Edith kept her navy blue topcoat on as long as she could. The dress underneath had never been stylish, even when it was new, and it was certainly not that now. She looked across at him. In fifteen years, he hadn’t gained a pound. Perhaps he was even trimmer now than when his perfect swimmer’s body had addled her brains. “Doyle,” she managed. “It’s perfectly obvious you’ve let yourself go to seed. For shame.”
Doyle smiled, said “Coffee?” She nodded, so he said to the waitress by their table, “One coffee, one tea. And the coffee …” He hesitated only a moment. “Cream, no sugar.” He looked at Edith. “I remember right?”
How could you not be impressed? Edith said as much.
Doyle laughed. “Funny, y’know,” Doyle said. “I knew back at Yale all those assholes could outgrind me, but I always was one hundred sure I’d end up ahead. On account of I remember reading an article about this top bartender once, and he said that the secret of success was remembering a customer’s name because once you had their name they were yours for life.”
“So you decided to remember how everyone liked their coffee, is that it?” Edith said. “Dale Carnegie insists there’s more to it than that.” She could not quite grab the name of the girl Doyle had married. It was hotel money though; that much she was sure.
“Okay, fifteen years in thirty seconds, you wanna go first or me?”
Their order came. Edith gestured for Doyle to begin.
“Well, I married Angie Florsheim and we live in Miami—we both still live there, but not together. Pfffffft. I see the kids though. And I run the business.”
“A hotel or something?” Edith said
“Before I arrived it was ‘a’ hotel. It is now, believe me, many.”
“That’s wonderful, Doyle.”
“I know things, Edith. I got a sense for the public pulse, you know what I mean?”
Edith indicated that she did.
“I decided to diversify. I knew one thing: Miami’s a cycle town and the hotel’s a cycle business. So, I went into an amusement park operation. I bought into a shopping center. I bought boats for chartering. I…”
Edith stirred her coffee, staring at the liquid now, listening to him. I and I and I and I and I… She took a sip, smiled at him, hoped the fact that her eyes were glazing over was reasonably well hidden. Dear God, what in the world would we have talked about for fifteen years?
“Me?” she said when he finally asked her resume. “Just a housewife. Three girls. And I do a little painting when I can,”
He reached across the table now, momentarily took her hand. “We had some fantastic times, remember?”
“Doyle, you broke my heart, remember?”
“I didn’t and you know it.”
“I most certainly do know it, and the only reason you might not is you weren’t there when you did it. I came down to New Haven expecting you to meet me and there was your roommate with the news that you were going into the hotel business.”
Doyle raised his right hand. “I always tried to let girls down easy,” he said. “It was best the way I did it.”
“It was chicken; I distinctly remember thinking that at the time.”
“Well, it all worked out great. I’m in great shape and you’re bearing up pretty good yourself from the looks of things. You married that tall guy on the rebound, huh?”
“Those things happen.”
“And it’s been great?”
Edith thought very carefully before she answered. She spoke then with some precision: “Not great, but never less than good. And getting better every year. Those things happen too.”
“He never knew about us, did he?”
“Never.”
“I always tried to keep my relationships quiet; it was best that way,” Doyle said. And then he said, “Dinner?”
Edith hesitated, because it might be fun to let Phillip see what an idiot she’d been, but then, he probably would tease her unmercifully about Doyle for years to come. Imitate him even. It wouldn’t be all that hard to imitate Doyle actually; all you’d need do was use the first person singular pronoun as often as possible and make believe you were Mortimer Snerd with two years of Andover behind you.
“Nothing glamorous,” he said into the silence. “I’m into health a lot. Not a nut. I’m not a vegetarian or anything. But fish tends to be my mainstay.”
“Phillip loves Gloucester House,” Edith said. “I’ll have to check, he may be working late though.”
“I’m only interested if he’s working late,” Doyle said. “And Gloucester House is too well known, it’s a crossroads, y’know? There’s these two on Fulton Street Sloppy Louie’s and Sweet’s. Great fish and you don’t run into a lot of people, y’know?”
Edith could barely wait to get out and call Sally Levinson. To reject the boy who broke your silly heart—-Christmas in February. “Oh Doyle,” she said. I have the children to think about.”
“The children?”
“I don’t think I could lose you again. I couldn’t trust myself, Doyle. You’re too beautiful.”
“I’m a lot more than looks, Edith.”
Edith almost asked what, but there was no point to stumping him, what did it prove. “We must remember each other as we were,” she said. “I’ve got to get to my shopping, Doyle.”
“You’re turning me down?”
“For now. Perhaps the next time we meet you’ll be into macrobiotics and then think of the music we’ll make.” She stood.
“Here, here,” he said, scribbling on something. It was a business card and he handed it to her. “Put this in your purse. My private number’s on the back.”
“Bliss,” Edith said, putting the card along with her charge cards and turning for the door. “Doyle,” she said finally and with total seriousness. “You have absolutely made my day.” And she practically floated back out into the night and across town to Third and perhaps, had she been in a less glowing mood, she might have noted that for whatever reason, the cold, the threat of snow, the flow of pedestrian traffic was altering. Sometimes the street from Third to Bloomingdale’s was flooded, sometimes not.
This was one of the “not” times.
So conceivably Edith, a more down-to-earth Edith, might have noted that the dark street was, if not empty, certainly, at least for this moment, on the way to being more than half deserted. And those that did walk walked quickly, eyes on the ground, bodies tilted forward against the wind and cold.
As Edith began the block, she might even have been bothered by the dark stairway that led to the basement of a brownstone. Ordinarily those stairs are gated and locked. This was open. Forced perhaps. Or forgotten. But in either case, an enormous shadow moved slightly in that opening.
But probably Edith would have plunged on to her beloved Bloomingdale’s anyway. My God, what could happen to a nice Jewish girl who had just experienced that most blessed of all emotions, revenge? Hot damn, thought Edith Mazursky Holtz-man.
Her heels clicked, clicked, clicked on the sidewalk. What indeed… ?
6
Billyboy
“The bus station please,” Billy Boy said when the Shrimp asked him where he wanted to be let off. He always went to them first whenever he hit a new town. There wasn’t any place you could get the feel of things like you could in a bus station.
“You got it.” Then no more talk till the Caddie pulled to a halt by Port Authority.
It had been that kind of trip. Fast driving, loud music, not a lot of chitchat. In the beginning it had been talky enough. The Shrimp —he had these pale blue eyes that looked through you sometimes —he’d gone to school in the Midwest someplace, Indiana or Ohio, and then he’d become an Angelino before deciding to make it in New York.
“What the fuck’s an Angelino?” Billy Boy asked.
“Someone from Los Angeles.”
“That makes me a Milwaukee-eeno then,” Billy Boy said, and he roared his laughter, because it was so funny.
Only the Shrimp didn’t think
so. He didn’t even smile. Just gunned the Caddie along the turnpike.
Billy Boy, frightened suddenly, told himself to Jesus watch it! So that was when their long silences began.
They got a flat on the Pennsy and the Shrimp was all hot and bothered but Billy Boy was so happy. If there was one thing he knew it was cars. No. He knew a lot about a helluva lot, but one of the things he knew most about was cars. He changed the Caddie’s tire so fast the Shrimp couldn’t goddam believe it Then he asked if Billy Boy wanted the wheel a little and you don’t say no to a Caddie, not ever, so he pushed it hard until they began getting into heavy traffic and up ahead in the late morning sun he saw it there.
New York!
It was one thing to be King in Milwaukee or Memphis or any of the other spots along his way. But shit.
New York!
“You better drive from here,” he said, and they switched in the car, the Shrimp taking the wheel, Billy Boy lifting him across into position, then sliding the rest of the way to the passenger’s spot again.
The tunnel was murder so it was close to one when the Caddie stopped at 41st and Eighth. “Hope your sister’s surprised,” the Shrimp said.
Billy Boy just stared. “Huh?”
“You told me you were surprising your sister.”
“Oh, naturally.” Pause. “But didn’t I also tell you I wanted the bus station?”
“This is Port Authority.”
Billy Boy stared at the huge building. “Isn’t there a smaller one?”
“Nothing’s smaller in New York.”
Billy Boy nodded, got out, muttered “thanks.” The air was suddenly so cold. He buttoned up his raincoat to the neck. It was still so cold.
“For the tire change,” the Shrimp said, and he handed over ten. “Take it!”
Billy Boy grabbed the bread. He didn’t know which was his bigger fear all of a sudden, the Shrimp or the City. “You’re a good guy, you’ll live a long time.”
The Shrimp looked at him funny. “Yeah?”
“Believe me,” Billy Boy said. “I can tell things like that.” And then he walked into Port Authority.
It was all fucked up, construction everywhere, arrows and pillars and thousands of people and—
—and why were they looking at him? All of them looking. At him. Dead at him.
They weren’t.
Not all. Shit, a lot weren’t.
But a lot were.
A lot
Too many.
It was his clothes. Here it was winter in the Apple and he had his prison shoes still and the jeans he’d taken and over the jeans the raincoat In the winter in the Apple he was in a raincoat, no wonder they were looking. He quick went into a store where a nigger girl said, “May I help you find a book, sir?” and he said, “Why would I want a fucking book, for Chrissakes,” and as she started glancing around—for help?—so did he, and there was every reason for him to want a book, it was a bookstore, and watch your mouth, you don’t swear like that at niggers, not in the Apple, they treated niggers different than back in other places, better sometimes, so he muttered “excuse me,” and hurried back out of the store.
And all the people were still looking at his clothes.
He went into a liquor store and asked to use the phone but the old Jew just pointed at a sign on the wall—”No Checks, No Phones”—and Billy Boy was back in the main corridor again, with all the people staring.
Ahead, at last, he saw some phone booths.
Two empty.
Good luck.
He sat in the first.
Bad luck.
Out of order.
Both.
He got in line to use one of the three working ones. Then he realized he needed the Yellow Pages. It meant maybe losing his place in line but he needed the Yellow Pages bad. So he left the line, opened the book, licked his thumb and forefinger, turned and turned until he found what he needed, then stood in line again.
“Hero’s” he heard, when his time finally came.
“Pm new in town,” Billy Boy said into the phone. “And I wondered how much things cost here.”
“I can’t give no prices over the phone, Mac, but I’ll tell you this: we’re cheaper than Primo’s, we’re cheaper than King Size. And our quality’s tops. What do you need?”
“Maybe a sweater and maybe some pants and a shirt too or like that. Socks. Underwear. Y’know.”
“The works, huh? Sounds like you got a heavy date.” And he kind of laughed.
Billy Boy tried to laugh too. What the hell did clothes have to do with women? You wanted a woman, you slipped her some bread, what the fuck did clothes have to do with fucking? “That’s right, the works. But it’s gotta fit good.”
“How big are you?”
“Big enough. And it’s gotta fit good.”
“We do half the wrestlers play the Garden, just come on in.”
“How much though?”
“Top quality? Couple hundred’ll see you fine. I’m interested in customer satisfaction, I never yet lost a sale over money, just come on over. We’re open till seven.”
Couple hundred. Two rich women ought to have that much. Maybe one. This was New York. “It’ll be after dark before I can get there. Where are you; like I said I’m new in town.”
“Just behind Bloomingdale’s, can’t miss us.”
Billy Boy left the booth and found his way as quickly as he could to the men’s room to check it out. It was big and not so bad as some. Couple queens off by the far sink, but who cared about a couple queens? He studied the place a long time and it really made him feel good. He could, if he had to, spend the night here. He didn’t want that, naturally. A hotel room with a bed would be a ton better. What he wanted was to get the clothes and a couple top-class bottles of whiskey and see a broad for a few minutes and then sleep. But that would require pulling a job or two. If he pulled the job, fine, it was hotel time. If he didn’t, not all that bad, he’d spend the night here.
Everything depended on one not-so-small point: Was this or wasn’t it a lucky day?
“Is this my lucky day?”
The Spic lady looked up from doing her nails. There were two kids behind her in the doorway. Behind them, a TV was blaring and men laughed.
Billy Boy waited in the doorway on Eighth Avenue. “That’s all I wanna know, how much?”
“You must come in and sit down,” the Spic lady said. She pointed to the Fortune-teller sign in the window. “I know everything but not from a distance.”
Billy Boy sat across from her, held out his hands palms up. “Is this my lucky day, yes or no, I wanna pull a job so you tell me.”
She blinked. “What you mean ‘pull a job’?”
‘‘Get a job,” Billy Boy said quickly. “I got to apply after employment and I wanna know should I or maybe it’s best if I wait till tomorrow.” He pushed his hands toward her.
‘Two palms is ten, five each.”
“Can you tell luck either way?”
“I could bullshit you with one. But a thing like luck I can only be positive with two.”
“Both then.” Her kids were out of the doorway now, looking up at him.
“Don’t they bother you?”
“They help me—sometimes they can be very sensitive.”
“So can I,” Billy Boy said. “Sometimes.”
“Take out the ten, hold it tight, make a wish.”
Billy Boy did what she said and almost wished that he could fuck all Charlie’s Angels one after the other. But then he quick decided that was dumb. The one with the hair was long gone and if he wanted three at once he could buy three at once. If this was a lucky day. I better wish this is my lucky day, he decided, and did.
She took the ten, put it under an ashtray on the table beside her. Then she took his palms, stared at them, began quickly to talk. “… through your palms I see this is a time of great decision for you … through your palms I see that next month will be lucky days for you… through—”
“Today, lady. I don’t give a shit about next month, okay?”
“I’m closing in on the truth, you think that’s so easy?”
“No. I’m just anxious. Go on.”
“… through your palms I see that though you don’t cry on the outside, inside your heart has many tears… through your palms I see you are a good man, and many people love you, but you got trouble showing you love them back… your wife or your girl friend, she loves you because you are a good man …”
“And you are a phony fortune-teller,” Billy Boy said, “Gimme my ten.”
Suddenly she shouted very loud in Spanish.
Billy Boy just sat there.
There were footsteps and male voices.
Billy Boy blinked and waited.
Two Spies with knives came through the doorway. She shouted at them in Spanish. They both looked at Billy Boy. One of them was just in white underwear shorts. He was little with a big knife. The other one had a bigger knife and he had pants on. The kids moved to the wall and stared up at everything. The one with just underwear said, “Out, asshole,” and he gestured toward the door with his thumb.
“She’s a phony fortune-teller,’’ Billy Boy explained. “I’m better than her and I want my ten dollars back.”
The one with pants moved a step forward, his knife held in front of him, his body balanced. “What you want and what you get ain’t necessarily the same, bimbo.” On the word “get” he pushed his knife higher into the air, making his meaning very clear.
Billy Boy sat there blinking. This was New York and you had to be careful. But they were making a fool of him. She was a phony fortune-teller and that was a bad thing, because some of the greatest people he had ever met were fortune-tellers—no, more—some of the greatest people who ever lived were fortune-tellers. It was a job you didn’t bullshit around with so even though it was New York and even though he knew he had to be careful, he quickly stood and turned his right hand into a fist and turned his right arm into a club and raised it high and took two steps toward the one with pants who started all of a sudden screaming “Give him the fucking money, Jesus Christ, you trying to get me killed?” and then he turned and ran back down the corridor and the one with just underwear grabbed the bill from under the ashtray and threw it to Billy Boy and then he turned and began beating up on the fortune-teller while he screamed at her in Spanish and the kids by the wall still watched in silence and they were the last things Billy Boy looked at as he left, shaking his head, wondering what kids like that were gonna turn out to be, living a life like that?