Harlem Shuffle(19)
The last time Carney had this many people in his office was that odd afternoon when he confronted the very laws of physics: how to get the goddamned convertible sleeper out of the basement. The sofa had been left there by Gabe Newman, the previous tenant, before he split town. Obviously Newman had carried the orange sleeper in through the metal grate in the sidewalk, or down the stairs through the trapdoor in the office. Unless he’d used a matter transporter machine, like in that movie The Fly, or a voodoo spell, unlikely propositions. But no one could figure out how to get it out, not Carney and not the four Italian men from Argent, who needed the room to finish the spring delivery. They heaved and grunted. The oversize sofa did not break down, it did not yield, it refused to clear both sets of stairs no matter what ancient, time-honored furniture-moving tricks they tried. Profanity provided no solace. The afternoon ground on and Carney got the fire ax and chopped the fucker up. It was an off-model and thoroughly unloved. The whole thing remained a mystery.
Now men had assembled in the office again and it was only a matter of time before they turned their attention to that other thing that didn’t fit: Carney. He hoped the ax wouldn’t make a return appearance.
A siren approached, crawling east down 125th Street. No one moved until they were sure it was a fire engine and not a cruiser. They were hard men, and then some breeze came along and they got scared their little match might blow out.
Miami Joe loosened his tie. It was hot. The fan wasn’t much use. “What I want to know is,” talking to Carney again, “can you handle what we got? I never heard of you before Freddie put your name in. Small-time or what—I don’t know shit about you.”
The man had a point, more than he knew. For Carney was not a fence.
Yes, a percentage of his showroom was stolen. TVs, radios back when he could still unload them, tasteful modern lamps, and other small appliances in perfect condition. He was a wall between the criminal world and the straight world, necessary, bearing the load. But when it came to precious metals and gems, he was more of a broker. Freddie came into his office with stuff, and Carney hoofed it downtown to Canal and his man Buxbaum. Buxbaum pulled out his loupe and scale, appraised the goods, and gave Carney fifty cents on the dollar to give to Freddie. Carney got five percent out of Buxbaum’s cut. It allowed the Jew to serve colored clientele without going uptown, without meeting them at all, and it gave Freddie—and the few local characters who came in with gem-encrusted bracelets or silver—another outlet for their goods, away from the Harlem drama.
Carney didn’t go into what happened to the rings and necklaces after his cousin brought them in. Freddie never asked, same way Carney never asked where they came from. If he believed Carney had secret supply lines to the midtown and Canal Street diamond districts, so be it. If it took Carney a day to come up with the cash, he was good for it. They were blood. These men in Carney’s office, however, were not blood, and they were not going to hand over hundreds of thousands of dollars in stones to a stranger and trust that their fifty cents on the dollar was “on the way.” Plus Buxbaum couldn’t carry that weight, far as Carney knew.
The last hour, Carney had been working on how to get out of this mess. He said, “I sell furniture. People come in off the street, look around, decide to buy somewhere else, that’s business. If you want to go to someone else, I don’t take it personally.”
Miami raised an eyebrow.
Arthur said, “Huh.”
Pepper looked Carney over. He leaned forward on the ottoman, alert and stiff. As if perched on a crate of moonshine in a backwoods shack, revenue agents barreling up the driveway, and not on a new Headley with sumptuous, space-age fill. He didn’t let Carney off the hook. “He knows, he’s in.”
Freddie said, “He’s solid. I told you.”
Carney had sounded too indifferent. Folks mistook that for confidence sometimes. In the store, his job was to nudge people into doing what they didn’t know they wanted to do—lay down a couple hundred on a new dinette, say. That was a different matter than convincing them to do the opposite. The crew had come here to reassure themselves of their decisions. He made a note to correct his pitch; it would come in handy the next time Elizabeth tut-tutted one of his ideas or May demanded an extra scoop of ice cream. He’d have to satisfy himself with making it through the meeting in one piece.
The safecracker dismissed the class. “We keep our mouths shut,” Arthur said, “see how it shakes out. Then divvy it up like we planned.” Miami Joe never closed a job unless he was satisfied they were free and clear. Putting off the split was sometimes a problem with the crew, but Arthur was known as a good thief, steady all around, and they trusted him to hold the loot until Monday. Give Chink Montague some time to get distracted with other business, the cops time to move on to another case to botch.
Four days, unless Chink Montague rooted one of them out and they put Carney’s name out there.
Four days for Carney to come up with an angle.
SIX
“See how quiet it is?” Leland said. “The dealer says it has one of those new compressors.”
The Westinghouse was bolted into the parlor window. Carney had never seen an air conditioner in someone’s house before; according to Leland Jones, theirs was the first on the block, though his father-in-law was a shameless exaggerator. They crowded around the unit’s plastic grille, Elizabeth up front flapping her face with her hands. She’d almost fainted that morning and a treatment was in order. May sneezed as the sweat on her body cooled. Carney had to admit it felt good.