103rd Street Boys

The hipster-bebop junkies never showed at 103rd Street. The 103rd Street boys were all oldtimers – thin, sallow faces; bitter twisted mouths; stiff-fingered, stylized gestures. (There is a junk gesture that marks the junky like the limp wrist marks the fag: the hand swings out from the elbow stiff-fingered, palm up) They were of various nationalities and physical types, but they all looked alike somehow. They all lookеd like junk. There was Irish, Gеorge the Greek, Pantopon Rose, Louie the Bellhop, Eric the Fag, the Beagle, the Sailor, and Joe the Mex. Several of them are dead now, others are doing time.

There are no more junkies at 103rd and Broadway waiting for the connection. The connection has gone somewhere else. But the feel of junk is still there. It hits you at the corner, follows you along the block, then falls away like a discouraged panhandler as you walk on.

Joe the Mex had a thin face with a long, sharp, twitchy nose and a down-curving, toothless mouth. Joe’s face was lined and ravaged, but not old. Things had happened to his face, but Joe was not touched. His eyes were bright and young. There was a gentleness about him com­mon to many oldtime junkies. You could spot Joe blocks away. In the anonymous city crowd, he stood out sharp and clear, as though you were seeing him through binoculars. He was a liar, and like most liars, he was constantly chang­ing his stories, altering time and personnel from one telling to the next. One time he would tell a story about some friend, next time he would switch the story around to give himself the lead. He would sit in the cafeteria over coffee and pound cake, talking at random about his experiences.

“We knew this Chinaman has some stuff stashed, and we try every way to make him tell us where it is. We have him tied to a chair. I light matches" – he made a gesture of lighting a match – "and put them under his feet. He won’t say nothing. I feel so sorry for that man. Then my partner hit him in the face with his gun and the blood run all down his face." He put his hands over his face and drew them down to indicate the flow of blood. “When I see that I turn sick at my stomach and I say, 'Let’s get out of here and leave the man alone. He ain’t going to tell us nothing.' "

Louie was a shoplifter who had lost what nerve he ever had. He wore a long, shabby, black overcoat that gave him the look of a furtive buzzard. Thief and junky stuck out all over him. Louie had a hard time making it. I heard that at one time he had been a stool pigeon, but at the time I knew him he was generally considered right. George the Greek did not like Louie and said he was just a bum. "Don’t ever invite him to your home, he’ll take ad­vantage: He’ll go on the nod in front of your family. He’s got no class to him."

George the Greek was the admitted arbiter of this set. He decided who was right and who was wrong. George prided himself on his integrity. "I never beat nobody."

George was a three-time loser. The next time meant life as an habitual criminal. So his life narrowed down to the necessity of avoiding any serious involvements. No push­ing, no stealing; he worked from time to time on the docks. He was hemmed in on every side and there was no way for him to go but down. When he couldn’t get junk – which was about half the time – he drank and took goof balls.

He had two adolescent sons who gave him a lot of trouble. George was half-sick most of the time in this period of scarcity, and no match for these young louts. His face bore the marks of a constant losing fight. The last time I was in New York I couldn’t find George. The 103rd Street boys are scattered now and no one I talked to knew what happened to George the Greek.

Fritz the Janitor was a pale thin little man who gave the impression of being crippled. He was on parole after doing five years because he scored for a pigeon. The pigeon was hard up for someone to turn in, and the narcotics agent urgently needed to make an arrest. Between them they built Fritz up to a big-time dope peddler, and smashed a narcotics ring with his arrest. Fritz was glad to attract so much attention and he talked complacently about his “nickel" in Lexington.

The Fag was a brilliantly successful lush-worker. His scores were fabulous. He was the man who gets to a lush first, never the man who arrives on the scene when the lush is lying there with his pockets turned inside out. A sleeping lush – known as a «flop» in the trade – attracts a hierarchy of scavengers. First come the top lush-workers like the Fag, guided by a special radar. They only want cash, good rings, and watches. Then come the punks who will steal anything. They take the hat, shoes, and belt. Finally, brazen, clumsy thieves will try to pull the lush’s overcoat or jacket off him.

The Fag was always first on a good lush. One time he scored for a thousand dollars at the 103rd Street Station. Often his scores ran into the hundreds. If the lush woke up, he would simper and feel the man’s thigh as though his intentions were sexual. From this trick he got his moniker.

He always dressed well, usually in tweed sport coats and gray flannels. A European charm of manner and a slight Scandinavian accent completed his front. No one could have looked less like a lush-roller. He always worked alone. His luck was good and he was determined to avoid contamination. Sometimes, contact with the lucky can change a man’s run of bad luck, but generally it works the other way. Junkies are an envious lot. 103rd Street envied the Fag his scores. But everyone had to admit he was a right guy, and always good for a small touch.