Amiable with Big Teeth by Claude McKay

Author:Claude McKay
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2017-01-23T15:14:20+00:00

14

PEIXOTA’S HUMILIATION

Pablo Peixota and Dorsey Flagg had left the scene of the demonstration immediately after speaking, before the disorder occurred. The Sufi, despite his bizarrerie, was a stimulating tonic to the Harlem kraal, they both agreed. So long as they were not wholly unconscionable fakers, men like Sufi Abdul Hamid and Professor Koazhy were performing a real service to their people, filling that lacuna in their lives which the privileged world had studiedly neglected.

Peixota went home to dinner. He had another engagement for the later part of the evening. The Good Old Pals of which he was a member were having a pig knuckles feed and card game. He had promised and wanted to attend. The Good Old Pals was Peixota’s pet club. It was founded long before he became a wealthy man by a group of young men, elevator runners and others, who were close associates. Now they were really “old” pals. Most of them were married and had children and only two of fifteen members were still operating an elevator. But every three months they got together in a midnight stag party to play cards until dawn.

The secretary and leading spirit of the club was at one time one of Peixota’s most trusted lieutenants in the policy game.1 Now he was the owner of a restaurant. Another lieutenant of Peixota’s who was a member was the proprietor of a flourishing little cigar and candy store, and it was said that he still held a small kingship in the policy. Another member was the proprietor of a bar and grill. One of the Good Old Pals had plodded through many years to become a lawyer and he was the only professional member.

For a decade, starting in during the hey-day of the Prohibition era, when money started coming easy to Peixota, he had provided the liquor for the get-together. As the wealthiest man of the Old Pals Peixota made this contribution with a generous gesture, always sending plenty and a variety of good liquor. It was such acts—remembrance of old friends and treating them just as in the past—which caused many Harlemites to be so loyal and ever ready to defend him.

The Good Old Pals were meeting at the home of their secretary. He lived in a private house, renting some of the rooms. His wife and daughter had carefully prepared the basement rooms for the event. They cooked the pig knuckles and left them simmering on the stove. They set the dishes and plates on the buffet, with dill pickles, horseradish, olives and bread. They set out a package of paper napkins. And when everything was perfect, mother and daughter went off to a midnight show, leaving the Good Old Pals to enjoy themselves as if they were a secret fraternity.

Twelve of the Old Pals were already there when Peixota arrived. His coming perceptibly changed the spirit of the atmosphere. Because although the others had started to play cards and had had something to drink, their mood was like actors doing minor roles as a preliminary to the appearance of the principal.

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