North River (2007) by Pete Hamill

Author:Pete Hamill [Hamill, Pete]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: FIC000000
ISBN: 9780316006583
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
Published: 2007-06-10T12:00:00+00:00

Before they reached the subway, Rose had begun to totter awkwardly on her high-heeled boots.

“Ooof,” Rose said. “It was easier walking in these at the shoe store.”

“We can get a cab,” Delaney said. “Or we can go home.”

“No. A cab costs too much. Let’s go.”

They moved on to the subway.

Her hobbling was worse as they walked toward the crowd around the cathedral on Fifth Avenue, with the RCA Building rising across the street, high above its incomplete neighbors in Rockefeller Center. Under her hat, Rose was now wide-eyed, seeing actresses in mink stepping out of limousines, their skin tanned from Florida or California, and the Tammany pols moving somberly up the steps of the cathedral wearing black armbands, and some of the old ballplayers moving among them, big and wide-shouldered in camel’s hair coats. Carlito was between Delaney and Rose, each of his hands held tightly in the thickening human swarm. He seemed awed, perhaps even frightened, by the size of the ballplayers and the sight of more human beings than he’d ever seen in one place, even Grand Central. Suddenly Delaney was nervous too. In this crowd, a knife would be better than a gun. Silently jammed into belly or back. Some random hoodlum, maybe even Gyp Pavese himself. Spotting them in the crowd, striking, then hurrying to Club 65 for a payday. He gripped the boy’s hand and glanced around. Rose squinted at him, as if sensing his thoughts.

“Don’t worry,” she said, using a shoulder to force a way through the gawkers.

Reporters and photographers were everywhere, scribbling notes or aiming Speed Graphics, attending the arrivals of saloon royalty. Delaney recognized old bootleggers and stagedoor Johnnies and Ziegfeld girls and at least one woman who was a famous madam. There were men in shabby clothes among them, brothers of those human ruins that Delaney had seen so often on breadlines or on house calls. Some were wiping at tears with their coat sleeves. Weeping for McGraw. Perhaps for themselves when young.

Rose took Delaney’s ruined arm as they came closer to the steps, her hand holding him tight, and she lifted the boy and whispered to him, calming him with her soothing tone. On the top steps, Delaney saw Danny Shapiro, pressed back into uniformed duty for the day, his lean face alert, his dark eyes scanning the crowd. Shapiro pointed at Delaney and gestured to himself, and they nudged their way to him, and Shapiro got them into the cathedral.

“You’re on your own now, Doc,” Shapiro said, and laughed. “I’m a Dodger fan and a Jew. I can’t help with anything else in this ballpark.”

They stood with others against the back wall, Delaney gazing down the empty center aisle, which awaited the pallbearers and the coffin. As they arrived, each man removed his hat, some holding them to their chests, others letting them dangle from their hands. Delaney placed his fedora over his heart. There were many bald heads in the cathedral now and women with white gloves. To

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