“Not bad at all.”
“What’s with the Bronstein?” he asked.
“I just want to know about her.”
“Yeah? You got a client got a case coming up against her?”
“Nothing like that.”
“Oh,” he said. “You telling me this is something you don’t want to tell me about? Or you telling me this is something I don’t want to know?”
“If you want me to tell you, I’ll tell you. I’m in your ballpark, Gene, we play home-team rules.”
“All I would wanna know is, is this something that could hurt us some way ’other?”
“No way I can see.”
“The thing is—”
“If I thought it was something could hurt you, I wouldn’t come to you with it, you know what I mean. If it was something that I had to do and it was gonna hurt you, I would go somewhere else. Not to friends.”
“ … The thing is, if we got a problem, I don’ wanna be the last to know it.”
“If it’s gonna be a problem, Gene, I’ll let you know.”
“Yeah, well, I checked her out for you, plus I know her a little.”
Angie brought two cups and the pot. Some women have cleavage and it’s a pleasure to see. Then there are some who have it and you wish they’d kept it a secret. The coffee was in those heavy old luncheonette cups, at least a finger thick around the rim. Only one was chipped. The coffee was fresh and strong. I added cream. Gene added cream and sugar, two spoons. He blew on it and took a thoughtful sip.
“Whatever happened to a woman’s place is in the home?” he said.
“I don’t know, Gene.”
“I mean, I understand the argument they got, mentally. But don’t family mean nothing no more? My mother, she’s got Alzheimer’s, senile. Whyn’t we say senile? She lives with us, ’cause that’s the way it’s supposed to be. What’re we supposed to do, put her in a home or someplace? What kinda thing is that to do? If Donna goes out with a job, how we gonna look after the old lady? You see what I’m saying? So women got a right to work, I understand that, but maybe it’s not right that they work, you understand what I mean?”
“Yeah, but times are changing.”
“Yeah, times are changing. Anyway, I’m saying all that to say that maybe where female D.A.s is concerned, I’m maybe not exactly unprejudiced. I think she’s a cunt.”
“Oh.”
“You know, you’re in politics, you learn you gotta got along with all kinds. You don’t like niggers, you don’t like niggers, but you got to recognize that they’re here, that they’re people and they’re gonna do what they have to do like we all do. So you get along. I get along. With the Jews, with the P.R.s, with the blacks. With guys you know the score. With women you don’t.”
“You don’t like her?”
“Well, you know, she gets herself hired with affirmative action. There wasn’t a whole lot of women lawyers in the D.A.’s office. So she gets out of law school and applies. She comes in for an interview, makes all the right noises. She’s supposed to understand that you don’t become a star overnight. Even with lawyers, there got to be infantry. But from the day she got hired, she’s complaining. She’s better than the work she got. And talks like she could run the whole office better.”
“She smart? Or dumb?”
“Book smart. Reality dumb. You know what the D.A.’s office is. Hell, they like winners. We like them to like winners. Come campaign season, D.A. he wants to say his office it got like a ninety-two-percent conviction rate. You know, I know, that just means they didn’t take anything to court unless it was a lock.
“The D.A.’s office, it’s not like sanitation, or the DMV, or parks, nobody knows you’re working or not. A prosecutor, they can keep score. D.A. got someone can get the job done, he moves him, her, up fast ’nough. This she don’ understand. She doesn’t wanna wait for Reuben to move her up. She wants homicides. She wants O.C. She wants this and that. That’s why she got sent over, work on that Gunderson thing with a special prosecutor, something.”
“Not because she was good?”
“She’s good, you think Reuben’s gonna let her take a leave of absence?”
“So she’s not good?”
“Fair’s fair.” He shrugged. “It’s not so much that she’s bad but that she’s a pain in the ass. … Other thing is, Reuben, he’s gonna pack his bags next year or in four, but mos’ likely next. Now things being how things is, that’s no big deal. We got Landsman—”
“Landsman?” I said. “You got to be kidding.”
“The man has paid his dues. Loyalty, you got to remember loyalty … .”
“I once saw Landsman in the John,” I said, “down the courthouse. He looks at the stalls, he looks at the door, he looks back again, finally he has to ask directions which way is out.”
“ … He’s been Reuben’s assistant twelve years. Knows the office. And he ain’t got no enemies,” Gene said. “Thing is, there’s a couple different people making noises at making a run for Brooklyn D.A. There’s Bill Vassey and Edith Bloom.”
“For D.A.?” I asked. Vassey was a civil rights type, black, usually found attacking the police or being attacked by the police in the course of being civilly disobedient. Bloom had been a liberal congressperson from Manhattan, a one-term media phenom. Then she lost her seat to redistricting.
“If they both make a run”—he smiled—“they split the reformers, Bloom gets the divorced women, the faggots, Vassey gets some of the colored votes, we keep the party faithful, the married women, all the Catholics including the P.R.s. Bloom against Landsman, one on one, we got trouble. … So. You want an introduction to Alicia Bronstein.”
“Yes,” I said.
“I’m not the best person to do that. She thinks you come from me or from Al … So what I got to do is think of a back way.”
“Thanks, Gene.”
“You know, Ant’ny, it’s funny, I miss seeing your father around. He was … you know what he was like.”
“He’s a long time gone,” I said.
“We didn’t agree ’bout everything. … You live by what he taught you, you’ll be all right.”
“Yeah, Gene. I’ll be in touch about Bronstein.”
“Call me day after tomorrow, something. Hey … and it might be a good thing, you get close to her. You might get a sense that she’s doing some business with Bloom, even Vassey maybe, but I think Bloom. If you do, you lemme know.”
4.
Bergmanesque
IN THE MEANTIME, I did what I should’ve been doing, the job I was being paid for, searching for Bergman. I went down to the county clerk’s office, looking for P.O.B. Services. It was listed. Thank God. It was a simple DBA—doing business as—of Finkelstein-Magliocci, Inc. P.O.B. was described as a personal financial management company.
Finkelstein-Magliocci, without the “Inc.,” was listed in the phone book. Dominic Magliocci and Morton Finkelstein, attorneys, had individual listings with the same phone number and address. I gave them a call. I told the receptionist that a friend of a friend, at a party, had recommended Dom as someone to handle my money. She put Mr. Magliocci on the phone.
“Look, Mr. Magliocci,” I said. “I’m a free-lance person. A photographer. I do a lot of traveling. I get my money in lump sums. And I am not what you call a natural-born checkbook balancer. So what I’m looking for—and this friend of my friend Johnny, who I met at a party, said you would be good for it—is someone who can collect my checks when they come in, make sure they get in the bank. I want you to handle my bills too. You know, make sure the rent gets paid, even when I’m out of town, and Con Ed and the phone company. And take care of keeping a reserve for income tax. You know, all of that.”
“Yes. Mr ….uh?”
“Crispy, Tony Crispy,” I said. It sounded like a good name for a photographer who couldn’t keep track of his bills and all of that.
“Mr. Crispy, we do exactly that sort of thing. Our fees are in the neighborhood of three
percent. … ”
“That sounds real reasonable.”
“Would you like to make an appointment?”
“Sure. Yeah. Today? Tomorrow?”
“Well, I don’t think I can fit you in until next week. … ”
“Mr. Magliocci, it would be great if you could squeeze me in. Either this evening or tomorrow.” I didn’t want this thing to linger on and on. “I have an assignment tomorrow. So maybe it’s a half day and I can squeeze some time. Day after that I’m off to Bhopal? Aplab? Someplace like that. In India. Photograph a chemical plant. Big place. Lots of pipes. So I’d like to get with this. Discuss it. Then, you know, when I get back, I can set it up right away. So I don’t get caught like this again. Frankly, I’m going to spend most of tomorrow night prepaying bills and catching up on old bills, and I don’t have the time—”
“Why don’t you,” he said, “come by around six tonight?”
Dom Magliocci had a standard gray two-piece suit. He was five feet seven, about 175 pounds, his hair was still dark but thinning. He impressed me as a straightforward small-time attorney offering a straightforward service. He did exactly the sort of thing I would have wanted him to do if I were that world-traveling photographer Tony Crispy. Or if I were Samuel Bergman, retired somewhere sunny and warm, wanting someone to collect the rent from my sublet, sending me my profit and the landlord his rent-controlled cut.
Insofar as it was a scam, I didn’t know if there was anything actually illegal about Dom Magliocci’s carrying out his client’s instructions. And unless I wanted to black-bag the place, it was a dead end. It could be done. Security in the building was a sign-in sheet requiring neither ID nor legibility. The guard was severely astigmatic. Office security wasn’t any better. A simple Yale lock. No alarm system was visible. The files in standard file cabinets. But I wasn’t going to do that. I wasn’t some crazed FBI agent.
Finding Sultan Sports Wear should have been simple. It should have been in the phone book. It wasn’t.
I went back down to Centre Street. Back to the County Clerk’s Office.
It had existed. It had even been a New York State corporation. Bergman’s title, VP, had been faintly misleading. In actuality he had been a founder and one of two major shareholders. The other was a Moses Fishbein. They sold out to LMC (Leading Man’s Clothes) Ltd. in 1976. LMC Ltd. was not on record at the county clerk’s office. That meant nothing in particular. They could have been a Delaware corporation or registered in New Jersey or even in England, what with their Ltd.
The Manhattan directory had three Marks but no Moses Fishbein. I struck out with the Brooklyn, Bronx, and Queens books. East to Long Island. There were two M’s in Great Neck. The first turned out to be Minerva. An old woman answered the second number. She turned out to be the widow Fishbein.
“I don’t know where Mr. Bergman is,” she told me. “I haven’t seen or heard of Bergman since 1977, when he set off on his around-the-world cruise. One postcard we got. One. Hong Kong. To my husband, God rest his soul. ‘Moses,’ it said, ‘wish you were here. These people don’t have unions.’ That, from a partner of twenty years. I bet he doesn’t write to his mother, either.”
I figured that people who had taken over Bergman’s company would have had to maintain contact with him, at least for a while. Although LMC Ltd. wasn’t on record at the county clerk’s office, it was easy enough to find. It was listed in the Manhattan phone book and in the red-book index of advertisers as well.
LMC Ltd.
(212) 247 2598
863 Madison Ave.
NY. NY. 10022
Approx. Sales: $25,200,000
Leading Man’s Clothing
(Mfg. HK)
Ex.Rep:
Scandinavian Ski Wear
Lilith of France
Burma Road Cotton
Marie Christine—Costume du Soleil
Chm: Harvey Ginsberg
Pres: Sheldon Ginsberg
Sec. Treas: Adela Ginsberg
Rather than approach the Ginsbergs directly, I decided to reach them through a mutual acquaintance. The organization that touches everyone in the garment industry is the union, the ILGWU. I dropped in at their headquarters to see Ralph DeLillio.
Before he said hello, he asked, “What the fuck are we supposed to have a government for? To protect us? Or to destroy us?” He lit a cigarette before he answered his question. “They’re cutting our hearts out.”
I said, “Hello,” then asked him if he knew the Ginsbergs at LMC Ltd.
“Yeah. Real schnorrers. They had two factories. In the Jersey place they had union workers. Then they had a sweatshop out in Queens. Like something out of 1911. No ventilation. No fire exits. No overtime. No workers who speak English, or even green cards, probably. And they’re slapping union labels on garments from both places.”
“So you figure they’ll be difficult to deal with?” I said.
“I got ’em on safeties,” Ralph said. “One spark, you got dead Dominicans and Taiwanese all over a four-story factory. So I go to OSHA. Violations up the wazoo. You know what OSHA tells me? They’re not doing field inspections in the Northeast. ‘Are you outa your fucking minds?’ I ask them. They mumble budget cuts and duplication of state services. I push up to the district supervisor, because this is a load of shit. What does this sonuvabitch tell me? Huh? This sonuvabitch, he tells me that ‘it’s time to get government off the back of the people! Free America from overregulation!’ ”
“That bad?” I said, making agreeable noises.
He sighed. “It’s worse, Tony, worse.” He stubbed out his cigarette. “Does anybody believe in unions anymore?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “So I guess you couldn’t talk to the Ginsbergs about Bergman?”
He lit another cigarette. “I took those bastards up on charges,” he said. “Litigation, you know what litigation is? Something that Jews invented to let us Guineas get old watching. A year passed, we’re making motions, they’re making nonunion garments, slapping union labels in them. But what they’re really doing is stalling. So they can move the whole thing to HK. Which they did.”
“I’m just trying to find this guy. Bergman. Used to own Sultan Sports Wear. Sold out to Ginsberg, eight, ten years ago. I’m just trying to find a way for Ginsberg to talk to me. But I guess you’re not on real good terms with them.”
“Those motherfuckers?” he snarled. “Sure I’m on OK terms with them.” He shrugged. “It’s nothing personal.”
“Thanks, Ralph. I owe you one.”
“How you doing?” he asked.
“I’m doing OK,” I said.
“What’s that mean? OK? That mean you’re gettin’ rich and famous, or that mean you getting by?”
“It means OK.”
“How would you like a job?”
“I already have a job.”
“I could use you,” he said.
“Free-Lance, I’m always available.”
“We gotta work staff. What kind of stuff you do? Divorces?”
“Some,” I admitted.
“Insurance fraud, employee theft, all that stuff?”
“Yeah,” I said.
“Tell you what, Tony, money ain’t what it’s all about. I look in the mirror and I see this ugly mug and I know I’m beating my head against the wall. But I look in the mirror and I see a guy who’s trying to do something for people. Something useful … How about it? Working for the union.”
“I’ll think about it,” I said. Not meaning it. But maybe I should’ve said yes. Then I could’ve been a happy guy. Like Ralph DeLillio.
5.
A Fate Worse Than Death
COBERLAND, SYDNEY: 121 E. 74 St. NYC // Emp. Wilfree, Madison, Madison, Montague & Reach // salary $98K // outside income $42K // Mortgages, Old Westbury and New Hampshire // Auto, leased, Mercedes // C/S $54K // A $30K // SLC $10 K and $7K. // 4 Judg Vacat // Suit Dismd // 2 Suits // Age: 48
I got his face from WFUX footage of a Stanley Fend
erman press conference. I followed him as he left his office. He took the subway. Went to the supermarket. Then home, East Seventy-fourth Street between Lexington and Third. Posh but not overwhelming.
He came down in forty-five minutes. His Adidas tops and bottoms matched, blue with a silver stripe. Running shoes with a logo on the sides. Runners are a pain in the ass to tail, for obvious reasons. But ninety-nine out of one hundred times, all they do is run in a circle and end up where they came from. So they can take a shower.
I figured him for twenty minutes. I went out for pizza.
I was wrong by eight minutes. I watched from the corner as he went upstairs. His apartment faced the front, and I saw his lights go on. I waited. I gave him an hour, getting on to 10 P.M. then let it go. Which is a lot of what my job, maybe a lot of jobs, is all about—a lot of nothing. Joey does crossword puzzles. That’s better than thinking.
The next night promised to be more of the same. He left the office a little later. Subway home. Drugstore this time. Quick stop at the liquor store. One bottle of wine. A man of moderation. He went up. I waited. The air was thick. Edging toward rain. Getting right to the edge of precipitation. But something—wind, a distracting shove from the cold front, a downdraft—kept keeping it back. Like the sky was just another woman who couldn’t quite come.
A half hour later, Syd came down. He had a gym bag. He went to the New York Health and Racquet Club on York Avenue. I waited out front. He came out, fresh and blown dry, in forty-five minutes.
He went west to First Avenue, then south. I ambled along behind. Down along First, he glanced, as he went, into various restaurants and bars. He looked at his watch. Considered. He decided he had time for a beer. He turned to face the bar beside him. Looked at the door, looked at the name. Hesitated, shuffling his feet. Then he turned and walked on.
You Get What You Pay For (The Tony Cassella Mysteries) Page 5
