The Iron Will of Shoeshine Cats

by Hesh Kestin

  “You invited us, Mr. Newhouse.”

  “Russell,” I said. “My friends call me Russell.”

  “Are we your friends?” this from the fireman. I knew that because his brother was in the then tunic-topped uniform of the NYPD. I knew the uniform well. For years before my father had made detective he had used to drape the tunic over the chromed steel frame of a kitchen chair. I knew the gun he carried as well: a Smith & Wesson .38 revolver, later to be replaced in the department by the plug-ugly hard-plastic Glock semi-automatic. I had cleaned my father’s gun once a week for years. He had never asked me to do it, merely showed me how. I took it from there. It was, of sorts, communication.

  “Sure we are,” I said. “We’re going through a tragic period in this country, and I hardly think we can give weight to the kind of squabbles we may have enjoyed in the past.”

  Father Bill crossed himself. Oddly, he was the most robust looking of the three. They were seated opposite on the green-leather couch whose back faced the door, from whose alcove Ira could watch my face for a hint of trouble before it began. This wasn’t my idea, but inherited from Shushan, who had left me the fortress he had built. As Justo brought in a bottle and glasses, I could not help but notice the air in the room was still sweetly redolent of yesterday’s pot, a clash of cultures if there ever was. Celeste was perched like a nervous icon at the other end of my couch.

  “You need me, boss,” Justo said. “Just call.” He disappeared into my old bedroom, probably to sit among the fitness equipment like a scholar in a gym.

  Ira looked to me questioning whether he should make himself scarce as well. I shook my head so slightly only he could tell.

  “Russell,” Celeste said. “This is like a bad dream. It just got out of hand. My brothers want to apologize.”

  “The fourth one too?” I said. “I understand he’s in the service.”

  “Professional army,” the fireman said.

  “Good for him,” I said. “You must be proud.”

  That about did it while the glasses were filled, ice plunked in, and... held. I supposed I was to make a toast.

  I raised mine, no ice. “Gentlemen, lady, to the memory of Jack Kennedy, a great president and a great Irishman.”

  We drank. The brothers drank again. Celeste sipped. She could do that all night, eventually knocking off half a bottle. But more often she preferred grass, big Pall Mall-size joints she used to ratchet up her orgasms. After I passed out she often continued on alone. She was that kind of girl.

  “So who’s going to give up the first finger?” I asked.

  Not so much as a clinking ice cube could be heard in the room. The three brothers looked at me, looked at each other, looked down at the plush tan and eggplant hotel carpet, past me out the windows to where neighboring rooftops neatly framed part of Central Park, then back down. The fireman looked at his hands. The cop looked blank. Father Bill pulled out his crucifix. For a moment I thought he might wave it at me, crying “Devil, get thee away!” But nothing so dramatic transpired. I couldn’t help but feel for them. Doubtless they saw themselves in the grip of the Brainiac Maniac, or Kid Yid Jr, heir to the criminal empire of the notorious Shushan Cats. I can’t say I didn’t enjoy it. These bozos had taken a great deal of pleasure in beating the bejesus out of me; now that they felt I had the power to do the same, and worse, I took pleasure in their fear. But there was a limit even to do that.

  Celeste broke the silence. “Russell, it was my fault.”

  I turned to her. “I’ve never seen you gift-wrapped. It works.”

  “You do like.”

  “But this is between the brothers Callinan and me. So please continue sitting there like a sacrificial offering and let us finish this.” I turned back to the boys. “So whose finger is it going to be? Let’s see. A cop needs all his fingers—so much graft, so little time. A fire fighter probably more so—all those ropes and hoses. So who does that leave?”

  Father Bill licked his lips. “Mr. Newhouse, I—”

  “Russell.”

  “Mr. Russell, as a man of the cloth, I urge you to turn from vengeance. Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord.”

  “What was He saying when you busted me up, and my apartment, and my car?”

  “Two wrongs—”

  “Three by my count,” I said. “Plus bearing false witness on the part of Celeste here, which makes it four. Celeste, did I do something wrong to you other than want to stop fucking you?”

  The brothers looked awful. It was hard not to feel for them. But Celeste was cooler. She always had that.

  “I did wrong by you,” she said. “As Jesus is my witness you never forced me to lie with you and commit sins. I confessed them and I’ve done penance.”

  “And for bearing false witness?”

  “Tomorrow. I’ll do that tomorrow. First thing. Just understand, Russell, that my brothers meant no harm.”

  “I’d hate to be in the same room when they mean it.”

  “Because they believed me, because I was angry, because you...”

  “Wanted out.”

  “I was hurt.”

  “No more than I was, sweetheart. Were we counting wrongs? Isn’t there a fifth? Dropping a dime on me to the district attorney when you gentlemen thought you could get away with it because Shushan is dead. Maybe he is, but his spirit liveth on. Which brings us to this evening’s meat course, the little matter of whose finger is going to be sacrificed first.”

  Father Bill stood up. Behind him Ira stood as well. The priest must have realized it. He sat heavily down on the green leather, resigned. “Is there no other way?”

  “Are you ready to pay the price Mr. Shushan Cats demanded?”

  The priest looked at his brothers. They looked at me.

  I looked at Celeste. “I still like you better without clothes,” I said.

  “All right, then,” the priest said.

  “You’re ready?”

  “Here?” he said, suddenly aware that a piece of him might suddenly disappear down a toilet, or remain locked away forever in a freezer along with the ice cubes and the silent steaks. “Now?”

  37.

  Maybe I should have been angrier. Maybe I should have played it out further, taken the priest into the kitchen, placed his hand on the oak cutting board by the sink, brought out a cleaver—and then, only then, relented. But in the nether regions of my mind was the fear I might not relent at all. For fear of cutting off the priest’s finger I cut off the game.

  “Father Bill,” I said. “Patrick, Monroe”—I wasn’t precisely sure which was which—“Celeste. We’ve just been through the murder of one good Irishman. I think we can do without the maiming of another.”

  All at once the room was filled with expelled air—and the sour stench of stale beer. The Callinans must have fortified themselves before making their hejira to the penthouse of the Westbury Hotel. They were smiling, really smiling.

  “Thank you,” Father Bill said. The other two said it together, as though in church: “Thank you, Mr. Newhouse.”

  “Russell,” I said. “But we do have some loose ends.”

  The smiles drained from their faces like suds from the bottom of a glass of Schlitz. Like Rheingold this was another brew that had over the years disappeared. Schlitz—the beer that made Milwaukee famous. That’s how it was marketed. It was cheap. The Irish loved it.

  Celeste came on again. “Russell, please.”

  “You three are going to pay for damage to my apartment. That’s not much. There wasn’t much to damage. Three hundred bucks. The car? After you broke it up the scavengers took the rest, so that’s a total loss. Let’s say twelve hundred. That’s fifteen hundred bucks. Five hundred a piece. You’re getting off easy.”

  “No problem with that,” the fireman said. “We can handle that.”

  “Amen,” said the cop.

  “But there’s also that other little matter, which can’t be so easily compensated. Any of you ever been beat up?” I didn’t wait for
an answer. They were Irish. Probably their father had been the first, then the nuns and priests. “So you know it’s not pleasant. Then there’s another kind of violence in the matter of the DA, trying to hurt me by proxy when you figured I was in no position to hurt you back, or even to defend myself.”

  “A big misunderstanding,” Father Bill said. “If you’d let me explain.”

  “No,” I said. “No explanations. That would just make it worse, father. First off, I want you to come to terms with the fact that your little sister here is a woman. I don’t want you ever to treat her badly because you’ve discovered she’s not the Virgin Mary. Is that clear?”

  They nodded.

  “A hell of a woman, by the way. Second, I want you—all three of you—to give to charity.”

  “Charity?” the priest said.

  “Charity. I’ll let you set the amount. But I want it to be every year for the rest of your lives. If there’s a year that you don’t give to charity, I’ll know it, because at the end of every year, when you pay your taxes, you’re going to send a note to my associate in the next room, Mr. Justo Ocero, at this address, telling him how much you gave and to whom. I’ll match that amount. But if I think it’s too little for your income, too cheap, I’m going to go for the fingers again, with interest. Should that happen there won’t be a chance to make amends. You won’t be able to write another check and get out of it.”

  “What kind of charity?” the fireman asked. “Any kind?”

  “Jewish?” the cop asked.

  “Jewish, Catholic, Buddhist, animist. I don’t care. Just so long as you do it. Think of it as penance, or absolution.”

  “Only a priest may offer absolution, Mr. Russell.”

  “Good, then you can give them absolution, and yourself. Once a year. Can you give too much charity? No. Can you give too little? Yes. I won’t accept too little.”

  The fireman looked confused. “How do we know, if you don’t mind, Mr. New—Mr. Russell, how much is too little?”

  “You’ll know when you try to pick your nose with a digit that isn’t there,” I said. “Number three.”

  The brothers braced themselves. It was physical, as though they were preparing to take a blow.

  “Number three is this. I’m going to forgive you for what you did, but from this day forward you owe me. Personally.”

  “Owe you?” the cop said. He knew he might be called upon first. If I was the man he thought I was, he was going to be called upon. “There’s certain things, difficult...”

  “I don’t care how difficult. You owe me. When I or a friend needs a favor, or a friends’s sister’s cleaning lady’s lover, he needs a favor, you’re there. Is that clear?”

  “What kind of favor, Mr. Newhouse?” the fireman asked.

  “Whatever fucking favor I say,” I said. “Are we understood, gentlemen?” Blank looks. “You have to say it. Are we agreed on these terms, gentlemen? Yes or no?”

  One by one they said it.

  “Good, then we have an agreement. Now Celeste, Father Bill, Patrick, Monroe, I regret that my associates and I have an appointment in Chinatown, so as much as I’d like to sit and chat with you I’ve got business on Mott Street.” I stood, shook hands with each of the brothers.

  Celeste kissed me, this time on the lips. “You were great,” she said. “You know, if ever...”

  “Absolutely,” I said. I put a fifty in her hand. “Celeste, do me a favor and take your fine brothers out for a drink. My treat.”

  Father Bill turned back at the door. “Any charity?”

  “Any charity. Just make sure.”

  “You’re going to want a receipt?”

  “I trust you, Father Bill,” I said. “I trust you all.”

  38.

  Despite the chill I had Ira put the top down on the Caddy as we sailed downtown in traffic abnormally light for a Saturday night. The assassination seemed to have altered the face of the city. Few people were on the streets. Still, the movies on Forty-Second Street and in Times Square remained open: The Ugly American, Charade, From Russia With Love, The Great Escape, Hud and (with a block-long line) PT-109, starring Cliff Robertson as a wartime JFK; for those who didn’t wish to be reminded of the news there was Irma La Douce, Tom Jones, Bye-Bye Birdie, Flipper and Lassie’s Great Adventure, to say nothing of King Kong vs Godzilla, The Slime People and It Happened At The World’s Fair with none other than Elvis Presley, plus Jerry Lewis in The Nutty Professor. Yet the streets that met Broadway were filling with theater-goers prepared to be delighted by Richard Burton in Camelot and to split a gut with Zero Mostel in A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum, along with less-certain results at Stop The World—I Want to Get Off, Brigadoon and Oliver. But beyond these pockets the streets themselves seemed somber, or perhaps only less frivolous. Even the panhandlers had disappeared. The murder of a president is not something people are prepared for, and Kennedy’s successor, despite his decades in Congress, or because of them, was not a known quantity to the average New Yorker. Then there was the all but unspoken question: Who was behind it? Had Oswald acted alone? Was a foreign power involved, as the network television news anchors passively suggested with each new disclosure of the unbelievable details of Oswald’s life—Marine, defector to Moscow, supporter of Fidel Castro—or was it all a right-wing conspiracy cooked up by the proto-fascist wizards of Dallas, or the Mafia, or... No one knew. The shadow hanging over the city was not mourning. It was the uneasiness of the uninformed: uncertainty, doubt, suspicion, palpable fear.

  As we drove down Fifth Avenue into the Village the normally buzzing streets were all but unpopulated save for a handful of young couples scurrying down the pavements outside the Church of the Ascension at Tenth Street and lonely young men carrying guitar cases strapped to their backs like centurions retreating behind their shields. A few disconsolate transvestites stood chattering in the cold at the corner of Eighth Street, the Village’s main drag in both senses. At Sixth a squadron of Hell’s Angels revved their Harleys. Further down an interracial couple, arm in arm, turned into the doorway of the massive apartment house at One Fifth Avenue, the doorman showering spit on the pavement as he closed the glass door behind them.

  “I was listening through the door,” Justo said practically under his breath from where he sat between Ira and me. “Shushan, he would be proud. Chinga, you did it beautiful.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” I said. “Ira, if the president’s dead or not we should have some music, right?”

  The big man turned on the radio, which took a moment to warm up. This was pretty much the last of the tube radios. Micro-electronics were coming in. The remorseless march of technology would soon become the dominant factor of American life, ultimately to become a fetish whose roots lay in the space race with the Soviet Union, which the year before had beat the US to the moon. It was the dawn of a new age. I hardly noticed.

  I will follow him,

  No matter where he goes

  Ira pressed a button.

  Hello mudda, hello fadda

  “What the fuck music is that?” I said. We were coming to Washington Square, on the edges spilling with people who, from the way they clumped together, had probably gathered spontaneously. Over the gag song on the radio I could now hear the cacaphony of plucked strings and plaintive strummed chords that was the feeble public mourning of the young and the would-be young. Though I didn’t quite share the views of Shushan Cats and Auro Sfangiullo regarding the now slain president, neither had I cared much for the man. There was something wrong there that a glamorous wife and well-cut suits could not quite hide.

  “That’s Allan Sherman—it’s a funny song about summer camp.”

  “I’ve never been,” I said.

  “Yeah, but it’s funny,” Ira said. “The kid is—”

  “Change it back,” I said.

  “But boss—”

  “But boss nothing. It’s not music.”

  By this time the Miracles had disappeared from WABC and the Crys
tals were into their sweet driving lyrics, senseless drivel and pure longing at the same time. I suppose the song was about desire. No one who heard it, loved it and sung along really knew or cared. It was the nature of doo-wop: the lyrics could be in Estonian.

  I met him on a Monday and my heart stood still

  Da doo ron ron ron, da doo ron ron

  Somebody told me that his name was Bill

  Da doo ron ron ron, da doo ron ron

  Yeah my heart stood still

  Yeah his name was Bill

  And when he walked me home

  Da doo ron ron ron, da doo ron ron

  Yeah he looks so fine

  Yeah I’ll make him mine

  And when he walked me home

  Da doo ron ron ron, da doo ron ron

  “Boss,” Ira said as we stopped at the light.

  “Listen to this guy, Justo. He’s growing a mouth.”

  “I’m entitled to my own opinion, ain’t I?”

  “Not while I’m in the car, Ira.”

  “But...”

  “Who’s the boss, Ira?”

  “You are, boss.”

  “So suffer,” I said.

  As we turned the corner I could see the park was packed, maybe more than a thousand people, most of whom seemed to be armed with instruments: guitars, mandolins, banjos, zithers, harmonicas, concertinas, bongo drums. At school I’d mostly just tolerated the folk scene, flannel shirts, carefully torn jeans, bad haircuts, no haircuts. Now I felt an odd kinship with these lost souls who had seized upon a dying tradition—in 1963 rock was ascendant, jazz still hip, but folk was just plain goofy—to create a bridge to a simpler past.

  These were the sons and daughters, grandsons and granddaughters of the Bhotke Society, of the Knights of Columbus, the Ancient Order of Hibernians and every other immigrant group in the city, the native-born generation having turned its collective back on the discredited culture of their parents—except for food, because tastes formed in childhood could not so easily be negated—to become un-hyphenated Americans. City of immigrants, New York was the center of the folk music renaissance, where a Robert Zimmerman become Bob Dylan, and where countless Goldmans and Manellis and O’Keefes identified not with the old country but with the makers of Appalachian ballads, Texas cowboy serenades and the labor hymns of Colorado miners.