The Saint of Lost Things (39 page)

By the end of his speech, Mario has the disgraced Gino Stella on a ranch in Argentina and the young Grasso brothers rich co-owners—equal partners, of course—of the restaurant that will put Wilmington, Delaware, on the map. “Me and you, we’ll be famous up and down the East Coast,” he says, standing. He walks from one end of the kitchen to the other. “We’ll be an Italian American institution robust for generations to come.” In time, he says, they will break through the walls of the neighbors on Union Street, and gobble up the laundromats and bakeries and shoe repair shops like a hungry fish.

As Mario talks on, dreaming bigger every minute, the bemused and skeptical expression on Antonio’s face changes to one of apprehension. He knows that when his brother finally stops, takes a breath, and asks him in no uncertain terms to invest his savings and his future in the restaurant, he will have no good reason to say no. He has enough money in the bank and in the drapes, with some to spare. Soon Maddalena will go back to the Golden Hem, and bring
home the extra income they’ve come to rely on for security. Their house in New Castle will have to wait a few years anyway, since they’ll need Mamma to watch Prima during the day while Maddalena works, at least until she is old enough for school. The only reason for saying no that Antonio can give Mario—if he ever stops talking and asks his question—is that he is afraid. And at this moment, with the
sambuca
working its charms, and Mamma and Papà in their final years, and having lost a chance like this twice before with Renato, and, most of all, with his wife and daughter safe and healthy and rocking upstairs (he can hear the lovely creak of the chair through the ceiling, the murmur of Maddalena’s shy lullaby), it seems a great failure of heart to be afraid.

Mario folds his hands on the table. “So,” he says.
“Fratello.
What do you think? Where would you rather be in twenty years? Taking orders from me or from that Hannagan?”

There is already so much pride to swallow. To give Mario an answer right away, to give him that much satisfaction, would make him unbearable. Years of negotiating begins now, Antonio thinks, with how he handles his brother’s proposition. He cannot say what he really feels: that he is grateful, and terrified, and relieved, and that this all comes as close to perfect as he could have imagined. He cannot say he is proud of Mario for the chances he’s taken over the years, for never giving up on all those Grasso businesses, and for the hard work at Mrs. Stella’s that brought him to this table tonight.

“One thing,” Antonio says. “The day you order me around is a day you’ll regret.”

“I can say the same to you.”

“Except,” Antonio says, and sits back in his chair. “Without me, there is no restaurant.”

Mario smiles. “Again, I can say the same.”

“A lot would have to change,” says Antonio. “The name, first of all.”

“You think I want Gino’s name on our family restaurant?”

But this conversation is already too much too fast. Antonio appears too cooperative. So he stands, his heart pounding, his face as serious as a banker’s. “I can’t tell you anything for sure right now,” he says. “Maybe not even until the weekend. But I will say this: it’s not the worst idea you ever had.”

“Of course,” Mario says. “I wouldn’t expect . . . ”He looks like a teenager: his tie undone, his hair a mess, that eager smile. “Take your time,” he says, and holds up his hands. “But do me a favor.”

Antonio clears the coffee cups. He puts them in the sink and runs the water. “What?”

“Don’t turn your back,” Mario says. His leg is shaking. “Make your brother proud.”

A
NTONIO’S FIRST CALLING
is to paint over the murals in the dining room of the old Mrs. Stella’s. He chooses a glossy gold, dark enough to cover in two coats the cartoon renditions of gondoliers and pigeons that Gino loved so much. Across the far wall he and Mario hang a large, beveled mirror, bought wholesale, to hide the cracks in the plaster and open up the room. They fill the other cracks throughout the restaurant, shampoo the worn red carpet, and polish the wood floors in the bar area. In the corner where Giulio used to stand, they install a jukebox. Fifty songs are now at their fingertips, at five cents a song. With pleasure they dismantle the neon sign in the front window and throw it on a pile of trash. In its place they mount a charming green awning, made of quality canvas with scalloped edges.
RISTORANTE AL DI LÀ
it says, in white block lettering. Below that, in small script you can read only up close:
MARIO AND ANTONIO GRASSO, PROPRIETORS.

When the day of the grand opening finally comes—December 31, 1954—Antonio slicks back his hair, puts on his best suit, and tucks into the vest pocket the speech he’ll make in the minutes before
midnight. He arrives at noon, six hours early, though he has no particular job to do, and is greeted with “Good afternoon, sir” by one of the waiters, an older man named Bruno whom he has known since he was a boy. Twice over the course of the day, the new cook asks Antonio to sample the sauce, and adds more salt when he declares it
sciapo.
As night falls, the candles are lit, and the guests begin to appear, Antonio looks over the reservation book again, though he can recite each name from memory. Thanks to the holdover customers from Mrs. Stella’s, and the signs he put up in Angelo’s Market, every table is reserved. And yet, despite all this respect shown to him, and the hard-earned savings he’s sunk into the renovations and the operating costs, Antonio feels out of place.

Compared to his brother, he is an amateur. Antonio needs only to watch Mario for one minute to see that he is no longer the frantic baker of the long-bankrupt Pasticceria Grasso, with flour in his hair; or the fumbling waiter of Café Grasso, afraid to carry more than two plates at once. Gone is the arrogance he showed during his brief adventure at Mrs. Stella’s. Look how gracefully he crosses the dining room, straightening silverware and tucking in chairs as he goes, winking at guests as if they’re in on some delicious secret, motioning from a great distance to the bartender—in a sign language Antonio has yet to grasp—for a certain table to get a bottle of
spumante
on the house. It is beautiful, this choreography.

Meanwhile, Antonio stands uselessly at the front door, so befuddled by the taking of coats and the showing to seats and the hundred other simultaneous demands of the dinner hour that he’s forced to cede the bulk of his maître d’ responsibilities to Ida. Ida! Even his
mezza scema
sister-in-law can maintain a confident and professional air amid the chaos. She seems to know each new couple by name and welcomes them with a “Happy New Year,” a bright smile for the gentleman and a different compliment for each lady. Antonio can barely speak to the people he knows—Gianni, the
Fiumas, Angelo—let alone these strangers. Ida hands them all noisemakers, promises them the meal of a lifetime and a room of friendly faces. “Start 1955 at the Al Di Là,” she says, “and you’ll have luck the rest of the year.”

What’s wrong with him? the guests must be wondering, as they pass Antonio on the way to their tables. Surely they ask each other, Why does he stand there, arms across his chest, mute as a mummy?

It occurs to Antonio that he has worked too long on the assembly line. He is too accustomed to a steady paycheck, the predictable turnover. Every time he has been laid off from a job, he has found one exactly like it in a matter of days. The inside of every automobile plant looks the same; he needs only to take his place, learn one or two relatively simple motions, and repeat them over and over until someone tells him to stop. He has no practice making his own decisions for a living.

Maddalena comes toward him. She wears one of her fancy dresses for the first time since the spring, when she used to put on her finest clothes just to walk the few blocks to Giulio Fabbri’s house. After tonight, she will have a more exciting trip to make. It will be she, not Ida, who will greet the customers and take the coats on weekends. She, not Signora Stella, will walk among the tables and tell stories from the Old Country. If Antonio does want to show her off in this way, which of course he does, he will have to buy her some new clothes. Jewelry, too. Makeup and shoes. But now that Renato, betrayed by the very existence of the Al Di Là, no longer speaks to him, Antonio has no access to the Insurance Closet. The thought of paying department-store prices makes him wince.

“Did you eat?” Maddalena asks. She leans against the jukebox, her hands behind her back, swaying to “Sh-Boom.”
Life could be a dream, sweetheart.
“The sauce has a good taste,” she says. “The veal, too. Like night and day, from before.”

“You think these people even noticed?”

“Americans,” she whispers, with a smile. “As long as they keep coming, who cares? We know the difference.”

“Gino had no respect for the tomato,” Antonio says, and they laugh.

Maddalena puts her hand on his stomach. “You have to eat.”

“I will,” he says. “I’m nervous about talking in front of everybody.”

“Don’t worry,” she says. “They’ll be drunk pretty soon.”

Antonio folds his arms across his chest. He can’t calm down, not even talking to his wife. The guests continue to push through the doors, someone knocks over the ceramic pot of poinsettias, the kitchen runs out of basil, the bartender—Angelo Montale’s son, Angelo Jr.—spills a bottle of red wine on the counter. How can Antonio eat, with all these unrelenting, unpredictable needs around him?

“I came to help Ida,” Maddalena says.

“You’re tired,” Antonio says. “Let her do the work for once.”

“I heard that,” says Ida, who comes up behind him with an armful of heavy coats. She dumps them in Maddalena’s arms. “If you’re just going to stand here doing nothing, Antonio, you might as well go sit. You’re making me nervous.”

Maddalena laughs. “We ladies can take care of everything.”

“Better yet,” says Ida. “Go home and get some basil.”

“Yes,” says Maddalena. “The fresh air will do you good.” She points him toward the door.

It is nine-thirty. The city is quiet and cold, the sky thick with stars. Everyone with a place to go tonight has already arrived. Only a few cars speed down Union Street, late for the best part of any New Year’s Eve celebration: these tipsy hours of anticipation and promise, when it feels as though, at the stroke of twelve, your heart will finally lighten and your sins will be washed clean.

On the windowsill above the sink Antonio finds the basil plant, pale green and struggling to survive the winter. As instructed, he takes from the freezer a jar of chopped leaves the women have saved from the plant’s happier days. He carries one on each arm, breathing in the sweet aroma, glad to be of some use.

When he gets to the corner of Eighth and Union, it is the first time he sees the Al Di Là at night, busy and open to the public. He stops for a moment, gazing from the far side of the street at the colored lights on the door wreath, the shadows moving across the windows. He sets the basil, which can wait, on the sidewalk. He has never known such joy. It is as fragile as the wineglasses his customers are now lifting to their lips. Make one slip, and the glass crashes to the floor. Can they guess that on this night, the last of a dangerous year, the man on the sidewalk in his black suit—shivering, biting his nails—has everything he wants? He has his family gathered inside, at the round table under the mirror: his wife, their baby daughter in her arms; his mother and father; his nieces. And yet there is no telling what punishments God is devising. How can he relax? How can any man?

He thinks of his speech. He’s practiced it over and over—the assurance that the cook uses the freshest ingredients and prepares all the food in the authentic Italian way, the pledge to expand the dining room and maybe even install a dance floor by the summer, the wish that 1955 brings peace to the world—but now the words seem all wrong. He considers tearing it up and starting over, but he’s run out of time.

Inside, all of the guests are seated, including Maddalena and Ida. Mario leans against a booth talking to Giulio and Helen. Antonio manages to eat a chunk of bread with some salt and olive oil, but he’s not sure his stomach can handle much more. Angelo Jr. hands him a glass of wine, and for a while he sits at the table beside his
mother. When Prima wakes, Maddalena hands her to him. He holds her for a few minutes before she starts to cry.

“They don’t love their fathers until they’re five,” says Ida.

Antonio watches the customers put on their party hats, twirl their noisemakers, and ready their bags of confetti. The jukebox plays “Secret Love” and “Young at Heart,” and a couple he doesn’t recognize slow-dances in the back corner, by the kitchen door. In time the room grows louder, a string of garland is pulled from the wall and wrapped around a woman’s head, and before long most of the guests are on their feet and milling about. The waiters start to hand out the fluted glasses, and moments later reappear to fill them with
spumante.
Mario keeps close watch on it all, and makes sure the tables are cleared of empty plates and used silverware. At 11:40, he nudges Antonio. “You ready, or do you want me to do it?” he says.

“You.”

Maddalena overhears. “But you practiced,” she says. “Don’t let it go to waste.”

“Mario’s good at speeches,” Ida says. “He’s done them before.”