法蘭克的母親安琪拉在唸完九年級後﹐試著去當女佣不成﹐她的母親給她錢到美國


來。





她抵達紐約的時候正是經濟大蕭條的第一個感恩節。她在丹和蜜妮夫婦所舉辦的派


對中遇見了 Malachy。當時 Malachy 因搶奪卡車坐了三個月的牢才出獄。兩情相


悅﹐發生了關係﹐安琪拉懷了孕。安琪拉的兩個表姐迪麗亞和菲蘿蜜娜對於安琪拉


未婚就懷孕﹐要採取必要的行動。





這兒描寫 Malachy 搶劫卡車以為裡頭是滿車的豆子和豬肉罐頭﹐不料卻是衣服的


紐釦﹐真是很有喜感。文中描述安琪拉那兩位大胸脯的表姐﹐也是非常的生動。





(2007-02-16)                        














【附錄原文】





And the child was named Angela for the Angelus which rang the midnight hour, 


the New Year, the minute of her coming and because she was a little angel 


anyway.





	Love her as in childhood


	Though feeble, old and grey.


	For you’ll never miss a mother’s love


	Till she’s buried beneath the clay.





At the St. Vincent de Paul School, Angela learned to read, write, and calculate 


and by her ninth year her schooling was done. She tried her hand at being a 


charwoman, a skivvy, a maid with a little white hat opening doors, but she 


could not manage the little curtsy that is required and her mother said, You 


don’t have the knack of it. You’re pure useless. Why don’t you go to America 


where there’s room for all sorts of uselessness? I’ll give you the fare.





She arrived in New York just in time for the first Thanksgiving Day of the 


Great Depression. She met Malachy at a party by Dan MacAdorey and his wife, 


Minnie, on Classon Avenue in Brooklyn. Malachy liked Angela and she liked him. 


He had a hangdog look, which came from the three months he had just spent 


in jail for hijacking a truck. He and his friend John McErlaine believed what they 


were told in the speakeasy, that the truck was packed to the roof with cases 


of canned pork and beans. Neither knew how to drive and when the police saw 


the truck lurch and jerk along Myrtle Avenue they pulled it over. The police 


searched the truck and wondered why anyone would hijack a truck containing, 


not pork and beans, but cases of buttons.





With Angela drawn to the hangdog look and Malachy lonely after three months 


in jail, there was bound to be a knee-trembler.





A knee-trembler is the act itself done up against a wall, man and woman up on 


their toes, straining so hard their knees tremble with the excitement that’s in it.





That knee-trembler put Angela in an interesting condition and, of course, there 


was talk. Angela had cousins, the MacNamara sisters, Delia and Philomena, 


married, respectively, to Jimmy Fortune of County Mayo, and Tommy Flynn, 


of Brooklyn itself.





Delia and Philomena were large women, great-breasted and fierce. When they 


sailed along the sidewalks of Brooklyn lesser creatures stepped aside, respect 


was shown. The sisters knew what was right and they knew what was wrong 


and any doubts could be resolved by the One, Holy, Roman, Catholic and 


Apostolic Church. They knew that Angela, unmarried, had no right to be in an 


interesting condition and they would take steps.