The Banished Children of Eve (2 page)

“Yeah,” he answers, “may he rest in peace.”

We continue: “Mr. James Dunne, ‘the Bowery Sphinx'?”

“Yeah, that's the plug he preferred. ‘His Holiness' was the cap I put on him. You don't look like no copper. What are ya? A reporter or somethin' like that?”

We confess, and our interrogee, having become interrogator, invites us inside to help us solve once and for all the riddle of the Sphinx.

T
HE ROOM WE ENTER
is long and narrow. Along the length of one wall stretches a bar of dark wood. The walls are stained with tobacco smoke, but are relieved, at intervals, by the framed images of various Tammany pharaohs. Indeed, here are the hieroglyphs of the New Kingdom's dynastic succession! Without even a word from our would-be
guide, we have part of the explanation behind the prominence of Mr. James Dunne, “the Bowery Sphinx.” These wall paintings tell us that, though we may think ourselves in humble surroundings, the Immortals have watered here, supped and imbibed with their supplicants, writing down on a small papyrus the brief messages that when taken to an office of the municipal government may result in a job, a contract, or perhaps even a commissionership.

The rotund gentleman at our elbow signals to the barman, and in an instant two glasses of whiskey are set before us. We pull out some coins and drop them onto the counter, where they make, no doubt, a familiar ring. Our companion lifts his glass and says, “Here it goes under the nose.” We put our glass to the lip, but take no sip.

The ritual done, we settle at last into fulfilling the purpose of this expedition. We mention that we saw in the paper several days ago a brief item on the passing of Mr. James Dunne, who was described as a longtime taverner known to customers and acquaintances by a title that had caused us no small wonder. How, we queried, did anyone in this cacophonous, garrulous quarter of the noisiest, most talkative town in the world get a reputation as a sphinx?

Q. Was he a mute [we continued]?

A. You mean, could he talk?

Q. Yes, could he talk?

A. Sure, he could jaw wid the best of 'em, when he wanted, but it was part of his beard that he handed out words like they was finniffs. It drew the crowds, I guess. Old man Dunne would run his velvet over his tombstones before he leans over and sez something like it's comin' from the gob of the Pope hisself.

At this point, we felt a twinge of sympathy with the first explorers among the antiquities of Egypt, who had been bewildered by the riddle of a language they had no key to understanding. What was a “finniff”? Why would one run velvet over a tombstone? The dilemma of those early
adventurers was given a solution, of course, by some soldiers of Napoléon's who, digging the foundation of a fort near the Rosetta Mouth of the Nile, came across a stone of black basalt that carried on it the Greek equivalents of the Egyptian characters. The mystery solved!

The aproned figure behind the bar, a small, bald man, proved our Rosetta stone. “Mike,” he said, pointing to our guide, “is a real Bowery mug. He thinks the whole world talks like they does around here.” The gist of the matter was, according to our barman–Rosetta stone, that Mr. Dunne was given to silence, and, as is often the case, whether deserved or not, some saw silence as the same as wisdom, and sought Mr. Dunne out. Mr. Dunne, usually solemn-faced, could always be found in the same chair by the window. When someone would sit next to him and ask for advice, he'd move his tongue across his teeth (“run his velvet over his tombstones”), think for a moment, and give them some small, sage piece of wisdom, or what, on the Bowery, is taken for wisdom.

Mr. Dunne had been the proprietor here for forty years or so (neither guide nor barman–Rosetta stone could say precisely how long). A remarkable tenure, indeed. But what of his origins? What had he done before running this august watering hole for the tribe of Tammany? What of his family? Barman–Rosetta stone looked at our guide. There was perplexity in both their faces. It seemed we had touched upon a question they had not considered before our arrival.

Our guide spoke first: “Now listen here, I'm not out to flog old man Dunne's ground sweat, let him and all the ‘faithfully departed,' as they sez, rest in peace, but to listen to all the talk you'd think it was some saint that died instead of a kiddie who stuffed the rhino and set hisself up in business before the booly dogs could lay a hand on him.”

The confusion must have been evident on our face, because our barman–Rosetta stone started interpreting before we even asked. No one really knew about Mr. Dunne's past. Some said he had set himself up as a taverner with the proceeds of a criminal career (“stuffed the rhino”) that he had landed before the
police (“booly dogs”) could apprehend him. But these theorists were merely maligning the dead (“flogging old man Dunne's ground sweat”). Nobody knew for sure.

“You could look it up,” our barman–Rosetta stone suggested. “If he ever served time, the police must have a sheet.” We considered it, but as we sat in the very seat where Mr. Dunne had sat for four decades and regarded the dull facades of ancient brick across the Bowery, we sensed that our expedition was coming to an end. The hard labor of that digging was best left to stronger backs than ours.

“There was a family,” he concluded. “They lived up on the North Side. Dunne would ride the El home every night. When he died, the widow came down here once to sign the papers when the place was sold. I heard she moved. Anyways, that was the only time I ever seen her.”

We bought a round of drinks for our hosts. The place was filling up, so we said our good-byes and went out into the cold sunlight that slanted down through the tracks above us. A train roared overhead.

The Sphinx could keep his secret, we decided. The city that bred him bore as little resemblance to the transriparian metropolis of our day as the mud huts of the primeval inhabitants of Egypt did to imperial Thebes. The sands of time had obliterated the landscape of his birth. And we, standing on the far side of that great desert, are unable to distinguish the truth of what was from the legend. Someday, perhaps, the archaeologists may turn up the bones of a creature with leonine as well as human features, and the Darwinists may draw from that discovery the ability to reach wider conclusions about the Sphinx and the world he inhabited. In this age, all things are possible. But for now, at least, the antiquarians and Egyptologists put aside their spades, and leave the Sphinx to his silence.

J
IMMY
D
UNNE FINGERED THE GLASS,
revolved it slowly in his hand. Whiskey lapped gently against the rim.

One of Dandy Dan's rules:
Never linger.

Sorry, Dan. No rule can't be broken. Said it himself and broke every one. Still, never tired of handing them out.

Outside the window of Mike Manning's Saloon, two currents flowed: the stronger away from the river, toward Chatham Square, Brooklyn trudging to work in Manhattan,
ferry load after ferry load; the other, lesser current toward the river, workingmen mostly, gangs of longshoremen on their way to the docks. At the corner of Cherry Street, the two streams collided and created a turbulent mix, like the waters of the Hell Gate.

Another rule:
Never
drink on the job.
God, that one Dandy Dan didn't just break but slipped on, an icy roof in January, too much whiskey, an iron railing shoved up through his jaw, poking out of his mouth. They said it was a sight, the crowds fighting to get close and catch a view, the booly dogs pushing them back.

The flow of the lesser current grew heavier, more longshoremen on their way to shape up for the morning shift. Those in need of a morning dose to get the shaking out of their hands and tame the confusion in their heads found their way into the warmth of Mike Manning's place. As soon as they arrived, Manning dispensed a line of shots. The whiskey rose to the rim, trembled, but didn't overflow. Without a word, Manning's customers lifted their glasses, the bottoms turned up toward the picture of Robert Emmet, Ireland's young martyr, his outstretched arm pointed toward the door.

Dunne watched the street. A cold, leaden mist clung to the waterfront and hung heavy with river smells, salt mixed with offal, smoke of coal furnaces and foundries, pungency of rotting fish. The customers, hunched over glasses that Manning instantly refilled, gathered at the end of the bar, close to the stove with its small pile of coals. An old man broke loose
and ran into the street. He retched into the gutter, wiped his mouth on his sleeve, and came back in. Manning refilled his glass. The man threw down the contents, blinked, closed his eyes.

Frail-looking, his face as serious as a priest's, Manning walked to the end of the bar, by the window. He glanced at Dunne's full glass with a tavern keeper's smile: involuntary grin, small and insincere. “'Tis a grim day on the River Styx,” he said.

The whistle of the Catherine Street ferry gave three short shrieks.

Dunne nodded.
Christ, it was places like this Dandy Dan ended his days, shebeens that in better times he wouldn't have stopped to piss in.
A man is knowed by the company he keeps.
The Gospel according to Dan.

Manning lifted the brimming glass in front of Dunne and wiped the bar with his rag. “Yer up early.”

Dunne nodded again. He kept looking out the window. Could do it all day. The first thing he had done when he came back from the West was find a stool, pull it to a window, and stare. He drew a thrill from the continual press of people, the endless traffic, the ceaseless hurry, but what exactly that thrill was he couldn't say. Something to do with what the gold seekers found in California, whether they struck it rich or not: the assurance that, though poor, they lived amid great possibilities.

A woman carrying an umbrella strolled up to the window, stopped, and leaned forward, the plume on her hat touching the glass as she peered in. She had the face of a dockside whore, white as a ghost, a layer of Lady Emily Bowden's Face Creme and Emulsifier to cover the sores and pockmarks. Her lips were apple red.

Manning waved her away. She stuck her tongue out. “Bloody whores,” he said. “A dog has more shame, and you'd be better in a dog's company. No dog ever caused
a man to be robbed, his lifeless body tossed into the river.” Manning shook his head. “The way they're multiplying, they'll soon be more whores in this city than men.”

The tavern keeper's smile returned to Manning's face. He tapped the bottom of the whiskey bottle against the bar. “Drink up,” he said. “The next is on me.” He went back to the other patrons. When he returned, he said in an offhanded way, “Is it a job you're going to?”

“Coming from.”

“Nights you work, is it?”

“Last night I worked the entire time, from the moment her husband left till the dawn's early light.”

“Whose husband?” Manning asked. He seemed confused.

Dunne winked. “I'm not one to give out names. The seal of the confessional is what I work under, at least when it comes to the ladies. No names and never any addresses.”

“Ach, you're one of those,” Manning said.

“One of what?”

“A squiffer, that's what, all dressed up for the ladies, doesn't matter whether they're married or not, no respect for the state of matrimony.”

“And you take no interest in skirts?”

“My younger days, well, I danced a few dances; but I've left the floor, prefer to sit and listen to the music. Far less dangerous, both for the soul as for the body.” Manning turned and walked back to the other end of the bar.

Dunne stuck a finger into the glass, then sucked it. Bitter as oil, it stung his mouth. Knew he should have changed his clothes before he came. Be a gentleman among gentlemen. A workingman among workingmen. A Roman in Rome. Never stand out. But there hadn't been time to go back to the hotel.
More of Dandy Dan's advice disregarded.

Manning pretended to gaze out the window, a vacant stare, but his attention was concentrated on Dunne, the mathematical brain trying to add up the several visits Dunne had paid to these premises. Most times he had come
in the early evening; this was the only morning visit. First time he saw him, Manning thought he might be a detective hired by one of the employers' associations to spy on the longshoremen, listen to them talk, and take it back to the bosses. Or maybe an agent from the Provost Marshal's office on the lookout for deserters. Either case, an omen of these disturbed and troubled times. But he never seemed much interested in who came and went or what they said. Nursed a single drink while sitting on a stool by the window. Always turned aside a conversation. Hard to figure.

Manning ran his rag over the bar in the same unthinking way he smiled when he poured a drink.

Across the street, on the northwest corner of Cherry and Catherine, the clerks of the Brooks Brothers store stood in the doorway waiting for the manager to appear and let them in. They poked out their heads and looked at the sky.

“Could save them the trouble of looking,” Manning said. “These bones of mine got the marrow of prophecy in them. They can tell whatever weather is coming, wet or dry, and can't remember a time they told me wrong.”