A Piece of the Action sm-5

by Stephen Solomita

  “You up for this?” Jake asked.

  They were passing through the toll on the far end of the Lincoln Tunnel. Abe was practicing the art of curling one corner of his mouth into a sneer and the question caught him by surprise.

  “Whatta ya mean?”

  “I’m talkin’ about what we’re gonna do.” Jake shook his head in disgust. If he didn’t know Abe Weinberg was a Jew, he wouldn’t believe it. “You’re probably adopted, right? Tell me you’re adopted. Your real parents were Okies who made a wrong turn and ended up in New York instead of California.”

  “C’mon, Jake. I just wasn’t expectin’ the question.” Abe cracked the vent window and lit another cigarette. He liked the way he looked with a cigarette dangling from his lip, but the smoke was hurting his eyes. “The answer is, yeah, I’m ready. Like I already told ya when you first brought it up.”

  “You’re ready to pull the trigger?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You’re sure you could do it?”

  “If the money’s right, I’ll machine-gun Madison Square Garden on fight night. That answer your question?” This time he got himself so far down in the seat that his knees were up against the dash. “Didn’t I do the fuckin’ spic?”

  “That was in a panic, Abe. That was stupid. I’m talkin’ about doin’ it cold.”

  Jake paused, waiting for a reply, but Abe stared out the window and began to hum the melody from Chuck Berry’s tune, Rock and Roll Music.

  “This is an honor the wops are givin’ us here,” Jake continued. “We do this right and we’re on our way.”

  “Well, we’re not doin’ it today, right or wrong,” Abe finally said. “All we’re lookin’ for is a place to dump a stiff that ain’t even a stiff yet. So what I can’t figure out is why you’re makin’ such a big deal outta nothin’.”

  This time it was Jake who didn’t bother to answer. They were driving through a huge swamp west of Secaucus. It should have been beautiful, at least from inside the car. The cold winter winds had driven away most of the pollution and the sun was shining in the brown and gold tips of the cattails and reeds lining the roadway. It also shone brightly on mounds of garbage left by illegal dumpers, many of them commercial haulers.

  Jake turned on an unmarked side road and began to criss-cross the swamp. He made lefts and rights at random, but he never got close to being lost. Abe, on the other hand, stared at the unfamiliar landscape as if he’d been transported to the moon on a Russian sputnik.

  “You got a map, Jake?” he asked. “So we could find our way outta here.” Though he didn’t say it, the idea of being in the swamps late at night scared him a lot more than bumpin’ off some guinea.

  “In my head is where I got my map, Abe. I never get lost.”

  “The world’s first Jewish Indian.”

  “Yeah,” Jake laughed, “call me Tonto. Tonto Leibowitz.”

  A much-relieved Abe Weinberg joined in his pal’s laughter. “Yeah, yeah. Pathfinder Leibowitz.”

  “Wait, this looks like a good spot.” Jake stopped the car. “In fact, it looks perfect.”

  The road was so narrow, one car would have had to put two wheels on the shoulder to let another car pass. The reeds were higher than the car and the piles of garbage were higher than the reeds. A track leading into the swamp disappeared fifteen feet from the edge of the road.

  “All right,” Jake announced, “you wanna be an actor? You wanna be Marlon Brando? You wanna be Elvis Presley? Now’s your big chance. We’re gonna do this exactly like next week. I’m gonna be you and you’re gonna be this guy who’s gettin’ what he’s got comin’ to him.”

  “Ya don’t think we could reverse the parts, do ya? I kinda like bein’ the hero.”

  “You tryin’ ta tell me Elvis wouldn’t end up in a swamp at the end of one of his movies? That’s too bad, ’cause the way he sings, it’d be a mitzvah.”

  They were both laughing, now.

  “Hey, remember Marlon Brando at the end of Viva Zapata?” Abe asked. “When they dump him in the street? The people couldn’t even recognize him. That’s how many times he got shot. If Marlon could do it, I could do it. An actor’s gotta have range.”

  “Great.” Jake opened the door and stepped out of the car. Abe followed a moment later. “I’m gonna talk it through while we’re goin’. First, this is the gun we’re gonna use.” Jake held up a.22 caliber revolver. “We don’t need no forty-five goin’ off like a howitzer. From up close, a twenty-two is just as deadly and you’re gonna be right on top of him. But remember, we wanna do this guy in the swamp. That means you can’t shoot him before we get here unless you absolutely gotta. So, what you’re gonna do is keep your finger off the trigger. Like this.”

  Jake held the.22 up again. He took his index finger off the trigger and laid it underneath the cylinder.

  “What if he tries to run?”

  “How’s he gonna run when he’s handcuffed inside a locked car? Ya getting me pissed off again, Abe.”

  “Ya can’t learn if ya don’t ask questions.”

  “Ya can’t learn if ya don’t ask questions,” Jake mimicked. “What do I got here, a goddamned schoolteacher? What ya should be thinkin’ is that ya can’t learn if ya don’t shut ya mouth and listen.” He waited for the message to sink in before he continued. “When we get here, I jump out of the car first. I come around to your side and cover this guy in case he decides to run. Then you unlock the door and get him movin’. Now, we’re both gonna go up the path here, but you’re gonna be the one who’s right behind him. Don’t get too close. If ya get too close, he could turn and kick the rod outta ya hand. But, also, don’t get too far away. If he jumps into them bushes, we’ll never find him. Remember, it’s gonna be dark. I don’t wanna use a flashlight unless it’s so black we’re gonna fall over each other. What you gotta do is stay arm’s length plus two steps away. Let’s try it.”

  Jake walked over to Abe with his left arm outstretched. He stopped when his fingers were touching Abe’s chest. “Now, take two steps back. Perfect. Memorize this distance. Ya don’t let him get no closer and ya don’t let him get no further away. Ya got that?”

  “Yeah, but one thing. When we’re marchin’ him up the path, do I still keep my finger off the trigger?”

  Jake looked up at the clean, blue sky. “How come it’s always me, Lord?”

  “What’d I say, now?”

  “Abe, this is where we’re gonna do it. Ya don’t think he’s gonna know that? Ya don’t think he’s gonna know this is his last chance? Once he gets outta the car, you gotta be ready. Don’t be a schmuck.”

  “All right, all right. I get the point.”

  “Good, now let’s walk in there and see what it looks like.”

  What it looked like was perfect. The narrow track wound among the cattails for a hundred yards, then ended abruptly in a small clearing. There was a pond on one side of the clearing (which would have been a great place to dump a stiff except that it was frozen like a rock) and a solid wall of reeds on the other. All you had to do was dump the body ten or fifteen yards off the clearing and by the time the rats got through with it, it’d be nothing but bones.

  “Okay,” Jake said, “we’re here. Whatta ya do next?”

  “I make him kneel with his head away from me so he can’t see it comin’.”

  “Do it.”

  “C’mon, Jake. I’ll ruin my pants.”

  “I’ll buy you another pair.”

  Abe knelt down and stared into the reeds. “Is that all right? Do I pass, teacher?”

  “I gotta give it to ya,” Jake admitted, firing three shots into the back of his buddy’s head. “You ain’t as stupid as ya look.”

  Five

  January 5

  Stanley Moodrow sat in the kitchen of his Avenue B apartment, thumbing his way through a copy of the Daily News while he waited for the coffee to boil. Moodrow had been reading the Daily News at the kitchen table for a long time. He couldn’t remember exactly when he’d beg
un to take an interest in the news of the day, but he could clearly recall his father passing him the comic section at a time when he’d been too young to do more than look at the pictures. And he could remember his mother picking up the paper, too. After his father went off to work. That’s when she got her breakfast.

  The way Moodrow saw it, his family had gone through a lot of ups and downs when he was a kid, but there’d always been two fixed pillars in their lives. Heirlooms to be handed down from generation to generation. One was the Daily News and the other was a baseball team called the Brooklyn Dodgers. He was reading the Daily News, but the Dodgers were out of his life. Permanently and forever.

  What did the sportswriters call Walter O’Malley? The most hated man in New York? And it was true-even Yankee fans hated O’Malley. For Dodger fans, the feeling was almost pathological. Moodrow could easily imagine putting a bullet into Walter O’Malley’s fat carcass. All those years waiting for a World Series? His father hadn’t lived to see it. His mother, either.

  Moodrow got up to check the glass bulb on top of the percolator. The bubbling liquid wasn’t really coffee yet, but it wasn’t all that far away. He left it to boil and took a box of Cheerios out of the cupboard. Moodrow wasn’t crazy about cereal, but the soreness in his ribs had eased considerably and he didn’t want to upset the applecart by messing with pots and pans. He was scheduled to report for assignment in two days and he was determined to do nothing more than eat, read the papers and watch television in the meantime.

  The doorbell rang before he could sit down. “Be there in a minute, Greta,” he called, reaching for his robe. It was a little early for Greta Bloom, his mother’s oldest old friend, to come up from the second floor, which she did whenever Moodrow was sick or hurt.

  “I just wanna see you’re okay. What’s the harm?”

  That was her answer whenever he tried to discourage her. Greta Bloom was a professional philanthropist. An impoverished philanthropist. Living on social security, the only thing she had to give was time. Greta went out to the shul on Clinton Street every day. She belonged to a dozen charitable “societies” and had more energy than Stanley Moodrow on fight night.

  “Good morning, Stanley. I know it’s early, but I wanted I should catch you before you went to work.” Greta Bloom, in a worn yellow housedress, was barely five feet tall. She peered up at Moodrow through pale gray eyes. Her face was small and round with sharp, narrow features that complemented her nervous energy. Even the wrinkle-lines on her forehead danced in time to her enthusiasm.

  “I’m not going to work today, Greta, so it doesn’t matter.”

  “Oy vey, Stanley. You’ve been fighting again. I thought you gave that up. I thought you were a policeman.”

  “Sometimes a policeman has to fight, too. You want coffee?”

  “I can’t stay. The sisterhood meets at ten o’clock and I didn’t even get into the shower yet. I was wondering could you do me a favor? Not for me, for a neighbor. Rosaura Pastoral who lives in 2D. You know her?”

  “Maybe if I saw her, I …”

  “It doesn’t matter. So many people moving in, moving out … it’s impossible to keep count.”

  “Unless you hang around the mailboxes and gossip all morning.”

  “Please, Stanley, I don’t have time for your wiseguy remarks. I told you I’m in a hurry. Anyway, Rosaura has a boarder-had a boarder, I should say-named Luis Melenguez who got killed on Pitt Street the day after Christmas. With a gun, Stanley. Somebody shot him. It’s been a week and nobody knows nothing. Rosaura went down to the precinct and the detectives wouldn’t even talk about it. Told her to go home and mind her own business. Can you imagine?”

  Moodrow could imagine. Cops know they have to take abuse from the victim’s family. It’s expected and you deal with it. But the landlady?

  “You want me to teach them some manners?” he asked without so much as cracking a smile. “Slap ’em around a little bit?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. And it’s not me. It’s not what I want. It’s for your neighbor, for Rosaura Pastoral. She’s a very nice woman.”

  “What’s for Rosaura Pastoral. What do you want me to do?”

  “Find out what’s going on. You told me last time you were gonna be a big-shot detective. That’s what I told Rosaura when I saw her last night. ‘Stanley’s gonna be a big-shot detective. He’ll find out what’s going on.’ ”

  Moodrow knew better than to refuse Greta Bloom. A compromise was the most he could hope for. “I’ll ask around, Greta. Find out who’s handling the case and where it’s going. But don’t expect me to jump in and solve the crime. This isn’t Gunsmoke and I’m not Matt Dillon.”

  “Stanley, don’t have a heart attack. Nobody expects miracles. If you tell Rosaura that everything’s kosher, I’m sure she’ll be satisfied. Now, I gotta run, bubbe. And put some ice on your face. You look like Frankenstein.”

  He closed the door behind her, then headed back for the kitchen. The doorbell rang again before he got to his Cheerios. “What did you …” he asked as he swung the door open.

  The sight of Kathleen Cohan in her new fox coat froze him in mid-sentence. It was funny how you could spend half the summer in a bathing suit, but you felt almost obscene in a striped bathrobe with your hairy calves sticking out.

  “Jeeeeeesussss Christ.”

  “Don’t take the Lord’s name, Stanley. I’m hoping that Jesus isn’t watching me, anyway.”

  “What are you doing here?”

  “You invited me, remember? Anyway, I’ve come to observe your domestic habits.” She pranced into the room and took off her coat. “I think it’s important to really know a person before marriage. Especially if you’re a Catholic and you have to stay married forever.”

  “Yeah? Great. Only don’t put that coat down or the roaches’ll kidnap it. My domestic habits ain’t that good.”

  “Ugh. You have cockroaches? I hate them.”

  “Everybody in the city has roaches.” He hung her coat in the hall closet.

  “I live in the city and I don’t have cockroaches.” She snuck up behind him, put her arms around his waist and squeezed gently.

  “Bayside, where you live, ain’t the city.” He paused for a second. “And that hug didn’t hurt. I must be getting better.”

  “If Bayside isn’t in the city, why do I pay city taxes?”

  He turned and kissed her. “For kids who grew up in this neighborhood, Bayside is Never-Never Land. Peter Pan lives in Bayside.”

  “In that case,” she giggled, “you can call me Tinkerbell.”

  He pulled her into his arms and kissed her. She responded eagerly, wrapping her arms as far around his back as they’d go. Moodrow, despite the fire pulling at his crotch, didn’t quite know what to make of her sudden appearance. He’d been trying to get into bed with her for the better part of a year, but he’d always respected her whispered refusals. That was the way good girls were supposed to act. At least according to the prevailing mythology. Was it possible that an official engagement changed the rules? He let his fingers slide down her spine, expecting to find that latex chastity belt under her skirt, but what he felt was the firm globes of her buttocks.

  “Kathleen …”

  “I’m supposed to be with Joanna. At the movies.” Joanna Buchanan was Kathleen’s best friend.

  “What?” Preoccupied as he was, Moodrow barely understood the words.

  “Daddy thinks I’m with Joanna. I actually was with her. We had breakfast after church, but then I came to see you. Joanna went to the movies. With her boyfriend.”

  Moodrow didn’t know what to say next, but he was smart enough to realize that she was running the show. And smart enough to let her, too.

  “I thought I’d probably find you in bed,” she declared. “I mean, if you’re in too much pain to come out and see me, you should at least be flat on your back.”

  “Right now, you could definitely knock me over with a feather,” Moodrow admitted. He waited for her to sa
y something else, but she just stood there, grinning. Finally he asked her if she wanted a cup of coffee.

  “Great.”

  “Sit on the couch and relax. I’ll be back in a minute.”

  He was pouring the coffee when he figured it out. She’d come here to go to bed with him. Deliberately and consciously. Yet he still had to seduce her. The realization didn’t come easily. The girls he’d known before he met Kathleen had mostly grown up on the Lower East Side. Some of them would do it and some wouldn’t, but whichever way it went, they didn’t need to play out this elaborate charade. Sex was a lot different in Bayside. In fact, as far as Stanley Moodrow was concerned, sexual politics out in the suburbs were more complicated than the politics at the U.N.

  Moodrow congratulated himself on his insight (“pretty deep for a twenty-five-year-old kid,” was what he told himself) and walked back into the living room prepared to do what he had to do. The only problem was that Kathleen wasn’t there. He glanced over at the front door, half expecting to find it open, but it was closed and locked.

  “Stanley?”

  There were only two other rooms in the apartment and they were both bedrooms, so that was where she had to be. In a bedroom. If his career as a detective went anything like this, he’d be back to walking a beat in a month.

  The bedroom was dark when he came in, but he could see well enough to know that she was in his bed. And that her clothing was draped over the back of a chair. He reached out to put the cup on the bureau and missed by a foot. The cup landed on the wood floor and splattered hot coffee over his right foot. He didn’t notice it any more then he’d noticed the punch that’d broken his nose.

  “I love you, Stanley,” she whispered. “And I don’t want to wait anymore. Not another minute. Even if you do look like Frankenstein come back from the dead.”

  Moodrow touched a finger to the tape covering his nose. He thought about taking it off, then realized that what he was going to have to take off was his bathrobe. With Kathleen watching.