“You don’t need a lawyer for this,” Gendell said, puffing on his cigar. “All you need is a messenger boy.”
“I do need a lawyer,” Dett said. “To be sure she doesn’t get cheated, make certain the deed they give her is what it’s supposed to be. I don’t want anyone at the bank pulling a fast one.”
Dett got to his feet.
“Wait a minute,” the lawyer said. “You come in here talking about the bank pulling a fast one, but you drop six grand on my desk and don’t even ask for a receipt. How do you know I won’t just pocket the money?”
“Because I know what kind of man you are, lawyer or not,” Dett said. “The mortgage I want you to pay off, it belongs to Tussy Chambers.”
1959 October 07 Wednesday 19:03
“The address is a bottle club in Cleveland. On East Seventy-ninth. In what they call the Hough area. It’s all colored there; a white man would stick out a mile away.”
“I never been there, boss.”
“But you got people there, right? A cousin, a friend, something?”
“Well, I knows people there, sure. But what you want, that’s pretty tricky stuff. Like being a spy.”
“It’s not tricky at all,” Dioguardi said, soothingly. Don’t want to spook the nigger, he thought, grinning inwardly as he realized his unintentional pun, vowing to use it later, when he got back to his headquarters. “The package is going to look like this,” he said, holding up a nine-by-twelve-inch manila envelope with thick red bands running both horizontally and vertically to form a cross.
“Looks like a Christmas package, boss.”
“That’s right,” Dioguardi said, encouragingly. “You could spot it at fifty feet. Now, we’ll make sure it gets delivered this coming Monday. All you have to do is watch for a white man coming out of that club, with this envelope in his hand.”
“What if he don’t pick it up on Monday, boss?”
“I told you; this is a colored place, in a colored neighborhood. A rough one, too. The guy I’m interested in, he’s a white man. So he’s not going to want to hang around. The way I have it figured, whoever he’s got working for him-inside the place, I mean-that person is going to call him as soon as the package gets delivered. And the guy I want you to watch for, he’ll be close by, ready to make his move.”
“I don’t think this is something I could do for you, boss. I mean, I wants to do it, sure, I do. I know you pays good. But I be worried that… well, they’s just too many things that could go wrong. And then you be mad at me. If this was Locke City, in Darktown, I mean, I could follow any man you say. But Cleveland, I ain’t never even been there myself. How I gonna chase after a man, I don’t even know the streets?”
“I was counting on you, Rufus.”
“That’s just it, boss. I wants you to count on me. I got a good reputation with you, don’t I? You ask Rufus to do something, it gets done. For a long time now, ain’t that true? Well, this time, something go wrong, now Rufus ain’t so reliable anymore, see? I can’t have that, boss. Now, you got a slick plan, find out who’s going to pick up your package. I know you a big man. You could probably make one little phone call, get a dozen good men to watch that place, if you wanted.”
Dioguardi leaned back in his seat, staring at nothing.
Rufus waited, silently.
“You make good sense, Rufus,” Dioguardi said, grudgingly. “You’re right. I’ll have it taken care of.”
“Thank you, boss. You said there was two things…”
“Yeah. And the other one, it’s right up your alley. All I want you to do is tell me if Walker Dett leaves town.”
“I gonna do that anyway, boss. I watching that man like a hawk for you.”
“You understand, I don’t just mean if he checks out, right? If he leaves town at all, even if he comes back. You can tell if he spent the night at the hotel, right?”
“Yes, sir. Easiest thing in the-”
“It’s a long drive to Cleveland,” Dioguardi said. “But it could be done in a day, easy. You watch him close, hear?”
1959 October 07 Wednesday 20:17
“How come you won’t be needing that shack you asked me about before?” Beaumont asked.
“I changed the plan,” Dett told him. “After I sapped that one punk, and that didn’t work, I took out two of his other men. That got him on the phone. I offered him a bunch of options, but, bottom line, either he was going to pay, or more of his men were going to die.”
“You shook down Sal Dioguardi?” Beaumont said, grinning. “A one-man protection racket, huh?”
“He couldn’t know how many people were involved,” Dett said. “All he knew was a voice on the phone.”
“How did he even know you were the same one who-?”
“I mailed him that souvenir. From the first one.”
“So what was the shack supposed to be for?”
“I figured he’d make some deal, say he had work for me. He’d know I wouldn’t come into his place, so he’d promise to meet me wherever I said. That’s why I wanted it local, so he’d think it was someone from around here. Like I said, he couldn’t know how many people were involved at my end. So he’d send a whole bunch of his best men to storm the shack.”
“And then?”
Dett gestured pushing a plunger with both hands. “Boom,” he said.
“Christ,” Beaumont said, exchanging a quick glance with Cynthia. “What kind of ‘strategy’ is that?”
“The kind that would make him deal with me the next time he heard my voice on the phone.”
“I guess it damn well would. But… why do you think he paid you off, instead?”
“I don’t know,” Dett admitted. “It wasn’t what I expected. Probably he thinks he’s going to snatch me when I go to pick up the money.”
“But there’s no chance of that?”
“None.”
“Maybe he’s doing just what Shalare promised he would,” Cynthia said. “Backing off.”
“Maybe,” Beaumont said, musing. “But maybe he’s got something else he’s thinking about.”
“I don’t think he runs that tight an operation,” Dett said. “I could just hit him, be done with it.”
“That’s just it,” Beaumont told him. “I don’t think that would put an end to anything. When I first sent for you, I thought Dioguardi was our problem. And he still is a problem, unless, like Cynthia says, he moves off, like we’ve been promised.”
“By Shalare,” Dett said, quietly.
“Yeah,” Beaumont agreed. “So now it’s Shalare that’s the problem. I… think. It’s like we’re watching a puppet theater. All we can see is the puppets; we can’t see who’s pulling their strings.”
“What do you want?” Dett said.
“Huh? You know what we want. The reason we brought you in here-”
“You thought there was going to be a war,” Dett interrupted. “Now you’re not sure. If you can’t say what you want, I can’t get it done.”
“I’m paying you-”
“-to do something. Or get something done. That’s what I do. Then I move along. No trouble for you; no trouble for me. I’m not looking for a salary.”
Beaumont sipped at his drink. Cynthia got up and stirred the logs in the fireplace. Luther watched from the corner.
Dett lit a cigarette. He took a deep drag, then looked pointedly at the cigarette, as if to say the fuse was burning down on his patience.
“You’re supposed to be a master planner,” Beaumont broke the silence. “So plan me this: how can we get Ernest Hoffman to back us?”
“Who’s Ernest Hoffman?”
“Ernest Hoffman is the most powerful man in the whole state. I’ve been studying him for years. Probably know more about him than he knows about himself.”
“Tell me,” Dett said, settling back in his chair.