up the far end of the gym was the ring and the lights overhead. Nobody was working the ring. A crowd was gathered around the apron. Ten or twelve fighters were exercising about the gym. On the walls were pictures of fighters and old fight posters.

  The other end of the gym was screened by a hardboard partition. Inside was the tea-room and two snooker tables. Both tables were being played. Frankie and Madden sat at the counter. Two men wearing rumpled suits sat smoking cigarettes along the other end of the counter.

  ‘What will you have?’ Madden asked.

  ‘What you afford?’ says Frankie, looking around.

  ‘Tea.’

  ‘Then tea,’ says Frankie. Frankie was a talker all right.

  ‘Hello, Madden,’ the red-faced one the other end of the counter said.

  ‘I thought you would be dead too, Koening,’ Madden said to him. Then said to Frankie, ‘Wonder where the girl’s got?’

  ‘Gone where all dolls go whose systems flush,’ said the dark one, laughing. Koening laughed with him.

  The girl came out from the kitchen, looked at them, saw Frankie, and smiled. She smiled a pretty smile. She had big brown eyes, a bigger chest, and was wide-hipped. She was big all right.

  Madden ordered.

  ‘Work here steady?’ Koening asked the girl.

  ‘Why?’

  Koening shrugged. ‘I just wondered. I thought that when Griffon was through I could take you to lunch.’

  ‘No thanks. I eat where there’s safety in numbers.’

  ‘Who these two jokers?’ Frankie asked Madden.

  ‘Newspapermen. They’ve come down to see Griffon.’

  ‘Who’s Griffon?’

  ‘What! He’s ninth in the middleweight division. That’s who Griffon is.’

  ‘Take it easy,’ says Frankie. ‘At least I heard ’bout Hennig and Billy Shorr.’

  ‘And who hasn’t?’ asked Madden.

  A polite hand of applause carried through the partition. Koening and the dark one got up and went into the gym. The bell rang as they went out.

  Then after a little:

  ‘Come on. We’ll go and take a look,’ said Madden.

  The gym was quiet now. Both fighters in the ring, wearing headgear, and up there under the lights. The sound of their breathing and scuffing of shoes carried with the thud of leather. They both took the first one easy, not getting much out of a walk. The bell ended the round and they turned back to their corners. Griffon was above them on a stool, relaxed, breathing rhythmically, a white sweatered second and pail-man leaning through the ropes with him. Griffon sat with his head back against the cushion, wearing red shoes and blue and gold trunks and a white sweat shirt with BENLEE in black across the front.

  The bell rang. Both fighters got up and went out. The other boy was tall and bony. He didn’t carry much of a punch. He backed under Griffon’s high left, fought a flurry, then faded. He was almost a head taller than Griffon. Griffon worked the high left jab. One, two – one, two, three. The left seemed glued to the boy’s mouth. Then the boy took a
couple of wild right swings at Griffon’s head. Griffon ducked, moved inside and let go both hands to the body. The boy’s mouth opened with them. He was bleeding badly around the mouth. With this boy. Griffon looked pretty good.

  As Griffon came back a photographer climbed up on the apron and shot his picture as he hooked out the mouthpiece. He sat down, and the second wiped his face and ran the towel around back of his neck. Sweat was showing through the sweat shirt between the shoulders and under the arms. The newspapermen were on chairs alongside the apron and a couple of them taking notes. A fat man climbed in Griffon’s corner.

  ‘Sonny Bernstein,’ said Madden, ‘Griffon’s manager. Before Griffon he had Al Morgan, and before that Danny Singer. Sonny done all right.’

  Above them Griffon sat with his head back on the cushion.

  ‘What do you think of him?’ Madden went on.

  ‘They could get somebody better to work with him,’ Frankie says it as the talking hushed for the bell. His voice sounded awfully loud and alone.

  ‘The boy do any better. Madden?’ asked Koening, laughing.

  ‘What’s it got to do with you?’ Madden said right back.

  ‘Sit down, fat man,’ says Frankie.

  The whole gym was watching it now.

  ‘Somebody throw that bum out!’ Koening shouted.

  Frankie walked right up to him and says: ‘Sit down, fat man.’ And brought his right hand out of his pocket quick and Koening sat down all right. That was Frankie.

  ‘Hey! What’s going on?’ shouted Bernstein.

  The timekeeper rang the bell, but the boys up there didn’t move.

  ‘Hey! What is this? What’s going on?’ Bernstein asked, coming around the apron.

  ‘This bum says Mike’s a plug,’ said Koening.

  ‘He says?’ said Bernstein, pointing at Frankie. ‘Him!’

  ‘I don’t say he’s a plug. I says they could get somebody better work with him. That what I says.’

  ‘So you got it against Meyers?’ Bernstein said, ‘Meyers could give you a rough time.’

  ‘He couldn’t give his old girl a rough time,’ Frankie says right back. ‘But don’t worry, mister. Your one’ll look all right in the newspapers – why don’t you take that hat off and comb his hair?’ Nobody ever scared Frankie any.