Coney (18 page)

“I love my Papa. At night in ze bed, I talk to God:
‘Le Bon Dieu
, help me stop. Tell me what must do.' Nozing help. My parents must buy for me new clothes all ze time. At
l'école
, zey make fun on me. Zey stick zere fingers in my flesh. I tell my Mama and Papa I no go school. Zey say I must.
Finalement
, when I have zirteen, zey say not go.”

She blew out a sustained chunk of air which unrounded her cheeks a bit. It was as if even now she was trying one more remedy.

“I miss
l'école
. I like read. Zat not stop. People say I full fat. No, 'Arry, I full books. You must read ze good books 'Arry.”

He nodded.

“When I have sixteen, I am like today. I not go out house. I must eat so much my Papa say he has not ze money. My Mama cry all ze time. I hear my Papa say: ‘What we do wiz her? How to feed her all her life? How we live? God curse us.' Zen zey both cry.

“One day I see in paper little words zat man look for, how you say, odd people, to be in show in America. I call ze number. 'Arry, you know ze one name Schnozz. It is he. I tell he of me. He come see me when Mama and Papa not home. He look on me all sides. He say good. You name Fifi and you come from
famille Louis quatorze.
I like zis Schnozz. He talk like book. He buy me ticket for ship to America. I no tell Mama, Papa. I leave note. I go America. I will write. I never do.

“Schnozz take me Coney. I sit in chair. People look, make fun, but is different. Zey pay to make foolish. I big hit. Newspapers ask how I am from
Louis quatorze
. I tell zem from books I read. Ze call me ‘Queen Fifi,' who eat cake like say Marie Antoinette. I like zat.”

She smiled, then sighed. She took the photo from Harry and held it in front of her.

“What you know of world, 'Arry?”

He shrugged.

“Is cruel.”

He nodded.

“One time I walk sixteen street, where are ze Italians. Zey grab me, pull me into ze club down ze stairs, tear off ze clothes and say: Dance! Zen zey make pipi on me an' push me into street naked. Would zey do zat to zis girl?” she asked, shaking the photo back and forth.

It was a horrible story, but Harry reacted with shivers of pleasure. It was the first time anyone had opened up their life to him, asked him to share pain or joy. With his parents, Aba, Bama, Zadeh, he felt joined by an accident of fate which commanded them to love him. He never felt loved for himself. Had someone else been born, he would have received the same automatic love. But Fifi had chosen him! Something about him had caused her to confide, to share her suffering, to seek his understanding. She was telling him things which, he sensed, she never had been able to tell anyone else. He knew very well the loneliness that attached to such secrets.

He kissed her on the lips, then took her hand and spoke for the first time of a shame which often overrode his will, and paid unwelcome visits, sometimes invading his dreams.

He was nine. At Hebrew school he was given a cardboard box stamped with a Jewish star and told to collect money so that Jews could plant trees in barren Palestine. His teacher dropped in two pennies through the metal slit so that he could shake a message of generosity. The first two passersby responded with coins. Success created the Harry Ephraim Catzker forest of Palestine, through which he skipped. A boy his size suddenly blocked his path. He raised a hammer above Harry's head. Harry had visualized the claw marks it would make in his forehead, how it would splinter his teeth, enter his eye.

He fell to his knees and begged not to be ripped apart. The boy snatched the box from Harry's offering hand and said:

“You sing good. You should join the Jew choir.”

Fifi smiled.

'Arry. Why feel shame? You do right. He have hammer. You have nozing. I do same zing.”

“No, Fifi, I should have fought him. I should have tried to hurt him, to show him Jews can fight.”

“'Arry, listen. When zose men push me down to cellar, I can scream for help. But I not, because if I do I have afraid zay stick me wiz knife or maybe worse. What sense?”

He nodded, but was unconvinced.

She smiled broadly. Her stretched lips dug deep dimples in her bloated cheeks. Her eyes caressed him. He hoped his eyes were as expressive.

“'Arry, you come see me again.”

“Yes, Fifi,”

“We talk, yes. Like two people. You like I teach to you le français?

“Yes.”

“Bon. A tout à l'heure
. Zat is first
leçon
. It mean see you soon.”

“Toot a loore, Fifi.”

“You must kiss me on two cheeks. Zat is also France
leçon.
”

Outside, he jumped straight up and clicked his heels together. He had done it! And in a French cunt! By the time his feet touched the ground, he felt shame for thinking of Fifi in that way.

A
FTER LEAVING FIFI,
H
ARRY WALKED TOWARD HOME ALONG THE
boardwalk. The strong wind off the Atlantic budged and chilled him. He isolated a gust and imagined its history: it had discomfited Ziegenbaum on the
Bremen
, eased along notes in bottles launched from every continent, slackened while passing over a lifeboat escaping a shipwreck, boiled white foam to artistically decorate buoys and beaches. In thrall of its journey, he did not see coming towards him Albert-Alberta and Otto. He would have collided with them had not Otto thrown a stiff arm against his chest, stopping him abruptly.

“Harry, old pal,
I
shall report you to the local constabulary for drunken walking,” Albert-Alberta said.

Not ready to leave unresolved a perplexing thought, Harry asked: “When the wind dies down, does
that
wind die forever?”

“This chap needs a hot chocolate to sober him up,” Albert-Alberta replied. “Look at you, you're dressed for the Fourth of July.”

“Ach, is not cold,” Otto said. He wore a light windbreaker over a T-shirt. “Get muscles,” he instructed Harry, “muscles make you warm.”

Albert-Alberta gripped Harry under the arm and led him to a diner on Surf Avenue. Seated in a rear booth, Albert-Alberta ordered a hot chocolate for Harry and a black coffee for himself. Otto asked for a glass of milk, telling Harry:

“Drink milk. Make strong.”

Otto drained the glass in one gulp and went to the bathroom. Albert-Alberta smiled mischievously.

“Did you ever play secrets?” he asked.

“No.”

“Well, we're about to.”

Otto returned.

“Ah, Otto,” Albert-Alberta said, “Harry and yours truly were discussing President Roosevelt and the disgusting trick he puts on.”

“Trick?”

“You know, the wheelchair and all that.”

“You mean, he not …”

“What better way to get sympathy?”

Otto thought.

“
Ach
,” he said.

“
Ach
, indeed.”

“How you know?” Otto challenged

“Think of the cigarette holder. Damn it man, it's all there.”

Otto's brow plunged into deep thought.

Albert-Alberta threw up his arms in exasperation, saying: “God, man, don't you get it, the cigarette holder!”

Otto smiled, and said: “
Ach
, of course, the cigarette holder …”

He nodded and rose. “Have appointment, must go.”

“He'll try and figure it out all night,” Albert-Alberta said. “I give Otto many sleepless nights. He'll believe anything about Roosevelt. He hates him because of what he says about Hitler. He'll tell all his pals at the German American Bund. They'll believe him. Probably decipher something bizarre about the cigarette holder.”

Albert-Alberta shot up his arm to a Nazi
heil Hitler
, then bent his elbow for a smart British salute.

“Were you in the army?” Harry asked.

“In a manner of speaking, sir.”

“What does that mean?”

“I served, but did not serve.”

“I don't understand.”

“I dasn't explain until you are older,” he said, cocking his head and fluttering his eyes.

“Hey, I'm old enough,” Harry said, simulating shaving.

“Not for my army career, lovey.”

“Soldier told me his.”

“Soldier”—he sniffed derisively—“crawling on his belly in the mud. Some tale!”

“Were you in the war?”

“In a way. Yes, in a way. You could say that I was in the home guard.”

“What's that?”

“It is men and women who …”

Albert-Alberta reached inside his sweater and pulled out a brassiere stuffed with rotting yellow sponges. He threw it to the ground. It bounced a bit. He swung his foot at it, like a football player attempting a drop kick.

“Damn it,” he said, “I won't walk around like this anymore. I'm not a freak. I am not!”

His eyes became fixed, lifeless, as if painted. He spoke in a monotone without affect.

“My father was a general. He was a hero and he raised me to be a hero. I couldn't wait to be brave and collect medals. I was always dreaming about battles. My house was full of generals. They were big men with big mustaches who smelled of tobacco and whiskey. They would tell me about their famous battles and I would tell them that I was going to be a hero. They would laugh and pat me on the head.

“MacLaren was my favorite. He would come to my room at bedtime and tell me tales of India and the dreaded Dervishes. He took my breath away. He gave me a swagger stick. I was never without it. He liked to touch me when he spoke. His hands were firm, commanding. He pinched my cheeks till they hurt. He crushed my shoulders.

“He told me I must stand at attention in the nude in front of a mirror to see that my entire body was responding to military discipline. I did. I liked the sight of me.

“Then MacLaren said I had to stand inspection from him. First he corrected my posture with those strong hands. Then he said it would be more helpful to me if I learned by example. If I copied him.

“He took off his uniform and stood beside me in front of the mirror. He was a hairy man. Black hair was tangled all over him. He walked behind me and rubbed against me. His penis parted my cheeks. It was hot.

“He lifted me like a baby being carried to his bath and laid me on my stomach on my bed. That hot penis hurt me so much I screamed. He put a strong hand over my mouth and said pain was part of being a hero. That it hurt him too. But there would be pleasure too. Later, he brought me women's clothes and dressed and undressed me.

“One night my father couldn't sleep. He heard noises in my room and thought I was having a nightmare.

“McLaren was a bigger general than my father. I was sent to a faraway boarding school. I spent my vacations at an aunt's house. My father refused to come near me. He died in the war. I ran away to America and practiced the only trade I knew.”

Albert-Alberta closed his eyes tightly. When they opened, his face was once again animated, mischievous. He smacked his lips.

“How do you like that, Harry?”

Harry shuffled his feet and looked down..

“My dear,” he said, “you fell for secrets. You didn't really believe me, did you? It's such a made-up tale. A
Canterbury Tale
. Next time I'll tell you about my mother the duchess, don't you know, and my father, the … oh that's too good to give away.”

He picked up the brassiere and whirled it over his head.

“Whee, whirling teats!”

They parted in front of the diner. Albert-Alberta squared his
shoulders and marched away, sounding the cadence with a briskly whistled
It's a Long Way to Tipperary.

Harry watched him, seeing no sham in the precise rhythm of his step and the pride in the swinging shoulders. Or maybe it was just another layer of secrets? Truth, Aba said, was a lie you believe. Did that apply to his own version of secrets?

Hidden surveillance was the portal to Harry's one unassailable truth. Observing scenes in which only he knew the full truth because only he was aware that there was a secret watcher, created truth.

On hot summer nights, invisible in the shadows beneath the boardwalk, he waited for couples to collapse on the sand, breathing like spent runners and crying out like white men under torture by
Fu Man Chu
.

His favorite every-season spy place was a spot on the boardwalk overlooking the entrance to the Half-Moon Hotel. The big shots who wore ribbons across their chests in Coney parades, like the beautiful baby contest or the season closer on Labor Day, had lunch or dinner there, staggering out drunk, arms draped around supposed enemies and singing Irish sea shanties. During conventions, the whores from Rosie's marched into the hotel like soldiers in close order drill.

The entrance also hosted quick dramas: a man-woman screaming match, or a cop's car arriving for a payoff smoothly delivered by the uniformed doorman.

A year ago he had seen his mother enter the hotel alone. Surmising that she was buying a pack of cigarettes, he had planned to sneak up behind her and surprise her as she walked home. Three hours later she had emerged with a tall, well-dressed man who had brushed her cheek with a kiss and put her in a taxi. He had witnessed repeat performances by tailing her when she announced a trip to the movies to calm her nerves.

He wondered if his father knew. Or if his mother knew about the women in Harlem his father and Aba talked about while Harry
eavesdropped beneath an open window. Both knew, he had decided, but didn't know, as in Bama's Yiddish dictum:
If you don't talk about it, and don't admit you see it, it doesn't exist.
” Anyway, whatever the state of awareness, it seemed a fair arrangement.

Harry returned to the boardwalk. The oxidized green hands of the round clock, set like a cyclopean eye in the tin sign identifying Silver's Baths, read nine-fifteen. His parents would not be home yet. He decided to wait until ten o'clock. If the house were still locked, he would sneak back into Bama's. To kill time, he put the Half-Moon Hotel under scrutiny.