“I know that, Grandpa,” I said.
“What do you know? Where was I? You made me lose my place.”
“Al Newberger was telling Irving what’s-his-name to take a hike.”
“Thank you, Ronnie. So Al tells Irving to take a hike and Irving, very gentleman-like, explains that if Al doesn’t ‘play ball,’ something terrible could happen to him or, worse, Vera.
“Now Al’s even more interested, because he can’t figure out how this guy would know Vera’s name. But he’s still not giving in to Irving, and when Irving says Itchy wants his gun back, Al pretends like he doesn’t have it. ’Cause how’s Itchy going to shoot Al if he doesn’t have his gun?” Sidney laughed ruefully and went on. “I can laugh now, Ronnie, it’s a long time ago, but you can imagine that this encounter with Irving Levchuck, however inconclusive, would begin to play with Al Newberger’s mind. He should’ve come to me right away, of course, but it wasn’t Al’s nature.
“So a couple of days later, after a game, Al and some of the guys are drinking at a place in South Philly that they used to go to, called the Two Deuces or the Forty-two Queens, one of those. Al leaves to go home and that guy Itchy Weintraub-with his face all bandaged and fucked up-jumps out of a car parked at the curb, grabs Al, and throws him in the front seat. Irving is behind the wheel.”
“Itchy, Irving,” I said. “It’s a little hard to keep these guys straight, Grandpa.”
“Do your best,” Sidney said. “So Itchy gets in the backseat and before Al knows it, he’s pointing a pistol at the back of Al’s head and Irving ’s saying, ‘Look, Al, Itchy’s got a new gun.’ Then he tells Al that they’re spreading a lot of money around town that says the Planets won’t beat the Union City Arrows by more than two points at the National Hotel on Saturday night. Al tells him he’s not going to do it, not going to shave points, and before he knows it, now Itchy’s got a piano wire around Al’s neck and he’s choking him to death and that seems to do the trick. Al’s in the tank.
“So, wouldn’t you know it, on Saturday night we beat the Arrows by a single point. Instead of killing the clock at the end of the game with a three-point lead, Al takes a bad shot and gives the Arrows the ball and then lets his man waltz past him for an easy bucket. I figure Al’s having a bad night. He’s too proud to come to me with his problem. But somebody else isn’t.
“A few days later, Vera comes to see me at my office. An exceptionally good-looking girl, Ronnie. She tells me how Al beat this guy up who used to work for the Matteo brothers and how Itchy’s going to pay him back. I ask her if Al knows she’s coming to see me and she says no. So I ask, ‘How do you know what this guy Itchy’s going to do?’ She says, ‘Because everybody knows how these bums operate.’ You following me so far?”
“Yes.”
“Good. Then you’ll understand my problem. Because I can tell that Al hasn’t told her anything. He never talked to nobody in general. So Vera knows more about this on her own than she’s letting on. So I ask her, ‘What’s your relationship with these monkeys, anyway?’ Because I figure-”
“-that she’s tied in with Itchy and knows exactly how much trouble Al’s in.”
“When I want some information I’ll consult the encyclopedia. So I thank Vera for her concern and figure it’s time to make some inquiries. Meanwhile, Al’s up to his pupik in trouble. I can use this like a hole in the head. We already got a Depression that won’t end. We got the German American Bund parading around the city in swastikas and jackboots.
“Al gets another visit from Irving, who tells Al that when the Planets go up to Harlem in a few days, the Rens are going to win by four. Al tells Irving no, I’m through, that’s it. So Irving whispers an address in Al’s ear, ‘That’s where my mother lives,’ Al says, and Irving says, ‘And it’s where she’s gonna die if the Rens don’t win by at least four.’ So Al says, ‘You can’t make me do this,’ and Irving says, ‘You’d be amazed by what I can make you do.’
“But the next day I buy Al dinner at the old Horn and Hardart and I tell him I know he’s in the tank. I don’t say it was Vera who told me. He admits some guy named Irving says some guy named Itchy is going to shoot him. I’ve got to take care of this problem, right? So I take Al down to Atlantic City to see Mo Mo Scharf.”
“Mo Mo?”
“Big bootlegger I knew ’cause he was the moneyman for a team I coached in the late twenties. Not that I knew he was an untervelt mensch at the time. Now he’s semiretired, living on the boardwalk, and I figure he might do us a favor. He was always doing business with the Matteo brothers. But I’m in for a couple surprises. First of all, he’s become a schlump. He’s a nobody now, an old man in slippers with a bad memory. But he does know one thing, and that’s the second surprise. He tells Al and me the Matteo brothers are no longer running things in South Philly. Who, then? A guy named Levchuck, Mo Mo tells me. Irving Levchuck.”
At this point, I recall clearly how Sidney ’s demeanor changed. He no longer seemed to be telling me a story at all. The light in Sidney ’s face dimmed slowly, as if on a rheostat, and his voice became quieter and more determined, as if he was now being forced to tell the story. “Now, Ronnie, you understand that, until this point, I have no idea that the guy who’s got his claws into Al is Irving Levchuck. Al knows him only as Irving. Let me tell you, this throws me for a loop, because I grew up with the guy.”
“You grew up with him?”
“What did I just say? Our mothers were in the same canasta club. Even then I hated him. He was a little goniff. When we were about twelve or thirteen, he stole some athletic equipment from the Jewish Community Center and sold it to some Negroes across town. I ratted him out. From then on, he hated me. I wasn’t surprised that he became a bookkeeper for Mo Mo when he was still in his twenties. He was always good with numbers. But did I know the little goniff had moved up to run organized crime in Philadelphia? What did I know from the workings of the underworld? I was shocked when Mo Mo tells me this, but I don’t let on to either of them that I grew up with the mamzer.
“Because now I know why Irving Levchuck has Al by the balls and won’t let go. First of all, he’s getting back at me for ratting him out twenty-five years before. But the real reason? Owning a piece of the Planets was like owning a piece of God. We were the force of good, Ronnie, and Irving was the kind of guy who had to take a shit on everything he couldn’t control. And without knowing it Al had just handed him the opportunity of a lifetime.
“So we drove back from Atlantic City in silence and when we played our last regular season game in Harlem a couple of nights later, I kept Al on the bench. And that fucking Itchy had the balls to come down to the bench near the end of the game and yell at Al. I was right there and I heard him ask Al, ‘You got a death wish, Al? You got a death wish?’ His face was right down next to Al’s, and Vic Fine, who’s sitting next to him on the bench, throws an elbow right in Itchy’s face. Itchy opens his coat and shows them his semiautomatic. ‘I got something better than elbows, you pricks.’ I remember this like it was yesterday, Ronnie. I thought he was going to use the gun then and there. But I point a finger at him and order him back to his seat, and you know what? He goes. But after the game, since I figure these mamzers are going to be waiting for Al, we got him out of the Renaissance Ballroom with the Harlem team.”