Florida Straits(15)

"Hello, Joey," he said. "Siddown."

The recognition should have made him very edgy, but Joey was so hard up for company that he barely let himself be bothered. "How you know my name?"

"This is a small town, Joey. Guy shows up, drives around in an El D with a New York tag, starts asking about bolita, starts talking to truckers, it gets noticed, people talk. And me, I'm a guy people talk to. No particular reason. Except I'm around, I'm available, I listen."

There was something strange about Bert's voice, something that Joey could not immediately place. Then he realized what it was. Bert sounded normal to him. "You from New York?"

"Yeah. Brooklyn. President Street."

"Whaddya know. Me, I'm from—"

"Astoria," Bert put in. "Right around Crescent Street."

Joey gave an uneasy little laugh. "You tryin' to make me, like, paranoid?"

"Joey," said the old man. He leaned back on his stool to give his young companion a chance to see him whole. "You really don't remember me? I guess I've really fucking aged."

Joey scanned the old man's long and loose-skinned face, and meanwhile Bert went on. "And if ya don't mind my saying so as an old family friend"—he pointed to the earpiece of Joey's sunglasses looped over his shirt pocket—"carrying your glasses that way, it makes you look like a pimp."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah," said Bert. "And speaking of which, if you're gonna pimp, try females. You might do better."

"You know about that." It wasn't a question, and Joey no longer sounded surprised.

"Small town, Joey. Very small town. But hey, that goes for every town. New York's the same. Joey, your father's a friend a mine, a business friend. And I knew your mother. A lovely woman. Plus which, I knew you, Joey, when you were a little kid. Four, five years old. Too little to remember, I guess. I useta see you inna park. You had the curliest hair of any kid there. You don't remember?"

The old man's lips were full and always moving, as if his teeth didn't set too comfortably in his gums. His ears were close to his head but big and soft, with fleshy lobes. His shirt was immaculate, with a pattern of white diamonds embossed on a white background, the starched wings of the collar as straight and even as the tail fins of a plane. "Bert," said Joey. "Bert." He screwed his face into deep-memory mode; then it unwound into a tentative smile. "Bert the Shirt?"

The old man give a quick and furtive glance around the virtually empty bar. "Piano, piano, Joey. That's not a name I'm known by anymore. It's just Bert d'Ambrosia, retiree."

"Bert," Joey repeated, like the name tasted good in his mouth. "Sure I remember. My mother liked you. Said you were a gentleman. And you always had hard candies in your pocket." Then Joey's face darkened and by primitive reflex he recoiled. "But hey, I thought you were dead."

"I was," said the old man casually, pulling the cherry out of his whiskey sour and nuzzling the fruit off its stem. Taking his time, he licked the froth from his lips and smiled.

Old people took a grim delight in talking about their ailments and operations, about their arteries hardening and their brains softening, their ankles swelling and their field of vision shrinking. In Florida these small epics of collapse and decay had become both an art form and a competitive sport, and Bert the Shirt d'Ambrosia had polished his delivery to the point where he was seldom beaten in the ghoulish contests. He had the best material, after all. Arthritis, phlebitis, prostate trouble, even cancer—these things couldn't hold a candle to a guy who'd actually died.

"Yeah, Joey, I was fucking dead. Scientifically, electronically dead. Morto, capeesh? Yeah. This was about eight years ago.

"You remember what the papers called the I-Beam Trial? Big-ass fucking trial. RICO. Construction racketeering, shit like that? They pulled in everybody. All the families. Some guys they booked, some guys they just subpoenaed. Big publicity splash. Well, a few guys didn't wanna go to court, remember? They faked angina, fainting spells, whatever.

"Me," Bert went on, "I went. I wasn't indicted. They were just yankin' my chain. I figured fuck 'em, they wanna put me on the stand, I can take the heat. Big mistake, Joey. I get to court, there's a million reporters on the steps, the prosecutors are in their best suits, cameras are in my face. I start not feeling good. I get clammy, my arms start to tingle. I get this tightness in my chest, and all I can think of is that it's like a fucking meatball rolling toward my heart. I'm thinking, Shirt, you asshole, all those big-ass steaks, all that booze, all those cigarettes, all that tension—now you're gonna die right here on the six o'clock news.