“That’s generous. That does sound nice.”
“And taking all these cabs, you’ll go broke. The A-1 has a small fleet of half a dozen cars. You can have one for the week. There’s room for it next to my Jag in the old horse stable I use for a garage, behind my building.”
Her eyes were moist. I thought for a second there this hard-boiled dame might cry on me.
“Nathan … this is very sweet of you. I hope I can repay you in some way.…”
“I don’t bother with straight lines that obvious,” I told her.
We were having coffee when she brought Hoffa up.
“He surprised me,” she said.
“Shorter than you figured.”
“That, and he … seemed so nice. So affable. Just a regular fella, although, you know … larger than life, no matter how short he is. I noticed he didn’t drink. There was beer and booze flasks all around, but all he had was Pepsi.”
“He’s a teetotaler like you, Helen.”
She sipped her coffee, thinking. “Tell me, Nathan-is he a bad man?”
“Depends.”
“Explain.”
“I think he genuinely cares about the working stiff. But he’s also fine with lining his own pockets, and if you’re his enemy? Let’s just say some of those nice women you were sitting gabbing with, this afternoon, have husbands who have committed some of the most vicious murders Chicago has ever seen. And Chicago has seen some.”
She lifted her eyebrows. “Well, they say he’s a crook, and I don’t have anything good to say about unions myself, so I can’t say any of that surprises me.”
But she had surprised me. “You’re against unions? An old bleeding-heart FDR liberal like you?”
She waved a hand like a child bidding good-bye. “Never had a union be anything but trouble for me, on the road. The entertainment unions either side with the management, or tell me I can’t play someplace ’cause it’s blacklisted, or side with one of the little dancers I travel with on some pay dispute.”
“Sounds like showbiz has taken its toll.”
Shaking her head, the piled-up blonde curls bouncing some, she said, “No more bleeding heart for me, Heller. Strictly a free-enterprise girl these days. Hell, Kennedy was the first Democrat I voted for since Roosevelt. I like seeing his brother go after a bent union.”
I gave her a kidding grin. “If you’re turning so reactionary in your second childhood, Helen, why didn’t you vote for Tricky Dick?”
She shuddered. “Didn’t you see the debates? All that sweat and five-o’clock shadow. Nixon looked like half the fucking club owners I deal with.”
That made me laugh.
“Anyway,” she said, “Jack Kennedy is cute.”
“You make me so proud we gave you girls the vote.”
“Still a wise guy. You haven’t changed much.”
She shook her head, smiled, and began fishing in her purse for her cigarettes.
“Your life, Nate, even now, it’s still like something out of, I don’t know, Sam Spade. Last night, when you grabbed your gun and went running outside, bare-chested? I was frightened, Nate, but also … excited. Reminded me of the world’s fair days. Kind of thrilling to know a man like you.”
“Ah, well, everyone thinks so.”
A tiny laugh. “Even after all these years, you still live on that dangerous edge, don’t you?”
“Not by choice.”
A bigger laugh, as she lit up a Lucky. “Well, certainly by choice. You don’t have to hang around with people like Jimmy Hoffa.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
I grinned at her. “Okay, smart girl. Those tickets last night? You think they were a gift?”
“Weren’t they?”
“No, Helen. They weren’t.”
“What were they, then?”
“A summons.”
We slept together that night, with no interruptions from any dese-dem-and-dozer wanting to kill me or offer me tickets to a sporting event, either. My world seemed peaceful, damn near idyllic with Helen back in my life (and bed), an existence not at all dangerous, and it only took me about half an hour before I got to sleep wondering what it was about Jack Ruby and that packet of cash that had made me the object of Jimmy Hoffa’s Sunday-afternoon attention.
CHAPTER 6
Monday, October 28, 1963
At the first hint of a ring, I snagged the receiver off the bedside phone before Helen could be disturbed. The few bedroom windows had venetian blinds, which were drawn nice and tight, making it easy to sleep in, and that’s what we were doing.
Not an infrequent practice of mine, after a late night out with a lady-a privilege of age and rank. Unless I had an appointment, I didn’t bother going in to the A-1 till around ten, and the only thing scheduled on this Monday was a staff meeting at 2:00 P.M.
I felt awake enough, if sluggish after an excessive nine hours-the clock radio read 9:45 A.M. But my thick, whispered hello-actually “Yeah?”-must have been a tip-off.
A familiar voice on the other end of the line said, “Don’t tell me you’re still in bed.”
“Gimme a second.”
In just my boxers, I carried the phone on its long cord across the room, out of consideration for the slumbering Helen.
“I’m an executive, Dick. I go in to work when I please. Anyway, I didn’t know I had to clear it with you.”
Dick was Chief Richard Cain of the Cook County Sheriff’s Special Investigations Unit.
“Well, rise and shine and get over to the Pick-Congress, toot sweet. Room 318.”
“Any special reason?”
“No reason. Maybe I’m just in the mood for a romantic liaison with your ancient ass. Also, there’s a murdered guy with your business card in his wallet.”
“Oh.” Now I was wide awake. “Be right there.”
I roused Helen just enough to let her know I had to leave for a while. We planned to move her out of the Lorraine Hotel this morning, into the client’s apartment downstairs; but now that might have to wait. Business.
She just nodded and nestled into her pillow and didn’t stir at all as I quickly shaved and showered and got into a two-piece gray worsted by Louis Goldsmith. Wanted to look my best for Dick Cain, and whoever this dead body was.
I had a sick feeling I knew the answer to the latter already, or maybe that was just the slightly stale doughnut I washed down with orange juice. Anyway, I didn’t remember giving Tom Ellison my business card, so it couldn’t be him. Shouldn’t be him.
But beyond that possibility, I had no idea who this stiff might be.
And I hadn’t bothered to ask Dick Cain what a sheriff’s man was doing on a city homicide-I figured I’d find out soon enough. My hunch was Dick was looking after my best interests, which was something he habitually did.
Dick had been my inside man at the Chicago PD for a number of years, until he quit to go into private practice himself. For a while he was in Mexico City, doing Christ knows what, but when he got back to Chicago, I used him for various A-1 work, mostly lie-detector testing, which he was damn good at. He had studied with my old friend Leonarde Keeler, who was only the guy who invented the lie box.
For the last year or so, Dick had been chief of the SIU for Sheriff Richard Ogilvie, a reformer who made a frankly odd fit with Dick. I had no illusions about the fact that Dick wasn’t the most honest copper in town-on the PD, he had played bagman, delivering mob graft to other coppers-but he was also a smart, tough detective who had an admirable arrest and conviction rate.
Right now, the SIU’s stated mission was to crack down on vice in Chicago and Cook County, and I had no doubt Dick was using that position to alternately line his pockets with payoffs and make splashy arrest headlines.
Understand that not every cop in Chicago was bent. But understand also that I had no real use for an honest cop in my life. A guy like Dick Cain, with some Outfit ties, on the inside of law enforcement, made a very handy resource for Nate Heller. And if I talk about myself in the third person again, you have my blessing to slap me.