“It’d kill me,” he moaned time after time as the weeks flew by, the outlook growing worse. “Like the fellow says, if you lose your good name, you’re done, finished, kaput. Think what Big Mo and Vince and Slim and all the other fellows would say. I let them down, made it tougher for them to give markers.”
For the record, the fellow who first placed a high value on one’s good name was The Preacher, son of David. In Ecclesiastes 7:1 he spoke: “A good name is more precious than ointment.” Shakespeare agreed. “Who steals my purse steals trash, but he who filches from me my good name leaves me poor indeed.”
By June 1994 Tony Gregory was a miserable human. Not only was disgrace looming ever closer, but he was undergoing excruciating withdrawal symptoms, for he was hopelessly addicted to the whirl of the wheel, the turn of the cards, the throw of the dice.
He was living incognito in a New Jersey motel on the cash from his last pawnshop transaction (a diamond ring he had taken as collateral for a four thousand dollar loan made to a rich playboy who finally ran out of money, never redeemed the ring). His only remaining asset was a jeweled watch (six thousand five hundred dollars F.O.B. Fifth Avenue, New York City, on a trip there to celebrate a big winning streak back in 1990).
He had been frequenting the lobbies of the luxurious New York hotels in a desperate search for a rich widow, any rich woman. But his bad luck continued.
Then, because of a noble gesture, his luck changed. It happened when he was on the way to Pittsburgh to visit the legendary Pittsburgh Will, famous as the player who broke the bank at Monte Carlo way back in 1934. Tony had lost track of Will, assumed he was long gone. Imagine his amazement while listlessly watching a TV program called “Old Age Is Getting Older” to see Will about to be interviewed, the occasion Will’s one hundred fifth birthday.
If the announcer hadn’t said that “our next guest is the famous Pittsburgh Will, a legend in gambling circles,” Tony would never have recognized the frail, wizened little man.
In a wheelchair, a nurse hovering behind, Will was ready, the nurse indicated. So was the smiling interviewer, a svelte young female whippersnapper not a day over forty.
“How does it feel to be all of a hundred and five?” she asked old Will in a throaty, gushy voice.
“Rotten,” croaked Will, “it stinks.” Oops. Silence. Loud silence.
Then, “Now, you don’t mean that, do you?” asked the interviewer gamely.
“The hell I don’t,” rasped Will. “Wait’ll you get to be a hundred and five. It ain’t no picnic.” Cringing, the interviewer gave up.
“Thank you,” she somehow managed, “and happy birthday! We now switch to Topeka, Kansas, where Jim has a ninety-two-year-old spry youngster who still drives her 1981 Pontiac to the mall every Thursday. Over to you, Jim.”
“Thank you, Carol,” said Jim, a handsome fellow. “That was great Yes, we do have...”
That was enough for Tony. He hit the remote, a terrible, sad feeling having enveloped him. Wow, poor old Will, he was the best, and look at him now. It’s a damned rotten world.
He spent a gloomy night. Next morning he had a sudden thought. Why not send old Will a birthday card, cheer him up? He went to a nearby mall, spent a good half hour trying to find a card appropriate to the unique occasion. He finally picked an All Occasion Birthday Card. It depicted a family outing involving three or four generations. It was summer, everyone was happy; the theme, it’s great to be alive.
Back at the motel Tony phoned the nursing home, got the address, mailed the card to Will (“Hang in there, old pal; you can still beat the odds”), pretty proud of himself. A week later he received a note from the nursing home.
“Will says thanks for the card, Mr. Gregory,” it read, “and he asks if it isn’t too much trouble if you could come to see him, before, as he puts it, he cashes in his chips. And if I may add a word, Mr. Gregory, I hope you can come. Will is a sad, weak old man not long for this world, and not one single person has ever visited him in the twelve years he has been here. Do try to come.”
The note was signed, “Thelma, head nurse, day shift.”
Tony reread the note five or six times, getting more misty-eyed each time. Finally he grabbed a handful of tissues, wiped his eyes, blew his nose, picked up the phone, booked a first-class seat on the nine forty-five A.M. flight from LaGuardia to Pittsburgh for the following day.
As that other fellow (Gaius Petronius, A.D. c. 66) has told us, “One good turn deserves another.” Bunny Ainsworth was on the plane in the seat next to Tony. Bunny was fifty-two, a slender, well-preserved, good-looking widow whose bookish birdwatching husband Harold had died tragically five years before, having fallen into an abandoned stone quarry a moment after his greatest birdwatching feat, snapping a picture of a rare Chippendale Vermillion. (“Vivid colors; scarlet head, yellow belly, blue tail. Seldom seen in North America.”)
“Eureka,” Harold yelled, jumping up from his hiding place. “A Chippendale Vermillion! I’ll be famous in Audubon circles!”
Alas, he had forgotten all about the quarry. Over he went, camera and film with him, the Chippendale Vermillion still seldom seen.
Naturally, Harold hadn’t anticipated departing life so precipitously, but he had long worried about what would happen to the family fortune (Grandfather Ainsworth had made a fortune in coal mines) if he were the first to go.
Concerned that softhearted Bunny would squander it on all sorts of worthy causes, he had specified in his will that the money be put in trust to be administered by a Pittsburgh bank, Bunny to receive an annual income of one hundred fifty thousand with increases for inflation. At her death, whether or not she had remarried, the trust would become a charitable foundation. The family mansion — all those big houses on LaFayette Terrace, built with coal money, were called mansions — would go to the county historical society at her death. Of course Harold discussed all of this with Bunny. She was in complete agreement.
Bunny’s income enabled her not only to live well but to pay Clara Hogan, the longtime Ainsworth housekeeper, a nice salary (part of which Clara used for her mother-in-law’s nursing home costs); to pay the two maids who came in four mornings a week a decent wage; to pay the part-time gardener more than the going rate. All of that still leaving Bunny with a substantial sum, allowing her to make generous contributions to local charities.
Bunny was well aware of her good fortune. Nevertheless, though far better off than any of her friends, in excellent health, she wasn’t happy. Of course she missed Harold. He had been a large part of her life for twenty-five years even if most of the time he’d had his nose buried in an old book or was off birdwatching. But she’d often wished he had gotten half as excited at seeing her in one of her pretty pink nighties at bedtime as he did when telling her about his latest sighting, and as the years sped by following Harold’s tragic death, she kept hoping that someone would come along who didn’t know a Carolina Chickadee from a Philadelphia Flycatcher, a Cape May Warbler from a Bohemian Grosbeak.
Someone finally came along — Tony Gregory, a tall, husky, darkhaired, devilishly handsome, forty-six-year-old Lothario who had been married twice plus being involved in many an affaire du coeur. Every single one of Tony’s conquests, including the two ex-wives (rich widows who had bailed him out of a string of bad luck), remembered their time with him as the high point of their lives. Unfortunately Tony was in thrall to only one mistress, gambling. Nothing else mattered.
Bunny was already seated when Tony boarded the plane. It took him less than a minute to recognize quality. He smiled roguishly, she giggled girlishly, it was no contest. By the time the plane landed in Pittsburgh, Tony had learned all he needed to know.