Silk Stockings -2

"Twirling Tops"

Twirling tops – the way that memory etched my memory of Revere Beach. Opening on to the northern end of Boston Harbor and bedecked with wooden coasters and elegant - at least in the mind of the holy unwashed - dance pavilions. Decked with enormous Victorian-eques style kiosks with which to part a rube from his money, with only the fleeting chance of resting a girl from her kisses. There was in fact action going on, in the bathrooms and far away from the hullabaloo of rides and dances. But I was the sort of person who did not know where these places were. But my face lied and spoke to others of the kind of knowing-know which intimated a deep understanding of the way things were.

Stand and people will race has to towards the incandescent amusements – there was a whiteness that hinted at an illicit kind of Quixotic gaiety. Things that do that were at least – untowards, and often - illegal. I looked at the streaming morass realizing that soon, but not very soon – we had plans. Wonderland would go from amusing people to exercising greyhounds. There was more money to be made that way - in its current form, you could only basically shill the entertainers, and they did not have much to give. The renters had enough reason not to pay for much at all, and they could hire some muscle as well as anyone could. But the racetrack meant that people who read greyhounds would happily pay a bit more money if it meant that the hound could show. Everybody was happy - bidders only made 60%, and the 40% could easily be shoveled into various different pockets. But it takes time to lean on enough politicians, and there must be studies to be faked. Once the building starts, to contractors who pay into the Kitty fund, all will go well.

That is why Tony and myself were here - to find some bits of dirt, which could be splayed on the newspapers. This would be done half a dozen times in a year, and eventually, there would be an outcry. Just as Scollay Square was to die in painful cuts - Revere Beach would be the playground of mob bosses to make money. The question was whether it going to be the Irish or Italian varieties. The beds were for the Irish, they had a lot of - as the New Yorkers said – chutzpah. I, of course, was hired by the other class of mobsters, because Nick in my case was not short for Nicholas.

“All of the beauty designed for ashes.” This was Tony’s opening line.

“I do not think about it.” There was a hush, and the summer breeze floated in with the breakers heaved in on the sand.

“You should because one day people will be lining up to smash Wonderland for dogs, just as we are lining them up to smash Wonderland with rides and swings.” Meaning, of course, the dance halls which now populated the soon-to-be expensive seafront. It was an arcade of flesh, to the one who mastered 'The Game' and its subsidiary bets on the side.

There was a splay of young flesh – the dames in dresses and silk stockings, the guys in sleek suits as if they were trying to seduce with a form of pseudo-dance. But this was the difference between the daylight and the nighttime: during the daylight, the guys wore T-shirts and jeans and would smoke whatever they could afford but at night they were dressed to the fines because their eyes were searching for the doll who could be persuaded. persuaded to do something anything that would make a story. But of course, that something was often very little indeed. Maybe Audrey would devastate the Louisiana coast but don’t think she would do the same for the bell that flew from your poll. But the hippiest tried while the bashful waited in the wings. We were waiting on the road. And it was closer than we knew.

And then through the cacophony of bodies I saw, for an instant, the slender but curved form. The curved form that I had seen in the Tam. But then it was gone.

Instead young men were plastering themselves in my face and the verbiage from their lips is not to be mentioned in a family-friendly outlet.

Then one young man, with a slick back hair in a quiff, laid eyes upon me. “What you lookin’ at the square?” It was not true, and it was not a compliment. But my cheeks were stone-faced, and I had a poker face.

Since this did not get any response from me, he went on: “I said ‘What are you looking at?’ Do you want me to give you a knuckle sandwich?” The thing about being in good with the boys is that civilians do not know the rules.

I looked at him: “I’m not looking at anything, and suggest you move along there is nothing to get ruffled about.” I glanced through the crowd to see Maria and apparently, the young man took this as me trying to ignore him.

“I don’t think you understand. There isn’t room for both of us here.” Such original dialogue. Who is his writer and how many murderous paws does he use to hammer this stuff out? It was not rapid, spontaneous, nor bursting with creativity.

At this point, Tony came swooping in and tried to lower the temperature. “My friend isn’t ignoring you he is looking for somebody else.”

 The young man looked at Tony and proceeded to try and snap his suspenders which were visible from the open jacket.

 Tony was having none of that and grabbed of the young man’s hands and twisted them both upwards. There came a cry of pain from the young man. Then Tony said: “I just that you clear out. Or I may have to get rough in my dealings with you.”

 Then Tony dropped the hands and started to turn away when a young man proceeded to clench his best and strike at Tony’s face. Note I said tried. Because at this point my right hand grasped the forearm of the young man and I twisted it about and held him so that he was dropped to the floor. “I don’t think you understand.” There was a muffle from the young man. “I can do whatever I want to you and no one, not even the police, will do anything about it.”

The young man was bent down. I lift my leg. His groin would hurt for a while.

Just then a flutter of eyelashes connected to mine. A sigh went out from her mouth. And she was gone.

I looked back at my compatriot and scowled. I let him go and he stumbled out.

Beginning again, I said: “Where would gentlemen seek a different form of entertainment?”

And in the background the calliopes drone on in a twirling top charade blowing over the waves.