Seventh Avenue (25 page)

Topo appeared puzzled; he removed his glasses and peered at Jay through icy gray fish slits. His straw squelched at the ice cubes in his glass, and he flicked his wrist to the waitress for another one.

“That’s not the whole story,” he said finally. “The work’s bein’ done strictly legit and very fast for a different reason. What we make here is peanuts. It’s the new locations that’s so important to
people.”

Jay had a sudden feeling of fear and revulsion.

“
I don’t get it. I’m not giving pieces of my business away.”

Topo blinked disbelievingly.

“Hey, you got the wrong enda the stick. We don’t want no dress stores. We got our own stores on the locations. Electrical, huh.”

“
You mean, Fredericks rented
you
stores?”

“Sure he did. It’s a shopping center, ain’t it? People gotta buy plugs, and radios and things, don’t they? We open up smart stores with all the latest things on the market. Strictly legit. Our joints are gonna give the public a service. We don’t want nothing from you . . . we just want you to know you got favors coming to yuh. Whenever you want to collect ‘em.”

“
I’m still in the dark.” Jay breathed a sigh of relief.

“Hey, Jaya baby. You’re a big boy now. We don’t care about no radios or batteries or crap like that. You got an electrical store. You got lots of aerials and mains and hook-ups, right? It’s for the wire service. This means we got places right near Jamaica, Aqueduct, and Belmont. And in Jersey we can cover Philly, from Passaic, which means Garden City, and Monmouth direct. In White Plains we get Terry Haute, Detroit and Chicago’s on a direct line. I got the clear from the
people
to tel yuh, because they got a very high opinion a yuh.”

“The wire service?” Jay rolled the phrase on his tongue. Everyone had heard of obscure big business gambling that was illegal in America. But no one knew who ran it, or what the profits were. Occasionally one read about a crusading district attorney who had a line on a gambling setup, but the story always drifted out of the papers in a day or two. Topo slid a long brown envelope across the table. His sweating hand had imprinted three fingers across its belly. He stared at it with rapt fascination and smiled.

“That’s the first time my prints’ve been on anything. Collector’s item. To show our appreciation, but has nothin’ to do with favors that we still owe, You’re a lucky guy to have
people
in your debt.”

The short-order cook emerged from the kitchen and sat at the counter, and the waitress served him an iced drink. They looked aimlessly at Topo and Jay sitting in the booth. It was hot, and they were bored, and they weren’t particularly curious about the young dark-haired man who opened the envelope.

Jay put the envelope on his lap out of sight when he noticed two people at the counter looking at him. He opened the flap and gasped when he saw a thousand-dollar bill sticking out of the corner. His head suddenly began to ache, and there were spots before his eyes. He saw Topo sitting in a cloud of gray smoke, the corners of his mouth spread out in a smile.

“
There’s ten of those in
the envelope.”

“
You must be crazy.”

“It’s a shock, huh? You deserve it, Jay. The setup’s worth millions.
People
have long memories, and if you ever get in a jam, you know where you got friends.” He got up abruptly and called to the waitress: “My friend’s paying for the coffees. It’s his treat. See yuh, Jay, and don’t forget.”

Eva had a particular dread of Thursday, for it had become the last night she and Jay could spend together. With religious promptness he would leave at eight every Friday morning for Lieberman’s farm to see his mother and Neal, and of course, Rhoda. Her week ended, therefore, every Thursday night, and she was left in a void, a universe with no center. When Jay came in later that evening, she barely turned her head. She could see that he was excited, but she could not shake off the depression that had set in early that morning. He kissed her with exuberance and clutched her in his arms.

“What makes you so happy? Glad to get rid of me? I’ll bet you’re getting sick to death of me.”

“
Eva, what’s wrong with you? What have I got but you?”

She gave him an abashed smile that conceded the point, but his mood, like the flick of a dial on the radio, had altered. When he was with her, he always had the sensation of walking on eggs. It exhausted him, but he was drawn to her, and he reflected with some detachment that the link between people who share joy is weaker and more transitory than between those who have lived through a tragedy. Herbie’s death had established a treacherous concatenation of emotional ties that imposed itself completely on their relationship. It had become for them both a form of bondage so that what they were, who they were, to each other was reduced to a variation of a single charade, its subject their roles in the death of a man who was unloved and now almost forgotten, save for the silent grief of a few thin-lipped relatives who had never been very close to him in life and who had only a nodding acquaintance with Eva. Responsibility is as much a quirk of memory as of action; to be responsible one has first to remember, and Jay and Eva remembered with clarity. They could no longer live with the quiet, the unspoken - now nothing could be left unsaid, for imagination might take over; human inventories were continually being made and adjusted so that nothing between them could reside in obscurity.

“
I’m gonna make you happy,” Jay said.

“
That’s nice.”

“
Everything’ll be changed . . .”

“
Isn’t it already?”

He paused in mid-sentence -

“Don’t get me sidetracked ‘cause that means one thing: too much to drink, going to bed and waking up with nightmares.”

“
You’ve got something to show for the nightmares.”

“Aw, Eva, give me a chance to tell you. I’ve made a deal with Harry.” In a breathless voice he outlined his plans to her, explained her role in the new hierarchy, and spent a few minutes eulogizing his one-man army. She was not quite overcome with delight at the suggestion, so he was forced to reveal what he had intended to conceal.

“Here,” he said, handing her a bill, “I want you to buy something for yourself and Lorna . . . something that you don’t really need.”

She looked at the bill with surprise and gasped when he showed her the rest of his bankroll.

“
Christ.”

“I did somebody a favor. The crazy thing was that I thought I was doing it for myself.”

“There’s a fortune there . . . You shouldn’t be carrying it around in cash.”

“I can’t put it in the bank either. Safety deposit, first thing tomorrow.”

“
Should I ask: how?”

“
Better if you didn’t.”

They had dinner at the Monte Carlo, and Jay felt deflated and drank too much. He had expected her to react differently to the news he brought her, the new opportunity, but she just sat sulkily picking at her steak as though it was unpalatable. The floor show was about to begin, and the waiter asked them if they wanted to order anything. Jay insisted on a bottle of scotch even though he knew he should not have any more. A group of men on a night out without their wives cackled when a dozen showgirls kicked up their heels to the can-can. They walked provocatively through the gauntlet of men and threw roses at them. One of the men got up and followed the girls. The bandleader escorted him off with a smile and a cry for audience applause for this “good sport.” Jay studied the man through a haze of smoke and bleary eyes. Eva looked at Jay critically, and he felt his irritation rise uncontrollably to the surface.

“Well, what
do
you want? Everything I give you . . . tell me what more?”

“Divorce Rhoda!”

“I’ve thought about it,” he lied, “but I can’t do it just like that.”

“Let her divorce you. She’s got grounds.”

“Grounds?” he said drunkenly. “What kinda grounds?”

“Adultery . . . the only kind they recognize in New York State.”

“What about the kid? Neal?” he said with a kind of desperation.

“They give visiting privileges.”

“Visiting privileges? He’s my kid . . . I love him. He’s a baby. It would be deserting him.”

Her face colored angrily, and she slammed the table with her fist, but no one in the club heard because the band was exploding through something loud and martial, and the girls were dressed in drum majorette costumes.

“What about my little girl? Jay, it can’t work this way . . .”

“Listen, I don’t want to argue. We’re supposed to be having a good time.”

“Jay, don’t you understand? I’ve given up everything for you . . . I can’t go on living in a hotel,” she said with tears streaming down her face. “I don’t want to spend my life as your personal piece of ass. Monday to Thursday.”

“I don’t like that kinda talk,” he said, pouring himself a huge drink.

“I’ve got to have something to hope for . . . a future.” She took out the thousand-dollar bill and crumpled it on the table. “Would you give me this if I was your wife? It’s conscience money. I’m grateful to you for the business chance . . . it’s what I always wanted. But there’s got to be more.”

“Can’t Lorna live with you?”

“That means my mother as well. No, it wouldn’t work.”

He stretched out to touch her, and she let him.

“Be honest with me. Have we got any future? Because if we haven’t, you’ve got to tell me now.”

“Sure we do. But I can’t get rid of Rhoda right now.”

“But will you? Ever?” she insisted.

“Yes, I will, but not now.”

A man came up behind them and slapped Jay on the back, right between the shoulder blades. He lurched forward, and Eva stared blankly. Her face was seamed with running make-up, and the man opened his mouth in astonishment when he caught sight of her.

“Oh, gee, sorry.”

Jay turned around angrily.

“Hey, I was right,” the man said. “It is Jay, or do my eyes deceive me?”

Jay glared at Howard, then gave Eva a furtive glance.

“I’m with that party of guys, and I thought I caught sight of you.”

Howard pulled up an empty chair and sat down heavily.

“My brother-in-law, Howard Gold,” Jay said in a reedy voice. “This is Eva Meyers.”

Howard looked from one to the other uneasily.

“Eva’s my designer,” Jay said.

“Oh, well. Glad to meet you.” He addressed Eva, as though Jay was in need of an interpreter. “Hard man to get in touch with . . . That’s what happens when you’re successful.” His eyes turned starry, and his manner was reverential towards Jay, “I’ve been trying to speak to you all week, but I guess you’re never any one place long enough to get messages.”

Jay poured Howard a long shot, and Howard’s gaze fixed itself on the bottle of scotch that he reckoned must have cost by his standards at least a week’s salary. He had never had anything stronger than beer in a nightclub: who could afford to? Howard held the glass with an emotion bordering on awe.

“That’s the thing we all admire about you, Jay. You know how to live. Everything first class . . . you want something, you go out and get it. Not many people can do what you’ve done.”

“Did you want something special?” Jay asked. Howard’s adulation bored him.

“Well, strictly speaking I hoped to speak to Rhoda, ‘cause it’s not your problem.”

“What’s it about?”

“Oh, I don’t want to break up your evening.”

“No, tell me.”

“It’s Myrna, see?”

“What about her?”

Howard paused and smiled meekly at Eva, who said she had to go to the ladies’ room to repair her makeup. When she had gone, Jay explained that Eva had been overwhelmed by the new job he had offered her and had cried.

“I really don’t know how to begin . . . it’s such a strange situation. Myrna’s always been a little peculiar. She was the artist of the family. Oh gee, Jay, I wish we saw you more often than we do. A while ago, around the time Neal was born - that was the last time we saw you - she came home one night and hasn’t left the house since. What with all the trouble you and Rhoda’ve had with Neal, no one wanted to tell you. Myrna just stays in her room and mopes around the house. Finally, last week, she put all the gas jets on, and when Poppa came in, he found her unconscious. They came for her in an ambulance, and she’s been under observation ever since. The doctor had Poppa and me in the other day and said she ought to be put in an institution. She’s only high-strung.

“He says - oh, I don’t know what they call it - that she’s a danger to herself and that maybe if she’s given proper treatment she’ll recover and maybe not. We didn’t know what to do, so Poppa said I had to ask Rhoda what she thought we should do, and I said, if anyone could solve the problem it would be you, so he asked me to call you, because he was too embarrassed.”

Slowly Jay came out of the haze of alcohol. He wondered if Myrna had told them anything, and if this was some kind of trick to implicate him. The old man hated him and would probably like to discredit him.

“I’m not sure what I can do. One thing though: she ought to get
the best
medical attention possible. Institutions are probably like
jails.”

“The private sanatoriums cost a fortune. None of us have that kind of money.”

Jay extended his hand across the table and felt for the crumpled
bill;
he gathered it into the palm of his hand without Howard noticing.

“Howard, if I do something, will you promise me one thing?”

“I don’t want you to do anything. I need your advice, that’s all.”

“My advice isn’t worth a damn. I’m no doctor.” He handed the bill to Howard, who accepted it reluctantly and held it up to the candlelight.

“Look, nobody asked for charity, and ten dollars isn’t going to be much use.”