Eddie understands the code of silence that is central to community life and the impact of breaking it but his weakness for Catherine, who falls in love with Rodolpho, leads ironically to him doing the same thing by betraying him and Marco to immigration.
When Marco and Rodolpho arrive Catherine is immediately attracted to him. Rodolpho asks her to dance symbolically taking her from Eddie. By the end of the scene the stage directions record Eddie’s disapproval and growing jealousy as ‘his face is puffed with trouble’. This is reinforced by the lawyer, Alfieri, who acts as a commentator telling the story in flashback:
Now as the weeks passed there was a future,
a trouble that would not go away.
Alfieri points out that Rodolpho’s arrival and Catherine’s feelings for him form the turning point which seals Eddie’s fate as his jealousy grows, poisoning him and his family.
Eddie’s feelings for Catherine cause him to find fault with Rodolpho. He suspects first of all that Rodolpho is using Catherine to become ‘a citizen’. This is articulated most clearly in a conversation he has with Alfieri:
This guy ain’t worried. This guy is here. So it
must be he’s got it all laid out in his mind already –
he’s stayin’. Right?
If this were the case Eddie would be right to be concerned for Catherine’s future happiness but Eddie’s evidence is weak. Rodolpho is spending his money rather than ‘putting it in a sock’ but Rodolpho is a young man dazzled by the consumerism of America compared to the extreme poverty of Italy. He admits he would rather stay than go back. We can see things from the points of view of both men but suspect that Eddie’s feelings for Catherine are affecting his judgment.
Secondly he tells Alfieri he thinks Rodolpho is homosexual. His evidence is that Rodolpho sings in high voice, cooks and makes dresses, which goes against Eddie’s macho Italian culture. However the same conversation reveals something much deeper:
When I think of that guy layin’ his hands on
her I could – I mean it’s eatin’ me out, Mr Alfieri.
The unacknowledged truth is that Eddie cannot bear the idea of Catherine with anyone. The metaphor ‘eatin me out’ suggests that Eddie is slowly being destroyed by his feelings.
Eddie’s feelings raise the tension in his household as he comes into direct conflict with Rodolpho. He offers to teach him to box in front of Catherine. This is a ruse to allow him to physically hurt him and show how manly he is compared to the ‘effeminate’ Rodolpho. When he hits him too hard Catherine takes Rodolpho’s side:
CATHERINE: (rushing to Rodolpho) Eddie!
Catherine’s voice contains a rebuke and her reaction indicates that further actions like this by Eddie will drive Catherine away rather than bring her closer to him. This is also the first time we see a reaction from Marco. He replies to Eddie’s physicality in kind by lifting a chair by the leg with one hand – a feat of considerable strength – to warn Eddie what will happen if he touches Rodolpho. This foreshadows the final conflict between Eddie and Marco.
In Act 2 the pace of events quickens. Eddie returns to the house drunk to find Rodolpho and Catherine coming out of the bedroom. He loses all control as he kisses each of them in turn. His kiss for Catherine suggests he is fulfilling his unspoken love for her as his inhibitions are down. The second is to prove to her that Rodolpho is homosexual by showing he enjoys the kiss. Later, as Eddie talks again to Alfieri he is convinced that Rodolpho ‘didn’t give me the right kind of fight’ but this is only Eddie’s perception rather than the truth. His actions are those of desperate man unable to see the truth of his own feelings and transferring their forbidden nature onto Rodolpho.
This is the climax of Eddie’s story as the only course left to him in his eyes is betrayal. It is ironic that the earlier kisses now echo the betrayal of Christ by Judas. The stage directions tell us that ‘a phone booth begins to glow . . . a faint, lonely blue’. The temptation to phone immigration to ‘snitch’ on Rodolpho overcomes Eddie and he takes this step from which there is no turning back. Eddie has betrayed his principles, Catherine who loves Rodolpho, Beatrice whose cousins they are and his community which values honour and the code of silence.
Eddie’s actions have bigger repercussions than he imagined. However, Eddie does not know that Rodolpho and Marco have moved in with a neighbour who is already keeping two other immigrants. When he hears he is panic-stricken telling Catherine as the officers arrive to ‘Go up the fire escape and get them out over the back fence’. At this point Catherine knows what Eddie has done:
(She stands a moment staring at him in a realized horror)
The stage directions show her recognition of Eddie’s betrayal which separates her from him forever. However his action goes much further than this because he has also betrayed Marco:
That one! He killed my children! That one stole the food
from my children!
Marco publicly accuses Eddie of betraying him. His anger is understandable on two levels: firstly Eddie has acted dishonourably and secondly Marco will be deported and as a result his children ‘will never grow up’ as they are starving in Sicily. Eddie’s action took no account of Marco’s situation. His jealousy blinded him to the wider effects of his betrayal and this makes his crime worse in our eyes and those of the community.
Despite his obvious betrayal Eddie refuses to accept that he is guilty. Just as he denied his feelings for Catherine he denies his actions:
I want my name. . . Marco’s got my name . . . and he’s gonna
give it back to me in front of this whole neighbourhood,
or we have it out.
He is asking for something he does not deserve and can never get back. Moreover, he worsens the situation by challenging Marco to a fight. This leads to the climax of the play when Eddie pays for his character flaw.
The climax of the play is like the "showdown" at the end of a western. Marco is coming to punish Eddie:
Animal! You go on your knees to me!
Eddie in return will demand his "name" back. Marco believes it is dishonourable to let Eddie live, but has given his word to Alfieri not to kill him. Eddie's pulling a knife means that Marco can see justice done, while keeping his word. Again the action is symbolic of the play's deeper meaning. Eddie literally dies by his own hand, which holds the knife, and is killed by his own weapon; but Eddie also metaphorically destroys himself, over the whole course of the play.
Alfieri's last speech tries to explain the mystery of Eddie's character. Most of us, says Alfieri, are "civilized": we suppress our basic desires for the overall good of the community. Eddie could not do this and his death is "useless" as it should have been avoidable. Yet ‘Alfieri expresses his admiration for Eddie as he made himself ‘wholly known’. Most of us, unlike Eddie, are more educated, more sophisticated, more in control and can either hide our feelings or, better, overcome them. Eddie, in a sense, was in the end true to himself.
Eddie is a modern tragic hero: an essentially good man destroyed by a flaw in his character - his obsession. His inability to compromise and recognise the obsession within him blinded him to the effect of his actions on his family and community.
