The government had agencies to handle a crisis like this. But the government had agencies that moved as fast as a garbage scow with anchors down. And the government would never think that an almost dead street in Manhattan might be the breeding ground for a great catastrophe.
I ran my fingers through my hair and wondered where all the wild ideas came from. Ideas weren’t real — but they preceded reality.
I heard the bells from the ice cream truck coming down Kenneth Avenue. I left bleak thoughts behind and went outside and bought three vanilla super-cones from a kid with a ring in his nose and brought them over to Bettie’s house.
Tacos let out those race-dog yips and when Bettie opened the door he nearly took his own personal cone out of my hand, along with my fingers.
Bettie just stood there smiling in her see-through nightie, her untrimmed delta a refreshing pleasure in these days of bizarre pubic buzz cuts.
“Why do I like you?” she asked.
“Because I bring you expensive presents. Like ice cream cones.”
The dog had already dropped his on the floor and was busy licking up the mess. I got a paper towel and wiped out the tongue marks from the flooring.
Bettie said to me, “That’s the first time they came down this street.”
“You said they got fresh, before...?”
“Those drivers were always making remarks to me from the village area.”
“You’re worth whistling at any place, kid.”
“They aren’t from around here, you know.”
“Now how would you know that?”
“From being blind,” she said quietly. “My ears hear things... like dialects, that other people might not recognize. All those drivers have New York accents.”
“Most of the people down here are escapees from the big city.”
“Sure,” she agreed. “But those people have money.” She paused. “Do ice cream truck drivers get paid much?”
I shrugged. It was an oddball question. I asked her why.
She told me, “Darris said he thought he saw one of them in Sarasota driving a new Porsche convertible. He had a real snazzy blonde with him, too.”
I frowned at that. Porsches don’t come cheap, and neither do snazzy blondes.
Of course, Darris could have made a mistake. Except old ex-cops don’t make those kinds of mistakes.
I picked up the phone, got Darris on the other end and asked Darris about the ice cream dealer in the Porsche.
There didn’t seem to be any doubt in his mind. “I was positive it was him, all right. Maybe I wouldn’t swear to it in court, but it sure looked like him.”
“You meet him often?”
“When they were getting permission to operate here, I had a half-hour discussion with him. He checked out at his last job up north. Want me to get out his file?”
“Sure do.”
I heard a metal door slide open, the rustling of papers and Darris said, “Here’s the skinny on the group that sells the ice-cream product over here.”
He read off five names, giving me their backgrounds and I stopped him in mid-sentence with, “Who was that last one, Darris?”
He checked back and said, “Romero Suede. Suede — like the shoes.”
“Late twenties, six feet tall, dark, pockmarked complexion?”
“Sounds like the very beauty,” Darris replied. “You know him?”
“If it’s the same Suede, my old partner nailed him twice for possession of narcotics. He got six months on Riker’s Island, did four and was turned loose.”
“Who got him off?”
“That came at the request of the city. The place was overcrowded and they needed the space.”
“You sure?”
“I’ll check it out. Incidentally, where’s home base for that ice cream business?”
“That’s one of the Garrison projects.”
“You know anything about that operation?”
“No,” he told me, “But if you want to take a ride to the county seat with me, we can check out the tax rolls and see if we recognize any names.”
“You’re on, Darris. Pick me up in the morning. You’ll give a nice official overtone to the inquiry.”
And he did.
Sunset Lodge was a well-respected development and the nature of our requests was simply to see who we might contact to share mutual interests in expansion possibilities.
We got what we needed.
Al Capone liked Florida. So did a lot of other hoods in the old Prohibition days. Some of them drifted down the Keys for retirement, away from the probing of big city cops, or to establish a new line of illegal traffic. For a while Cuba made a great base, then South America opened up a new narcotics trade potential. The ones who got rich went back to being part of the financial underworld, turning dirty money into clean cash.
Retired mobsters weren’t just living at Garrison Estates — they owned it!
On the way back, Darris behind the wheel of his hopped-up black Ford, I said, “Buddy, I think we’re up to our ears in one big, deadly scam.”
“What?” His voice was soft, but the way he said it was like thunder cracking.
“Do me a favor,” I said, “keep a close watch on Bettie. And I mean close. Get one of the station house bunch, or several, to keep a relay cover on her. They know the routine and they know me.”
“How about Joe Pender — he was a pal of yours, right?”
“Perfect. And anybody Joe recommends.”
“Weapons?”
“Damn right.”
“But...”
“The old warhorses’ll be glad for the action.”
“Jack... these guys are all married.”
“I know. You think their wives protested when they were on a hot case?”
He didn’t answer me.
I said, “They’re cops’ wives, pal. They’re with us.”
“I should have known better than arguing with the Shooter,” he told me. “Now, where will you be?”
“Unfortunately, back in the Big City.”
“Unfortunately for the Big City,” he said.
Something had happened to me.
The Big City had become jammed with those “teeming” throngs that had always seemed so natural before. Suddenly they were all strange faces and behind each face was some odd agony that no one else knew about and the afflicted didn’t want to divulge. I used to see these aberrations and try to study them, but this time nothing formed into a clear matrix. I tried to ignore them and go about my business.
Sometimes I’d had to shoot one of them. I didn’t like it, but if I hadn’t, that one would have shot somebody else. Now, there was that feeling again. Something was happening and it wasn’t clear yet. It was arising like an animal awakening from hibernation and it was going to be angry and vicious if anything got in its way.
It was an instinctive gesture, but my hand ran over the familiar bulge that said the old, well-oiled Co... .45 was in its hip holster where it was ready in case all the action was suddenly shoved in my face.
Going into this alone was bad news, so I called Davy Ross and got him just as he was leaving his office at his new assignment.
I said, “I’m back again, Dave. This thing keeps getting bigger and bigger.”
“They all do, Jack. What’s going on?”
“I need backup, buddy — this is going to need more hands.”
“Want me to alert some of the group here?”
“Tell them to keep their cell phones handy. And their sidearms.”
“Got it... and by the way... I got a call to be passed on to you. Remember that vet, Brice, from Staten Island?”
I felt a coldness come down on me like a sudden shower.
“Yeah. What happened?”
“Somebody tried to knock him off. They got into his bedroom and took a shot at him, but one of those pet dogs of his jumped the guy from behind, and the bullet missed. The mutt got his teeth into the guy.”