Havana

Chapter 17

There were things Frankie accepted. Being yelled at by a screaming old man who told him he was shit, he was nothing, he was so stupid his mother should be ashamed to have opened her legs for his father. That had happened enough times so that Frankie knew how to deal with it, which was just to close down, issue the aspects of contrition that would ultimately bore his punisher, and wait for it to blow over and go away.

But this was new. The little Jew man simply closed him out for the next few days. He, Frankie, ceased to exist. The world went on as if he were a ghost, an invisible man; nobody spoke, nobody acknowledged, nobody even let his shadow touch Frankie's, that's how deep the freeze was.

And the funny part: it hurt Frankie. It hurt him badly, in ways he still didn't know he could be hurt. And so he prayed. Not that he was a religious man, but he did have some notion of something Up There that he would have to answer to, and that cared little for the venal sins he had committed and would burn willingly for. But he wanted to face St. Peter unblemished by treachery. He wanted St. Peter to say, "Frankie, you've been a bad boy, but you always done what you were told and you never ratted nobody out, so by your lights you were a good man, a good gangster. All else is forgiven; only disloyalty may not be forgiven." He prayed for another chance, and possibly not much went on in the world that day, for God found time enough for Frankie, and allowed the little Jewish man with the sad face to forgive him.

"I am so sorry, sir."

"Don't call me sir, Frankie. I am no boss. I am a counselor and a friend and bent under responsibilities. Just call me Meyer."

"Yes, Meyer."

"You did so wrong. You were not supposed to drink or speak. You were not supposed to act out."

"Yes, Meyer."

"Frankie, these instructions were not pointless, arbitrary. I did not give them to amuse myself, do you realize that?"

"Yes, Meyer."

"When you say Meyer you are thinking sir. I can hear it in your voice. Say Meyer as if you mean Meyer."

"Yes, Meyer. Yes, Meyer."

"Better, by far. Now listen to me and think. Think!"

"Yes, Meyer."

"We cannot lose Cuba. We cannot. Absolutely. So much depends on Cuba. But Cuba is a strained balancing act. Our partners, though it is unsaid and unvouched for by document, are certain American corporations that also depend upon Cuba for rivers of money in the form of cheap sugar, labor and fruit, as well as real estate ventures and eventually offshore manufacturing. But these men are not our kind. They don't like our ways. The force we use to settle our problems scares them. Yet we need them."

"Yes, Meyer."

"They must be comfortable around us. They must see us as slightly comical versions of themselves, as capitalism gone raffish and exotic. We're from Damon Runyon, or out of the movies and played by Georgie Raft or Eddie Robinson or Humphrey Bogart. We're not squalid, violent, profane, quick-tempered. No, no, we're colorful, vivid, amusing rogues. We're stars and crime is our screen, do you see?"

"Yes, Meyer."

"Ben Siegel, of them all, he understood this. They loved him out there, and had he lived, he would have become a star, I'm convinced. He would have been on the television. Big, handsome, lovable, a lady's man. He would have been such an emissary from us to them. It's a crime he was killed so young."

Frankie knew God was being merciful today. He blinked back tears of thanks.

"Meyer, I know of Ben. Ben, Ben, Ben, he was my hero," he said. "How I loved him. Others loved DiMaggio, or Ted Williams, me, I loved Bennie. I wanted to meet him but he was taken from us before that could happen. I just want to be like him. That's always been my ambition."

"That pleases me. I loved that boy like a son and lit candles for him for a month in the Catholic church, though both of us are Jews. That's how much I loved him, and I had a need to show it. Someone shot him in the face while he read the papers, and some even say it was me who gave the order."

"I never believed it. It couldn't have been the great Meyer."

"It was not one of mine, or one of ours. It was from the outside, do you understand?"

"Meyer?"

"Yes."

"Not an excuse. But an explanation. Please, just this once."

Meyer considered. Then he said, "So explain a little."

"The man I was yelling at?"

"Yes, the congressman's bodyguard."

"Don't you know who he is?"

For once, Meyer had no real answer.

"Some thug," he said, "with a badge. That's all."

"Meyer, I heard it from one of the coupiers at Sans Souci, who recognized him. That's what's eating me. That's why I went all hot and cuckoo. He's the man in Hot Springs. Who punched Ben. Who became famous by punching Ben without warning. Ben swears to get him. Yet it's Ben who is shot, in the face, on his sofa. This big guy: he's the one, I tell you."

This struck Lansky in a curious way. He saw how well it fit together, what perfect sense it made, the Arkansas connection, the political connections, the size and apparent toughness of the bodyguard. A little flare of some passion he had never felt before suddenly coursed in shades of red through his mind.

"Think about it, Meyer. Please. Think about it. I won't mention it again. But the man who killed Ben Siegel… God has put him here, under our noses. What would you do with him?"

But in another second, Meyer was wise again. Something had changed, but he was wise.

"Never follow your feelings. That way is damnation. The business first. Always, the business first, and there's much to do here, and it must be done discreetly, yes, to solidify and indemnify our position."

"And then?"

"If it's him, if we know it's him."

"Yes."

"Then we kill the schmata. But always, business first. Then vengeance. Or, rather, justice. I could kill for that."