PROLOGUE
Murray and Me...
Life on the Glamorous Track
The
phone rang early on a May morning.
When I picked it up, and said hello, I got the shock of my
life: It was my friend Margie calling to tell me that Murray, the
Mafia bookie, the nightclub denizen, Murray my constant companion,
roommate and meal ticket for eight years — my Murray, whom I
threw out over 30 years earlier was dead.
This was 1985, and Murray had been in
Chicago for nearly all the years since I left, or rather politely
asked him to leave the New York apartment we shared.
There was a time in those crazy years after World War II,
when I lost a husband, raised a baby boy, and kept up with the
nightclub set, when Murray became a vital part of my everyday
life. We were a couple: regulars
at the Copacabana, Latin Quarter, “21", all the fashionable
night spots where Murray conducted his business and I chatted with
celebrities. I was
Murray's companion, and he was my live-in benefactor.
For eight years it was a mutually agreeable arrangement.
But, then Murray had decamped to
Chicago because of a dispute with some Mafia friends over money he
owed them. Except for a brief visit I made a few years earlier, I
hadn't heard from him since.
But now I felt I owed him something. In
times past when I needed help and a friend, Murray was there, even
though he never required a thank you. I knew there would be no
family there, he never maintained a relationship with them — it
still seemed my place.
I caught the next flight to Chicago.
Immediately I went to get Murray’s keys from Margie and Howie
Wong, his best friends. Next,
I headed right for Murray's apartment on Lake Shore Drive, one of
the better sections of Chicago. Most people would have been
stunned by Murray's home. Not I.
I always associated Murray with gorgeous apartments with
white rugs, ornate furniture, expensive curtains, lamps and
original artwork. He
was always redecorating our New York apartment, often on the spur
of the moment. He had
expensive — if flashy — taste and was no cheapskate;
he bought only the best.
His Chicago apartment proved he hadn't
changed. Not only the
rugs, but all the furniture was white.
The couch had white satin pillows, the tables were glass,
and the custom-made draperies were closed to keep out the light
and block the view of Lake Michigan. Murray, like me, had seen the
best of the glitz era, and he wanted to keep it that way.
In the kitchen, I couldn't resist
checking the refrigerator. What
I saw was typical: lots
of chocolate candy and ice cream.
Murray only snacked at home; he dined out for every meal.
A side-room, perhaps a pantry, was filled with all sorts of
electrical cooking gadgets from Hammacher Schlemmer (a specialty
store for the rich) — this from a man who couldn’t hammer a
nail.
I was helping Margie take inventory,
when the phone rang. I
answered, and a surly, raspy voice asked, “What are you doing in
that apartment? I wanna talk to you...”
It
doesn't take much to get my Irish temper up. “Listen,” I said,
“if you have anything to say to me, come talk to me eyeball to
eyeball.”
I hung up.
I wasn't afraid of anybody out there.
But, I knew I'd have company soon.
Marge left to return to work, so I was alone when this
little Al Capone type — squinty eyes, no neck, large cigar, big
hat, and a limp — came strolling down the hallway.
The apartment door was open, so he came in, peering around
to see if he knew me, and if anyone else was there. I waited.
When he got ready to say something, I got there first.
“Look, before you say anything, sit
down.” He sat.
“I'm no whore Murray hooked up
with,” I said, “we go back 40 years.
I'm here to see that Murray gets a good funeral.
That's what I came out here to do.
OK?”
I was speaking calmly.
He remained silent. “I don't know who you are or what you
want here,” I continued. “Are
you here to help?”
The little guy thought a moment …
then nodded yes.
“First thing we do, we check him out
of the hospital,” he said, in a casual way as if we were going
to rent a car. “Then we'll get him over to this funeral parlor
that some friends of mine have, so we can set up the wake
properly.”
The funeral parlor was owned by the
Italian mob — however, I wasn't about to argue that issue right
now. We went to the hospital, signed some papers, and arranged to
have Murray brought to the funeral home.
It never occurred to me that Murray
being Jewish could be a problem after he died.
It had never been a problem when he was alive.
All the mob guys called him “Little Moishe”, but that
was about it.
“Little Al”, whose name turned out
to be Rocco got the ball rolling: The wake was to take two days
and nights, with the funeral to follow on the third morning in the
Our Lady of Something-or-other cemetery.
Fine! I knew
none of these people, although it was obvious that his old mob
friends still had special affection for Murray. Most people who knew him did.
He had never been a typical “dese” and “doze” mob
guy. He had been a
quiet, gentlemanly guy with a strong sense of duty. So now I
considered my duty to be that of seeing Murray properly buried,
then I could go home.
But first, there was the wake on
Thursday and Friday. It was suggested by Rocco that it would be a
“good thing” if I could be in the front row of mourners to
greet the visitors, as Murray had no family.
OK by me ... anything to move things along.
The wake was a picture of floral excess
— Murray would have loved it.
Roses ($600 worth) adorned the head of the casket,
another $600 arrangement was placed at the foot.
Other bouquets, wreaths and clusters sat in baskets and
huge vases atop tables, which occupied every niche and corner.
The ornately carved casket had a white
shirred lining and seemed to rest on a huge wave of flowers. The
room was decorated in an ornate style — heavy red drapes, red
furniture a large-patterned carpeting.
Soft Italian music was played in every corner of the room
and into the side rooms.
Murray himself seemed lost in these
surroundings. He
looked smaller than I remembered, and his white hair stood out
because his flesh looked so colorless.
During the wake itself, with a steady
stream of people coming and going, you could hear the constant
buzz of voices, too low to distinguish what was being said. But
there was the atmosphere that is always present at a wake attended
by people, about the same age as the guest of honor in the coffin.
You get the feeling of, “Who's next?”
Mourners, almost exclusively men
well-dressed who stood around in small groups whispering to one
another, took up spaces not occupied by all the over-furnishing.
Occasionally, someone from one knot of mourners would ease
over to another group and wedge himself into the conversation.
All who spoke to me did so with
deference. In effect, I was the token woman.
Many of them I knew immediately, Guys I recognized from
California, Vegas, New York, all came to pay their respects. At
least I remembered their faces, because I never knew the real
names of Murray's associates.
All those Italian faces and star sapphire pinky rings were
vivid reminders of my life with Murray.
So were the money filled envelopes passed quietly to
Murray’s pizan, Rocco, on the receiving line. Rocco was the
treasurer.
I received none of these tokens of
respect, but I didn't expect or want any of it.
I just wanted to get this over with so I could go home, but
my post-Murray adventure wasn’t over yet.
After the first evening of the wake, I
was back at the apartment ready for bed, when the phone rang.
“Now, what do they want?” I asked
myself as I picked up the phone.
“You don't know us,” a strange
voice said calmly, “but, we're friends of Murray.”
“Yes?”
“Yes. But we're his Jewish friends,
from Las Vegas. Murray
was Jewish.” he said.
I realized where this conversation was
heading. “I know, but I couldn't tell the mob guys what to
do.”
He interrupted, “We know all about
that, so don't worry. But,
we want to get Murray out of that funeral home and into a Jewish
one so we can sit Shiva.” This was shaping up as something I
wanted to be far away from, and I said so.
“Look, you guys fight this out among
yourselves. Leave me
out of it. By the end
of the week, I'm getting on a plane for New York.
I just want to see Murray buried. You guys can settle where
and by whom.”
I skipped the Italian wake that night
because I was asked to sit with the Jewish mourners. This was the
Las Vegas mob, who arrived en masse soon after my conversation
with Little Al’s counterpart, Kenny.
After talking to me, they went to the
Italian funeral home, long after visiting hours — and took away
Murray's corpse. It
was a comedy of errors
I wasn't surprised that the Vegas mob
took over. I wouldn't
have been surprised if we suddenly heard from the New York mob,
and I had another wake to go to. Murray would have been touched by
all the attention of grief and respect he was getting from the
organization.
The Jewish funeral was a stark contrast
to the previous evening's opulent wake.
The funeral parlor was very plain, if not bare.
Wooden chairs arranged in rows, facing a simple wooden
unlined casket. Murray
now wore a yarmulke and what looked like a simple robe.
I couldn't help wondering if this
simply furnished funeral parlor had ever before hosted a deceased
who was first embalmed and had been the featured guest at an
Italian wake. This was hardly in keeping with Jewish tradition, so
it’s probably just as well that they didn’t know.
It seemed as if the Las Vegas group won
out in whatever negotiations they had over Murray’s body,
because the next morning, a limo picked me up and took me to the
gravesite they had picked in a Jewish cemetery. I didn't recognize
anyone. The crowd was
large and didn't mingle much.
I felt very lonely and sad, and more than ready to leave.
But before going home I had to pack up Murray's things and make
arrangements to get rid of the apartment.
The Chicago boys told me to take whatever I wanted of
Murray's effects.
Like Murray’s décor, his closet was
a shrine to old-fashioned excess: I packed 250 shirts, 100 suits,
60 pairs of shoes (some still in boxes), coats, jackets, lots of
Cavanaugh hats (these fedora-like hats were a sign of high style
in Murray’s circle), and jewelry — gold watches, cufflinks
(gold and platinum) and everything else a man about town would
wear. It took boxes
and boxes to pack it all, though some of the clothes wound up
adorning his Chicago chums. All
these belongings, and the furniture, went to Marge and Howie's
apartment – except for a small box I packed for myself –
including a gold Cartier watch given to him by Hugh Heffner, which
I still wear today.
Much of this is what you might expect
from anyone’s house, but I thought I’d find one or two signs
of Murray’s unorthodox lifestyle.
Whenever he was short of cash, an occupational hazard in
his business, he'd pawn something valuable, and reclaim it when he
was flush again, so pawn tickets, or hock tickets, as he called
them, were always to be found among Murray's personal things. Out
of curiosity, I searched for some, but none were to be found.
When I finally finished the apartment
was totally empty, another door, another life closed. I caught the
next plane back to New York.
My conscience was clear.
I had done what I wanted, to honor Murray for the past, and
now I could get on with my life.
I had no idea what was in store for me, and that's a good
thing. My life was
due for a dramatic about face, about as far from the Murray’s,
the mob, and the Copacabana as you can get. But, I'm getting ahead
of myself...
Copyright 2003 - All Rights Reserved
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