“So do I,” I said, “but being responsible to anyone other than myself and my family is one of the things I now avoid because I never much liked it anyhow.”
“You’re very blunt.”
“I see no reason not to be.”
“No, I don’t either,” Vullo said. “In fact, it’s rather refreshing. However, we do have a problem that you may be able to help us with. I trust you won’t mind giving us your thoughts?”
“Not at all.”
“We need to find a replacement for Quane,” he said. “I think you’ll agree that he had certain singular qualities that will make replacing him rather difficult.”
If Roger Vullo wouldn’t mourn for Max Quane, at least he would miss him — or his singular qualities, which consisted largely of a quick, cunning mind, a thoroughly manipulative personality, a streak of utter ruthlessness, and an unerring eye for other people’s weaknesses. If he had really wanted to, Max Quane could probably have been a highly successful business executive, or if that were too tame, a Hollywood agent.
I thought about where Vullo might find himself another Max Quane and then I had an idea. But before I could tell him about it his secretary came in with the check. She handed it to Vullo who scrawled his name on it and then moved it across his huge desk to Murfin who signed with something of a flourish and handed it to me. I looked at it, saw that it was for five thousand dollars, and put it in my pocket.
Vullo dismissed his secretary with a curt nod and when she was gone I said, “I’ve heard about someone who might be able to help you find a replacement for Max. He’s a headhunter.”
“What’s that?” Vullo said, not at all ashamed of his ignorance.
“Someone who specializes in finding just the right person to fill hard-to-fill jobs. In fact, the one that I’m thinking of was the one who somehow located those two hundred guys that the union’s hired. His name’s Douglas Chanson although he calls himself Douglas Chanson Associates.”
Vullo gave his right thumbnail a nasty nip. “How very curious that you should mention Chanson,” he said.
“Why curious?”
“He’s a friend of mine and when I was just starting the Foundation I went to him for advice and counsel. And it was he that recommended Murfin here.” Vullo looked at Murfin. “I never told you that, did I?”
“No,” Murfin said, “you never did.”
“Douglas suggested that I be discreet in my approach to you, so I was. You don’t mind, do you?”
“No,” Murfin said, “I don’t mind.”
“So perhaps Mr. Longmire has a good suggestion. I think I will get in touch with Douglas again. What do you think, Murfin?”
“Whatever’s right,” Murfin said.
I could see that our meeting with Vullo was over, at least as far as he was concerned, so rather than risk one of his peremptory dismissals, I started to get up. I was almost halfway there when the phone rang. Vullo frowned, picked it up, said, “I see,” looked at me, and frowned again. “It’s for you,” he said. “Would you mind taking it in Murfin’s office?”
“Not at all,” I said and headed for the door with Murfin close behind me. When we reached his office I picked up the phone and said hello. It was my sister and she sounded frantic, or as near to frantic as Audrey would ever permit herself to be.
“All right, calm down,” I said. “What’s the matter?”
“Sally called.”
“So?”
“She wants to come home.”
“Well, good.”
“She sounded awful.”
“What do you mean awful?”
“How the hell do I know what I mean by awful? She sounded scared and mixed up and desperate and, I don’t know, panicky, I reckon. She wanted me to come get her.”
“Why doesn’t she take a cab?”
“Goddamn it, Harvey, I told you she’s scared out of her mind. She wants me to come get her, but I can’t leave the kids and I don’t want to take them over there so I told her I’d get you to go.”
“Where’s over there?” I said.
“It’s over on Twelfth Street Southeast.” She read the number to me. It wasn’t much of a neighborhood. “I didn’t want to take the kids over there.”
“No,” I said, “I don’t think you should. When did she call?”
“About ten minutes ago. Maybe fifteen. I called Slick and he said you might still be at Vullo’s.”
“Did Sally say anything else?”
“Like what, damn it?”
“I don’t know. Anything?”
“She just said she wanted to come home,” Audrey said. “Isn’t that enough?”
“Sure it is,” I said. “I’ll go get her.”
“Right away?”
“Right away.”
I told my sister good-bye and hung up. I turned to Murfin. “You want to take a little ride?” I said.
“Where to?” he said.
“Over on Twelfth Street Southeast. Max’s girl friend is there. She wants to go home to my sister’s except that she’s too scared to take a cab.”
Murfin looked at me. “The spade fox,” he said thoughtfully.
“That’s right.”
“Think maybe she can tell us something about Max?”
“We can ask,” I said.
“Yeah, we can, can’t we,” he said. “Okay, let’s go.” He started toward the door, then stopped, and turned back to me. “You know something?”
“What?”
“When we get back from our little run out to St. Louis, maybe you and me had better check out this Douglas Chanson Associates guy. What do you think?”
“I think you’re right,” I said.
Chapter Twelve
We took mubfin’s car, the big brown 450 SEL Mercedes that he drove carelessly, almost recklessly, the way a lot of people drive leased cars, secure in the knowledge that somebody else will have to pay for the skinned paint or the nicked bumper.
“You wanta know something?” Murfin said.
“What?”
“I like this car better’n any car I ever had except one. You wanta know what that one was?”
“A 1957 Cadillac convertible that you had when you were nineteen,” I said. “It was yellow.”
“I already told you about it?” He sounded disappointed.
“You already told me.”
He told me again anyway.
When Murfin was graduated from high school in 1956 he hadn’t gone on to college because there hadn’t been any money to send him and because he really hadn’t wanted to go anyway. Instead he had gone to work for something called the Acme Novelty Company in Pittsburgh. The Acme Novelty Company supplied Pittsburgh with most of its pinball machines, which were legal, and with all of its slot machines, which weren’t.
The principal owner of the Acme Novelty Company was one Francesco Salleo, quite often referred to in the Pittsburgh papers as Filthy Frankie, who was alleged to have certain important connections Back East (New York) and Out West (Las Vegas). Filthy Frankie was quick to recognize Murfin’s genuine mechanical ability, as well as his flair for sound business practices. As a result Murfin quickly went up the promotional ladder at the Acme Novelty Company and soon was in charge of the placement and servicing of all slot machines in Pittsburgh’s numerous fraternal halls, country clubs, veteran’s posts, after-hours joints, and whorehouses.
As a reward for his diligence, ability, and unswerving loyalty to the firm, Filthy Frankie rewarded Murfin, by then nineteen, with a salary of $500 a week, not an insignificant sum to a nineteen-year-old back in 1957 or, for that matter, today.
It was with his newly gained prosperity that Murfin purchased the 1957 yellow Cadillac convertible, a car remembered, if not cherished, for its enormous tail fins. In it he went courting Miss Marjorie Bzowski, eighteen, daughter of Big Mike Bzowski, business agent for Local 12 of the United Steelworkers of America (AFL–CIO).