What Moodrow wanted was Kathleen Cohan back in his apartment on the Lower East Side. What he got was Kathleen Cohan so repentant that she was afraid to come within two feet of him. Kathleen had had her little talk with Father Ryan, a talk that turned out to be a lecture about the impossibility of forgiveness unless the penance was performed. And, of course, she would not be allowed to receive Communion until her sins were forgiven.
Moodrow, listening to Kathleen recite the details, felt his heart drop into his shoes. “Kate,” he said when she was finished, “we’ve got enough troubles with your father. We don’t need any more.”
He went on to describe, in detail, the events leading up to his conversation with Pat Cohan. What he wanted, naturally, was for his fiancée to back him up a hundred percent. He wanted her to burn with indignation at the idea of forcing a man to confess to crimes he didn’t commit. What he got was a puzzled, frowning Kathleen Cohan.
“This Zayas,” she finally said, “is a homosexual and a thief. Did I get that right?”
“He steals women’s clothes and dresses up in them. I guess that’s a pretty big hint.”
“Well, why do you care about him?”
If Kathleen’s voice had been challenging or angry, Moodrow would have known how to respond. But Kathleen was clearly puzzled. She wanted an answer she could understand and Moodrow didn’t have one. Or, at least, he didn’t have one that would please her.
“Zayas was pitiful, Kate. Most likely, there are things happening to him right now that I can’t even describe to you. They took him over to the Tombs and he can’t make bail. I mean there’s a fair chance that he won’t even survive.”
“What I’m thinking,” Kate interrupted, “is that some liberal judge is going to have the same attitude you do. I’m thinking he’s going to give Zayas probation. Zayas is a homosexual. Do you want him out on the streets? Do you want him hanging around the schoolyards? Maybe homosexuality isn’t a sin. Maybe it’s a disease, like the psychiatrists say. But, even if it is a disease, it’s a contagious disease. The only way I know to control a contagious disease is to isolate it until the doctors invent a cure.”
Moodrow felt his mouth tighten down until it was a short straight line, almost a scar frozen on his face. “And what do you want me to do, Kate? You want me to be the judge and the jury? You want me to write my own laws? You want me to be God?”
Kathleen jerked backwards. The movement was involuntary and, for a few seconds, she was really frightened. She’d never gone to any of Moodrow’s fights, never witnessed his potential for out-and-out ferocity.
“Stanley, please …”
“What?”
Suddenly, she reached out and pulled him toward her, burying her head in his chest. “I want you to get along with Daddy,” she said, holding onto him as tightly as she could. “I’m begging you, Stanley. Daddy is all alone in the world except for me. It’s been hard for him. When he lost Peter, when he lost his only son, he was devastated. In a way he’s lost his wife, too. Maybe this is worse than losing her. What I’m saying is I need my father and he needs me. If I lost him, I think I’d die.”
Ten
January 13
JAKE LEIBOWITZ WAS LOST IN dreams when the first blow struck the exposed flesh of his back. He was dreaming of prison, of cooking up and hiding a batch of prison hooch in his cell. Somehow, despite the sharp pain and the crack of the leather belt, he failed to wake up immediately. Only the character of his dream changed. It changed from the gleeful anticipation of alcohol intoxication, to a surprise visit by club-wielding prison guards. Still asleep, Jake did what any smart con would do under the same circumstances. He put his hands over the back of his head, curled himself into a ball and waited for the hacks to tire.
When he finally opened his eyes, only to discover his pillow instead of the concrete walls of a prison cell, Jake became slightly disoriented. Somebody was screaming at him, but he couldn’t make out the words. Then, very slowly, inch by inch, it came to him. He wasn’t in prison. He was home in his own bed. And the person beating him wasn’t using a club. She was using a leather belt. And she wasn’t screaming about prison contraband. She was screaming, “A rabbit? A rabbit? A rabbit?”
Timing the rhythm of his mother’s assault carefully—the last thing he needed was to catch a shot in the face—Jake rolled away from the wall, grabbed his mother’s arm as the next blow descended, and pulled her onto the bed.
“Jesus Christ, ma,” he said, as he scrambled to his feet, “you shouldn’t of …” He didn’t finish the sentence, because he knew that he did deserve what he’d gotten.
“A rabbit for a mamaleh,” she moaned. “A rabbit for a mamaleh.”
“What did you do?” Jake gestured toward what remained of his mother’s coat. She’d cut it into pieces and scattered it all over the floor. Which meant, Jake suddenly realized, that while he was sleeping, she’d been standing next to his bed with a pair of scissors. “Mamaleh, I’m sorry.”
Jake’s mother, still gasping for breath, slowly pulled herself upright. “You, you, you … you goy!” Fueled by this insult, she got to her feet and yanked the mattress off the bed. “Where is it?” she demanded. “Where is it?”
“Where’s what?” Jake asked, though he knew exactly what she was looking for.
“Don’t play the shmegegge with me. I’m looking for the money.” She began to rip the drawers out of his dresser, scattering his carefully folded clothing among the bits and pieces of mutilated rabbit.
“Enough.” Jake finally grabbed his mother, holding her arms tight against her sides. “There’s no money here.”
“Don’t lie to me. A goniff doesn’t put his money in the bank.”
“The money’s not here, mamaleh. Not that I have a whole lot, because I’m just gettin’ started in business. But what I do have ain’t here. Just try to calm down. I said I was sorry and I promise to make it up to you. I promise that tonight, when I come home, I’ll have a new coat for you.”
“You think I’d trust you to buy my coat? You think I’m a schmuck?”
“Okay, you’re right. Tonight, I’ll give you a hundred dollars to buy your own coat.”
“Five hundred,” she said calmly. “Not a penny less.”
“I’m not made of money,” Jake moaned. “For five hundred dollars, you could buy mink.”
“Five hundred.”
“Two.”
“Two?”
“Two hundred.”
“Four. I’ll make do with four hundred.”
“Two-fifty, mamaleh. And that’s my last offer. If ya don’t take it, I’m gonna move out and find a place of my own.”
“You act like a big macher, but what you are is a cheapskate. A bum.”
“I’m not changin’ my mind.” He felt her relax in his arms, heard her murmured assent, and let go.
“So, when do I get this money?”
“Tonight, when I come home.”
“Tonight? It’s already three o’clock in the afternoon. Tonight, for a big shot like you, means four o’clock in the morning.”
“I’ll leave it on the kitchen table.”
“Okay, Jacob, I’m trusting you. But take one piece of advice from a poor old mamaleh. If you don’t leave the money, don’t go to sleep. Now, I’ll make you a nice breakfast while you get dressed. And don’t bother about the room. I’ll clean it after you leave.”
Jake got himself showered, shaved and dressed in record time. In a way, his mama had done him a favor. He was supposed to meet Izzy Stein at four o’clock. Not that Izzy wouldn’t hang around if Jake showed up late, but Jake had made a very important decision about his own future and Izzy was a key part of that decision.
The rush didn’t bother Jake, either. He and Izzy had business to take care of. Which meant he’d be wearing his working clothes. Somehow, a sweatshirt, khaki pants, work boots and an ancient peacoat didn’t require a lot of care. His mother’s salami omelet, on the other hand, went down very slowly. He couldn’t u
nderstand why his mother insisted on adding a ton of garlic to everything she cooked. Not that he was foolish enough to ask her.
“Jake, you gotta get out of here,” he muttered to himself, as he washed the omelet down with several mugs of bitter black coffee. It wasn’t the first time he’d made the observation. He looked at his mama standing by the stove. She was nearly as tall as he was. And she outweighed him by fifty pounds.
“You said something?” she asked, dropping a spoonful of Crisco into the hot frying pan.
“We’re a team, mamaleh. That’s what I said.”
“That’s nice, Jakey. Such a sweet boy.”
Ten minutes later, Jake was out in the street. He took a moment to note the overcast skies and the warmer temperature. It looked like rain, which was just fine with him. Rain would keep the honest citizens off the street, the ones who felt it was their duty to report a crime. The morons.
He walked the few blocks to Izzy Stein’s hotel, the Paradise, and entered the lobby.
“You wanna go ’round the world with me, baby? Ten bucks. I do you good.”
It was too early for the whores to be out on the street, but that didn’t mean they weren’t working. Jake ignored them, nodding to the desk clerk before climbing the stairs to the second floor. Izzy had had a number of rooms in the months since Jake had gotten out of prison, always on the second floor, rear. If worse came to worst, Izzy had explained, he could jump out the window without killing himself.
“Who is it?” The voice from inside 2C was sharp and suspicious.
“It’s Jake.” The door opened and Jake walked inside. “Who were you expecting?”
“Careless got me sent up the river. It ain’t happening again.”
Jake looked the small room over, shaking his head. A bed, a table, a chair, a tiny chest. “Damn, Izzy, you could do better than this. Ya movin’ up in the world. It’s time ya had a decent front. So’s you could get respect.”
Izzy sat on the edge of the bed. “Big places make me nervous. Too many rooms. Anybody could be hiding anywhere.”
“Ya could still live in a hotel room,” Jake insisted. “Ya could just make it a better hotel room.”
“I hope ya didn’t come down here to talk about my domicile. Because Sandy’s gonna be here in half an hour.”
“Sandy? Don’t make friends with that wop, Izzy. I don’t plan for him to be around too long. He’s nothin’ but a spy for Steppy Accacio.”
“Ya know somethin’, Jake, you got one big problem. Ya worry about the wrong things. Ya wanna find out how much I care about Sandy? Tell me to kill him. Then, you’ll know. Now, what’s up?”
Jake took a deep breath. “We’re movin’ faster than I expected. Maybe we got lucky or maybe we got so much talent we deserve it. Whichever way, if we don’t look out, we’re gonna get in over our heads. What we gotta do is organize.”
“Ya don’t hear me arguin’.”
“Lemme explain, all right? Don’t interrupt. Now, the way I see it is like this. First, we got the SpeediFreight thing goin’ strong—next week, we’re doin’ another load of cigarettes and there’s plenty more comin’. Plus, now Accacio’s givin’ us a piece of the dope. We’re gettin’ the retail for all the projects on Avenue D, from Fourteenth Street to Houston. There’s ten thousand people livin’ in those projects and we’re gonna serve as many of them as we can. And that’s the point, that bit about as many as we can. I don’t know about you, but I got no desire to peddle dope on the street. If ya don’t get busted, ya gotta worry that some junkie’s gonna pipe ya for ya stash.”
“Let him try it.” Izzy lit a cigarette and tossed the match on the floor.
“Ya know what you need, Izzy? Ya need a woman. A Jewish man without a woman is helpless.”
“C’mon,” Izzy sighed. “Get to the point.”
“The point is that we gotta find some help. We need a couple of young guys. Guys just startin’ out. As long as they ain’t wops. I don’t care if they’re fucking Chinamen, as long as they ain’t wops.”
“You got anyone in mind?”
Jake grinned. “That’s where you come in, Izzy. You’re gonna be my lieutenant and ya first job is to recruit us some employees. I’d do it myself, except that I don’t know anybody. All them years in a federal joint in fucking Kansas? Talk about a wasted youth.” He shook his head sadly. “See, what I’m hopin’ is that in a few months, we won’t personally touch nothin’. We organize. We collect. But we don’t touch nothin’. Whatta ya say?”
Izzy took a moment to think it over. “I guess I could do it. You got any objection to the Irish?”
“Whatta you, an idiot? No Irishman’s gonna work for a Jew. It’s impossible.”
“No Italians. No Irish. You want I should find some Apaches?”
“Look, Izzy.” Jake took his time, reminding himself to be calm. “Try to remember what it was like to be a Jew inside the walls. How many cons could ya really trust? I know what I’m asking ain’t easy, but it’s gotta be done. Accacio thinks he can control us, because we’re weak. Just a couple of kikes on a string. What we’re gonna do is put together an organization that can stand by itself. That don’t gotta go beggin’ for crumbs. The dope business is the coming thing. It’s gonna be bigger than Prohibition. Once I get my hands on a chunk of it, I don’t have no intention of letting go.”
Izzy managed a grin. “You shoulda been a lawyer.”
“Then it’s settled?”
“I’ll get on it startin’ tomorrow.”
“Great, now I hope ya didn’t tell Santo what we’re doin’ tonight.”
“I didn’t have to tell him. He already heard it from Joe Faci.”
“Yeah? Well hearin’ is one thing, but seein’ is something else. He ain’t comin’ with us. I got a little surprise for young Santo.”
Fifteen minutes later, young Santo knocked on Izzy’s door. He came into the room with his habitual grin firmly in place.
“Whatta ya say, Iz? How’s it hangin’?”
“Long and low, Sandy. How’s by you?”
“Everything’s everything. Whatta ya say, Jake? We workin’ tonight?”
“You ain’t.” Jake was beginning to hate everything about Santo Silesi, especially his easy grin and his refusal to take offense, no matter how hard Jake pushed him.
“Whatta ya mean?”
“What I mean is I got a special job for ya. A job ya could be in charge of all by yourself. I’m sure ya relatives already told ya what we’re gonna be doin’ with the dope. Right?”
Silesi nodded. “They said somethin’ about it.”
“Yeah? Well here’s what I got to say about it. I need someone to go in there regular. Somebody to take care of the customers. That’s you, Santo. You’re gonna have regular places to be and regular times to be there. According to ya relatives, we could dump between a hundred and two hundred bags a day. For starters. What you’re gonna do is come to me every morning and every afternoon. I give you the dope and you give me the money. Any problems?”
“You want me to go in there alone, right? You’re not worried that I’ll get ripped off.”
Jake laughed. “You tryin’ to tell me ya scared of the Puerto Ricans? I thought you wops were supposed to be so tough?” He watched the blood rise into Santo Silesi’s cheeks and ears. “Here’s the thing, Santo. This is what I need ya to do. For now, anyway. You got a problem with it, you could always quit and go back to ya relatives.”
“Why do you have such a hard-on for me, Jake?” Santo spoke quietly. “I’ve done whatever you asked me to do.”
Jake walked across the room, stopping three feet away from the younger man. “People who work for me do what I say. And what I say is take a fuckin’ hike. Ya don’t like that? Well, there’s nothin’ between us, but air.”
Santo Silesi broke for a moment. His friendly eyes turned to stone. The anger in them was cold and implacable, the icy glitter of sunlight reflecting off the face of a glacier. Jake grinned and braced himself. Twelve years
in Leavenworth? A Jew in Leavenworth? If Santo Silesi came forward, Jake fully intended to kill him.
“Hey, guys,” Izzy said. “This don’t make no sense. It’s stupid.”
“Yeah, you’re right,” Silesi said, struggling to manage a smile. “I’ll play it whatever way you want, Jake. As long as I get my piece.”
“I don’t welsh,” Jake said. “So that ain’t a problem for you. Now, take off. I’ll see ya tomorrow morning.”
Once Santo was out the door, Jake turned to Izzy. “Ya see that, Izzy? Ya see that?”
“I seen it,” Izzy replied, calmly. “The wop’s colder than he looks. So what?”
“One day, when Steppy Accacio don’t need us anymore, this is the guy who’s gonna try to kill us. That’s ‘so what.’ ” He paused to allow Izzy to reply, but Izzy kept his mouth shut. “Somethin’ else I found out from Joe Faci last night. He says he’s gonna feed us information on what the narcs are doin’. He says he’s got a lieutenant from the Seventh in his pocket and this lieutenant’s got connections higher up. If there’s heat, we’re gonna see it comin’.”
“Ya wanna hear somethin’ funny, Jake. It seems like this guy Faci’s spendin’ a lotta time lookin’ out for us. I mean considering how you keep insistin’ that he’s gonna kill us.”
Jake put his hands on Izzy’s shoulders. “Listen, Izzy. We ain’t family to Joe Faci. We ain’t Sicilians or even Italians. We’re Jews. When Steppy Accacio puts us on the line, he’s only takin’ a step back to protect himself. If protectin’ himself means we gotta go, he’ll put us down without thinkin’ twice. Now, whatta ya say we get to work?”
Izzy shrugged into a black turtleneck sweater. He pulled a wool Eisenhower jacket over the sweater, then added a heavy watchcap and leather gloves.
A Piece of the Action Page 13