May 7, 1939
"Can I talk to you a minute?"
Jennifer turned and looked at Nick curiously at his words. She looked wary. "Alright," she said.
She was making breakfast, which was usually his domain. But with all that had happened, after the shooting the night before and then sleeping side by side and waking up and almost sharing a kiss, things felt a bit strange. Nick had made the beds separately but not bothered to push them apart while Jennifer was in the bathroom. He then used the bathroom after her and thought about what he needed to do today. And he'd come out to the kitchen to find her in front of the stove.
He crossed to her, standing close so they could talk quietly. He didn't want to be overheard by the recording equipment.
"Last night, those men who killed Riggs said some things. I need to look into some things."
"You? Not O'Toole?" she asked in return.
He should turn over a potential lead to the FBI. But Jen was not telling him to do that. She was giving him the benefit of the doubt, which he appreciated. "It's for me. One of those guys mentioned the name of people I knew in my old neighborhood. People I lost track of," he explained.
"So you want to know what the story is with them," Jen deduced.
He nodded.
"Do you want to go alone?"
Nick wasn't entirely sure how he wanted to answer that. Her question wasn't accusatory, as though she might be offended that Nick might not want to bring her. Jen wasn't like that. .
"It's none of my business," she added, backing off slightly.
"No," he said, deciding in that moment. "It could be relevant to the case. And having fresh eyes might be good. I've got a lot of baggage with it."
She looked up at him. Her face was close—had to be with how quietly they were speaking—and he could almost feel her breath on his cheek with the way he was leaning in low so they were eye to eye. And those turquoise eyes of hers were filled with a kind of concern and something he couldn't quite understand. Maybe something he didn't want to admit to seeing.
Nick pushed himself off the edge of the stove where he'd been standing. He couldn't let himself get swept away. There was too much to focus on. Especially today. "I'll tell Walker and Smith we're going out."
The FBI agents stationed across the street didn't care much what Nick and Jen did on their day off, not when there wasn't anyone in the backroom. It was easy to tell them they would be going out and back later. Nick figured they could stop at the butcher for some chops for dinner, just to make a good show of it. Truth be told, this was not something he wanted to tell the FBI. They knew plenty about him already, he knew, but some things he'd keep to himself.
An hour later, after breakfast had been eaten and cleaned up, Nick got his hat and jacket while Jen got her hat and gloves and purse. She looked a little more like the private eye he'd seen nosing around crime scenes back in Midtown instead of Trish Claybourne, but Nick couldn't help but think she looked better like this. A little simpler, a little more elegant. All of the things Trish Claybourne wore were all lovely but it was clear that whoever the real Trish Claybourne was, she was a woman who liked to be noticed and liked to make a bit of a spectacle of herself. Jennifer wasn't like that at all, though he'd seen how good she could be at playing the part. But thankfully she seemed to know that this jaunt was not one where they'd be the happy-go-lucky Claybournes.
They walked down the street together, looking like any two regular people. Nick's nerves increased with every step. Jennifer walked quietly beside him. He could feel her glancing over to him every so often as they went down to the subway station and put their tokens into the turnstiles. He led her to the right platform to get the train that would take them to where they were going. They'd be getting off at the station Nick had used for almost twenty years and hadn't used in fifteen since.
It wasn't until they got on the train and found seats in an uncrowded car that Jennifer asked where they were going.
"Williamsburg," Nick told her. "That's where I grew up."
She frowned. Nick wasn't entirely sure why. He knew her pretty well by now, but he wasn't a mind reader. Did she know of Williamsburg? Did she know what kind of neighborhood it was? Did his growing up there surprise her?
Nick didn't ask any of those questions, nor did Jen offer any explanation. Instead, Nick gave her a little more information. "The…talkative…guy from last night mentioned the names of some brothers. I knew them. Their family lived in my building. The oldest was a couple years above me, the other two were younger than me. I was…I was like a fourth brother in the family. I didn't have anyone, just my mother and grandfather. They were my best friends. And that gangster last night starts threatening to do to Riggs the same as someone did to Willie Shapiro."
"Shapiro?"
He nodded. "Willie was the youngest. Irving was oldest, and me and Meyer were in the middle."
"Yeah, the Shapiro Brothers," Jennifer said with a nod.
"You know them?"
"You don't? They tried to get into the garment district."
This was certainly news to Nick. How did he not hear about that? Anyone who went toe to toe with Lepke Buchalter in New York made the news, even if it did happen all the way over in Brooklyn. And if Jennifer was right—and Nick had no reason to think she wasn't—then the Shapiro Brothers had gotten themselves mixed up in Murder Inc. And that mouthy little Jew in the backroom last night probably was, too. There was every chance their shop in Bushwick was about to get right in the middle of the Luciano Family and Murder Inc. all in one go.
Jen got up when Nick did and left the subway at the station in Williamsburg that must have been familiar to him. She didn't know anything about Brooklyn at all, but she was glad he did.
It was interesting, though, to know he'd grown up so close to where they were now. She knew as well as anyone that ten blocks from your home neighborhood was a foreign land. But the Claybourne shop in Bushwick was closer than she imagined from Williamsburg. Nick's old neighborhood. It wasn't a place she knew much about, but she thought Bernice might have mentioned it. Might have been one of the Jewish neighborhoods where people flocked when Harlem started to be a Black neighborhood instead of a Jewish one.
But Nick wasn't Jewish, was he? He didn't look it. And Buchanan certainly wasn't a Jewish name. It wouldn't have bothered her if his name was Jacob Schwartz, but it would be surprise to find out he was Jewish. But maybe not everyone in a Jewish neighborhood actually was Jewish. When it came to Nick, though, she just didn't know.
She had lived with this man for two months, spent every waking moment with him. She knew him. She trusted him with her life. But she also didn't know a thing about him. And that realization bothered her. Then again, Nick didn't know anything about her either. Maybe that should change. Going with him to his old neighborhood was going to be a good start.
They walked down Bedford Avenue and turned down Clymer Street when Nick slowed. He halted in the middle of the sidewalk.
"What is it?" she asked.
He was staring straight ahead to the street corner. "This was my street. I haven't seen it in a long time."
"Is it different?"
"Not at all," he answered. His voice was quiet. Reverent, almost.
Jen wasn't sure what to say to that. Though maybe she'd have the same reaction if she ever found herself at West 40th and 11th Avenue ever again.
Their respective thoughts were interrupted when an old man came shuffling down the steps of a building just ahead of them and he started pointing at Nick and let out a barking laugh. "Goychik!" he exclaimed happily.
Nick let out a puff of air and shook his head in disbelief. "Mr. Marmelstein, es hat shoyn a lang tzayt."
The old man—Mr. Marmelstein—walked toward them, and Nick approached him. "Vi azoy bistu geven?"
"Gut, a dank," Nick answered.
The two men continued to talk with Jen watching in utter disbelief. She had no idea what they were saying, but she knew it was Yiddish. Nick spoke Yiddish.
"Trish," he called, catching her attention.
Jen came over, and Nick introduced her to Mr. Marmelstein as Trish Claybourne, a friend. Since Nick obviously couldn't pose as Wesley Claybourne, he couldn't say they were married or partners working together. Friend worked just fine. After all, Jen rather hoped it was true. They were friends now, weren't they?
The men thankfully both spoke English in Jen's company. Apparently Mr. Marmelstein was a good friend of Nick's grandfather, who had died when Nick was twelve. Mr. Marmelstein was very sweet and congratulated Nick—'goychik'—on such a pretty friend.
Nick laughed at that. Mr. Marmelstein then invited Nick and Jen both to join him at the deli down the block.
As they walked, other people walked by and Mr. Marmelstein shouted, "Kuk, es iz di Goychik!"
Half a dozen people came to greet Nick warmly in Yiddish, many of them hugging him. Nick, being the quiet and reserved sort of man he was, responded sweetly but far less enthusiastically.
At one point, there was a break in the greetings so Jen could ask, "Why do they call you Goychik?"
He chuckled. "Goy is a term for someone who isn't Jewish. My mother grew up here, too, and she married my father, who wasn't Jewish. He left, and she took me to live with her father back here. So even though I'm Jewish through my mother and I was raised as Jewish as anyone else here, I'm the son of a goy, and Nick Buchanan isn't a Jewish-sounding name. But boychik is a term of endearment for a little boy. So they called me Goychik."
Jen smiled. It was a sweet story. And it certainly explained a lot.
They were interrupted once again, this time by an older woman whose body carried a lot of weight, making her large and formidable. She saw Nick and lumbered up to him and began shouting, "Vi bistu geven?! Vi ken ir nisht kumen heym, Goychik!?"
Nick tried to answer her, but the woman didn't seem to want to hear a response. She smacked him on the arm and then pulled him to her and kissed his cheek before walking away.
"What was that?" Jen asked in surprise after Nick just kept walking alongside Mr. Marmelstein as though nothing had happened.
"Mrs. Kazan wanted to know where I'd been and why I hadn't come home."
"Really? She sounded so angry."
Nick just shrugged, smiling slightly.
Eventually, they arrived at a deli. Mr. Marmelstein sat at a table, and Nick and Jen joined him. The two men helped Jen with the menu, recommending what was good and what she might like. Mr. Marmelstein called her Shikzah, and it made Nick laugh. Jen didn't know what it meant, but she could tell that Mr. Marmelstein meant it to be complimentary. She'd ask Nick later.
They waited for their food, and Nick leaned in close, speaking softly. "Mr. Marmelstein, I came back to the neighborhood because I heard something I wanted to ask about. Maybe you might know."
"Ask," Mr. Marmelstein instructed.
Nick frowned, pausing for a moment. "Vos getrafn tsu di brider Shapiro?"
Mr. Marmelstein let out a sad sigh, shaking his head.
"You know better than anyone that my mother got me away from them. I know they got into trouble. We all would have. It's all ancient history now, but I gotta know," Nick implored.
"Irving and Meyer moved against Lepke and their cousin Gurrah here in Williamsburg."
"When?"
"Years ago, now. '31, I think."
Nick nodded, encouraging Mr. Marmelstein to continue.
"Irving went first. Shot in the street in the summertime. Meyer was in the Lower East Side by then. Found dead in the fall."
Beside her, Jen felt Nick let out a shaky breath, gently mourning his childhood friends. "And Willie?"
"He was on the run for a few years after that. Murder Inc. caught up to him, though. Summer of '34, they buried Willie alive in a sandpit in Canarsie."
Jennifer didn't even know these people, but hearing of their brutal deaths made her feel sick. The waitress put the plate of knish in front of her, but Jen had no interest in eating it.
"A dank, eych," Nick murmured.
"All four of you boys got into trouble when you were kids, but you were kids," Mr. Marmelstein said. "Your Zayde knew what you were up to, and he knew you'd grow out of it. Your Ma helped you out, but you now the Shapiro Brothers didn't have that. They kept going down that path until it was too late. Half the boys from this neighborhood have joined Murder Inc. or been killed by them."
Nick nodded knowingly, but he did not say anything. He picked up his Reuben sandwich and started eating. Mr. Marmelstein picked up his fork to eat the kreplach in front of him. Jen started picking at her knish to be polite. She couldn't help but think that her first real visit to a Jewish neighborhood hadn't really gone as she might have expected.
Author's Note: While I am Jewish and know some Yiddish, I am not fluent and cannot put together full sentences. The dialogue in Yiddish here is courtesy of Google Translate, and if anyone has recommendations on changes, please let me know. Also, all the gangsters (the Shapiro Brothers, Lepke Buchalter, the Luciano Family, etc.) are all real and the deaths of the Shapiros are exactly as described. Just to add a little real life color to our story.