The Yiddish Gangster's Daughter (A Becks Ruchinsky Mystery Book 1) by Joan Cochran (popular books of all time .txt) 📗

“Did you ever do anything like that again?”

“Unfortunately, no. A week later, Moe got sent off to basic training. I wanted to join up but I was too young and your grandmother wouldn’t sign the papers. Schatzi stuck around awhile and I heard he helped bust up a couple more Nazi rallies in Jersey. Worked with a Jewish fighter who had an in with the cops there. I asked Schatzi if I could join him, but he told me to get lost. Eventually, he enlisted too.”

The waitress returns, her arms laden with heavy white china plates of bacon, eggs, and pancakes. Bacon, my father claims, is the only cut of pork that becomes kosher when eaten outside the home.

I break the yolk of my fried egg over my pancakes. As I eat, I imagine my father fighting in the midst of a throng of rioting Jews. It’s not hard to envision. I’ve seen him fight his temper, his left eyelid twitching as he struggles to rein himself in. Sometimes, he’d get so mad at my mom, she’d send us to our rooms where we’d listen to him raging.

“So what happened to the Nazis?” I ask once we’re nearly through the meal.

Tootsie looks up from his plate, considers my question. “They kept meeting, but not in such large numbers, and they demanded a police guard. Can you believe that? You’ve heard of Mayor LaGuardia? Like the airport.”

I nod.

“His mother was Jewish and he spoke Yiddish. But he still provided police protection at Nazi rallies. He had to love that.”

“And Lansky?”

“What about him?”

“You see him again?”

“Yeah, once, a long time later.” He looks over my shoulder and out the window before returning his gaze. “It’s funny. No one talked about breaking up Nazi rallies after the war. Hell, after the liberation of the camps, you’d think every German in America loved the Jews.”

We eat in silence. At least I do. My father’s making enough noise to rouse the dead. Which, in a sense, he has.

Once we’re through, I turn around to signal the waitress, who is waiting on a couple in the booth next to us. When I turn back, the man Tootsie stopped to see at the counter is approaching our table. He’s tall with elegant silver hair and wears a soft aqua cashmere cardigan over linen pants.

My father introduces me to Winchell Levin as his kaddish, meaning I’m the one who’ll say prayers in his memory once he’s gone. He tells me Winchell’s an old friend from New York.

“You going to Schatzi’s funeral?” Winchell asks. “It’s at noon today. The old neighborhood will be there, at least those who haven’t kicked the bucket.”

Tootsie turns to me. “What do you say?”

“Whatever you want.” I’m not doing anything. And I’m dying to meet these characters from my father’s past. “We can drop the soup at your place and head over.”

Tootsie stands and pats Winchell on the back. “We’ll see you there.”

“Yitgadal v’yitgadat sh’may rabo.”

Every one of the old geezers at the graveside service is reciting the mourner’s prayer. I’m not. For one thing, I can’t remember the words. For the other, Tootsie keeps poking me in the ribs with his elbow and whispering in my ear. It’s like a Who’s Who of alter cockers with whacked-out nicknames. Bernie “The Weasel” Shapiro. Mort “Schmutzy” Lieberman. Daniel “Peanuts” Wolinsky. Even the old lady who accused my father of murder is there, in her wheelchair accompanied by a nurse in a white uniform. An old man chats with her, then looks our way.

The whole thing is so incredible, these old guys floating around in their too-large suits, wiping away tears and missing the days when they beat the crap out of each other. My father’s riding a seesaw of emotion, crying one minute, chattering rapidly the next. Neither of us mentions Abe Kravitz, who glares at my dad before turning back to the service.

“Peanuts, over there,” my father says, pointing to a short bald guy leaning on a walker, “had something to do with the dockworkers strike after the war. And Schmutzy,” he says, motioning toward another midget, this one in a wheelchair, “had a fist like a golem.”

The high point of the funeral comes about fifteen minutes in, when a gray Ford pulls to the end of the row of cars parked on the right side of the cemetery’s main road. Two men in their midforties step out. The driver is tall, an obvious bench presser, his chest muscles straining at the seams of his gray suit. The man who gets out on the passenger side is a trace shorter, with a facial palsy that gives him a permanent, crooked grin. Their identical sunglasses catch the sun’s glare and even I recognize them as cops.

If this were an Italian Mafia movie, everyone would be edging back to their car. But these are old Jews who probably haven’t pulled off a job in five decades. Everyone, including the widow, a tiny octogenarian with raven black witch hair, looks toward the cops before returning his or her attention to the service. No one gives a damn. The cops keep their distance, hovering ten feet behind the mourners.

My father grabs my arm. ‘’We need to go now,” he whispers.

“It’s almost over,” I say. “Can’t you wait?”

“I’ve got to piss.”

He drags me toward my Mercedes, leaning forward to propel himself more rapidly. As we near the car, I recall rumors that floated around the family about my father and Uncle Moe. When I was in my teens, a cousin from New York swore that Uncle Moe and my father had killed a man. I didn’t believe it. Now I wonder if the old man’s being paranoid or has a good reason to leave. He stares over his shoulder at the cops as we get in the car and drive off. He’s scowling and his silence makes me nervous. I wonder if his rapid departure has anything to do with Fat Louie’s murder. I