Word: underworld
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There is the mystery of Bechstein's spiritual state. Which life will become his model, that of his father--a lord of the underworld--or of Cleveland--an insouciant motorcylist? The two sit on opposite ends of Bechstein's spirtual seesaw. His father, head of a numbers racket and prostitution ring, is willing to forget the past in order to enjoy the present, and the world be damned. Cleveland, who would like to get involved in the same underworld life, hangs out at the Cloud Factory--the name he assigns to one of Pittsburgh's omnipresent smokestacks--his thoughts often...
...novel, The Immortal Bartfuss, the concept of a Jewish homeland is not relevant. Bartfuss, the emotionally anesthetized protagonist, does not even have a proper home. He sleeps in a room apart from a wife he avoids and two daughters he scarcely knows. Bartfuss is some sort of underworld trader who keeps his money hidden in a box that his family cannot find. His business hours evidently are erratic and short, because he spends most of his time gazing at the sea from a Jaffa beach or sitting in cafes drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes...
...upcoming book Donnie Brasco: My Undercover Life in the Mafia (New American Library; $18.95), written with Richard Woodley, reveals the full extent of his dangerous voyage into the underworld. Pistone lived with mobsters, gained their trust and came close to being initiated as a wise guy -- a "made" Mafioso. He helped arrange business deals between crime families in different parts of the country and was the subject of three Mob-style tribunals, or "sit-downs," any of which could have resulted in a contract on his life. "In the Mafia, it's always someone you know real well who kills...
What was valuable in Sheehy's piece, and got overlooked in criticisms of her second-rate psychoanalysis, was her reporting on how Hart and Rice met in the slimy underworld of South Florida. Their paths crossed on a party boat frequented by drug dealers and other high rollers. (Rice, in fact, lived for two years with one of the biggest drug dealers in South Florida, a man now in jail on a long sentence...
...people cherish superstitions about the bill, Ferranti-Dege employees said. "People thought they were bad luck," said James J. Casey, assistant manager at Ferranti-Dege. He said one of the reasons the bills were originally discontinued in the 1950s was because many people associated them with gambling and the underworld, partly because they were commonly used for placing two-dollar bets at racetracks...