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Roaldus Richmond
MC ,t4kc.tNSt aye.
Recorded in
Writers' Sectjgg;
I'LL cin STOWL AGAIN
rtlr;
DATE:
*Tub, I'm on the WPA new," Lunn said.
"I guises you 'always will be," his wife said. "I goes* you'll never get
another decent job."
Dann shrugged his wide shoulders, his rugged dark face crinkled in a
frown. "If there ain't any you can't get 'em," he said.
The little kitchen was clean under the light. wood fire burned in
the stove; the smell of drying wood ea me from the oven. A crucifix hung
over the oilcloth -covered table but it was purely ornamental. They were
not religious. In the dimness of the living -room were pictures of movie
actors Mrs. Dana was a romanticist.
"We never been so bad off." She spoke with bitterness. "I don't
know what's going to become of us. when I was a girl I had everything I
wanted. Then Lan always had swell jobs. My own girls had everything, too.
They dressed better than any other girls in high school. They were better
looking too, if 1 do say it. Row they're gone. Loth married to swell guys.
But look at us here. We tot nothing any wore."
"We'll have war," Lanli said gravely. "Stout every twenty or thirty
years for this country. Yrom the end of one to the beginning of another.
The Revolution then 1812 a& Mexico in '48 the civil War in 18W3
the Spanish-American and the last one. Seel ihe time is up. .hey
could& stopped littler last fall. Now well,he'll take lots of stopping."
"HitlerL2 Mrs. Lanli said. "Nussolini too, that big bull/ liwo of a
kind. Somebody ought to
vtifue'•
"Try it," Lanli said.
z.
"Ne try itt Let a man do it. Let some big worthless hulk like you
do it. If they kill you after, what difference it makes?"
"shut up," Lanli said, "Listen, I'm going on the road pretty quick
agiin. I'm sick of your nagging. There's nothing for a man here."
"Atom! a. men that you Genet even support your family? 40', when I
think of the things we used to have. 4 mother would die if she saw henrys
were now. Ny mother came from a good family. J• eame from Carrara, see?
They're different than these other Italians. Nor* delicate, more refined."
"The Vellis are from arrara too," Dan observed.
"Nontagnat" cried his wife in scorn. "Prom the mountains not the city.
There's a difference. just like between North and South Italy. Look at the
Salvatore,' Napolitani trash. The nap of Naples all over their fuss."
"I'm Tuscani," Lan said.
Hifi wife ignored him. "My mother was a dressmaker in the Old ‘;ountry.
She was awful smart. And you should see pictures when she was young. %hat
stufft Ay father was a status -cutter in Carrara. Aly mother used to walk by
the plass where he worked. All the men would whistle and says 'E'er* comes
your tin, Pietro.' 4 mother would not loot up until he whistled. She
knew his whistle from Ill the rest. My, he was a handsome man, blond with
dark eyes. He died when he was only thirty.four.
*His family didn't want him to marry mi mother. litotes why they left
there and came to this courtry. And it killed himy the granite. My mother
never ot over it."
*She married another quick enough."
"Sure, but did she love him? Not Net like my father, she didn't
Lanli said* "I should have stayed down South. I was cutting stone
la in Alberton, ueorgia. The granite isn't so good and they don't pay so
3.
much, but there's work anyway. Steady -work. Ihe trouble is those crackers
will work for nothing and like it. Just like the erenchmen they brought
into Barre. You ean't organise them either. I tried it. I tried to show
them how the Union would increase their pay. ihey wouldn't listen. They're
too soared and stupid. tut the work down there is steady and living is
cheap. That's something, ain't it? In harre living is expensive and the
work is on and aft. You only got half -.a -year's work at the best.
"I'm a surface•outter. I learned the trade under my father in this
country. he'd worked the hard granite of northern Italy. There's one group
here that lived in Central Italy, near home. They got their training in the
soft stone quarries. This stone is volcanic stuff, most of it is used for
building. The quality of the stone has a lot to do with how good a job a
carver does. This 4roup didn't do muoh statue cutting or carving over there,
and they haven't done it here. The real artists cos* from the north country
where they have a harder granite and marble. 4 father oane over first and
sent batik for as and my brothels. We couldn't speak a work of imglish. I
don't know how ve cot train tickets or anything. 4 father had a small shed
and he taught us to out stone. If we'd all stuck together we might've built
1.1;; a big company. Lots of others did. But we didn't get along. be boy*
IWO foolish. to could make more money cutting stone for somebody else so we
left my father. to couldn't see ahead. So we made it find spent it. On
clothes and boose and parties."
"On women, you meant" cut in his wife. "hat's how you spent it."
NAw, I never vent for women," Dann. said. "ziome of them did, but net
me. I'd rather be with a on of fellows, just sitting around drinking and
talking. You knew how it is."
4.
"Hew about that big black widow horini?" demanded his wife.
'Her' That was nothino. It was her idea, wasn't it? But I didn't
do nothinf. I didn't want her, for chrisake. If I wanted lemon I could
get better than thet."
"You could, could you? tell let me tell you I could elvers get all
the fellows I vented, too,
"Jesus Christi" Dan said. "shut up, will you? We want to talk. We
aren't talking about women. uo play the piano or something."
Mrs. Danli vent in the other room to indifferently thump out a few
popular songs. "I can't play," she said. "But you should hoar my daughter
flint playt" ban waved her impatiently into oblivion with one big brown hand.
*We made money," he vent on. "And we drifted around the country. You
could always pick up a job in them days. I out stone in Montreal, ,oneord,
Quincy. I cut stone in Hardwiek and berm. I worked the bouth, too. Lf
you got sick of one place you could shove on to another. Always there was
jobs. Look at Venture« he gets a Barre 4r1 in trouble so he hits for the
South. He gets another girl down there in trouble and lauds bask here. He
marries the first one and beats itl Finally we hear he dies of syph. That's
women for you. but not for me."
"My, Lan is romantic," Darin called. "When he was away this is
the kind of letter he'd writes 'Dear Maria, nclosed find check, Yours
truly, ban."'
Lanli's dark lined cheeks crinkled deeper. "I knew that was all you
was interested in," he s,16. "ihe check." be accepted and lit another
cigarette. "I roll mine now," he said. "I'm getting to like them rolled.
But tailormados taste 4:reed for a change...
5.
"sew you oan't get a job. Lot around hare. Aaria wante me to back
to cutting stone. I'd do it if I could get a job. iAlt net for long. I've
had enough of that dust. Pa almost fifty. I mover tolu anybody but Vitt
three -fourths filled up with silicosis. I knew it. I don't talk about it.
I don't think about it much. Cut I know. What I want is a job with a
construction ormpany. Outdoors and all, bossing a gang of men. I know
oorstruotion and I've handled men. I works(' in the Rolland Tunnel. I
bossed a gang on the lifteen-Mila Falls Lam. I had a gang of Vets on the
'Wrightsville job. If you can get work outa them punchdrunks you can got
work out* anybody And I did.
"I've had enough stonecutting. ALsost all the guys that started with me
are disad or oo sick to work. Andreoli went last week. Oassandro is about
drne. katthewson is in the sanatorium bad. They're all gone." Dealt squinted
through cigarette smoke. "I oan't stand this ?PA much more. karia want*
me to go back to the sheds.
it looks like there's nothing much else. I
don't like the idea. I know what she doesn't know. I know I shouldn't out
no more stone...
"But Jesus k.hrist," Waal said. **hat's a man going to do? The girls
are gone but I got a boy growing up. I ain't gettin6 anywhere this way.
The boy can't have half what he floods, no more than Aaria can. And I can't
even buy a glass of beer after the rent and groceries are paid. Yes, I'll
go back to the sheds. cut store again.-- for awhile. If I can get
a job."