Short Stories: Five Decades (4 page)

Borough of Cemeteries

D
uring the cocktail hour, in Brownsville, the cab drivers gather in Lammanawitz’s Bar and Grill and drink beer and talk about the world and watch the sun set slowly over the elevated tracks in the direction of Prospect Park.

“Mungo?” they say. “Mungo? He got a fish for a arm. A mackerel. He will pitch Brooklyn right into the first division of the International League.”

“I saw the Mayor today. His Honor, himself. The Little Flower. What this country needs …”

“Pinky, I want that you should trust me for a glass of beer.”

Pinky wiped the wet dull expanse of the bar. “Look, Elias. It is against the law of the State of New York,” he said, nervously, “to sell intoxicating liquors on credit.”

“One glass of beer. Intoxicatin’!” Elias’s lips curled. “Who yuh think I am, Snow White?”

“Do you want me to lose my license?” Pinky asked plaintively.

“I stay up nights worryin’ Pinky might lose his license. My wife hears me cryin’ in my sleep,” Elias said. “One beer, J. P. Morgan.”

Regretfully, Pinky drew the beer, with a big head, and sighed as he marked it down in the book. “The last one,” he said, “positively the last one. As God is my witness.”

“Yeah,” Elias said. “Keep yer mouth closed.” He drank the beer in one gulp, with his eyes shut. “My God,” he said quietly, his eyes still shut, as he put the glass down. “Fer a lousy dime,” he said to the room in general, “yuh get somethin’ like that! Fer a lousy dime! Brooklyn is a wonderful place.”

“Brooklyn stinks,” said another driver, down the bar. “The borough of cemeteries. This is a first class place for graveyards.”

“My friend Palangio,” Elias said. “Il Doochay Palangio. Yuh don’t like Brooklyn, go back to Italy. They give yuh a gun, yuh get shot in the behind in Africa.” The rest of the drivers laughed and Elias grinned at his own wit. “I seen in the movies. Go back t’ Italy, wit’ the fat girls. Who’ll buy me a beer?”

Complete silence fell over the bar, like taps over an army camp.

“My friends,” Elias said bitterly.

“Brooklyn is a wonderful place,” Palangio said.

“All day long,” Elias said, reflectively rubbing his broken nose, “I push a hack. Eleven hours on the street. I now have the sum of three dollars and fifty cents in my pocket.”

Pinky came right over. “Now, Elias,” he said, “there is the small matter of one beer. If I’d knew you had the money …”

Elias impatiently brushed Pinky’s hand off the bar. “There is somebody callin’ for a beer down there, Pinky,” he said. “Attend yer business.”

“I think,” Pinky grumbled, retreating, “that a man oughta pay his rightful debts.”

“He thinks. Pinky thinks,” Elias announced. But his heart was not with Pinky. He turned his back to the bar and leaned on his frayed elbows and looked sadly up at the tin ceiling. “Three dollars and fifty cents,” he said softly. “An’ I can’t buy a beer.”

“Whatsamatta?” Palangio asked. “Yuh got a lock on yuh pocket?”

“Two dollars an’ seventy-fi’ cents to the Company,” Elias said. “An’ seventy-fi’ cents to my lousy wife so she don’t make me sleep in the park. The lousy Company. Every day for a year I give ’em two dollars an’ seventy-fi’ cents an’ then I own the hack. After a year yuh might as well sell that crate to Japan to put in bombs. Th’ only way yuh can get it to move is t’ drop it. I signed a contract. I need a nurse. Who wants t’ buy me a beer?”

“I signed th’ same contract,” Palangio said. A look of pain came over his dark face. “It got seven months more to go. Nobody shoulda learned me how to write my name.”

“If you slobs would only join th’ union,” said a little Irishman across from the beer spigots.

“Geary,” Elias said. “The Irish hero. Tell us how you fought th’ English in th’ battle of Belfast.”

“O.K., O.K.,” Geary said, pushing his cap back excitably from his red hair. “You guys wanna push a hack sixteen hours a day for beans, don’ let me stop yuh.”

“Join a union, get yer hair parted down the middle by the cops,” Elias said. “That is my experience.”

“O.K., boys.” Geary pushed his beer a little to make it foam. “Property-owners. Can’t pay for a glass a beer at five o’clock in th’ afternoon. What’s the use a’ talkin’ t’ yuh? Lemme have a beer, Pinky.”

“Geary, you’re a red,” Elias said. “A red bastidd.”

“A Communist,” Palangio said.

“I want a beer,” Geary said loudly.

“Times’re bad,” Elias said. “That’s what’s th’ trouble.”

“Sure.” Geary drained half his new glass. “Sure.”

“Back in 1928,” Elias said, “I averaged sixty bucks a week.”

“On New Year’s Eve, 1927,” Palangio murmured, “I made thirty-six dollars and forty cents.”

“Money was flowin’,” Elias remembered.

Palangio sighed, rubbing his beard bristles with the back of his hand. “I wore silk shirts. With stripes. They cost five bucks a piece. I had four girls in 1928. My God!”

“This ain’t 1928,” Geary said.

“Th’ smart guy,” Elias said. “He’s tellin’ us somethin’. This ain’t 1928, he says. Join th’ union, we get 1928 back.”

“Why the hell should I waste my time?” Geary asked himself in disgust. He drank in silence.

“Pinky!” Palangio called. “Pinky! Two beers for me and my friend Elias.”

Elias moved, with a wide smile, up the bar, next to Palangio. “We are brothers in misery, Angelo,” he said. “Me and th’ Wop. We both signed th’ contract.”

They drank together and sighed together.

“I had th’ biggest pigeon flight in Brownsville,” Elias said softly. “One hundred and twelve pairs of pedigreed pigeons. I’d send ’em up like fireworks, every afternoon. You oughta’ve seen ’em wheelin’ aroun’ an’ aroun’ over th’ roofs. I’m a pigeon fancier.” He finished his glass. “I got fifteen pigeons left. Every time I bring home less than seventy-five cents, my wife cooks one for supper. A pedigreed pigeon. My lousy wife.”

“Two beers,” Palangio said. He and Elias drank with grave satisfaction.

“Now,” Elias said, “if only I didn’t have to go home to my lousy wife. I married her in 1929. A lot of things’ve changed since 1929.” He sighed. “What’s a woman?” he asked. “A woman is a trap.”

“You shoulda seen what I seen today,” Palangio said. “My third fare. On Eastern Parkway. I watched her walk all th’ way acrost Nostrand Avenue, while I was waitin’ on the light. A hundred-and-thirty-pound girl. Blonde. Swingin’ her hips like orchester music. With one of those little straw hats on top of her head, with the vegetables on it. You never saw nothin’ like it. I held onto the wheel like I was drownin’. Talkin’ about traps! She went to the St. George Hotel.”

Elias shook his head. “The tragedy of my life,” he said, “is I was married young.”

“Two beers,” Palangio said.

“Angelo Palangio,” Elias said, “yer name reminds me of music.”

“A guy met her in front of the St. George. A big fat guy. Smilin’ like he just seen Santa Claus. A big fat guy. Some guys …”

“Some guys …” Elias mourned. “
I
gotta go home to Annie. She yells at me from six to twelve, regular. Who’s goin’ to pay the grocer? Who’s goin’ to pay the gas company?” He looked steadily at his beer for a moment and downed it. “I’m a man who married at the age a’ eighteen.”

“We need somethin’ to drink,” Palangio said.

“Buy us two whiskies,” Elias said. “What the hell good is beer?”

“Two Calverts,” Palangio called. “The best for me and my friend Elias Pinsker.”

“Two gentlemen,” Elias said, “who both signed th’ contract.”

“Two dumb slobs,” said Geary.

“Th’ union man,” Elias lifted his glass. “To th’ union!” He downed the whisky straight. “Th’ hero of th’ Irish Army.”

“Pinky,” Palangio shouted. “Fill ’em up to the top.”

“Angelo Palangio,” Elias murmured gratefully.

Palangio soberly counted the money out for the drinks. “Now,” he said, “the Company can jump in Flushing Bay. I am down to two bucks even.”

“Nice,” Geary said sarcastically. “Smart. You don’t pay ’em one day, they take yer cab. After payin’ them regular for five months. Buy another drink.”

Palangio slowly picked up his glass and let the whisky slide down his throat in a smooth amber stream. “Don’t talk like that, Geary,” he said. “I don’t want to hear nothin’ about taxicabs. I am busy drinkin’ with friends.”

“You dumb Wop,” Geary said.

“That is no way to talk,” Elias said, going over to Geary purposefully. He cocked his right hand and squinted at Geary. Geary backed off, his hands up. “I don’t like to hear people call my friend a dumb Wop,” Elias said.

“Get back,” Geary shouted, “before I brain yuh.”

Pinky ran up excitably. “Lissen, boys,” he screamed, “do you want I should lose my license?”

“We are all friends,” Palangio said. “Shake hands. Everybody shake hands. Everybody have a drink. I hereby treat everybody to a drink.”

Elias lumbered back to Palangio’s side. “I am sorry if I made a commotion. Some people can’t talk like gentlemen.”

“Everybody have a drink,” Palangio insisted.

Elias took out three dollar bills and laid them deliberately on the bar. “Pass the bottle around. This is on Elias Pinsker.”

“Put yer money away, Elias.” Geary pushed his cap around on his head with anger. “Who yuh think yuh are? Walter Chrysler?”

“The entertainment this afternoon is on me,” Elias said inexorably. “There was a time I would stand drinks for twenty-five men. With a laugh, an’ pass cigars out after it. Pass the bottle around, Pinky!”

The whisky flowed.

“Elias and me,” Palangio said. “We are high class spenders.”

“You guys oughta be fed by hand,” Geary said. “Wards of the guvment.”

“A man is entitled to some relaxation,” Elias said. “Where’s that bottle?”

“This is nice,” Palangio said. “This is very nice.”

“This is like the good old days,” Elias said.

“I hate to go home.” Palangio sighed. “I ain’t even got a radio home.”

“Pinky!” Elias called. “Turn on the radio for Angelo Palangio.”

“One room,” Palangio said. “As big as a toilet. That is where I live.”

The radio played. It was soft and sweet and a rich male voice sang “I Married an Angel.”

“When I get home,” Elias remembered, “Annie will kill a pedigreed pigeon for supper. My lousy wife. An’ after supper I push the hack five more hours and I go home and Annie yells some more and I get up tomorrow and push the hack some more.” He poured himself another drink. “That is a life for a dog,” he said. “For a Airedale.”

“In Italy,” Palangio said, “they got donkeys don’t work as hard as us.”

“If the donkeys were as bad off as you,” Geary yelled, “they’d have sense enough to organize.”

“I want to be a executive at a desk.” Elias leaned both elbows on the bar and held his chin in his huge gnarled hands. “A long distance away from Brownsville. Wit’ two thousand pigeons. In California. An’ I should be a bachelor. Geary, can yuh organize
that?
Hey, Geary?”

“You’re a workin’ man,” Geary said, “an’ you’re goin’ to be a workin’ man all yer life.”

“Geary,” Elias said. “You red bastidd, Geary.”

“All my life,” Palangio wept, “I am goin’ to push a hack up an’ down Brooklyn, fifteen, sixteen hours a day an’ pay th’ Company forever an’ go home and sleep in a room no bigger’n a toilet. Without a radio. Jesus!”

“We are victims of circumstance,” Elias said.

“All my life,” Palangio cried, “tied to that crate!”

Elias pounded the bar once with his fist. “Th’ hell with it! Palangio!” he said. “Get into that goddamn wagon of yours.”

“What do yuh want me to do?” Palangio asked in wonder.

“We’ll fix ’em,” Elias shouted. “We’ll fix those hacks. We’ll fix that Company! Get into yer cab, Angelo. I’ll drive mine, we’ll have a chicken fight.”

“You drunken slobs!” Geary yelled. “Yuh can’t do that!”

“Yeah,” Palangio said eagerly, thinking it over. “Yeah. We’ll show ’em. Two dollars and seventy-fi’ cents a day for life. Yeah. We’ll fix ’em. Come on, Elias!”

Elias and Palangio walked gravely out to their cars. Everybody else followed them.

“Look what they’re doin’!” Geary screamed. “Not a brain between the both of them! What good’ll it do to ruin the cabs?”

“Shut up,” Elias said, getting into his cab. “We oughta done this five months ago. Hey, Angelo,” he called, leaning out of his cab. “Are yuh ready? Hey, Il Doochay!”

“Contact!” Angelo shouted, starting his motor. “Boom! Boom!”

The two cars spurted at each other, in second, head-on. As they hit, glass broke and a fender flew off and the cars skidded wildly and the metal noise echoed and re-echoed like artillery fire off the buildings.

Elias stuck his head out of his cab. “Are yuh hurt?” he called. “Hey, Il Doochay!”

“Contact!” Palangio called from behind his broken windshield. “The Dawn Patrol!”

“I can’t watch this,” Geary moaned. “Two workin’ men.” He went back into Lammanawitz’s Bar and Grill.

The two cabs slammed together again and people came running from all directions.

“How’re yuh?” Elias asked, wiping the blood off his face.

“Onward!” Palangio stuck his hand out in salute. “Sons of Italy!”

Again and again the cabs tore into each other.

“Knights of the Round Table,” Palangio announced.

“Knights of Lammanawitz’s Round Table,” Elias agreed, pulling at the choke to get the wheezing motor to turn over once more.

For the last time they came together. Both cars flew off the ground at the impact and Elias’s toppled on its side and slid with a harsh grating noise to the curb. One of the front wheels from Palangio’s cab rolled calmly and decisively toward Pitkin Avenue. Elias crawled out of his cab before anyone could reach him. He stood up, swaying, covered with blood, pulling at loose ends of his torn sweater. He shook hands soberly with Palangio and looked around him with satisfaction at the torn fenders and broken glass and scattered headlights and twisted steel. “Th’ lousy Company,” he said. “That does it. I am now goin’ to inform ’em of th’ accident.”

He and Palangio entered the Bar and Grill, followed by a hundred men, women, and children. Elias dialed the number deliberately.

“Hullo,” he said, “hullo, Charlie? Lissen, Charlie, if yuh send a wreckin’ car down to Lammanawitz’s Bar and Grill, yuh will find two of yer automobiles. Yuh lousy Charlie.” He hung up carefully.