Vantagio laughed. "Oh, kid, you are a greenhorn. Strictly from the backwoods. Listen, kid. In the vernacular of our fair city, the word 'house' means a brothel, a bordello, a bagnio, a crib, a sporting house, a cathouse, a whorehouse, or, in short, a house of prostitution! And here you are. This is the pleasure palace of the United Nations, the top 'house' in all of Manhattan!"
Another orgy of synonyms, of equivalent terms, of slang words, nicknames, and so on. Mary did the same thing while listing all the names for heroin. Wonder why. Is the author trying to show off, is he padding the story, or what?
Also, I had no idea "house" meant "brothel." I must reluctantly conclude that Heller is more "street" than I am.
Vantagio offers Heller a job as a bouncer, but the battlefield engineer refuses, insisting that he needs to go earn his diploma. The mobster agrees, noting that he himself has a masters in political science from Empire University, and look at him now, running the premier bawdyhouse of New York City! ...Well, if your customers are mainly folks from the UN, that could actually make sense. I mean, they'd be more favorable towards you if you knew something about their countries and customs, surely. Help create an environment where they'd feel more comfortable while paying for sex.
The conversation is interrupted by two disheveled men listed as gunsels, a term which Hubbard is probably using as a synonym for "hired gun" rather than its homosexual connotations. They explain that they were delayed by the cops, who were surely working with the rival mobsters. When Vantagio recounts Heller's gravity-defying acrobatics and improbable aiming skills, they both gush "Jesus!" in unison before being dismissed to tidy themselves up. This is a respectable establishment, Vantagio explains.
It's for that reason that he doesn't sell drugs, he tells Heller, since the UN crowd would think they were "trying to bleed information out of them"... Hubbard, you told us this last chapter. Anyway, this is a good-old fashioned whorehouse, with no drugs but plenty of bootleg alcohol (which is a drug). Even though it isn't prohibited anymore, they still bootleg their liquor to avoid federal taxes, and because it's traditional.
Customer satisfaction is just one reason Vantagio doesn't push drugs, the other is economics. Drug-using hookers "get all dried up" in only a year or two, and prostitutes are an expensive investment, requiring extensive training, study at Towers Modeling School, work as doctors' assistants, and even a post-graduate apprenticeship to "an ex-Hong Kong whore." Plus, if they got involved in drugs they'd have to bribe the DEA, on top of losing their UN customers.
Just in case you thought these mobsters were objecting to drugs for any ethical reasons.
"[...] So, no drugs, kid."
"No drugs," said Heller, probably thinking of Mary Schmeck.
I just want to highlight this to emphasize how awkward and problematic the "Gris as narrator" concept is. Here we have Hubbard trying to make his main character appealing by having him remember the tragic loss of his companion to the scourge of drugs. The problem is that Heller doesn't actually do this - instead, Gris is suddenly speculating on what Heller is thinking, and remembering a fallen companion with any measure of sympathy is simply out-of-character for him. For all we know, Heller could be thinking about baseball and mindlessly parroting what his new friend tells him.
The book's hero is totally closed to us, while the voice describing and commenting on everything that happens belongs to a loathsome little worm who I got sick of early last book. And there's eight more books of this. (editor's note from the future: well, five-and-a-half)
Anyway. Since Heller saved his life, Vantagio decides to let him room in The Gracious Palms while he goes to college, complete with free meals and drinks. All Heller needs to do to "repay" him for use of the facilities is to spend an hour every now and then sitting in the lobby. Of course, Heller can't be served any alcohol while rooming in this illegal whorehouse, because he's underage.
And then... why, Hubbard... Vantagio hits a buzzer to summon the brothel's staff, and has Heller stand on a marble ledge to be presented to them. "The sea of upturned lovey faces looked like the color plates of the porno and movie magazines had all gone into a mad shuffle." Vantagio announces that Heller has saved his life, and the ladies under his employ must "treat him decent." And they oooh and aaaah and drool over his muscles and pant in barely-restrained lust, but Vantagio warns that Heller's clearly underaged, and he doesn't want to be brought up on a "morals charge" while running this whorehouse serving bootleg liquor. The stolid, mustached Mama Sesso will enforce this order, tossing out any (bleeptch) who Heller complains of bothering him.
And-a Mama Sesso talks-a in the a-stereotypical Italian accent-a. Mama mia.
There's not much left to tell. Heller takes his stuff to his room, followed by beautiful women just itching for the chance to throw him down on a mattress, only for his would-be paramours to be shooed off by Vantagio. The mob boss gives Heller some money and an address for a "tall man's shop," ordering him to get some non-baseball clothes.
Yes, that's right. Looks like we're getting another chapter of Heller going shopping.
Gris ends the chapter furious, because not only has Heller just made a host of new enemies, but he's rooming in a very secure building (since bawdyhouse owners don't like people breaking in and rummaging through belongings, as that upsets the customers). Also, Raht and Terb are still shadowing Heller and sending in completely useless reports, and of course Gris has no way of sending them new orders or filling them in on the situation or in fact interacting with them at all, because Hubbard couldn't think of a way for his plot to work if the bad guys had a two-way radio.
Back to Chapter One
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