Dollface: A Novel of the Roaring Twenties (25 page)

“Stop it!” I screamed as I grabbed his arm.

“Stay out of it, Vera.” He shrugged me off and struck her again.

I still had the carving knife in my hand and like a reflex, I charged toward him and plunged the knife into his rear end. It all happened so fast and the blade went in so easily. It cut through his trousers and skin like it was nothing. The salami had been harder to slice up than Izzy’s ass.

Izzy let out a scream and I yanked the blade out as he whipped around. “You fuckin’ bitch!” He drew back his hand, fingers balled in a fist, ready to let me have it.

I looked him in the eye. “C’mon, Izzy, hit me. Hit me and Shep’ll kill you. Go ahead, Izzy. I dare you to.” I taunted him, dancing the knife before him in a lazy airward crazy-eight. “C’mon—”

“Vera, no!” Evelyn got up off the floor. Blood trickled from her nose and mouth.

Izzy held his ass, staring at me, speechless. I had him and he knew it. He knew he couldn’t touch me.

“Now, I want you to apologize to me and then you’re going to apologize to Evelyn. And I swear, if you ever say another disrespectful word to her—if you ever lay another hand on her—I’ll come back and slice your balls off.” I stopped the knife’s slow dance. I looked at it for a second. It was already tinged with his blood and I inched it closer to him. I don’t think I ever blinked.

“Vera, don’t!” Evelyn was at my side, begging.

Without taking my eyes off Izzy, I shouted, “Say it! Say you’re sorry.”

He studied the knife and rolled his eyes.

“Say it, goddammit!”
I moved the blade in closer.

He mumbled something. Could have been an apology or, knowing Izzy, an obscenity.

“I didn’t hear that.” I touched the blade to his shirt collar.

“I said I’m sorry. Okay?”

“Now tell her.”

“It’s okay, Vera,” Evelyn cried. “He didn’t mean anything by it.”

“No, Evelyn! It’s
not
okay!” I grabbed a vase—the first thing I could find—and slammed it to the ground. “It’s not okay at all. Now, Izzy, tell her. Tell her you’re sorry.”

His eyes moved from mine to the blade before he jerked his chin away. “Sorry.”

“Louder!” I swooped in with the tip of the knife under his chin. One move and I’d pierce his throat.

“I fuckin’ said I’m sorry.”

“Now tell her you’re a piece of shit. And you don’t deserve her.” I raised the knife higher, nicking him so that a pinprick of blood sprouted on his chin.
“Say it!”

“I’m-a-piece-of-shit-and-I-don’t-deserve-her.”

“Evelyn, c’mon.” I threw the knife onto the table, reached for her hand, and pulled her close. “You’re coming home with me.”

GUN MOLLS ON PARADE

T
he trial got under way right after Labor Day, and just like with the hearing, Shep had asked me not to come down to the courthouse. It was agonizing to stay away, but again he said he didn’t want me subjected to the prosecution’s lies. All day I’d wait for news, for updates of any kind, but by the time Shep came home at night, he said he didn’t want to talk about it.

During the first days of the trial, we sat silently through dinners—pickled tongue with green beans, beef croquettes with creamed corn, a rack of lamb with scalloped potatoes—recipes that I’d spent the day preparing in hopes of distracting myself. When we did talk, it was nonsense.

“I heard the Farmer’s Almanac is predicting the worst winter in over a decade,” I said one night, leaning over to wipe the creamed yams off Hannah’s fingers. “Isn’t that something?”

Shep nodded, pushing a clump of meat around with his fork. “I guess we should brace ourselves for a rough couple of months.”

I leaned back in my chair and glanced at my plate. “Yeah, it’s going to be a bad one.” I stabbed a piece of brisket but couldn’t bring myself to eat it. Instead, I set my fork down with a loud clank. Hannah let out a quick shriek and went back to sticking her fingers in her yams.

Shep tossed his napkin onto the table and scooped up Hannah, sucking the creamed yams off her fingers one at a time, making her giggle so that her belly shook.

I pushed my plate away and cradled my head in my hands. I couldn’t look at the two of them just then.

“Remind me,” Shep said, “I need to ask the neighbors to trim their hedges back.”

I looked up. “Dammit, Shep! I don’t want to talk about the neighbors’ hedges! You have to let me in. You have to tell me what’s happening.”

“Relax.” He set Hannah back down even as she continued to grope for him, her fingers outstretched and straining. She wanted more of him. So did I.

“Everything’s under control,” he said, reaching for his wineglass, draining it with one gulp. “We’ve got nothing to worry about.”

But all I did was worry. In the days that followed, time passed in slow motion. The ticking of the kitchen clock pounded into my skull like a hammer; the shrill of the telephone made my heart stop.

Not knowing that my husband was on trial, committee members called nonstop with details for the luncheon that was coming up at the end of the month. I tried to focus but I couldn’t concentrate. Meanwhile Barbara and some of the others from the JWC invited me to play bridge or else join them for coffee. I made excuses, took rain checks, and feigned sore throats and headaches. I couldn’t pretend that all was fine and I wouldn’t dare speak about Shep’s trial outside our circle. The boys had managed to keep it out of the newspapers and even my own mother didn’t know what was going on. The only ones I turned to were the women who knew me best.

The girls did whatever they could to distract me, keeping me busy with shopping sprees or Walnut Room lunches and double features at the movie house. And more shopping. I distracted myself with one purchase after another, foolish things I didn’t want or need: an extra set of china, crystal candlestick holders, new linens and a telephone table with an attached chair, along with dresses and shoes, hats and pocketbooks.

Evelyn came by one day after I’d put Hannah down for her nap. She brought me the new issue of
Vogue
and a box of my favorite peanut brittle.

“What’s all this?” she asked, looking at the racks of cookies and pies I’d baked the night before and earlier that morning.

“You should see what’s in the icebox.”

She peeked inside. “Who’s going to eat all this?” Earlier in the week I’d made stuffed peppers, a standing rib roast, deviled eggs and two gelatin molds.

“I’m sick of shopping, and cooking’s the only thing that’s keeping me sane right now.” I had
The Metropolitan Cook Book
along with
Mrs. Wilson’s Cook Book
and half a dozen others sprawled out across the kitchen table. The radio was on, but I wasn’t paying any attention to the program.

“What are you looking for?”

“Trying to find a recipe for pull taffy. I just saw it the other day,” I said, leafing forward and back, scanning through the pages.

“You know how to make taffy?”

“Of course not, but it’ll give us something to do— Ah!” I marked my place with my finger. “Found it.”

I cleared away the other cookbooks and looped an apron over Evelyn’s head, tying it behind her waist.

“Well”—she turned to face me, arms out to her sides—“how do I look?”

“Like a real
balabusta
,” I said with a smile. “A real Yiddishe homemaker.”

Evelyn peered over my shoulder while I mixed the sugar, corn syrup and butter in a saucepan. While it boiled, I took down two glasses and poured us each a drink.

“You’re drinking an awful lot these days,” she said.

“Not as much as I’m shopping and cooking!” I clinked my glass to hers.

We sat and made small talk and smoked cigarettes until it was time for the water test. “Come.” I motioned for her as I spooned a droplet of the taffy mixture into a cold glass of water and waited for a ball to form. “Does that look like a hard ball or a soft ball to you?” I asked, rolling the mixture between my fingers.

“What’s it supposed to be?”

“A hard ball.”

“Then I say it’s a hard ball.”

“If this doesn’t work, it’s your fault,” I said, removing the taffy from the stove to let it cool.

We went back to the table and I poured another drink. “So how’s Izzy?” I asked.

“I was wondering how long it was going to take you to ask about him.”

Evelyn had wasted no time getting back together with him. Though we never discussed it, I knew she resented me for stabbing him. After that incident she stayed in our guest room for two days. Two lousy days was all it took before she crawled back to that bastard.

“Ready to pull some taffy?” I asked when the mixture had cooled down. I took a clump of butter and slapped it into her hands. “Butter up, baby!”

Reaching into the saucepan, I took out the blob of taffy and plopped it into Evelyn’s slippery hands. “Now just stand still.” I grabbed a fistful of taffy and while she held on to it, I started stepping backward until I was about two feet away.

Over and over again we did that, stepping farther apart each time, until I was on the other side of the kitchen and the taffy looked like a giant wad of chewing gum. It began to sag in the middle and almost touched the floor. I dived in to save it, landing on my rear end. Evelyn plopped down on the kitchen floor beside me, giggling as she held her half of the taffy up over her head. It was the first time I’d laughed in days, maybe weeks. We were howling, doubled over, holding our sides, and in the middle of all this, my laughter turned to tears. I dropped the taffy on the floor and broke down and sobbed.

•   •   •

B
y week two of the trial, Shep was in good spirits. He waltzed through the front door that Monday night, wrapped his arms around me, and gave me a deep kiss. “The defense busted the prosecution’s case wide open,” he said, moving over to the bar to pour himself a drink. “Now we just have to go through the motions. But this’ll all be over within a week, Dollface, and we can get back to normal.”

Normal.
Now, that was a relative term.

The Jewish Women’s Council luncheon was just a week away, and feeling optimistic about Shep’s case, I threw myself into the final planning stages. I met with the committee heads, reviewed menus and seating charts, inventoried all the donated items for the auction, and telephoned the wealthiest Jewish women in Chicago to remind them about the event.

On day ten of the trial, I was walking home from a meeting at the Palmer House Hotel where we had reviewed the details for the luncheon. It was a crisp autumn day, and I thought I’d take the long way home and stroll along the lakeshore. I’d always found the waves washing up along Oak Street Beach to be soothing, relaxing.

I passed by the newspaper boy on the corner of Michigan and Walton. He was holding up the afternoon edition, waving the
Chicago Tribune
in the air for all to see. One look and my heart stopped.

Shep’s picture was on the front page. I reached for a newspaper and my mouth went dry.
Assault . . . Carrying a concealed weapon . . . Transporting illegal liquor . . . Attempted murder
 . . . I couldn’t finish the article and set the paper back on the stack. I walked away briskly and then broke into a run.

The next morning, after I’d tried to explain what could not be reasonably explained to my mother, I hung up, and two minutes later the telephone rang again. It was Adele Markey on the line.

“What do you mean, you have concerns about the luncheon?” I was distracted, wrestling with Hannah on my hip, who was reaching for the teddy bear I’d set on the table when I answered the telephone. Hannah was at that stage where she was getting into everything and I was afraid that if I set her down I wouldn’t be able to keep an eye on her. “What kind of concerns do you have, Adele?”

“Well, are you still planning on attending the luncheon?”

“Of course I am.” I laughed and hoisted Hannah up further on my hip. “Why wouldn’t I be attending?”

“Well . . .” She sighed.

“What’s this all about, Adele?”

“I don’t know how else to put this, but, well . . . I’ve heard it from several of the members. . . . If you’re going to be at the luncheon, we should expect cancellations.”

“What? Why?” I set the baby bottle back down on the table.

There was a long pause. I pictured her standing in her dark, cavernous hallway where her telephone sat on the mahogany table.

“Adele, who said they wouldn’t go?”

“All of them.”

Another long pause hung on the line. I couldn’t speak.

“Vera, you have to understand. . . . This business with your husband . . . It’s not good for the council’s image.”

“But Shep hasn’t done anything wrong. It’s all a bunch of nonsense. He’s being falsely accused.”

“That very well may be true, but it’s been all over the newspapers and the radio, too. I’m afraid we just can’t tolerate that sort of association with the Jewish Women’s Council.”

“And if I cancel?”

“Then the other members said they would be happy to attend the luncheon.”

“But I chaired this event. I’ve planned the whole thing.” Hannah was wiggling in my arms, straining for her teddy bear.

“I’m sorry, but the members are just too afraid to let that sort of element into the council.”

“Afraid? Afraid of what?”

“Vera, the Jewish Women’s Council doesn’t associate with gangsters. I’m sorry.”

After Adele Markey hung up, I was stunned. I dropped the telephone and almost dropped Hannah as she lunged for her bear on the table. It was as if I’d been struck with polio or influenza. I was infected. Guilt by association. I hoisted Hannah up higher in my arms and held her as close as I could. As soon as I felt her tiny arms cling to me, my eyes went blurry.

My one chance to prove myself and it had been pulled out from under me. I wanted to blame Shep, but that wasn’t fair. But if not Shep, then whose fault was it? The very person who had propped me up in this town had also knocked me down.

•   •   •

T
he girls stopped by the house that afternoon to check on me and as soon as I let them inside, they knew something was wrong. Something beyond just the trial.