by Sol Stein
“Thank you. I thought you might say no, so I have a smaller proposition, a little business we could do, all right? As you know, Nick—it’s okay I call you Nick, right?—I been putting together pieces in a certain eight-square-block area in Woodside, right, almost perfect except for a small piece of property the size of a hat, a candy store with three apartments up above, that somebody else owns, you know what I’m talking about?”
“That piece is owned by one of my companies, Mr. Barone,” I said. “I thought you knew that.”
I’d seen what he was doing in Woodside and I bought that small parcel overnight. He hadn’t played fast enough. The rest would be no good to him unless he got my piece.
Barone said, “I know you get a lot of real pleasure out of that candy store, Nick, but I thought you might get more pleasure if I paid you two fifty for it.”
“I have a better idea, Mr. Barone. Why don’t I give you five hundred for your parcels?”
He hung up so hard my eardrum hummed. I could have kissed the telephone. It was as if a whole church choir was singing all around me. Oh God, how I loved screwing Barone to the wall! I walked a foot off the ground.
When I told the old man, I expected him to say, “Wonderful! Wonderful!”
What he said was “That’s not the last time you hear from Barone, Nick.”
“Better offer for my parcel? I still won’t take it.”
“Barone not stupid. He wait for you to make mistake.”
I didn’t think Barone had the patience to wait three four years.
*
I picked up the phone and said to Rivers’s secretary, “Sweetie, this is Nick Manucci. Put Mr. Rivers on.”
In two seconds she’s back. “Mr. Rivers is busy.”
“Tell him Barone sent me.”
I heard her breathing but that’s all.
“Sweetie, don’t sit on your twat. Tell him what I said.”
The next thing I heard is Rivers saying, “Mr. Manucci, what you said to my secretary has got her very upset.”
“Did she give you my message?”
“I have someone in my office.”
“Well, step out of your office into her office ’cause I am going to have the rest of our conversation now.”
That tough son-of-a-bitch lawyer’s got Barone’s nutcracker on his balls. Somebody stupid would have said to me, “Who’s Barone?” or something like that. Rivers is not stupid. When he gets back on, he said, “What’s this about Barone?”
“Mr. Rivers,” I said to him, “this is my offer. I’ll pay you a retainer, rain or shine, two grand a week.”
He coughed. He didn’t have a cold. He had a pineapple up his ass he couldn’t get rid of.
“I’m not kidding,” I said to him. “You use my two grand to pay Barone back and in no time—three years tops—you’re free and clear.”
He did the cough again. I’m polite. I said to him, “You take care of your cold, Mr. Rivers.”
“I don’t have a cold. I’m thinking.”
So I said, “Let me help. You can live on what you get from your other clients. You can forget Barone. Your new wife—you do have a new wife, right?”
“As a matter of fact I do.”
“Well, she’ll sure appreciate not having to worry about Barone. And I’ll appreciate being your number-one client. That makes two people who’ll appreciate you who may not be appreciating you right now.”
It’s time for Rivers to say something, so I shut up and concentrate on finishing my doodle, which is a tic-tac-toe I always win.
“You’re an interesting negotiator, Mr. Manucci. I thought you handled the Golub matter beautifully.”
“We have a deal?”
“I’ll come over to your office.” He sounds like I just let him out of jail.
“We don’t need a meeting. We just had it. You want me to pay Barone direct? He’ll know it’s from you, but he won’t know it’s me that’s paying it.”
He’s thinking. I don’t want him to strain himself, so I said, “This way you won’t have to think about income tax.”
I figure by this time Rivers wants to kiss my ass. “You can draw up a piece of paper,” I said.
“I’d just as soon not have it in writing. You’re a gentleman, Mr. Manucci, I trust you.”
What am I going to say? “Terrific. You’re retained. The first payment gets to Barone on Friday.” I don’t want him thanking me, so I said good-bye and hung up. What I’m thinking is Hey, Papa Manucci, when I walked in there Rivers was working for Barone—now he’s working for me!
18
Ben
I arrived at the office late. Charlotte said, “That Chicago man called.”
“Did you tell him everything’s under control?”
“He didn’t want to talk to me. He wants to talk to you.”
“Tell him I’ve got a strep throat.”
“Your check-up man called, too.”
“Who?”
“Steve Nissof. He said it was urgent.”
“Why didn’t you call me at home?”
“I did. Jane said you were still asleep, that you’d had a rough night.”
“She should have awakened me.”
“She said she’d leave a note.”
“I didn’t see a note.”
“I’ll get him,” said Charlotte, dialing.
“I hurry my ass off,” Nissof said, “then I can’t get you.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Well, Mr. Riller, you’re lucky. You got yourself a deal.”
“When do I see Barone?”
“You don’t have to. I offered him three thousand to light a little fire. You should have heard him yell. Three thousand is tipping money! But when I said the fire was to be under Nick Manucci, hey man! If Barone didn’t have a habit of taking money, he might have done this for nothing.”
“You didn’t tell him the job was for me?”
“Absolutely not. You should have heard him on the subject of Manucci. Our timing was perfect. Apparently Manucci screwed him out of some collateral just a couple of days ago. What you’ve got to do first, Mr. Riller, is get me my five thousand. I only get two grand out of the deal.”
I felt a squirrel in my chest. “I hope this isn’t going to involve anything physical.”
Nissof said, “Manucci was squeezing your nuts, wasn’t he?”
I didn’t say anything.
“Now look, Mr. Riller,” Nissof went on. “It’s done. No backing off. A phone handshake with Barone is made in concrete, understand? I can’t welsh on him, which means you can’t welsh on me. When do I get the dough?”
“Soon.”
“How soon?”
*
I reached Jane at her office. “I’m in the middle of a meeting, Ben.” I could feel the hesitation in her voice. “Can I get back to you later?”
“No. Get rid of them. Excuse yourself. I’ve got to come up with five grand cash today. The only place I know that’s got it is your account at Chemical.”
We never discussed her business account. All I knew was that some part of it produced interest that showed up on our joint tax return. Judging by the interest, it had to have over five thousand in it.
All Jane said was no.
I know she put her hand over the mouthpiece, but I could still hear her say something to whoever was in her office. When she got back on, I said, “You want me to beg?”
“Will you tell me what you’re doing with it?”
“I’d rather you didn’t know.”
“Ben, be careful.”
I should have been careful a long time ago.
She waited at least ten seconds for me to say something. I was suddenly afraid that she might hang up. “Jane?”
“I’ll bring it over lunchtime,” she said. “I want you to tell me what this is all about.” She hung up.
I looked up at the ceiling. Was I expecting to find Louie there? Louie wasn’t anywhere.
19
Mary
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br /> Don’t ever complain about nothing happening because that’s when something happens.
When I came out to prune the roses along the walk I noticed the leaves of the linden tree in front of the Baldridge house across the street dropping a speckled net of shadows across an unfamiliar dark green car. I could make out two men in the front seat.
Nick was very strict about rules. I hurried inside, still holding the pruning shears, and phoned Alice Baldridge.
“I hope I’m not getting you at a bad time, Alice.”
“No, no, fine,” she said. “What’s up?”
“Does that green Caddy in front of your place…are those people coming to visit you?”
“I’m not expecting anyone, Mary. But if it’s a nice car, maybe I should invite them in.”
She’s a joker, Alice. I thanked her and dialed the police as I was supposed to.
“This is Mrs. Manucci, Cedar Drive East.”
“Yes, Mrs. Manucci.”
“There’s an unfamiliar car with two men in it parked across the street.”
“Maybe they’re waiting for someone, Mrs. Manucci.”
“I checked with Mrs. Baldridge. She isn’t expecting anyone.”
The policeman sighed. “Can you see what kind of car it is?”
“Green Cadillac.”
“Did you note the license number?”
“Can’t see it unless I go out into the street.”
“Never mind, Mrs. Manucci. We’ll check it out for you.”
When we moved to the suburbs I told Nick I wanted a place where the cops were friendly like in Minnesota. Nick grew up in New York City. He couldn’t imagine a place where the cops were friendly.
From the bedroom window upstairs I had a clear view of the street. I saw the patrol car come around the corner and pull up alongside the Cadillac. I could see someone on the passenger side rolling the window down.
The policeman didn’t get out of his car. The man in the Caddy was saying something. I guess the policeman then said something. When the police car pulled away, and a few seconds later the Caddy went, too, I went back down to my roses, relieved. The man I had my first affair with, Gary, drove a Cadillac.
He used to come to the house because I hated the idea of motel rooms. The kids were in school, Nick never ever came home in the daytime, so it was safe. Doing it in your own bedroom was exciting in itself because Nick said never bring a man home. Gary came here twice a week until someone told him who Nick was. He asked me point blank, “Is that who your husband is?” I told him yes that was Nick, and he never came back.
Doing the roses gives me peace like nothing else. Nick never touches them. Even the forsythia, the first color we get in this neighborhood, I don’t let it grow scraggly, I give it shape. And fertilize it plenty so the yellow is the yellowest yellow you’ve ever seen.
Would you believe it was a poli-sci teacher who taught me to see color? Mr. Milford, the one great teacher I ever had, used to say Distinguish color carefully and you’ll learn to distinguish carefully in other things. He’d say yellow can be a dozen different yellows, by which he meant from the palest ivory which isn’t really yellow, to the lemon-dark of these forsythia. What color are roses? he would say, and we would chant back red, pink, white, yellow, and he’d say Go on and we’d yell our new choices: peach, orange, lavender, and someone would say Who ever saw a lavender rose? and it was I who said Angel Face is lavender. And then Mr. Milford would say What color is the human race? and we’d say white, black, brown, yellow and he’d say Go on and we’d have to say tan, pink, rust, ocher, blue-black, café-au-lait. Mr. Milford said you have to be precise, you have to be clear, you have to make distinctions.
A noise made me look up quick.
My heart skittered when I saw the same dark green Cadillac drive up and stop on my side of the street this time. The nerve, after being chased by the police!
This time the man on the passenger side got out, and the driver took off. I glanced across the street to see if by any chance Alice was looking out of an upstairs window. Nobody.
The man lifted the hook on our gate at the end of the driveway, let himself in, and put the hook back in place. He was dressed in a striped business suit but didn’t look like a businessman. Maybe it was his complexion, dark like the southern Italians my father used to have such strong feelings about.
As he came closer, he took his hat off and held it against his chest in a way I hadn’t seen since the old movies.
“Mrs. Manucci,” he said. “I just tried to phone you from the drugstore to let you know I was coming, but nobody answered the phone in the house.” He smiled. “I guess that’s ’cause you were out here.”
He was letting me know he knew no one else was home.
“My name is Angelo.”
I waited for a last name.
“I need to talk to you. Just for a couple of minutes, okay?”
If I went inside to call the police, would he try to stop me? What would I tell the police, that he was trespassing?
“I don’t get involved in my husband’s business matters,” I said.
“Sure, sure,” Angelo said, “but this is different. Can we go inside to talk?”
“We can talk right here.”
“If you don’t mind people seeing us…”
“Please tell me what you want.”
“I’m sorry if I frightened you before, Mrs. Manucci. I only wanted to get a message to Nick.”
“You could phone him at his office.”
“Not really. Mrs. Manucci, I represent some businesspeople who gave a big loan to one of the regular customers. The collateral on that loan was a very expensive computer setup. You know what collateral is, Mrs. Manucci.”
“Yes. Of course.”
“Well, when we turned down a request for more money from the same party because he didn’t have any more collateral, your husband lent him some and took a second mortgage on the computers.”
“I’m not sure I understand.”
“Maybe you don’t have to.” Angelo took out a packet of cigarettes, looked at it, put it back. “I don’t smoke anymore,” he said with a little laugh. “I shouldn’t be carrying them. The problem, Mrs. Manucci, is that your husband had the computers loaded on a truck two days ago and moved them to Canada. That’s our collateral, Mrs. Manucci, he had no business moving it out of our reach. If he wants to compete with us on loans, that’s okay, but what he just did doesn’t get done without causing a lot of harm. Please tell Nick that you and the kids would really like to have those computers returned right away.”
He put his hat back on. “That’s all you have to remember, Mrs. Manucci, to have the computers returned, okay?”
“Where can he reach you?”
“He doesn’t reach us. He just returns the computers.” He went back out into the street, and almost immediately the dark green Cadillac was there picking him up.
I ran into the house to call Nick, but the phone was already ringing. It was Alice Baldridge.
“That car came back. Are you okay, Mary?”
“Sure, sure, I’m okay, it was just some businessmen looking for Nick.”
“I was hoping you’d be okay. I didn’t think they’d come back after the police car came by. Were they Americans?” Alice asked.
“I don’t know,” I lied.
“The man who talked to you, he didn’t look American to me. We never used to have cars just sitting there in the street before.”
“Before what?”
“I didn’t mean anything, Mary.”
“I’ve got to call Nick, Alice, I’ll talk to you later.” I hung up without waiting for her good-bye.
Comment by Aldo Manucci
Long time ago I told Mary, “If you have baby, you tell Nick first, if Nick in trouble, you tell me first.” I teach Nick how to wipe his nose, wipe his ass, do business. I tell him never cross anybody. God take you soon enough, don’t meet him halfway. When Mary call me, she talk to Nick already. I call Nick.
“What make you do stupid thing like that? You got enough customers.”
“They wouldn’t give him another loan,” Nick said. “That makes him a free agent.”
“He still owes them. He’s their customer.”
“Look, Pop, I’m handling it. Please?”
“Nick, you handle it, that’s why you got trouble. They know their business. If they won’t give a guy a second mortgage, how come you do?”
“Papa, that computer setup is worth eighteen times what they lent the guy.”
“Bigshot, you think you’re ahead of Barone because you got possession of collateral? You got possession of nuts! If they get to you, it’s your fault you’re dead. Mary’s a smart wife, but the world eats widows. Why you take the collateral to Canada?”
For a minute Nick said nothing. He’s making up a lie.
“Don’t lie to me, Nick.”
“I found out this customer was looking for another loan on top of mine. He was offering the computers as collateral, a third mortgage, without telling them about my loan. I had to protect my loan, didn’t I?”
“What about Barone’s loan? He come first. You mad ’cause somebody try to do to you what you do to Barone.”
“The guy said Barone’s people never went to his place like I did. They did it all on paper. I never thought Barone would find out.”
“I told you not to lie, Nick. You want give Barone the finger. You want him find out you took his collateral.”
“Hey, Papa…”
“Nick, hear me good. Return it.”
“I can’t.”
“What you mean?” Nick got me scared now, I tell you.
“The truck was impounded in Canada.”
“Mary, Mother of God. Get it back.”
“I’m trying. My man up there says it could take three, four weeks.”
“Nick, they kill people, you know that.”
“I’m not afraid of them, Papa. I can take care of myself.”
“I don’t give good goddamn about yourself, you hear what the man say to Mary? He said, ‘You and the kids want to have computers returned right away.’ He was talking going after them not you, stupido. You want the disgrace of a man who loses his wife and kids because of a business mistake?”