Mangrove Squeeze

by SKLA

  Suki bit her lip and thought. Tonight at Lazslo's place would be a war. She would have to smile through her distaste, probe while trying not to be pawed. She deserved an antidote to all of that. "How's tomorrow?"

  "Tomorrow's great," said Aaron. "How about Lucia's?"

  "Lucia's," Suki said. "We're not talking macaroni now. Lucia's, that's pasta."

  "Eight o'clock?" said Aaron.

  "I'll be there," Suki said.

  "I do not like it," said Ivan Fyodorovich Cherkassky.

  He was sitting in his living room, which was modern and beige and spare, its paintings empty of figures, its furniture undented by humanity. The room lacked a fireplace and a cart of liquor and was altogether less grand than his old friend Markov's. His windows looked out at a less expansive view of patio and sky and dredged canal. Sourly he said, "The mouth opens when one tries to open other things."

  Markov's voice sounded wet and wheedling through the telephone. "Ivan," he said, "it is the last time he will see her. He gave his word."

  "The word of a boy whose pants are out of shape," Cherkassky said. "You trust this word?"

  "He is infatooated," Markov said. "He will have her, and then his schwantz will droop, and the world will not be changed, and she will seem less beautiful, and it will all be over."

  Cherkassky fretted. He looked across the narrow, still canal to the garish mint-green house on the other side. So stupidly cheerful, these Americans, with their houses of peach and turquoise, archways and walkways of bright tile, their obnoxious optimism and cars the colors of candy. Finally he said, "Would have been much better if you tell him simply no."

  "Ivan," said Markov, "do you remember, long ago, what happened when your schwantz would stand?"

  The scoop-faced man hung up.

  He sat there in his unlived-in living room and he thought a while. He didn't pace, he didn't fidget He just looked out the window and wondered why it was that the more wretched his life became—the more devoid of joy, the more totally inhabited by mistrust and disapproval—the more determined he was to safeguard it at any cost. He once again picked up the phone.

  He called the Belorussian woman who cleaned Lazslo's apartment. He told her to get on her scooter and come to Key Haven right away.

  "So Sam," said Bert "when you worked, what kind of work did you do?"

  Sam scratched his head through the tangles of extravagant Einstein hair, said modestly, "I invented things. I was, ya know, a tinkerer."

  "Invented things?" said Bert. He was impressed but also distracted. His chihuahua needed attention.

  They were sitting poolside at the Paradiso, in the shade of a metal umbrella painted like a daisy. But the sun had shifted and now Bert had to reach across the table to slide his dog back into the retreating shadow.

  "Gets dehydrated," he explained. "Eyeballs dry up. Lids stick. He goes ta blink, his ears wiggle but nothing happens wit' the eyes. Looks confused. And his little asshole too. Dries up. Looks like chapped lips. Crinkly. Vet said rub a little Chap Stick on it. Can ya believe it, Chap Stick. I gotta remember which pocket his is in, which pocket mine. So wha'd y'invent?"

  Sam didn't answer right away. He watched the pale chihuahua, sublime in its passivity, being slid across the surface of the table, its tiny toenails screeching softly against the paint. When it was safely in the shade again, it seemed to smile; its mouth twitched open, showing mottled gums. Finally Sam said, "I invented very simple things. Useful little gizmos. Like, you know that kind of can opener, it has a wheel, you squeeze the handle and the wheel bites through the top? I invented that."

  "You invented that?" said Bert. "You musta made a fortune."

  Sam said, "Before that wheel, you opened a can, you got dents in your fingers, that's how hard you had to squeeze. But a fortune? Ach! I sold the patent, flat-rate, to a company. Moved my family to the suburbs. Spent a lot more time at home."

  "Retired right away?"

  "Nah," said Sam. "Kept working. Built myself a bigger workshop. Fiddled with crystal radios, phonograph needles, wireless intercoms. But I liked being home. Seeing my boy grow up. Helping with homework. Going to the bakery together, now and then a day game at the Stadium. Simple things... And what did you do, Bert?"

  The table they were sitting at was right next to the pool. The breeze was fresh and it was too cool for swimming, but that didn't stop the short-term guests from swimming anyway. They kicked, they splashed, the liquid noises obscured the words when Bert said softly, "I was in the Mafia."

  Sam wasn't sure he'd heard right. He double-checked that his hearing aid was in. He looked dubiously at his new friend, the skinny face, the banana nose. He said, "You were in modeling?"

  Bert leaned in a little closer, spoke no louder but bit the words off cleanly. "Not modeling. Mafia."

  Sam said, "Now you're making fun of me."

  "An old man," said Bert, "does not make fun of another old man. God doesn't like that shit."

  There was a pause. Tourists splashed; a red biplane dragged an ad across the sky above the beach.

  Finally Sam said, "So you're in the Mafia now?"

  "Retired."

  Sam pursed his lips. "Things I've read, movies—I didn't think you could retire."

  Bert said, "Special case. I died."

  Sam wagged a finger in his face. "God doesn't like that shit," he warned.

  So Bert told him the story. The dread subpoena; the murderous stress of being called to testify. The heart attack on the courthouse steps. Ambulances, sirens, the mask thrust over his bluing face. And finally, the deliverance of a dead-fiat EKG. Twenty-seven seconds of eternity, before they shocked him back to life. Enough for Bert to persuade his bosses that he'd fulfilled his solemn pledge: He'd come in living, and gone out dead, and this second go-round should be his own.

  "What it all comes down to," he concluded, petting the head of his comatose dog, "is that it don't mean diddle what we did before. Now is now, what's left of it. Ya get old, things level out."

  "Yeah," said Sam, "I think that's true."

  "Prime a life," said Bert, "things are all uneven. This guy's rich, this guy's poor. This guy's a bigshot, this guy's a pissant. Old, it gets equal again, like wit' little kids. Ya need other kids ta play with, that's all. We're just a coupla kids in Florida."

  Sam thought that over, made a futile attempt to smooth his fluffy hair. "Except," he said, "in my mind I'm not a kid. In my mind I'm not retired even now. I still think. Try to. I try to think of something useful. Nothing comes, but in my heart I'm still inventing."

  Bert toyed with the mustard-colored placket of his shirt. "Okay, ya put it that way, I guess I'm not retired either."

  Sam looked at him a little funny.

  "I mean," Bert explained, "ya retire from work but ya don't retire from habits. A certain way of looking at the world, a way of reading people, situations. Comes in handy sometimes."

  "That's what I want," said Sam Katz.

  "What's what you want?"

  "Still to come in handy. Be of use."

  "That's a luxury," said Bert.

  "Dream up some idea, put together some gizmo that still might come in handy."

  "Ya never know," said Bert.

  "That's right," said Sam. "I never do."

  Bert reached across the table, tapped Sam's wrist with his gnarled and spotted fingers. "A great idea, a useful gizmo, it could pop into your head at any second."

  "Oy," said Sam. "Things pop out. They don't pop in."

  "Stay with it, Sam. Ya never know. Besides, what choice ya got?"

  Chapter 10

  It was twenty after seven, and Lazslo Kalynin was inspecting himself in the full-length mirror on the inside of his bathroom door.

  He hooked his fingers in the corners of his mouth and stretched his cheeks out wide to look for specks between his teeth. He tilted back his head to search out errant nose hairs. He leaned in close to examine his pores, to root out clogs, and preempt the occasional pimple.

 
When he had dealt with minor flaws, he turned sideways to appraise the bigger picture, trying to imagine how a casually passing stranger might perceive him. He came away pleased with his stylish haircut, manly but hip; with the rich sheen of his blue silk shirt, the understated chains beneath it; with the hug of his jeans, whose fly was cinched together not with a zipper but a rank of cool steel buttons. When Suki undid them, she would be greeted, titillated, by a swath of flame red briefs.

  Content with his person, he strolled through the apartment, whose every primped pillow and dimmered light switch said seduction. Ludmila, the Belorussian housekeeper, had not only done the dinner preparations, but had left big vases of fresh flowers on the dining table and next to the sofa. The Gibson guitars, acoustic and electric, were strewn here and there with a studied carelessness. The Harley posters were straight on the walls. A six-pack of CDs had been loaded up with music designed to showcase Lazslo's sensitivity, his many moods.

  At 7:35 the doorbell rang.

  Lazslo patted his hair and checked the tuck of his shirt before sweeping open the door—and then he tried not to show his disappointment when he saw how Suki looked. He'd imagined she'd be all made up, her full mouth red and beckoning, wearing something slinky, showing hints, at least, of perfumed cleavage. In fact she'd left her blue eyes unadorned, her lips unpainted; she wore no scent, and her loose concealing blouse was buttoned resolutely to the neck. If Lazslo's brain registered the message, his glands negated it at once. She was teasing, he decided, continuing her strategy of being hard to get

  He was standing in the doorway, leaning at an angle he thought was very sexy, blocking passage with his arm against the jamb. He said hello and gave a meaty smile. Unyielding, he stayed there in the portal, and they both knew he was trying to exact a toll of contact before she could pass into the apartment. She managed a weak greeting, thinking What an asshole.

  Not for the first time but nearly for the last, she wondered how far she could push her luck with this preening brat, and just what the hell she was trying to accomplish, as she arched like a gymnast to slip past him without their bodies touching.

  "Fred," said Pineapple, "ya know what I sometimes wonder about?"

  They were sitting on the seawall just south of Houseboat Row. The sun had been down an hour or more but there were still faint gradations in the sky, hints of pink rays being smoked out into negatives. Fred didn't take the bait and Pineapple went on: "Luck."

  The word brought forth a snort from Fred. "Luck? What about it?"

  "Like for starters, whether it exists."

  Fred thought about the people he dug holes for—people with big houses, swimming pools. He thought about people he met in bars—fat bankrolls, nicely dressed. Some of these people, he admitted, seemed a lot smarter than himself. Others really didn't. He said, "Damn straight, it exists."

  Pineapple looked across the shallows where unlikely shoots of mangrove were colonizing the sea, buying back land for North America one sand grain at a time." Ya think it changes? Luck, I mean?"

  "Ours hasn't," said Fred. He sucked his beer.

  "Finding the hot dog, that was lucky."

  It was true but Fred had staked out the bitter position and now he didn't want to change. He said, "Piney, is there some point you're aiming at?"

  "Not really," acknowledged the man with the medieval face. "It's just that, well, ya hear different things."

  Fred left that alone, rested his beer on the seawall and lit a cigarette.

  "Like ya hear people say," Pineapple went on, "don't push your luck, like you only have a limited supply, and once it's gone, that's it."

  Fred said, "And you're shit outa luck from there."

  "But then," said Piney, "other people, they make it sound the opposite, like exercise, like the more you push your luck the more you have."

  "I don't see the point of exercise," said Fred.

  "Like, in battles," said Pineapple, "the guy that leads the charge hardly ever gets shot. Not in movies at least."

  "Exercise," said Fred, "I get enough fuckin' exercise digging holes and riding my bike for beer. What kinda bullshit is more exercise?"

  Pineapple looked down at his long thin legs as they dangled over the seawall, his bare feet just a few inches above the flat water that held the dying colors of the sky. "Fred," he said, "we weren't talking about exercise."

  "Ya think I don't know that? We were talking about war movies."

  Piney gave up on conversation and looked down at the ocean.

  Lazslo wished that she would drink more.

  He kept topping up her Chardonnay. He topped it up when they were sitting at the table, eating steak; he topped it up now that they had moved onto the sofa. Every time he drank some beer, he went to replenish her wine, finding each time that the level of her glass had barely budged. As if to compensate, he drank more beer himself.

  He couldn't decide how the evening was going. Suki was keeping her distance—that was bad. But conversation was very lively—that was good. Except there was a tension in the talk, a constant tugging—and he couldn't tell if that was playful or just difficult. Lazslo spoke of Caribbean islands, exotic travel—sensuous things that cost money, that Suki was supposed to believe they might do together if she became his lover. But she followed up on none of that. She talked about rents and business and politics and crime.

  "The diving off Cozumel," Lazslo was saying now. "Fantastic. And Yucatecan food—great fish with lime and orange sauces, none of that rice and beans garbage."

  Suki had an ankle folded under her against the velvet of the couch. She leaned back just outside of Lazslo's reach. She said, "And how about the food in Russia?"

  Lazslo made a gesture of distaste. He didn't want to speak of Russia. He was an American now, with flame red underpants and Bruce Springsteen on the stereo. He said, "Russia, no big fat juicy steaks. No asparagus in January."

  Suki said, "Amazing, what's happened to that country."

  "Forget that country," Lazslo said. "Dreary, cold. When, so close, we have the Grenadines, the Cayman Islands..."

  He moved to touch her hair, her ear. He had to slink, almost grovel to reach her. She had time to seize his wrist and fend it off. She said, "Caribbean, that's just vacation. Russia, that's history. Fascinating."

  She released his wrist, and Lazslo found himself lying at an uncomfortable and undignified diagonal. His lunge had sent a throb up to his head, and he very vaguely realized he'd gotten one Budweiser ahead of himself. He said, "Fascinating?"

  "The way authority just collapsed," said Suki. "The way a Mafia seemed to spring up practically overnight, good Soviets suddenly becoming master criminals."

  Lazslo straightened up, regrouped. He put his hands on the cool glass coffee table and studied her a moment. Her eyes were bright and wide, her throat a little flushed. Her fingers were splayed out on her knees and for the first time all evening she was leaning toward him. A shrewd, sophisticated thought occurred to him. He didn't recognize it as a desperate stratagem whispered by his gonads. He topped up her Chardonnay, and said with a worldly lift of his eyebrows, "This Mafia stuff—I think it excites you."

  Suki held his gaze a moment then looked down as if caught at something naughty. "Maybe it does," she said. She sipped a little wine.

  "Why?"

  "Oh I don't know. Maybe just the boldness of it. The daring."

  The word echoed in Lazslo's loins. Ill-advisedly he swigged some beer. He said, "Daring, yes. Especially when you consider the constant fear that Russians lived with."

  "Turning to crime," said Suki, a little breathlessly— "it's like a crazy but perfect facing down of that fear, the final rebellion against the control—"

  "The control," said Lazslo, "that was giving even ordinary people a million daydreams of revenge, of breaking loose." He'd swiveled toward her now, his knees far apart, a hand on one ankle.

  "And," said Suki, "the sheer scale of what they're doing over there—"

  "Ha!" said Lazslo. "
Americans can't even begin to understand the scale."

  Suki said nothing, just reached for her glass next to the vase of extravagant flowers, and sipped some Chardonnay.

  "What Americans don't get... " said Lazslo. "Look, American criminals—even your big bad Mafia—all they do is nibble around the edges. Skim a little here, break a little piece off there. In Russia, we ... What they've done in Russia is go to the very heart of the wealth. You understand?"

  Suki only looked at him. Her lips were slightly parted, her shoulders rounded toward him.

  "You say daring?" he went on. "Your tough Americans, they rob a drivethru teller in a shopping mall. Russian Mafia, they cruise right into the treasury. They steal history. Old Church ikons. Jewels left over from the tsars. Famous paintings. Even military hardware."

  "Military?" Suki said.

  "You forget your own propaganda?" Lazslo said. "The Soviets put guns before butter—isn't that what you were taught? The masses starving while the generals get fat? So where else is more wealth?"

  Suki reached toward her wine then stopped her hand. Lazslo widened the angle of his legs and savored her discomfiture.

  "Military, yes," he went on. "Why not? Renegade scientists and highly placed bureaucrats—why couldn't they steal guns? Missiles? Nuclear material? Daring enough for you, Suki?"

  Suki licked her lips. Her hands were bundled in her lap. She couldn't speak.

  Lazslo was titillated by victory; he gloated. "So now you are shocked. Crime excites you and now you are shocked."

  Suki sipped some wine, took a moment to collect herself. "Well yeah," she admitted. "Sort of. But all that wealth— where does it go? What good does it do you in Russia?"

  Lazslo swigged some beer. "In Russia? No good at all," he said. "It has to travel. Say you have church art—you open up a shop in Moscow? No, you go where the collectors are. Paris, New York, Hong Kong. Say you have something for which there is a great demand in Libya, Iraq—"