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Charlie’s bloodied hand had been the first thing he noticed.
“There’s another fifty in the car,” Charlie flexes his fingers, assessing the damage, before balling up his stained handkerchief and setting it on the safe to fetch his drink.
“They’re Ingersolls.” He says as if this would please Meyer somehow.
“I wish you would stop with this. We schlep around with a box of watches, what do we look like?” He grouses. All that needless energy spent over something they had no use for.
Charlie’s been doing this since they were kids. Coming to him with split knuckles or a wide smile, sometimes both, and presenting Meyer with whatever trinket he’d managed to pilfer. Pocket watches, rings, cigarette cases, one time a pair of reading glasses (Charlie had said he didn’t want him going blind hunched over “all them books” and Meyer didn’t have the heart to explain that it didn’t work that way). When they fell in with AR, Charlie graduated from mere pickpocketing and the gifts became more extravagant. New pairs of Wingtips, silk ties, and cufflinks. The watches remained a constant, though. Meyer didn’t know if it was out of habit or if Charlie just liked them best. He wanted to refuse them all. Charlie didn’t need to impress him, not anymore, but whenever Meyer put him off Charlie would fix him with that wide-eyed, hangdog look, and well...he could hardly say no to that.
“Fellas who know what time it is.” Charlie grins, but the way he fidgets communicates something hesitant and unsure. Like most things that go unspoken between them, Meyer is somehow able to infer exactly what Charlie’s asking. Did I do good?
It occurs to him in that moment that over all these years, he’s been the sole recipient of what he considered to be Charlie’s misguided generosity. Sometimes Benny would move to take something Meyer insisted he didn’t want and Charlie would snatch it back with a snarl.
“I didn’t go through all this trouble on account of you.” He would say, and in his next breath he’d call Meyer an ungrateful little prick.
Meyer unwittingly thinks back on his upstairs neighbor, Karel, in the tenements. He was an educated man, a professor maybe, before he came to America. Meyer would sit out on the fire escape when the weather permitted, and listen to the warbled, tinny music that would filter out from his open window that faced the alley. Chopin, Vivaldi, Schubert. One day, he’d invited Meyer inside, out of the cold. He gave him mulled wine and spiced cookies. He put on another record.
“I like this one.” Meyer hummed appreciatively.
“Ah, Rossini. I had no idea I would be entertaining such a man of taste.” Karel said, and sat heavily in a worn wingback chair. “La gazza ladra, The Thieving Magpie. Do you know any Italian?”
“Some. I’m learning.” Meyer didn’t say that it was more out of necessity than anything.
Karel beamed. “Wonderful! Would you like to know the story?” Meyer nodded. “A grand party is being thrown for the village hero, a solider returned from battle, and he’s in love with a lowly servant girl. During the festivities, some silver goes missing, and the girl is accused. The mayor is called in to investigate, but he too is in love with the girl. When she rejects him, he imprisons her and sentences her to death. Fortunately, the other villagers notice that things have continued to go missing, and finally discover the true culprit. A magpie. And the girl’s life is spared. Do you know what a magpie is?”
“No, sir.”
“It’s a bird—highly intelligent, aggressive, too. They’re reputed to collect shiny objects, they line their nests with them. Makes them a good foil for an opera, I suppose.”
“Why would a bird do something like that?”
“Why else, dear boy?” Karel laughed. “To attract a mate.”
The memory makes something hot prickle at the back of his neck. Was that it? Was this all some kind of ritual courtship on Charlie’s part? He can feel himself flushing, and he grits his teeth against a sudden wave of embarrassment. Charlie’s had just about every girl between East Houston and Henry Street and Meyer left a lot to be desired, in looks and most certainly in bedside manner. Although, he thought there had been moments. Moments when Charlie let his hand linger on his shoulder for longer than was strictly companionable. Where he’d offer Meyer the cigarette he’d already lit for himself, and when Meyer put it to his own lips, he’d catch Charlie’s eyes sweeping low to his mouth. Or sitting close enough to press himself along Meyer’s side as they’d count their earnings for the night—thighs, calves, ankles touching—molten points of contact.
Wishful thinking, stop this now.
“Might as well set up a push cart.” He mumbles, taking a fierce drag from his cigarette.
“Arnold Rothstein’s here.” Benny says bursting through the door, the fucking momser, but he’s right, and the panic that sets in takes precedence over anything else.
The rest would have to wait.