“The conditions weren’t right.”
Rothstein laughed again. “Knowing Albert, I gotta agree with you,” he said. “He ‘s not one to go face-to-face with anybody.
“Well, he was a very pushy guy, you see, and I figure he came to me wanting something, so pushy was not the right attitude.”
“You’re large on attitude, are you?”
“No, I’m large on if you want something you say ‘please’ and ‘how about it, ‘ not ‘gimme. ‘
“I’d say that’s reasonable. Unfortunately, Albert A is not a reasonable fellow. He is definitely a ‘gimme’ guy.”
“He s a back-shooting son of a bitch. He kills for wages. He smells like death. And he has hyena breath.”
“Hyena breath.” Rothstein laughed. “That s great. You’re full of em.
“Anyway, he is definitely not the kind of a man you send to talk business. Not f you’re serious anyway. You send a negotiator, somebody who talks give and take. Somebody with a greased tongue and the long schmooze. So what we did, we moved him around some before we sat down to talk. Spooked his tails. Anastasia’s a planner. He couldn’t take me on because he was out of his element, he didn’t have a plan. And his back- shooters were lost.”
“Very clever. So you think he came to kill you?”
Keegan looked at Rothstein and raised an eyebrow.
“No, I think he came to borrow a smoke.
“I must admit, sending him to negotiate anything was poor judgment. Not mine, incidentally. I’m simply here to mediate some differences.”
“That’s why I don’t believe it, A. R. That’s why I think it was not a proposal made in good faith. It was a setup that went sour. They thought they were dealing with one of the Katzenjammer Kids.”
“What exactly do you want, Francis?”
“What do I want? Nothing. Not a single, solitary thing. Zip. Just leave me alone. I’ve got a little specialty business. Hell, it’s a nothing to you guys. Somebody got a wire up his ass on this thing. I do a thousand cases a month, your people do twenty thou. If they wanted to do twenty-one thou, no big thing. See what I mean, what s the diff? A couple of times they tried to knock me over and for what? A thousand cases a month?”
“Three times they almost pulled it off” Rothstein said with a note of fatherly caution in his tone.
“But they didn’t,” Keegan answered. “So why are we here, Mr. Rothstein? Have you got a beef with me?”
“You wanna know the truth?”
“That would be nice.”
“I wanted to meet the man told Albert Anastasia he was too small a guy to fit in a goddamn Rolls-Royce.”
“That’s the whole of it?”
“Look, Francis. . . that’s what you prefer, isn’t it?”
“That s my name. I never have gone in big for monikers.”
“Or publicity.”
“Or publicity. I’d rather have my face on the post office wall than the front page of the Daily News.”
“That’s very smart Anyway, the whole of it is this. You are doing business with some very important people. People I would like to get next to. Like the governor, for instance. So I thought maybe we could work a little something out. You wash my hand, I wash yours. You know how that works. I’ll put Albert back in his box, tell the Sicilians to lay off You got no more troubles. Shit, son, let’s see, a thousand cases a month at your price, that would be about, uh, two and a half mil a year, correct me
I’m wrong. We got another two, three years before they repeal the stupid law. We’re talking a lot of gelt here, seven, eight million bucks and nobody hassles you anymore.”
“And for this?”
“For this maybe you could put me in touch with some of your people.”
“I never met the governor.”
“You have access.”
“I n afraid I couldn’t do that, A. R.”
“Oh?”
“Look, let s get to the bone, okay? I know these people socially. As far as they know, I’ve got a damn good bootlegger. They give me the order, I take care of things for them. I never see a dime at that end. So, you see, if I even suggested such a thing, that somebody should parlay with you, that would come down badly on me and you. You ‘ye got Tammany in your pocket, but it doesn’t work that way up in Albany. It would not just blow a good thing for me, it would have the state boys up your ass with a searchlight. So what I’m saying to you, I’m giving you some advice. It’s a bad call, A. R. You don’t want to do that. It’ll give you a headache aspirin won ‘t cure.”
Rothstein looked at Keegan with his mouth open Just a hair. He was impressed. The kid made sense to him. Keegan knew the lay of the land upstate. He’d been operating free as a sparrow for three, four years now. On the other hand, Rothstein ‘s corruption di4 not spread that far. He did not own any state cops or any upstate people that amounted to anything.
“That’s sound thinking, Francis. You ‘re fast on your fret.”
“I’m just calling it the way I see it. Why bite a tiger in the ass?”
“I must say, I could use a man with a head like yours. Most of my people think with their guns and their balls. You give ‘em two and two, they gotta take to the weekend to come up with four. Muscle they know about Brains? Shit, they think you go twenty miles south of Yonkers, you fall of the planet. I don’t suppose you’d be interested in a little change in professional direction at this time?”
“That’s a flattering offer but I like things as they are.”
“Tell you what I’m gonna do, Francis. I’m gonna go back and I’m gonna tell Frank and Lucky to leave you alone. That I owe you one. I appreciate good advice. I give it out a lot but I don ‘t get much back. I can understand why you backed Albert A down. He didn‘t know what to make of you. How many guns you have on him after you cut him out from his pack?”
Keegan c smile broadened. “You’ll never know,” he said.
“I guess I won ‘1.” Rothstein smiled back. “Pleasure meetin’ ya, Francis Keegan. Good health.”