Suds In Your Eye Read Free

ornate brass bed occupied the position of honor. Near it was a bureau, a platform rocker, and a small round table. At the other end of the bed was another huge rocker upholstered in red leather. Pushed as close as it would go to the shelves that lined the opposite wall stood the piano. The ancient upright had been rejuvenated by a coat of violent red lacquer; judging by the stains on the keys and the number of cigarette bums, it had come out of some bar. The front of the piano was missing entirely, both above and below the keyboard.
    ‘Set down and drink your beer!’ Mrs. Feeley urged hospitably. Miss Tinkham didn’t need much urging. In her haste she swallowed the first mouthful too fast; her haste resulted in a long-drawn burp which she struggled valiantly to conceal.
    ‘Excuse me!’ she apologized.
    ‘Think nothin’ of it!’ said Mrs. Feeley. ‘It’s stronger than water that raises the wind!’ While putting her guest at ease Mrs. Feeley was thinking: Ah! Drinking beer on an empty stomach! Just as I thought! Not a penny to bless herself with in that fine bead bag!
    She trotted to the back of the room and came back with a big red can of crackers under her arm, a hunk of jack cheese in one hand, and a knife in the other. She plumped them down on the table and whacked off a slice of cheese, which she passed to her guest on a cracker.
    ‘Here!’ she said. ‘My guts generally starts growlin’ ’bout this time if I don’t have my little mornin’ snack!’
    ‘What a rare, rare sense of humor you possess, dear Mrs. Feeley! The true Celtic wit!’
    ‘Well, we ain’t in this world for long, so we might’s well laugh while we are here! Drink your beer: there’s more where that come from….Feel like givin’ us a tune?’ she queried, waving her glass at the piano.
    ‘Indeed I do,’ said Miss Tinkham. After adjusting the stool carefully to the right height, she tucked her handkerchief into a corner of the battered keyboard and announced her selection.
    ‘I shall play for you,’ she said, enunciating with exaggerated clarity, ‘“The Two Larks,” by Letchy Tissky’; and she did. She played with much arching of wrists, crossing of hands, and other dainty flourishes. Between the notes Miss Tinkham muffed, and the notes that wouldn’t sound on the piano, the two larks emerged in a rather moulting condition. But Mrs. Feeley was not critical.
    ‘Gawd! That’s wonderful!’ she cried, clapping her hard little hands. ‘Say, with them boards missin’ a body can see them little hammers flyin’ up an’ down on the strings! You sure give ’em hell!’ she added warmly.
    ‘That’s sweet of you, my dear! But I’m afraid I’m a little out of practice. I haven’t played in two or three months, not since the last party up at Spanish class. But they gave me an ovation that night! A regular ovation!’
    Mrs. Feeley was not at all sure what an ovation was, but it must be all right judging by the rapt expression on Miss Tinkham’s face.
    ‘Why was you playin’ in Spanish class?’
    ‘Oh, it wasn’t right in class, though we frequently sing songs in class! It was at a party. We often have parties; refreshments, too! Do you speak Spanish, Mrs. Feeley?’ she inquired.
    ‘Well, in my business you pick up a word here an’ there, but I wouldn’t say it was exactly parlor Spanish!’
    ‘Really, my dear, you should come to the class. The teacher is delightful: never scolds if you don’t bring up your homework. There are about thirty of us in the class and we have the loveliest discussions! Last week our teacher read us a poem about a cockroach and a cat by Mr. Don Marquis, and the week before that we had a colored movie of a yacht cruise to Acapulco. Most cultural, dear Mrs. Feeley, especially at a time like this when we should all be interested in the Good Neighbor Policy.’
    ‘Yeup! My friend Mrs. Rasmussen told me about them classes. She went up there to get her citizen, long ago before her husband died.