84

             
                                       Chapter Eight
                                               Izzy

Loveland, Ohio

October 15 1937

9:20 AM

A crowd of — in Loveland, ten or twelve people congregating in the same place at the same time would be considered a crowd— and now, as this kind of thing ‘never’ happens in Loveland, were, unbelievably, standing before Pink’s Hardware.

Sitting on the open tail-gate of the small, brown and white panel truck used by the Summer Springs/Loveland Sheriff’s Department, the pot used to bring her husbands breakfast to him still held beneath her chin. Her face deathly pale, Agie’s eyes red and puffy, once again fighting to keep her stomach down.

Already questioned by the sheriff, ‘Willie Hoskins’, who’d been a half block down, on the other side of the street, and could only describe the car as ‘a black or dark blue’; he thought: ‘34 or ‘35 Chevy’. And when he saw Mrs Pink walking on the other side of the street…” Willie said “...he crossed over to say ‘good morning’, then continued walking with her until they got to the store where they found Mist Pink, and then he called the sheriffs office.

“And you didn’t see anything?” Sheriff, Darrell Newmeyer asked Agie, who is able to breath somewhat normally after seeing the bloodied body of her husband. “I told you…” gasping, lifting the pot to here mouth… the gasping urge to vomit passing “...all I know...”

Hearing the distantly approaching siren of the Cincinnati Hospital Coroners ambulance. Having blurted it out the first time, between choking bouts of vomiting. “So, please…” asked genteelly “... tell me again.”Newmeyer asked.

“Okay.” Agie hesitantly said: “Unless someone calls to ask Morrie to open early, he opens at eight and I come along…” closing her eyes, taking a deep breath “...a while later with coffee and breakfast that we’ll usually eat together. So when I came today, I did not see ‘any’ car in front…” glancing at Willie Hoskins “...and all I saw when I went in... ‘Oh, God’!” Putting the pot onto the fail-gate and bringing both hands to her face. “All I saw was all  that blood on the wall and…” sobbing, spoken between gasps of air “...poor Morrie.”

As, many of those in the assembled crowd knowing Agie and Morrie Pink for years, cried along with Agie as, sitting alongside, his comforting arm about her shoulders, sat the ‘Seamstress’ Izzy, who had lost half his mind in a muddy, gore filled battlefield in France during ‘The Great War’.

Captain Izadore, Marshall Feldman

(Vol 1) Chicago, Illinois

June 14, 1937

In the Kaminsky’ slum storefront apartment: All along the rear, eastern wall, Ellen jealously noted the twenty gallon water heater, the four burner stove, the small gas heather, the long steel sink and icebox, and butted within the corner of the eastern and southern walls, is a two walled plywood partition that would be the toilet and shower. There is a double bed lengthwise along the northern wall and an old kitchen table with four matching chairs.

Upon seeing it, “Your place looks like a palace compared to ours.” Malcolm Murphy had said.

“Man next door going to be thrown out.” Murray said. “Monday’s rent day and the landlord comes by to collect. What if I ask what the rent next door will be, and you and your Ellen and your little boy come Tuesday for dinner so we can talk of what the rent will be. You think maybe you and your wife could pay a bit more for that place.?"

“I think, maybe, if you could spare a wee corner of your cart for me?”

(vol 1) Chicago, Illinois

Maxwell Street

Saturday, 6/20/37

Standing before the far end of the cart. “ ‘Shoemaker’!” Waving a pair of beat up shoes overhead. “Shoes repaired while you wait'!”

Waving a handful of belts over his head. “ ‘Belts’! ‘Suspenders!” Standing before the other end of the cart. “ ‘Fancy, hand tooled belts! Suspenders’!”

Notation: Time Forward; The two families, now living side by side in similar storefront apartments— Murray Kaminsky, repairing shoes five days a week from home, at Maxwell Street on Saturday and Sunday. Malcolm Murphy able to display his hand tooled leather goods, along with ‘Ellen’s Hat Creations’. Along with Murray at Maxwell Street on weekends. Both having ambitions to partner their own business— Food cost shared, the cost of gas to prepare that food shared as meals would alternate from the Murphy’s to the Kaminsky’. Gas even shared to heat bath water as Clyde and Sharon were bathed together— And small at first, in months, though, the quarters and half's and dollars beginning to accumulate.

Summer Springs, Ohio

October 15 1937

10:07 AM

Entering Mazie’s Eats, preparing to sit. “Did you hear?”

“Coming from the kitchen… “Hear what?” ...wiping her forehead with a kitchen towel.

Sitting. “Guy in Loveland that runs the hardware store, got killed.”

Disbelievingly. “ ‘What!?”

“Yeah! Sheriff and Coroner’s there. Someone shot him.”

Dragging him from the chair. “Get out!” Shooing the man out the door. “ ‘Elmer’!” Mazie screamed loud enough for her husband to hear.

Annoyed! Unless extremely cold, the grocery door left open at this time of year. Stepping outside. “What the hell you bellowing for?”

Crossing over. “Elmer, we ‘got to get to Agie’!” taking him by the shoulder. “Someone shot Morrie!”

Taking a moment for the words, ‘ Someone shot Morrie’ to sink in. “Who? Is he…”

10:48 AM

As the blood and gore splattered wall hadn’t been cleaned, driven the block and a half from the store to home by Elmer and Mazie— forced to sit; on the phone. “Auntie…”

One word needed. “Agnes, what’s wrong?” Bertha asked.

“He’s…” breathing deeply “...Morris, he’s dead.”

The line silent, then from New York City, six hundred miles away. “Your husband, he died?”

“No. Murdered. Someone shot him.”

“Why?” Pulling a kitchen chair and sitting. “Who’d do such a thing?”

“There’s absolutely not a clue. Someone saw a car rushing from in front of the store at that time, but couldn’t identify it, so no one knows anything.

“Agnes…’ in a worried tone “...are you alone now?”

“No, Auntie..” glancing at Mazie and Elmer “friends are with me.”

“Good! You do know, don’t you, that if you ever want to come back, I’d be more than happy to have you home again.”

“I know, Auntie, but I’ve still a… ‘my’ business to run and this has been my home for twenty-two years.”

“All-right, dear. Just remember!”

“I will, Auntie… Love you. Bye.”

“Love you, too.”

Sighing, the connection was broken.

“I think…” Maize said “...that you ought to close the store for a couple of days and just try to relax.”

“Thank you, Mazie but…” using the palms of both hands, rubbing tears from her eyes “… I think just sitting here will give me too much time to think and, really, I think I’ll be better off going back to work… Only…”

Having seen blood streaked wall and guessing what her friend was thinking. “The wall! Give Elmer and me the key and we’ll go clean it up.”

Closing her eyes, taking a deep breath and leaning back in the chair. “Oh, God, I don’t want to see that again. Thank you! Key’s in my purse, but I’m pretty sure that at the time, locking the door was not on my mind.

Staying with Agie a short while to make sure she was alright, by the time Mazie and Elmer returned to Pink’s Hardware, Izzy had scrubbed the wall and floor removing all visible trace of Morrie’s blood and brain matter.

October 22, 1937: The body returned from the Cincinitti Coroner, Morrie Pinks was laid to rest in the Summer Springs Cemetery. Keeping busy at the store right up to the time, leaving Lester Harris, now working full time, in charge, as she had wished, Agie drove to the cemetery by herself.

Notation: Sporadic rainfall returned to most regions of America by the last two months of 1937, hypothetically bringing the Dust Bowl years to a close, causing a marked financial uptick in many local communities.

With money becoming somewhat looser, a strange thing happened to Seamstress Izzy’s Clothes Barn.

Word spreading that there was a mysterious seamstress in Loveland, a, no less, that was making the most adorable children clothing using some material from older clothing. So there began a money making business from what had been a free give away or exchange of all types of outgrown, worn-out, reconstituted raggedy, eons old clothing that, with the handy-work of the man simply known as Izzy, had been transformed into a worn looking— ‘worn looking’ ? Everything but the thread holding it all together would have been handed from growing child to child for forty years, or longer. But now transformed into am ‘adorable’ pair of five year old girls jeans with ‘Raggedy Ann and Andy’ professional sewn onto each knee, Cincinitti women would drive the sixteen miles to Loveland and the newly renamed ‘Clothing Emporium’ as Izzy, truly being a master seamstress at heart; at the beginning using the bolts of s material given him as a Christmas gift, the Seamstress of Loveland had taught himself how to make ‘adorable’ children’s clothing…. “Izzy!” Seamstress Izzy.

Captain, Izadore Marshall Feldman: U.S Army.

A graduate Civil Engineer—The Army in need of engineers! At the urgent request of General John, Black Jack, Pershing; the commander of the American Expeditionary Forces during World War I. Offered the rank of ‘Captain’ without need of military training, Izadore Feldman enlisted in the U.S. Army on June 18, 1918.

His orders in November of 1919 were to oversee and direct the construction and reinforcement of seven continual miles of allied trenching within a one third mile of the German defence line at Hainaut Province, Wallonia, Belgium, when on the twelfth day of November, at precisely two thirty PM, there came an exactly timed fusillade of six large bore German cannon bombarding four of the seven miles of trenching, completely destroying an area large enough for the entire locally reinforced Nazi army to overtake the militarily statistic city of Wallonia.

As for Captain Izadore Feldman: The conjunctive roar of six huge cannon, even from a third mile distance, nearly shattering his eardrums; rendering him unconscious, the striking, multi explosive force hurled him upward seven or eight feet rearward landing in either mud, or on a dismembered, disembowelled body... Consciousness slowly returning as, in shock, attempting to move, finding himself unable to move because of the weight of the diagonally split corpse that lay flatly and heavily upon his chest with split head remaining upon a bloodied neck, with face turned forward, with dead eyes open staring into Izadore’ eyes as soundless, fetid scented words venting from the ragged furrow of the mouth of a dead man that was now but a... ‘Why me’? The shattered corpse pleaded. ‘Why not you’?

Not a soldier, but moreso a civilian in an army officers uniform preforming a strategically ordered job.

Izadore Feldman screamed.

The words and image of the dissected soldier implanted within his mind, for the next three weeks Izadore Feldman screamed. Either vocally or mentally,…

Izadore Feldman screamed.

December, 1919

Considered insane, Captain Izadore Feldman was shipped to Baltimore, Maryland; to an understaffed, poorly operated military facility for battle- worn, too unfit mentally to return to the European hostilities.

12/6/19, 3:05 AM: Silent! His eyes opening. Staring about the dimly lit, barrack like room. Silent! The screaming within the mind of Izadore Feldman had stopped. His mind silent! The sight and smell and sound of the dead soldier no longer existed.

No longer existed along with ‘any’ memory of the past life of Izadore Marshall Feldman.

Izadore Marshall Feldman had never existed.

‘Izzy’. He knew his name because that is how he had been referred to by doctors and nursers and attendees: ‘Izzy’. Looking at the chart hung from his rear bed rail… ‘INSANE’ it said.

Oddly, Izadore was able to read. So that much of his past remained intact. Along with — as the time and need arose: the sense of hunger, of danger, of cold and warmth, of fear and, why, of course he did not know. The man now, and forever known only as ‘Izzy’, had an urgent need to escape this place and to walk. To walk where? To escape! To just walk.

At this time of morning, with all attendees away, walking through the deserted hallway he obeyed an instinct to enter the room marked ‘clothing’, where, now, ‘Izzy’ discovered stacked mounds of U.S. Army issue worn clothing, and kit bags and mounds of shoes and boots.

Dropping the hospital gown he wore to the floor, scattering the mounds of clothing until he found two sets of likely fitting clothes, that somewhat did fit, along with an Army Colonel’ long-coat. Then searching the pile of shoes and boots, he picked a pair of what appeared to be fairly new combat-boots that, once worn, snugly fit. The second and third sets of clothing— somehow thinking, he might need them, were jammed into a kit bag.

3:34 AM: Dressed now for the outside world, noting a table with somehow smuggled cutting weapons retrieved from incoming soldiers, Izzy lifted a sheathed bayonet. Withdrawing the fourteen inch, ground to a dagger pointed weapon— another of his basic instincts: caution— carefully running his finger alongside the sharply honed, razor sharp blade. Sheathing the weapon, feeling secure now, Izzy slipped it beneath his waist and belted pants where it pressed closely alongside his left thigh.

3:37 AM: The past no more than his search for clothing, escape and a means to defend himself, Izzy walked.

1920 through 1933: The ghost; An Urban Legend?

Affable enough, appearing much like any of the thousands of men roaming the country looking for work in exchange for food; in exchange for a bit of cash to buy food, in exchange for the evenings left over meal.

Friendly enough, other than his army issue khaki clothing, looking much as any hobo but, if one were to study the mans face — if the man would remain still enough — one might see eyes and mouth slightly off kilter; off kilter enough to be mentally, slightly off kilter.

From camp-sight to camp-sight, from hobo jungle to hobo jungle, from city to city, from state to state; sweeping a sidewalk for five cents, shoveling snow for a quarter, always walking, of harm to none... But for the one that caused Izzy to become ‘The Ghost’.

Topeka, Kansas, Funerary 7, 1922, 10:22 PM

Having no food on this day, following a dry river trail towards a campfire he had spotted from the road he’d been walking on a higher embankment, hoping to find others like himself willing to part with a bit of food.

Knowing enough not too shout, as shouting might cause those about the fire, thinking it might be the law, to scatter. Still in shadow,“Hello, there.” Izzy said, approaching the two men that, rather than purchasing a loaf of bread and a bit of cheese with the fifty cents they’d begged on that day, had instead spent their money on a quart of poorly made moonshine... that they were well into.

Turning to Izzy’s softly spoken greeting. “Well…” inebriated enough to need hands and knees to bring himself to his feet “...who the ‘fuck’ are ya?”

The man’s tone causing Izzy to back-step a few feet.“Been on the road for days…” gently asked “...and could use a bit to eat, if you’ve any to spare.”

“Ain’t got nothin’ to give ya, ya fuckin’ bum, but…” fists bunched, drunkenly lumbering towards Izzy, whom,“...I likes that there coat you’re wearin’!”

Sensing danger, for the first time in his year and a half on the road, reaching between the seams of the long-coat, grasping the handle of the bayonet.“Not looking for trouble,” he said, backing further into shadow.

“Ya ain’t lookim’ for trouble, are ya?” Coughing horsefly, spitting a wad of phlegm in Izzy’ direction. “Me! Well maybe I am.” Arm cocked...“Gi’me that fuckin’ coat!”

Without a thought, the dagger like point easily piercing the man’s stomach.

Stopping now, unbelievably looking at the blade plunged into his stomach, as even though, lurching forward, the movement slicing the man’ gut spilling entrails onto the dirt as, screaming in pain and fear, dropping to his knees, trying to shove them back in as Izzy, moving quickly, disappeared into shadow. As Henry Hickey, the second drunken man, with whisky bleary eyes, heard the screaming cries of his dieing friend, along with the reflected metallic blink of a sword.

Denver, Colorado, March 14, 1922, 10:07 PM

“I tells ya…” Henry Hickey said, taking a long pull from the bottle, then passing it to the man on his left “...it was a fuckin’ ghost that killed me pal.”

“Henry, ya been telling that story around now! A fuckin’ ghost ya been saying that gutted Fred like a fuckin’ Carp fish, huh?”

Making a hand motion for the bottle to be passed back to him. “Yeah! Just like a fuckin Carp, with a sword yet.”

“He asked to eat, ya say?”

“Yeah, but we didn’t give the fucker nothing,”

“Maybe if ya had’a?”

“Maybe…” shrugging his shoulders “...if we had’a.”

Thus the story was started, and sent, via the ‘Hobo Telegraph,’ of a sword wielding, hobo ghost, and that if he comes around, give him somethin’ to eat and he’ll leave ya be… Maybe!

New York, New York, December 24, 1923, 9:45 PM

However, the second killing made the sword wielding ghost a Hobo’s ‘Urban Legend’, as it happened on well lit, Times Square in New York City on Christmas Eve, where thousands of people crowded together searching for a last minuet gift, or those that just wanted to be within the festivities,.

Also making this time and place a mecca for bums begging of one’s loose change, or for pockets to be picked.

Four years on the road. Four years wandering aimlessly with none but the specific need of shelter and food. Causing no harm or fear. His sunken cheeks — moreso caused by lack of food than true physical appearance —His beard peppered with gray and the clothing worn: army issue pants and officers soiled long-coat giving the appearance of a homeless veteran down on his luck, causing well wishing people on this night before Christmas to reach into their pockets— without the poor ‘veteran’ asking for a handout, and as his hand was not held out, to merely drop whatever coins the kindly person wished to donate, directly into the long-coats oversize pockets.

Was Izzy aware of these kindly gestures? As his memory extended but to the here and now, aware these people meant him no harm, as nickels and dimes and quarters dropped into the coat pockets, each with a, “Merry Christmas!” Izzy would cheerfully return the greeting.

The killing of the threatening man in Topeka, Kansas completely leaving his mind seconds from it happening.

Keeping up with the man in the long-coat, watching from behind individual or small groups of three or four people, ‘Leslie Falkner’s’ conniving mind keeping track of those dropping change into the long-coats pockets.

Aware and appreciative to receive whatever change had been dropped into his pockets, seeing a large group of people exiting the theater across the street after the eight O’clock showing of ‘King Kong’, hoping for more change, Izzy crossed over.

Crossing to the other side of 42nd Street, afraid he might lose him in this thicker crowd, Falkner followed.

Knowing 42nd Street well, the man in the long-coat— “Merry Christmas!” — renaming within the thickest of the group because, escaping within the group he would become anonymous.

Making his move, coming closely alongside, in what appeared to be a friendly gesture, placing his right arm over Izzy’s shoulder, about his neck,his throat. “I’ll take…” jiggling the long-coat pocket with his left hand while lightly pricking the skin of Izzy’s throat with the switch-blade held in his right hand “... what you’ve got there and…” reaching further across, tapping the right side pocket…”

Louisville, Kentucky, December 28, 1923, 7:15 PM

Wearing their winter coats, with knit caps pulled over their ears, sitting on a fallen tree trunk in a wooded area outside of town.

“ Ira…” tapping the ripped corner of page seven of the New York Times “...it’s the same guy!”

Passing the gasoline tasting bottle of ‘Wild Irish Rose’. “Your ghost, huh?” Spoken in a drunken, condescending tone.

Grabbing the wine bottle by the throat. “Yeah! Here…” taking a long slug, and handing the scrap of newsprint “... read for yourself!”

“Henry, ya knows…”

Handing the all but drained bottle back. “Yeah, I knows, Ira, ya can’t read! So I’ll…” the printed words slurring; blinking his eyes, straightening the wrinkles “… say to ya what it says.”

Holding the bottle straight above his mouth to catch the last drop. “Yeah, giggling, “I want’sa hear ‘bout your fuckin’ ghost.”

Indignantly. Paper say’s it happened on Christmas Eve...”

“’Night’afore Christmas?”

“Yeah, Ira! That’s when Christmas Eve most usually is. Any way, ya’ know how crowded Times Square most always is?”

“Yeah.” Holding the green bottle to the sun to double check, then throwing it over his shoulder into the brush.

“Losts’a people there when it happened. ‘cause …” lifting his butt, searching his pockets “… got a dime, you’ve any money?”

“Yeah...” searching both pockets, coming up with three pennies from one two from the other “...five cents.”

Sighing because a bottle of ‘Wild Irish Rose’ cost twenty cents. “Anyway…” going on with his story “... there were lots’a folks there when it happened ‘cause theye’d just got out the movie…

“What they see?”

“What the hell difference, ‘what they see’? Anticipating. “Paper says ‘King Kong’.”

“Who’s he?”

“Ain’t no fuckin ‘he’! He’s a giant ape.”

“Oh, okay.”

“So it was really crowed then, after the movie, an’ the crowd was walking out an’, the paper says suddenly there was a dead guy layin’ there, on the pavement, bleeding all over the place, ‘cause, the paper says, he was stuck through and through with what looked like it must’a been a fuckin’ sword.”

“Could’a been one’s those rich guys that has a sword in his cane. Bet’ch’ya.”

“Paper says the guy that got croaked just got out’s the whosgow— so don’t seem like the cops don’t care much ‘bout him.”

“So…” standing “...lets go up an’ see if we can mooch five cents off’a someone.”

Remaining sitting. “Thing was, the paper…” jiggling the torn scrap “...says that no one saw the guy what did it— no one saw nothin’, and the cops said, the paper says ‘whoever croaked the guy, just disappeared. Just like the ghost.”

“Yeah!” All this talking making Henry Hickey thirsty, standing now. “Lets find someone to mooch a nickle from.”

Different times, different places: Ira warming his hands before a garbage can fire, telling Henry Hickeys ‘sword wielding, hobo ghost story’, adding some small embellishments of his own— and so on and so on from jungles, smoky camp fires, from where congregating bums went looking for handouts, from where congregating hobos went looking for work. Someone wanting a little attention: “Say, you guys heard the story of the bloody murdering sword swinging, hobo ghost?”

Years passing: 1924, 1925… 26, 27, 28, 29, 30… The story having passed on, when some topic for conversation was needed from coast to coast, and back again. No new stories of a murdering, bloody sword stabbing ghosts, and eventually faded into hobo legend.

‘Izzy’? Izzy walked from the east coast to the west coast, from north to south. Always contributing, possibly only two potatoes held in the pockets of the great-coat, or an apple or some of the few cents he’d earned on that day, so most always welcomed by those unfortunate enough to have to be eating over a flaming garbage can.

Walking from 1931, into January, then in…

Assuming this older aged man had been a soldier during the Great War, Izzy was found found tightly wrapped and huddled within an old Army issued, khaki long-coat lying in the narrow alcove of the once antiquities store on a frigid night February of ‘32. As there was nothing to steal within any of Loveland’s vacated shops, rather than having a vagrant break the lock or a window to gain entry, the doors were left unlocked…

Oddly, obviously not aware, Izzy’s mind came alive— the quarter portion of Izzy’s… Of Seamstress Izzy’s mind stirring as, ‘life goes on’!

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                                             96

                                     Chapter Nine

                                      A Double Life