The Foreign Service Journal, July-August 2004

times rent the storefront to a family at some negligible rent like $5 a month, or maybe even no rent at all. “Otherwise the store would stand empty,” some owners would say, as if the families were not objects of their charity, but rather were doing the owners a favor by occupying the stores. Dad said it was a Christian act, done by store owners who were often Jewish. The fam- ilies had to pay for heat and electricity if they wanted them and could do so, but sometimes the landlord would even neglect to bill them for the utilities. “Mr. Quillen has come home drunk again and is beating up his wife,” Dad continued. Redface had looked in and tried to quiet Mr. Quillen, but there was nothing else Redface could do. The policy of the police and the courts in New York City was clear and simple: Do not interfere in domestic troubles. “A man is the ruler in his own home.” Dad said Redface was bound to either follow this policy or be fired, though he knew it was cruel and stupid. Redface had often tried to reason with Quillen when he was sober as well as drunk. The priests of St. Vincent’s had tried many times also, but nothing could stop his drinking, or help Mrs. Quillen in her purgato- ry. “So it’s up to us, lad, to do what we can to bring peace in the home,” Dad concluded. When they got there, the baby was asleep in a cot and Maureen Quillen was sitting on a stool at the counter in the front of the store. The rear of the store was partitioned off, with a door leading to a bedroom and a toilet. Tim’s heart began to pound when he heard cursing and screaming, and the sickening sound of fists hitting flesh, coming from the closed-off rear of the store. “Tim, you know Miss Quillen. Why don’t the two of you go over some of your lessons? I’ll be going back to visit with the folks. I won’t be long.” Dad closed the door after himself as he stepped into the rear area. T im wasn’t worried about his dad getting hurt; he knew he could take care of himself. Dad was fore- man of a street gang laying gas pipe for the Brooklyn Union Gas Company. He loved to tell his boys about how he had to separate his Irish immigrant workers into street gangs by their county of origin in Ireland. Otherwise there would be constant fighting among them. Dad was a Mayo man, and also a weekend club fighter — at smokers, Knights of Columbus bazaars, men’s gatherings — making $10 if he won his four rounds, five bucks if he lost. Dad didn’t lose often. It was an easy way to make extra money beyond his $35 a week as foreman — as long as you kept in shape. One of Dad’s semipro fighter buddies, “Jerry Levine, The Fighting Marine,” came to dinner from time to time. Dad told Tim that Jerry could be world welterweight champion if he wanted, but he refused to fight on Friday nights for religious reasons, and there- fore had to pass up the best bouts. “Why? What’s a religious reason?” Tim had asked. “It’s like we Catholics won’t eat meat on Friday — it’s a sacrilege that we will burn in hell for, if we do it. Just know, lad, that the man is a saint, because he won’t do something against his beliefs, even though he would profit from it,” Dad had explained. Jerry was as sweet and gentle a man as you could ever hope to meet. Dad said that all really good fight- ers were gentle like Jerry, probably for two reasons: first, they get rid of their base instincts, their native male aggression, through fighting; and, second, they abhor chance violence through fear of breaking their knuckles on someone’s jaw, and having to stop boxing and lose money until the fractures heal. Y eah, Tim knew Maureen from school. She was a little runty kid, watery eyes and runny nose. None of the other girls were friends with her. She had black hair and a round, red face and was very shy, always hanging her head and never looking directly at you. Tim remembered that the last time Sister had slapped Maureen, her left cheek had turned white and stayed that way for a few minutes from the impact. All the guys resented it when a nun hit a girl — hitting a boy was undoubtedly deserved, but girls were entitled to a certain amount of dignity and were seldom struck. If they were, their mothers would be right up to complain to the pastor. But nobody seemed to care when Maureen Quillen was slapped. Anticipating graduation in June, all the eighth- F O C U S J U LY- A U G U S T 2 0 0 4 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 33 Francis Xavier Cunningham is a chemist and solid pro- pellant rocket scientist who joined the Foreign Service in 1973. After postings to Brussels, Manila and Cairo, an assignment in INR and a detail to NASA headquar- ters, he retired in 1992. He is currently a WAE, work- ing on electronic document review.