Friday, October 12, 1934

(Day Four)

I made strong coffee, fried some eggs and a rasher of bacon. I looked up that word, rasher, in my mother’s dictionary when I was a boy. The British lady who ran the Flint Hills Café in Emporia always used it. When I asked my mother what it meant, she told me to look it up. She almost always told me that when I asked about a word. She liked to see me poking around in books. It made her happy and I was glad to oblige. Rasher (rash’ur) n. a serving of bacon, usually three or four slices. It became a part of my vocabulary, and ever since I’ve flaunted rasher at every opportunity, even though folks look at me funny. And that morning I made my rasher four slices. A guy’s gotta keep his strength up.

After showering, I surveyed the damage in the mirror: wing-tip sized bruises on my chest, side, precariously close to my groin, and two lumps on my head. I’d have to be careful when I parted my hair. The headache was almost gone but the head still tender. By the time I had maneuvered down the stairs and out to my car, I had discovered that my body only hurt when I moved, or breathed. Lucky me.

The Plymouth started right up. A guy could get used to that. I headed over to the newspaper office to see what Dominic and his boys had dug up for me.

Even from the far end of the Star’s large city desk room, her red hair shone like a beacon, beckoning me to approach. I arrived at her desk and started to tip my hat when I remembered why I hadn’t worn one. Instead, I offered her a slight bow. “Good morning, Virginia.”

“Good morning, Mr. Morris.”

She nearly sang the words, and she remembered my name.

“Mr. Goucher in?”

With sparkling eyes, she said, “Sure thing, Mr. Morris. Dominic’s in the morgue downstairs.”

“Call me Phil.”

She blushed as bright as her freckles.

The blush added a frown. “What happened to your head, Phil?”

“Oh that. Nothing really: a shelf full of books collapsed on me.”

“Oh, dear, are you all right?

I offered her a sheepish smile. “Sure, just a little lumpy is all. Best get downstairs to speak to Mr. Goucher.” I raised my hand to touch the hat brim that wasn’t there and completed the motion with a full-blown chivalrous bow—another blush.

I would have danced down the stairs for her had my body permitted it.

Dominic sat hunched over a pile of newspapers, an unlit cigar flitting back and forth in his mouth. He held an old newspaper in each hand and peered at a third on table. Dom didn’t see me approach. “Morning, you old spaghetti slinger.” I slid the armless oak library chair around, straddled it and leaned forward on the chair-back.

“Morning to you, you sod-busting, hick reprobate,” Dom said without looking up.

I grinned, which prompted a wince. I made a mental note: smiling hurt too. I decided to forgo any wise guy responses. You don’t trade barbs with the barber. He’ll shave you bald.

“Still working the Kansas, Missouri story?”

He kept his eyes on the yellowed paper before him. “Yep, goes out in the Sunday Star.” Dom held up a shut-up-while-I-read hand. I did, and while I waited, took in the scattered newspapers, reading their upside down headlines. My mother would have loved this place. And she would have been square with me being a newspaper man like Dominic, instead of a lowly gumshoe.

Dominic carefully placed the papers in specific spots around the table—apparently, there was some kind of order to the table’s disarray. “Hello, Phil.” For a moment more his gaze lingered on the papers, and then rose to meet mine. He pulled the mushy cigar from his mouth. “Holy shit, man, you go ten rounds with Max Baer?”

I tried not to smile. “You should see the three dames who a ssaulted me.”

“I’d like to.” Dominic stood and looked across the room. “Jimmy?”

A young man popped his head out from the cases. “Yes, sir?”

“Would you please collate these chronologically and bring them up to my office?”

“Now, sir? I’m still looking for that post-Civil War piece you asked for.”

“After you track that one down will be fine.” He motioned to me. “C’mon, let’s go up to my office.”

As we reached the top of the stairs I glanced over at Virginia’s desk. She wasn’t there. I kept a lookout for her scarlet mop as I followed Dom across the city desk. If she had been on that floor, I’d have spotted her. Don’t know why they call it the city desk, for there’s dozens of them in one large open room. It smelled of tobacco and over-heated coffee. Each time I had visited, a pleasant hum of activity hit me as I opened the door: the chatter of voices and the ring of telephones, more telephones in one room than I had ever seen before. There were no offices except along the far wall, just desks lined up in neat rows like soldiers at inspection. The crisscrossing aisles held a volume of foot traffic that rivaled the cars on Twelfth Street at 5 p.m.

We made our way through the Star’s city desk village to Dominic’s office against the north wall. Dominic left his office door open. He once told me he liked the place’s chatter. Inside I took the seat across from his desk with my back to the large pane of glass that allowed Dominic to view the room’s activity and vice-versa. “Got anything for me?”

“Yep.”

“So give.”

Dom took a deep breath like he was going to spill the beans all in one sentence. Then he exhaled. “Look, we been pals for quite a while, right?”

I nodded my head. “’Bout ten years.”

“And I’ve helped you before, right?”

I didn’t like the direction this conversation was moving. “You bet, Dom, and I’ve helped you too. Your paper’s been privy to a lot of dirt I’ve spaded up. We’re both scratching backs here.”

He leaned way back, balancing the chair on two legs like a small-circuit circus performer. “Now don’t get your bloomers in a bunch. You’re reading what’s not there.” His foot intermittently tapped his desk drawer to keep the chair from falling. Otherwise, for several seconds at a time, it balanced almost perfectly. “Like I told you before, the interns could have been busy for a month on Big Tom alone. And I already knew most of what they would have found anyway.”

It seemed he wasn’t going to stonewall so I kept my yap shut.

“So I just had them check out the boy and your man Palmisano over the last three years.”

“Okay.” I waited.

The chair wobbled precariously when a foot tap over corrected. “Here’s the way we’re gonna play it so we don’t waste away the whole day. You ask me questions, and I’ll help you to the extent the Star can.”

I shrugged. “House rules. You mind where I start?”

“Start with the old man.”

“Okay. What does the Star have on the old man’s gambling or his gambling debts?”

Still precariously perched, Dom looked perplexed. “Gambling debts? Nothing. Everybody in town knows he scored big on a pony race a few years ago. Snoopy Susan wrote something about it in a column back then.”

Snoopy Susan was a pet name the Star’s employees called Susan Sanderson. She penned a weekly gossip column called Susan Sanderson Around Town. It was strictly highbrow society stuff. In fact, more than once I’d heard Dom refer to her as Snooty Susan.

“But nothing about gambling debts?” I said.

“Nope. You got a story for us?”

“Maybe. It’ll have to wait, though. What about his relationship with the boy? They on good terms or they on the outs?”

“The Star doesn’t have much on that. We know the father has done what he needed to do to keep the kid out of the hoosegow and off the front pages, though.” He rocked back and forth, his foot on the desk providing the impetus. “But it seems the boy has straightened up in the last eighteen months. And either he’s stopped hanging out with those Irish mob kids, or our sources inside the police department need updating.”

“Okay. Anything recent I should know about the kid?”

“Nothing you don’t already know.”

“Gee, Dom, I’m glad I’m not paying for this info.”

“You didn’t ask me about the wop yet.”

“Did I just hear an American of Italian descent call another American of Italian descent a wop?”

He grinned. “Some of us are wops. Besides, Palmisano’s a Sicilian.”

“Okay, what about Palmisano?”

“Murphy in Features has gabbed with our interns. Murphy’s been working on a piece about the mob war. You familiar?”

“Somewhat. Go on.”

“Turns out our wop’s a real warrior. Palmisano started with the Black Hand as a teenager running protection.”

“Black Hand?” That term was new to me.

“Yeah, Murphy says that’s what they were called when they first came over from Sicily and settled in the Northtown. At first, they extorted money only from their own people, the Sicilian immigrants. Apparently, Sicilian mobsters have been extorting hard working Sicilians over there for a long time. It’s a time-honored tradition of sorts.”

Someone walking by waved. Dom smiled and nodded. He looked back at me. “Now where was I?”

“The Black Hand extorting people in Sicily.”

“Oh, yeah. Some immigrants came to American, in part, to escape the custom. But unfortunately, the practice matriculated over with the immigrants. Black Hand comes from the mobster’s extortion letters to the poor schmuck immigrants, which included a black ink handprint—the black hand of death to any who squealed or didn’t pay-up.” Dom’s grin grew. He was enjoying himself.

“So Palmisano started at the bottom with the Black Hand and worked his way up a notch or two. But once Prohibition began, his star streaked when the Sicilians horned in on the Irish mob’s gambling, booze, and prostitution. And by then they had already branched out beyond picking solely on their own countrymen”

Jimmy, the kid from downstairs, cleared his throat at Dominic’s office door. Dom brought his chair forward on all fours. “Come in, Jimmy.” The kid had a stack of newsprint in his hands.

“Here you are, Mr. Goucher. Chronological just like you asked. And I put the Civil War piece on top.”

“Good job, Jimmy. Put them over on the file cabinet.”

The kid did as he was told and started to leave.

“Say, Jimmy?”

“Yes, Mr. Goucher?”

“You were with me when we went up to Murphy’s office and went through his dope on Tony Palmisano.”

“Yes, sir.”

“What do you make of him?” Dom asked.

“Not the kind of man I’d want to run into after dark, sir.”

Dominic nodded, pleased. “Okay, Jimmy; that’s all for now.”

The kid hurried out, and Dom leaned forward. “Palmisano was a regular hero of the Mob War. He and his squad made life miserable for the Micks, and made life end for more than a few of them.” He opened a drawer, pulled out two fresh Roi-Tan cigars and handed me one. He struck a match across a worn spot on the top of his desk. He lit mine, shook the match out without lighting his own. He began to chew his Roi-Tan more than delicately. I lifted my eyebrows.

“Wife says I gotta cut down on my smoking. Now, where were we?”

“Palmisano making life miserable for the Irish.”

“Bingo. By the time the market crashed, Palmisano was one of Lazzeri’s two chief lieutenants. And he’d branched out into the drug trade. Two years ago the other lieutenant was killed by a hit and run driver. Bingo! Now he’s number two.”

“I heard he was big on violence, both delegated and in person,” I said.

“We can’t confirm that of course. If we could, we’d print it and the mobsters know we would. But Palmisano’s bad news, Phil. And he’s got the Irish mob on the run. They’re insignificant now that Prohibition’s over.”

He leaned back again, recommencing his circus act. “Leastways they were.” Smugness lit up his cigar-chomping face, and his balance was perfect.

“What do you mean?”

“Hear about the fire last night?” Miraculously, he maintained his two-chair-legged balance. So that was what newspaper men did all day.

“Yeah, I saw the fire. Rusty Callahan and I drove by it on the way home from the Plaza.” I didn’t mention our hospital stop.

“Know what burned?”

“I heard it was some booze warehouse.”

“Not just some booze warehouse, the biggest in Kansas City, maybe the biggest west of Chicago. And it was owned by the Lazzeri mob. And now that it’s toast, KC’s largest liquor warehouse is owned by—”

“Mike Leary’s mob?”

Dom rocked on two legs and chewed his cigar. “Exactamento, my good man.”

“Arson?”

“Don’t know. And if the police know they aren’t saying yet. We’ve got our boys all over it. But it does change the dynamics of the mob war a bit.”

“Interesting,” I said. And it was. Very. I didn’t know if it changed anything about the search for the kid, but the warehouse fire changed things for life in general around Kansas City. And not just the price of booze. Nothing lends a town that special touch of ambiance like a nice bloody mob war.

I took a drag of the crunchy, slightly stale Roi-Tan and blew a stream at the smoke-stained ceiling. “Did you know that Tommy Holloway was working for Tony Palmisano?”

Dominic went over backwards, his plunge sudden and unchecked. The chair hit the floor as his head hit the back wall. A framed diploma from the University of Missouri plummeted and landed next to him, glass shattering. Laughter rang out. Outside the office, people stood and peered and there was a smattering of applause.

Dominic rolled away from the broken glass, brushed a few shards off his suit and stood. He grinned at the onlookers and offered them his favorite digit. Laughter notched up briefly, and then the city desk returned to business. Dominic righted his chair, checked it for stray shards and sat.

“What did you just say?”

“You didn’t hear me?”

“No,” Dom said. “That was rhetorical. The kid is wrapped up with Palmisano and the Lazzeri mob?”

“Yep.”

“Tell me more.”

“That’s the thing, Dommy. I’m on a case, a confidential one. I shouldn’t have blabbed what I already have—very unprofessional.” I flicked the cigar’s long ash in his ashtray.

“So you can’t give me anything else, Phil?”

I shook my head.

“Nothing?” he pleaded.

“Nope, but within the next few days I’m liable to dump a doozy in your lap, something that might be picked up by the AP and the UPA wires.”

He leaned back in his chair. “Sounds like you’re setting me up for something, Phil.”

“Nope, just proposing a little back scratching. Here’s the deal: you help with my case without knowing what it’s about and I get you the story of the year. Who knows, maybe a Pulitzer.”

He laughed, not a laugh for show, but one of genuine humor. “You gotta be kidding.”

“Nope.”

“Well, nobody ever said you didn’t have balls. Okay, what do we gotta do for this story and our Pulitzer?”

It was my turn to laugh. I reached into my suit coat pocket and pulled out a slip of paper, plopped it on the desk and slid it over to him. Dom leaned forward, grabbed and unfolded it.

“That’s got my office and home phone numbers, and the home and office phone numbers for Rusty Callahan who’s working the case with me,” I said.

“Oh, yeah? I know Mr. Callahan.”

“Right. Here’s what we need. I want you to reach out all the Star’s tentacles within your control. Anything they hear about Palmisano, Tommy Holloway, or a young lady named Beverly Cresto—anything. Have them call you anytime, night or day.”

“More interesting all the time. Who’s Beverly Cresto?”

“That’s a good question. Okay, so they call you and you try me first, then Rusty. If you get no answers, write a note and sign it and seal it and send someone trustworthy to my flat. Have them slide it under the door. Make sure they slide it all of the way under.” Dom’s head tilted sideways like a kid’s might while working a tough math problem.

“Say, this doesn’t have anything to do with Nazis, does it?”

“No Nazis. And after leaving the note, have Virginia keep trying to reach me.”

He lit his well-chewed cigar and puffed its tip up nice and red. “You know Virginia?”

“Just met her the other day.”

“She’s got a boyfriend, Phil. I don’t want you screwing around with her.”

“Message received. Do we have a deal on this? Can you help me?”

He thought about it for a moment, tipped his ash, one end of his cigar a mushy mess. “This stinks, you know, not knowing what’s going on, what we’re getting ourselves into.”

“Good, you’ll do it.” I offered my right hand to shake on it.

He held his right hand up like a cop stopping traffic. “One condition. If we’re using our resources to bird dog all of this information for you, it’s only fair that we can investigate at the same time. And if we figure out, fair and square, what it is you’re up to, we have the option to run with it.”

He had me. “Only fair, Dom. But do me a favor. Should that happen, you’ll let me know before you go to print.”

“You got it.” We shook on it. I ground my cigar out and started to walk out of his office. I stopped and turned.

“Say, know any reason Detroit police detectives would be in town snooping around?”

“No. Are they?”

“Yep. Add that to your snooping around list, too.”

“Will do,” he said, and I walked out across the city room.

At her desk Virginia watched me walk across the city room. Both her smile and her blush were in full bloom. I gave her a big grin and a “Good day, Miss Mathers.”

Twenty minutes later I pulled into a parking spot on the street in front of the Rawlston building. After I shut off the Plymouth, and while it sputtered and spewed, refusing to go down easy, I pulled out my watch. I had just under an hour before I met Colleen.

In the lobby, Henry waited for passengers.

“Morning, Henry.”

“Morning, Phil.” That big toothy grin of his and the way he emphasized the “Phil,” made me realize that he had most likely never called a white man by his first name. The thought troubled me. We stepped into the elevator.

“Three?” Henry asked.

“Yep. See anything fishy this morning?”

“No, suh, Phil, everybody here belongs here.”

“Good. How’s the boy doing? Chet still mired in his slump?”

“No, suh! Chester got six hits, one a home run, when the Elite Giants was in town this week. The boy, he in Chicago for a weekend series now. Don’t know how he done last night in Chicago but he’s feeling good again. Got his average back up over .290. Thas the last ballgames of the year. He be home next week.”

Henry’s youngest boy, Chet, played left field for the Kansas City Monarchs of the Negro National League. The Monarchs were a formidable team. Their pitching staff, anchored by Bullet Joe Rogan and Satchel Paige, was as good as any in baseball, white or black.

He slowed the lift as we neared the third floor. “That’s great, Henry. Seems nobody can keep your boy down long.” I patted his shoulder. “You must be a proud papa.”

“I am. Mighty proud.” He eased her to a perfect stop. “Say, Phil, when you gonna find a girl to marry so’s you can have your own kids?”

He slid the gate open, and as I exited and turned down the hallway I waved my hand and called out, “Don’t hold your breath, Henry.” His laughter followed me down the hall.

When I reached the office door, a light glowed behind its opaque glass, but the door was locked. Good girl.

“Morning, Jill,” I said once the lock was negotiated and the door swung open.

“Morning, Boss.”

“Any news?”

“Yeah, Rusty called, and so did someone from the police and, oh my god, what happened to you!”

This was getting old. “Nothing, really; it’s nothing.”

“Nothing? Oh, you poor boy.” She hopped out of her chair and came around her desk to meet me. She examined my head, touched it gently, then pressed the peak of one of the lumps.

“Ow!” I pulled my head away. “Jill, I’m all right, okay?”

“You can’t be all right. You look terrible.” And the way her brow creased and her lips scrunched she looked like a worried mother, reminded me of mine back in the day.

“You should see Rusty,” I said.

She grabbed my arm, led me into my office and sat me down in my chair while she crouched beside me. Her hands battled with her brain, the hands wanting to touch and nurse, the brain knowing I would blow my stack. “What happened?”

I took her hands in mine—as much in self-defense as anything else—and stood, causing her to rise too. Then with a tight hold on her dangerous digits, I sat on the edge of the desk. “Here’s the deal: Rusty and I were poking around the Plaza last night looking for Beverly Cresto, or news of her. Some thugs jumped us, four of them.”

She looked near tears. “You’re lucky you weren’t killed.”

I shook my head slow and easy. “Nah, they didn’t want to kill us. They were only sending a message.”

Jill’s brows furrowed. “What message?”

“Forget about Beverly Cresto.”

“You report it to the police?”

I chuckled. “No, but they sure enough know about it.”

“I don’t understand.”

I decided that it was okay to release her hands. “Because the thugs who jumped us were cops.”

Jill’s mouth dropped open and she let out still another “Oh, my god.” As I lit a cigarette she began to pace the office, back and forth in front of me. “What do we do now?” she said without slowing.

Cigarette firm in my lips, I pulled out my watch. “In about 20 minutes, I’ll stroll over to Lenny’s Newsroom. While I’m questioning Miss Holloway, you poke around some more for the Cresto girl. We know now that’s her name. Look for anything, where she attended elementary school, anything. And see if you can dig up some information on one of Kansas City’s finest, Detective Kerry Patterson.”

“He one of the thugs?”

“That he is, Jill.”

I put my watch away and took a long drag of the Lucky. A smoke helps me think. “Martha’s husband’s a Detroit firefighter isn’t he?” Martha was Jill’s big sister. Jill nodded.

“Give Sis a ring and see if her man’s heard of a Detective Harmon of the Detroit P.D. Don’t know his first name.”

“Another cop thug?”

“Yeah, an out-of-town pugilist, a real head thumper.”

“I’m not sure how soon I can reach Martha, or when she will next see Mark. Firemen work strange hours.”

“That’s okay; just covering all of the bases here. What’d Rusty want?”

“He asked how you were. Now I know why. He said you should call or come by his office after one.” Jill stopped pacing and stood in front of me. She reached her hands in the direction of my head. I reacted, grabbing them before they procured their target.

“It’s okay, Phil. I won’t hurt you.” I relinquished my hold and ever so softly she clasped my neck below the ears, leaned forward and placed a gentle kiss on my forehead. “Listen,” she whispered, inches from my face, the scent of Juicy Fruit flowing with the words. “I know I can’t convince you to drop this case.” As her gentle hands still caressed my neck, I shook my head. She smiled a sad smile.

“But I don’t want to lose you,” she said. The way she said it—the angst and desire of her inflection—involuntarily, my eyebrows shot up. Jill released me and stepped back. “Because Rusty won’t pay me nearly as much.”

With a swish of her skirt, Jill turned her back and walked away. At the door, she spun around with a move that rivaled a Ziegfeld girl’s. She delivered another shot. “Besides, Rusty’s office is too far from my apartment.” Another spin and a hand tossed in the air, she returned to her desk. “I’ll get busy on Cresto and the cops while you go make goo-goo eyes at the Holloway girl.”

The scent of Juicy Fruit faded, replaced by the smell of my Lucky Strike.

Henry must have gone to lunch or taken a break as his relief brought me down to the first. The reliever was a ham-faced and silent woman. Our conversation consisted of me saying “Lobby, please” and her answering with an almost imperceptible, “Hmph.”

I hoofed it down to Lenny’s, four blocks south. The movement helped keep the damaged muscle tissue from tightening. The Newsroom’s big-windowed store front allowed me to check out the place before I entered—no Colleen yet, and no familiars either. The place was half-full.

By noon, all of Lenny’s eight tables would be occupied as would the dozen or so counter stools. Lenny provided good food, the local daily papers and a handful of several-days-old big city dailies like the Chicago Tribune, the LA Times and the New York papers. They sold a lot of papers, but most folks came for Lenny’s greasy-good food.

I gave the lady at the register a nickel, grabbed the morning Kansas City Times and took the table at the far end of the room. Remembering my ribs, I slid gingerly into a chair and sat with my back to the wall. The gal serving tables looked over at me and held up her coffee pot. I nodded. A couple minutes later she showed with a cup and the pot.

“Want cream with that, honey?”

“Nope, black as coal. There’ll be two of us,” I said. “Just keep my cup filled till my pal shows and then we’ll order.”

“You got it.” She stared at me, allowing her coffee pot to tilt precipitously. “Somebody use your head as a bowling ball, hon?”

“Something like that” She nodded with disinterest and headed for the kitchen, topping off cups as she went.

The fire was front page news. A fireman had been overcome by smoke and was in the hospital in serious condition. The night watchman, badly burned, was in another hospital—probably the guy we saw being wheeled in last night. The fire chief reported finding two charred bodies, as yet unidentified. The police called the fire suspicious and declined comment on any possible evidence uncovered. Norman Clark, the head man of Genoa Distributing, placed the value of lost inventory at nearly two hundred thousand bucks. Clark said the night watchman should have been the only person there that time of night. After my talk with Dominic, I suspected Mr. Clark was a well-paid figurehead for the Black Hand mob.

I flipped to the sports page. There was an article about the 1934 World Champion St. Louis Cardinals. They called them the Gas House Gang because of their rough and tumble brand of play. My dad would have loved them, and in a different life maybe I would have been with them playing in the outfield. The sports page’s lead column asked the question: Is Babe Ruth Done? The Babe had been merely human the last two years and wasn’t getting around on the fastball anymore. The Bambino was getting too old for baseball, a young man’s game.

Sipping my coffee, I wondered about private detectives. Was investigations a young man’s game? Unlike baseball, a club doesn’t cut you loose when you can’t get around on the heater anymore. Detectives, like firemen, like night watchmen, like cops and crooks, might get dead if they get too old to do their jobs well. So what about me? Was thirty-four getting long in the tooth for a detective? Those thoughts tap-danced around my head until something down deeper popped to the surface. Jill said someone from the police called and I never asked who. Maybe I was getting old.

The gal showed with more coffee and I shook off that line of thought. I wasn’t ready to hang up my gumshoes. My cup full, suddenly I had a case of the heebie-jeebies. The hair on my neck bristled. My eyes rose from the Times and I looked around expecting something odd. But there was nothing around me but decent folk chowing down. No boogie men peered in from sidewalk either. The clock on the far wall showed 11:13. Colleen was late.

A few minutes later my cup sat empty next to the paper. I was trying to get the waitress’s attention when the door flew open and Colleen hurried in. She stopped just inside the door and looked around, hands on hips and legs apart like she had just flown the Atlantic solo. Her wind-blown blond bob looked professionally mussed to make her appear casual. She wore navy blue pants with knife-sharp creases, tightly pleated at her tiny waist and billowy below. A matching navy blazer hung open on her frilly white blouse. She saw me and waved. Heads turned as she approached, mostly male.

I hopped up and pulled out the chair across from mine. My rib cage issued a stern reminder about sudden swift movements. She plopped down in surprisingly good spirits for the frantic sister of a missing boy.

As I returned to my seat, she must have seen the wince, or maybe it was the lumpy head. Her expression changed. “Phil, what happened to your head? It looks horrible.”

“You should see my ribs.”

The worried look faded, replaced by a sly one. “Is that an invitation?”

Confounded momentarily, I eventually returned her smile with one of my own. “Rhetorical, Miss Holloway. When I offer an invitation, you’ll know it. Any news about your brother?”

“Nothing.”

“No ransom notes, bank withdrawals, rumors flying?

“No.”

The waitress showed with menus and more java. I folded the paper and took a quick gander at the menu. It had been a while since I’d eaten here, but I remembered the burgers were good. I ordered one with cheese. Colleen ordered a salad and a glass of Coca-Cola.

“Tell me about your brother’s car.”

“The Stutz Bearcat? It’s really nice, but I’m not sure it’s his, though.

“What do you mean?”

“It might be a loaner from that mobster Tommy’s been hanging out with.” Her Coca-Cola arrived and she dipped her teaspoon in the sugar bowl, brought up a heaping spoonful, tapped it on the side of the bowl until it leveled and then dumped it into the cola. She swirled her spoon around and around, dissolving its contents.

Maybe I had a funny look on my face, for when she looked up her smile broadened, showing rows of perfect teeth. “What?” She said.

I shrugged my shoulders.

“Sweets for the sweet,” Colleen said as she took a gulp and offered an audible sigh. “Now, you poor man, what happened to you?”

“Later, Miss Holloway. Do you know where he keeps the car?”

“Why later? And why Miss Holloway?”

“This is business. I’m on the clock.”

“Well, you just better take a lunch break or I’ll get angry.” She stuck out her lower lip.

“Okay, Colleen, do you know where your brother keeps the Stutz?”

“That’s better. And yes I do.”

“Where would that be?”

The pouty lip returned. “You don’t sound like you’re taking a lunch break.”

“And you don’t sound like a girl whose brother is missing, and who might be in big trouble or dead.”

That did it. Out came the tears, and they looked like the real deal. I pulled out a fresh handkerchief and held it out to her. She took it, nodded, blew and wiped for a bit. When she looked up her eyes were wet and red and had changed from blue to green.

“Okay,” I said. “We’ll eat our lunch. But afterwards, we need to talk about your brother.” She reached across the table and squeezed my hand. The sniffling abated, and she asked me if I had heard about the fire. I showed her the Times front page account, which she skimmed.

“It’s those mobsters getting a gulp of their own medicine,” she said.

“You may be right.”

“Of course I’m right. It’s obvious.”

“You think it was arson?”

She paused and looked up at the ceiling before her bloodshot green eyes returned to me. “Yes, I do. Somebody they hurt just hurt them back. That’s all.”

“Sounds personal.”

Colleen folded her arms. “It’s just that I don’t like bullies.”

“Some would say your father is a bully.”

“And some would be right. He is. He is to everyone, his family included. Especially his family.” Anger rose around her pretty eyes.

“So maybe your brother got tired of the bullying and ran off.”

She shook her head. “I don’t think so. And besides, we’re on our lunch break—no more Tommy for a while.” We sat in silence while she read the fire story.

Our lunch arrived. Colleen dug into her salad but seemed particularly interested in my burger. After the third bite, watching her eyes follow each one up to my mouth and back to the plate, I offered her a bite.

“Oh, no thanks, I’m fine.”

“Aw, c’mon,” I said. “Have a bite,” and I held the burger over her salad plate.

Colleen tilted her head and pursed her lips. “Well, okay, a little one.” She took the burger, held it daintily, her pinkies sticking out as if she held a fancy tea cup, and then took the biggest little bite I’d ever seen. She handed what was left to me and struggled to chew the mouthful she had taken in. We both burst into laughter, which had her spewing burger, lettuce, and bun crumbs, which in turn ratcheted up our laughter.

People turned to gawk at the fuss and some of them began laughing. Still giggling, Colleen managed to get the rest of the bite down and we went back to our own meals.

As we ate Colleen asked me what I liked to do as a kid.

I thought about it for a moment. “The usual stuff boys do—sports, especially baseball. I loved to play Civil War soldiers with the other boys. And I loved to read. My whole family, and occasionally some of my pals rode horses at my uncle’s ranch near Strong City.”

“Strong City? You’re teasing. There’s no Strong City.”

“No, I’m serious. It’s a little town an hour west of Emporia by car. It’s beautiful out there. Ever hear of the Flint Hills?”

“No. Tell me about them.”

I gulped my coffee and held the cup up. The waitress nodded. “The most beautiful place I’ve ever seen. Rolling hills of bluestem, hardly a tree anywhere. And when the wind blows, which is always, the bluestem waves like it’s a pale blue ocean.”

“What’s bluestem—some kind of grass?”

“Yeah, and in the heat of the summer, it turns blue like a hazy summer sky. It grows tall, taller than any grass around here. My friends and I would ride through it along the ridges and we’d canter down into the valleys. By July the bluestem grew so tall it was as if our horses had no legs, as if they just floated along on the waves.”

“Sounds beautiful, Phil. You’re a poet.”

I laughed. “Hardly. But that place’d make a poet out of my Plymouth if it spent an afternoon there.”

Colleen giggled and put her hand on mine. Then she got all serious. “Would you take me there someday?”

“Maybe. Let’s find your brother first.”

She turned serious, no hint of mirth. “Promise me.”

“Yes, Colleen; I’ll take you to see the Flint Hills.”

Damn if it didn’t look like she was about to cry again. But she shook it off and brightened.

“And we can ride your uncle’s horses?”

“I suppose. You ever ride a horse?”

“A lot when I was a girl, but only English saddle.”

“We’ll have to make a Western girl out of you.”

“I can’t wait,” she said.

At that instant, frozen in time, Colleen looked like a teenager. I could imagine her riding in those tight English britches with that rhythmic up and down gait. But she would look good in denim and flannel too. I wondered what it would be like to live on a ranch with her. I had a hunch she’d love animals.

“Did you have your own horse?” I asked.

She sank in her chair. “No. I begged Daddy for one, but he wouldn’t listen. I rode one of the stable horses, the same one every time. I pretended Thor was mine. I loved grooming him and feeding him apples and carrots. Thor got excited every time I walked into the stables.”

Thor apparently had good taste.

“You said you rode with your friends,” she said. “Did you have a lot of friends when you were a kid?”

“I suppose. I had two best friends, Mike and Mark. We were always together, and then there was a handful of others we played with. What about you?”

“No, not really.”

“No friends? Or no best friends?”

“Neither. Daddy’s position placed me on a kind of rich kid’s island, and only the wealthiest, most important kids could be there. I didn’t go to normal kid schools. I never even went to a school that had boys.”

“Really?” I said. As I pondered that, she pushed what was left of her salad around with her fork. I considered how different my own childhood would have been without friends, and how it might have changed who I am now.

“What about the girls you went to school with?”

She laughed. It wasn’t a laugh of humor. And she didn’t say anything, but instead speared the last cherry tomato and forcefully bit down on it.

“Those girls were more competitors than friends,” she said, chewing. “Who could make the best grades? Who could wear the latest fashions and say the meanest things about those who didn’t? Whose fathers had the nicest cars, the biggest houses? I hated most of them, and they envied me because my daddy was at the top of the food chain. And they hated me because I wouldn’t play their mean little games.”

She looked up and thoughtfully chewed her tongue, then pointed her fork at me. “They called me Little Rich Bitch, mostly behind my back. But they were the bitches and they didn’t even know it.”

I could think of nothing to say.

“So there you have it. I guess I’ve always been just a lonely girl.”

“It’s funny,” I said. “There are probably a million girls who’d swap places with you.”

“And most of them would regret it before long.”

Our plates were sparsely populated when our waitress showed and asked if we’d saved room for pie. We decided to split a slice—cherry—and we nixed the waitress’ a la mode suggestion.

“Phil?”

“Yeah?”

“Do you think I’m pretty?”

I gave her a theatrical up and down assessment. “No,” I said, and then watched Colleen scrunch her mouth tight to hide the quivering lower lip. “Gorgeous, certainly, and even stunning, but, sister, you left pretty back in the dust.”

Colleen’s face lit up and she laughed her husky laugh. She reached over the table and squeezed my hand again. A guy could get used to that touch.

The place had begun to fill, and each time someone came in I raised my eyes to check them out.

“Why do you keep looking at the door?”

“Force of habit, doll. Want to make sure no undesirables get the jump on me.”

“Who?”

I hadn’t told her about dropping the hood, Colin Hardy, and decided to keep it that way. “Guy like me makes enemies as a part of doing business. A guy like me who isn’t careful doesn’t get to be an old guy like me.”

“You’re not old.”

“You’d be surprised.”

“How old are you?”

“Sorry, guys like me have some information that must remain confidential.”

“But not your age?”

“Sorry, but that’s double secret.”

She smiled the canary-eating smile she gave me the first time we met in her father’s library. “We rich girls have ways of obtaining information, Mr. Morris. I’ll know how old you are by lunch time tomorrow.”

I dropped the only-as-old-as-you-feel cliché on her, to which she responded, “With that bruised head and the ribs you won’t show me you must feel like an old man.”

“Touché,” I acknowledged, and then added, “I do feel pretty old today.”

Colleen smiled. She reached her hand out toward the lumpy side of my head and said “Let me touch the big one. I’ll be gentle.”

I recoiled with a cockeyed grin and a questioning look.

She paused, hand in mid-air. The laughter again. “Not that big one, silly, the one on the side of your head.”

I held still and her hand softly caressed the new contours of the right side of my head. Her touch was gentle but not totally pain-free. I must have winced, for she quickly withdrew her hand.

“You never told me how it happened,” she said.

“In a minute.” I took a sip of coffee. “What do you know about a girl named Beverly Cresto?”

Instant recognition, then her eyes opened wide and her gaze darted around the café. Earnestly, she pushed a lonely remnant of salad around the plate. Then her eyes returned to me, completely composed. “Who?”

“Beverly Cresto.”

Colleen looked up in staged thoughtfulness. “I think Tommy may have mentioned that name, I’m not sure. Why?”

What a load of crap. But I wasn’t sure how to play Colleen on it. There were so few people on my side on this case. I needed her. I needed her help, that is. I decided to go easy.

“Do you remember what your brother said about her?”

“Why? Is it important?”

The girl was good. I decided to level with her to a point. “I think she was the last person to see your brother before he disappeared.” Her eyes darted away again. She pulled her lower lip into her mouth and held it there with her teeth, sucking on it as if it was a hunk of butterscotch candy. I waited to see what she would come up with next.

Colleen swallowed a gulp of the sugar cola and placed it back on the table. She looked at me with those disingenuous blue-green eyes. “I think Tommy may have gone out with her a time or two. That’s all I know.”

“You ever meet her?”

“No.”

She was lying. I waited to see if she would volunteer anything, but the pie showed up with two forks. For a time, cherry pie seemed to be the only important thing on earth for her, every ounce of her consciousness absorbed in the pie, the fork, and the voyage to her mouth.

I guessed that her conscientious eating allowed her time to worry and plot and plan what to say. But damn her, she was gorgeous. I hardly ate a bite and found it hard to concentrate on the task with such beauty an arm’s length away. I found myself transfixed by the rhythmic rise and fall of that frilly blouse as she ate.

It seemed only moments later that she took her cherry-coated fork and dabbed the remaining crumbs, capturing them like flypaper does flies. I watched her meticulously gather the strays. “You still haven’t told me how you were hurt,” she said.

I snapped out of my stupor and watched as she lifted the fork to those luscious lips, interring the crumbs forever. She waited for me to respond.

I looked her in the eyes. “Last night, my partner Rusty and I were asking about Miss Cresto around restaurants in the Plaza.” That brought a slight facial tic. “Four gentlemen met us in an alley and suggested we conclude our search immediately. These lumps and bruises testify to the forcefulness of their suggestion.”

Colleen looked rattled. I felt sure she knew more than she let on, but my instincts told me she had no inkling of our alley rough-house last night.

“Oh, Phil,” she reached out for my head again. I leaned back, avoiding her touch, watching her eyes. “Who were they?” She asked. Her eyes told me she didn’t know.

“No idea; it was dark and they jumped us from behind.” No need to tell her everything.

“How do you know the beating was about that woman?”

“Listen, doll, they made it a point to let us know why they were kicking the piss out of us. They told us to forget about the Cresto girl.”

“Oh.” Colleen stared at pie plate, as if she were checking for escaped crumbs. I kept silent to see what she’d say next. The place was full now; a handful of customers stood at the register waiting for seats to open up.

Our waitress showed, chewing her gum like it had committed some offense. “Get you anything else, honey?” She wanted us up and gone so she could fill the table with more tippers.

“Nope, we’re good.”

The waitress slapped the ticket on the table and hurried off. I took the ticket, wondering if Colleen would try to pay her way—she didn’t. Gingerly, I rose. Using my father’s chivalrous training, I helped Colleen out of her seat. I left a generous tip, paid the lady at the counter and noticed the bank calendar on the wall behind her was a year old.

Outside, we paused awkwardly.

“So what now?” she said.

I assumed the comment was about the case and not some version of innuendo. “My partner and I have a number of leads we’re pursuing.”

“What kind of leads?”

I plucked two cigarettes out of my case, put them in my mouth and lit them, handing one to Colleen. She took it and nodded her thanks.

“Sorry, Colleen. That’s confidential for now.”

“But why? He’s my brother.”

“I’m not going to explain myself, doll. I know what I’m doing.”

“But I might be able to help you.”

“You already have. I’m clear now that you don’t know this Beverly Cresto, but your brother has mentioned her.” She looked down at the sidewalk. When she came back up to me, her lips were stretched thin, as if she had physically zipped them.

The zipped lips reminded me. “Say, you never told me where your brother keeps the Stutz.”

I watched her eyes, expecting another lie.

“Oh, yeah; it’s in a repair garage on the Boulevard three blocks west of the big fire last night. Somebody and Son’s Garage. Alberto’s, maybe.”

It seemed she was being square. “Is it there now?”

“I don’t know. I never thought to look.” Something about the way she said it didn’t jive. But maybe she was only surprised not to have thought of it herself.

“Okay, thanks.” I started to tip my missing hat. “So long, Colleen.”

“Will I see you again?”

“Don’t worry. We’ll see each other again. So long.”

I didn’t look back until I crossed 15^th Street a block down. She stood in the same spot, cigarette in hand, watching me turn the corner until my steps put a hotel’s bricks and mortar between us.

My Plymouth was parked against the curb a half block down from the Rawlston building. As I drew close, it seemed to sit cockeyed. Once I reached it, the reason became obvious. Both curbside tires were flat. A closer look showed that some wise guy had removed the tube’s valve cores.

I hurried inside. The elevator was in use, between six and seven and heading up. I took the stairs. Even though my legs felt no ill effects from the previous night’s escapade, by floor three the effort made me huff and puff. My ribs ached and my heartbeat throbbed in my head. I understood it as another sign this P.I. had reached his peak and was headed down the other side. But I rationalized it was just the cigarettes and last night’s beating.

The office door was locked. I kept most of my body against the corridor wall which was thick enough to thwart slugs, then rapped on the door. Jill, with a hint of hesitance, asked who was there.

“It’s just me, Jill. Don’t shoot.” I unlocked the door and entered.

“How was your lunch with the lovely Miss Holloway?” Jill’s voice oozed scorn.

“Peachy, thanks for asking.” I shuffled through the mail on the corner of her desk. “Who put the bee in your bloomers this morning?”

She let out a big, Shakespearean actor’s sigh. “I don’t like her. All of that money, always getting everything she wants. And she wants you, Phil, wants you as a play toy. I don’t think she gives a fig for her brother. This is just something new and exciting for her to do.” I kept my mouth shut and let her wind down of her own volition.

“She enjoys the role of distraught sister, and if she can get the rough-tough detective to fall for her, all the better. You watch yourself, Boss.” I waited, but she was finished.

“You’re not alone, Jill. Rusty gave me the same speech, only not so eloquently.” I tapped the stack of letters on my palm. “But I’m a big boy. I can handle some spoiled rich girl.”

Jill had begun typing. She stopped and looked my way, looked me straight in the eyes. “Famous last words, Boss. We’ll chisel them on your tombstone next month.” She went back to typing without another look my way.

I headed for my office and stopped in the doorway. “Have you ever even met her?” The clicking keys stopped and she stared at me, saying nothing. I held up my hands, spun around and went into my office. At my desk, my left hand reached for the Jim Beam drawer, but I called it back. Instead, I leaned back in my chair, swiveled back and forth and tried to replay the last twenty-four hours.

Where the hell did Beverly Cresto fit in? For some reason cops from two cities wanted us to keep away from her. Maybe Cresto knew what happened to the kid and if so, maybe the cops were involved. Why did Colleen panic when I mentioned Cresto? And what kind of stiffs followed me and broke into my apartment, killed my dog, vandalized my car? Maybe they thought they could scare me off with that crap, but they accomplished the opposite. They didn’t know how bulldog stubborn I could be. When I got pissed off, I … damn, I needed to settle down.

I slid open the Beam drawer and pulled out the bottle and that grimy glass, then threw down an inch of caramel calmer. I started to pour another but held off, put the cap back on and stowed it away. I stared through the open door and listened to Jill’s rhythmic clicking.

The cop. A cop called this morning. Who? Which one? Was it Patterson, the bastard?

“Jill?”

The clicking stopped. “Yeah, Boss?”

“Who called from the police department this morning?”

“I wondered when you’d think to ask. Detective Chief Myers called.”

“What’d he want?”

“Hang on, let me check my notes.” I rose gingerly, went into her office and just as gingerly sat down in the chair opposite her desk. Jill held the note. “He said that he had some information you might be interested in.”

“What kind of information?”

“He wouldn’t say.”

“Was it about the shooting two days ago?”

“Boss. He. Wouldn’t. Say. Okay?”

“Sorry, Jill. You still upset about the Holloway dame?”

Another deep sigh. “No, I’m worried about you. I know you loved that dog, and maybe you’re vulnerable now, but you’re slipping. You’re getting careless.” Her look of worry changed to a wry smile. “I feel like I’m going to need to hold your hand on this case.”

My turn to smile. “Look, there’s almost nothing I’d rather do than hold hands with you. But what would your boyfriend say?”

She slapped her hands on her desk, then raised one and pointed it at me as if it were a revolver. “I’m serious. You listen up, you get your mind off your dog, your privates off that fancy rich tart, and keep them on this case, or I’ll be looking for work one way or another.”

I held my arms up during her little speech as if she were about to shoot me. Although I was tempted to toss off her words as banter I thought seriously about the advice.

She interrupted. “Now weren’t you supposed to meet Mr. Callahan right after your little lunch with Miss Holloway?”

“Oh, yeah.”

Jill tilted her head.

“But then my car had the flat tires.”

Her head tilted further. I had I hunch that she saw “sheepish” written all over my face.

“Jill …”

“Call me Miss Marlow, Mr. Morris.”

“Miss Marlow, would you be so kind as to call Mr. Callahan and inform him of my car problems and ask him to please come by my office?” She nodded. “And would you please telephone Western Auto and inform them that I have two flats on my Plymouth in front of our building? Tell them that the valve stems have been removed. Ask them if they can free someone up to swing by and take care of it.” Another nod. “And finally, Miss Marlow, will you call the police department and see if Chief Myers is in and if he has a moment to speak to me?” She was already dialing.

“Thank you, Miss Marlow. I’ll be in my office.” The outer office had become chilly enough to require blankets.

Sitting at my desk, more exasperated at myself than with Jill, I shoved away the desire to open the bottom drawer. Instead, I opened the one above it and grabbed a few sheets of paper. On one, I wrote “Tommy” in the middle and drew a circle around it. Next to it, I wrote “Colleen,” and below that, the old man. Along the top edges of the sheet with arrows linking them to “Tommy,” I put “the Irish mob kids,” “the Italian mob” with a separate arrow to nearby Palmisano. In between the Irish kids and the Italians, I put “Colin Hardy” with a question mark and arrows to both the Irish and Italian mobs.

On the lower right edge, I wrote “cops” and an arrow to Tommy. To the side of cops, I scribbled “Patterson and “Harman (Detroit PD).” Halfway between those two and Tommy, I wrote “Beverly Cresto” with arrows both to the two detectives and to Tommy. And below the detectives, I added “Chief Myers” with a question mark.

In the lower left, I put the senior Holloway’s debt-holders with an arrow to him. In the bottom middle with no arrows anywhere I wrote “Flat Face” with a question mark and below him, I put “who else?” I leaned back and looked at the sheet—too many lines and arrows. I needed to eliminate some possibilities. But how?

The more I looked, the more it all came back to Beverly Cresto. On another sheet, I wrote “Cresto” and the two detectives and Tommy and then I added “Colleen” because she knew more about Cresto than she let on. I began to think of possible tie-ins and doodled as I thought. The doodles had taken over for the thinking when Jill stood in the doorway.

“Phil?” Thank God she’d set aside the Mr. Morris.

“Yes, Jill?”

She smiled. She had one hell of a smile.

“Rusty’s on his way. Western Auto will be out by 3:30. Chief Myers is holding and he told me his time is valuable, and he won’t hold long.”

I thanked Jill and immediately picked up. “Chief Myers, how kind of you to take my call.” I heard Jill’s receiver click off.

“Yeah, Morris, what can I do for you?” He sounded like he had a cold and I pictured that schnoz and the boatload of snot it must carry. The thought that Myers must have to special order his handkerchiefs made me grin.

“You phoned this morning while I was out. I’m sorry I missed you. My secretary said that you had some information for me.”

“That’s right. We’ve been tying up some loose ends on the shooting you were involved in. Turns out that Hardy guy you shot wasn’t working for the Irish mob anymore.”

“Oh, yeah?” I said. “Was he working for someone else, or do you think he was on his own?” No sense ticking the man off that his news was old news.

“He may have been on his own, but our informants tell us that he has been strong-arming for the Italian mob lately.” He paused, apparently impressed with the information he had given and expecting me to be impressed too. “And, Mr. Morris?”

“Yeah?”

“Those were animal bite marks on his wrist and hand—probably canine.”

Myers was full-to-the-brim with old news. “That’s good to know, Chief; thanks. Anything else?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact. The way these things work, Mr. Morris, is we scratch your back and you scratch ours.”

I didn’t tell him that I’d already had my back scratched, and even so, that was one half-assed scratch he’d provided.

“So let me ask you this,” Myers said. “Why would someone who works for the mob break in to your place and then follow you around? What kind of case might you be working that would have the mob interested your activities?”

“Gee whiz, I don’t know. I’ll have to check my case load and give it some thought, Chief.”

“Look, Morris, you and I both know this is all about the kid’s disappearance. We can help each other on this. If you go it alone, you’re liable to end up dead like your mutt, or like Hardy. Work with me here. I can help you. Where are you on the case?”

One winter while my father still lived, my mother and I waded through Shakespeare. I was a little young to grasp it fully, but she explained as we went. So much of Shakespeare hides in our language without us knowing it. Like discretion is the better part of valor comes from him. And I knew I could be discreet for Mr. Holloway, yet still give Myers some tidbit to keep him open to communication. But even as a kid I was a damn-the-torpedoes-full-speed-ahead-guy, which wasn’t from Shakespeare.

“I’m glad you’ve offered to help,” I said. “What do you have Detective Patterson working on?”

“Patterson? Why Patterson?”

“Just a hunch. What case is he working on?”

“Tell me your hunch first?”

“I think he might have some knowledge of my case.”

“That’s impossible. He’s on loan to Detroit PD. They’re working on a joint investigation.”

“Involving what?”

Myers sighed loud enough for me to hear. “I’m not at liberty to say. What’s all of this Patterson shit about, Mr. Morris? I have numerous other detectives that I can assign to your case.”

“What do you know about Beverly Cresto?”

Myers paused, maybe honestly considering the name or maybe conjuring a canned reply. I wished I could have seen his face.

“Who?” he answered, and I repeated the name.

“Name doesn’t mean anything to me. Why do you ask?”

“Because last night your detective Patterson and some Detroit detective and two of your uniforms jumped Rusty Callahan and me because we were asking questions about her. They beat us up pretty good, but I expect your detective isn’t feeling so hot today either.”

“You have to be joking.”

“Ask Patterson if I’m joking and make sure you’re looking at his smashed up face when you do.”

“I will,” he said. “But who’s this Beverly Cresto?”

“Ask Patterson that too. And let me know what he says. Then we can talk some more about my case.”

“Believe me, I will. And don’t forget, I can help you, Morris.”

“I won’t, Chief. Thanks for your offer.” I hung up, no bridges burned. And I thought I handled that as well as a guy who just got beat up by the cops could be expected to.

I looked at my sheets and scratched out the arrow from Colin Hardy to the Irish mob and darkened the one pointing to the Black Hand. Next to Myers, I wrote in parentheses “good guy” and added a second question mark. There were good cops, lots of them. My dad was a good one. And though Myers was a pompous asshole, maybe he wasn’t one of the crooked ones.

Jill was at the doorway again. “How’d it go?”

It was a good question. “I don’t know. Okay, I guess. Chief Myers might be trying to help out this time.”

“Seriously?” The look on Jill’s face might be worth some dough if only I had a Polaroid.

“Yeah, I’m serious. I guess some pigs can fly.”

She laughed. “Coffee?”

“Sure, thanks.”

I was sipping from a steamy second cup when Rusty knocked on the office door. He knew why we kept it locked. Jill let him in and saw his colorful face. She fawned over him like a mother goose who’d found her lost gosling. Rusty looked over Jill’s head across the office at me and winked. He was enjoying himself.

Eventually, Rusty put his arm around Jill’s tiny waist and led her into my office. He offered her the spare chair. She shook her head. “No, I have work to do.”

At the doorway, she offered us a final shot. “Aren’t you a pair to draw to? I pity the poor client who hires you two punching bags.” She returned to her desk and her typewriter began to chatter.

Rusty eased into the chair across from my desk. “Pretty surly staff you got here.”

“Yeah,” I said. “With an emphasis on the pretty.”

“So you let her get away with all of that bad-mouthing?”

“I have to. She runs the place.”

Rusty leaned way back in his chair straining to catch a glimpse of Jill at her desk. “Yeah, well if you ever decide to cut her loose, I got first dibs.”

I allowed my head a slow, careful shake of disgust. “I think you’ve made that abundantly clear to both of us, Russ.”

I lit up a Lucky and offered him one. He shook his head.

“You do some poking around today?” I asked.

“Yep,” Rusty said.

“Learn anything?”

“Some. You?”

“Don’t be coy, Russ. Give.”

“You first.”

I told him about my lunch with Colleen, about which earned me the disapproving eye-roll and head-shake combination. I said she knew more than she admitted about Miss Cresto, but that she did give me the spot where the kid kept his fancy new car. And then I laid out my visit to the Star office and the information Dominic provided and the quid pro quo deal we crafted.

“The Pulitzer, Phil? Slathering it on thick, don’t you think?”

“One never knows. Pulitzer’s within the realm of possibility.”

“Extreme outer edges of the realm, maybe.” Rusty leaned forward and planted his elbows on my desk. “So what do you make of the fire? Think the Mick mob is mounting an offensive?”

“Maybe. Dominic seemed to think so.”

“And what’d your rich little chippy think?”

“I told you, all she said was that it must be somebody getting revenge. And she’s not a chippy.”

Rusty grinned big. “Wait a second. No horizontal cha-cha with the twist yet?” He raised his arms up toward the ceiling. “What’s this old depressed world coming to? Our king is dead.”

“She’s a client, Russ.”

“Yeah, a wealthy gorgeous one, who, as the story goes, will lay down for anything in wool trousers, if it works to her advantage.”

“I believe we’ve already waded through this swamp. Your message has been received. Now you need to trust me to handle her the way I would any other client.”

Rusty wrinkled his lips and looked up at his eyebrows like a judge considering the option of life in the stir or death by hanging. “Like any other client, huh? All right, if you’re sure you want to guide the Titanic through these waters, captain, be my guest.”

“Good. Now what you been doing today?”

The elbows came back on my desk as he leaned forward. “I’ve been poking around amongst my Hibernian friends.” I guess my confusion showed because he added, “Irish friends, Phil.”

He hadn’t shaved that morning and the red stubble that hid amongst his freckles was nearly translucent. “Once I found out whose warehouse got torched, I wanted to see what they would say about it,” Rusty said. “And I wanted to find out if any of Tommy’s ex-pals knew our friend Beverly. If Marty Connors had met her, I wondered if any of the others had.”

I lit another butt and waited for his narrative. Turns out nobody admitted to anything related to the big blaze. Rusty said that normally those young mob punks would act real smug and wink their eyes, do everything but brag about the deed and who’d done it. If the Hibernian—I liked that word—kids had known anything, they would have given something away, Rusty related. So he believed that either what’s left of the Irish mob hierarchy kept a tight ship, kept the arson from even their sons, or somebody else was responsible.

“Internal power struggle amongst the Black Hand mob?” I asked. That seemed to perplex Rusty so I added “Black Hand is the Sicilian mob, Russ.”

“Huh? Okay. Yeah, maybe. And maybe your boy Tommy got stuck on the wrong side of it.”

“What about the girl?”

“Almost nothing. None of them had ever heard the name. So I figure she wasn’t in the picture until after the kid started playing with the gentlemen from Sicily.”

“Beans. Nothing?”

“Almost nothing. One of them says he saw the kid a couple weeks back driving through the Plaza district in his fancy car with a gorgeous long-haired blonde. The kid said he’d never seen her before.”

“He give you a description?”

“Gorgeous. Long, straight, blond hair.”

“That’s it?”

Rusty looked irritated. “That’s what I asked him. The kid answered ‘Hey, man, they were driving by in a car. What’d ya expect?”

I showed Rusty my sheet of scribbled Tommy tie-ins. He looked at it for a bit, then picked up my pen and darkened the arrow lines between Tommy and the Italian mob, and the triangle between Tommy, Cresto and the cops. “I’m thinking these hold the most promise: an internal—Black Hand, did you say—struggle, or the cops and the girl.”

Rusty met my gaze and held it. “Either way,” he said, “he’s probably dead.”

He was right too. The fact was there was no ransom note after more than a week. That put the chances of him still breathing a filly-at-the-Derby’s long shot. I nodded my acknowledgment.

Rusty shrugged. “What now?”

“I figure we go take a look at the kid’s car.”

“Then we clean up, grab something to eat and head over to the auditorium.”

I didn’t have a clue. “Auditorium?”

Rusty’s head turned to share his incredulity with an invisible pal across the room while he waited for me to make the association. I had nothing but a shoulder shrug to give.

Motionless, he looked at me for maybe ten seconds, trying fruitlessly to coax recollection.

“The Battler Bryant – Larry Shull fight.”

“Oh yeah. I’d completely forgotten. But I’m not sure that we have time for that.”

Rusty acted like I was trying his patience. Me trying his patience for a change. “Phil, everyone will be there. Every. One. Who knows who we might see?”

I began to feel as if this entire day rolled along at a normal pace, but my brain had been coated with sorghum molasses, always two steps behind. Maybe I’d taken a punch or a kick the night before that had scrambled brains. But one thing was crystal clear: I looked forward to the end of this rat-bastard case and a return to normalcy.

“You’re right, Russ. We ought to make an appearance.”

“It happens.”

“What happens?”

“Me being right.”

We both laughed.

At the office, we told Jill we wouldn’t be back in today. And I allowed Rusty a couple minutes of flirt-and-innuendo time. Jill was a terrific foil for his cocky bravado. In the elevator I prompted Henry to talk about his ball-playing boy, then leaned back and enjoyed Henry’s glow and Rusty’s authentic interest and encouragement as they traded baseball stories.

Western Auto hadn’t been out yet to take care of my flats, so we took Rusty’s car down to Southwest Boulevard. The streets were blocked around the scene of the fire, and we had to detour to go west. We found the garage Colleen told me about easy enough, only it wasn’t Alberto’s, but Garvey and Sons, Ned Garvey proprietor.

When we entered, the only person there had his head under the hood of a Model T.

“Excuse me,” I said.

“Hang on a second, Bud. I’m almost done here.”

A second turned out to be close to five minutes, which included some derogatory comments made toward the uncooperative engine. Rusty and I took a look around the place. There was room to work on four or five cars at once, and the place had garage doors both front and back. I took a peek out the window of the back one onto an alley. A sheet of the Star newspaper skittered past, propelled by the late afternoon breeze. Nothing special there, an alley with trash cans.

“Okay, boys, what can I do for you?”

“You Ned?” Rusty asked.

“Nope, I’m the ‘and Son.’ Name’s Albert. Folks call me Al.” He vigorously wiped his hands on a rag that had been draped over the car’s fender. “Car problems?”

“No, sir. I’m Rusty Callahan and this is my pal, Phil. Does Tom Holloway Junior keep a car parked here?”

Al’s brows furrowed and his neck brought his head back like a turtle does when it sees someone coming. “I’m not sure I follow. This is a repair garage, not a parking garage. Why would we let someone park a car here?”

I stepped forward, not close enough to intimidate, but close enough to give pause. “Probably because someone pays you good money, I’m thinking. Look, Mr. Garvey. Tom’s sister Colleen says he keeps it here. We’re not looking for trouble. But Tom hasn’t been home for a few days and his family worries.”

His demeanor changed. “Well, okay. Yes, young Mr. Holloway keeps his car here. A nice Stutz. Must have set his old man back plenty.” Al set the rag back on the fender then looked at his palms. “Look, fellas, I’d shake hands with you but …” He showed us why not.

“Tom gives me a sawbuck a month and I gave him a key to the back garage door. I leave that back space open for him. He’s a good kid and doesn’t make any trouble. He pays on time too—cash. He asked me to keep this quiet. That’s why I hedged your first question.”

“That’s okay; we understand. When’s the last time you saw him or the car?”

“About a week ago. He took the Stutz and said that he would be gone for a while. Even gave me next month’s sawbuck two weeks early.”

While I pulled out my billfold, Rusty asked if Tommy had said when he’d be back.

“I’m not sure whether he did or didn’t. If he did, I don’t remember. Course I was all excited about an extra ten bucks in my hand.”

I pulled a business card and a five out of my wallet. “Thanks for your time, Mr. Garvey. Here’s my card, along with a token of the family’s appreciation for helping us out. There’ll be another sawbuck if you give the number on the card a ring when you see either the car or the kid.”

As we walked to the door, Rusty stopped and turned. “Anyone else come around asking about the kid?”

Garvey nodded. “’Bout four days ago. They acted like they owned this place. Scared me some.”

“What’d you tell them?”

“I know what I wanted to tell them. But my dad was here and he told them that the boy used to keep his car here but he didn’t now.”

Rusty asked him what they looked like and he could only remember hats and overcoats and troubling dispositions.

In the car as we headed back to check on Western Auto’s progress, Rusty and I discussed what Al gave us. We agreed that since the kid told the garage that he’d be gone for a while, that seemed to eliminate kidnapping. That was good news. Still unanswered was where he went, why he left, who he went with, and when he might return—if he was still alive, that is.

We couldn’t rule out that he went somewhere with Beverly Cresto, even though the fact the cops very physically protected her privacy made it seem she hadn’t gone anywhere. But maybe the two of them were seeing the sights in the Windy City or partying on the Atlantic City boardwalk. Rusty had discovered that the Irish hoods he spoke to neither knew, nor had even heard of Cresto. We didn’t yet know whether the mobsters that Tommy had been working for recently knew the dame. That would have to change. I moved having a little gab with Mr. Palmisano to the top of my list.

Somewhere out there, a man with an extremely flat face lurked, waiting to hook up with me again. Was he one of the pair of men that broke into my flat? Flat Face, or whoever he worked for, didn’t want me looking for Tommy. That was another puzzle piece that pointed away from Tommy off on a lark with some girl.

“Good chance your pal Palmisano will be at the fight tonight,” Rusty said.

“Yeah, and maybe our elusive gorgeous girlfriend.”

“As long as we’re maybe-ing, maybe she’ll be arm-in-arm with her beau, Tommy.” I looked over at Rusty as he turned onto Broadway. He maintained his poker face.

“Sure, maybe.”

“And then the case is solved, and you’ll be guilt-free to go sniffing after Colleen Holloway. If she’ll still be interested”

“Right, Russ; thanks for your heartfelt encouragement.”

It turned out my Plymouth was, again, standing on all fours and Rusty pulled in next to it. We agreed to meet in the bar of the President Hotel at 8:00. Rusty knew my Plymouth almost as well as I did, so he waited to make sure it would start. It did. I swung by to pay my tab on the tire repairs and then headed home.

Standing nude in front of the bathroom mirror, I could see why I was so sore. Colorful bruises peppered my chest, stomach and what I could see of my back. I suppose I was lucky there had been no internal damage or broken ribs. I’d broken two ribs in a scrap back in ’29. They hurt like a son-of-a-bitch, and for a long time. If the opportunity arose, I wanted to show the detective from Detroit what broken ribs felt like.

The refrigerator yielded leftovers from my landlady and two lonely Schlitz beers that begged to be put out of their misery. I obliged.

I decided to wear my brown slacks and sport coat with a sweater—no tie. No sense putting on airs at a boxing match, although there were always plenty who did. A lot of folks go to a big fight more to be seen by others than to see the fight. There would be a crowd of those folks, and they would be up front, near the ring, close enough to see the sweat fly and blood spatter.

The Star had called for rain on Saturday but the weather was more like Indian summer on fight night. I arrived early and parked under a street light about a block from the President. The bar was crowded, some waiting to be seated for dinner across the lobby and some just having a few before walking over to the auditorium.

In honor of Mickey Doyle and Battler Bryant, I asked the barkeep for Irish whiskey on the rocks. He asked if the brand mattered. And I ramped up my Irish accent, “Now, sure and you know it does, Lad.”

“We got Bushmills and Jameson,” he said, unimpressed.

“Now I’ll be havin’ the Catholic whiskey.” He looked at me like I spoke Chinese. Bushmills came from Northern Ireland, and it was said the stuff was made from British piss by turn-coat Protestants.

“Just give me the Jameson,” I said, losing the accent. “Make it a double.” Shaking his head, he walked to the other side of the bar.

When the drink came, I tipped him a buck and we became best pals. He had just set down my third, that one only a single, when Rusty squeezed his way to my spot at the bar.

“What’ll you have, Russ?”

“Budweiser.”

I flagged down my new pal and ordered a Budweiser.

“Place is packed,” Rusty said.

“Yep.”

I was hunched forward, elbows on the bar, sliding my glass back and forth between my hands. Rusty leaned over next to me and gave me the evil eye. “Hey, pal, you look three sheets to the wind.”

“Nope, one sheet, two sheets max.”

“Better slow down”

“This is my last.”

My bartender brought the Budweiser and Rusty gulped down about half. He looked at me and belched.

“Trying to catch up?”

He grinned. “Nope, just thirsty.” He took another more dignified swallow. “I put a ten-spot down for each of us on Bryant with one of the gentlemen I spoke to this morning.” He emphasized the word “gentlemen.”

“Yeah, what kind of odds we get?”

“Just like Mickey said, six to one. I stopped there for lunch and asked some of the usual suspects about the Cresto girl. Told Mickey we planned to show and he said he’d leave a couple of tickets for us at will-call.” I nodded.

Rusty looked at his watch. “The undercard has already started. We might as well stroll on over.”

I nodded again and threw down my drink. Standing erect, I realized that, though I wasn’t exactly drunk, I was in the general vicinity.

Not only had Mickey Doyle left tickets at will-call, but they were good ones. We found our seats on the fourth row not far from Battler Bryant’s corner. There was a fight in progress. The fighters whaled away on each other in the middle of the ring, and it didn’t look like it would last much longer. Two more bouts were scheduled on the undercard. The place was two-thirds full. Typical of these kinds of big deal fights, most of the empty seats were up front. The high-rollers and society types would make their grand entrances sometime between 9:30 and 10:00. They always arrived late, overdressed and with aristocratic pomp.

We took a look around. Most of the mobster crowd had already found their seats. They had plopped themselves in good seats near the ring, forming the majority of ringside seats that actually had bodies in them. By design or by some great coincidence, the mobster groups sat across the auditorium from each other. Only the ring held back their animosity. Looking at them I was reminded of that summer my mother immersed me in Shakespeare—and there before me played out a medieval boxing match, Montagues on one side, Capulets on the other.

I pointed out the seating arrangement to Rusty. “Yeah, I noticed,” he said. “But no Lazzeri or Leary yet.”

“Nope, and no Palmisano.”

“Know what they oughta do?”

“What?”

“Put the gloves on Lazzeri and Leary and let ’em go after each other for twelve rounds. Loser leaves town.”

“I’d pay to see that,” I said. While we reflected on such a dream fight, the palooka in the near corner dropped like a logger’s lodge pole pine, the ten-count only a formality.

The next bout lasted only three rounds. The tall guy with a two-inch reach advantage kept the shorter one at bay, snapping left jabs with an occasional hard right combination. At the end of the third round the balding short guy was bloodied, his left eye almost swollen shut. He couldn’t get inside the big guy’s jab to do any damage. The ring doctor looked at the poor sap’s eye and called the fight.

The final warm-up bout featured two promising welterweights, a Negro named Casey from KC, and Fletcher, a young southpaw from Omaha. Waiting for that one to begin, we watched the place fill up; the fashionably late procession of those who had survived the depression with wealth intact. Resourceful Rusty produced a flask. We nipped at it as we watched the parade. The upper echelon of the mob made their appearances, as did the police commissioner and two handfuls of cop chiefs and captains. Mike Leary and a classy brunette took their seats on the front row. Chief Myers accompanied the mayor and his wife. Myers’ nose glowed like a crimson lighthouse through the auditorium’s smoky cigarette fog.

Throughout the last two bouts, I scoured the place for Beverly Cresto, no easy doings considering all we knew was that she was a knockout with long, blond hair. Plenty of blondes, a handful had a shot at being her. I tried to make a mental note of where the handful sat, but my mind wasn’t working so hot.

Just after the final fight of the undercard began, Tom Holloway arrived, with Colleen and some fella I didn’t recognize. Until they found their seats in the second row amongst the cops and politicos, my eyes saw only her—the way her perfectly muscled legs moved in those night-black heels, the place those legs attached themselves, her silky gown a shade too tight there. Not too tight, perfectly tight. Some kind of fur wrap tossed itself carelessly below her shoulders, held in position solely by bent elbows.

As they walked by our seats, Colleen spotted me and her haughty expression of privilege chameleoned into a hungry smile before returning to its original pose. Rusty saw it too.

He gently elbowed me in my bruised ribs. “The black widow has arrived, already casting her net.” Without looking at me, eyes back on the fight, he handed me the flask. I took a long pull of the fiery stuff.

I concentrated on the fight. Casey moved like a greyhound, landing three punches for every one Fletcher managed. By the fifth round, Fletcher was desperate. If he didn’t take Casey out soon he would go down. He plodded after Casey, trying to pin him on the ropes, but Casey exacted a terrible toll and kept moving. The kid was good.

In between rounds, I tried to find those few blondes that met our sketchy description but had forgotten where they were. And now the place was full. I kept searching and found one, but my disobedient eyes returned to a different blonde. Several times our gazes met, and like a lovesick thirteen-year-old, I looked away and tried to make it seem as if I wasn’t looking.

At the bell opening the sixth round, Casey became the aggressor. Fletcher ducked and covered and backpedaled. Casey, aware that Fletcher was protecting his head and offered minimal counter punches, went to work on his body. When Fletcher protected his body Casey downed him with a hard right to the jaw. Wobbly, Fletcher made it to his feet at the eight count, and before Casey could finish him the bell clanged.

In between rounds, Palmisano and Lazzeri and the requisite bodyguards arrived and took their seats on the Capulet side. A moment later, Rusty nudged me painfully in the ribs. I turned to him ready to encourage him to cut out the rib poking, only to see his pointed finger in my face. I followed the finger’s point. Detectives Patterson and Harmon had arrived and were headed for seats, not in the cop section, but opposite the cops, on the side of the ring between the two warring houses.

Patterson and Harman took their seats, and as the seventh round bell rang, Flat Face and the chubby goon I met in front of the courthouse walked in. They took seats in the general vicinity of the two detectives. Neither Flat Face nor the detectives looked my way. I turned my attention back to the fight. The seventh round was all Casey, and the only surprise was that Fletcher still stood at the bell.

Between rounds, I directed Rusty to Flat Face and his pal, six rows back and more than a dozen seats west of Patterson and Harmon.

“They’re in no man’s land,” Rusty shouted over the crowd noise. “Who do you figure pulls their strings?”

“Don’t know, Russ. Let’s keep an eye on them between rounds and after the bouts. See if they tip their hand. And how ’bout no more pokes in the ribs? Tap me on the shoulder.”

Rusty laughed and nodded.

Casey took care of business in the eighth. Fletcher couldn’t backpedal fast enough. Less than a minute into the round Casey cornered him, and with a flurry, put him down. Fletcher had barely stirred by the time the referee counted him out.

The referee raised Casey’s gloved hand to a round of applause and cheers. The local KC kid might be only a handful of fights away from a shot at the welterweight title. Casey trotted around the ring in triumph.

The seated crowd thinned as there was maybe thirty minutes before the main event. Folks made their way out to the concourse to smoke and socialize, or to use the johns. Our pugilistic detectives made for one of the exits and less than a minute later Flat Face and his dim-bulb, slovenly pal stood and left through the same tunnel to the concourse.

I took another swig of the flask and handed it back to Rusty. “I think I’ll go relieve myself and see who’s hanging out with whom.”

“I’ll be your chaperone.” Rusty got to his feet. When I stood, I felt that momentary alcohol-fueled woozy feeling. It took only a couple of seconds for the body and the brain to readjust and I side-stepped down the row toward the aisle. Once I reached it, I felt fine and skipped down the stairs. As I did, I took a quick look Colleen’s way. The Holloways remained in their seats, and Colleen’s eyes seemed to point straight at me, though I couldn’t be sure from this distance.

On the concourse, we looked around. It was so crowded a fella couldn’t see much but the folks close around him. The line for the men’s room wound a dozen guys out the door, so Rusty and I decided to split up, snoop around, and meet again at the men’s room door. I slithered between bodies for three minutes tops when we literally bumped into each other.

I stood a half head taller, and for a moment he didn’t recognize me. Once he did, the shock of recognition changed swiftly into something darker.

“If it isn’t the big dick,” Flat Face said.

“And my wise-ass henchman,” I said. “Not out threatening honest people? Your boss give you the night off?” We stood about twelve inches apart. He looked up at me, his expression one of cold malice.

“Maybe I’m here watching you, wise guy. Maybe tonight’s the night one of us gets popped.”

“I was just entertaining that same thought.” I wanted to punch him, to tear into him, to let loose the animus that had built since two pricks like him carved up Sammy. But the place was too crowded and I was also aware the liquor urged me to throw away the caution I had gained from more than a decade as an investigator.

He stood there, legs apart daring me to make a move. Somewhere nearby, maybe right behind me with a blade, was his sidekick.

“Tell you what, friend, I got a fight to watch.” I gave him a three-finger salute. “Another time.” That discretion and valor thing again, I thought. I was getting to be a regular practitioner.

He sneered in derision. “I knew you were a weak sister, but it won’t save you. Your ass is mine, Morris. Just a matter of time.”

“Looking forward to it,” I said as I walked away.

The line at the restroom door had shrunk, and Rusty stood there waiting. We compared notes. Neither of us had seen the detectives. I told him about the gab with my pug-faced shadow.

“He’s a persistent little hood,” Rusty said. “We may just have to quiet him down.”

“Yep,” I said.

Ten minutes later we were back in our seats. The announcer had entered the ring and awaited the boxers. Battler Bryant entered the arena first to a boisterous reception. Bryant was a local boy and had fought a full third of his forty-one bouts in here in town. At one time, six years or so ago, he was a legitimate contender. Age and attrition and questionable management had taken their toll. Battler had lost five of his last eight fights, not because he was washed up, but because he had a name, and all the up and coming heavyweights and light heavies wanted name opponents to grease the wheels to a title shot. Battler battled the best young boxers for a pummeling and a payday.

In his corner, Mickey pulled off the boxer’s robe and the Battler shadowboxed to warm up his muscles.

Rusty tapped me on the shoulder, handed me the flask and leaned toward my ear. “Mickey was right. For thirty-something years old he looks in great shape.”

I nodded and took a short nip from the flask—only an inch or two left.

The Iceman showed with an entourage twice the size of Bryant’s. Shull was young and blond, and as he moved up the aisle near us, his face had none of the boxer’s trademarks. His nose was clean and straight, no cauliflower ears, his cheeks and lips the same general shape as anybody on the street. He also looked big. His reception from the crowd was noticeably less enthusiastic. A St. Louis kid, Shull trained in Chicago, but had fought and won here twice before.

In the ring without a robe, Shull looked like one of those Greek gods that sculptors sculpt, a Greek god who worked out a lot. Standing across the ring from each other, it was hard to believe that the two fighters were in the same weight class.

“Holy shit!” I said.

“Ditto,” Rusty replied as I returned his flask. Rusty took a long draw. “Looks like those six-to-one sawbucks we laid on Bryant might have been a sucker’s bet.”

“Yep, still gotta fight the fight, though.”

Rusty laughed. “Better him than me. Give me four cops with nightsticks in an alley over 12 rounds with that guy.”

“Amen to that, brother,” I said, as they lowered the microphone for the ring announcer.

The announcer squawked out his “good evenings” and “ladies and gentlemen’s.” We learned from him that 36-year-old Steve ‘Battler’ Bryant stood at 32 wins, 9 losses with 23 wins by knockout. ‘Iceman’ Larry Shull, ten years younger than Bryant and the number four light-heavyweight contender, came in with a record of 22 – 1 with 20 knockouts. A pretty impressive record.

According to the ring announcer, Shull, who was taller, wider, bulkier and had a longer reach by two-inches, only weighed three pounds more than Bryant’s 173. Face-to-face receiving the referee’s instructions the difference became even more pronounced.

I leaned toward Rusty. “No way he’s only three pounds heavier than Bryant.”

“Maybe Shull’s hollow,” Rusty offered.

The boxers touched gloves and retreated to their corners, awaiting the bell. The general chatter in the auditorium stilled, anticipating its ring. It seemed more a library crowd than a prize fight’s. When the bell rang, volume increased. Bryant leaped out of his corner and opened up a flurry of body shots culminating with a left hook to Shull’s head. The crowd roared its approval, especially the Irish mob side. Problem was, most of Bryant’s flurry was blocked by Shull’s arms and gloves, and the left hook that landed flush on Shull’s jaw didn’t seem to faze him. That wasn’t Bryant’s only problem.

As the Battler landed his hook, he left himself open for a straight right hand and Shull accommodated. The right staggered Bryant back into the middle of the ring. He was hurt and Shull should have pressed his advantage. He didn’t. Instead, Shull displayed his footwork, dancing around Bryant, almost playfully sticking jabs in his opponent’s face for the remainder of the round.

When the bell ended the first round, Rusty and I turned to each other.

“Trouble,” I said.

Rusty shook his head. “I’ll say. He might have taken Bryant out right there. Either Shull’s just having some fun or somebody’s laying money on a KO in a certain round.”

Mickey and Brownie squatted in the corner in front of the seated Battler. Mickey shouted and shook his finger and shouted some more. Battler nodded his head. Whatever Mickey was telling him had better be good, I thought.

The second round found Bryant more cautious. He still tried to work on Shull’s body with quick flurries and retreats. Shull stalked him, looking for an opening to deliver another haymaker. But it was a half-hearted stalking. Shull seemed more content to defend and counter.

At the end of the second round, the crowd voiced its disapproval at the lack of action. And when the third round followed form, the crowd grew angry and a chorus of boos reverberated above the sound of the bell ending round three.

Rusty passed me the flask. It was almost empty so I only pretended to drink. You always want to let a fella empty his own flask. But I was also at a point a guy gets to when he’s had a lot to drink, a point where he doesn’t want to quit, where he needs one more drink. I felt that way then, and my mind stuck on that desire. Rusty brought me out of it with a tap on the shoulder.

I leaned toward him and he pointed to the Lazzeri mob side. At first, it didn’t register, but then it did. The whole place seemed angry. They hadn’t come to see a dance recital, they came to see head bashing and blood. Everyone voiced their displeasure at the tepid activity inside the ring—everyone except the first four rows of the west side. A subtle distinction. The mobsters displayed an abundance of contentment, a smugness that spoke of inside knowledge.

I looked at Rusty. He nodded. Either the fix was in and both fighters were involved, or Shull had been instructed to drop Bryant in a certain round so someone could cash in on the long odds of picking a round. And the Irish still held on to the lion’s share of bookmaking in town.

“The Black Hand boys have laid a load down on one round,” I said.

Rusty nodded. “And probably through intermediaries on bets placed with Irish bookies,” he said.

“Yeah, a big score that raises one mob’s boats and beaches the other.”

I watched Mickey with his fighter in Bryant’s corner. He shouted and waved his arms and again stuck his finger in Bryant’s face. If Bryant was in on the fix, Mickey didn’t know it. Involuntarily my gaze moved to Colleen. She was speaking to her father. As she spoke, her slender, graceful fingers slid her short blond bob behind her ear. An alcohol-fueled desire welled inside me—a desire to touch that hair, her ear, to hold her, devour her. I squelched it by turning toward Flat Face. But he and his chubby pal were gone.

The fourth round bell rang. Bryant went after Shull with less caution, landing some good body blows and a left uppercut. Shull backed away and defended. Late in the round, Bryant hurt Shull with a combination and Shull went on the attack. Though Shull didn’t land anything, the force of his blows, blocked by Bryant’s gloves and arms, staggered Bryant. As the round ended the crowd sensed that something had changed, that the fight they came to see had begun.

The fifth round brought boos again. Bryant stalked and Shull danced and produced half-hearted jabs. Rusty and I looked at each other. This wasn’t the round the gamblers bet on. Even Bryant’s stalking seemed insincere. Maybe he was in on it.

In the sixth round, Bryant cornered Shull and landed some good body blows. But again, a straight right hand from Shull sent Bryant reeling backward. And again Shull did not follow the advantage. At the end of the round, some cups and a half-pint bottle landed on the canvas. The ring announcer pleaded for the crowd to refrain from hurling objects at the ring. The volume of the crowd’s distaste grew. The man to the right of me joined the booing a little too closely to my ear. I nudged him and pointed to my right ear.

“Sorry, Mac!” he shouted loudly enough to wake sleeping babies six blocks away. Though he continued to boo, he used cupped hands and leaned slightly toward the poor guy to his right, who yelled just as loudly.

The seventh round began with a subtle change. Bryant still advanced and Shull still avoided and defended, but Shull consistently countered. He looked for openings as Bryant attacked, and began to stick him with his jab and an occasional powerful right hand.

The crowd roared late in the round when Shull attacked. It all began when Bryant had him against the ropes. Instead of covering up, as he had for six rounds, Shull, head bobbing and swaying, leaned on the ropes and traded punches. Bryant got the worst of it and backed off. This time Shull pursued and he stunned Bryant with quick jabs and a right cross.

Bryant backpedaled, trying to shake off the effects of Shull’s right. Shull chased him up against the ropes and dropped him. The noise reached a crescendo fed by those screaming for blood and those imploring the Battler to get up. Bryant quickly rose and took the referee’s standing eight-count. The ref wiped his gloves clean and then signaled them to fight on. Shull didn’t go for the knockout; instead, he snapped his jab at Bryant’s face until the bell ended the round.

“This is it,” Rusty said. “This will be the round Shull takes him out.”

“Looks that way. Bet he doesn’t mess around either,” I said.

Mickey and the cornermen furiously attended a cut that had opened above Bryant’s left eye. I watched them work, but before Bryant stood for the eighth round I took a quick peek at the Holloways. The father was speaking to someone in the aisle, someone unfamiliar. Colleen looked straight at me. How long had she been watching me? She smiled and gave me a tiny wave. I nodded and turned away.

My gaze roamed as the fighters stood. Chief Myers appeared to look my way. He brought his hand up to his ear as if it held a telephone receiver in it, then pointed at me and then back to the phone-hand at his ear.

“You see that, Russ?”

“What?”

“Chief Myers?”

“No, what?”

The bell rang for the eighth round. “Never mind,” I shouted over the crowd’s cacophony.

Shull came after Bryant, and he left all caution back in his corner. Bryant ran from him, but he also utilized Shull’s aggression against him. It was a fighter’s retreat, filled with jabs that found Shull’s face, and an occasional quick combination. Shull doggedly kept up the attack trying to corner Bryant, or connect with brutal force.

Shull caught Bryant with a good right hand before he could duck and dart away. Bryant’s forehead gushed red and he repeatedly used his glove to try to keep the blood out of his eye. It streamed down his forehead, over and around his eyebrow, and made Bryant virtually a one-eyed fighter. Sensing the advantage, Shull came in again, forsaking his jab. He swung wildly with both hands aiming to land a blow that would finish Bryant.

Bryant, half blind up against the ropes, saw an opening and delivered a three blow combination that ended with a left uppercut. Shull went down.

Stunned, the crowd grew silent for a moment, then erupted. The whole auditorium crowd was on its feet. They had what they wanted—a good fight with lots of blood. Though the smart money was on Shull, the majority at the auditorium pulled for Bryant, and they were getting all they had hoped for.

Shull rose to his feet at the six count while Bryant, in his corner, gloved the blood away from his left eye. Shull bled now from his nose and his cheek below an eye. His cheek swelled, partially obscuring one eye. Squinting through the swollen cheek, Shull’s face, perhaps for the first time, resembled a boxer’s.

The referee wiped Shull’s gloves and motioned for the fight to continue. More cautious now, Shull led with his jab. He quickly realized that Bryant’s bloody eye made him vulnerable on his left side. Shull kept sliding that direction, using his jab with a series of hammering right crosses that came in from Bryant’s blind side. Several of them landed. Bryant was hurt. He wouldn’t last to the bell.

Perhaps sensing that it was a fight he couldn’t win with caution, Bryant ducked and came inside with everything he had. He landed a handful of body shots and an uppercut that snapped Shull’s head back. But Shull pummeled Bryant’s face and ribs.

The crowd grew hysterical. Hell, I was hysterical! The punishment each meted out to the other was brutal. Neither should have still stood when the bell rang, but stand they did. Their tired arms dropped to their sides before the bell’s clanging died away. The fighters’ cornermen had to literally guide them to their corners. Both men’s faces streamed blood, their shoulders and chests freckled with the stuff.

I felt dizzy, both from the destruction I had witnessed and the alcohol I had consumed. So I sat down, as did most of those standing, in a kind of communal fatigue.

Still standing, Rusty looked down at me. “Can you believe that? Have you ever seen anything like that round of boxing?”

I took those as rhetorical questions and managed a mild shake of the head. It seemed clear that the fight wouldn’t go on much longer. One of them would finish the other quickly. But it no longer seemed that Shull finishing Bryant was such a sure thing. And if Palmisano’s mob had bet a bundle on an eighth round knockout, they had just lost it.

The crowd rose again in anticipation of the ninth round. The referee and fight doctor squatted in the Battler’s corner looking at his eye. Mickey stood next to him shouting at the two. A fella didn’t need to read lips to catch a few of his words. Mickey turned and heaved his bloody towel into the third row. The referee motioned to the ring announcer and to the guy operating the bell.

Rather than clang once to start the ninth, he clanged it non-stop for five or six seconds as the referee trotted over to Shull’s corner. Shull stood, ready to go another round. The ring announcer reached his dangling microphone.

“Ladies and Gentlemen, the ring doctor has stopped the fight. The winner, with an eighth round technical knockout, ‘Iceman’ Gary Shull.”

Pandemonium erupted. The ring was buried in projectiles including dozens of liquor bottles. The men in the ring covered their heads and scrambled to get away. A bunch of stiffs rushed the ring trying to show the referee or the ring doctor or anyone handy that they knew their way around fisticuffs. Fights broke out around the ring and even in the aisles. Rusty sat down and enjoyed the show, and once I saw the Holloways had safely made their exit I joined him.

There weren’t nearly enough uniforms to squelch the melee, and the cop hierarchy had already made a hasty exit. So the police down there somewhat passively tried to keep the fighting from becoming a conflagration. When necessary, the cops night-sticked the over enthusiastic pugilists. And we spotted some comic relief.

A woman with auburn hair in a sky blue dress pummeled a guy with a large red handbag. The way she wielded it, the big red bag must have weighed five pounds. The guy tried to flee, but she marked him step-by-step whaling away on his head and shoulders.

As I watched the bonus bouts, I noticed that the bevy of mob kingpins had also made a hasty exit. It was just the common Joes down there getting in some exercise.

“My shovel-faced friend and his shadow left sometime around the fourth round,” I said to Rusty.

Without turning his head, Rusty kept his eyes on the lady with the two-ton handbag. “They must have had some important business.” He chuckled as the man finally eluded the woman who went to work on another guy. “That lady has some serious issues with men.”

“Can’t blame her. We’re all cads,” I said. “I been thinking those two trouble boys might have left early to set up an ambush for someone.”

“Someone we know?”

“Maybe.”

The fight had died down and the police seemed to be gaining the upper hand on the remnants. A police officer escorted the lady in blue out of the auditorium, not in handcuffs but he did have her purse.

I stood and stretched, a little woozy and still feeling the alcohol buzz.

Rusty stood too. “So what now?”

“I figure we better be careful as we leave. Either take a back exit or leave in the middle of a crowd.”

“I like the crowd idea,” Rusty said. “If they got somebody watching the back exits we’re toast.”

“Okay, we go out the front in a crowd then. You got your rod, don’t you?”

Rusty looked hurt. “No, Phil, I forgot all about it. And I forgot my underwear too.”

“So that’s why you wore your brown slacks.” We both laughed, and then headed down to the exiting crowd.

The lights of downtown made it easy to see. We huddled in a crowd that began to split up at the corner, some headed north on Wyandotte and the rest either east or west on 13^th Street. Both Rusty and I had parked over by the President Hotel. There were a half dozen others in our group headed east. We kept our eyes moving; every passing car potentially contained shooters.

Without incident, we ducked into the hotel bar. I ordered a whiskey doubled-up and Rusty a Schlitz. Rusty prefers Schlitz after drinking the hard stuff. Turns out we both had parked less than a half block apart. I suggested that we walk together after our drinks, two guns being better than one.

“Since these fellas are after you, and they know what car you drive, why don’t you let me take you home? I’ll go get my car and pick you up out front. We leave your Plymouth here overnight.”

“What if they mess with my car again?”

“You’ll be alive in the morning to get it fixed. Besides, I thought the old man was paying your expenses.”

“He is.”

“There you go. Whaddya say? Let me drive you home.”

I never liked relying on other people for help, even Rusty. But what he said made sense. I agreed.

As he stood I grabbed his arm. “Be careful. They know who was with me. They might figure getting to you is almost as good.”

Rusty paused in sober thoughtfulness. “A better plan, to my way of thinking. They plug me and they’ve taken out the brains of the operation.” He slid his automatic into his coat pocket and walked out into the street. I tossed down my drink and ordered another.

Before I had a chance to get worried, Rusty’s car pulled up to the curb out front. I slipped my own revolver into my coat pocket and, to my astonishment, left my drink unfinished on the bar. Keeping my right hand on the gun in my pocket, I walked through the bar and outside, half-expecting a hail of bullets. There was no hail or even a shower, just a warm muggy night.

As we headed to my place I kept looking for a tail, but no one followed. I told Rusty about watching Myers in between rounds and him motioning me to call.

“What’s he want?”

“Hell, Russ, I don’t know. I don’t read sign language.”

I told Rusty to pick me up at 8:00 in the morning, told him that I needed to get my car and check in with Tommy’s old man. And I wanted to see what kind of burr Detective Chief Myers had in his trousers.

Rusty looked at me as if he doubted my sanity.

I gave him a palms-up shrug. “What?”

“Eight … a.m.?”

“You heard me. I’ll be fine, up and ready with bells on.”

“You’re the boss.” He wore an adolescent’s smile.

Rusty parked his car at my place and we went up to my flat together, just in case. I fumbled to unlock the door and the new heavy-duty deadbolt. The match I had slid in the door was still where it was supposed to be. We made a quick check of the place and returned to the door. Rusty hesitated.

“What? You waiting for a goodnight kiss?”

My humor brought no reaction.

“You okay?” he asked.

Was he getting sappy on me? “Yeah, I’m okay. Now scram, gumshoe, before I call the landlady.”

I had another drink or two before I went to bed. Normally I sleep like Sammy used to, the roof could get torn off by a twister and I’d have to wake Sammy up to take shelter. But I had trouble sleeping that night, loaded though I was. And when I did sleep I had a dream, a nightmare.

I stood in an alley and that flat-faced son of a bitch was at the other end holding fistfuls of money. His pal stood next to him, his Thompson gun blazed away at me. Only it wasn’t just him. There were at least a dozen of him stationed all around the far end of the alley—all of them fired at me. I held only my .38, and each time I shot one of them another popped up nearby. I couldn’t reload fast enough to whittle their numbers. All the while the bastard waved that money, bills floating to the street around him. He laughed hysterically, only he and his cluster of identical pals weren’t alone.

On both sides of Flat Face were uniformed Kansas City cops, all smiling Satanic smiles and slapping bloody nightsticks in their palms. And my dad stood there with them in his uniform slapping his nightstick and wearing a grim grin I had never seen. He pointed his stick at me and then swung it like a baseball bat.

I don’t remember how it ended or if it ended. And I know at some point I woke up feeling like I had sawdust in my mouth, the dream still vivid. I don’t remember going back to sleep, but I must have.