by Thomson, Lh
“You know who I am?”
Silence. I assumed Mince was nodding. Very few people in Philadelphia could have avoided knowing Vin the Shin.
“Good. Then you know that I’m a serious man, David, and I insist upon being taken as such. Now… open your mouth.”
“What….” Mince exclaimed.
There was the sound of struggling, as Paulie held the kid in place. Then the mobster spoke again, his voice low, menacing. “You feel that barrel against the back of your mouth, David? You go turn yourself in for the beer job, or the next time, Paulie pulls the trigger and blows your brains out. And after the cops and the courts deal with you, you make nice until you’re out of school, or the next time, Paulie pulls the trigger, and blows your brains out. Got it? Nod slowly if you do, ‘Cause we don’t want him to do it accidentally. Good.”
There was silence for a moment again, then the sound of Terrasini lighting a cigarette, the familiar click of a Zippo lighter opening, a moment later snapping shut. Terrasini said, “You know, it’s funny. Because most kids your age, they’d be a hell of a lot more scared right now. I got a feeling you don’t feel too much of anything, do you kid?”
Again, Mince said nothing, but I could have sworn the gangster’s voice was tinged with admiration. “That’s it, isn’t kid? I know a little about this, ‘Cause I’m in a tough business, where it don’t pay to feel too much. So maybe you do what I tell you now, and in a year, maybe you come back and talk to me about what you’re going to do with the rest of your life.”
“Okay,” the boy said simply.
“There’s a good kid. Now get the fuck out of my car.”
I heard the limo door open and closed, and watched through the passenger side as David went back into his building. The partition whirred and lowered.
“So there you go, Quinn, you get your favor.”
I wasn’t sure what to say. I hadn’t really counted on him offering the kid a job. He read my reaction and said, “Hey, I see promise in the kid. He’s a stone-cold killer that one.” Then he gave me another hard stare. “You look shocked, Quinn.”
I said, “I’m sorry Mr. Terrasini, I just…”
He waved a hand. “Fuggedaboutit. Think about it this way: would you rather have the David Minces of the world taking care of our dirty business, or capping John and Jane Public?”
Before I could answer, he added, “And you don’t get ‘neither’ as an option in the real world. Speaking of which … what about you, kid? You need some steady work?”
I politely declined. “Insurance business is good to me, Mr. Terrasini. Going to stick with that for a while.”
He puffed on his cigarette, looking happy with himself. “I know how that feels. Insurance business has been pretty good to me, too.”
And that made Paulie and his chunky colleague both jiggle with laughter.
Terrasini said, “You change your mind, you give me a call, kid. If this Mince kid works out for me, I still owe you.”
I nodded. Then it occurred to me. “We can clear that up really quickly, sir. You got business with a guy named Carl Hecht? He’s got some stake in the gallery that was robbed, and I’m interested to know what; a friend of mine’s job might depend on it.”
If things worked out the way I hoped with Vin the Shin, John DeGoey would finally be off the hook with the Hecht brothers, and I could get back to the question of who walked away with a Johannes Vermeer original.
Chapter Ten
FOUR HOURS LATER, things were not looking good.
As the sidewalk flew by, the soles of my shoes clacked loudly, only partly drowned out by the heaviness of my breath. I was in good shape, but the pair chasing me evidently were, too, and they had guns, and we’d been running for close to ten straight minutes.
North Philly has lots of little ethnic enclaves, and in this one just off Michener Avenue, the folks were mostly from the Caribbean and Africa. On a better day, when the rain wasn’t cutting lightly across a bleak late afternoon sky, I might’ve been up here with Nora, getting some fine jerk chicken and curry. Despite some of the more paranoid and bitter city residents referring to neighborhoods near here as “North Killadelphia,” experience has taught me there are good and bad everywhere.
For now, I had to keep sharp, rounding a corner off East Vernon and sprinting down Forrest Street past what looked like an old red brick church. The mesh fences were rusted here and the neighborhood had been getting progressively worse throughout the chase, but the properties and terrain felt wide open compared to the small lots downtown, and I couldn’t figure how I was going to lose them.
I cut behind some row houses, where a group of kids were gathered smoking weed. They instinctively looked to bolt, but I called out. “Yo! Who wants to make fifty bucks? I got two cops chasing me.”
The leader of the group, a tall kid with a serious look and a black Nike sweatshirt, stepped up. “You got the fifty?”
I pulled out my wallet and peeled off three twenties. “How about we make it sixty?”
The kids smiled.
It couldn’t have been more than twenty seconds later when the pair rounded the corner after me, two muscular, fit middle-aged white guys in non-descript single-breasted suits., both with their pieces drawn. They were exactly what the kids expected … even if they weren’t actually cops.
There must have been about a dozen kids, and as I crouched behind two trash cans, they gathered in front of them, hiding me efficiently.
The older one had a moustache. “You kids see a guy run by here a minute ago, tall, athletic?”
“He look like you?”
“No, younger.”
“I meant he a white dude?”
The other kids laughed. I peeked through the group as the older thug shoulder-holstered his gun.
It had started just after my meeting with Vin the Shin, when he’d confirmed that Carl Hecht was tied in with one of his subsidiary associates, some real-estate scam one of his nephews was running, he’d said.
Hecht’s approach in muscling out John DeGoey was so old-school mob – offer a helping hand then leverage that debt like a sponge with a vice-grip on water – that it just made sense for there to be a connection, and to use my one favor to ask about him. Of course, that kind of operation isn’t too different from what happens on Wall Street daily, although crossing a ‘made’ guy in Philly tended to result in more immediate damage.
Vin the Shin said he’d never liked his nephew, didn’t think he was sincere. He had no problem loosening the screws on John DeGoey. “He’s a little motherfucking weasel,” was his way of putting it over the phone. “Yeah, I’ll tell him to end that little venture right quick. Piss him right off.”
I’d asked him what that would mean for Hecht, and Terrasini sounded unimpressed. “What the fuck you do mean what does it mean for him? How the fuck would I know?” he’d said. “I wouldn’t bet on him walking away from the whole thing with too much fucking money, though. Knowing Johnny, he’d be lucky just to walk away.”
I’d figured that would get Johnny Terrasini and Carl Hecht off DeGoey’s back and save Alison’s job. Anyone warned off by Vin the Shin would be smart enough to just walk away and lick his wounds.
Evidently not. Hecht had called me a couple of hours later.
“What’s the deal?”
“What deal?”
“Maybe you tell me.”
“Again, you’re on the vague end of the spectrum ….”
“Friend of mine says you got some powerful friends of your own. I want to know why you’re involved in my shit. Five o’clock, at the Golden Dragon on East Wadsworth.”
Then he hung up.
East Wadsworth is not exactly what you’d call upscale, mostly brick low-rises rented out to small businesses barely making it. So I wasn’t entirely comfortable with the arrangements. But like I said: who figures a crooked business guy like Hecht for taking on a friend of Vin the Shin? No one, that’s who. And he thought I was a friend of Terrasini’s, no dou
bt.
The Golden Dragon was an old neighborhood fried rice joint. I’d never noticed it before, just a million others like it, a small storefront with fading gold lettering on peeling red paint.
I was three feet from the front door when the window exploded under the hail of bullets. The black SUV had pulled up on the other side of the road, a handful of men inside opening fire, the shattered fragments of glass cascading over the sidewalk. Of course, unlike in the movies, in real life the average handgun just isn’t that accurate from thirty feet away, and so all the drive-by managed to do was raise the cost of the restaurant owner’s glass coverage.
Realizing they’d pull up with traffic behind them, I took off in the other direction. Unable to U-turn into the oncoming lane, two of them had bailed out after me.
And that was how I came to be crouched, ten minutes later, behind a handful of fifteen-year-olds in north Philly, in the middle of a scorching afternoon. Obviously, Hecht had set me up for a hit, and it occurred to me that maybe Johnny Terrasini wasn’t so worried about his uncle any more.
I figured if I tapped either of these guys and drug them down to the cop shop, they wouldn’t say jack, not unless they wanted the same treatment from a handful of other guys. My problem now was two-fold, as the confused pair backed away from the group and started scanning up and down the road again: first, I’d parked across the street from the restaurant, making running back to my car impossible when the gunfire went down. So I had to get back there without the rest of the crew in the SUV spotting me.
Second, I had to shake the two guys standing ten feet away.
As you might have figured by now, fights in real life tend to be short and brutal. It’s a matter of necessity: someone nearly always has a weapon on them, and if one side doesn’t knock the other senseless quickly, someone’s probably going to get killed by that weapon.
As I don’t carry a gun – and am not allowed to by the state, it should be noted – this generally puts me at a disadvantage. So sticking to that core concept of finishing things quickly is especially important.
The two were facing opposite ways down the street, about twenty feet away. I motioned for the kids to keep quiet then grabbed their basketball, walking calmly towards the two. Before they could turn, I nailed the guy to my right with a hard chest pass into the back of his head, momentarily stunning him.
The noise prompted his partner to swing quickly towards me. But I’d already run four or five paces towards him, so he was really just turning into the punch.
As hard as he went down, we weren’t done – his buddy had gotten up from his knees and was scrambling to grab his snub-nose .38, which landed about six feet away. I took a running kick at his chin as he reached for it, hitting it square enough to hammer him backwards, hitting the concrete sidewalk with a satisfying thud.
A few feet away, the kids’ basketball was slowly rolling. I grabbed it and tossed it back to them. “Thanks.”
The biggest kid nodded towards the two unconscious goons. “They really 5-0?” he said.
I shrugged. “I wouldn’t recommend waiting around until they wake up to find out,” I said before heading back to East Wadsworth at a sprint.
By the time I reached my car, I’d spotted the SUV rounding the neighborhood twice. Unfortunately, before I could unlock the beast’s door and jump in, they’d spotted me. They pulled up to the sidewalk and two more men jumped out. With a handful of pedestrians around, neither had his piece out, but they ran towards me from just under a block away.
Fleeing was getting monotonous. I bolted a half block and peaked over my shoulder. Both were older, but trying hard to keep up. I turned down a side street and a sign caught my eye across the road. “The Island Sun.” Where had I heard that before?
Dufresne, the artist. His parents’ place. I sprinted across the street and into the attached bookstore, peaking back out the front door window just in time to see them round the corner after me and come to a screeching halt, trying to figure out my new direction.
From behind me, a warm woman’s voice said. “Can I help you?”
I looked sheepish. “Uh, yeah. Sorry.”
“You in some sort of trouble?”
I waggled my head back and forward, weighing my answer. “Yeah, I guess you could say that. You don’t know Clinton Dufresne by any chance?”
“I gave birt’ to him, so I’m betting I do,” she said sternly.
“Uh. Yeah. Sorry. I’m an investigator, working on that gallery theft…”
“He told us. It scared hell out of us. But why are ya starin’ out the windah?”
“Bad guys.”
“‘Ow bad?”
“Shoot me dead bad.”
She chewed her lip for a moment. “I grow up in Kingston,” she said. “I know all sort of good people get caught up. Ya come back ‘ere to the office be’ind the register.”
I tilted my head and examined her with a smile. “Clinton has a nice mother.”
“And that’s why he a nice boy,” she said seriously.
She was right about that, too.
By the time I’d managed to get out of north Philly, Hecht had called me back.
He didn’t even wait for me to ask who it was. “Look, nothing personal,” he said. “It wasn’t my call.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, well… you pissed off that partner of mine that you called in a favor on. You know, from Vin the Shin.”
“Not really a favor…”
“Could have fooled me. Him too, I imagine.”
“I just wanted you to leave this one guy alone. Is that so tough?”
“Not for me. For my partner? He’s not big on ultimatums. He is one upset motherfucker. I’m even contemplating getting out of town myself.”
Straight to the point. “And how serious would you say his level of annoyance is with me, Mr. Hecht?”
“I’d say if you were still inside the joint, you wouldn’t make it through lunch without a shiv in the back.”
“Don’t sound so happy about it.”
“Oh don’t get me wrong: I don’t give a damn if he whacks you. I just don’t think it’s good for business. So you got Mr. DeGoey a little help. It’s all good. Life goes on, you know? Well … my life goes on, anyway.”
And then he hung up.
Funny guy.
Well, not that funny. Johnny Terrasini, openly defying his uncle? That didn’t sound good at all. In this town, that kind of rival stuff usually meant bullets flying two ways. And even though I wasn’t involved… I was now involved.
I headed back downtown, calling Nora and Alison along the way, and getting both to invite everyone down to the Druid. It was time to fill them in on everything that had gone down. They’d doubtless already heard about Teddy Allison and Polly Clark being booked but would have no way of knowing about Patrick Delaney’s connection, what with him still being in jail.
And there was still the matter of the missing Vermeer.
But first I went home. I’d bruised the hell out of my knuckles for the second time in three days, and they needed ice. Plus, I had to check if my neighbor Ricky was okay, and fill Vin the Shin in on his treacherous little nephew.
I parked the Firebird in the underground lot and took the elevator up to my floor. As the door was opening, Ricky was just locking his door to go out, maybe to see Al downstairs.
“Ricky, hey. Look, I just wanted…’
He held up a hand. “Talk to it, Liam.” Then he walked by me and hit the elevator button for a down car.
“Ricky…”
He gave me a quick, hurt look. “I been beat up enough times in my life already by ignorant assholes, Liam,” he said. “I don’t need that shit where I live, you know? And you don’t even come by and talk to me about it for two days?”
He was right. You might feel awkward, or guilty, or lousy. But when you’ve done a friend wrong, you don’t walk by his door without stopping to talk, and that’s exactly what I’d done.
“
I got caught up in the case,” I said. “I’m sorry man, really…”
He held up the hand again. “Just… stop. I don’t want to hear it, okay? You really hurt my feelings man and I just don’t want to even talk to you right now, you know?”
And then he marched into the elevator. I motioned to come after him and he shook his head seriously then pushed the button to close the doors.
Damn.
In my apartment, my phone messages had stacked up. My mother tended to only use land lines still – modern technology wasn’t really her thing – and she’d left about twenty to make sure I wasn’t going to miss Sunday dinner two weeks in a row.
Alison Pace had left one, too.
“Hey… Look, I’m sorry if I came on a bit strong the other night. I just thought you should know I’m going to try and work things out with Leo. I know he can be a bit of a dog, but we’ve been together two years, you know? Anyway, I got Nora’s message, so I guess I’ll see you tonight at the Druid? Okay. Well … bye Liam.”
Even after the chase and the fight – such as it was – I still had nervous tension to wear off. I put on the TV and listened to a repeat of Conan from the night before, as I ran through some stretches and a light workout. Then, while Andy ran Conan’s tie through an electric cheese grater, I turned the volume down and called Vin the Shin.
His nephew’s betrayal didn’t seem to faze him.
“So you want a fucking medal for telling me this? You think I owe you a favor? I already did you a favor.”
Wiseguys can be exasperating to deal with. “Look, I just thought you should know: he set me up, and was making noises about coming after you. At least that’s what Hecht said.”
He was silent for a few moments then took a deep breath. “You know, I’ve been real nice to everybody what pissed me off this week,” he said, his voice raised to near a yell. “Pretty fucking soon, that’s going to end!”
I didn’t say anything. Even on the phone line, it would’ve been like poking a bear with a real long reach.
He sighed again. “Sorry kid. I don’t mean nothing by it, you know? You done good telling me about this. Just keep your head down, okay? I can’t look after you, even with Johnny gunning for me. He’s a ‘made’ guy, which means it’s hands off for me when it comes to keeping him away from you, you understand?”