Two Mafia men have been assigned to execute Buck Rackets for giving himself airs, making unauthorized excursions to Jersey City and otherwise getting too big for his britches.
Crime chieftains have argued for days over the language of the contract. One faction contends that the phrase should be “too big for his breeches.” The other argues that using the word “breeches” will make the Mafia sound like a sissy.
A compromise is negotiated. The contract will refer to Buck’s lower garment as “britches,” but specify that he must be slain gangland-style instead of being bumped off.
The “breeches” faction, with its taste for elegance, is happy with the compromise. They foresee newspaper headlines that say “Buck Victim of Gangland-Style Slaying,” which has an official resonance, instead of “Buck Bumped Off,” which sounds tacky.
This creates problems for the two Mafia men. Naturally, they would rather bump Buck off. They can manage that when he is on his way to pick up the papers at the newsstand or in a men’s shop showing the salesmen he is too big for his britches.
A bump-off is a piece of cake, as they say in the Mafia, but a gangland-style slaying is a bowl of consommé to be eaten with chopsticks.
In the first place, it has to be done in a restaurant if the slayee is a distinguished Mafia official like Buck Rackets. This is written into the Mafia constitution to give all high officials of the organization a sense of security.
This way they know they are never in danger of being slain gangland-style until they eat out. They are also assured of dying on a full stomach.
The two Mafia men have been following Buck for days, but he is too canny for them. Instead of going into restaurants he is content to buy carry-out doughnuts and eat them while walking the streets.
As a man who is giving himself airs, however, he must sooner or later flaunt his pretensions, they know, by going out for an expensive lunch with three martinis, a jug of wine and an avocado stuffed with a blonde.
Buck makes his fatal move in midtown and enters La Chambre de l’Estomac, the most notorious expense-account restaurant west of Zurich.
The Mafia men put on ski masks, stuff their pockets full of side arms and cradle shotguns. They enter La Chambre de l’Estomac and confront Marcel, the maitre d’hôtel, or as he is called in the Mafia, the mayter D.
Marcel immediately sizes them up as small tippers. “Do you have a reservation?” he asks. With an insouciant wave of their shotguns, they intimate that they wish Marcel to stand aside. Instead, Marcel draws a velvet-covered chain across their path.
Others have tried to bluff their way to his tables in the past by a show of arms. Marcel knows from long experience how to teach them that paper bearing Andrew Jackson’s portrait does more than shotguns can.
“There will be a thirty-minute wait for a table,” he tells them. “Would you like to wait at the bar?”
One of the Mafia men proposes that they bump off Marcel.
Marcel explains that he is too busy to be bumped off and much too important, since being bumped off is tacky. “If you must bump somebody off, I shall see if we have a busboy available,” he tells them.
“In the meantime”—indicating a sign that says, “We reserve the right to demand proper attire”—he says, “I must ask you to check your ski masks in the cloakroom.”
The second Mafia man is furious. What does Marcel take him for? One of those cheap expense-account chiselers who order $80 meals, pay five bucks to buy back their hats, then charge the whole thing off to Uncle Sam so the poor taxpayer has to pay for it?
“If you’ll refrain from making a scene,” Marcel says, “I can have a table for two set up in the kitchen.”
Look, says the first Mafia man, Marcel does not understand. They are not hungry. They could not afford Marcel’s prices if they were hungry. They are here to slay Buck Rackets gangland-style. If Marcel does not lower the chain and honor their shotguns, they will have no option but the trigger. “I will ask Mr. Rackets if he will see you,” says Marcel, opening his palm in anticipation of ten big ones for messenger duty.
One of the Mafia men becomes angry enough to shoot the gin on the mirrored wall behind the bar, but he sees reflected in the mirror the face of a world-famous expense-account chiseler cooling his heels in obedience to the law that nobody goes through Marcel’s velvet chain without cooled heels if his tips are not up to the mark.
The Mafia man asks the expense-account chiseler for his autograph. “Sure,” says the chiseler, “but first lend me your shotgun so I can bump off that headwaiter.”
The Mafia man declines, explaining that it would be tacky. They decide to slay Buck gangland-style at the next restaurant but that will probably be unnecessary. Marcel is already presenting Buck’s bill. Buck appears to be succumbing to apoplexy, but on a full stomach.