by Sol Stein
She doesn’t say a thing.
“You biting your lip? I’ll give you something to bite. Don’t you turn your back on me. I can’t make the house grow back where it was. We were lucky to get this rental where the kids could go to the same school, which is what you wanted, wasn’t it?”
I am not going to lose one night’s shut-eye about the house burning.
“I don’t care about the house,” she says.
“You better care I collect the insurance. They’re talking ‘suspicious origins,’ maybe I need to feed them a few clues to Barone. This isn’t the South Bronx where you can torch a house and forget it.”
“Your father says you deserved it. He’s only sorry that it’s my home, too.”
“Listen, why don’t you marry the old man you like him so much. You think he never made mistakes?”
“Oh sure,” Mary says. “He made one helluva mistake the night you were conceived. He should have worn a condom.”
Out she goes before I can grab her. I used to like her smartass mouth better when it wasn’t shooting off at me.
I don’t care. I’m having a helluva time with this whole Riller deal. I try to be useful. For instance, when Ben filled me in on his old pal Sam Glenn wanting to waltz backward, I said, “One phone call is all I need. Give me his info card.”
Ben says, “Can I listen in?”
Why not? I let Ben pick up the extension, but I warn him, “Don’t breathe.” I dial the number, and I tell whoever, “Mr. Sam Glenn, please.”
So she says, “Who’s calling?” and I say, “Ben Riller,” winking over at Ben. I hear some intercom back and forthing and then he comes on. “You fuck,” he begins.
I motion Ben it’s okay, relax.
“Mr. Glenn, Ben is kind of busy right now. This is Ben’s partner. I’m in the money business, like you. I do lending and collecting. I assume you know people in the money business in New York, like Mister Forty-four?”
Dead air. “Are you there, Mr. Glenn?”
“Yeah,” he says finally.
“Good, good. You might want to call Forty-four and ask him about Nick Manucci, that’s my name. I can give you other references.”
He cuts in. “I know who you are.”
“How nice. I understand that now that the play is fully financed, you want your piece out, is that correct?”
“That play’s a dud.”
Ben is motioning me, but I wave him off. This is no time for interruptions.
“I’m sure your opinion is right for you, Mr. Glenn. I don’t want to disagree with you. Just I think The Best Revenge is going to make a lot of money. Your sour grapes would just bother the hell out of me if you complained afterward, so I’d just as soon…”
“Just as soon what?”
“Take you out.”
I drum my fingers on the mouthpiece. Then I says, “I could send somebody to see you about that. I have a friend in Chicago.”
“I know about your friend in Chicago. I don’t want him on these premises.”
“Easy, easy. I was going to suggest he meet you at…” I look at the card in front of me. “…thirty-five Ann Street.”
“I don’t see anybody at my home.”
“Oh, that’s sad, Mr. Glenn. I understand you threatened Mr. Riller a while back. That’s not true, is it?”
Dead air again.
“It’s okay to lie if that’s what you want to do. All I care about is your investment. I’m perfectly happy to buy out your piece.”
“For cash?”
“I’ll leave that up to my friend in Chicago. Maybe cash, maybe a note, maybe just his word, he’s a man of his word.”
I hold my hand over the mouthpiece. It seems like minutes before he says, “Mr. Manucci, I’d rather discuss things with you than with one of your delegates. Do you want me in or out?”
I wink at Ben.
“But Mr. Glenn, you are in. Maybe you should stay in. Otherwise people could misinterpret your withdrawal. Mr. Glenn, I just noticed the time, I’m late for a funeral. Tell me quick, in or out.”
I can feel his sweat on the phone line.
“In,” he says.
“Glad to hear it,” I say. “Gotta run.”
I hang up. Ben looks like he’s going to do a jig.
“Forget it,” I say. “Any time.”
*
I’m beginning to think that when Ben fell into my lap, I was ready for something different. I used to get excited one and a half times per transaction. Should-I-or-shouldn’t-I is like a vibrator on the brain. Do I or don’t I lend money to this guy sitting across from me? What would it take to cash in on the collateral if the loan went bad? Is this a one-shot or the beginning of a steady? When I say okay to the loan, the vibrator stops.
The half-high comes at the end of the line, the due date. Sometimes, not a ripple. But usually there’s a phone call and the vibrator dings. Could I give him another week? Could he repay the loan and have his brother-in-law take out the same amount, only could his brother-in-law take it out a few seconds first so he’d have the money to repay the original loan, shit like that. You can’t believe the things people will try.
Sometimes it’s smart to go along if you’re getting your vigorish and you’re pretty sure you’ll get the principal eventually. Money’s no good to you unless it’s out there working.
The only time your brain has to work in high is when the customer first starts dancing. He’s looking for a delay. A delay is okay if a guy knows what he’s delaying for and it’s just a matter of time. The amount of time doesn’t matter. But if it’s an act of God the guy’s waiting for, you’ve got to show your knuckles. Showing knuckles to Sam Glenn was nothing.
*
A week before the opening, Mary and I were at the Rillers’ town house for dinner and for Ben and me to shoot a little pool before Mary and I headed back to our rental. When Ben and I were down in the playroom, I asked him, “You ever get bored putting on a show?”
Ben concentrated on his bridge shot. Then the cue went straight forward just an inch, hitting the cue ball which hit the five perfectly, and only when the ball dropped into the pocket did Ben look up at me and say, “Are you kidding? It’s the longest horse race in the world and there’s no place or show.”
I waited my turn. Using the bridge for a difficult top shot, I said, “Loaning money is boring compared to your kind of horse racing.” I chalked the stick too much.
“Stick around,” is all Ben said.
“Ben, I been meaning to kind of apologize about hassling you on your deal at the beginning. I almost missed the fun.”
“Suppose the play flops?” Ben said, his eyes at me dead cold.
“I’ve thought about it.”
“What have you thought about it?”
“I’ll write it off my income tax. Maybe the next one will make it double. I can afford fun.”
I concentrated so hard on giving the cue ball a little backspin it nearly missed the ten ball. Instead of plunking into the pocket, the ten ball moved just enough to position it for Ben.
“Like that,” I said. “I missed, but I’m still ahead. I’d like to have a serious talk with you sometime, Ben.”
We heard the doorbell ring upstairs. Ben took his turn, aiming carefully.
I said, “Last night I was thinking, if I was to get married all over again, you know what kind of woman I’d go after?”
“Shhhhh,” Ben said.
When he pocketed the ten ball, still bent over the table he looked up. “What kind of woman?” he said.
“Like Mary. She’s got eyes for you.”
Ben straightened up. “What are you talking about, Nick?”
“I’m not fucking blind, Ben. I been neglecting her for a long time. She’d pick up on a guy like you.”
“Don’t get jealous, Nick, it takes two.”
“Not always, Ben.”
Ben’s wife was on the last stair coming down to the poolroom. I hoped she didn’t hear anything.
“The UPS man wants your signature for the package, Nick,” she said.
Instantly Ben said, “Stay here, Nick.” Like a shot he was up the stairs. I followed him. His hand on Jane’s arm got her away from the door. He opened it.
The UPS man said, “You Mr. Manucci?”
“Mr. Manucci isn’t here. Where’s Lenny?”
“Who’s Lenny?”
“Our regular UPS man.”
“He’s off today.”
“Where’s your truck?”
“Down the block. You going to sign for this package?”
“Get the hell out of here or I’ll call the cops.”
Ben shut the door in the guy’s face. I started to say something and Ben said, “Hold it.” Then he opened the door a crack.
“Just wanted to make sure he didn’t leave the package. It’s all right, the guy’s gone and so’s the package.”
“What’s this all about?” Jane asked.
Mary said, “Nick’s head.” She was asking Ben, “Isn’t it?”
Ben looked like all the blood been drained out of his face. He said, “UPS never delivers this time of night. Why would UPS deliver a package to Nick here? Who would know he’s here?”
“Hey,” I said to him, “you didn’t send the package, did you, Ben?”
Ben just stood there.
I felt the stubble on my cheek. You shave it off every morning and by evening it’s pushing its way faster than weeds.
I’m thinking I’m happy, and that package shows up at the door. I got the damn computers back to Barone’s guy, didn’t I? My new lawyer said Barone accepted the parcel in Jackson Heights, didn’t he? We’re supposed to be even.
They were all watching me so I looked straight at them and said, half-laughing so they’d know I wasn’t taking it too seriously, “Hey, maybe that was a real UPS package. You guys order anything from Bloomingdale’s?”
Jane shook her head. “He asked for you.”
“Maybe it’s a present. Maybe Barone forgot his little game is over. I better remind him.”
“How?” Ben asked.
I never got the chance to answer because Mary said, “This is no way to live.”
29
Ben
On opening night, when the usherette showed us to our seats in the back row with a “Good evening, Mr. Riller,” as if I were the only identifiable person in the party of four, Nick said, “What’s the matter, Ben, don’t you know anyone who could get you better seats?”
“I’ve already seen the play,” I said. “From here I can watch the audience.”
Nick shuffled us in so that it was Jane, me, Mary, and Nick last, which left Mary where, concealed by the wrap in her lap, she could move her left thigh as close to mine as she wanted to. The more I had warmed to Nick these past six weeks, the queasier I felt about Mary’s heavy need to get her battery charged. At the same time I had to admit I felt a surge from attracting the wife of the man who’d had me in a half nelson when we first met. Why was Jane getting up? Had she seen anything?
“I’m going to use the facilities before the lines form,” she said, moving past us to the aisle.
Nick, who’d been riffling through the program like an excited school kid, was trying to attract my attention. “I like that,” he said, hitting the title page with the back of his hand. BENJAMIN RILLER, IN ASSOCIATION WITH NICHOLAS MANUCCI, PRESENTS THE BEST REVENGE, A PLAY IN THREE ACTS BY GORDON WALZER. Then in a voice of old friendship he had started to use with me, a breathy, confidential near whisper, he said, “I didn’t think my old man in the wheelchair’d be such a good idea for tonight. I want to bring him down later in the week, what do you think?”
I knew the feeling. I’d craved for Louie to see my first production. At every opening, I felt him all over the place, watching the play, watching the audience, watching me.
If you want to understand a people, Louie had once said, listen to their special words. That’s when he told me about the four-thousand-year-old secret of the Jews. In Yiddish, Ben, naches means the pride a parent gets from the achievements of a child. Who else has an untranslatable word that means that? Nobody. And who else gives their kids such a need to provide naches to their parents?
Suddenly I remembered Louie saying You run faster than Ezra. Make sure you’re running in the right direction. I’d forgotten to send Ezra tickets to the opening! Distraught, I glanced around, saw him sitting eight or nine rows down, next to the critic from the Times. Thank God Charlotte had remembered.
Tell the Times what a louse I am, Ezra. At openings, he and Sarah had always sat in the seats that Nick and Mary were now occupying.
Ezra had understood Louie better than I had. He had the distance. He was someone else’s son.
We both chased Louie’s aperçus to the mouth of the grave.
Louie had outrun us. We were too young, stopped at the door, not let in. Louie was too young and he was let in! After thirty-five years I still missed him. God in Heaven, I thought, now that You’ve got Louie, keep half an eye on him or he’ll work himself to death up there, too.
A woman way up front in the fourth row turned in my direction. My heart jumped. Zipporah! Was she staring in my direction because I had thought of Louie and not of her? In a second I refocused; the woman looked very little like Zipporah. My brain needed brakes.
“How long till the curtain?” Nick asked.
“Couple of minutes.”
“Never been so nervous,” he said, forcing his voice to chuckle.
“You were right, Nick. We should have bribed the critics.”
“Yeah, but how do you bribe the audience?”
Nick had a first-class osmosis factor. He picked up fast.
Why was that woman turning around again and looking in my direction?
*
In 1954 I was up in New Hampshire to catch a local production of a new play that two or three people had said might be worth considering for Broadway with a better cast. The play was as good as the publicity. Backstage I introduced myself to the local producer and we arranged to talk deal over breakfast at nine the next morning.
When the phone in my motel room jangled me awake the next morning, it was only seven a.m. I’d left a call in for eight.
“I have a person-to-person call for Mr. Benjamin Riller,” the operator said.
Ezra was on the line. “I’ve got bad news, Ben.”
“Who’s suing me this early in the morning?”
Ezra’s silence got to me. “Say something.”
I could hear him swallowing. “Zipporah is dead.”
I’d talked to her yesterday morning. Zipporah was in perfect health.
“I’m sorry,” Ezra said.
How could she die in New York when I was in New Hampshire? “Just a minute.” I put the phone down. I found Kleenex in the bathroom and blew my nose.
“What happened?” I said into the phone.
“She was uncomfortable yesterday afternoon. When she couldn’t get you, she called me and I called the doctor and told him to get his ass over there. He told her to take Bromo-Seltzer. It was a heart attack, Ben. It’s very hot in New York now, and the funeral people want to pick the body up as soon as possible.
“Before it starts to smell,” I said.
“Stop it, Ben. There’s a flight out of Keene an hour and a half from now. You can make it. I’ll meet you at LaGuardia.”
I left my apologies for the producer to find when he woke up. It cost sixty dollars for the local taxi because I wouldn’t wait for another passenger heading in the same direction. Ezra took my bag when I got off the plane, and shook my hand the way Jews do to seal a death. When we got to the apartment, the front door was open. I headed straight for the bedroom. Two men—they looked like furniture movers—were heaving Zipporah into a body bag, her left breast flopping out of the nightgown.
*
Jane, just getting back to her seat, said, “The curtain’s going up.”
30
Jane
> Gordon Walzer was prickly the one time I met him after reading the play.
“It’s very clever,” I said.
“You mean insightful.”
“Okay, insightful.”
“And you’re wondering how a hippie-looking slouch who doesn’t look like the people you associate with can have a brain that produces interesting work.”
I told him, “Mr. Walzer, you are not reading my mind successfully.”
“Oh yes, I am, Mrs. Riller. If you knew that Henry James picked his nose, you might not have read The Princess Casamassima. Anyway, how come your Broadway-smart husband picked a verse play to risk his ass on?”
“Because he wrote one once.”
“Riller?”
“Riller.”
During the first act on opening night I felt that I was seeing the play for the first time. Perhaps because I could feel the audience. A shared cigarette is not half a smoke, but a different experience.
Gordon Walzer was now working a whole theaterful of people.
On stage, Ruth Welch seemed to billow to twice Christopher Beebe’s size, as she said:
George, you’re wrong. Harvey
discovered the circulation of the blood
and thought there were humors in it.
A politician has to study history.
A doctor has to study his precursors,
who were mostly wrong. You need
to study yourself, George.
I measured the beat as the audience waited. Then Beebe said:
What’s that supposed to mean?
And Ruth replied:
I love you, George.
George said:
You love yourself.
Ruth waited a second, then said:
I’m beginning to. When will you begin?
Beebe stood frozen as if in mid-breath. It was a fabulous silence, manufactured by Mitch.
Ruth, playing chicken with the audience, waited a beat, another beat, and then simply repeated, When?
The applause was shattering. The auditorium seemed to vibrate. I could see people at each other’s ears. The curtain was down on the first act.