Brooklyn Page 0,57
a single bit.”
“So where are you from?”
“I’m from Brooklyn,” he said, “but my mom and dad are from Italy.”
“And what were you doing—”
“I know,” he interrupted. “I heard about the Irish dance and I thought I’d go and look at it and I liked it.”
“Do the Italians not have dances?”
“I knew you were going to ask me that.”
“I’m sure they’re wonderful.”
“I could take you some night but you would have to be warned. They behave like Italians all night.”
“Is that good or bad?”
“I don’t know, but bad because if I had gone to an Italian dance I wouldn’t be walking you home now.”
They continued in silence until they reached the front of Mrs. Kehoe’s house.
“Can I collect you next week? Maybe get something to eat first?”
Eilis realized that this invitation would mean that she could go to the dance without having to take the feelings of any of her fellow lodgers into account. Even for Mrs. Kehoe, she thought, it would serve as an excuse not to have to accompany Dolores.
Later, during the week, as she was making her way from Bartocci’s to Brooklyn College, she forgot what she was looking forward to; sometimes she actually believed that she was looking forward to thinking about home, letting images of home roam freely in her mind, but it came to her now with a jolt that, no, the feeling she had was only about Friday night and being collected from the house by a man she had met and going to the dance with him in the hall, knowing that he would be walking her back to Mrs. Kehoe’s afterwards. She had been keeping the thought of home out of her mind, letting it come to her only when she wrote or received letters or when she woke from a dream in which her mother or father or Rose or the rooms of the house on Friary Street or the streets of the town had appeared. She thought it was strange that the mere sensation of savouring the prospect of something could make her think for a while that it must be the prospect of home.
Around Mrs. Kehoe’s table, Eilis’s ditching of Dolores, which Patty, having fully witnessed, informed the others about before breakfast on Saturday morning, meant that they were all speaking to her again, including Dolores herself, who viewed being ditched, since it had resulted in Eilis meeting a man, as eminently reasonable. In return for this view, Dolores wanted only to know about the boyfriend himself, his name, for example, and his occupation, and when Eilis intended to see him again. All of the other lodgers had scrutinized him carefully as well; they thought him handsome, they said, although Miss McAdam might have wished him taller, and Patty did not like his shoes. All of them presumed that he was Irish, or of Irish origin, and all of them begged Eilis to tell them about him, what he had said to her that made her dance the second set with him and if she was going to the dance the following Friday night and if she expected to see him there.
The following Thursday evening, when she went downstairs to make herself a cup of tea, she met Mrs. Kehoe in the kitchen.
“There’s a lot of giddiness in the house at the moment,” Mrs. Kehoe said. “That Diana has a terrible voice, God help her. If she squeals once more, I’ll have to get the doctor or the vet to give her something to calm her down.”
“It’s the dancing is doing it to them,” Eilis said drily.
“Well, I’m going to ask Father Flood to preach a sermon on the evils of giddiness,” Mrs. Kehoe said. “And maybe he might mention a few more things in his sermon.”
Mrs. Kehoe left the room.
On Friday evening at eight thirty Tony rang on the front door bell, and, before Eilis could escape from the basement door and alert him to the impending danger, the door was answered by Mrs. Kehoe. By the time Eilis reached the front door, as Tony told her later, Mrs. Kehoe had asked him several questions, including his full name, his address and his profession.
“That’s what she called it,” he said. “My profession.”
He grinned as though nothing as amusing had ever occurred to him in his life.
“Is she your mom?” he asked.
“I told you that my mom, as you call her, is in Ireland.”
“So you did, but that woman looked like she owned you.”
“She’s my landlady.”
“She’s a lady all