Table Money

by Jimmy Breslin

  At one o’clock, he went up to the hog house, where he showered and dressed in a shirt and tie. He drove downtown to the offices of the Central Labor Trades Council, on the sixth floor of a building on Park Avenue South. The “South” is added to the name for purposes of realty values, always more important in Manhattan than the next heartbeat; this was a neighborhood of lofts and cafeterias and was not to be confused with the golden street to the north, the real Park Avenue.

  “We haven’t seen you in such a long time.” The receptionist had a maternal attitude. “How are you?” There was so much solicitousness that Owney was uncomfortable. She walked him down a corridor that was lined with pictures of men with jaws out and dull eyes; the labor leaders all try to imitate John L. Lewis in posing for photos and, lacking his eyebrows, try to make up for it by sticking the chin out. The dull eyes, however, remain with them after the picture is taken.

  “Brother Morrison!” Kellerman, loud and nervous, stood, not too well, at the end of a long table, around which sat a dozen people. Kellerman indicated a seat near him, which Owney took. He looked around and immediately recognized Allingham, who ran the central council while the figurehead, McGrath, was in bed with liver trouble. Allingham sat with the business agent, Callahan. Both of them nodded. Sitting next to Callahan was the young prince, Donnelly, who smiled greasily.

  Four blacks, each in T-shirts and sunglasses, walked in after Owney and sat together at the end. “Samuel Gompers sent them,” Kellerman muttered under his breath. Allingham nodded, somebody closed the door, and Kellerman had to turn around and cough up phlegm into a handkerchief. He then said, “As education director of the City Central Labor Trades Council, I want to raise the moral obligation we have for fighting men who return from Vietnam. Every maj——”

  “We got a question to start off with,” one of the blacks said.

  “Sure.”

  “We nominally from Eleven ninety-nine, hospital workers’ union. We tired of hearing that all we can do is run around with bedpans. We got to provide our brothers with more. We interested in making exams like Fire Department fair for our brothers. If they could fight Vietcong, they could fight fires, right?”

  “Brother, we are with you,” Kellerman said. “But tests are up to the courts.”

  “We know better than to trust some white-bread judge. We want a new man writin’ questions for the next test. Someone give our people an equal chance.”

  “You can’t expect them to lower standards,” Kellerman said.

  The black suddenly held up a booklet and said, “Here’s a Fire Department test asking which one of these names don’t belong together: de Gaulle, Montgomery, Rommel, Bach. I don’t know none of those names. Imagine some brother back from Da Nang lookin’ at this.”

  Kellerman smiled and spoke quietly. “De Gaulle, Montgomery, Rommel. World War Two generals. Bach, a German composer. Of course Bach doesn’t fit. I don’t see where that’s so unfair.”

  “I never seen his name in print. I never heard of him. Most of my people have heard—that’s all, they just heard—of the Beatles. Nice white kids. But my people don’t know what the Beatles ever sung. So this Bach. How can you expect a black from Brooklyn to read about him? Man, you just put a history book anywhere near a black kid who got any heart and this kid, he jes’ turns his head. We got no place in history, so why we bother learnin’ it?”

  Kellerman mumbled an answer and started to go through his papers. From the center of the table, smiling, leaning between Callahan and Allingham, Donnelly suddenly spoke. “Then you tell us the name of a composer.”

  “Billy Strayhorn. James Brown. Listen to James Brown songs, man.”

  Donnelly got aggressive, showing off for Callahan and Allingham. “How can you mention these guys, whoever the hell they are, in the same conversation with Bach?”

  “Who the fuck is Bach, man? We don’t know who he is.”

  “Come on,” Donnelly said.

  “Tell you what,” the black said, holding the book out, “look at this next question.”

  He handed the book to Donnelly, who read aloud: “The Tet offensive was the result of (a) superior fighting ability of the Vietcong; (b) American combat soldiers’ reluctance to fight; (c) massive Chinese Communist aid while America was busy fighting a rearguard action against ‘peace’ groups at home; and (d) tactical errors by our generals.” Donnelly cleared his throat. “The answer in the test is ‘c’ I sure agree, too.”

  The blacks laughed.

  “What’s wrong with the answer?” Donnelly said, hesitantly.

  “Bullshit answer, man.”

  “What do you think the answer is?”

  “Fightin’ people for no reason in their back yards. Homeboys always win.”

  “Yo, homeboys,” one of the other blacks said.

  Now one of them, fat pouring out of the bottom of a T-shirt, said, “We know. We in Nam. You in Nam?”

  Donnelly gave a half smile. “No. I have to tell you I wasn’t.”

  “Well, I was there,” the fat guy said. A little too quickly, Owney thought. “So how you answerin’ a question like that to us? See? We right about what we sayin’.”

  Owney looked directly at the smoked glasses. “I don’t think that was the reason.” His voice drew everyone in the room.

  “You tell me? I there.”

  “Where?”

  “Nam.”

  “Where in Nam?” Owney asked.

  “Vietnam.”

  “What Corps?”

  “Army.”

  “No. I asked you what Corps you were in.”

  “Man, I told you. I was in Nam.”

  “Were you in Eye Corps or Two Corps or what?”

  “What co’? I don’t know no co’. I was in Nam.”

  “You were in bed.”

  “I nearly die in Nam.”

  “Then tell me the Corps area you nearly died in.”

  “Fuck you and your co’.”

  “You fought blankets in bed,” Owney said.

  “Blue-eyed motherfucker.”

  Owney knew he had the guy now. “Look at these eyes. What color do you think they are?”

  The face said nothing.

  “They’re brown, just like yours,” Owney said. “If you’d been in Nam, you would know that. All white guys don’t have blue eyes. You don’t learn that by sitting in bed all day and eating potato chips. Look at the shape you’re in.”

  Allingham suddenly cleared his throat and took over. “Clearly, we have some sort of impasse here. Or a misunderstanding. I’m sure you know that Brother Morrison here has quite a record in Vietnam. Holder of the Congressional Medal of Honor. I think somebody should have mentioned that right at the outset and we would have saved ourselves a lot of unwarranted animosity in this room. I think we better study this situation more before I can make any recommendations.”

  He set the date for another meeting and the blacks filed out sullenly, without looking at Owney, and Callahan clapped Owney on the back and presented him to Allingham and said, “He’s coming along, coming along.”

  And then Owney said, “I think they were right about the test.”

  “What do you mean?” Allingham said.

  “I lived with a lot of blacks. They come from a different world and we don’t know it.”

  “Well,” Allingham said.

  Owney said, “The guy was right. I just got mad because he was lying.”

  “And you think that he’s right about the test?”

  “Absolutely.”

  Allingham shook his head. “You got me screwed up. But that doesn’t mean I’m not listening to you.” Then Owney shook hands and walked away from Allingham and Callahan. He saw Donnelly behind them, afraid to move one step away from Callahan. As Owney walked out, he knew everybody was looking at him.

  “Now that was leadership,” Kellerman said to Owney after his class the next night. “True union leadership.” He stood on the corner of Jamaica Avenue as a bus bounced past. He waved t
o the driver.

  “Hello, brother.”

  His head followed the bus as it went. “Surface men in the Transport Workers Union, the last real union men left. Once you go downstairs into the subways, the make-up of that union changes. Gets pretty dark. All right. Here we go.”

  Kellerman started across for O’Looney’s and Burke’s bar. When Owney didn’t move, Kellerman stopped and waved his arm impatiently.

  “Come on.”

  “Not tonight.”

  “Do you have a flu?”

  “I’m just not drinking.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “Want the truth?”

  “Yes.”

  “I need a layoff. Just a little. You know I was out for that whole month.”

  “You had a virus.”

  “Whatever. I’ll tell only you. But I’ve been going to a couple of AA meetings.”

  Kellerman’s arms flapped. “Who told you that you drink too much?”

  “Nobody, actually.”

  “Because nobody can! You’re no alcoholic. What are you, crazy? What put that in your head?”

  “I still better get home.”

  “You’re coming with me. Who do you think maneuvered you into that thing yesterday? I’m going to see that you replace George Meany.”

  He took Owney by the arm and walked him across the street. Kellerman held the door to make sure Owney went in, then followed with an old briefcase under one arm and his pants flopping around his shoes and his free arm waving in the air.

  “Brother trainmen!”

  The bartender put a shot glass down with such force that it sounded like a hammer. When he saw that Owney was with Kellerman, he put a second shot glass down.

  “Remember the Ludlow Massacre!” Kellerman shouted.

  Owney went for the door. “I forgot something in the car.”

  Owney’s campaign was as subtle as advancing tanks. On one day, he went to the supermarket for Dolores’s mother and aunt. On another, right after work, he drove the mother to the bank. And late on a Saturday afternoon, in the rain, he suddenly showed up and found only Dolores and Virginia home. Dolores, who had made a deal with Virginia to watch the baby while she went to the movies, walked sullenly into the bedroom and when she came out, Owney was still there.

  He said, “I could use a movie, too. I’ll drive you.”

  Dolores said, “Who said I was going to a movie?” and Owney said, “Virginia.”

  Dolores felt the room narrowing until the walls touched her shoulders. Reluctantly, she went with Owney, sitting close to the car door so their legs didn’t brush, over to the early showing of The French Connection at the Midway on Queens Boulevard. She sat stiffly, maintaining space between them, and she was certain that he would do something, a touch, a hand carelessly draped on her shoulder, and she knew that she would have to react. Push him away like we’re back in high school, she thought sourly. Right away, with the Three Degrees performing and, suddenly, the eerie Don Ellis big band music as the detective saw the drug peddlers in the nightclub, the film caused the audience to become tense and motionless. Somewhere during the picture, she realized that she was at least comfortable sitting next to him. Or was she really?

  After the movie, she thought about this in the ladies’ room as she brushed her hair vigorously. How could Virginia have trapped her like this? What was she doing with him in the first place? She was getting a divorce and every time she walked through a room, he was sitting there. Anyway, Virginia would serve one purpose now. She could say truthfully that she couldn’t even stop for coffee with Owney because Virginia was at home with the baby and was counting on going someplace at nine o’clock.

  Then she and Owney were walking out through the lobby. Down at the doors, the usher stepped aside and the crowd started in for the next show. Almost past her before she saw him was LaVine, who was smiling and talking to a man and a woman with him. He walked right past her. Dolores stopped and wheeled.

  “David.”

  LaVine, still talking, walked on.

  She stood with surprise and disappointment running through her. Then irritation. What is he, afraid? She shrugged and started walking again. Owney, who had stopped, caught up with her. His face was blank. He kept looking straight ahead and said nothing. He walked with Dolores up to the glass doors leading out to the street. Dolores pushed her door open. Owney came up to the door alongside and then his right leg whipped straight out and kicked out the glass. He pushed the brass-colored door frame open and walked through the broken glass. He said nothing.

  A porter, looking at the door, said, “It must have been some kid. Threw something right through the window on us.”

  It was eight-twenty on a Saturday night in Queens, when, in silence, he let Dolores off and then drove to Gibby’s on Myrtle Avenue, where, when he walked in, Gibby was inspecting the mouth of a customer, who had his lower lip pulled down to reveal a lack of teeth.

  “He done some job on you,” Gibby said.

  “Give us a beer,” Owney said.

  The customer then released his lower lip. “Imagine that? An usher at Shea Stadium doing that to me? How come they have ushers like that? Go to the ball game at Shea Stadium, an usher punches you in the mouth.”

  “You ought to sue the whole ball club,” Gibby said.

  “Oh, I am. I can’t work because I got punched in the mouth.”

  Gibby now said to Owney, “You said a beer?” When Owney nodded, Gibby stood at the tap and as he poured the beer he spoke to the guy with the punched mouth. “When did this happen to you, anyway?”

  “Last week.”

  “You take a day off from work to get punched by some lousy usher.”

  “Oh, I didn’t take the day off. I was working there as an usher, too.”

  Gibby put the beer in front of Owney, who backed away from it and went into the men’s room. When he came out, he headed straight for the barstool, put a hand on the beer, felt its icy cold, and then pulled the hand away and walked to the phone. He dialed Navy. “I think I need you.”

  “That’s what I’m here for.”

  “I’m in Gibby’s on Myrtle Avenue and I’m about ten seconds from taking a drink. My wife just got me crazy.”

  “Here’s what you do,” Navy said. “Don’t take a drink yet. Wait there for me. Don’t go anyplace else. Smoke a cigarette. Have some coffee. Whatever. Just don’t drink until I get there. If you still want a drink then, we’ll talk about it. But please do me one favor. Just sit there until I get there.”

  Owney hung up and went back to his seat at the bar. The beer was still in front of him. “You got any coffee?”

  “You want a diner, then go to a diner.”

  Owney sat and smoked. He saw in the smoke his wife Dolores, whirling around in the Midway lobby, calling to this guy. Brown-haired woman in a blue sweat shirt, the shoulders falling in disappointment when the guy didn’t turn around. Now, as he saw her whirling in the theatre lobby, her feet made this squeaking sound on the floor. In the smoke over the bar, suddenly here was the opponent, head bobbing, body dancing to Owney’s left, and lumpy arched eyebrows telling Owney, come on, let’s go. Come on, where are you? Owney’s hand came out to the glass. Still cold and gold. He stared at the glass and thought about Navy and his fingertips touched the glass.

  “She nearly made me drink tonight,” Owney said when Navy walked in.

  “You didn’t need her for the five million drinks you had before tonight,” Navy said.

  The next morning, Sunday, Owney drove to Brooklyn to meet Navy in the diner on Fourth Avenue for purposes of reinforcement: coffee, a smoke, and those warm but strong glances that Navy used to cause the desire for whiskey to disappear. “How did you sleep?” Navy said, and Owney said, “Good. After I left you, I just dropped out.”

  Navy smiled. “I got none. I’m not home fifteen minutes and I get a call from one of our brothers. The first call was from a bar. The second was from home. He was just trying to calm himself
with a few pills. Well, the next call was from the Flushing precinct. So I got up and drove all the way past your house and picked him up. I got him out in the car.”

  “Now you have to drive to Jersey?”

  “Not with this man. I’ve got to stash him good. I take him to Maryland.”

  “Do I know him?”

  “What’s the difference? You shouldn’t even look at the poor guy. I have to tell you the truth: I had to truss him up. I don’t want him strangling me on the drive. You’ll think I’m a kidnapper, you see him.”

  “On a weekend,” Owney said.

  “People drink then, too.”

  “Then I guess I shouldn’t have bothered you last night, but I was about to go. My wife doesn’t say anything to me and, I told you, I see this guy.”

  “You never can be sure because you’re so paranoid from alcohol as it is. I told you, when I stopped drinking I used to sit there in a stew and my wife would say to me, ‘What’s the matter?’ and I’d say to her, ‘If you cared about me, you wouldn’t have to ask.’”

  Owney laughed.

  “Now you’re starting a day on the right foot. Why don’t you make sure by going to a meeting and talking it over with them?”

  Owney didn’t answer.

  “See if you feel like it. You’re giving yourself a chance if you get up and say something at a meeting.”

  When Owney nodded absently, Navy said, “I have to tell you. Otherwise, I think you’ll have constant trouble.”

  “I can take care of myself,” Owney said. “I get a little help from you, that’s all I need. I don’t need a public ceremony.”

  “If you wouldn’t be so stubborn, you’d listen to me.”

  “I do. But I know myself.”

  Navy smiled. “That, sir, is a very good topic to discuss someday. Well, I’m not going to be coming back until tomorrow afternoon. I’m too tired to drive down and back. I’ll stay over someplace.”

  “Don’t worry about me,” Owney said. “Any trouble, I’ll handle it.”

  “I’m more worried about a laugh,” Navy said. “That can do it to you. A good laugh. For our set, that can be harder to handle than all the trouble in the world.”