bar,
standing in brogans with his ankles crossed, his sportshirt stained
with sweat from armpit to armpit, drinking beer, talking with the
bartender, and smiling. Charlie's smile went away when he met Jack
eyeball to eyeball.
"Missed you the other night, Charlie," Jack
said.
"Yeah. I think you're gonna keep missing me,
Jack."
"That's a wrong attitude. "
"May be. But I'm stuck with it."
"Don't be stupid, Charlie. You're not stupid."
"That's right, Jack. I'm not stupid."
Jack's face had all the expression of an ice cube,
Charlie's full of overheated juices. He was telling Jack now about
something I had no clue to; but from their tone there were
confidences between them. It turned out Charlie was responsible for
Jack being in the Masons. They had been young thieves together on
Manhattan's West Side in 1914, running with The Gophers, a gang Owney
Madden led until he went to jail for murder. They both wound up in
the Bronx about 1925, with Charlie gone semi-straight as a numbers
writer and Jack a feared figure in the New York underworld because of
his insane gang tactics and his association with the powerful Arnold
Rothstein. Jack had also opened a place he called The Bronx
Theatrical Club, whose main theatrical element was Jack's presence as
a performing psychopath. I say performing because I don't think Jack
was psychopathic in its extreme sense. He was aberrated, yes,
eccentric, but his deeds were willful and logical, part of a career
pattern, even those that seemed most spontaneous and most horrendous.
He was rising in the world, a celebrated hijacker, and Charlie was a
working stiff with money problems. Charlie married Jimmy Biondo's
sister and they vacationed in the Catskills. When times got very
rough in New York, Charlie and some two-bit Jersey thieves bought a
defunct brewery in Kingston and went into shoestring bootlegging. In
the years after, Charlie opened his roadhouse and also became the
biggest beer distributor in Greene and Ulster counties. He was tough,
with a reputation for muscle if you didn't pay promptly for your
goods. But he was different from Jack. Just a bootlegger. Just a
businessman.
"I'm having a little meeting tomorrow night,"
Jack told him, "for those who couldn't make it to the last one."
"I'm booked up."
"Unbook, Charlie. It's at the Aratoga. Eight
o'clock. And I'm all business, Charlie. All business."
"I never knew you to be anything else, Jack."
"Charlie, old brother, don't have me send for
you."
Jack left it there. turned his back on Charlie and
walked down the bar and into the table area where only one table was
occupied: by that beauty in a white linen suit and white pumps; and
at the table with her a five-foot-five, one-eyed, waterheaded gnome.
This was Murray (The Goose) Pucinski who'd worked for Jack for the
past five years.
"Oh, God, Jack, oh, God where've you been?"
was Kiki's greeting. She stood to hug him.
Jack squeezed her and gave her a quick kiss, then sat
alongside her.
"She behaving herself, Goose?" Jack asked
the waterhead.
Goose nodded.
"How could anybody misbehave up here?" Kiki
said, looking me over. I was struck by the idea of misbehaving with
her. That was the first logical thing to consider when you looked at
Kiki. The second was the flawless quality of her face, even
underneath all that professionally applied makeup; a dense rather
than a delicate beauty, large, dark eyes, a mouth of soft, round
promise, and an abundance of hair, not black as Alice had said, but
auburn, a glorious Titian mop. Her expression, as we visually
introduced ourselves, was one of anxious innocence. I use the phrase
to describe a moral condition in fragments, anxious to be gone, but
with a large segment still intact. The condition was visible in the
eyes, which for all their sexual innuendo and expertise, for all
their knowledge of how beauty rises in the world, were in awe, I
suspect, of her rarefied situation: its prisonerlike quality, its
dangers, its potential cruelties, and its
standing in brogans with his ankles crossed, his sportshirt stained
with sweat from armpit to armpit, drinking beer, talking with the
bartender, and smiling. Charlie's smile went away when he met Jack
eyeball to eyeball.
"Missed you the other night, Charlie," Jack
said.
"Yeah. I think you're gonna keep missing me,
Jack."
"That's a wrong attitude. "
"May be. But I'm stuck with it."
"Don't be stupid, Charlie. You're not stupid."
"That's right, Jack. I'm not stupid."
Jack's face had all the expression of an ice cube,
Charlie's full of overheated juices. He was telling Jack now about
something I had no clue to; but from their tone there were
confidences between them. It turned out Charlie was responsible for
Jack being in the Masons. They had been young thieves together on
Manhattan's West Side in 1914, running with The Gophers, a gang Owney
Madden led until he went to jail for murder. They both wound up in
the Bronx about 1925, with Charlie gone semi-straight as a numbers
writer and Jack a feared figure in the New York underworld because of
his insane gang tactics and his association with the powerful Arnold
Rothstein. Jack had also opened a place he called The Bronx
Theatrical Club, whose main theatrical element was Jack's presence as
a performing psychopath. I say performing because I don't think Jack
was psychopathic in its extreme sense. He was aberrated, yes,
eccentric, but his deeds were willful and logical, part of a career
pattern, even those that seemed most spontaneous and most horrendous.
He was rising in the world, a celebrated hijacker, and Charlie was a
working stiff with money problems. Charlie married Jimmy Biondo's
sister and they vacationed in the Catskills. When times got very
rough in New York, Charlie and some two-bit Jersey thieves bought a
defunct brewery in Kingston and went into shoestring bootlegging. In
the years after, Charlie opened his roadhouse and also became the
biggest beer distributor in Greene and Ulster counties. He was tough,
with a reputation for muscle if you didn't pay promptly for your
goods. But he was different from Jack. Just a bootlegger. Just a
businessman.
"I'm having a little meeting tomorrow night,"
Jack told him, "for those who couldn't make it to the last one."
"I'm booked up."
"Unbook, Charlie. It's at the Aratoga. Eight
o'clock. And I'm all business, Charlie. All business."
"I never knew you to be anything else, Jack."
"Charlie, old brother, don't have me send for
you."
Jack left it there. turned his back on Charlie and
walked down the bar and into the table area where only one table was
occupied: by that beauty in a white linen suit and white pumps; and
at the table with her a five-foot-five, one-eyed, waterheaded gnome.
This was Murray (The Goose) Pucinski who'd worked for Jack for the
past five years.
"Oh, God, Jack, oh, God where've you been?"
was Kiki's greeting. She stood to hug him.
Jack squeezed her and gave her a quick kiss, then sat
alongside her.
"She behaving herself, Goose?" Jack asked
the waterhead.
Goose nodded.
"How could anybody misbehave up here?" Kiki
said, looking me over. I was struck by the idea of misbehaving with
her. That was the first logical thing to consider when you looked at
Kiki. The second was the flawless quality of her face, even
underneath all that professionally applied makeup; a dense rather
than a delicate beauty, large, dark eyes, a mouth of soft, round
promise, and an abundance of hair, not black as Alice had said, but
auburn, a glorious Titian mop. Her expression, as we visually
introduced ourselves, was one of anxious innocence. I use the phrase
to describe a moral condition in fragments, anxious to be gone, but
with a large segment still intact. The condition was visible in the
eyes, which for all their sexual innuendo and expertise, for all
their knowledge of how beauty rises in the world, were in awe, I
suspect, of her rarefied situation: its prisonerlike quality, its
dangers, its potential cruelties, and its
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