“So this man worked for you and Matt’s father,” I asked.
Madame nodded. “He came to us fresh off the boat from Italy. An eager aspiring artist.”
“Marlon Brando-ish? Isn’t that how you described him?”
“More Victor Mature, dear. The young female customers absolutely swooned when they saw him in our shop or Washington Square Park — that’s where he liked to set up his painter’s easel.”
“So he was hot stuff?”
“Oh, yes. Smoldering male charisma, liquid bedroom gaze... Oo-la-la...”
Oo-la-la? I suppressed a smile. “Is that why I’m the one driving you to Astoria to meet with him instead of Otto?”
“My. Don’t you have a suspicious mind?”
“I think we’ve already established that.”
“Well, the answer to your question is no. My Otto would have taken me, but he has a very important business dinner lined up this evening so I’m a free agent.”
“Uh-huh.” The last time Madame characterized herself as a “free agent” she was in East Hampton, enjoying a fling with a septuagenarian expert on Jackson Pollock.
“And, besides,” she added. “I’ve wanted you to meet Enzo for ages. Given your background, I thought it was about time.”
“Whatever became of Enzo’s art career, anyway?” (Myself an art school dropout, I couldn’t help wondering.) “Did his work ever sell?”
“Oh, yes. Enzo’s female admirers bought many of his paintings. Restaurants and caffès hired him, too. At one time, you could see his trompe l’oeil frescos in dozens of pizzerias around town. But most of them are gone now. Irreplaceable because Enzo stopped selling his work.”
“Why? What happened?”
Madame shrugged. “Life.”
“Life?”
“His lover became pregnant,” she said, glancing at the fast-passing rows of storefronts. “The same year her father died. Angela asked Enzo to marry her and take over her family’s caffè in Queens, save them from financial ruin.” Madame shrugged. “Enzo adored her...”
I nodded at Enzo’s story (half of it, anyway) because I knew just how many hours it took to run a successful business, and just how much love it took to give up on a dream. Suddenly, without having ever met the man, I liked him, very much.
“Caffè Lucia is a pretty name,” I said.
“He renamed the place for his daughter. A lively, outspoken child, as I recall; all grown up by now. And sadly, last year, Angela passed away during their annual visit to Italy...”
As I turned onto Steinway Street, I noticed Madame glancing at her watch.
“This trip isn’t over yet,” I warned.
“I know, dear. I’m looking.”
Parking is what we were looking for, and I didn’t see a single open spot. Eyeing the crowded curbs, I rolled by cell phone shops, clothing stores, and restaurants with Greek, Italian, Cyrillic, and Naskh signage. Finally I turned onto the tree-lined block where Caffè Lucia was located, and Madame began waving frantically (because attempting to find parking in this town could turn even the most urbane cosmopolitan into a raving maniac).
“There! There! A spot on the right! Get it! Get it!”
“Fire hydrant,” I said. “I’ll circle again — ”
“Look! Look! That car is leaving! Go! Go!”
I zoomed into the spot, right behind a mammoth SUV. As I climbed out from behind the wheel, I could almost feel the adrenaline ebbing from my bloodstream. (Not quite as stressful as driving a golf cart through a war zone, but close.) Unfortunately, I wasn’t off the battlefield yet. More trouble was heading our way — in size-twelve Air Jordans.
“Hey, lady!” (The greeting was quintessential Jerry Lewis but the accent was definitely foreign.) “You can’t park here!”
A scowling man barreled toward us, gesturing wildly.
“Excuse me?” I said.
“You have to move your car!”
Stone black eyes under tight curls the color of Sicilian licorice; a slate gray leisure suit (sans tie) over incongruous white tube socks. I couldn’t place the guy’s accent, but that was no surprise. While this area used to be primarily Greek and Italian, more recent arrivals included Brazilians, Bosnians, and natives of Egypt, Yemen, and Morocco.
The guy stopped right in front of us, hands outstretched to keep us from moving down the sidewalk. For a moment, I stared at his day-old jaw stubble. Another blind follower of Hollywood’s derelict chic trend? Or simply a misplaced razor?
“You have to move that junk heap! I can’t have it in front of my club!”
Junk heap? I frowned, scanning the area around my admittedly non-late-model Honda. I saw no fire hydrant, construction cones, or city signage.
Madame glanced at me, then back at our human road block. “I don’t understand, young man. Are you saying this isn’t a legal parking spot?”
“I’m saying you can’t park here unless you’re going to my club.”
“Your club?” I said.
He jerked his head at the shadowy doorway behind him. Under a scarlet neon Red Mirage banner, a sign announced: Happy Hour 5-8 PM. Monday thru Thursday.
Madame’s large, expressive eyes — so intensely blue that tricks of light turned them lavender — displayed gentle crow’s feet when she smiled. She wasn’t smiling now.
“Listen up, friend — ” (Her voice dropped to a serious octave.) “Our parking spot is legal. Your attempt at extortion is not.”
Given the level of society to which Madame’s late second husband (a French importer) had elevated her, not to mention her Fifth Avenue address, even I sometimes failed to remember that the doyenne of polite society was no cream-filled profiterole. The woman had come to this country as a motherless, penniless refugee. Not long after, she’d found herself alone, a widow in her prime, with a boy to raise and a coffeehouse to run — no mean feat in a city that challenged its shop owners with difficult regulations, sky-high overhead, and a demanding (and occasionally dangerous) customer base.
Of course, Club Guy here didn’t know any of that. And when Madame actually took a step closer, he froze. A moment later, he began muttering in another language, obviously befuddled by a dignified older lady’s willingness to go toe-to-toe with him. Finally, he waved his arms and cried, “I’m a businessman, lady! I’m just trying to keep this spot open for taxis to drop off paying customers!”
Score one for Madame. He was on the defensive. But his Air Jordans had yet to budge. That’s when I noticed a flash of headlights. The driver in that mammoth SUV had started his engine.
“There,” I said, “why don’t you keep that spot open for your customers!”
Our human road block instantly raced off to reserve the vacated space.
Madame tapped my shoulder. “Shall we, dear?”
“We shall.”
Then I looped my arm through hers, and together we started down the sidewalk toward our hard won destination: Caffè Lucia.
Two
Like the accident on the bridge, I approached Enzo Testa’s caffè without knowing exactly what lay ahead, although I should have had a clue — not because of the smell of accelerants or the sound of cartoonishly loud ticking, but because of the woman who unlocked the door.
In her early forties, Enzo’s daughter Lucia seemed almost storklike in her fashionable gangliness. Her nose was long, her squinting eyes the flat color of sour pickles. Her sleek, short, slicked down hair, which should have echoed the same dark hue as her salon-shaped brows, was striated instead with the sort of shades you’d find in a jar of whole-grain Dijon (or the bottles of an uptown colorist).