Coney

by Amram Ducovny

  Otto’s eyes murdered, then acquiesced.

  “Yah, yah.”

  “Now watch me sink this shot, Otto, but more important, watch the beautiful position of the cue ball for the next shot. Position is everythin’ in life. Ain’t that right, Kraut? Ain’t that what you tell little boys?”

  Otto, who wore a chest-hugging white turtleneck sweater and a wide Sam Browne belt that pinched his waist, hardened his pectorals and drew his forearm back against his biceps, bulging them.

  “Vat vould you giff for a body like dis von, Voody?”

  Woody spread his legs and cupped his crotch.

  “I’ll take what I got, Kraut. How would you like to suck my petunia, which is man-size?”

  He turned to Harry.

  “You know what the kraut wears for a jockstrap? A rubber band and a peanut shell. Ain’t that right, strong-ass?”

  Otto threw his cue stick onto the table scattering the balls, and bellowed:

  “I am all around me der sick bodies I vomit to see.”

  Woody picked up a ball from the table and gripped it behind his right ear.

  “Kraut, you owe me five bucks for the game. Some shit screwin’ up the table when I need eight to win. The dough now, or I bounce this off your kraut skull.”

  “Ven ve finish game.”

  “How the fuck can we finish when you screwed up the table!”

  “Not my fault!”

  Otto strode toward the door. Woody jumped off his platform, hit the ground and somersaulted into Otto’s path. They froze about a foot apart. Woody’s outstretched arms suggested a comic book Christ. Otto pawed the ground like a skittish stallion.

  “You don’t leave without payin’ the dough.”

  Otto threw a crumpled bill at Woody’s feet.

  “On der floor, vere you belong.”

  Woody signaled to Sidney to pick up the bill.

  Otto slammed the door. A few seconds later the pane glass facade was shattered from the outside by a seven ball, which then ricocheted off the wall about two feet above the seated Blue Man. Jamie, standing closest to the front, was pelted with glass, He put his hands to his cheeks. Blood rose through his fingers..

  The freaks stampeded for the door. Albert-Alberta, hands on unstable breasts, ran past Harry, yelling:

  “On your horse, boy! You don’t want to be here when the constables arrive.”

  A smell of shit as palpable as taste and a breath-starved wail focused Harry on Sidney, who stood next to Woody. His tiny pink eyes teared. Woody, holding his nose, pushed him away. He began to whoop like a police siren.

  Woody ran to a back room, returning with two empty cartons marked Wheaties and Butterfingers.

  “Kid, help me break these down.”

  They flattened out the cartons. Harry held them against the shattered pane while Woody, on his platform, secured them on the unbroken glass with surgical adhesive tape which he ripped into strips with his teeth. The wind pushed the cartons, but they held.

  Woody remained on the platform, surveying the street.

  “Now what the fuck do I do with Sidney? Sam ain’t in sight. He was supposed to be back by now. Shit, I can’t go near that moron. Fuck it! We’ll lock it up with Sidney inside. Sam shouldda come on time. It’s his brother. Right, kid?”

  Harry wondered: What does that terrified thing feel? Maybe nothing. Maybe that’s the way God made up for the way he was. There was already so much pain that God said: Let there be no more pain. But Sidney was crying because … because …

  Harry’s stomach cramped violently. He burst through the swinging bathroom door and pulled down his knickers and underwear just in time.

  When he came out Woody had put on his blue serge double-breasted overcoat and a wide-brimmed Stetson hat. The dwarf was swinging a silver key chain with two keys attached, wrapping it around his index finger and then unwinding it.

  “I know how it is, kid. That moron’s stink almost got to me. Now you go outside. I’ll do the rest.”

  Harry, chills passing through his upper body, while his bowels burned, walked past the howling Sidney without looking at him. He watched Woody shove Sidney onto a bench. The dwarf smelled his fingers, spat on them, and bent over to rub them on the patch of trousers that showed beneath his coat. Woody locked the door.

  “What a fuckin’ mess. That lousy kraut will get his. Don’t worry.”

  “Did you call the police?”

  “Police, hell. We got better ways. Victor Menter owns this place. The kraut would be lucky if all he had after him was the cops.”

  Harry heard a faint whimper from the pool room.

  “What about Sidney? Won’t Sam be mad you left him like that?”

  “Fuck Sam. He was supposed to be here.”

  “Sidney could walk right through the cardboard. Maybe we should fix him up or something?”

  “Nah, kid. Sidney stays where he’s put. Don’t feel bad. He ain’t got no feelings. He’s just another freak. You goin’ home?”

  “Yeah”

  “Come on into the candy store, I’ll buy you a milkshake.”

  “OK.”

  They sat at a back table. Harry sucked the thick liquid through a straw. Woody sipped a coke.

  “Ever think of goin’ on the road?” Woody asked.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Just takin’ off. Ridin’ the rails, hitchin’, like that.”

  “Never thought of it.”

  Woody jabbed his finger at him.

  “You should. Good experience. Teach you about life. I did it for about five years. I could give you great addresses of friends of mine everywhere.”

  “Yeah. But what about school?”

  “I meant after school lets out. That’ll give you from July till past Labor Day. Good weather for bummin’”

  “I’ll think about it.”

  “I’d do it if I was you. Even be good for your health.”

  The dwarf’s face was firm, serious. Woody was willing him to go.

  IN THE CHERRY TREE: DECEMBER 11, 1937

  Aba: Heshele, today we celebrate a birthday.

  Harry: Whose?

  Aba: Ours. Mankind. Great men in Washington, at a place called the Carnegie Institution, have closely examined some bones found on the Island of Java and decided that they belonged to the first human being, One million years ago. Previously they had thought we were a mere half million years old.

  Harry: What did the man look like?

  Aba: An ape.

  Harry: How do they know it was a man?

  Aba: From the teeth. Apparently they can tell the difference between the teeth of apes and men. There are no secrets from these scientists.

  Harry: What about Adam and Eve?

  Aba: What about them?

  Harry: Wasn’t Adam the first man?

  Aba: Perhaps the man on Java is Adam.

  Harry: Then the Garden of Eden was on Java.

  Aba: Why not?

  Harry: I thought it was in Palestine.

  Aba: Perhaps they will find bones in Palestine that will prove you correct.

  Harry: Why are there no apes before men in the Bible?

  Aba: Because the Bible does not believe in evolution.

  Harry: That one day an ape became a man.

  Aba: As you say. But there is more. Once an ape became a man, his brain developed rapidly, so that he could think complicated and beautiful thoughts, as indeed did the scientists who examined the bones of the Java man.

  Harry: What thoughts were those?

  Aba: Well, it seems they could not put together the skull because it was badly cracked and the reason for this, they all agreed, based on their knowledge of man, was that it had been bashed in by a headhunting enemy so that he could eat the brain, which, they assure us, is a headhunter’s delicacy.

  CHAPTER

  27

  WALKING HOME, HARRY WONDERED AT WOODY’S SUGGESTION. EVERYONE swore that the dwarf always had an ulterior motive, but what could Woody gain by sen
ding him cross-country? Perhaps to visit the friends he had mentioned, who were fellow bookmakers or worse. Would it be a dangerous mission that defied even the FBI? The idea appealed to him, but he needed to be wary of being set up as a fall guy. He must outfox Woody, the fox.

  Entering his house, he was surprised to see his father, mother and Aba. Usually by early Saturday evening they were on Second Avenue, having a drink before seeing a play or sitting with friends in a cafe.

  “Ah, Heshele,” his father said, “I’m glad we caught you. Put on your best clothes, you are coming with us to witness history.”

  “Ils ne passeront pas!” Aba shouted, raising a fist over his head.

  Something French, Harry thought, maybe Fifi should know.

  “Lafayette, we are here,” he said, fitting in.

  Aba and his father laughed.

  “Not Lafayette, Heshele,” his father said, “Asch.”

  “What is Asch?”

  “Indeed, what is it?” Aba answered. “It is an apostate, with the talent of a flea, who has chosen to lick the boots of the goyim for profit.”

  “Huh?”

  His father beckoned Harry onto the couch beside him.

  “There is a Yiddish writer named Sholem Asch, who has written a book called The Nazarene, in which he paints a glowing portrait of one Jesus Christ. The book is a best-seller. He is making a fortune.”

  “Blood money, Jewish blood,” Aba interrupted.

  “Yes,” his father continued. “Tonight, as is Sholem’s habit, he will dine at the Cafe Royal. But tonight he will not dine, because when he tries to enter, the Yiddish writers and actors will stand in front of the Royal, hands joined, barring the apostate from their presence. And you will see it. No, better, you will lock hands between Aba and me.”

  “That is just right,” his mother said, “a child for child’s play. A big moral statement, hah! You’re all jealous of the money.”

  During the subway ride, his parents became embroiled in a squabble over whether his father should take a second job as a teacher of Yiddish. Harry and Aba moved away to allow them vitriolic privacy.

  “Nu, American boy,” Aba said, waving an imaginary flag, what have you been up to?.”

  “Aba, am I too young to write?”

  “Of course not. Rimbaud had written much excellent poetry at your age. What did you have in mind?”

  “I’m not sure. I have an idea for a story about a boy, maybe about my age, who is asked to become involved with bad people, maybe even gangsters, like Lucky Luciano.”

  Aba’s green eyes widened.

  “Interesting. What does the boy decide?”

  “I’m not sure. See, he doesn’t know exactly what they want him to do. He wonders whether he even may be asked to kill people.”

  “And could he kill?”

  “Oh, no.”

  “Then he must say no to these people.”

  “But he doesn’t know if he will be asked to kill. He doesn’t know what he must do until he does it.”

  “And how does the story end?”

  “I don’t know, Aba. The job would let the boy travel all over the country, and he would like that, but …”

  Aba’s palm rested on Harry’s knee.

  “Things are difficult to write, if you have not lived them. And since I am certain that all this is foreign to you, why don’t you choose another subject. But do write, Heshele, do write.”

  In the Cafe Royal a low cloud bank of tobacco smoke lay over tables at which women sat silent while men shouted, gyrated their arms and leapt up to deliver important words directly into a recipient’s ear. The language was Yiddish, compressed into a mighty singsong noise; a bastard echo off the crumbling Walls of Jericho.

  “Hello Milton,” his father greeted a waiter wearing a tuxedo dotted with a menu of stains. “What do you recommend tonight for the first dish?” Milton, who studied and imitated the expansiveness of the actor patrons, put the tips of his fingers to his lips and kissed them loudly.

  “The sweet herring swam in the Garden of Eden. It is my personal favorite. But if you prefer something more substantial, than take the chopped liver with fried onions and schmaltz. It is also a personal favorite, but forbidden to me by my stomach.”

  “I’ll take the chopped liver,” his mother said.

  Aba and his father ordered the same.

  “And the young Mr. Catzker?”

  Harry was pleased that Milton recognized him. In the last two years he had no longer been occasionally invited to accompany his parents to the Royal. His height and general appearance set people to reevaluating his mother’s version of her age. She was in a battle with Stella Adler for reigning beauty of Second Avenue. Harry and motherhood were hardly the attributes she wished to project.

  As an infant he had been brought often and allowed to crawl on the floor, sheltering under tables.

  “Heshele,” Aba had told him, “one day you can boast that you saw the most famous Yiddish feet in America.”

  “Milton,” Harry answered. impersonating Edward G. Robinson, a man who knew what was what, “I will also have the chopped liver.”

  Milton placed on the table a plate with four round scoops of chopped liver. Each smeared some on a slice of black pumpernickel bread and chewed while Milton hovered, eager for the verdict.

  “Excellent.” his father assured. “Such chopped liver my enemies should never taste.”

  “Thank you, Moishe.”

  “Nu, Milton, what for a main dish?” Aba asked.

  “Everything is wonderful. The goulash, the schnitzel à la Holstein”—he kissed his fingers again—“but for gentlemen and a lady of your taste it must be the roast goose and a good bottle of Magyar wine.”

  “Done!” Aba said.

  The others nodded. Milton retreated.

  “Heshele,” Aba said, “you see all these people here? They write plays and poems. You think that’s just noise you hear. No. It’s plays and poems. Maybe we could write one, hah?”

  He winked, called Milton and, pointing to a distant table, asked: “Isn’t that Feibush Steinberg, the impresario?”

  “Yes.”

  “Please ask him to join us. Tell him I have a theatrical proposition that could prove mutually beneficial.”

  Milton spoke to a man considerably older than the three other men who shared the table. The man looked toward Aba, shrugged to his companions and approached.

  Steinberg wore a tan cashmere suit, black shirt and red ascot. His large face lay under a domed, shining, bald pate. His features were aggressive: hyperthyroid, black, bloodshot eyes, a wise nose, which sprouted hair from the nostrils, and a gray Vandyke beard that pointed almost straight out, as if to jab.

  “Feibush Steinberg,” he said, waving three fingers at the table.

  “Won’t you join us in a glass of wine?” Aba asked.

  “Thank you.”

  He sat down.

  “Milton said you had a proposition you wished to lay before me. I know you as a poet, Stolz. Have you turned playwright? In any case, I ask, as Diaghilev was wont to: Amaze me!”

  “Most apt. You see I have this idea for a play …”

  “My dear Stolz, I do not wish to be rude, but you must be aware of how many ideas for plays are brought to me each day. I need plays, not ideas.”

  “Of course, Steinberg. But as you have noted, I am new at this. A little background will help. I am to be married to the daughter of Druckman, the rich ex-bootlegger. Some call him a gangster, but I think they go too far. My father-in-law-to-be has confessed to me that it has always been his ambition to be involved in the theater. He added that if I would set myself to writing a play, it would be his pleasure to ensure that it was produced.”

  “Your father-in-law …”

  “To-be …”

  “Wishes to invest?”

  “Without a doubt.”

  “Tell me your idea.”

  Aba looked first at Harry and then directly into Steinberg’s half-closed e
yes.

  “I thought it should be a subject that interested Druckman. So I conceived of a young Jew hired by Italian gangsters to do their killing for them. Perhaps it even touches Druckman’s own history. The youth travels the country and becomes a sort of traveling salesman of death. A catchy title: Traveling Salesmen of Death, don’t you think?”

  Steinberg stroked his beard

  “Jews hired by Italians to do killing is an interesting twist, reminiscent of Babel and even Bialik. But why should Italian gangsters have need of anyone to do such deeds for them?”

  “A good question. The answer is relationship. If one Italian gangster is killed, all Italian gangsters in the immediate vicinity are suspected. Here, the killer does not know his victim, and besides, he is a Jew, and as such is known as a member of a law-abiding people. No connection. No suspicion. The perfect crime!”

  Harry stared at Aba. Now, he thought, I really know how amazing is a poet’s mind. His father was having a difficult time suppressing laughter, while his mother absented herself by vamping any eye that wandered her way.

  Steinberg pulled strongly at his Vandyke as if to test its reality.

  “But the fact that this killer is Jewish, is that the only Jewish component? This is the Yiddish stage.”

  “Of course, Steinberg, but I thought you would see the analogy with the Maccabees and the Romans. Perhaps not a perfect match, but I will work on it.”

  Steinberg’s bulging eyes seemed in danger of tipping out of their sockets.

  “Yes, well, hmnn … your father-in-law …”

  “To-be …”

  “I would like to meet him. Here is my card. If he would call me.”

  “And I can tell him you are interested in my idea.”

  “Yes.”

  They watched Steinberg return to his three disciples.

  His father, Aba and even his mother, who obviously could flirt and listen, burst into laughter.

  “Where,” his father, now thrown into hiccups, gasped, “did you get that marvelous bubbe-mayse?”

  Aba looked around furtively.

  “I had a collaborator, who shall remain nameless.”

  “In what lunatic asylum does he reside?”