Wild Card

Izzie could not get Betty out of his mind. Trying to track his beloved down, he’d called around Nyack, and discovered she was renting a one room apartment over a butcher shop with freezing cold floors. He got her number from information, and called her every night. Most times, Betty cursed him and slammed down the phone. Once, she’d tortured him by talking dirty, then hung up. She could be rotten like that, but Izzie still missed her. He decided to send her a present. Not just any present, but a true expression of his love. Slipping out of the house in Ventnor one morning while Josh and Seymour were asleep, he drove up and down Atlantic Avenue until he found a pawnshop. The store was called Goldfarb’s, and could have given Fort Knox a lesson in security. Iron bars on the windows, multiple surveillance cameras, a burly armed guard by the door. The owner was a Rumpelstiltskin-like character named Herbie.

“What’s your pleasure?” Herbie asked.

Izzie placed a stack of hundred dollar bills on the counter. Herbie riffled the stack with his thumb to make sure they were all real.

“I’m looking for something special for my girlfriend,” Izzie said.

“She must be quite a lady.”

“She itches where I can’t scratch,” Izzie explained.

Herbie disappeared behind a beaded curtain. When he returned, he was carrying a metal strong box. It was heavy, and he placed it on the counter with a grunt, then popped the lid. Inside was a collection of the most beautiful jewelry Izzie had ever seen.

“Do you ship?” Izzie asked.

Two days later, he phoned Betty. This time, she’d wanted to talk.

“I can’t believe you bought this for me. It’s so beautiful,” she cooed.

Izzie was sitting in the second floor bedroom of the rented house with the phone pressed to his ear. He could hear the ice melting from his beloved’s voice. He had sent Betty a spectacular diamond bracelet along with a pair of fur-lined slippers.

“I wanted you to know how I felt,” he said.

“How many diamonds does it have?”

“Thirty-five.”

She purred into the phone. “One for every year.”

Izzie knew she was older than that, but played along. “That’s right.”

“Are they all real?”

“They sure are. No glass for you, baby.”

“And the metal. Is it silver?”

“Platinum.”

“God. It must have cost a small fortune.”

“It’s hot, so the guy gave me a good price.”

Betty screamed so loud that Izzie had to pull the phone away from his ear.

“You sent me a hot bracelet?”

“Yeah,” Izzie replied. “Whatta you think, I got it from Tiffany’s?”

Betty called him a fucking asshole and slammed down the phone.

Izzie went downstairs feeling lower than a snake’s belly. This long-distance romancing wasn’t working. He needed to drive to Nyack and see Betty, and apologize to her before she tore a hole out of his heart as big as Manhattan.

The first floor was jumping. He and his brothers had brought home a dozen suckers from the casino, and everyone was drinking and smoking and having a good time. They had expanded their operation to include a pool table, which doubled as a craps table, and a second card table, where the suckers could play each other before Izzie cleaned them out. He found Josh in the kitchen fixing a tray of sandwiches. His brother looked worried.

“What’s eating you?” Izzie asked.

Josh said, “Whose idea was it to invite that guy Vinny Acosta?”

“Mine. He’s got a ton of money. And he’s dumb as a fence post.”

“He’s a scary guy. I want to get rid of him.”

“His money’s as green as anyone else’s. Leave Vinny to me,” Izzie said.

By four A.M., all of the suckers had left the house except for Vinny Acosta. He was a scary guy, about six-two and two hundred and fifty pounds, with a nose turned sideways, slicked back hair, and a way of looking at you that made your skin crawl. Vinny had gotten drunk, sat down in front of the TV, and started watching a new cable station called ESPN that showed crazy stuff like sumo wrestling and log rolling. At four, a college basketball game came on, and Vinny killed the set, and came over to the card table where Izzie, Josh and Seymour were sitting.

“Basketball is for fags,” Vinny declared, throwing down a wad of cash. “Let’s play cards.”

Izzie whistled through his teeth. “What did you do, rob a bank?”

“None of your fucking business. Deal ‘em.”

Izzie shuffled the deck sitting on the table, and had Vinny give them a cut. Vinny was watching him like a hawk, and Izzie knew not to try and switch a deck on him. Instead, he held the deck over his Zippo lighter, and sailed cards around the table. It was called using a shiner, and let him see every card as it was dealt. He memorized only one hand — Vinny’s — and signaled it to his brothers when he was finished dealing. If Vinny was strong, they would all drop out. If not, Vinny would be raised and cleaned out.

Vinny had a pair of 7's. Izzie signaled the hand to his brothers, then glanced at Josh. His brother was sweating. Vinny had him spooked.