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it and read.
    Meet me tonight.
    â€”Anna
    I couldn’t have been more stunned if Jack Dempsey had smacked me in the face. I stared at the thing for a long time and was as confused and hopeful and horny and hot and bothered as I’d been in years.
    I only knew one Anna, and she and I had spent maybe the most memorable night of my life at the Hotel Chatham.
    But she was dead, or so I’d been told.

Chapter Four
    Every guy who met Anna fell for her, at least a little. Some of us a lot more. I guess I met her in 1925 or ’26. I was fifteen or sixteen.
    I don’t remember exactly what I’d been doing that day, probably delivering payouts to one of the judges. Well past lunchtime, I found myself on Fifty-Seventh Street and I was hungry. In that part of town in those days, there were a few fancy places to eat, places that wouldn’t let a scruffy kid like me in the front door. I usually wore dungarees or work pants, shirt and tie, coat and cap—clothes that didn’t slow me down and blended in on the street. And I had to look like I belonged in a police station or the Tammany offices, where I was assumed to be some Mick’s kid.
    Besides the fancy beaneries, there were lots of little places with names like Aunt Polly’s or the Kangaroo that were meant for women. I guess guys could eat there if they wanted, but none of the guys I knew went to them, so I didn’t either. But that day, my gnaw was so huge I was considering it.
    Then I saw a brightly painted sign for the Spanish Marketplace, and a cartoon man was part of the design. A menu was posted by the door. It listed sandwiches and stuff, not the beef and beans you’d find in a place that was just for guys or the waffles and desserts you see a woman’s place. And, when I looked through the glass in the door, I saw the head waitress, a big busty brunette, who smiled at me. As soon as I opened the door, the smell of coffee floated through and that did it.
    It was a hole-in-the-wall place with small tables with candles, striped tablecloths and matching folded napkins, and woven rugs on the floor and hanging on the walls. The big brunette showed me to a table next to the kitchen. I stared at her butt as she walked away. Then the waitress handed me a menu, and I looked up and fell in love.
    Now, here’s the truth of it. Anna wasn’t beautiful. Hell, I guess maybe she wasn’t even that pretty by some standards, but if you remember what Mary Pickford was like in the movies then, you know what I’m talking about. She was neither thick nor slim. Just right to me. About medium height, a little taller than me, I’d learn later. Her hair was a little more blonde than brown. She had wide shoulders for a girl her size and a complexion that used to be called peaches and cream with most of the peaches in her cheeks. Her eyes were dark, and when she smiled, she could light up a room. She wore a black skirt and a white blouse with lots of ruffles in front, Spanish ruffles, I guess, and a silly little round cap perched on top of her head.
    I don’t remember what I ordered or what I said at all, but after the meal was over, when she brought me the bill, I said, “What’s your name, when do you get off work, and what would you like to do then?”
    She laughed and said, “Aren’t you the fresh one? I should slap your face.”
    â€œNo, you shouldn’t. You should go out with me.”
    She looked around to see if any of the other girls who worked there were listening. “I can’t tonight. I’m Anna, by the way”
    â€œI’m Jimmy. How about tomorrow?”
    â€œI don’t know.”
    â€œOK,” I said, “I’ll come back and ask you then.”
    I was there the next day, and I was there the day after that and then, worn down by my persistence, she said yes.
    At least that’s the way I choose to remember meeting her. I was probably too tongue-tied to say anything