Funny Boys (10 page)

“Garlic? That lard ass wife a his wouldn’t let him dip the wick
in a pickle barrel without her permission.” Irish winked. “If ya sweet on Gloria, cost you five oh and that’s only for an hour.”

“Sounds like you were there, Irish.”

Irish winked and hitched up his pants again.

“I been evywhere.”

The general routine of the tumler was the same in all of the hotels in the Catskills. An essential part of a tumler’s job was to know the guest list in advance so that those designated VIPs were given the kind of treatment accorded to their rank.

Irish was particularly helpful on that score, and on that Friday when the guests began to check in for Decoration Day weekend, Irish ran a bragging commentary on the guests, their wives and girlfriends. He assumed, of course, that Mickey knew them as well and that this display of his knowledge was merely to impress Mickey.

“There’s Charlie Workman and Allie Tannebaum and Plug Shulman, and Bugsy Goldstein and Kid Twist Reles and Pretty Levine and Gangy Cohen and Jack Drucker and Irv Ashkenaz. Thems da important ones. I know da dames, too.”

The names went on and on. Mickey had difficulty remembering, especially the women who, for the most part, were nondescript, especially the wives. There were exceptions, though, flashier types, who Irish usually designated as girl friends under the general heading of coorvas. Occasionally Mickey would interject an “I know” merely to validate his own pretended knowledge, but Irish was an encyclopedia, too concentrated, focused and excited by seeing these “celebrities” file into Gorlick’s Greenhouse.

“Pep ain’t come yet,” Irish said, his eyes darting over the crowd. “Pep’s my Rabbi.”

Mickey shrugged and said nothing.

“He be here. He tole me. Usually stashes a coorva heah for da summer. He’s got ’em evywhere. Dat Pep’s a card. He, Bugsy Goldstein and Kid Twist are da top a da heap.”

“So I hear,” Mickey said, remembering Pep’s brutality. His stomach knotted at the memory.

Gorlick and his fat wife stood by the desk dressed to the nines, hugging and kissing each guest and ordering the help to take the baggage to the guests’ designated rooms. It was a madhouse, noisy and confused, looking more like a staging area for refugees than the lobby of a Catskill hotel.

Considering the reputation of these men for killing and general mayhem, Mickey was surprised by their ordinariness. Collectively, they had the look of a very nondescript tribe, resembling working men and women, more like mechanics and waiters and store clerks on a family outing than the kind of gangsters portrayed in the movies.

The hotel became more frenetic and hectic as the day wore on. Kids began to run wildly through the lobby. Many of the men embraced in the abrazo fashion and peeled off into smaller groups, happy in one another’s company, leaving the details of the check-in to the women.

Then Mickey spotted the other man who had brutalized him and his father in the store and who he had seen again with that Pep monster in the corridor outside of Gorlick’s suite at the Park Central. Mickey moved slightly, trying to make Irish a buffer between him and Reles’s field of vision.

“There’s Reles,” Irish said, poking Mickey in the ribs. “That Kid Twist is one tough bastard.”

“A bastard, that’s for sure,” Mickey said. It was a mistake. Irish shot him a suspicious glance.

“Ain’t ya gonna say hello?” Irish said with a touch of sarcasm. “Ya said ya knowed him.”

“Maybe he should get set first,” Mickey said.

“Ya said ya knowed him good,” Irish pressed. He put his arm on Mickey’s back and pushed him forward. “Anyway you’re the tumler. Go tumel him.”

“Bad to tumel them when they come right off the road,” Mickey told him, trying to be reasonable. “They’re too edgy. They don’t want to be kibbitzed around with.”

“Ya shittin me, tumler?”

“Get off my back, Irish.”

“Now I get it. Ya full of it. Ya been braggin. Ya don know any of dese guys. Right? Ya been shittin me.”

“Go screw yourself, Irish.”

“Ya said you knowed ’em good.” Irish squeezed Mickey’s upper arm. It hurt but Mickey would not give him the satisfaction of knowing this. Then Irish hitched up his pants with his elbows.

“Tell you what, tumler. I’m gonna need like two bucks a week from you for …” Irish scratched his head “… special services. Yeah, that’s rich. Special services. A good deal, too. Hell, I give ya back the for. Ain’t I generous, tumler?”

It wouldn’t end there, Mickey thought. Irish would find ways of abusing him all summer. It was a direct, unabashed challenge. The man had no conscience and, as he had seen with Marsha, could be cruel and quite ruthless.

“You’re a card,” Mickey said. “A real jack off.”

“I ain’t laughin. Ya been trowin me da bullshit, tumler,” Irish said. “We got ways to take care a bullshitters.” Red blotches had erupted on his face. Mickey looked over at Reles.

He was dressed in a brown suit, which looked like the same suit he had worn at the Park Central, scuffed brown shoes
and a hat pulled low over his eyes. He wore a shirt buttoned at the collar but with no tie and he needed a shave. He was talking animatedly to his wife who was holding the hand of a small dirty-faced boy.

Despite the domestic scene, the man was as he remembered on that night, eyes glowing agates of hate and the sausage-squat body a container of meanness and cruelty.

“Dey don like punks usin dere name in vain,” Irish said.

Mickey calculated the odds carefully. Chances were that Reles might not even remember him. Besides, he would be out of Irish’s earshot.

“You want me to put in a good word for you, Irish?” Mickey said, trying to build up some measure of the old arrogance.

“Yeah. You an La Guardia.” Irish punched a finger in Mickey’s chest. “Dis summer tumler, ya watch yaw ass, cause Irish is gonna be on it.”

Irish’s words triggered the action. Mickey turned and strode over to Reles. Suspend all fear, he begged himself, but they were hollow words.

“Hi, Mr. Reles. I’m Mickey Fine, the social director.”

“Whadayaknow. The new tumler,” Reles grunted, eyeing him with laser intensity. Mickey thought he saw a level of indifference and he was relieved. So far, so good, he thought, forcing himself not to look back at Irish, although he felt the man staring at his back. “Meet the wife and Heshy.”

Mickey forced a smile and gave the boy a kitcheykoo.

“We’re gonna have fun this summer, Hesh,” Mickey said to the boy, who looked back at him with the same cold, menacing eyes as his father. “Chip off the old block,” Mickey said, forcing his cheerfulness.

“You gonna make it fun ain’t ya, Mick?” Reles said.

“I’m here to make your stay a bowl of cherries,” Mickey said, watching Irish from the corner of his eye. He looked worried, less swagger in his posture.

“Ain’t that the pits,” Reles said, followed by a burst of guttural laughter.

“Maybe you should be the tumler,” Mickey said with good-natured aplomb.

“I tumel on my own turf, right, Helen?”

“My Abie’s a scream,” the woman said. She was squat, over-stuffed, with dyed red hair.

“I got anudder one faw him,” Reles said, looking at Helen. “You know da one.” He tapped an ear.

“Oh no, not that one.”

“Why do farts thmell?” Reles asked.

Mickey threw up his arms. “Ya got me,” he said.

Reles bent over and talked directly into Mickey’s ear.

“Tho deaf people can enjoy them, too.”

Mickey doubled up in faked laughter. He looked at Irish peripherally and gave him a chilly look. Irish seemed further deflated. Still bent over Mickey shot him an Italian “fuck you” gesture, hand slapped over biceps.

At that point, the bellhop came with his cart and began to load up the Releses’ luggage.

“Make sure these people have rooms with adjoining towels,” Mickey said. He put a hand at the side of his mouth and addressed Reles. “There’s a couple of good rooms in this joint. On a clear day you can even see the dresser.”

Both Helen and Abie Reles laughed, then Mrs. Reles and the boy went off with the bellhop while Reles lingered behind. He bent over and whispered in Mickey’s ear.

“You ain’t sore about da udder time, are ya, Mick?”

Mickey felt a sour, cold backwash deep inside of him. He looked toward Irish who seemed forlorn and totally defused. At least he had settled that score.

“Neva feget a face,” Reles said.

“Business is business, Mr. Reles,” Mickey said.

“Pep’s toilet drink diden hurt ya,” Reles said patting Mickey on the back. “Ya look a million.”

“I kept my promise, remember,” Mickey said, trying to keep his knees from trembling. “Next day cash on the barrelhead.”

“Yaw a good kid, Mickey. I don feget nothin like dat.” He bent over and whispered. “Ya take care a Helen and Hesh this summer. Take care good and I take care a ya.”

He put his arm around Mickey and squeezed his shoulder. Notwithstanding the ugly memory of that night in his father’s store, Mickey felt good, somehow vindicated. Stiffening his posture, he strode back to Irish and moved his face close enough to see his pores.

“You ever pull that shit on me again, Irish, I tell them that Mr. Shmekel Irish got too big a mouth. You fashstay?”

Irish flushed a deep reddish purple and his lips trembled.

“I was only kiddin aroun, tumler. Fact is I only been on one job and I nevah seed nothin.”

“Think I don’t know that, asshole?”

Irish fished in his pocket and brought out the four dollars he had taken from Mickey. Grabbing Mickey’s arm, he lifted it and tried to put the four dollars into his hand. Mickey pushed him away.

“Call it a loan, Irish,” Mickey said. “Five for four. You pay a deuce a week all summer then pay me back the rest on the last day.”

“Come on, Mick,” Irish pleaded, forcing a smile, showing large red gums. “That’s even above shylock rates.”

“You got it, Irish,” Mickey said, returning Irish’s smile and putting his arm around his shoulders. “Penalty charges. You and me, Irish. We’re business associates now. Aren’t we?”

“Sure, Mick, anyting you say,” Irish nodded, shrugging his acceptance.

“Get out of line and I’ll tell the boys that they got a canary loose outside the cage.” Mickey chuckled menacingly.

Not bad, he thought. He was getting the hang of the environment.

“I
T’S LIKE A BEAUTIFUL DREAM
,” M
UTZIE THOUGHT, AS SHE
looked out of the window at the wide expanse of green lawn that slanted gently to the lake. She could see children flashing down the slide, hitting the water and stirring up a splash that in the sunlight looked like crystal bubbles bursting out of the slate gray lake.

Their mothers sat lounging on chairs or playing cards under gaily striped umbrellas. Some of the older children swam in the cordoned off swimming area while a few tiny sailboats, like paper toys, skirted beyond the painted buoys, sails flapping in the light breeze.

She marveled at the way in which her life changed so dramatically. She had become a woman and won the heart of a powerful man who protected her and showed her a new and exciting world, a long way from the drab, colorless, boring life she had been leading.

“Just look at this gorgeous sight,” she whispered aloud. She had turned away from the window and looked into the full-length mirror at the new dress Pep had bought her. What men do, men do, she assured herself. They had their reasons. She concluded that Pep was like a soldier in an army that was at war, and in a war
sometimes people got hurt, or worse. Like in those war movies about the World War. If you thought of it that way, you knew you had to stop thinking about what happened on the battlefield and act more like the women who stayed at home.

She turned away from the mirror to look outside again. The beauty of the view soothed the nagging irritation of these dark thoughts. Of course, she had gotten good at pretending that she was walking around with blinders on, with ears stuffed with cotton and a mouth that uttered hardly anything except when she alone was with Pep.

So far, being Pep’s girl, his numba one as he called her, was like being a celebrity. People said, “That’s Pep’s girl” and looked at her with what she thought was awesome respect. Besides, if anyone, including his associates in the combination, did not show her respect, that person would have hell to pay. She was very careful not to be overly friendly with anyone and to keep to herself. Besides, she had the sensation that the women were keeping her under extra-special surveillance. Pep had a real jealous streak. Actually, she liked that. It made her feel really special, valuable, worth protecting. And he had taught her all those moves to show her gratitude.

She was, of course, true to her promise. She never again asked him what he did to make his living. She found that she could separate it in her mind. Not that she had to lie to herself. All she had to do was to imagine herself as a thoroughbred horse with blinders running around the track. Over and over again. Round and round. It was nice to be pampered, noticed, admired and showered with perks and presents.

As her father had said countless times, the world belongs to them that have the gelt and the objective was to get it and not be pushed around. Wasn’t that the real American dream? Wasn’t that
what being a go-getter meant? Hadn’t she been a go-getter by transforming herself to look like a Hollywood star?