Palisades Park

by Alan Brennert

  “That young guy who’s working the wheel with you is one hunk of heartbreak,” Toni noted. “What’s his name?”

  Minette winced and said, “Jay.” Then added, “Junior.”

  Toni’s eyes widened. “He’s your old boyfriend’s son?”

  Minette nodded. “His father asked me to put him to work. Get him some experience.”

  “Isn’t it a little—uncomfortable—having him around?”

  “Yeah, you could say that. He’s a good kid, but I’d like him better if he wasn’t the spitting goddamn image of his old man.” Minette’s face only hinted at the pain she must have felt. She looked down at the menu and said, “Speaking of uncomfortable, is your mom coming to see you today?”

  “Hope not. I didn’t invite her.”

  Minette sighed. “Toni, you’ve got to see her sometime. Even your dad’s made his peace with her … he’s seeing that nice Lehua now, everything’s worked out for the best, for him and for you.”

  “It wouldn’t have worked out for me if not for you,” Toni said. “You were there when I needed a mother. You’re the one I want here today.”

  Minette seemed touched by that. “I was happy to do what I could. But showing you how to set your hair and do your makeup doesn’t compare to the fourteen years Adele put into raising you. She led you and Jack out of here when the whole place was in flames, remember?”

  Toni frowned at that, flagged a waiter, and ordered a salad.

  An hour later, she was standing in her brightly colored swimsuit off to one side of the free-act stage. For the past fifteen minutes, the voice of park announcer Bob Paulson had been booming, every five minutes, throughout the park, “Today on the free-act stage at one o’clock, see that high-diving sensation, the Amazing Antoinette, as she jumps from the top of a ninety-foot tower into a tank filled with less than six feet of water…”

  It was standing room only as Toni looked out at the crowd, but the audience who mattered most to her was sitting in the front row: her father, looking at once proud and terrified as his eyes went from Toni in the wings to the towering aluminum ladder on the stage. Sitting on either side of him were Bunty Hill and Minette Dobson, and standing at the end of the row was a grinning Irving Rosenthal, as Paulson’s voice welcomed the crowd:

  “Ladies and gentlemen, here’s a young lady whose high-flying gymnastics have made her a sensation on the carnival circuit in the Midwest—but we’re proud to say she took her very first dive, at the tender age of five, right here in our saltwater pool! Give a hometown welcome to Palisades Park’s own Amazing Antoinette—Toni Stopka!”

  The words, and the applause that followed, brought unexpected tears to Toni’s eyes. She walked onto the stage, bowed to the audience, caught her father’s eyes and gave him a thumbs-up—then, to the familiar percussion of “Sabre Dance,” began scaling the ninety-foot tower.

  Reaching the top, she stepped onto the platform just as the music faded. She looked down, gauging the distance, the wind, and factors on the ground, as usual … but this time was far from usual. She gazed out at the park spread out below her, and she wasn’t looking down at some random collection of carnival tents and concession booths … she was looking at the place where she had grown up. On her right was the pool where she learned to swim, and next to it the midway where her family’s French fry stand once stood. She saw Roscoe Schwarz’s Funhouse, and the thirty-foot-high dome of the Carousel building, and the wooden peaks and valleys of the Cyclone coaster, all the familiar midways and marquees that had been, even more than Edgewater, the small-town streets of her childhood.

  She was standing where Arthur Holden once stood. And Peejay Ringens. And Bee Kyle. She felt a rush of pride and accomplishment.

  She pushed backward off the platform, drawing her knees to her chest as she began her first tuck-and-roll, and saw Palisades as she never had before—a blur of speed, color, sounds, and smells, tumbling under her like tilting funhouse floors and distorted mirrors.

  She somersaulted twice before straightening her body and slicing into the water like a knife. She dawdled less under the surface than usual, coming eagerly to the surface; and as she climbed the side ladder, she basked in the approving roar of the audience.

  She took her bows alongside Arthur Holden and Bee Kyle.

  Afterward her father came up to her, his face shining with pride and relief, and hugged her. “That was amazing, honey. You are amazing.”

  After Uncle Irving had congratulated her, Toni was surprised to find herself staring into the face of the freckled, red-haired Jimmy Russo.

  “Told you I’d come when you played Palisades,” he said with a smile. “Got to look after the bank’s investment, after all.”

  “Yes, of course. So what do you think, am I a good risk?”

  “Hard to say ‘good risk’ about someone who does what you do for a living,” he joked, “but I think we invested wisely. You’ve got a great act and a great future ahead of you.”

  “Thanks. From your lips to God’s ears.”

  “I’ll bring it up at Mass this Sunday,” he said, smiling. “What do you say I take you out to dinner the night before and we can toast to the future?”

  The debacle with Cliff, almost a year ago, faded in the bright promise of Jimmy’s smile. “My last show is at seven. I can be ready by eight.”

  “My sister Grace takes twice that long to get ready, and she doesn’t even jump off a tower,” he said, impressed. “Shall I meet you here?”

  “Yes, by the main gate.”

  “Great. See you then.” He started off, then turned back. “You were beautiful up there,” he said, and with a shy smile moved off into the crowd.

  * * *

  After her last show, Toni went over to Eddie’s Polynesia, where she was finally old enough to order a drink—one of Trader Vic’s “Florida daiquiris,” which her father prepared as she sat at the bar and chatted. “Melba says that thanks to our protest, the New Jersey legislature changed the state civil rights law to include swimming pools,” Toni noted proudly. “We really made a difference, and not just to Palisades.”

  “You did,” Eddie agreed, pouring two ounces of Bacardi Carta Oro Rum into the blender, “but don’t fool yourself into thinking we still don’t have a long way to go on that score.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  He added maraschino juice, lemon juice, sugar, and lime juice. “Couple weeks ago, Lehua and I went into New York to visit Vi and Hal. We took a little heat from some stupid kids on the street.”

  “What? Why?”

  “Because we were a couple. Because they thought she was colored.”

  Toni sat stunned as her father switched on the blender for about ten seconds, then poured the contents into a tall glass. “But she’s Hawaiian.”

  “Her skin was darker than theirs. To them she was colored. One called me a nigger lover.” Toni shuddered. “I wanted to drop him headfirst into a garbage can where he belonged, but Lehua said, ‘Just walk away.’”

  As Eddie soberly placed the daiquiri on her cocktail napkin, Toni said, “Well … let’s celebrate one small victory, at least.” She raised her glass in a toast and took a sip. “Mm, this is delicious.”

  “We have a limit of one to every high diver who comes in.”

  She laughed and asked, “Have you heard from Jack?”

  Eddie frowned. “He sent me a note last month. His letters have been getting shorter and shorter. He used to draw funny little figures in the margins, but he’s even stopped that.”

  “I’ve tried writing him several times and all I get back are travelogues about Korea. I don’t think he wants to tell me about being in battles.”

  “He’s stopped writing about that to me too.”

  “Why the hell did he have to go and enlist?”

  A second after she’d uttered them, Toni realized they were the same words her mother had used after her father entered the Navy.

  * * *

  Saturday night, after her evenin
g dive, Toni used one of the rooms for visiting sideshow performers, did as much as she could reasonably do with her hair without pincurling, applied her makeup, then slipped into a blue two-piece peplum dress she had bought at Schwartz’s just for the occasion. She met Jimmy outside the main gate, and as he rolled up to the curb in his shiny 1951 Buick, her efforts were rewarded by a look of pleased surprise as he got out to open the passenger-side door.

  “Wow,” he said. “I liked you in the swimsuit, but—wow.”

  Ella’s maxim about confounding audience expectations worked both ways. Toni smiled as she slid into the passenger seat. “Thank you.”

  He took her to the posh Chimes Restaurant in Paramus, where they both ordered steaks and continued the conversation begun in the car. Jimmy wanted to know how her carnival engagement had gone, and she told him all the good, discreet parts. She asked about him, his family, and he told her he was the second-youngest of six children. “Must’ve been nice, being part of a big family,” she said. “It was just me and Jack, growing up.”

  “Only two of you? You’re sure your family is Catholic?”

  “My mother is Presbyterian. After Jack came along she told my dad, ‘I’m done having babies, feel free to have one yourself but two is my limit’—and from that point on they, ah, invested heavily in the rubber industry.”

  He laughed. “Heresy! My mother would never have spoken the word aloud, much less actually use one, for fear the Pope might strike her dead on the spot. Did your mom actually tell you this?”

  “Oh yeah, we had a talk when I was thirteen. I’m glad she did, I—” She caught herself before revealing her own use of the heretical device with Cliff. “I know, at least, why there was only me and my brother,” she said.

  An unwelcome notion crept into her thoughts. “Is your family pretty … devout?”

  He nodded. “Mass on Sundays, confession on Saturdays, Father Manz over for dinner once a month.”

  Toni was accustomed to the more relaxed moral standards of the amusement business, but here was a young man from a strict Catholic family. What would he think if he knew that the young woman he was courting was … well … not a virgin? It wasn’t like she slept around, she’d only been to bed with Cliff—but would that still tarnish her in Jimmy’s eyes?

  The thought plagued her throughout dinner, turning what should have been a pleasant evening into a tense one. She tried not to betray her anxiety, and Jimmy didn’t seem to pick up on it; after dinner, when the orchestra began to play, he even asked her to dance. She was not a practiced dancer but could follow along well enough, and as they slow-danced to someone else singing Nat King Cole’s “Unforgettable” she allowed herself to finally relax, enjoying the warmth of his hand in hers, the other hand cupped around her waist. She liked his … solidity, for want of a better word, and took in the scent of his cologne as their faces brushed against each other’s. She enjoyed it so much that she suggested they stay on the dance floor for the next tune, “Don’t Let the Stars Get in Your Eyes.”

  But on the way home a new fear occurred to her—and she decided to gently determine whether she had anything to worry about on that score.

  A discussion of the excellent cuisine at the Chimes gave her an opportunity to bring up Eddie’s Polynesia: “It’s doing really well, he’s thinking about expanding it—more tables, a bigger menu. It’s been a good thing for him … he’d been mooning over my mother for too long.” She added casually, “Have you met the lady who works as a hostess there—Lehua?”

  “The Hawaiian singer? Sure, she’s good.”

  “Good for my dad too. They’re, ah, seeing each other.”

  “Yeah?” Jimmy said. “That’s swell.”

  “You really think so?” she said, perhaps a bit too earnestly.

  “Well, sure,” he said. “She’s very pretty. They make a nice couple.”

  In the light of a passing car she studied his face, looking for any sign of dismay or dissembling—but found none. He seemed completely sincere.

  She let out a breath and said, “I think so too.”

  * * *

  The following week Toni and Bunty performed a series of acrobatic dives off the pool’s diving board for The Strawhatters, the DuMont television series so far only airing locally on the New York station WABD-TV. The host, Bob Haymes, was a handsome young actor and singer who gave Toni a great introduction—“Here’s a beautiful young lady who flies through the air with the greatest of ease—but no trapeze”—commenting enthusiastically as Toni performed a cupid dive, a flying tuck, a parasol dive, and others she had learned from Bunty. The producers liked her so much they decided to film Toni’s high dive for the following week’s show. As Bunty predicted, she wasn’t getting paid anything extra for this—but just appearing on this new medium of television was thrilling enough compensation.

  Afterward, she and Jimmy had a quick supper at the newest restaurant on Palisade Avenue—Callahan’s Roadstand, which had opened right next door to long-standing local favorite Hiram’s, which also served the same basic menu of frankfurters, hamburgers, and French fries. Jimmy was a devotee of Hiram’s deep-fried franks, crispy on the outside and succulent on the inside; but Toni was quickly won over by Callahan’s nearly foot-long hot dogs, thick, juicy, and grilled to within an inch of their lives, nearly exploding from their sausage casings.

  “This place,” Jimmy predicted, “won’t last long next to Hiram’s.”

  He would only be off by about fifty years.

  At the end of Toni’s month-long engagement at Palisades, Irving Rosenthal extended an invitation to return next year. Toni accepted at once, then left for a series of shorter gigs her agent had set up here in New Jersey: Olympic Park in Maplewood for a weekend, the Steel Pier in Atlantic City for five days, and the Sportland Pier in Wildwood.

  She kept in touch with Jimmy by phone and on weekends he drove down to the shore to see her. “How many towns did you play in Kansas?” he asked over fried seafood in Wildwood.

  “All of them, I think,” Toni said, laughing. “At least it felt that way.”

  “Doesn’t all that traveling wear you down?”

  “No, it was exciting. But being a forty-miler isn’t all that bad, either. I’m happy to be back in Jersey. I love living in Edgewater and seeing the Hudson from my front window. It’s nice to just drive home after a gig.”

  “Sounds like you can have more of a life that way, too. A home, family…” He quickly added, “Assuming that’s what you want, of course—”

  “Oh—sure,” she said, just as quickly. “I want a family, someday, kids. But I also want to keep diving.”

  “You mean … even after having kids?”

  “Sure. Even if it’s only playing summers at Palisades. Why not?”

  Jimmy smiled and said, “Well, you do have a loan to repay.” They laughed, quickly returning their attentions to their fried shrimp and cod.

  The relationship became more passionate with the proximity of hotel rooms, though always just stopping at the door, with Jimmy driving home afterward. One night, though, in the midst of a blinding thunderstorm that canceled Toni’s evening show, they decided that driving back was too dicey, so Toni invited Jimmy to sleep on the couch in her hotel room.

  Toni got into her pajamas in the bathroom as Jimmy, in boxers and undershirt, threw a blanket and pillow onto the lumpy couch. They smiled awkwardly at each other, then she said, “Well … g’night, I guess.”

  “G’night.” He gave her what started out as a light goodnight kiss. But they both quickly became more amorous, Toni wrapping her fingers around the nape of Jimmy’s neck—

  And then a little voice inside told her Stop, and she suddenly pulled away. “Wait—no,” she said, breathless, “maybe this isn’t a—good idea…”

  “Uh … okay,” Jimmy said, confused.

  “I mean … maybe it’s too soon. Maybe we should…” She stopped, sighed, then decided on the truth: “Jimmy, I’m just … afraid. That you’ll be disappoint
ed when I tell you that I’m not a … a virgin.”

  She said this last so softly he strained to hear it.

  He gazed at her soberly and she braced herself for rejection.

  “Toni … I’m sorry, but…” Oh God, here it comes, she thought. “I’m afraid you may be disappointed to learn … neither am I.”

  She looked at him, nonplussed, until he broke into a laugh. She happily laughed along with him, and then he cupped his hands around her waist, pulled her to him, and they took up where they had left off.

  * * *

  The last “bird,” as Bunty Hill had put it, came home to roost in January of 1953, when a convicted gunman serving time in state prison testified before the State Crime Commission that in 1935, after being wounded in a waterfront shootout, he was given shelter from pursuing authorities by Chief Frank Borrell of Cliffside Park. The accusation was page-one news in The New York Times; Borrell denied ever knowing the man.

  Then, on the morning of March 12, Toni was at home reading the morning paper as her father was bringing in the mail. “Hey, Dad,” she said, not without a certain glee, “the Chief’s been indicted.”

  Looking distracted, Eddie said, “What?”

  She read aloud: “‘Frank Borrell, the easygoing police chief of Cliffside Park, New Jersey, was indicted yesterday, along with a cousin and two members of his police force, by the Bergen County rackets grand jury … charged with having protected the gambling empire of Frank Erickson, who is serving eighteen months in prison, and lying to the grand jury.’” She whooped. “Get this: Erickson rented two buildings from Borrell’s cousin, Patsy, yet the Chief says he never knew about them and Patsy claims he’s never even spoken to Erickson … even though his son collects Erickson’s rent. Hah!”

  Eddie appeared to barely listen to any of this. He sat down at the kitchen table and tossed down one of the envelopes he had just brought in. “Look at this,” he said tonelessly, and Toni glanced over at it.

  The return address read UNITED STATES ARMY, WASHINGTON, D.C.

  “Oh my God,” Toni whispered.