Carriage Trade by Stephen Birmingham

Author:Stephen Birmingham
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781504026338
Publisher: Open Road Media

“We got a hundred and fifty big ones from your old lady,” he said that evening. “We’re on our way, Silas baby, we’re on our way!”

“Si,” he said. “I think I’d rather be called Si.”

“Whatever you say, pal. But we got a hundred and fifty big ones from the old lady. A hundred and fifty big ones—and a hat.” He tossed the pink-and-white hatbox onto Silas Tarkington’s sofa.

“Watch it, Moe!” Si snapped. “My mother puts a lot of work into those hats of hers!”

“Aw, come off it, Si. Shit. It’s just a hat the old lady couldn’t sell.”

“And stop calling my mother the old lady!”

Moe Minskoff stared hard at his friend. “What’s with you, pal?” he said. “You got a wild hair up your ass or something?”

“I don’t like the way you’re talking about my mother.”

“Shit. You never gave a shit about your old lady, and she never gave a shit about you.”

“She just gave you a hundred and fifty thousand bucks, didn’t she?”

“Shit. That was because I promised her a nine percent return on her money and some rent-free space in our store.”

“She’s still my mother, and that’s still her money—and she gave you that for my store, not our store.”

“Your store, our store, what’s the diff? I still got the dough out of the old lady.”

“I said stop calling her that, Moe!”

“Jeez,” Moe said. “What’s all this mother shit all of a sudden? She never once came to see you in the joint.”

“That was because she was too busy—working to make a living for her family.”

“So all of a sudden she’s the Virgin Mary? She was too busy gettin’ it off with Weiss, the tooth doctor, is what it was. He was drillin’ her in more ways than one, that’s for sure.”

“Shut up, Moe!”

“You shoulda seen how her eyes lit up when I mentioned that fucker’s name.”

“I said shut up!”

“Jeez,” he said. “I get you a hundred and fifty big ones from your old lady, and I get this shit. Some gratitude I get. Some thanks.”

“You can take your hundred and fifty big ones and blow them out of that big fat ass of yours, one by one!”

Moe Minskoff’s eyes narrowed to tiny slits. “Come off it, pal,” he said. “Don’t give me no shit. I know what you’re pissed off about. I know you like a book. It’s not me calling your old lady your old lady, is it? Shit, no. It’s because you wouldn’t have shit if it weren’t for your old lady and your old man. Here’s you, Mr. Big Shot, quittin’ school and sayin’ you’re gonna make a million bucks, like Mr. John Jacob Astor. What happens to you? You wind up with zip to ten in the slammer. What happens to the old man and the old lady? They end up makin’ the million makin’ and sellin’ ladies’ hats! They amounted to somethin’, and you didn’t amount to a shit sandwich. That hurts, doesn’t it, pal? That’s a tough booger to swallow, ain’t

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