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“Wait a second,” I say. I disappeared into my parents’ den, where it took me only a minute to find a Time-Life illustrated history of organized crime, one of those volumes they used to advertise on television; when you signed up, they’d send you one a month. I used to be fascinated by this particular volume and brought it back to the kitchen table, where I quickly found what I was looking for and turned the book around so Sidney could see it.
It was a wire service photo of Irving Levchuck’s body in a South Philadelphia alley. He lay on his back, limbs akimbo, his hat sitting on its crown a few feet away. In the photo, a dark smudge on his cheek indicated where the bullet had entered. Blood, rendered black by the film, pooled behind his head on the alley’s gravel surface. The caption read: “On April 14, 1938, in a slaying that was never solved, Philadelphia mobster Irving Levchuck was gu
“While you were telling me the story, I kept thinking it sounded familiar,” I said.
Sidney stared at the photo for a long time as he passed his hanky over his face and forehead. “That’s him, all right,” he said. “I haven’t seen that photo in a long time, Ro
“Now the cops back off finally because none of the guys on the team will break and, frankly, the cops are glad Levchuck’s been rubbed out, maybe even the ones whose pockets he’s been lining. Everyone figures that it was a gangland slaying and they leave it alone. Except that one fact doesn’t quite fit. Irving ’s wallet’s gone, assuming he was carrying one, but he’s got a money clip with a couple hundred dollars in it still in his front pocket. That’s like walking around with a few grand today. Why would someone go to the trouble to take his wallet, but not his money?”
“The killer wanted a souvenir,” I suggested.
“Souvenirs are for tourists and children. At least the guy could’ve taken Irving ’s walking-around dough. Anyway, so Irving ’s suddenly out of the way, but who can predict what’s go
“Wow, Grandpa, that’s quite a story. You lived through some amazing times.”
Sidney yawned. He consulted the old Benrus on his wrist. “It’s late.” But he made no move to get up and pad off to the guest room he’d occupied for a few years now.
“So, Grandpa,” I said, “do you think Al did it?”
“Naw.”
“Then it was an incredible stroke of luck that Levchuck was murdered when he was.”
“Luck had nothing to do with it.”
“You don’t think so?”
Sidney was rummaging around in one of his pants pockets. He pulled out something wrapped in a white cloth, like a piece of an old undershirt, and said, “I’m an old man, Ro
“You’re good for ten more years,” I said.
He pushed the undershirt-wrapped package across the table, keeping his hand on top of it for a moment before leaving it in front of me.
“It’s for you.”
“What is it?”
“Open it, Ro
It finally occurred to me what it was, and when it did, tears filled my eyes. To this day, I can’t say whether they were tears of pride that he was my grandfather, tears of mourning because he was going to die soon, or tears of fear because of all I would have to do in my lifetime to feel worthy of him. Probably a combination of all three.
“Go ahead, Ro
“I can’t.”
“Don’t be a putz. Open it.”
“No.”
“You’re telling me you can’t even open it?”
I opened it. I unfolded the cloth and there it was. A wallet, a brown rectangle of leather, remarkably well preserved.
“Go ahead, Ro
Gingerly, I flipped the wallet open and took out the folded papers, one by one, soft with age. A Pe
A killer’s wallet, given to me by the killer’s killer, who happened to be my grandfather. My father’s father, who loved my father and me, but who also loved his “boys,” the long stream of brilliant Jewish basketball players for whom he would do anything. And had.
“So that someone should know,” he said.
“Jesus, Grandpa.” I looked down at the wire photo of Levchuck lying in the South Philadelphia alley, then at the wallet that had been taken from his pocket, then at Sidney. “You?”
He just looked at me.
“The gun you took from Al?” I said.
Sidney didn’t say anything.
“What do you want me to do with this, Sidney?”
“That’s your business, Ro
“Jesus,” I said.
Then he coughed lightly into his fist, took a sip of water, and said, “We won that series in seven, Ro
SHOTS by S. J. Rozan
I’d been following the Knicks all season, but I didn’t see Damon Rome’s last game. I was down at Shorty’s that December evening, with a beer and a bunch of guys who, like me, could have been drinking at home, where the liquor’s free and the TV tuned to whatever you want. But the liquor’s the excuse, not the reason. And at Shorty’s, the TV over the bar is on so the silent drinkers have something to keep their minds off whatever brought them here alone, and the ones who want to talk to each other have something to talk about.
It was late in the football season, still plenty of time left for basketball, so the TV was tuned to the Giants and the talk was interceptions, rushing, bad knees and bowl chances. Close to halftime, waiting for a commercial to pass, someone ordered another Rolling Rock and brought up the Knicks, how hot they were, and other guys, working on their own beers, shook their heads over it. Who’d have thought? The Knicks unstoppable heading for the playoffs, a real shot this year at taking it all, in a season when Nathaniel Day played only ten games.