Flesh and Blood Page 18

  The black man said nothing.

  “You manage this place?” Silverman asked.

  “No.”

  “A guy named Bowler does, right?”

  “Mr. Bowler, yes.”

  “He here?”

  “No.”

  Silverman looked surprised. “No shit? Well, that’s funny, because Mr. Cavanaugh—he owns this shop, right? Mr. Luther Cavanaugh? I mean, I may be at the wrong place.”

  “Mr. Cavanaugh owns it.”

  “Yeah, that’s what the boss said,” Silverman told him. “Anyway, Mr. Cavanaugh has expressed an interest in upgrading the equipment here. He asked for a rep to be sent over.”

  “I don’t know nothing about that.”

  “You don’t? Well, Mr. Bowler does. Why don’t you give him a call?”

  “He’s in Florida,” the man said. “He had a heart attack down there.”

  “Really? A heart attack. That’s too bad.”

  “He’s in intensive care down there.”

  “No kidding,” Silverman said mournfully. “An older man, is he?”

  “Around sixty, I guess.”

  “Well, my best wishes, you know,” Silverman said. “But, like they say, life goes on, and Mr. Cavanaugh asked me to come over and take a look at this place, maybe give an estimate on upgrading the whole thing.” He smiled quietly. “I’m surprised Mr. Bowler didn’t mention it to you before he left.”

  “He had a lot on his mind, I guess,” the man said.

  “Don’t we all,” Silverman told him. “So, what do you think? Could I take a look around?”

  The man stared at him cautiously.

  “Just a minute or two,” Silverman assured him. “I’m an old pro at this. You won’t have to shut a thing down. You won’t lose a second of production. I guarantee it.”

  The man glanced down at the card. “Well, okay,” he said hesitantly. “I guess so.”

  “Thanks a lot,” Silverman said as he walked briskly into the building.

  The rear of the building was bathed in a deep gray light, and as Frank walked in behind Silverman, he could feel it like a soiled curtain which had suddenly been wrapped heavily around him.

  “What do you want to look at?” the man asked Silverman.

  “The whole operation,” Silverman answered lightly. “I got to get an idea of the pace, you know, cutting, stitching, sorting. You ship out of here?”

  “In small lots,” the man answered. “No big trucks.”

  Silverman smiled at him conspiratorily. “I got you,” he said.

  The man seemed to relax a bit. “Station wagons,” he said, volunteering a bit of information for the first time.

  “Yeah, that’s the best way,” Silverman said amiably. “You go to vans, you can end up eating a lot of shit for it.”

  The man nodded enthusiastically.

  Silverman slapped his hands together lightly. “Well, let’s have a look-see, shall we?”

  The man’s hand swept out toward a small, lighted doorway. “In here,” he said as he started off toward it.

  The darkness gave way suddenly as the man opened the door, and the loud clatter of machinery swept over them.

  “Oh yeah, this looks familiar,” Silverman said to him as they walked onto the main floor of the shop. He smiled. “Looks like you got some pretty old stuff here.” He looked at Frank and chuckled. “What do you think, Mitch?”

  Frank nodded. “Old, yeah,” he said weakly.

  “This is Mitch Donovan,” Silverman said to the other man. “I didn’t catch your name.”

  “Pete Crawford.”

  Silverman stuck out his hand. “Glad to meet you.” He looked back out onto the floor. “How long you working here, Pete?”

  “Four years.”

  Silverman drew in a long breath. “Well, I been in rags for almost forty years.” He laughed. “Longer than some of these goddamn machines.” He stepped forward, his eyes squinting in the hard light. “Looks like you got a pretty good work force here.”

  “They’re okay,” Crawford said.

  “Got fast fingers, do they?”

  “Fast enough, I guess.”

  Silverman laughed. “Yeah, well, with these old relics, they’d better be.” He glanced at Crawford and smiled. “’Cause if they’re not, they’ll sew their fucking fingers together, right?”

  The two men laughed heartily for a moment, then Silverman moved forward up the central aisle, glancing left and right as he walked.

  All around him men and women stood at their machines, their hands flying from the threading needles to the bolts of cloth which lay in piles at their feet.

  “These old machines run pretty hot,” Silverman said as he continued up the aisle. He turned to Crawford. “They bitch about it in the summer, but in the winter they keep their mouths shut, right Pete?”

  Crawford nodded. “That’s right.”

  “People want it both ways,” Silverman added. “That’s their goddamn problem.”

  “We don’t listen to much bitching,” Crawford said sternly. A thin smile slithered onto Silverman’s lips. “Just ask to see their green cards,” he said. “That’ll shut them up fast enough.” He took a few steps forward, then lifted his head slightly and stared thoughtfully over the room, turning slowly in a broad circle.

  “The problem with a shop like this, Pete,” he said authoritively, “is that if you change one thing, you got to change them all.” He looked at Frank. “And that’s where the money comes in, right, Mitch?”

  “Right.”

  Silverman stroked his chin. “Now, this place can be upgraded,” he said to Crawford. “No doubt about it. But it’s not going to be cheap, you know what I mean?”

  “Everything costs money,” Crawford said.

  “Yeah, it does,” Silverman said. “It sure does. Of course, sometimes if you spend some money, you can save some money.” His eyes swept out toward the floor again. “Take the work force for example. How many people you got working here?”

  “Twenty-two,” Crawford said.

  “You mean on this shift?”

  “Yeah.”

  “How many shifts you got. Three?”

  “Two.”

  “Twelve hours a pop, then.”

  “That’s right.”

  Silverman pretended to go through a series of calculations. “Well,” he said finally, “I could probably fix it up to where you could drop a third of your labor costs. That would mean about ten units, you know.” He looked closely at Crawford. “Which would probably put the savings at …” He stopped. “What’s the hourly, Pete?”

  “The average makes about seventy dollars,” Crawford answered immediately.

  “Per week?”

  “’Bout every nine days they get that.”

  For an instant, Frank saw something tighten angrily in Silverman’s face, but it instantly released, and Silverman smiled sweetly. “Yeah, I could save you some of that,” he said cheerfully. “No doubt about it.” He glanced at his watch. “Well, I told you I could check it out in about two minutes. I didn’t lie, did I?”

  Pete smiled contentedly. “No, you didn’t.”

  Silverman turned to Frank. “Got any questions, Mitch?”

  “No.”

  Silverman draped his arm over Crawford’s shoulder and guided him back toward the rear door. “Well, we’ll be in touch with Mr. Bowler, Pete,” he said. “Thanks for letting us in. It would have been a bitch to have come all this way for nothing.”

  “No problem,” Crawford said.

  They shook hands again in the parking lot, and then Silverman headed back toward his car. “Want a Coney Island dog, Frank?” he asked lightly as he pulled himself in behind the wheel.

  19

  Silverman took a bite from his hot dog, then a swig from the can of Budweiser he kept nestled between his legs.

  “I like the boardwalk,” he said as his eyes scanned it, moving along the line of arcades, freak shows and fast food stands. “People say it’s
cheap, vulgar.” He smiled. “What the fuck do they know about real life, huh, Frank?” He took another sip from the can. “I was born out here, and every time I come back, I remember how my father used to ride the rides with me. It scared the shit out of him, but he did it anyway.” He wiped his mouth with the napkin. “Your father still alive?”

  “No.”

  “Mother?”

  “I don’t know. She went away.”

  “Up and left, just like that? Usually it’s the father who does that.”

  “This time it wasn’t,” Frank said. He looked toward the large freak show just behind him. A man in a brightly colored vest was hawking the show to several people who’d gathered around him. A black woman with a large snake stood beside him, along with a hooded man whose arms and chest were covered with tattoos. “She just left one day,” he added. “I don’t know where she went.”

  “Probably just as well,” Silverman said with a shrug. “My mother died when I was ten. After that, it was just me and the old man. He sold shoes until he dropped from it. He fucking hated shoes. Around the house, he went barefoot.”

  Frank laughed.

  “It’s the goddamn truth,” Silverman insisted. “First thing when he got home, summer or winter, he’d take off his fucking shoes. And let me tell you something, that’s not your ordinary Jew that does that. I mean, taking off your shoes is like sitting shiva, mourning the dead.” He stopped to watch an old woman as she fumbled through one of the public garbage receptacles, looking for cans or bottles she could turn in for a nickel apiece. “This woman you’re looking for,” he said, “this Hannah Kovatnik. What do you know about her?”

  “Not much,” Frank told him. “She was a leader in the ’35 strike. She came from Poland, a little village near Bialystok. Her father was a rabbi on Fifth Street. She had two sisters, Naomi and Gilda. When her father died, she took a job on Orchard Street. She led the shop in the strike, then disappeared. Pacheco says she was dropped from the union for some kind of ethics violation.”

  Silverman waved his hand. “That could be anything.”

  “That’s what Pacheco said.”

  “The sisters, though,” Silverman said. “Did they work in the shop?”

  “Yeah, both of them.”

  “You know for how long?”

  Frank shook his head.

  “I can check that out when we get back to the office,” Silverman said. “Anything else?”

  “I’d like to find someone who knew her,” Frank said. “Someone who might know where the sisters are.”

  “You said she disappeared, but she must have turned up again.”

  “Yeah, in 1955.”

  “Doing what?”

  “Working for a place called Maximum Imports.”

  “Nico Constanza’s operation,” Silverman said immediately.

  “You’ve heard of him?”

  “Of course.”

  Frank took out his notebook. “Who is he, exactly, Constanza?”

  “He’s a douchebag,” Silverman said without hesitation. “He’s connected, and from time to time he’s been known to bring in some muscle to negotiate certain unpleasant labor difficulties. Years back he was just another little prick hanging around Broome Street in Little Italy. You know, watching the old guys play bocci, maybe running a few errands at the racetrack. Then he got into the trade by selling garment hangers. After that, he moved into manufacturing.” He smiled. “But like a lot of street thugs, he had trouble controlling himself. One day he personally did a number on one of our people. It so happened that we had a D.A. who owed us a favor, and so Constanza bit off two years. He broke rocks for eighteen months, then hit the streets again.”

  “But not for long,” Frank said.

  Silverman’s smile widened. “So, you heard.”

  “Something about the IRS.”

  “Oh, yeah,” Silverman said cheerfully. “That miserable fuck went to Atlanta on an eight-year rap. Did four. Then got iced by some psycho in the communal shower.” His eyes brightened. “You can imagine how greatly he was mourned.” He finished off the hot dog. “How long did the woman work for him?”

  “Until 1968.”

  “When he went to the federal penitentiary in Atlanta.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Then what’d she do?”

  “She signed on with Imalia Covallo.”

  Silverman’s eyes drifted over to the sea. “Is that who you’re working for?”

  “Yes.”

  “What’s her interest?”

  “Hannah was an old employee,” Frank said. “Miss Covallo wants her to have a decent burial.”

  “She has a heart of gold,” Silverman said.

  “You know something different?”

  Silverman shook his head. “Not really. As far as we know, she runs a pretty clean operation. For the rag trade.”

  “Meaning what?”

  “That it’s a nasty world, Frank,” Silverman said. “And when the profit margin is risky and the labor costs are high, well, things get pushed and shoved a little.”

  “Does Covallo do any pushing?”

  “No more than most,” Silverman said. “Maybe even a little less. Like I told you, she’s as clean as they come, I guess.” He drained the last of the beer, then set the bottle down on the wooden bench beside him.

  “But no better?” Frank asked.

  Silverman looked at him. “Why should you expect her to be? It’s the way of the world, my friend. You live in a snake pit, you become a snake.” His eyes swept back to the open sea as he laughed bitterly. “You take that little shit-stick who showed us around that sweatshop today; you take him, for example. He’s got nothing but that stinking little job. He doesn’t live much better than those wetbacks he pushes around. Hell, he probably lives in the same neighborhood they do. Coming home from the shop, he’ll probably get mugged by the same psycho. But it doesn’t matter. He’s Cavanaugh’s boy. If Cavanaugh ended up in a car trunk on President Street—you know what I mean, Frank, with a little hole going in and a big hole going out—why, he’d probably cry his fucking eyes out. But if ten illegals drop dead on the floor, he doesn’t want to know from that.”

  He turned away suddenly, as if in disgust, took a deep breath, then let his eyes wander from the sea back to the whirling rides behind him. “That’s what people want, for Christ’s sake,” he said vehemently as he pointed toward the rides. “That’s all they fucking want, just to go to the park with the kids, spend a few bucks without having to think about every goddamn penny.” He looked at Frank. “Is that so much, for God’s sake?”

  “No.”

  Silverman stood up quickly and headed down the board-walk.

  “Back in my day, this whole place was nothing but Jews,” he said as Frank stepped up to him. “Like the rag trade, nothing but Jews.” He stepped over to a garbage can, dropped the bottle into it, then moved on, slowly ambling toward the great steel chaos of the Cyclone. “And when it changed,” he added, “the trade and the neighborhood, I got to tell you, it bothered me a little. But, you know, when I was a kid, my father used to read me this speech from Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice, that part about ‘hath not a Jew’ this, ‘hath not a Jew’ that? You know, feelings, hungers. Well, I just put something in the place of Jew. Hath not a spic this, hath not a chink that? And that’s all I had to do to get my heart back again.”

  Frank nodded slowly, then looked up and saw the cars of the Cyclone as they made their first thundering plunge, and as they fell, it seemed to him that the individual screams of each separate person on it blended seamlessly into one long, unending cry.

  The library of the American Garment Workers was cluttered, but Silverman clearly knew his way around it.

  “We got all the old issues of the union paper here,” he said as he pointed to a long line of gray metal shelves. “And we have a lot of correspondence.” He pointed to the opposite wall, where scores of filing cabinets were lined up. “Over there, we keep newspaper
clippings by year and topic.” He walked over to a green metal door. “And in here, we keep the old contracts and stuff.” He waved his hand. “But for starters, we can check on the sisters the way Benny checked on Hannah.” He stepped over to a small desk in the back corner of the room and placed his fingers on the computer keyboard. “Give me their names again,” he said.

  “Naomi Kovatnik,” Frank said.

  “Okay, just a second,” Silverman said as he began to type.

  Frank stepped behind him and watched the monitor.

  For an instant, it went blank, then a message appeared.

  NO RECORD FOR NAME. CHECK SPELLING.

  Silverman looked at Frank. “Got any other names for her?” he asked.

  “No.”

  “Was she ever married?”

  “I think she was,” Frank said. “But I haven’t been able to run it down.”

  “Okay,” Silverman said with a quick shrug. “How about the other sister?”

  “Gilda Kovatnik,” Frank said.

  “G-I-L-D-A,” Silverman repeated quietly as he typed in the name.

  Again the screen sputtered for a moment, then her name appeared in small amber letters.

  “There it is,” Silverman said. He leaned forward. “Says she was a member in good standing until 1936.” He looked at Frank. “That’s when she left.”

  “Left what?”

  “The union.”

  “That’s the same year as Hannah,” Frank said. “Did she leave voluntarily?”

  “Yes,” Silverman told him. “She probably went into another line.” He hit a single key, and the screen sputtered once again. “Never joined the union again.” He pointed to the lower righthand corner of the screen. “There’s one other thing,” he said.

  Frank leaned toward the screen. “What?”

  “She’s dead.”

  Frank stared at the small D at the edge of the screen, then the date which had been written beside it: SEPTEMBER 12, 1954. Just beneath it, there was a final entry, PD: SAN JORGE COLOMBIA.

  “What does that ‘PD’ mean?” Frank asked immediately.

  “Place of death,” Silverman told him.

  Frank took out his notebook and quickly wrote it down. “How do you know she died?”

  Silverman hit another key. “Yeah, that’s what I figured,” he said, almost to himself.