“I can give you advice,” I said.
“Screw your advice,” she told me coldly. “No advice from a cop.”
“I got a friend who makes pictures. We were in the war together. He might be able to use your type if you have the guts to try. Maybe it won’t work, but I can always ask.”
“Why?”
“Why not?”
I was starting to feel like a damn dogooder and didn’t like it. Thirty days in the can would probably make more of an impression, but she was from the place I grew up and couldn’t get out and I knew what she felt like.
Rose looked at me, the beer motionless in her hand. “You mean it, don’t you?”
I nodded.
“What’s this world coming to?” she said. “So I’ve tried everything, why not advice from a cop?” The hardness washed out of her eyes and the expression turned serious. “René had somebody stashed in his apartment. Somebody he knew.”
“How did you know that?”
“Because he was buying groceries for two, that’s why. I saw him at the deli, old Pops mentioned it and once I saw the laundry he brought into the laundromat. He bought booze he’d never buy for himself and he had those allover smiles he never had when times was hard.”
“Who, Rose?”
“I never inquired. If I did it would mean a belt in the mouth and I had enough of that, and in my business that would be...”
“Disastrous,” I supplied. “Yeah.”
I got up and pushed the chair back where it was. “I’ll make that call for you. Take it.”
“Okay, copper,” she said. She lifted the bottle to her lips, sipped at it without taking her eyes from mine, then put it down and smiled. “And you know what? I’ll make it, too.” When I agreed with a little grin she said, “Watch out for that Al Reese. He had the bull on René and was pushing him. You’re the copper I’ve been hearing about, aren’t you?”
“Probably.”
“Then watch him. He knew René had dough coming. I saw them arguing one day and it was all on Al’s side. He had René pinned because of something he knew René did, like he does with everybody else, and held it over his head. When René started flashing that cabbage, Al was there, so he put things together and put the squeeze on him. Don’t play that fat boy down, copper. He’s just a precinct captain around here, but dig his place on the Sound and that boat he has and the broads he pays for and you’ll see more. The tax people ought to do him like they did Capone. Where he lives here is only for show to get the votes for the party like he’s one of the boys, but he’s a power, man, a big power.”
“I’ll watch him,” I said.
“He’s smart.”
“So am I.”
“He’s tough.”
“I’m a helluva lot tougher, sugar.”
“But he knows more about René and that’s what you’re interested in, isn’t it?”
“You’re on the ball.”
“I like you, copper. You’re welcome to stay a while if you want.”
For fun I winked like maybe I’d be back, but we both knew what it meant. Twice now I’d been invited to a bed party free by a couple of pros who could make it interesting and twice I kissed off the deal. Too much training, I thought. Too many Army VD films.
Hell, that wasn’t the reason. It was that damn Marty. I kept thinking about her.
The late-afternoon shift was just beginning to drift into Donavan’s place when I got there. This was the straight bunch, the guys still in work clothes carrying lunch pails, having a drink before they had to breech the fortresses of their own homes. The bartender caught my entry and tried to pass the word, but I stopped him with a single look and went back to where Donavan was sitting behind a paper and pulled it away from his face.
“Al Reese,” I said. “Where is he?”
His tone was bland, but forced. “He ain’t been in.”
All I had to do was start that damn vicious grin again.
“Try Bunny’s,” he said in a hurry. He covered his fright by looking at his watch. “He don’t generally come over here until six.”
I said, “You make a call, Donavan, you put the word out and I’ll smear you all over your own joint. You got that?”
“Listen, Scanlon...”
Tough guys I didn’t like. I just grinned again, and he got the message. Whatever he saw in my face scared the crap out of him. “Look... I got my own business...”
I didn’t bother to hear him out.
Bunny’s was a fag joint around the bend. Hell, you’ve probably read about it a dozen times if you keep up with the columns. At night a cop is stationed outside and a cruiser goes by every ten minutes looking for trouble. It was an old place and back when Prohibition was still in effect and the stage door Johnnies were still escorting the chorus babes around as status symbols and it was a genuine saloon, Larry and I were making bucks for eating money holding open car doors for the tux crowd and sometimes steering the lonelies to spots where exciting company could be found in a hurry.
Now it was changed, the exterior was gaudy, the canopy and doorman expensive, the line of taxis unusually long for this area at this time, but the reason plain... it was the convention season, and the out-of-towners wanted a peek at New York in the rough.
I could still feel Larry at my side, laughing at the suckers, knowing what marks they’d be when a forlorn lad was out for a favor and a broad watching to see how expansive her date would be. Hell, that was how he got his loot to go watch all the Tom Mix shows.
Chief Crazy Horse, I kept thinking. Miss you, boy. Of all that big family we had, I miss you the most. One lousy war and a missing in action notification telegram busts us up.
You didn’t miss a thing, Larry. The world went wild after you left. Most of the bunch are dead. Some died with you... some the hard way. Some are still waiting to die. The rest just waiting.
I went inside.
Al Reese was at the bar, his bulk taking up a corner of it Loefert was two stools down with a pretty, but hard-looking B girl beside him, and next to her Will Fater and Steve Lutz were sipping drinks without talking, satisfied with watching their reflections in the back bar mirror.
It was going to be a fun evening. And the night hadn’t even begun.
When I tapped him on the shoulder he turned around, annoyed at the interruption, his chunky jowls ready to chop into me with a wise remark, then all at once he went white.
Everybody was looking when I said, “On the wall, fatty. Hands out, feet back and apart and make a move I don’t like and you’ll catch one.” I let them see the rod in the Weber rig and whatever my face said, they knew I wasn’t kidding. To insure the deal I nodded to Loefert, Fater and Lutz to join him and without a word they took the position. Hell, I knew they’d all be clean, but when you roust you roust and you don’t give a damn. Tomorrow all hell would break loose at HQ when Reese put the squeal in, but right then I was enjoying myself. The customers had a treat, the hired help had a laugh and Al Reese damn near had a stroke when I finally got them patted down, identified and let them go back to their seats. For the others it was an old routine, but for Reese, it was strictly a new experience.
To add to it, I shoved him in the corner and made it quick. I made it loud enough so the bartender would hear it and let it go out on that grapevine that was faster than Western Union and said, “Fat boy... there’s a girl named Paula Lees that you lay off.” I looked over at Loefert and knew he was listening to every word. “If you... or anybody... bothers her I’ll take your ears off. Now I’m not speaking figuratively. I mean take your ears off. One day see Fuchie. Remember him? Remember that goatee he had? Know what his chin looks like now? I did that, fat boy, and the same I’ll do to your ears. Yell all you want and it’ll be like old times in the Tombs with the rubber hose and the hard cell. Think we can’t do it that way now and you aren’t thinking straight.”