your evening,” the hostess said before sauntering away.
Once settled in, Ellis removed his fedora, cream with a silk band, and rested it at his side. His father had done the same with his old brimmed hat.
“Like I was saying,” Ellis told his parents, “I hear nothing but raves about the place. Fellas at the paper say it’s got the best prime rib in town.” As his father’s favorite dish, the steak had been a key factor when Ellis made the reservation. “So, what do you think, Pop?”
The music melded with his father’s mumbled reply.
“It’s a lovely choice, sweetheart,” his mother jumped in with a bright smile.
After weeks of her coaxing, the couple had finally made the trip to New York, a city Ellis had come to consider his home.
And to think, just four months ago, sulking at Hal’s Hideaway over his editor’s warning, Ellis had thought for certain he was on his way out. But with the help of far too much whiskey, he’d managed to make a deal with members of the Irish Mob. On the legitimate side, their boss owned a fur shop in Midtown. Ellis had suggested the guy run a charitable promotion: donating his proceeds from a weekend of sales to the Children’s Aid Society. A newsworthy story Ellis could pitch.
Just like that, a batch of furs fell off a truck and floated down a river—according to the insurance filing anyhow—and boom! Money was raised for the kiddies. In exchange, Ellis received a solid tip about a congressman who had the gall to skim off veterans’ benefits. Cautiously separated by a week, both stories found a cozy spot in the Tribune.
Then came a bonus.
Compliments of his Irish contact, Ellis received a list of several other crooked politicians, with sufficient clues to their shady deeds. Incredibly, this one required no return favor. Since the fingered officials were in the pockets of Russian, Jewish, and Italian mobsters—in other words, not the Irish ones—exposing their dirt was repayment enough. Ellis never directly tied the lawmakers to the underworld, as he had no desire to take a dive into the Hudson quite yet, but inadvertently it was a win-win.
In a nutshell, he’d taken his lumps and come back swinging. Jack Dempsey would have been proud.
Still, not pushing his luck, Ellis had expanded his network to the less daunting of society. For an extra buck here and there, switchboard operators and hotel bellboys shared juicier scoops than just about anyone. Not to mention local firemen. Close observers of their territories, and with loads of downtime in the firehouse, they readily shelled out tidbits for free.
Before long, Ellis’s biggest challenge became writing pieces fast enough. He’d reported on everything from graft in city licensing and racketeering in the housing industry to a senator’s simultaneous upkeep of three mistresses.
An impressive feat, that one.
In truth, Ellis’s articles lately had been heavier on flash than substance, but sometimes you had to fill the gaps until the next big break. Just last week, for instance, a widow was hoping to identify the murderer of her husband, a notorious rumrunner from Queens, and Ellis had covered the séance. They couldn’t all be worthy of a byline—although, incredibly, he’d already earned two. Neither of them had graced Page One, where so far his articles had appeared unsigned, but all were now money in the bank—quite literally, thanks to some finely aged scotch.
He’d presented the bottle as a Christmas gift, a risky dent in his savings, while daring to ask the Tribune’s owner for a raise. He’d aimed for eighty bucks a week, hoping for seventy. But after several shared highballs in the middle of the day, they somehow landed at eight-five.
The best part? Ellis finally felt like an official “man of Park Row,” and tonight his parents would share the same view. At least, that was the plan.
“You sure you don’t want something more…festive?” he asked, referencing their goblets of water. “Maybe some sherry to go with your dinner, Ma.”
The waiter stood like a sentry at attention. Any drink was game after he’d pocketed Ellis’s early tip with all the slickness of a politician.
“The night’s on me,” Ellis reminded his mother.
Looking tempted, she glanced at the last of Ellis’s gin martini, served in a teacup—as were all libations here as a precaution for a raid. But before she could decide, her husband answered for them both.
“We’ll stick with water.” His eyes, bare of glasses tonight, were unwavering. His openness to an occasional nip at home apparently didn’t extend