Straight Pool

by JJ Partridge

  He let that sink in.

  “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”

  “I don’t believe in coincidence,” he replied sharply.

  “And Calibrese?”

  “You have good instincts. His old man worked at Charlie Fessenden’s grandfather’s quarry, along with three uncles and a parcel of cousins when it got closed down. The Westerly Star did a story on the lockout, people showing up for work, the gates closed, security guards and cops with dogs at the quarry gates. One of Calibrese’s uncles and a security guard got into a fight because the uncle wanted his tools out of the quarry house. Started a melee involving the whole family and a bunch got arrested for assault and trespass. Fessenden prosecuted the uncle, his father, and some cousins but eventually the charges got dropped. But the Calibrese family got a bad reputation because of the fight and had trouble getting jobs until the aftermath of the hurricane when everyone got clean-up work. That’s something a Calibrese’s not likely to forget. Understand me?”

  I did. Long before the clubhouse fire, fate allowed Ugo Calibrese to work out a scheme that would wound an avaricious, not very bright, Fessenden, while at the same time, he would make a lot of money. A lot! Simple, elegant, and rewarding revenge for the way his family was treated decades earlier, the snobbery, as he saw it, of his Watch Hill ‘neighbors.’

  “Is this a waste of time?” I said.

  “Probably,” said Benno. “Let me tell you why. At the time of the fire, Pontarelli is in a gay bar in New London. Plenty of witnesses.”

  “That takes care of one possibility. But only one.”

  “Why are you doing this?”

  “I don’t know.” Pause “You know that.”

  “Yah, I guess I do.”

  I was going to leave it at that when he said, “I don’t know if you can use this but there’s some other things you oughta know. About Calibrese,” and I listened to the veteran cop go through years of speculation, rumor, and underworld talk, on Ugo Calibrese. When he was through, all I said ‘thank you’ and ‘can you put this in an e-mail to me.’ His every surmise was a nugget for me, every set of facts a string of pearls.

  How could I exploit this?

  I went into the kitchen and took a bunch of green grapes from a bowl in the refrigerator, a welcome home present from Mrs. Pina, and went out to the den. I wanted to talk it through with Nadie but that wasn’t going to be possible. She’d say ‘call the police,’ and if I didn’t, I’d be protecting Charlie, and therefore Dani, or would it be for Tramonti or maybe a whole ‘class’ of people. I had come so far alone. I had to work it out by myself.

  * * *

  After an early dinner, Nadie had nodded off twice watching television on the sofa and by ten, she was asleep in our bed. When I slipped in an hour later, her breath was shallow like the sounds of waves in a conch shell. On the table next to me was a Ross MacDonald thriller from the early seventies, The Goodbye Look, taken from the shelves of the game room at Fisher’s Island over the weekend.

  For a few minutes, I stared at the cover of the tattered paperback with its psalms of praise for the author … ‘better than Hammett and Chandler at their best,’ ‘best living writer of the mystery thriller’ and similar blurbs from reviewers. I’ve read every Lew Archer novel at least twice. Why? Because Archer burns himself out trying to discover the truth about what happened at a precise moment in time and place even though he knows the real world defies absolutism, that a lot of details never get filled in or don’t make sense, that no reconstruction ever gets it quite right. The novels move forward, scene by scene like in real life, messy guessing games about motive and opportunity. Archer sorts it out by asking questions, uncovering lies, getting his hands dirty, maybe losing a scruple here and there. Usually, he thinks he has it all figured out, and then it unravels; he follows another line of inquiry but remembers he created the line in the first place. He doesn’t try to cram all the facts into logic and miss a better idea. Real life.

  And, there is the part of his investigation that is personal and has little to do with the client or size of retainer; he satisfies a sense of justice and tries not to do harm.

  Plus, he played snooker!

  I went downstairs, poured a drink of Macallan, and spent the next few hours trying to apply Lew Archer’s approach to link the death of Ollie Randall, the cowardice of Charlie Fessenden, the crimes of Magua Jones, and the cunning of Ugo Calibrese. Justice for whom? Who would be harmed? I was soon fighting myself. When an opportunity comes to cut corners, my conscious mans the barricades.

  When I read Benno’s e-mail report at the office the next morning, I knew what I would do. Even if Lew Archer would do it cleaner, and better.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  Ugo Calibrese took my call and seemed almost indifferent to my request to meet. He said eleven o’clock at Greenwick Downs and was off the phone. That made my neck prickle with apprehension. Here’s a guy who’s out to ruin Charlie Fessenden, who resents people like me, and he says, “C’mon over.”

  * * *

  A gigantic video billboard on a stanchion hawked jackpots and daily drawings as greyhounds danced, horses pranced, slot machine cherries lined up, and dollar signs paraded. Like ‘South of the Border’ signs along Route 95 in Virginia and North Carolina, a series of message boards followed with flashing arrows pointing to ‘Parking Lot C, Free Parking,’ and ‘Lot B, VIP Valet Service, Dog Track.’ Over the crest of a hill, completely out of context in its bucolic setting, an enormous, stucco box painted a bilious yellow, with a forest of satellite dishes on its flat roof, rudely pushed out of a modest hill. ‘Lot A’ was along its nearest side where Greyhound, Peter Pan, Pawtuxet Valley, and Conway buses lined up against the building like little piggies at the sow.

  A discrete sign directed vendors to a parking lot at the far side of the building so I continued up the highway and saw it was actually two lots, one marked ‘Executive’ and the other ‘Others.’ A bulging arm with a faint bluish tattoo protruded from a security booth. At my approach to the barrier, the arm extended up to a brown short sleeve shirt. “This here’s private,” said a voice from the shadows.

  “I’ve got an appointment with Ugo Calibrese.”

  A shaven head, square, with no neck and the potato nose of someone who had taken a few punches, leaned out of the booth. An unlit cigar was jammed into a corner of a mouth rimmed by meaty lips.

  “Nobody toll me,” he said importantly.

  “Why don’t you check it out?” I offered.

  “They’re supposed ta tell me!” A cell phone went to an ear that might have been half again the size of my own. “Shir-lee, there’s a guy here ta see Ugo.” Long pause. “Yah suppostah tell me!” and the cell phone clattered against something hard as the barrier swung up. He leaned out of the booth far enough for me to see ‘Guido’ stitched on his shirt over a logo of three cherries against a blue seven in a white oval. “Yah see a black Jag down there? Park there,” he said. I did as I was instructed, parking next to Calibrese’s car, locked the Charger, and walked back to where Guido, now wearing sunglasses, was amply filling a folding chair next to the booth. He didn’t bother to look up from the Daily Racing Form. “They shoulda told me,” he mumbled.

  From under an old fashioned marquee, the kind with bulbs that turn on in sequence, with dollar signs and slot machine cherries, a faux marble foyer led to a desk where a greeter, an aging plump blond in a tight fitting Greenwick Downs polo shirt, hailed me with “Hi, how ya doin’?” I continued into a cavernous, over air-conditioned slots palace where rows of hundreds of video slots converged on an ersatz volcano spouting colored steam into the rafters. Strings of spotlights there made looking up painful. Metallic, whirring, and ding-dong sounds mixed with the ca-chings of jackpots that seemed augmented by an audio system also pumping out Dean Martin ballads. There were, I noticed, no clocks and no windows.

  A quick survey of the slot players revealed that the vast majority of patrons were over-weight, sixty-plus wome
n squatting on seats attached to the machines, grimly hard at work as though at stamping machines in a piecework factory, with fingers wearily at ‘bet’ buttons or grasping one-armed bandit cranks. The honk of a Clarabelle horn behind me and the brush-by of an obese woman in an electric wheelchair ended my inspection. Not quite a geriatric ward, I thought, but at least senior day care.

  Ubiquitous signs directed patrons to ‘Smoke Free Slots,’ ‘Bingo,’ ‘Dog Track,’ ‘Horse Pari-mutuel,’ ‘Restaurant Row’ and ‘Pool Stadium.’ A large security person—they all were large, and I thought of Peter Gardiner—with a radio at his hip and a ring of keys on a black belt looked me over as he sauntered by. I asked for Calibrese’s office. “Second floor,” he said with a shrug toward the rear of the slots floor. He accompanied me to an elevator where he punched numbers on a keypad and pressed the number two on the elevator’s control panel.

  Apparently, nobody was supposed to go up there, even the elevator doors opened with reluctance. In the tiny reception area, a curly haired man about forty, with muscles born to heft under the now familiar polo shirt, was on a cell phone. He was, according to his shirt I.D., ‘Carmine.’ He closed the phone when I asked for Calibrese. “Shir-lee’s on her lunch break,” he sniffed and like ace parking lot attendant Guido, Carmine, thinking this ‘suit’ was an unwanted salesman or pain in the butt government official, eyed me suspiciously as he made a brief and inaudible call on his cell phone. Then, he escorted me down a corridor with stagnant air and floors that squeaked noisily, likely plywood under industrial carpeting. One wall of smoked glass overlooked the gaming room below. I peered down at the sea of winking lights and asked Carmine if this was a typical midday, midweek crowd. “Actually,” he replied like a person who rationed goodwill, “not as many as usual. Probably runnin’ some promotion at Foxwoods or Mohegan.”

  At the end of the corridor, Carmine pushed through swinging doors into a suite of two offices; its reception desk held two empty Dunkin’ Donuts coffee cups that could have been there for days. At a half-opened door, Carmine knocked, and left me.

  The shades in the office were drawn, nothing adorned the walls, and the furniture looked dusty and cheap. A double bulb ceiling fixture gave scant illumination. Music from the slots hall was audible from a speaker on a shelf behind Ugo Calibrese who sat at a desk devoid of paraphernalia except for a blotter, a telephone console, and a black and white photograph of a woman with a pleasant face and too many ropes of pearls. He wore an unbecoming brownish, long sleeve shirt that couldn’t disguise his bulging breasts and made him look even more the toad. Or was it Jabba the Hutt.

  “Have a seat,” he said sourly. I nodded, noticing that his black pompadour was an unconvincing hair piece, and took a chair set back a few feet from the desk. From a score of Mafia movies, I knew the first thing you do when you meet an adversary on his own turf is let him know that you honor his hospitality. I also knew that any shallow banter would be a poor attempt to hide weakness in my position. “Thank you for seeing me,” I said to no response. Then, “I have to tell you that I’m impressed.”

  “By what?” he said evenly.

  “I always thought it was a dog track, with some bingo and slots attached. Now I find out it’s a casino with a dog track attached.”

  He grunted and waved his hands dismissively. “Casino? No fuckin’ way. The players, they go out to Foxwoods or Mohegan. Poker, blackjack, craps, high stakes games which I don’t have. I’m penny ante. Lotta nickel and quarter slots. Everything is video, no table games. I gotta get the day people, the bus operations, the seniors, the meat and potatoes guys on a lunch break, with cheap buffets and lots of door prizes. Otherwise, I die. Half of Rhode Island goes to Foxwoods and Mohegan and spends the real dough. We get the scraps.”

  Okay, what next. “As I said on the phone, I’m not here on behalf of anybody. Just myself.”

  “Yeah-h-h.”

  “I mean that. Nobody knows I’m here.”

  “Sure, sure,” he responded. “What do ya have to say?”

  It crossed my mind that he might think I was there as a behind the scene representative of Haversham Golf Club. That could complicate things.

  “Your lawsuit against the Haversham Golf Club? I want you to drop it.”

  He noisily inhaled and laughed like an old car cranking up until he coughed. “Sure, sure,” he said wiping his hand across his mouth. “Okay. Is that all? Don’t ya want I should do somethin’ else for ya? C’mon, I’m in a generous mood.”

  My play. “The Commissioner doesn’t appreciate the rumors you started on his brother-in-law. You don’t need the next mayor on your case.”

  “You say I did?” The words were uttered with heavy, well-spaced emphasis. “You and Flanaghan? Why would I? What do I care about a pompous ass like Fessenden?” His face screwed into a self-satisfied, almost smile. “Hear he got canned. Nothin’ to do with me. That was from his own kind. And …,” he leaned forward slightly, his finger raised in emphasis, “I got no beef with the Tramontis. I have no problem with the police. Everything I do is clean. And, my money says Sonny gets reelected.”

  “Fausto Tramonti’s ….”

  His right hand smacked the desk. “I don’t give a fuck about Fausto Tramonti!” He was too dismissive. “Ya got somethin’ else?” His mouth had twisted, his eyes were barely open, his head pushed forward toward me.

  Well, that took care of bluster and bluff. Was the growing pessimism leaking into my chest showing up in my face?

  I moved my chair closer to his desk. From my jacket pocket, I pulled out the list of restaurants, bars and clubs from the Journal article on Sonny’s expenses, with notes and materials from Benno’s research. “Seems like you are in the recycling business.”

  “Huh? What recycling business?”

  “You lease Café Oltranto on Atwells to Vincent Villucci and Paulie Vallone is your tenant for Croziano’s. Both big contributors to Sonny. You own, among others, Napolitano’s and Aroma’s. I could go on. Your restaurants, clubs, bars, your friends’ places, are where Sonny’s holds his big fundraising ‘times.’ All these places take in a lot of cash at the Mayor’s parties because of huge markups on drinks, food, etc., all of which Friends of Russo gladly pays. But that’s no problem because a lot of money is coming in. It’s like Sonny is your salesman, a silent partner, getting a piece of the action with the contributions you raise from all your tenants, your buddies, their buddies, all bundled up in big paydays for Sonny, that goes through Friends of Russo and on to your places and those of your friends. It’s clear how the money gets recycled. A complaint to the Ethics Commission….”

  If it hadn’t been his own office, he’d be walking out. His hands were flat on his desk, like he was going to spring. “What is this shit, some kind of fuckin’ half-ass blackmail? If it is, you’re a fuckin’ amateur! I say show me and ya show me nothin’…” His eyes narrowed. “This is all fuckin’ Bacigalupi! He’s been on my case for years. I heard you guys had him on the payroll. Well, fuck him. You tell that skinny-assed dick to take his ‘recyclin’’ and stuff it up his ass!”

  Okay, we go on. Obviously, I wasn’t going to get anywhere with a Bertie Woosterish ‘I regard your answer as unconvincing and inadequate’ or ‘we’ll pass on that.’ I had to show my hole card. I said as casually as I could manage, “Joe Pontarelli.”

  “Huh…?” His face was a squint of surprise.

  “P—o—n—t….”

  “Whaddabout him—” and was interrupted by a public address announcement that Mrs. Tilly Campignato of Cranston was the winner of the one hundred dollar ‘Greenwick Greenback’s hourly drawing. Calibrese turned off the speaker on a shelf behind his desk. “What’s Pontarelli got to do with anything?” he responded with some real curiosity.

  “He works for you for almost ten years, then moves over to Haversham Golf Club as a groundskeeper. He’s your eyes and ears on the grounds. That’s a smart move, like getting Silverman as a member to keep tabs on the Club. He’s got to kno
w that if the pumps that run the irrigation system are damaged or shut off, DEM comes down like a ton of bricks on the Club and they close the course. If that happened before July third, it triggers your lease deal.”

  Hot button! Calibrese’s breath was taken in slowly, his face scrunched up into a scowl. He barely sputtered, “Listen to me, ….”

  “The night of the clubhouse fire, Ollie Randall, the guy who got cremated, walks into the pump house. The door isn’t locked. For some reason, the security system isn’t on or is disengaged, still he made it look like someone got in by jimmying a window. After the fire, Pontarelli, when told the door to the pump house was unlocked that night, doesn’t investigate, doesn’t seem to have mentioned it to anybody—and whatever damage Randall did, got repaired by Pontarelli, all on the q.t.—”

  “And…?”

  “And weeks later, a night when electricity is knocked out during a thunderstorm, there’s Pontarelli’s at the pump house, this time fooling around with the generators. They’re both on, as they have to be to keep the pumps running if the electricity is off. So, why does he have the protective cover pulled off one….”

  “Where’s this goin’?” he hissed.

  “It gets better.” I think my voice remained modulated, maybe I forced myself to grin, but I had the ice of anxiety in my gut. “Everybody in Westerly knows all about the Windmere Country Club and the ’38 Hurricane. The manager, Higgins, took a manslaughter rap for the deaths of three people, including a kid, who didn’t get out of the clubhouse before it was struck by the tidal wave. While in prison, his wife divorced him, took away his daughter. After he got out, he never had a decent job again.”

  Calibrese’s fists pounded the desktop. He practically shouted, “What’s that got to do with Pontarelli?”

  “Higgins’ daughter married a Pontarelli from Providence and moved up there. When her husband was killed in Vietnam, Higgins moved in to take care of his grandson Joe. Higgins must have told his grandson his very sad story, that because he was an ‘outsider,’ in Westerly, he was the only one jailed in all of South County….”