“He plays cards with thieves,” my grandfather said.
The bell over the door tinkled. The scent of soap and lilac pierced the stench of cigar smoke — my Aunt Bianca.
“Good evening, Frank,” she said.
“Hello, Bianca,” my grandfather said wearily.
“Their pants were robbed, Aunt Bianca,” I said.
“Hello, Iggie,” she said, and kissed me on the cheek. “Where’s your Grandma?”
“Home,” my grandfather said. “Cooking.”
Luke opened the door and was starting out of the shop when Aunt Bianca said, “What do you mean, your pants were robbed?”
“That’s right, Aunt Bianca,” he said, and ran out of the shop.
“You, too?” she asked Dominick.
“Yeah,” Dominick said.
“A college boy like you?”
Dominick shrugged. “They had guns,” he said.
“The broken record,” my grandfather said.
“They did, Pop.”
“What kind of guns?” I asked.
“Big ones, Iggie.”
“Did they have masks on?”
“No, no masks.”
“Then why don’t you know who they are?” my grandfather asked.
“I never saw them before,” Dominick answered. “I don’t know if you ever noticed, Pop, but I don’t usually hang around with crooks.”
“I have to see Tessie about doing the table,” Bianca said.
“No more table,” my grandfather said flatly.
“I have a widow who wants to talk to her husband.”
“Not in my kitchen!”
“Then where?”
“Do it in your corset shop.”
“My shop doesn’t have a three-legged table. I’ll talk to Tessie about it. Good evening, Frank.” She opened the door, the bell tinkled. She turned back, and said, “You look very handsome today, Iggie.”
“Thank you, Aunt Bianca.”
“Don’t take him by eyes,” my grandfather said.
“Come give your aunt a big kiss.”
I found her immediately. She pulled me into her arms and into her bosom, and bent to kiss me on the cheek, and then patted me on the head, and I suffocated ecstatically on lilac and soap. “Tell your mother to come to the shop once in a while, it won’t kill her,” she said.
“I’ll tell her, Aunt Bianca.”
“Close the door,” my grandfather said. “We’re not partners with a coal man.”
“I was just leaving,” Bianca answered, and went out.
“No three-legged table!” my grandfather shouted after her.
“She smells nice,” I said.
“The butcher thinks so, too,” Dominick said.
“Sta zitto,” my grandfather warned.
“What for?” Dominick said. Everybody knows about Aunt Bianca.”
“You mean about her sleeping with the butcher?” I said.
“Who told you that?” my grandfather asked.
“She’s a widow,” Dominick said. “There’s nothing wrong with it.”
“Is that what they teach you in law school?” my grandfather asked. “That there’s nothing wrong with your mother’s sister sleeping with the butcher?”
“Well, what’s wrong with it, Pop, would you tell me?”
“Why doesn’t he marry her?” my grandfather asked.
“Maybe he doesn’t like her,” Dominick said.
“Then why’s he sleeping with her?” I said.
“You hear what this child hears?” my grandfather said.
The bell over the door tinkled again, and Luke and Matty came rushing into the shop, out of breath. Matty always smelled of Camel cigarettes.
“What took so long?” my grandfather asked.
“We ran all the way over,” Matty said. “Hi, Iggie, how’s the kid?”
“Fine, Uncle Matt.”
“You love my daughter?” my grandfather asked him.
“What?”
“Your wife, my daughter.”
“What is he crazy?” Matty said. “È pazzo questo?” he asked Pino. “We been married eleven years, she’s gonna have another baby any day, what are you asking me now if I love her?”
“Then get back their pants.”
“What?”
“And my ring,” Dominick said.
“And my watch,” Luke said.
“They’re crazy, right, Iggie?” Matty said. “How do I know who stole your stuff?”
“Ask who you play cards with,” my grandfather said.
The shop fell silent. They were waiting for Matty to say something. I turned to where I figured he was standing. The clock ticked noisily on the wall. Matty sighed.
“What kind of watch, Luke?”
“A Bulova. Seventeen jewel.”
“And the ring, Dom?”
“From Fordham. Gold, with a red stone.”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
“Ma subito,” my grandfather said. “Quick, you hear?”
“Pop, I ain’t Al Capone,” Matty said, and went out.
“There much pressing back there?” Luke asked.
“There’s always pressing back there,” my grandfather said. “Thank God.”
“Who wants some hot chocolate?” Luke asked. “You want some hot chocolate, Iggie?”
“Don’t get chocolate on the clothes!” my grandfather said. Dominick had opened the door and was starting out of the shop. “Where are you going?” he asked.
“Home,” Dominick said. “I got torts.”
“You got torts, I got clothes,” my grandfather said. “Help your brother sort them, then you can go.”
“I can do it alone,” Luke said. “Go on, Doc.”
“Okay?”
“Go, go,” my grandfather said.
“Buy me a charlotte russe and stick it in the icebox for when I get home, okay, Doc?”
“Right,” Dominick said, and started out again.
“Watch when you cross!” my grandfather said.
“Pop, I’m twenty-six years old,” Dominick said, and closed the door behind him.
“Well, back to the eighth circle,” Luke said, and went through the curtained doorway, and started the pressing machine. I don’t know where he picked up that reference to Dante. He had dropped out of high school in his sophomore year, going to work first for my Uncle Marco in Brooklyn, and then later helping out part time in the tailor shop. He was now my grandfather’s full-time presser, and he earned a good salary, more than my grandfather would have paid an outsider. He rarely played violin anymore, but he banged the piano obsessively, and I think he dreamed of starting his own band one day, I don’t know. He once approached my father about joining his band, and my father (hypocrite who couldn’t read a fucking note) said, “Can you read music, Luke?”
“Sure I can read music,” Luke said. “I studied violin for four years, didn’t I?”
“I mean piano music,” my father said.
“Well, no, I can’t read piano music, no. I mean, I can read the notes, but no, I couldn’t play from no sheet music, if that’s what you mean.”
“Well, suppose somebody should come up to the piano with her own music, like, you know, to sing a song at one of these affairs? Could you play it for her?”
“If I knew the song, I could play it by ear.”
“But suppose you didn’t know the song?”
“Then I guess I couldn’t play it,” Luke said. “But I know almost every song ever written.”
“Sure, but suppose the sax player or the trumpet man know it only from the sheet music, you understand me? Only in the key it’s written. Then what?”
“Well, then I don’t know what,” Luke said.
I overheard that conversation when I was supposed to be asleep, the way Luke had overheard my mother’s story about the Chinese rape artist. Luke was the one who later repeated the Charlie Shoe story to me. He told me he thought maybe it was true, but why anyone, even a Chink, would have wanted to touch Stella when she was eleven and ugly as sin (according to Luke) was beyond him. “Your mother puts on airs,” he said to me. “She always did.”