The Spiked Heel

Their friendship had been a curious one in that Danny was some six years younger than Griff, and six years can make a hell of a lot of difference in early childhood. Griff was twelve when Danny moved into the teeming Puerto Rican-Irish slum that was 138th Street and Bruckner Boulevard, in the Bronx. They discovered almost instantly that they had one thing in common, a split Welsh-Irish ancestry. Griff’s father was Welsh, his mother Irish. The reverse applied to Danny’s parents. The ancestral bond somehow destroyed the barrier of years. Griff would sit on the front stoop of his tenement for hours on end, telling his mother’s stories of the old country, stories about goblins and leprechauns and good fairies, while Danny listened in wide-eyed wonder. Having no brothers or sisters of his own, Griff adopted the skinny kid with the blue eyes, protecting him in street fights, insisting that he be allowed to play with the older boys. Danny was a grateful kid, even if he was out of his league. Valiantly, he tried to keep up with Griff in the neighborhood games of Ring-a-leavio, Johnny-on-a-pony, Kick the Can, I Declare War. When a stickball game was started in one of the side streets off 138th, Danny was always a participant, usually in the least desired position of catcher. But he was always there, out of breath, true, and Griff watched over him like a patron saint.

When Griff and the older boys discovered sex, Danny was left behind somewhat. There was a sixteen-year-old Puerto Rican girl in the neighborhood, and her name was Ida, and she was well known. Griff, together with the other boys who were approaching adulthood, discovered Ida, and they discovered that Ida had sisters who were not related to her by blood. The sisters were not all Puerto Rican. Some of the sisters were Irish, and there was somehow something more honorable about lifting the skirts of an Irish lass, even though Griff had been painfully aware of his mother’s ancestry that first time with Mary Murphy. He learned the way of the gutter, and he learned it well, but he was always conscious of the undesirability of his environment, wondering why he had to live where he lived, surrounded by poverty and squalor, unable to reconcile the charming handsome ways of his father with the man’s curious inability to earn more money than he was earning.

He read a lot, partly to escape the dull reality of the tenements, partly in an attempt to better himself, somehow raise himself above what was around him. His grades in school were good. His teachers considered him a well-mannered, studious boy. His mother often talked of his becoming a priest. Her brother had been a priest in the old country, and she considered service to God the worthiest profession. Griff, however, was not a particularly religious child. He had received his First Communion at the age of seven, when he’d barely understood the mystery of the Mass or the meaning of sin. He had been confirmed at ten, his Uncle Roger serving as his godfather, and presenting him later with a Mickey Mouse watch. The confirmation had been disappointing. Griff had heard tall stories about the slap the priest gave you when he confirmed you. The slap was supposed to be a mighty thing, a thing that nearly knocked you off your feet, a test of manhood. Contrary to what he’d heard in the streets, the priest practically stroked his cheek when he gave Griff his middle name. The test was disappointing. He’d been hit harder when the fellows were just clowning around on the front stoop.

Later, when he had known Ida, and Mary, and a redheaded spirited buxom kid of fifteen named Betty, when he had known real sin, he could never again listen to his mother talk about “the call” with any amount of seriousness. He had learned about life in the gutter; he could not for a moment believe the celebrated, celibate fortress of the priest was a reality. He knew reality. He did not plan on entering the priesthood. He planned, instead, on going on to college. Meredith Griffin died when Griff was sixteen. He had never been a good money-maker, but he had been a fine man, and Griff was honestly broken up by his father’s death. His mother, religious as she was, realized that a breadwinner was a more desirable asset at this stage of the game than a man of God would be. When Griff came to her with his first working papers, she dutifully signed them.

He started his career at Julien Kahn, the first place he worked, the only place he ever worked.