The humidity in the room seemed to increase, and Frank felt sweat beading along his forehead. He went to the window, opened it, and watched a small group of children playing in the street below. "I'll take care of it."
"Good." Vincent smiled. "Now let's talk for real."
"I'm listening."
"I gave Michael a figure. How does twenty-five large sound? Think we can pull things together with that kind of coin?"
Frank turned from the window. "Are you serious?"
"As a heart attack."
"Twenty-five grand?"
"With ease."
An uncontrollable urge to laugh overtook him. Twenty-five thousand dollars far exceeded what he'd hoped Michael might be willing to front them. "What's the juice?"
"Nada."
"Michael's going to loan us that amount of cash without any points?"
"What am I, some dickhead off the street?" Vincent laughed. "I'm familia, remember?"
Frank lit a cigarette and forced himself to look at the situation objectively. "What's the catch, Vin? There has to be a catch."
"Very minor. Michael will front us the money, but he has to arrange it by going through Fratenzza."
Frank felt his heart drop to his feet. Michael Santangelo worked directly under Gino "The Ear" Fratenzza. He controlled the entire area, all the way to Providence, and was a man who demanded both respect and outright fear. Although Frank had seen him in the neighborhood countless times while growing up, he'd never actually met him. "Fratenzza, huh?"
"Don't worry about it. I known him since I was a kid."
"This is a heavy hitter you're talking about."
"You know how he got the name 'The Ear', right?"
"Yeah," Frank said, "in the old days when he was making his bones with the Biacchi Family he used to rip the hit's ears off with his bare hands."
"Neighborhood gossip," Vincent told him. "A couple of months after Fratenzza took over the area he was playing a round of golf with Fat Vic DeNicco and Tommy Calhoun, that big barrel-chested mick who used to run the street booze and dope for him, remember?"
Frank thought for a moment. "The one who got shot down by the docks when we were in high school?"
"Yeah."
"I remember him."
"Michael was still working muscle for Fratenzza at the time so he was driving the golf cart. Anyway, they're playing and Fratenzza's bullshit because he's losing. Fat Vic has the good sense to let the bastard stay a few strokes out in front but Calhoun's actually trying to win. By the time they get to the fourteenth hole, Fratenzza is out of his mind pissed-off. This dumb potato-picker still hasn't figured out that he's not supposed to be trying so hard. And then, if things aren't bad enough, out of nowhere Michael sees Fratenzza's wife barreling toward them in a golf cart. You remember seeing his wife Louise around, right?"
"Kind of a cheap-looking bleached blonde with a big gut?"
"That's her," Vincent said with a grin. "Only back then she'd just retired from one of those topless Vegas shows. She had tits out to here and an ass that'd make you come in your pants just looking at it, but she had a big mouth on her, too. Michael says she was always making eyes at other guys and giving Fratenzza a hard time about every goddamn thing. He'd knock her around now and then but it didn't do any good. The bitch refused to wise up.
"So with Calhoun trying to be Arnold-fucking-Palmer," he went on, "Fratenzza's already having a bad day. The last thing he needs is Louise in this golf cart. She drives right up onto the green, almost runs over Fat Vic's foot, and goes charging right at Fratenzza, screaming about how she found a note in one of his suits from some whore he'd been banging on the side. Michael doesn't know what the hell to do so he just sits there watching. Well, Fat Vic starts laughing and turns away, so Fratenzza won't see him and Calhoun lines up his putt and ignores the whole thing. Meanwhile, Louise is still screaming and yelling about what an asshole Fratenzza is and how she wants a divorce, when all of sudden he grabs her by the throat, throws her down on the ground, and with a penknife he keeps on his key chain proceeds to hack her fucking ear off."
Frank felt his jaw slacken. "Holy shit."
"Slices the motherfucker off – off – right there, throws it into his golf bag and tells the bitch if she ever talks to him that way again he'll cut the other one off. Michael's the one who ended up taking her to the hospital. After that, everybody called him 'The Ear', and you can bet his wife calmed right the fuck down and never raised her voice to him again."
"What happened to her ear?"
Vincent stared at him. "What do you mean?"
"Her ear. What happened to her ear?"
"The one he cut off?"
"Yeah."
"How the fuck should I know?"
"But I've seen Louise Fratenzza around," Frank said. "She's got two ears, Vin."
He waved at the air between them. "The right one's a fake."
"A fake? How the hell you get a fake ear?"
"I don't know, must be rubber or plastic or something. You know, like one of them Mr. Potato Head ears."
Within seconds they had both begun to laugh. Lightly at first, then uproariously as the realization of what they had been discussing dawned on them.
"What happened to her ear?" Vincent echoed. "It's a dealer at a blackjack table in Atlantic City, you twisted prick."
Once they had regained control of themselves, Frank lit another cigarette and sat at the kitchen table. "Seriously though, I didn't think we'd have to deal with anybody but Michael."
"Neither did I," Vincent admitted. "But the way Michael explained it, it's safer if everything goes through Fratenzza."
"Guess it's all his fucking money anyway."
"But this way if something goes wrong and we have trouble paying the money back, nobody can go to Michael and say: What the fuck did you do? This way he covers his ass by letting Fratenzza make the decision."
"You sure he'll OK it?"
Vincent nodded. "Of course. It's just a matter of going through the motions and showing 'The Ear' respect. You know all that grease ball shit guys Fratenzza's age still make everybody go through. All we do is pay our respects, and once the loan is repaid and we've made a few bucks of profit we pass a little along to Fratenzza as our way of thanking him for his help and support. Little tribute, as they say."
"How much money we talking about?"
"Couple thousand once we can afford it."
"What about actual payments on the loan?"
"Michael will give us as much time as we need as long as there's some sort of regular payments coming in. He's not out to break our balls."
"We're scheduled to be in Rhode Island next week for Charlie Rain's show," Frank said. "I'd like to be able to tell him that we're up and running by then."
"I can have a meeting with Fratenzza arranged within a day or two. Just say the word."
Frank took a deep breath and looked up at Vincent. "Word."
From the window in his bedroom Gus watched the sun as it set over the city, its natural beauty an inordinate contrast against the squalor of a manmade skyline. He could also see the emergence of those people it seemed dusk itself produced, night crawlers slithering up through soil under the safety of darkness.
Three punks in their early teens had already gathered at the end of the block. Each wore oversized clothes, baseball caps and beepers. Each took turns approaching the cars that every five minutes or so slowed just enough to make a buy. Interesting, Gus thought, how almost all of those cars were makes and models one generally only saw passing through areas like this. Rich white boys and stressed-out yuppies gliding through the city, scoring their powders and pills from children. When Gus was young this had been a nice neighborhood, but those memories were so distant he often questioned their validity. At times, the line between a lie and the truth could be frustratingly indistinct.