Uncle Al and the Wiseguy

Restaurants affect people. This was proved when Aunt Margie Alderson dragged her husband Albert, his sister Elmyra and me, Elmyra’s daughter Stacey, to Ristorante Vesuvio di Napoli. What should have been a pleasant evening turned into an adventure.

Uncle Al is an easygoing guy with a boyish face and easy smile. He still has the wavy hair that used to make girls sigh, although it is now more gray than brown. He is tall, with a paunch that spills over the top of his waistband. His favorite outfit is an old Grateful Dead tee shirt and a pair of faded jeans. He is retired from his job as a telephone repairman and content to stay put and do the same things he has been doing for the last forty years.

Aunt Margie is a tall, plump, baby-faced woman in her early 60s, with neon auburn hair. She is funny, gregarious, and quick to try new things. She still works as a doctor's receptionist because, as she puts it, "I have to do something besides stay at home and watch Jeopardy with Al!" She and Uncle Al have been married for almost forty years, living proof that opposites attract.

Mom has kept her figure, although she is sixty years old. She has been wearing her hair in the same bob for the last thirty-five years. She never has a polyester thread out of place. She is a careful money manager, in other words, cheap.  She has been working as an accountant since graduating from college, so budgets are on her brain. She has been a widow since Dad passed away ten years ago. Although she enjoys a night out, she doesn't do it often, especially if she must pay for it.

Aunt Margie's efforts to get Uncle Al to go out are usually met with resistance. She had him trapped, though, when her birthday came around. She wanted to go out, and dammit she would pick the restaurant. Because he loved her, Uncle Al acquiesced. Aunt Margie invited Mom and me to join them. I felt sorry for Uncle Al, but I was glad that Aunt Margie was getting a night out.

Aunt Margie chose Ristorante Vesuvio di Napoli because it had gotten superlative reviews in the newspapers. The owner, Freddie Caruso, was a local celebrity. He was a world-class chef and a third-rate tenor. Several times a night he entertained patrons with loud, off-key renditions of Neapolitan songs and two or three opera arias.

Our reservations were for Friday night at 8:00, and we arrived by 7:45. Aunt Margie sported her favorite red dress and a pair of gold earrings. Mom wore a navy blue polyester pantsuit and a powder blue blouse. I wore a black tunic and a pair of black Capris. Uncle Al had a blue sport jacket over his Grateful Dead tee shirt and had put on his cleanest pair of jeans. It was a clear, tangy late September evening.

We sat at the bar to wait for our table. There was a television at one end of the bar, playing an old episode of The Sopranos.  The voice of Andrea Bocelli serenaded patrons in the main room over an intercom. A trim elderly man with shoulder-length gray hair and a coral-colored shirt sat at the bar working on a crossword puzzle with a pencil. A pretty, dark-haired young woman was tending bar.

“What can I get you?" she asked us.

"I'll have a strawberry Daiquiri," said Aunt Margie.

“A Piña Colada for me,” I said. “With alcohol, please.”

"I'd just like a glass of water," said Mom, aiming a disapproving look at me that I pretended to ignore.

"A beer for me," said Al.

"You got it," said the bartender. She mixed and poured the drinks and put them on the counter.

Uncle Al picked up his beer, leaned against the bar and looked around.  He spotted something on the wall across from us that made him stop mid-sip. He poked Aunt Margie and whispered, "Hey, Marge, look at that over there. That picture. I swear that's Vinnie The Cheek Piccolo. I saw him on the Biography Channel. He's a famous mafioso. You know what that means? Gangsters eat here. What if he comes here? What if someone puts a contract out on him and they come and shoot the place up?"

“Ooh! I wish he would show up tonight!” said Aunt Marge.  “That would be exciting!"

Uncle Al turned back to the bar and sipped his beer, but I saw him shoot two or three sideways glances at the picture on the wall.

We were eventually escorted into the main room and seated at a round table in a back corner with a view of the entire room. The lighting was tasteful and subdued. The wall behind us held a reproduction of Michelangelo's Creation of Adam. A spinet piano stood by the wall opposite us. The tables had elegant beige tablecloths, linen napkins and baskets with assorted bread. Waiters in red vests and gray shirts wove in and out of the room, along with aromas of basil, oregano, garlic and various meats. The voice of Andrea Bocelli on the intercom had been exchanged for that of Jerry Vale. Everyone was talking, and the chatter echoed off the walls, accompanied by the usual clicks and clangs of dishes and silverware.

The waiter brought us our menus and Aunt Margie began to study hers. Uncle Al turned his over a couple of times and finally opened it and peered at it as if it were written in Martian. As usual, Mom looked for the cheapest thing she could find. When the waiter came to take our orders, Aunt Margie ordered prosciutto and melon, spaghetti bolognese and beef braciole.  I ordered fettuccine Alfredo and clams oreganato. Mom ordered the assorted antipasti. When the waiter suggested she might like an entree, she declined, and he shrugged his shoulders and moved on to Uncle Al.

"Do you have fried chicken?" asked Uncle Al.

"Well, I could bring you some chicken parmigiana if you want. That's as close to fried chicken as we get here," answered the waiter.

"Does that come with French fries?"

"No, but it comes with salad or antipasto and a pasta dish."

"Okay. I'll take the chicken, then. Give me a salad with Italian dressing."

"We just have olive oil and red wine vinegar."

"I'll go with that, then."

When the waiter had left, Uncle Al rolled his eyes, picked up the beer he had brought from the bar and a piece of bread and leaned back in his chair. Aunt Margie and Mom sipped their drinks as they chattered eagerly while Uncle Al sat silently munching, drinking his beer and looking sour.

About fifteen minutes later a middle-aged man dressed in an elegant black silk suit and wearing a black fedora entered the restaurant and was led to the table next to us, at which a young woman was sitting. The young woman rose, kissed and embraced the man and they sat down and began to talk. The man removed his hat and Uncle Al saw his face.

"Don't turn around and don't look! That guy in the next table is Vinnie the Cheek Piccolo!"

"Wow!" whispered Aunt Margie.

Mom took a compact out of her purse and pretended to check her makeup. "You're right," she whispered. "That does look like him."

"I wonder who the woman is," said Aunt Margie.

"Probably his girlfriend," said Uncle Al. "They all have girlfriends they go out with on Friday nights. I know that from Goodfellas."

The conversation was interrupted by two chords from the spinet piano. The elderly man who had been sitting at the bar was now at the piano. Next to him stood a short, fat man with a round face, thinning brown hair and a thin moustache, wearing a gray shirt open at the collar. He picked up a tambourine that had been lying on top of the piano. The pianist played a lively introduction. The bald man began to sing an Italian folk song, prancing among the tables and beating the tambourine.

"That must be Freddie Caruso," said Aunt Margie.

"I can’t hear you," said Uncle Al, talking loudly to be heard. "There’s too much noise here."

"Hey," interjected Vinnie the Cheek. "Do you mind? The man is singing. Show some respect."

"Sorry." Uncle Al shrank back in his chair.

Freddie Caruso's prancing landed him next to the gangster’s chair. He exchanged a few words with him and his companion and stared daggers at Uncle Al. The pianist vamped until Freddie resumed singing and banging the tambourine.

Freddie finished singing, to polite applause from the diners. He looked at Uncle Al, shook his head, muttered something about cucuzzi and disappeared into the bar. His place was taken by a handsome, dark-haired younger man with a pleasant baritone voice who sang a nice but unexciting rendition of Santa Lucia.

"Is it okay to talk now?" said Uncle Al.

"Ssh!" said Aunt Margie. "Wait until the singing is over."

The waiter approached our table with the salad and antipasti we had ordered. The young baritone had to scoot backward to dodge the oncoming load.

Freddie Caruso walked back to the piano, stared at Uncle Al to make sure he wasn't talking, and began to sing an aria from the opera Tosca in a loud, vigorous, off-key tenor. Uncle Al gave his whole attention to his salad. When Freddie was finished, most of the customers applauded and he headed for the kitchen. The pianist and the other singer packed up and retired to the bar. The intercom was turned on again, and this time it featured the voice of Luciano Pavarotti. Vinnie the Cheek and his companion stopped talking and crooned a phrase or two of the song, along with Pavarotti.

"Can I try a little of your prosciutto and melon?" asked Mom.

“You have your own plate of antipasto,” said Aunt Margie.

“Oh, but that looks so good. I just want a taste.”

"Oh, go ahead," said Aunt Margie. Mom lifted one of the pieces off Aunt Margie’s plate.

Vinnie the Cheek rose and walked past us, toward the men's room. We stopped talking and eating and shot surreptitious looks at him.

"I wonder what he's doing here," said Uncle Al, after the man had passed by. “I wonder if he's holding some meeting later, to plan some big caper or decide who to rub out.”

"He's with his girlfriend," said Mom. "How much business can he be planning with her around?"

The waiter returned with the rest of our food, which he placed in front of us. In the meantime, the gangster had returned to his place at the next table. By this time, Uncle Al was curious enough to stare at him out of the corner of his eye. The gangster noticed this, and raised a glass of wine to Uncle Al, who promptly lowered his eyes and dived into his chicken parmigiana.

"They put a lot of crap on their chicken," he said. He began to scrape the cheese and sauce off the meat.

"Please don't do that!" said Aunt Margie. "It's embarrassing."

"That's okay," said Mom, holding out her plate to Uncle Al. "I'll take it." She allowed Uncle Al to scrape the sauce and cheese over her antipasti. "Ooh, Margie!" she said. "Can I try some of your spaghetti?"

"Yes," said Aunt Margie. "While you're at it, take a piece of the beef, too. You know you will, anyway."

Mom's little antipasto plate was filling up. A waiter noticed this, and silently brought her a second small plate, rolling his eyes and shaking his head. Mom thanked him and divided her haul between the two plates.

"Can I have a piece of that chicken?" she asked Uncle Al.

"Why do you bother asking?" he answered.

"Oh, stop being a grouch," she said as she cut off a piece from the end of the cutlet.

We began to eat our food, at the same time stealing furtive looks at the man at the next table and his companion.

After a while, the young baritone and the pianist came back into the room and launched into Reginella Campagnola. Because he couldn't be heard, Uncle Al stopped whispering.

"They're like that, you know. They have their favorite restaurants and they go out at night a lot.”

The man and woman at the next table turned and looked at him. He quickly turned around in his chair and faced the other way.

"I think he heard you," said Aunt Margie, in a stage whisper that could also be heard at the next table. She looked away from Al and pretended to be engrossed in her beef braciole.

Mom suddenly showed great interest in the reproduction of Michelangelo's Creation of Adam on the wall behind our table. This gave her a chance to observe our next-table neighbors. "He's coming over here," she whispered.

The man at the next table had risen from his seat and was approaching us. He stopped, looked intently at all four of us in turn, then pointed to Uncle Al, who, by this time, had turned his head and was looking shyly up at him.

"Next time try the veal. It's the best in the city," he said. He continued to stare at Uncle Al, then saluted him and returned to his table. Uncle Al, who had not missed the Godfather reference, said only, "Thanks."

Freddie Caruso was approaching the piano again, with a piece of sheet music in his hand.

"Are you married to him?" he asked Aunt Margie as he passed our table.

"Thirty-nine years," said Aunt Margie, holding out her hand so Freddie could see her wedding ring.

"You have my condolences," said Freddie. He turned and headed for the piano. In a minute he was blaring Torna a Surriento to his captive audience.

When Freddie had finished singing, he left the pianist and the baritone to continue serenading the customers while he went to the kitchen. Vinnie the Cheek motioned to the baritone, who went over to see what he wanted. The two of them had a whispered conference, during which The Cheek pointed to Uncle Al. He then handed some money to the singer, who returned to the piano and spoke to the pianist.

The pianist played a short chordal introduction, and the baritone began to sing the theme from The Godfather.

When he finished singing, The Cheek applauded and gave him a thumbs-up. We were too stunned to move, having been sitting in suspended animation throughout the song.

The singer and the pianist packed up again and headed for the bar. Mom and Aunt Margie giggled, and we went back to finishing our dinners.

When dessert time came, Uncle Al, Mom and I ordered coffee, and Aunt Margie ordered a cappuccino and some tiramisù, remarking to the waiter that it was her birthday. When the waiter came back, there was a lighted birthday candle in the tiramisù. The pianist and the young baritone returned to the piano and sang and played "Happy Birthday." Then they returned to the bar. The Cheek raised his wine glass to Aunt Margie and said, "Salute!" He winked at Uncle Al and said, "I always say, keep your friends close.”

When we were finished with dessert and coffee, Uncle Al called for the check, which the waiter brought a few minutes later. We calculated how much Uncle Al, Mom and I had to pay. Mom and I each took out some cash and handed it to Uncle Al. Uncle Al dug his wallet out of his jacket pocket and took out a credit card.

As we got up to leave, Aunt Margie waved to The Cheek, who was paying his own bill.  He smiled and nodded at her.

On our way to the exit, we encountered the young baritone. Aunt Margie complimented him on his singing, and he thanked her.

"That man at the table next to ours," said Uncle Al. "Does he come in here often?"

"Who? Professor Buono?" said the singer.

"Professor?" said Uncle Al.

"Yes," said the singer. "He's the head of the Department of Italian over at the college. That woman with him is his daughter. Why?"

"Oh, nothing," said Uncle Al. "He reminded me of someone."

The singer laughed. "He looks a lot like Vinnie the Cheek Piccolo. Their families are related. The Cheek comes here with his wife on Saturday nights, so he'll probably be here tomorrow night."

Uncle Al, Aunt Margie and Mom looked at each other for several seconds, wishing they could sink into the floor. I put my hand on my mouth to stifle a laugh.

Uncle Al shook his head and sniggered to himself.

"You think you're meeting a famous gangster," he said, "And he turns out to be a college professor."

"Are you disappointed?" asked Aunt Margie.

"Yes," said Uncle Al.

He began to giggle again, and in a few seconds all of us were laughing as we opened the door and walked out into the sharp September air.

As we waited outside for the valet to bring the car around, still laughing in uncontrollable spurts, Professor Buono and his daughter came outside and spotted us. The professor walked over to Uncle Al, looked at him with eyes glowing with mischief, patted him on the cheek and said, "You're a good fellow."

"Oh Pop, cut it out!" said his daughter, giving him a playful slap on the arm and making him laugh. "Don’t pay any attention to him," she said to us as they walked away.

The valet appeared with the car. Aunt Margie and Mom looked at each other and both of them lit up.

"Let's come back here tomorrow night!" said Aunt Margie.

"You got it!" said Mom.

"No!" bellowed Uncle Al.

We laughed all the way home.