I was hoping Louis would bring him over so I could give him a closer look. I waved at the two of them, but if Louis saw me, he was ignoring me. Finally he nodded at my future husband, no handshake exchanged, and the two of them parted ways.
Louis made his way over to the cage, hands in his pockets, stooped over, whistling.
I said: Who was that young fella you were chatting with?
He said: I wasn’t chatting with nobody.
I said: I just saw you. With that well-dressed Jew.
He said: That wasn’t anyone you should be worried about.
He smiled when he said it, all casual-like, but I felt prickly and cold. I never got a chill from Louis before, not my entire life.
Elio Ferrante
Was Louis Gordon a criminal? I guess we should think about what it means to be a criminal. History teaches us that some of our most successful leaders engaged in illegal activities. Hell, all of our presidents are war criminals. And I got some tough guys in my family, even though I love them like crazy. I’ve seen fights. Growing up in Brooklyn, you see fights. But I don’t mean Mafia, just, you know, big guys, tough guys. Some do time. But sometimes it’s just people blowing off steam.
And then there’s my cousin Joseph. He’s a gambler, and he got himself in all kinds of trouble, fell in a hole he couldn’t climb his way out of, but what he got caught for was credit card fraud. This is considered a victimless crime. He certainly felt that way, and for the most part, so did the judge. He’s in a halfway house now. His wife left him, took the three kids with her, left the dog behind. It was his dog. But he can’t keep it obviously, so guess who has the dog now? Me.
This is a beautiful dog, an Akita. Do you know about these dogs? They’ve got this soft, plush fur, and they’re sort of like stuffed animals. They don’t give a crap about anyone but their owners — they’ll basically ignore anyone else, maybe at best have a lazy interest in them — but they are loyal to the core to the hand that feeds them.
My cousin’s dog, she’s in perfect condition. Her teeth are as white as yours, like polished stones. This dog has been loved and cared for her entire life. Beautiful fur, shiny eyes, great disposition. And she sits by the door every night waiting for him to come home — even if his wife doesn’t. How bad could a person be if he took care of a dog this well? But he’s a criminal, I know it. Everyone in my family knows it. Thanksgiving was the worst last year. You know when everyone’s not saying someone’s name but you’re all hearing it anyway? It was like that.
There was a documentary that came out a few years ago on these guys, these Coney Island guys, not Louis specifically, though. I ordered it for the school library. Kids watch it sometimes for extra credit. I could get it from the school library and we could watch it together; I can fill in some of the blanks for you. A lot of these guys were heroes in their community. I think that’s an important thing to remember. They were legends and saints. Even if they broke the law.
Mazie’s Diary, June 15, 1922
Postcard from Jeanie. How’d she make it all the way to California?
Daydreamed about the Captain showing up one day at a performance of hers, just stumbling in there, an accident, maybe another girl on his arm. Jeanie and him never even knowing I loved them both.
Mazie’s Diary, July 2, 1922
Saw that dapper Jew down the block today again.
Nobody knows Louis’s business except Louis, not even Rosie I don’t think.
Elio Ferrante
My cousin I was telling you about last week, the one on the force, he took a look and there’s no record at all of any arrest of Louis Gordon, anytime before 1923. Now, if he had any aliases, it might be a different story. And that doesn’t include other states obviously. And to be honest, my cousin says the paperwork system from eighty years ago, maybe it’s not the most reliable in the world. But according to existing records, Louis Gordon was never arrested or convicted of any crime.
Mazie’s Diary, August 3, 1922
In my cage, counting pennies, a smack of hands against my booth. I looked up, and there was the Captain, forehead pressed on the glass.
He said: There she is, the most beautiful lady in the world.
I raced from my cage and embraced him, a girlish fool. I pretended he was mine to keep.
What else can I do but love him?
I don’t care if I’m supposed to care that he’ll never be here when I need him. Fleeting as a fly. I only know that I have a good time when I see him, that he makes me feel like a good-time girl again, back when I knew nothing of the world, back when all I cared about was a laugh. And I need that right now. I need a laugh. Squeezing both my hands. The kisses all over me, and his sweat on my flesh. All the world contained between us. Even that grunt he makes when he’s done that I know has nothing to do with me, it makes me laugh. He’s just him, he’s just a man. Weak and human and all it comes down to is a noise.
Mazie’s Diary, August 5, 1922
Last night, damp in his hotel room. I threw away everything for two days just to lie there sweating with this man. He gave me a dozen dangling gold bracelets and they dripped down my arm. The fan blew overhead, an open window, the breeze coming off the river, and still we were just stuck in each other’s sweat. I couldn’t move away from him, neither he from me.
He said: Come back with me to California.
I laughed at him. Not being cruel, just amused. How funny to think about that. How funny it would be if I left, too. What would my world be like somewhere else? I hadn’t thought about that in so long, being somewhere else, it felt almost like it was never. So I had all those thoughts at once, and his arms were around me and I was covered in his sweat, and so I laughed.
He said: Don’t be mean.
I said: I’m not being mean. It’s a lot to ask.
He said: It seems like nothing to ask. It seems like the simplest thing in the world. Marry me, Mazie.
I said: What would I do in California?
He said: This. Exactly this. Every day. For the rest of our lives.
I said: Life isn’t made of just this.
But I didn’t know what else it was made of either.
He said: This isn’t how I thought it would go, proposing to a lady.
I said: We don’t even know each other.
He put his fingers inside me, two of them, deeply.
He said: I know you.
Rosie would never get the kitchen clean enough if I left, is what I thought. If I’m so special to this man why don’t I see him but once a year, is what I thought. I don’t know how it works, that kind of love, is what I thought. I only know the temporary kind.
He said: The air is cleaner, the sky is bluer, and the trees are as tall as skyscrapers.
I said: That’s not possible.
He said: I’m telling you, Mazie, you don’t need skyscrapers when you have trees like these.
I told him no, but I was gentle and I kissed him and I whispered only that I was too scared to say yes. Which was not a lie, though not the whole truth. I have never been able to tell him the truth about anything though.
I know you, is what he whispered over and over in my ear all night. But this morning he seemed relieved I had said no. Or maybe I was just imagining it. Or maybe I wanted to imagine it. He told me I could change my mind if I liked. He said California would always be there, and so would he. A great big state far away, on the other side of the country. I gathered up my things and returned to my life. He went off on a ship. Tomorrow I’ll explain to everyone in my life where I’ve been. Today I’ll think about California.