Marilyn the Wild (18 page)

B
RODSKY
had been glowering at transvestites for the better part of an hour. He couldn't direct his rage at the Chief. Isaac scrounged on Times Square when he was due at Headquarters for a press conference to celebrate the recapture of Stanley Chin. Talk about sleuths. Isaac was the only cop at Headquarters who had the brains to guess where Stanley would run. A Chinese boy goes to Chinatown, Isaac announced, while Cowboy Rosenblatt had his tongue in his ass, shoving detectives through Brooklyn and Queens. Ten minutes after the dispatcher gave Isaac the news of Stanley's flight from St. Bartholomew's, a squad of “angels” led by Manfred Coen walked from Centre Street to Mott, scooped the lollipop out of a Chinese cafeteria, and delivered him to the prisoners' ward at Bellevue. And now Isaac the Just was sleepwalking on Eighth Avenue.

“Downtown, Isaac, that's where we belong. Why are you pussying up here?”

The Chief ignored him. He was looking for a girl. Honey Schapiro had fled the coop again, disappeared from Essex Street to rejoin her pimp. Isaac wasn't on an errand for her father now. Mordecai could play his own shepherd. Isaac wanted information from the girl. The Chief couldn't squeeze Esther out of his mind. Living with Ida and Marilyn in two congested rooms, he imagined Esther Rose sitting naked on a floor with her finger in a mayonnaise jar.

“Isaac, there she goes.”

They trapped Honey Schapiro between two Cadillacs. She had eyelashes on with thick corrugations that couldn't have been contained in a fist. You could see the imprint of her crotch through the flimsy material of her skirt “Screw,” Honey said, seething at Isaac. “My father's man.”

Five pimps, “players” in floppy hats and suede coats that brushed against their ankles, came down the block to rescue Honey. Ralph, her old protector, was one of them.

“Brother,” he said, “why you annoying an innocent girl?” With four other “players” backing him up, Ralph could afford a touch of arrogance.

Brodsky interposed himself between Isaac and the “players.” “This isn't a pinch. It's a friendly conversation between my Chief and Honey Schapiro. So walk away, or you'll lose your pimping hats.”

Isaac snatched Honey up from the bumpers of the Cadillacs and deposited her on the sidewalk. “Tell me about Esther and Rupert Weil.”

“Fuck you.”

The “players” chortled under the protection of their hats.

“Honey, have you ever been to the Bronx juvenile house? The lady wardens have ticklish thumbs. They turn girls into zombies. You'll wake up with a baldie head. The wardens like to explore with pliers. Do you know what it means to have a bleeding nipple?”

Honey was petrified. Her shoulders wagged.

“Give me Esther's pedigree … You must have grown up with Rupert. What's he like?”

Honey scratched around her eye. “What do you want from me? I never saw them get it down together. Rupe, he came out of the crib pretty weird. With a chessboard tattooed on his belly. Call that normal? It takes Rupert to pick a mama who's a bigger fruit than him.”

“Did Esther say anything to you?”

“Yeah, she said I should save my cunt for the proletariat Shit like that. Who asked her advice?”

The five pimps figured Isaac was a crazy man; why else would he interrogate a bimbo in the street? Brodsky had his own suspicions. Isaac was stuck on a dead girl, a lollipop who would have been happy to kill him. “Chief, it's getting late. Those crime reporters have no loyalty. They'll interview Cowboy if you aint there to satisfy them.”

The First Dep's sedan remained on Times Square. Brodsky had to go inside the Tivoli Theatre to scratch around for Wadsworth, Isaac's milky nigger. The chauffeur came out alone. He popped his head through Isaac's window. “Wadsworth says he don't sit in police cars. He'll meet you in the lobby. That's as far as he goes.”

Isaac sent the chauffeur into the Tivoli again. “Brodsky, tell him I'm hurting today. I'm too nervous to breathe the air in a movie house.”

Wadsworth sneaked into the sedan; he sat up front with Isaac, while Brodsky dawdled under the marquee, staring at the bosoms on a signboard near the ticket booth. Wadsworth kept hunching into his seat. He had the pink eyes of a captured flounder. He wouldn't greet Isaac in Yiddish, or English. Isaac had to speak.

“Wads, I wouldn't pull on your shirt without a reason. You know that I need. The Guzmanns stole a corpse away from me. They're meddling in my affairs. I don't want their dice cribs, Wads. Let them gamble in peace. Just tell me where the local whore market is, the place where the Guzmanns can trade in all the little girls they snatch from the bus terminal.”

Wadsworth wouldn't shift from his corner. He showed Isaac a crumpled palm. “Put a razor in my hand, why don't you, Commissioner? So I can slit my throat before the Guzmanns get the chance.”

“Don't be foolish, Wads. I'm not looking for a bust. I'll lean on the whore merchants, that's all. The Guzmanns will never know who my source is. How could they? And why curse me with the title of ‘Commissioner'? I'm just a lousy chief.”

“Isaac, Zorro doesn't sleep with his ears in the ground. You tap his marketplace, and he'll know.”

“Wads, the Guzmanns are creepy pimps. If they touch you, I'll stick their balls in a medical jar.” Wadsworth didn't smile. “You have a big family, Wads. A boy with uncles and cousins living in city dormitories shouldn't be so particular. Get what I mean? You can float out of my house, Wads, that's your privilege. But if Cowboy finds out you're no longer registered to me, hell take away your seat at the movies.”

“Isaac, the Guzmanns are angels next to you.”

“I agree. The Guzmanns wrap their money in prayer shawls, but can they keep you out of the Tombs? I'm your friend, not Zorro. Remember that Now give. What's the name of that whore market?”

“Zuckerdorff. It's an outlet for diseased merchandise. Seconds and thirds. Zorro rents the showroom every week.”

“A dummy corporation, is that it?”

“No. You can get a blouse for one of your girlfriends from Zuckerdorff. Isaac, be careful with the old man. He's Zorro's great-uncle.”

Brodsky drove the Chief to “Zuckerdorff's of Sixth Avenue,” which was in the basement of a pajama factory on Fortieth Street, between Tenth and Eleventh. Zuckerdorff had no secretaries or shipping clerks. He was a man with handsome eyebrows and prominent bones in his skull. He must have been eighty years old. Isaac had to extricate him from a wall of haberdashery boxes. Zuckerdorff didn't take kindly to this intrusion. “Gentlemen, do you have a piece of paper from a judge? Otherwise leave me alone.”

The Chief wouldn't go for his inspector's badge, so Brodsky had to pull out his own gold shield. Zuckerdorff laughed in the chauffeur's face. “Mister, I seen plenty of those. They're good for scaring the cucarachas.”

“Isaac, should I bend his mouth?”

The Chief stepped around Brodsky to catch Zorro's great-uncle at a sharper angle. Plaguing an old man with bluish skin on his temples made Isaac bitter with himself. But he couldn't allow a tribe of Bronx pimps to laugh him out of his borough. “Zuckerdorff, if you're counting on Zorro, forget it. I eat Guzmanns in the morning. They're tastier than frogs' legs. So consider what I have to say. Either you shut Zorro out of your company, and forbid him to walk his whores through these premises, or you'll have to stack your boxes in the street. I can turn you into a sidewalk corporation faster than Zorro can pedicure his father's toenails.”

Zuckerdorff hopped to the telephone. He dialed without looking back at Isaac. His conversation was quite brief. “Zelmo, this is Tomás … I have two faigels in my office … funny boys … cops with bright ideas … they like to threaten people.”

Zuckerdorff tittered with a finger on his lip. The bones shook in his skull. “My friends, you'd better vacate the building. Because your badges are going to be in my toilet bowl in another minute. If you decide to wait, I can fix you some beautiful red tea.”

Isaac wondered if the Marranos poured jam or blood in their teacups. He was more curious about this than the identity of Zuckerdorff's benefactor.

A man clumped into the basement He must have thick soles, Isaac assumed. “What precinct are you from?” the man growled, without seeing Isaac. “Are you grabbing for the nearest pocket? I'll break your knuckles off.”

Isaac recognized Zelmo Beard, a disheveled detective from the safe and loft squad. Zelmo stared into Isaac's eyes. His chin collapsed His ears seemed to crawl into his neck He waltzed in his baggy overcoat, toppling the wall of haberdashery boxes. Zuckerdorff had all the omens a seller of damaged blouses could need. He blinked at Isaac. This cop had a capacity for pure evil. How else could Zuckerdorff explain the explosion of blush marks on Zelmo Beard?

Zelmo began to genuflect near Isaac's thighs. “Chief, I didn't know the First Dep was interested in Zuckerdorff … he takes in pennies, I swear. Garbage deals. He's a glorified junkman.”

“Zelmo, I thought you had more sense. Why are you out muscling for a family that's been a nuisance to my life?”

“Isaac, I couldn't give a shit about Zorro.”

“Prove it. I don't want him finding any more outlets for his little girls. Wherever Zorro turns, you chase him, Zelmo, understand? You can start with Zuckerdorff. Hit him with summonses, sprinkler violations, the works. That way Zorro will know I'm sending him my regards. Brodsky, come on.”

The chauffeur basked on Tenth Avenue. His boss had to be the greatest detective in the world; better than Maigret, better than the Thin Man, better than Cowboy Rosenblatt. Isaac the Just could destroy the Guzmanns and all their Manhattan links without raising his thumb. He carried honey and acid inside his mouth. He could bite your face, or purr you to sleep. “Isaac, the reporters, Isaac. You'll snow them out of their pants. Should I signal Headquarters?”

“Brodsky, we're going to Bellevue.”

The sedan pushed east, Brodsky sulking behind the wheel. He hated hospitals with fat chimneys and raw brick. Isaac went up to his mother's room. He found his nephews in the hall, Davey and Michael. The boys wore their hunting clothes: Edwardian suits cut to the measurements of a child, stiff collars, and identical flame red ties. “Uncle Isaac, uncle Isaac,” they screamed, lunging at him. Isaac had to bribe his nephews with fifty-cent pieces before they would give up their hold on his knees. The hallway would soon be a battlefield. The boys were waiting to pounce on their father. Where was Leo's ex-wife? Davey and Michael couldn't have plunked themselves outside their grandmother's door.

“My father's a killer man,” Michael said.

“Who's he been killing?”

“My mother and me.”

Isaac couldn't argue with a seven-year-old. He abandoned his nephews for a peek at his mother. Sophie had her vigilers: Marilyn, Leo, and Alfred Abdullah, her suitor from Pacific Street. Abdullah greeted Isaac with a sorrowful smile. An American Arab out of Lebanon, he could grieve over Sophie's wounds as hard as any son. Isaac nodded to the chairs around the bed. His mother lay in her pillows with blue salt on her lips, fluids leaking in and out of a nest of pipes. Marilyn barked a husky hello. Isaac felt uncomfortable with his daughter in the room. He saw the strain, the nervous flutter of her eyelids. She was miserable without Coen. And Isaac had contributed to this. Blue Eyes was only two flights away, in the prisoners' ward, minding Stanley Chin. Marilyn couldn't get through; the prisoners' ward didn't entertain the guests of jailors, nurses, or cops.

Leo could feel the chill between father and daughter. He edged closer to Marilyn's chair. Marilyn was his buffer zone. He remembered Isaac's promise to tear off a lung if he refused to give up his hiding place in civil jail. Leo hadn't made preparations to leave Crosby Street. The climate suited him. He could smoke, play cards, sneak out to visit his mother. Sitting next to Marilyn, he waited for Isaac's wrath to fall. He'd misinterpreted the Chief. Isaac was too occupied with Rupert, Esther, and the Guzmanns to worry about one of his own simple threats. Leo's tenure at Crosby Street didn't concern him now. Abstracted, with leaking pipes in his eye, he spoke to Alfred Abdullah. “How's Pacific Street?”

Abdullah stared past Isaac in alarm: Sophie's head came off the pillows. “The baby,” she said. “Bring me the baby.” Sleeping, she had the look of a woman whose skin was on fire, her face deepening with blue salt and the passage of blood. Coming out of a coma, her complexion changed. She was pale, with a mouse's color, during her periods of lucidity. The glass pipes swayed over her arm, impeding the flow from gooseneck to gooseneck. “Bring me the baby,” she said.

Isaac stood with both fists in his chest. Abdullah made little grabs at his throat. Leo covered his eyes. Only Marilyn had the sense to clutch the pipes and narrow their sway. “Jesus Christ,” she said. “Can't you see? Mama's calling for Leo.”

Leo sprang out of his chair. His shoulder landed in the bed. Sophie began to caress his bald spot. Leo was crying with his mother's fingers in his scalp. “Shhh,” she said. “Where's the Philistine?”

Abdullah crouched behind Leo. Sophie rejected him. “Not you,” she said. “Where's the philistine? …”

“Mama,” Isaac said, his ankles sinking under him. “I'm right here.”

“Did you meet the cock-a-doodle?”

Isaac shrugged, rendered incomplete by his mother.

“The cock-a-doodle,” Sophie insisted. “In Paris, France.”

Isaac was caught with pimples on his tongue. Leo must have snitched; mama couldn't have known about his rendezvous with Joel in the Jewish slums of Paris, unless the fluids dripping into her also fed her intuition.

Sophie was through with bald spots. She reached for Abdullah's hand. Leo wouldn't move; he kept his ear against Sophie's hospital shirt Sophie smiled.