A House in Naples

by Peter Rabe

  “How do we get upstairs? I have business with three pasticceria.“

  They went upstairs and Martha ate two of them. “So you may keep your beautiful car,” she said and wrapped the third one in a napkin to take it along.

  First they walked uphill a way because that way the home trip would be easier. When the orchards started they turned back and went downhill till the street crossed a bridge. The bridge was narrow and arched over a gorge full of stones and dry eucalyptus trees. The road there hadn’t been a street for so long it had become an overgrown path between orchards and broken stone houses. Nobody lived there any more, just lizards.

  “Where does the bridge go?” she asked.

  “No place, really, except kids use it for a short cut down to the city. Come here. In the middle. Up there you can see Vesuvius, and opposite, the bay. Nice sight?”

  They stayed for a while and then walked back. It was after twelve. The strong heat was pouring from the sky and everything held still under it. They thought about their cool house with the large cool bed where they would lie down and wait till the sun went lower.

  When they saw the terrace they saw Joe standing there. He was leaning against the wall and had a twig in his mouth. Then he spat it out.

  “Bantam is here,” he said.

  Chapter 19

  It wasn’t a lazy noon any more, or a time to lie in the dark room. Charley nodded at Joe, who pushed away from the wall, and they left. Martha watched them go through the weeds.

  “Boy, you pick ‘em. You know how to pick ‘em,” said Joe. “A sonofabitch in pressed pants who comes around at the height of the day — ”

  “How long’s he been here?”

  “Snooping around the place, asking questions at the osteria, even at the docks — ”

  “Stop beefing.”

  They got to Joe’s kitchen and Bantam was there, at the table. Joe gave him a dirty look. He yelled at Francesca to get him a can of beer and after she brought it he sent her out. Adele had already left. That was something new — Joe sending the women out and nobody had to press him, Joe being irritable and letting it show

  “Hi, Bantam.” Charley sat down.

  “Delmont,” said Bantam. He had a glass of water in his hand and kept sipping from it. He waited for Joe to sit, but Joe stayed by the hearth looking gruff.

  “You met my partner, I guess.” Charley nodded at the hearth.

  Bantam made his face go sour and didn’t look at Joe.

  “You know, Delmont, if there’s going to be any deal around here, if something’s going to shape up, that ox you got for a partner better learn to cooperate.”

  Charley looked over at Joe and couldn’t figure it. Why should Joe try to queer this deal — unless Bantam was exaggerating.

  “I haven’t heard a thing about a deal,” said Joe. He came to the table, banged his beer can down so it slopped. “This nobody — “

  Bantam jerked around and glared.

  “ — he comes around here with nothing but questions, snooping around and stirring up who knows what trouble. Hell, he even tells me he sent a man to the magistrate’s office to check on who we are! What in hell — “

  “Shut up, Joe.” Charley looked annoyed because he couldn’t figure it. “Just shut up.”

  And as if he had made his point Joe didn’t say any more. He sat down and held the beer.

  “I told you in Genoa — ” said Bantam.

  “All right, forget it. Forget Lenken and remember you’re dealing with me.”

  “I’m not going to sit here — ” Bantam started again when the heat got Charley, or something got him and he slapped his hand on the table.

  “You want to deal or we go someplace else, Bantam? Make up your mind.” He was sharp and he meant it, because he could tell Bantam was gassing and nothing else.

  Nobody answered. They were waiting for Charley.

  “All right, Bantam. You came here to do a job. Did you find out what you wanted?”

  “I found out.”

  “So come on, how’s it look. We look good enough?”

  “I checked around,” said Bantam, not wanting to commit himself. “I made some phone calls after you left Genoa and checked around here.” He sniffed. “Looks okay,” he said, as if it were an effort. Then he jerked his head at Joe. “Except with an attitude like that — “

  “Listen to me, Bantam.” Charley leaned across the table. “You start getting coy with us and we throw you out. I can’t use some small-time chiseler who gets offended when some stupid ass like Lenken here doesn’t have the right manners. I can’t use a punk who can’t stick to business he’s so sensitive with personal feelings. I’m telling you straight, Bantam — either talk business or don’t talk at all. Office politics don’t make a dent around here. Got that straight?”

  Joe’s mouth had come open, and he wasn’t putting it on. The way Charley handled it was something to see; it was something to learn. He figured Charley must have gauged Bantam pretty close to push him around the way he did, because Charley never threw his weight except for a purpose. Then he saw that Charley had gauged it right.

  “You can stop tearing my heart, Delmont. Or we don’t deal.”

  That’s the way Bantam put it, but it meant he was anxious and he was ready.

  “So let’s deal. You got it set up for one five-hundred carton?”

  “All set,” said Bantam.

  “What did you get?”

  “You said Aureomycin.”

  “That’s what I said. And it’s full potency. I have that checked, in case you — ”

  “It’s the real thing.”

  “Where’d you get it?”

  “Now look, Delmont — ”

  “You look. You tell me from where because I’m going to check how well you covered. I don’t buy what leaves a track straight to my front door.”

  “It’s from European Relief, consigned here.”

  “Port of Genoa?”

  “Of course.”

  “That’s where you arranged for it?”

  “What else, Delmont. You think — ”

  “From now on we take only merchandise arranged for at the loading point. That’s New York. That way they don’t catch the theft by just checking the bill of lading. You got that, Bantam? I want to be covered all the way.”

  Bantam saw it and felt respect. But he covered it.

  “You keep criticizing like that, Delmont, maybe you better go it alone. You said delivery in two weeks and I got it for you in just two days. That’s nothing, maybe?”

  “That’s good enough to show you’re eager. Where is the stuff now?”

  “In Capri. There’s a yawl in the harbor there — ”

  “Boy. You are eager.”

  Bantam gave Charley a dirty look and pushed his glass away. Then he looked at Joe.

  “How about some of that beer, Lenken?”

  “Get some,” said Charley, and Joe did. He brought the beer and didn’t say a word. While Bantam poured from the can Charley took his box from his pocket and rattled it. He thought the thing had shaped up fine, the merchandise ready and waiting just across the bay, Bantam so eager that he rushed it down ahead of time, and all on consignment. They could use it. Unless Bantam had rushed it too much, leaving a trail. Not likely. Not an old-time hood like Bantam — Charley could check that a little, make some calls to Genoa.

  “Bantam, how come a yawl got here so fast, all the way from Genoa? You send it out a week before I came to see you about it?”

  “Jerk,” said Bantam and drank beer. “I brought it down in my car. The yawl picked it up just outside Naples.”

  “I like that, Bantam,” and Charley smiled at him. He didn’t grudge a man’s being smart.

  They talked details for a while longer, instructions to be phoned to the man who was waiting in the Capri restaurant, and then Charley got up.

  “I’m going down to the quay. Set up the second haul,” he said to Joe, “and get a delivery routine worked out. Sort
of the same way we handled the French imports. Only twice as good.”

  “You’re fixing a pickup for tonight?” said Joe.

  “Tonight. I’m going myself.”

  “Go ahead,” said Joe. “I’ll finish up here. I’ll phone Capri later.”

  Joe tossed his empty can under the sink and looked out the door to see which way Charley was going. Charley was cutting across the garden. He was going to his house first. And a while later he would come back this way to go down to the street.

  • • •

  Because of the trees outside and the closed wooden shutters, Charley had to wait to get used to the change in light. It was cool inside and the overgrown windows gave the dim light a green cast. He could hear Martha sit up in the other room. She had been asleep.

  “Charley?”

  He walked to the couch and sat down. Her shoes were off and she was wearing a cotton shirt.

  “How you keep your belly so flat with all those sweets you keep eating — ”

  “I’m very active. All through siesta I toss and turn in my sleep.” Then she stopped smiling at him. “You are leaving, Charley?”

  “Ya. Just for the night.” He got up and went to the closet. He still had the gun there, the one from Rome. “Just this night, Martha, and Joe won’t be here. But take the gun. You know how it works?”

  “No,” she said.

  “Here. Pull on this trigger and hold fast. That’s all. And always remember, use it only from close up. The closer the better.”

  She nodded and watched him put it on the table. She would use it; she would have no hesitation if it became necessary.

  But they both felt how the gun didn’t make his leaving easier. Leaving was no longer a one-night routine to do a fast piece of business — to make the island run that would take perhaps two hours or so. They felt the difference but didn’t say anything.

  “You seen my spray jacket? That rubber thing I had hanging here?”

  “In the other closet, Charley, outside. It made a smell here so I thought — ”

  “That’s all right It does. We should always keep it out there.”

  He found the jacket and put it on the table. Then she watched him get canvas shoes with rubber soles and he put those on. He also took a long flashlight and put that next to the spray jacket, on the table. There was nothing else to do. He had everything, but he didn’t want to leave.

  “Look, Martha — ”

  “Come here, Charley.” He came to sit by her and she leaned against him. “It is a bad time to think, Charley. You will do what is right, but now — ” She didn’t finish. His need for her had come with a suddenness that made him press her against him as if there were nothing else he could do. There was nothing else. It was the only kind of togetherness they knew. It was like a struggle, with the strength of just one more time each time, and it made them one.

  When he left he kissed her goodbye, leaving her quiet and almost asleep.

  Chapter 20

  Joe saw him leave. He had been watching for it. When Charley had turned to go down the steps Joe stopped watching. He slapped his hands on the table and got up. He wanted another beer.

  Martha, too, watched him leave. She had gotten up when she heard Charley close the door and she came out to walk through the bushes that grew along the wall going down to the street. At the bottom of the stairs Charley turned back and saw her. He waved and Martha waved back. Then she sat on the wall where she could see the bay.

  Joe came back from the icebox and put two cans of beer on the table. He said, “Take one,” and pushed it over to Bantam. Then he sat down. He watched Bantam’s face. Bantam didn’t want the beer. He wanted to leave.

  “Take it,” said Joe.

  Bantam got up. “You take it, Lenken. I got better things to do than hang around here.”

  “We’re done. All fixed up the way Chuck wants it.”

  “That’s why I’m leaving.” Bantam picked up some papers and his pen.

  “You got me wrong,” said Joe. “I didn’t mean any harm before.”

  It stopped Bantam but the look he gave Joe wasn’t friendly.

  “Listen to me, farmer. I’m older than you and I’ve been busy for longer than you. I left small time when you were maybe just starting to steal apples somewhere. I’m telling you just so you get your bearings. Don’t horse with me, Lenken, because your type I’d just as soon see dead.”

  “Don’t talk big, Bantam,” but Joe saw it didn’t upset the man.

  “Like your friend Delmont said, we do business and leave out personalities. I’ve taken your crap for that reason. So stay out of my way.”

  “Well,” said Joe, “I got more business.”

  Bantam laughed.

  “Take it to the neighborhood gang.”

  “There’s money in it,” said Joe.

  “Lenken.” Bantam leaned close so Joe could see the skin of his old face. “You maybe think I’m a small operator, and I am, Lenken. But in a big organization. I can clap my hands and you don’t eat breakfast tomorrow.” Bantam went to the door. “Because of no stomach,” he added and started to walk out.

  Joe wasn’t doubting a word of it.

  “That’s why I wanted to talk to you,” and the way he said it, Bantam stopped, turned back toward the table. “I’m sorry about before. That was an act,” said Joe.

  “I don’t get it.”

  “So come here and I tell you.”

  Bantam waited.

  “Sit down, Bantam, and I tell you the rest.” Joe watched Bantam stand there and saw he was interested. “An act,” he said, “to make Chuck think I got no use for you.”

  Bantam sat down.

  “So now I can talk to you, Bantam, and Chuck would never guess that you and I could do business together.”

  “What is it?” said Bantam. “The double cross?”

  “It’s murder.”

  “Wrong man,” said Bantam and got up again. “I don’t hire out.”

  “Wait.” They looked at each other and then Joe went on, “Not even if it’s your own skin?” When Bantam sat down again he pulled a cigarette out and lit it. Then he leaned into his chair, eyes blank, and smoked.

  “You better tell me, Lenken.”

  “I will. How long have you known Delmont?”

  “I never did. Just met him a few times.”

  “Quite a lush, that Delmont, getting off the stuff after twenty years, running a business like ours, being in Cairo and Naples all at the same time — ”

  “Talk plain, Lenken.”

  “I will, Bantam. But tell me, what does a guy like you — with your training and so forth — what does a guy like you do when he’s roped in on a lie, when he’s pushed around, and all the time the guy who does it is pulling a fast one?”

  “You know the score, Lenken, don’t you?”

  Joe laughed. When he stopped he said, “Delmont is dead. This guy Charley is somebody else.”

  There was a silence while Bantam held the smoke in his lungs and his face went stiff. If they got wind of this in the States, Bantam getting himself sucked into a deal by a guy he thought was somebody else —

  “Who is he?”

  “A guy I’ve known for fifteen years. He’s not a cop, if that’s what you’re worried about, but cops at least you can go by.” Joe paused. “You always know what they’ll do, they even wear uniforms so you can spot them — “

  “And this Charley?”

  “Figure it out yourself. He snowed you, didn’t he?”

  “Maybe you’re snowing me.”

  Joe shrugged. “He’s been in Cairo? Somebody there must know what he looks like.”

  Bantam thought for a while and wondered why Joe was telling him this. They weren’t friends, that’s for sure, but why bring in an outsider, even risk ruining the business deal they had on?

  “How come he’s alive?” said Bantam. “How come for fifteen years you don’t do the job yourself?”

  “Because he’s got me, Bantam. Somethi
ng goes wrong and it gets back to me I’m finished. I’m not set up like you, Bantam. I haven’t got the connections and all, and with you doing this job I’ve got an expert on it.”

  “I told you, Lenken — “

  “Wait. Think of it this way. Without Chuck what have we got? A nice business with just you and me. He’s giving you twenty-five percent? You can make it fifty. You ship the stuff in, I distribute; you cut out this guy you don’t even know, and I do business with a guy I can trust. You and me, Bantam — “

  “Shut up a minute.”

  “I’ll shut up, Bantam; but remember, he’s making the pickup tonight, with nobody looking but your two men — “

  When Bantam ground out his cigarette, Joe knew he had him. Joe knew he had found the setup where Charley was getting his and Joe wasn’t even in it. He didn’t know where it would happen, who was doing the job; all he knew was it was going to happen, and he’d end up with a business layout much better than he had even dreamed. He had to smile to himself because it left just one loose end, like an extra bonanza. There was Martha.

  “All right,” said Bantam. “I’ll check.”

  It was a disappointment to Joe, but he understood about checking. Only it had to be fast.

  “Check what? My story?”

  “Like you said. Cairo. Ask them about this lush Delmont, if he ever left the town, how he looked, about that aspirin habit — ”

  “But you gotta do it now, Bantam, or we miss our chance. We can’t — ”

  “You got a phone?”

  “At the restaurant. Call Cairo, and then your hoods.”

  “All right,” said Bantam. “If the Cairo call checks with your story, I’m in.”

  They looked at each other, each hoping the other wouldn’t say something else to make this thing less simple or to upset the decision. When they heard the steps outside it was like a relief, no matter what might walk in.

  Adele came through the door, and then Francesca. They stopped when they saw the two men and moved to leave.

  “Come on in,” said Joe, but they still hesitated. They had never seen him so animated, with arms waving and a grin on his face. “Come in already.” He got up. When Francesca came by he slapped her rear and told her to cook something good for later. Then he looked at Adele. He was grinning.