When it was time for supper, Shan obliged Lina by lighting the candles displayed on the branches, all of them safely placed. Mrs. Capello allowed the radio to play as they ate. Her reason for the exception was obvious to Shan: instrumental Christmas hymns filled any telling lulls. They also did well to distract from her and Shan’s meager appetites. It was the first supper in a long while when he’d declined any wine.
As the family finished up, Shan prepared to excuse himself. “I’m feeling pretty tired,” he said, which wasn’t a lie.
Suddenly a heavy pounding shook the walls. The family froze, startled, before the front door flew open. Nick trudged inside and toward the dinner table. He had a hint of a stagger and no coat, his tie loose and crooked. His gaze cut to Shan. “We’re gonna talk. Right goddamn now.”
Shan rose from his chair. This time there was no misreading the topic.
“Niccolò,” Mr. Capello demanded. “What is this?”
“Nick, please,” Shan said. “Let’s go somewhere else, just the two of us. Like we did earlier.”
But he didn’t budge. “I gotta know they’re wrong. That what I heard ain’t true.”
Mrs. Capello placed a hand on Lina’s arm, a signal to remain seated. Shan had brought this upon himself.
“See, last night after work”—Nick started to pace, his skin reddening—“I phoned Josie to make sure she’s all right. When nobody answered, I figured she’s ignoring my call ’cause she’s sore at me. So this morning, one of Sal’s guys checked on her. She’s nowhere to be found. Here I am, worried she might’ve meant what she said about leaving for good. Right away I start diggin’ around. Turns out about the time I’d called, Josie and some guy were seen in her window. And all she’s got on is a robe.”
Nick’s voice trembled, a fierce fight to remain calm. “Since Josie refuses to talk to me, I’m here to get the truth. ’Cause that slimy bastard just happens to fit your description.”
“Enough!” Mr. Capello was now standing. “You are drunk. How dare you come into this house, accusing such a thing!”
Nick’s attention veered to his father. “A neighbor saw him sneak away in the dark. In your truck, Pop. Yours!”
Shan had been so out of sorts, he’d made it halfway home before a motorcar honked, informing him that his headlights were off. An unintentional mistake—like all of this.
“Nick, wait,” he tried again. He dared to move closer, hands lifted in a peaceful approach. “Hear me out. It’s not what you think.” He cringed at his own words, which sounded just as awful as he’d feared.
“Yeah?” Nick leveled his gaze at him. “Then look me in the eye. I want you to swear to me you didn’t lay a hand on her.”
Shan glimpsed Mr. Capello’s expectant look; he was waiting for a denial.
If only Shan could give them one.
“Josie was upset—after your fight,” he began. “I drove her home and we had some drinks. But we were just talking . . .” He faltered, with no easy way to phrase the rest. “We’d fallen asleep on the couch. We didn’t mean for anything to happen.”
“So you took advantage of her,” Nick finished, clenching his jaw. “That’s what you’re tellin’ me.”
Shan wanted to denounce this, but given a split-second of thought, shame from the possibility barred him from arguing. “Nick, I’m sorry,” he said simply. “I screwed up. I know this. But honest, it’s not as bad as—”
The defense cracked in two and Shan found himself on the floor, his head knocked against a leg of the table. Only then did he fully register the slug to his jaw that had taken him down.
“Get up,” Nick shouted with both hands in fists. “I said, get up!”
A mix of screams and hollers erupted in the room.
Clambering upward, Shan held out a hand to hold Nick off, but it did nothing to stop another punch to his face, followed by the next. A glass distantly shattered.
Through the cavern of Shan’s mind, an inner voice ordered him to curl up and endure the rightful punishment. Yet a darker part of him, a bitter anger born from an inability to fight back, swelled with an ancient fury. A raw instinct to survive.
With all the strength he could muster, he charged at Nick, rushing him backward, until they hit a wall in the next room. Nick tried to shove him off, but it was Shan’s turn to unload a series of punches to the face, the gut. Furniture toppled and more screams sounded. Then the pendulum swayed and Nick pinned Shan on the coffee table. Gripping Shan’s shirt collar, Nick drew back for another strike. When his fist plowed downward, Shan grabbed hold of it, preventing another swing. Nick was wrestling to break free when a flare of orange snagged Shan’s focus.
Fire . . . the Christmas tree. It was in flames.
“My God,” Shan said, right as Nick took notice.
Fallen candles had splattered wax on the wooden floor. The fire was spreading between branches. Mr. Capello swung a blanket at them, trying frantically to smother the blaze.
Nick and Shan split ways to help. Shan raced to the kitchen for water, past Lina already with a bowlful. At the sink Mrs. Capello was filling a large saucepan, which Shan grabbed half-filled, leaving her to prepare another. If they didn’t work fast, their home would soon be engulfed.
Back in the sitting room, Nick was stomping out flames on the throw rug as Lina hurried back into the kitchen with her empty bowl. Shan flung his water at branches on the right while Mr. Capello attacked those on the left. Smoke crowded the room, causing them to cough.
Shan dropped his pan and yanked off his outer shirt, ripping the line of buttons. He joined Mr. Capello in swatting at the tree.
Lina reappeared and threw more water.
“Pop, I got it,” Nick said, taking the blanket from his father, whose motions were slowing. The remnants of candles rolled over the floor.
Together Shan and Nick worked at extinguishing the flames, launching more smoke into the air. They circled the tree, their shoes crushing fallen ornaments. They didn’t rest until every threat was reduced to cinders. The smallest spark was shaken loose and stomped upon, each branch left lifeless and bare.
Nick wiped the sweat from his ashen face. There was no denying the damage they had done, to the home, to each other. A shadow of soot blackened the wallpaper.
Shan squatted before a center branch. There, Tomasso’s angel hung limp and charred. Of all Shan’s regrets, this was his greatest.
“Mama, help!” Lina’s cry turned them around. She was kneeling by Mr. Capello. He was slumped beside the davenport as if he’d fallen short of reaching the seat.
Shan hurried over with Nick, arriving as Mrs. Capello rushed from the kitchen carrying towels. Tossing them aside, she dropped down before him. “Benicio, what is wrong?” She touched his right hand, which was clutching his other arm.
His breaths had gone shallow and his eyes exuded pain.
“Rispondétemi,” she pleaded, but still he didn’t answer.
“I’ll call a doctor.” Lina started for the phone.
“No,” Nick said. “We need a hospital.”
Shan agreed. “I can drive. Lina, get the door.” He bent down, releasing his singed rag of a shirt, and motioned to Nick. “I’ll take this arm. You take the other.” As they helped maneuver Mr. Capello to his feet, Mrs. Capello fetched several coats to layer over him during the drive.
“Don’t worry, Pop,” Nick said. “We’re gonna get you help.”
32
Time slowed to an excruciating pace at the Brooklyn Hospital. Infants’ cries and a vibration of tension filled the air. Smells were ripe with disinfectant and the metallic scent of blood.
A nurse would update them soon. The Capellos were told this upon each inquiry until “soon” became a term Shan despised. Granted, they weren’t the only ones waiting. Clustered through the check-in area were plenty of others with fear creasing their faces. Most were immigrant families, struggling to speak English, reliant on the volunteer hospital for any chance of a cure—whether for polio or scar
let fever or the wretched consumption.
Finally came the name: “Mrs. Benicio Capello?”
The family snapped to attention. They rushed toward the nurse who stood before the reception desk in a white hat and an apron that layered her seersucker dress, a pen and file in hand. Her height and broad shoulders gave an imposing air.
“My husband, Benicio—he is safe?” Mrs. Capello clenched the rosary she’d been using to pray.
“He does need rest, but he’s going to be all right.”
“Thank God,” Shan murmured.
Mrs. Capello gasped and made the sign of the cross, exuding the same relief shown on Nick’s face. Lina hugged the extra coats draping her arm. Not until then had she shed any tears, but now as she smiled, they came down in streams.
Nick asked the nurse, “What happened to him?”
“It appears Mr. Capello has suffered a heart attack.”
They all fell silent.
Heart trouble, like Tomasso.
“Tell me,” the nurse said, opening her file, “has he ever had heart problems in the past?”
Mrs. Capello shook her head. “No,” she said, and Lina concurred.
As the nurse scribbled a note, Shan thought back to the last time Mr. Capello had collapsed, how his breaths had shortened in much the same way. And in that instant, he realized what he had missed.
“Actually,” Shan said, and the group turned to him. “This might have happened before.”
Lina blinked, astounded. “When?”
“Last week. We were at a plumbing job, and he nearly dropped the sink. He was out of breath and sweating. But he said it was just a dizzy spell.”
“Why the hell didn’t you say something?” Nick said. They were his only words to Shan since the family arrived at the hospital.
Shan wanted to explain, to justify—more to himself than anyone else. “Pop said not to. He was afraid Ma would worry.”
Mrs. Capello lowered her eyes, making Shan wish he had chosen better wording. If any of them were to blame, it was Shan.
“Be that as it may,” the nurse cut in. “The doctor has recommended he stay overnight for observation and follow-up tests. If those are clear, he may go home. In the meanwhile, should you care to see him, family members are welcome, but only for the next hour.”
Lina stepped forward, cradling her mother’s shoulder. “Yes, of course we would.”
“Very well.” The nurse shut her file. “This way.” She pivoted, asserting a path through the room of strangers. Lina and Mrs. Capello hastened to keep up.
Shan started to follow, but Nick halted him with a hand to the chest. The earlier heat in his eyes had since cooled to icy steel, now reflected in his voice.
“She said family.”
Shan just stood there. So shocking were the three words, they might well have been three thousand volts. He watched Nick disappear down the hall, wondering if Lina and her mother would even notice his absence.
Moreover, would they be relieved?
At this point, Shan felt no right to take a stand.
He felt gazes in the room upon him, most likely due to his bedraggled state. The tousled hair, the split lip, the splatter of blood on his undershirt dusted with soot. He closed his overcoat, grateful Mrs. Capello had brought it along, and realized the one way he could help was giving the family space.
Shan ambled through the darkness and soon found himself in Fort Greene Park. Fatigue setting in, from far more than the scuffle, he took a seat on a lone park bench. A lamppost glowed overhead, a spotlight on an empty stage. The frosty air caused his eyes to water and his nose to run, or perhaps emotion was the greater source.
From his coat pocket he retrieved the handkerchief he had carried for years. After wiping his nose and lip, he peered at the silken cloth. His thumb traced the elegant monogram, the embroidered initials of George M. Cohan, a reminder of the day they had first crossed paths.
In many ways, he still felt like the kid he’d been in that alley, no less cold and on his own. The Capellos had offered more generosity than any orphan deserved, but in the end, Nick was right: Shan wasn’t truly part of the family. A fact he had allowed himself to forget.
It all began with a debt, long ago paid. The time had come to move on. Even before tonight’s chaos, he had arrived at that truth. Scrutiny from the likes of Agent Barsetti and Mr. Carducci, and others just like them, only further confirmed the notion.
Shan squeezed the wadded handkerchief and thought of Mr. Cohan. A world-famous performer, he had grown up on the road, part of the Four Cohans, touring from town to town. It was a nomadic existence, allowing few ties, not meant for all types of folks.
But clearly it was a life intended for Shan.
1935
33
All things come into being through opposition, and all are in flux like a river. Put simply, nothing stays the same.
Shan had memorized the philosophy—from Plato, was it?—for an exam during his high school years. Even so, he hadn’t afforded the concept much thought. Now proof of it glared in all things, and not just in his reflection—although the years of touring, booze, and girls had certainly left their marks.
The old philosopher had been right, too, about the tendency of humans to battle that change. He’d merely failed to mention that vaudevillians, more than anyone, would be leading the front lines.
“It’s just a slump,” performers asserted when ticket sales started to drop. “Folks out there still love a good variety act.” And to an extent they were right. But what did they love more?
Breasts.
Fellows all over the country just couldn’t get enough. No matter how rich or poor, educated or dim, once the curtains opened and the chorus girls appeared, every man in the theater traded his life’s worries for a glimpse of those heavenly melons. Some patrons would hoot and whistle; others sat glued to their seats, entranced by the jiggling and bouncing. And when it came to the twirling of tassels, even the ladies in the audience couldn’t hide their awe.
Shan had to admit, for his first few weeks as a comic in burlesque, it took fierce concentration to prevent his own arousal. A two-gal striptease had preceded his act, and Shan was, after all, a man. Who could fault him? But in time, the sexual luster faded—during the show, that was—and his focus returned to the crowd.
Performance-wise, the gig differed little from vaudeville, which he had first broken into with Mr. Cohan’s help. That was when Shan learned how unglamorous it all was. The grueling rehearsals and constant shows, up to eight a day in “small time,” left barely a moment to breathe. Each week folded into the next, same for the months, and ultimately the years. After traveling through snowstorms and rainstorms, he would slog into another hotel bearing no resemblance to the Plaza and find industrious ways to cook in his room and wash laundry in the sink.
But hell, it was a living. And there was no taking any job for granted after the stock market crashed in the fall of ’29. That was just over two years after Shan joined his first circuit. Back when he was willing to play the straight man in a two-man sketch with a gagman who’d hog the laughs. The one benefit was it drove Shan to diversify his skills, allowing him to stand on his own.
Then, after six years in the business, it became clear that the usual wheels, or tours, were dying. The fact was, most unemployed men had the good sense not to spend their last nickel to watch a terrier do the cha-cha, or a dwarf yodel while riding a unicycle; but given a chance to see a bare-skinned beauty, they would empty their pockets down to the lint.
When Shan first announced his decision to switch course, he was scorned—mainly by the vaudevillian ladies—for being lured by the carnal appeal. They were wrong. It was the dough he was after, nothing else. A hefty bankroll ensured he’d never have to rely on anyone again.
Which made his surprise act tonight that much more of a risk.
No doubt there would be a price to pay, in spite of his working for the famed Minsky brothers for the past two years. But t
here would also be consequences if Shan didn’t put Paddy O’Hooligan back in his place.
The recently added comic, the son of a Hungarian Jew, had adopted his stage name to match his role of an immigrant from Limerick, fresh off the boat. For a month Shan had suppressed his irritation. As if the guy’s ego alone wasn’t enough, his exaggerated brogue sounded more suited to a Scot in the Highlands. It was understandable that his attempts at Hollywood stardom had gained little traction.
Still, Shan had felt no personal affront until today.
Late this morning, “Paddy” had knocked on his hotel door, delivering news that the rehearsal for the censors had been delayed by an hour. In every city, Pittsburgh in this case, all of the acts required approval to perform for the public. Nothing lewd enough to warrant a raid was permitted. A typical list banned full nudity and vulgar movements, the use of “damns” and “hells.”
Of course, as went everything in life, there were ways around every rule. For cities that outlawed stripping onstage, for example, the gals would just step behind the curtain each time they shed a garment before coming back into view. What’s more, after passing the censors, most obscenities were simply slipped back into the show. This made the approval process a pitiful farce, but still participation was vital.
It was not well received, then, when Shan arrived at the tail end of the run-through today, which had been moved to an hour sooner, not later, than planned.
“I could’ve sworn I’d said ‘earlier,’ ” Paddy later told Shan, though a faint gleam in his eyes said otherwise.
The short, prune-faced director, Mr. Bagley, not one for excuses, blustered his displeasure, then moved Shan up in the order of acts, thereby shifting Paddy to a loftier slot. As billing went, the farther down, the more prestigious the performer. The one exception was the final number, reserved for a dreadful musical piece—such as a harpist who plucked away while tooting a kazoo—to help clear out the audience in time for the next show. “Playing to the haircuts,” they called it, since that was about all the entertainer would see.
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