“What do you want?”
“The sign in the window.”
“You want the sign?”
“I want that,” and he pointed at the neon window sign with Stanwix spelled backward.
“You want a Stanwix beer, is that it?”
“Yes. What’s the name of this place?”
“Cody’s,” the man said.
“This isn’t the Club, I know that.”
“It’s Cody’s Havana Club, if that’s what you mean.”
“Cody’s Havana Club,” George said. “I’ve been here before.”
“I’ll get your beer,” the man said.
George took a swallow of the beer and he loved it. He looked at it, watched it sweat. He rubbed the sweat, then lifted the glass and sipped. He loved the taste, the coldness on his tongue, in his throat. I should drink more beer. He tipped up the glass and finished it. He licked the foam off his lips. The bartender looked at him.
“Do it again?” he asked George.
“Do what again?”
“Have another beer.”
“Good idea. I’ll have another beer and do it again.”
The barman drew another beer. “Only costs you a dollar,” he said.
“What does?”
“The beer.”
“A dollar? That’s way too much. Beer costs a nickel. Some places they charge a dime. A glass of Bordeaux wine costs ten cents in Paris.”
“That’s before I was born,” the bartender said. “You want a beer today it’s fifty cents a glass and you had two glasses. One dollar.”
George took out his wallet and fished for one of his five-dollar bills. He gave it to the man and stared at him.
“Is your name Dick?” George asked.
“No.”
“You look a lot like a friend of mine. I haven’t seen him in a while. You know Van Woert Street?”
“I do,” the bartender said.
“Dick. That was his name. Dick Hawkins. Did you know him?”
“Never heard of him.”
“Nigger Dick Hawkins,” George said. “He could go in and out of anybody’s house on Van Woert Street, just like a white man.”
“Nigger Dick on Van Woert Street, imagine that,” the bartender said.
“Wonderful fella,” George said. “He’d do anything for me. They’d come around and tell me this and that and Dick’d say to them, ‘You leave this kid alone, he’s a friend of mine,’ and they’d never touch me. Looked a lot like you. Is your name Dick, by any chance?”
“No, my name is George. Nigger George. I live on Van Woert Street. You ever heard of me?”
“No, can’t say that I have and I live on Van Woert Street. Nigger Dick I know. Wonderful fella. Looks just like you. He’d do anything for me.”
“You know what I’ll do for you?” the bartender asked.
“No.”
“I’ll get your change, you’ll finish your beer and then I’ll kick your ass the fuck out of this bar.”
“Hey, what are you saying?”
“I’m saying I don’t want your business, motherfucker.”
“Are you crazy? You can’t use that language in public. There’s women in here.”
Everybody in the bar was looking at George. Man wearing his shirt outside his pants, two women in straw hats. George tipped his hat to the women who were sitting at the bar, separated by one stool. That looks like Vivvie. George saw them all staring as if they expected something from him, so he picked up his beer and raised a toast: “I care not for riches or wealth of the best, I care not for finery grand. Just give me a lass who owns a good name and give me a willing hand.” He smiled and took a mouthful of his second beer. The woman in the yellow straw hat raised her glass to George and took a sip.
“He’s all right, Roy,” she said to the bartender.
“Sure he is,” Roy said.
“No,” she said, “I know him a long time. He works in the court. He handles the grand juries.”
George broke into song:“Good-bye, gang, I’m through.
Old pals I can’t forget.
I say good-bye to you, without the least regret.”
“I know that song,” the woman said, and she sang along with George:“I’m through with all flirtations.
There’ll be no more fascinations.
There is one to whom I’m true.
Good-bye boys, good-bye girls, good-bye gang, I’m through.”
Behind the bar Roy turned up the volume on the news show. The woman came over to George at the bar.
“George Quinn,” she said, “you’re still a rascal.”
“George Josephus Jeremiah Randolph Franklin Aloysius Quinn,” he said. “A pleasure to see you, my dear. Will you kiss me now or will you wait?”
“You’re a scream. The last time we were in a bar together was at Farnham’s. Do you remember?”
“Farnham’s is a wonderful place. Right up to snuff.”
“Oh, I know. I love the atmosphere. That wonderful dark wood.”
“The atmosphere is wonderful. The wood.”
“You mustn’t mind the bartender, George. He’s a sensitive boy, he doesn’t like that word you used.”
“What word?”
“Nigger.” She whispered it.
“Nigger Dick, I knew him well.”
“Yes, but you shouldn’t say his name like that anymore. Just call him Dick, and don’t say nigger.”
“That’s his name. Nigger Dick. He was part of the Sheridan Avenue Gang. I knew every one of them. There was only one Nigger Dick.”
“Just don’t say it anymore, okay? You understand? Don’t say it or he’ll throw you out. Roy can get very excited.”
“Roy, who’s Roy?”
“The bartender. He said his name was George, but it isn’t.”
“Right. He’s not George, I’m George.”
“You certainly are. George Quinn.”
“That’s me. Will you be going dancing at Beauman’s this evening?”
“You’re still thinking about Beauman’s.”
“It’s right up to snuff. King Jazz’s orchestra. You can’t beat it. I don’t recall your name.”
“Vivian, Vivian Sexton, George. You know me a hundred years.”
George took off his hat and held it out to her. “It’s venerable to know you so long, Vivian,” he said.
“You are such a gentleman,” she said.
“I would be privileged to buy you a drink, Vivian. We could sit at that table over there. I’m on my way to the Club and I have to cash a check. The clock of life is wound but once and no man has the power to tell just where the hands will stop.”
“That certainly is true, George, and it’s a very poetic thing to say. I’d be glad to have a drink with you.”
George placed his hat over his heart and he asked her, “Will you kiss me now or will you wait?” And Vivian kissed him on the cheek.
Max Osborne, wearing a white guayabera, alone at the end of the bar, studied Roy and saw the father in the son, a much larger version, a laboring man’s arms and chest, a heavyweight, but the undeniable child of Cody: that same rigid backbone, same barrel of a chest, hands with their long fingers, skin a shade lighter than Cody’s, but no evidence in the son of Cody’s quiet talent for avoiding public conflict. This fellow had a talent for chastising the world. But he’s Cody’s boy. Like Max’s girl. Children of a new day.
Max compared Roy with the four photos on the wall above the baby grand, blowups of the man and his icons: Fats who took Cody on as a protégé, and Billie — ah Billie, so unbelievably young, with the young Cody playing while she hits a note with eyes closed. Also — with the open back of a piano, trombone on the floor, light on a cymbal — the Duke, hunched at the keys so you couldn’t know it was him, but who else could it be? And then Bing, leaning on the piano and singing at Cody, telling him to shine. Bingety-bing-bing.