As Time Goes By (25 page)

Then he saw a foot in the doorway where someone
had been standing. It was a lone foot, and it didn't seem
to be moving much. The gunfire had also stopped.
Maybe five seconds had elapsed since the attack, not
even. They were both still alive.

"Goddamn sons of bitches bastards," muttered
Solly, snapping a new clip into his automatic. He was
up on his feet in no time flat and charging out the door.
Rick had youth on his side, but he was no match for
the boss.

Solly paid no attention whatever to the foot in the
door. As Rick rounded the corner he could see that
the assailant to whom the foot belonged was still alive,
but unarmed; Solly kicked his pistol away as he ran by
him. "Ricky, knife, alive!" he shouted before disappearing down the stairs. "Goddamn sons of bitches
bastards..."

Rick leaned over the wounded man. One of their
slugs had caught him just above the heart, and he could
plainly see the man wasn't going to make it. The guy
on the floor was dark, with curly black hair, and as he
leaned over him, Rick couldn't at first tell whether he was Italian or Jewish. Then he remembered his boss's
warning about the knife.

The wounded hood whipped the stiletto past his face
so close and so fast, Rick almost lost his nose.

Sicilian, for sure.

He
could hear gunshots from below as he rendered the man harmless by socking him on the jaw. He left
him there and hustled down the stairs.

Solomon Horowitz sat on the bottom step. The other
Italian lay at his feet, quite dead, shot through the left
ear at what must have been very close range. Had he
tried to surrender? Rick didn't want to know.

"Salucci?" asked Rick, heading out the front door.
They must have come uptown somehow. He looked up
and down the street in vain for the getaway car. A few black passersby looked at him nervously; he didn't un
derstand why until he realized he still had his pistol in
his hand. He slipped it into the special pocket in his
suit coat and stepped back inside.

Solly and the dead man had disappeared. He could
hear a heavy tread on the stairway. He followed it up.

With the stiff slung around his shoulders, Solly had tramped up the stairs and back to the office. The ac
complice was still alive. Solly dumped the corpse right next to him.

"Ricky, you speak some wop," he said. "Find out what's going on here before I get angry."

Rick spoke to the dying man in Sicilian. Most of the Sicilian he had learned fighting the Italian kids in East
Harlem had something to do with somebody's mother
or sister, but it would have to do.

The dying man was croaking something unintelligi
ble. Rick could understand that: if he had a bullet in
his chest, he might not be easily understood, either. He
bent his ear as close to the man's mouth as he dared;
even in death some of these guys were known to bite
off a nose, an ear, any body part they could get their
teeth around.

"Son of a bitch bastard," Solly said impatiently.
"With this
shtunk
we get nowhere." All at once he
snatched up the wounded Sicilian in his arms. Cradling
him like a baby, Solly walked over to the elevator.

"Wait a second, Sol," said Rick, but Horowitz
wouldn't listen.

"Ricky," he commanded, "open the door."

Rick started to ring for the operator, but Solly barked
at him: "I said open the door, not call the car."

Rick pried open the safety doors.

With a grunt, Solly hurled the man down the elevator shaft. Then he went back, picked up the dead man, and
threw him down the shaft as well.

For
the first time Rick was able to get a good look at
them: The man with the knife lay on his back, his left
leg splayed outward, his right arm bent at the elbow,
his hand resting on his waistcoat. His left arm was
raised as if in thought, its hand applied to the left side of his head, which was unmarked except for a blood
stain on his right cheek. His mouth stood slightly
agape, as if he had been just about to say something.
His dead companion's head was nestled in the first
man's left armpit, as if they were brothers and still accustomed to sleeping together in the same bed. He lay spread-eagle and ungainly, both arms flung out to the
sides as if in surrender, hands limp, toes pointing up
ward.

"Fresh off the boat Salucci no-goodniks, come to make mischief," Solly said. "Salucci thinks he can
muscle in on Solomon Horowitz in Harlem? He sends
these goombahs to whack me? Goddamn son of a bitch
bastard!"

Rick wanted to hit back right away. He knew what
this was all about, and a wave of guilt washed over him.
He hadn't given the boss O'Hanlon's message because
he didn't want him to find out about him and Lois—
and this was the. result.
           

Solomon would have none of it. "Ricky," he said,
"what for we got to go looking for Salucci? He should
only come looking for us, and explain why he tries this
farpotshket
thing, and to beg my forgiveness before I
come downtown and shoot him right in his whore's
bed. So nothing is what we got to do. We sit tight, and
mark my words, we get visitors. What we don't do is go looking for them, and what else we don't do is run
away."

He wasn't even breathing hard. "Is old saying: 'The
rabbi whose congregation don't want to drive him out
of town ain't much of a rabbi. And the rabbi they do
drive out ain't much of a mensch.' Right here is where
I'm staying."

Rick said he didn't understand why they didn't send
Tick-Tock down to the Lower East Side to pay back
Salucci several times over.

"Because we're not ready," his boss replied. "When you're not ready, and you do something anyway, why,
you got nobody to blame but yourself when everything
turns out a
farshtinkener
mess, is why."

Why they weren't ready was a question that sud
denly occurred to Rick. Where the hell was Tick-Tock
Schapiro?

C
HAPTER
T
WENTY-
T
WO

Two days later Rick and Solly were sitting in the
freshly repaired back room of the Tootsie-Wootsie
when Abie Cohen made a noise and the managers
looked up to see, standing in the same doorway that the
two Sicilians had so recently darkened, Dion O'Han
lon, Lorenzo Salucci, and Irving Weinberg. Behind
them were Cohen and Tick-Tock. Nobody had a gun
out.

Rick jumped to his feet, but Solly didn't move.
"Hello, boys," he called out. "I've been expecting you. Come in and make yourselves at home." He acted as if nothing had happened.

O'Hanlon glided in on his tiny feet. Salucci, bigger,
moved slowly and deliberately. At his side, Weinberg
bobbed and nodded like one of those little birds that
rides a rhinoceros.

"Good evening, Mr. Horowitz," said the Irish gangster in his soft, lilting voice.

"Shall I pat him down?" Rick asked, but Solly
wouldn't let him.

"Never insult an equal," he said, sitting there like a
Jewish Buddha. "Otherwise he feels free to insult you
back, and who knows where that all ends?"

"Solomon the Wise," said O'Hanlon, making him
self comfortable. "And good evening to you, Mr.,
er . .. ?"

The move was Rick's. "Baline," he replied as if he'd
never seen O'Hanlon before. "Rick Baline. I'm the
manager here."

O'Hanlon bowed. "Baline," he said, rolling the word
around on his tongue as if trying to distinguish the
taste. "The name of course is familiar to me, and for a
moment there I thought your face might be as well."
He pulled back both corners of his mouth to imitate a
smile. "It must be the light. My mistake."

"Abie, some chairs for my guests," said Solly.

Everybody sat, with their hats on and their hands in
their laps. It was safer that way. For three top gangsters
like these to come into Horowitz's stronghold with as
sassination in mind would be crazy, reflected Rick, and then he decided that was probably what Giuseppe Gug-
lielmo had thought, too. He stayed cautious.

Solly opened the colloquy. "Do I send my boys downtown to make trouble for you, Dion?" he asked,
waving his hands in the air. He could not bring himself
to address Salucci or Weinberg directly. "Solomon
Horowitz is a man of honor. He sticks to his agreements, and since Atlantic City in 1929 his agreement with O'Hanlon says that Harlem and East Harlem and
the whole damn Bronx is his to do with as he pleases. Is this not still so?"

O'Hanlon smoothed an imaginary wrinkle off the
front of his double-breasted suit, which he wore tightly
buttoned up. "That's what we're here to discuss," he
said, his voice cool. "The two unfortunate lads who
expired on your premises were blood relatives, cousins
of some sort, I believe, of Mr. Salucci here, freshly
arrived in this fair land of ours and sent north across a Hundred and Tenth Street by their distinguished relation in order to bring a certain business proposition to you. Mr. Salucci is very distressed to think of the discourtesy with which you greeted them, and by your
impatience in not giving them a fair hearing."

"The next time he has a business proposition for me,
maybe he sends his boys unarmed, as always." Solly
busied himself with cutting and lighting a cigar. "Then
they get a fair hearing instead of ending up in a box."

O'Hanlon looked distressed. "The inexperience of
poor immigrant foreigners," he said, "often has regrettable consequences." He looked around the room. "As
no doubt all of us in this room, with the possible excep
tion of Mr. Baline, can attest These lads were armed for the simple reason that their own sad homeland of Sicily suffers from such a deplorable lack of law en
forcement that honest citizens must perforce defend
themselves."

The Irish mob boss crossed his legs and sat back in
his chair. "But that is water past the Spuyten Duyvil
now," he said. "The real reason for our visit is to put
the memory of this unfortunate incident behind us. We cannot let even such a tragedy as this interfere with the
larger purpose for which we have come here today."

O'Hanlon rose and faced Solly like a priest about to
pronounce a benediction. "Lorenzo?" he invited, levi
tating his dainty hands. "Solomon?"

Salucci rose sullenly and faced Solly across O'Hanl
on's surprisingly wide shoulders. "Please accept my
most humble apologies for this sad misunderstanding,"
said the Italian in a dull monotone.

Solomon just looked at him. "This he calls an apology?" he said, immobile.

"Lorenzo's command of English leaves much to be desired, graciousness-wise," O'Hanlon remarked affa
bly. "To translate, what he means is that it will not
happen again, and you have my word on that."

Solly got slowly to his feet, eyeing Salucci warily.

"Solomon, you and I go back a long way," O'Han
lon reminded him. "I am asking you as a friend to do
this thing for me now." He stepped back briskly, like
a matador, as the two men came together, threw their arms around each other, and kissed each other on the
cheeks.

"That is the end to it, then," said O'Hanlon, satisfied, as they parted. Solly's face, Rick noticed, was
flushed, Salucci's sallow. Everyone sat down again,
except Rick, who had not budged.

"It seems to me such friendship should be celebrated
with a suitable toast," said O'Hanlon. "Will the host please do the honors?"

Solly reached into the lower right-hand drawer of his
desk. It was the same drawer, Rick knew, where he
usually kept a small .22. He wondered if O'Hanlon
knew that and decided he probably did. There didn't
seem to be much that O'Hanlon didn't know.

Solly came up with a bottle of whiskey and three
glasses. He poured small golden shots into each of
them, kept one for himself, and handed the others to
Salucci and O'Hanlon. "A day like this demands the best."

"To friendship," offered O'Hanlon, and everybody
drank. Then Solly rose.

"Today is a very special day," he said. "On two
more counts. So I drink now a toast to my friend Yitzik Baline—the finest of my club managers, the straightest
shot among my boys, and the man I love like a son. If
God forbid anything should ever happen to me, he is
my whattyacallit, my heir apparent." Nobody snickered at the aspirated "h," Russian style. "Everything I have shall be
his.
L'chaim!"

Everybody sipped politely. Tick-Tock frowned.

"Everything but one thing," continued Solly. "And
now, Ricky, you should forgive me, another toast, this
one even more important." Solomon's face, Rick no
ticed, had taken on an uncharacteristically serious
mien.

"To my daughter, my only daughter, Lois," he
began, and Rick felt his heart stop. "Who today I
proudly announce is betrothed to a very important man
in this city of ours."

Solly looked proud. Abie and Tick-Tock looked puz
zled. O'Hanlon looked satisfied. Salucci looked mean. Weinberg just looked.

"Yes, and to none other than Robert Haas Meredith.
Three months he has been courting her like a true gentleman, and now we got payoff. Always a bridesmaid
and finally a mother!"

Rick clenched his jaw so tightly, he would have bit
ten off his tongue had it gotten caught in the mandibles.

"Solomon," exclaimed O'Hanlon, rubbing his hands together. "Sure, and I couldn't be more delighted. This
happy event well and truly cements this peace treaty of
ours, for haven't Mr. Meredith and I conducted some
small business together most profitably in the past and
look forward to doing so in the future? 'Tis truly a
splendid day for all."

O'Hanlon and Solly were laughing now, best of
friends. What was it the Irishman had said to him at
Rector's about warring kingdoms? Now Rick under
stood.

A month later Lois Horowitz and Robert Meredith
were married. The newspapers described the bride as
Lois Harrow, the daughter of a successful property
man from Darien. The ceremony at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church on Fifth Avenue was small and very pri
vate, and the few members of the public who happened
to stumble upon it were ushered out by a phalanx of
extremely large men in tight-fitting, bulging suits.

A teary-eyed Solomon Horowitz gave away the
bride. Dion O'Hanlon was the best man. Rick Baline
sat in a church for the first time in his life. Even he had
to admit they made a handsome couple. He wondered
if their lives would prove to be as uncomplicated as
their looks.

When she emerged from the church, Lois threw her
arms around Rick's neck. "Isn't it swell, Ricky?" she
breathed. "I'm going places now!" Over her shoulder
he could see Meredith shaking hands with his new father-in-law. "We can still be friends, can't we?" Lois
said as he trained his ears on the other conversation.

"Mr. Horowitz," Meredith was saying, "it is a pleasure doing business with you."

He didn't see Lois again for three years.