A Piece of the Action

“I know you love your father, Kate, but you have to admit he has his faults.” He waited for her to nod in agreement. “And one of his faults is he thinks of you as a medal he’s giving out. If I want the medal, I have to earn it. Which basically means obeying him, even if what he wants has nothing to do with your welfare.”

“Daddy’s just being protective. The way fathers are supposed to.”

“But where does that leave me? I’m not a dog on the end of his leash. I have to live my own life. And after we get married, your life and mine are gonna be one and the same. The point I’m making is that sooner or later your old man has to let go.”

What he wanted to do was bury his lips in her throat, to run the tips of his fingers over her body, to join their flesh until neither of them could tell where one body left off and the other began. But he didn’t do any of that. It was the wrong time and the wrong place and he knew it.

“I suppose he does,” Kate said, “but I think it’ll come naturally. After we’re married. Daddy respects marriage.”

“Yeah, well, I hope so. But there’s something else we have to get straight and that’s where we’re gonna live.” The issue had been bothering him ever since he’d realized they were going to have to survive on his salary. If they saved their pennies, they might someday be able to afford a home of their own, but that was going to be in the future. Way in the future. “Because the thing of it is that I’ve already got a two-bedroom rent-controlled apartment right now. For which I’m paying eighty dollars a month.”

“But the neighborhood, Stanley. It’s falling apart.”

“Look, I know the Lower East Side isn’t much. It never was. But half a million people live there and they mostly get along. What I want you to do is come to see me tomorrow. It’s Sunday so you oughta be able to get away. Let me take you around, show you what the neighborhood’s really like. If you still think you can’t live there, we’ll find some other place. But at least come and take a look.”

Sixteen

January 19

The thing about Jake Leibowitz, Jake Leibowitz thought, is he never kids himself. He faces up to the crap reality throws at him is what he does. He deals with the bullshit.

When Santo Silesi brought him the word that O’Neill and his bitch had to go, Jake’d seen it as a routine piece of business, as the price you pay for your mistakes. That routine had changed dramatically when he, Izzy and young Santo found 800 Pitt Street deserted. Jake had figured it out right away. The O’Neills were a link between Steppy Accacio and the electric chair: O’Neill to Jake to Faci to Accacio. That’s how it went. Take the O’Neills out and the chain breaks.

But with O’Neill and his old lady most likely talking to the cops, the only sensible thing for Steppy Accacio to do was move up to the next link. Which happened to be Jake Leibowitz. Jake and his buddy, Izzy Stein.

Well, Jake Leibowitz wasn’t going to run. Not from Accacio and not from the cops. And he wasn’t going to panic, either. He’d waited too long to get his piece of the action. What he’d do is watch his back at all times. Watch his back and wait for Santo Silesi to make a move.

“Yoo-hoo, Jakey, are you decent?”

Jake, staring at his reflection in the mirror, rolled his eyes. “Yeah, ma, c’mon in.”

Sarah Leibowitz pranced into the room, her rotund body encased in the rattiest fur coat Jake had ever seen. “You like?” she asked, spinning around to give him the big view.

“Great, ma. What kind of fur is it?”

She threw him her darkest look. “A hundred percent fox. If you knew from fur, you wouldn’t ask.”

“That’s what I was gonna say. Only I didn’t wanna look bad in case it was mink.”

Ma Leibowitz sniffed. “So why are you dressed so fancy-pancy? You getting married?”

“I gotta go out, ma.”

He looked back at the mirror, at his beautiful gray suit. The suit he’d almost fought the salesman at Leighton’s to get. “Continental,” the salesman had insisted. “Continental is the fashion now.” Then he’d brought out a three-button jacket and a pair of trousers with a little buckle in the back. “I’d rather wear a fucking dress,” Jake had said. “What I want is double-breasted and no bullshit about it.” The suit he ended up buying was a compromise because even though it was double-breasted, it only had one button. Way at the bottom.

“This is crap,” he’d told the salesman, but then he’d tried on the jacket, looked in the mirror and known right away. The damn thing draped his chest like a Roman toga. He looked like he’d just stepped off the cover of Esquire. “Do the cuffs. I’ll pick out some shirts while I’m waitin’.”

Now, he never wanted to take the suit off. Even though his business this morning was routine. He was supposed to meet Santo Silesi in the projects on Houston Street and hand over the day’s supply of heroin. Dope was a seven-day-a-week business. Miss a day, even a Sunday, and your customers went somewhere else. Later, after Santo had his pockets full, Jake and Izzy were going to meet down at Katz’s Delicatessen for some breakfast and a strategy session. The strategy wasn’t hard to figure: locate O’Neill before it’s too late. Find him or get ready to fight. Jake wanted to know if Izzy had come to the same conclusion. Especially about the fighting part of it.

Jake took his.45 from under the pillow and shoved it into his belt.

“What’s with the gun?” Sarah Leibowitz asked.

“You want fox, mind your own business.”

“For me he has no respect,” Sarah moaned. “For me …”

“Cut the crap, ma. I ain’t got the patience for it.”

“Huh,” she sniffed. “You could at least straighten your tie.”

He did straighten his tie. Then he left the bedroom. “I’ll be back when I’m back,” he said, shrugging into his black overcoat. “Don’t wait up.”

It was cold outside, cold and windy, as usual. Jake held his hat with one hand as he walked along Avenue D It was like being in Kansas, in Leavenworth, Kansas, where the wind came across the prairie like a bullwhip in the hand of a sadistic hack. The only good thing about this winter of 1958 was that Santo Silesi had to spend hours every day standing in it.

“I’ll bet the little prick has a face the color of Santa Claus’s costume,” Jake said to himself as he hurried along. “I’ll bet his face is so raw he screams when he shaves.”

When he finally located Silesi in a park near the river, Jake’s first thought was, “Good, he’s got customers.” But as he moved a little closer, Jake realized that something was very wrong. Silesi was surrounded by five Puerto Rican kids wearing identical baseball jackets. Jake could see young Santo’s head swiveling as he tried to watch everyone at the same time. What it was, what it had to be, was a rip-off. Pure and simple.

Jake pulled the.45 and laid it alongside his coat. Santo and the five kids were standing just off the path and Jake waited until he was abreast of the group, then turned, stepped forward and smashed the.45 into the nearest kid’s head. The kid dropped without so much as a groan.

“Who’s talkin’ here?” Jake asked, looking from one kid to another. “Who’s the big shot?” He paused, allowing the barrel of the Colt to swing in a slow half-circle. “What’s the matter? Nobody got nothin’ to say? You a bunch of patos? You a bunch of faggots?”

Their eyes were riveted to the.45. They couldn’t even think of anything else.

“Somebody better wake the fuck up,” Jake said. “Because I ain’t gonna slap the next one.” He drew the hammer back.

“I am the president,” a tall, slim kid announced.

“That’s funny,” Jake said, pointing the.45 at the center of the kid’s chest, “you don’t look a bit like Dwight David Eisenhower. Not with all that greasy hair. Ike’s bald.”