But Looney would have to learn to deal with Capone, and vice versa; as he often said, this business was one of strange bedfellows.
Tonight he’d called a small meeting of a handful of his most trusted associates, and they had gathered at the long table in his library, all seated toward one end. Looney—gauntly handsome, white mustached, in a dark brown suit and gambler’s black string tie—sat at the head. On a chair against the wall behind him, not officially a part of the inner circle, was Michael O’Sullivan.
O’Sullivan was Looney’s most trusted lieutenant. In some ways, an odd duck (you’d never find him at a Bel Aire orgy), the war hero had earned himself and his boss respect all around Midwestern mob circles. Looney had loaned Mike out to Chicago numerous times; and somewhere along the line Mike had become a living legend—the Angel of Death, they called him.
This melodramatic sobriquet supposedly derived from O’Sullivan taking no pleasure in killing—it was said he wore a somber, even regretful expression when pulling a trigger.
Though O’Sullivan’s relatively lowly duties included bodyguard and occasional driver, Looney trusted the man like no one else in his organization. Someday there would be a place for Mike at this table; someday, perhaps, at its head.
When such a thought crossed his mind, John Looney would wince, feeling he’d committed a small betrayal against his own blood. At the eventual head of the table—the seat he would one day vacate—should be his son, Connor. But Connor was…a troubled boy.
Looney did not mind that his son had done poorly in school; the reports that Connor was a bully, and a mean one at that, did not discourage him, either. The family business was a brass-knuckle affair, after all. But Connor had other unattractive traits—he was impulsive and violent; and he drank, and he got emotional over women.
Yet John Looney loved his son; he often paired Connor with Mike O’Sullivan, in hopes that Mike’s self-control and professionalism might rub off. That Connor and Mike would form a bond, so that O’Sullivan could sit at Connor’s right hand one day, and help John Looney’s son rule.
Tonight, at the conference table in the booklined room with lamps glowing yellow, Connor sat at his father’s right hand. Connor, wearing a gray suit with vest and dark blue silk tie with diamond stickpin, looked sharp indeed; a youthful version of his father, albeit with a longer nose and slightly weaker chin, and minus the mustache. He seemed to be just a little drunk.
At Looney’s left hand sat the lawyer Frank Kelly, affable and prosperous-looking in a brown suit and red bow tie, a gray-haired fleshy man of fifty with a confident manner. Kelly had been Looney’s law partner since the last century.
Next to the lawyer was Emeal Davis, a brawny cueball-bald black man in a light blue suit with his dark blue derby before him on the table like a meal he was contemplating. In his mid-thirties, Davis oversaw the transporting of liquor, guns, and whores between Rock Island and Chicago.
Across from Davis, seated next to Connor, was a striking blonde in her late twenties, Helen Van Dale. She wore a tight-fitting black satin dress with a lace collar, her hands in white gloves folded primly before her; on the back of her chair was her mink coat (she had not trusted it to the Looney butler). A former whore herself, Helen was the madam who coordinated all prostitution in Looney’s realm.
“Let’s start with the recall effort,” Looney said, hands flat on the table. “Frank, what do you have for me?”
Kelly beamed, leaning back in his chair, arms folded. “We’ll have our people all through the Market Square rally tonight. Both speakers, Harry McCaskrin and Ed Gardner, will be demanding the mayor’s recall, and—”
“I want you to talk to them beforehand,” Looney said.
Frowning, Kelly removed his pocket watch and made a show of checking it. “The rally’s in less than an hour, John—what do you want me to talk to them about?”
“I’ve made a decision,” Looney said. All faces turned toward him expectantly; what trick did the Old Man have up his sleeve this time? “Several prominent, highly respectable citizens have approached me, and I’ve decided to accept their draft.”
Reactions around the table were varied, starting with Kelly, whose face fell, as he said, “You want to run for mayor, John? Why in God’s name?”
Connor was smirking, Helen Van Dale laughing quietly to herself, her full bosom jiggling, Emeal Davis wearing no more expression than a cigar-store Indian.
“We all know Mayor Schriver has to go,” Looney said.
“No argument,” Kelly said. “But this recall passes, we can put in a puppet, and—”
“Why not save myself the trouble of pulling the strings? Frank, you know that I came to this town with political ambitions, only to be viciously quashed by the ruling class. Now I’m in a position to take the reins.”
“John,” the lawyer said, shaking his head, his voice oozing with friendly familiarity, “drumming Schriver out of office is well and good—but a man with your kind of power stays in the shadows…not the spotlight.”
“Pop,” Connor said, “don’t you think bein’ mayor would be kind of a…comedown?”
“I think it’s wonderful,” Helen Van Dale said, savoring her words. “John Looney has found the ultimate way to spit in Rock Island’s eye.”
Kelly was shaking his head again, the mop of gray hair losing its shape, locks drooping onto his brow. “John, I don’t know if McCaskrin will play ball.”
“He’s our man, isn’t he?”
“Yes, but he’s after the nomination for state attorney, and he’s a Republican. You’re a Democrat.”
“Thank you for reminding me, Frank.”
“Oh, I’m sure he’ll say nothing against you, and he’ll praise you as a good citizen…but endorse your candidacy? I think not.”
Looney shrugged. “Gardner’s a more fiery speaker, anyway. And he’ll jump at the chance to ally himself with us.”
Connor’s eyes and nostrils flared. “Pop! Gardner? You can’t be serious—the guy’s a goddamn socialist!”
“We’ll need the votes of both the socialists and the Democrats to swing it.” Looney turned to O’Sullivan, seated by a table next to a Tiffany-shade lamp, having backed away from its light into darkness. “Mike…join us, would you?”
And Looney gestured to the table.
Slowly, O’Sullivan rose and went to the chair next to Davis. Connor was frowning—having this bodyguard invited to the table where insiders made key decisions, surely galled Looney’s son. But it couldn’t be helped.
“I realize, Mike,” Looney said, “that these socialists stick in your craw.”
O’Sullivan said, “Not up to me, Mr. Looney.”
During the patriotic fever of 1917, socialists like Davenport newspaperman Floyd Dell and his radical writer pal John Reed had led antiwar efforts, preaching peaceful draft resistance and US neutrality. They and other socialists had been treated like traitors by the government.
But along the way, the socialists had become a viable political party, and right now, across the river, Davenport’s mayor was socialist, as were five aldermen and several other elected officials. In Rock Island, the socialists hungered to gain this side of the Mississippi, greedily coveting the mayor’s seat and various city commission seats.
“This has to rub you wrong, Mike,” Looney acknowledged, with a somber shake of his head.
O’Sullivan said nothing.
Connor said, “These socialists are a bunch of blow-hard rabble-rousers! Privileged-class intellectuals who never done an honest day’s work.”
O’Sullivan shrugged. “I can’t disagree with that. But could I ask a question?”
“Of course, Mike,” Looney said. “I want your opinions and advice—that’s why I asked you to sit down with us.”
O’Sullivan leaned forward. “Mr. Looney, surely you can’t respect a bunch of pacifists, who were against the Great War—can you?”
“Mike, me boy, I have no truck with pacifists; I believe a man has to stand and
fight for what he believes is right, and that he must redress the wrongs committed against him.”
“As do I, sir.”
“And I respect you and the honor you brought on the Irish Catholic community with your valor.” Looney did not add what he really felt, for fear of truly alienating his top lieutenant: that what went on over there had been England’s war, not the war of a “Free Ireland!” rebel like John Looney.
Who said, “I’m a Democrat like you, Mike. And a capitalist—if you haven’t noticed by now that I’m a capitalist, then you just ain’t been paying attention.”
And O’Sullivan actually smiled at that. So did everyone else at the table.
“All around us workers are going out on strike,” Looney said. “And the unions’re on the rise. That’s good for us—we support the working man, because we want him to relax with the diversions we can offer him, after work…Right, Helen?”
Chuckling, she said, “Right, John.”
Suddenly Emeal Davis, looking sideways at the bodyguard, spoke, in his brooding baritone: “Mike, we make alliances. That’s how we can do what we do. And a lot of working stiffs these days vote socialist. Don’t kid yourself.”
Obviously not liking the sound of any of this, Frank Kelly, pale as a ghost, rose and said, “Well, I better get over there, and make our pitch. Are you willing to run as a socialist, John?”
“No need. It’s a recall ballot. My name will be listed, and that will be enough.”
Distractedly nodding to everyone, Kelly shuffled out.
Looney gave O’Sullivan a hard look. “What do you say, Mike?”
O’Sullivan said, “Mr. Looney, politics aren’t my calling. Anyway—you know I’d follow you into hell.”
“That I do know, son.”
Connor winced at “son,” and Looney immediately regretted using the word. But he was a man who spoke from his heart.
“Tonight, at that rally,” Looney said, “we’ll build support for my candidacy, and stoke the fires that already rage in Rock Island against this mayor.”
“Fueled by the News,” Helen Van Dale said, puckishly. “I start all my fires with copies of the News.”
With a small smile, Looney cast his gaze on the madam. “Do you have more information for me, Helen?”
“If I didn’t, would that stop you? Wouldn’t you just put your most creative reporter in front of a typewriter and let him run wild?”
Helen could get away with this taunting because Looney had great affection for her; and because, next to him, she was the most powerful person in the Tri-Cities.
Much of the information that gave Looney’s scandal sheet, the Rock Island News, its unique leverage came from Helen, who was in a position (so to speak) to know the sins of various and sundry local men. Looney felt no shame for using his newspaper in a so-called “blackmailing” manner that rival publication the Argus had termed “a paper gun held at the heads of his victims.”
Looney merely used the naked truth culled from the lives of these hypocrites to sway them to do his bidding, from paying him off for not running a story to cutting him in for a piece of their action. That was how he’d built his empire: bootleggers, gamblers, and whoremongers had a choice of exposure in the News or taking on a new partner. Right now, John Looney had over one hundred and fifty such partners, who paid him on average four hundred dollars a week in tribute.
“There can be no question that the mayor is feeling the heat,” Looney said. “Which is the other piece of news I have for you—I’m meeting with Mayor Schriver in less than an hour. At his invitation.”
Connor frowned, and Emeal Davis exchanged worried glances with O’Sullivan.
Davis said, “You could be walking into something, Mr. Looney.”
O’Sullivan, sitting forward, asked, “Where is the meeting to be held?”
“Oh, we’re quite safe,” Looney said, with a dismissive wave. “City hall! Right out in the open. Above board.”
Connor said, “What are you meeting with that clown for, anyway? If you’ve decided to run for mayor, already.”
“If the mayor can convince me he is ready to change his ways,” Looney said to his son, “to cooperate with my various requests, to go back to our old arrangements…I will consider taking myself out of the recall equation.”
Davis was nodding. “That sounds reasonable.”
“Emeal, Mike,” Looney said, “I want you to accompany me. Connor, we have dozens of boyos in that Market Square crowd. You circulate. Make sure they do their jobs.”
“You can count on me, Pop.”
Looney stood, motioned with outspread hands, palms up, that the meeting was over.
Connor turned to Helen, and Looney overheard his son say to her, “After the rally, how about I stop by?”
She touched his cheek. “Not tonight, sweetie. Another time.”
And the black-satin madam and her mink coat swished by.
Looney went to his son. “What was that?”
Connor’s eyes went wide with feigned innocence. “What do you mean, Pop?”
“I told you to lay off that…” He turned to make sure Helen Van Dale was gone, but finished in a whisper. “…flesh peddler. You find yourself a nice girl.”
“I’m just havin’ fun. I’m young, yet.”
“You’ll grow old fast, hanging around with whores. You want to catch something?”
Connor frowned, and nodded toward the other side of the room, and O’Sullivan and Emeal Davis, whose proximity meant they could not have avoided hearing the exchange. The father had unintentionally embarrassed his son.
Looney smiled at Connor. “Ah, I’m just an old woman. You’re right, my boy, you’re young…Have a good time. Sow your wild oats.”
Connor grinned. “Thanks, Pop.”
The father raised a forefinger. “After you do your work at the rally.”
“Right.”
Looney patted his offspring on the cheek. “Good boy.”
Then the mob kingpin gathered his two most trusted men, neither of which was his son, and headed out for a meeting with Mayor Schriver.
Market Square, actually a triangle, was the center of rural commerce in this part of Illinois. An open area of hard-packed earth at Seventeenth Street, from Second to Third Avenues, here farmers could sell corn, potatoes, and hay, among other produce, the railroad station only a block away, making shipping a snap.
The rowdy buildings surrounding Market Square housed first-floor restaurants, saloons, and retailers, with upper-floor hotels for farmers and other transients; on the Seventeenth Street and Third Avenue corner stood John Looney’s Sherman Hotel, whose Java House was a wide-open speakeasy and whose upper floors were the bailiwick of madam Helen Van Dale.
At the opposite end of the same block, the stodgy four-story brick Argus newspaper building seemed to avert its many-windowed gaze from the indecency surrounding it; this competitor of the News had made a crusade out of bringing down publisher Looney, who regularly responded to charges with his own assertions of the rival editor’s supposed sojourns at an insane asylum.
At the center of the square squatted an ornate turn-of-the-century pump house with archways and a speaker’s platform bearing built-in electric illumination under a gingerbread roof. On this clear, not terribly cold March evening, streetlamps joined with the glow of the speaker’s platform to provide plenty of light for the several thousand people, primarily men, who had gathered to hear speakers demand the recall of Mayor Schriver.
The first speaker, Harry McCaskrin, a stocky mustached fellow in bowler and topcoat, had a mild appearance but shook his fists in the air, spouting gloriously invective oratory as he railed against the corruption of the mayor’s office, along the way praising the efforts of the editor of the News.
“Without the endeavors of John Looney,” McCaskrin said, nostrils wide, “Rock Island would be a Midwestern Gomorrah!”
Only half-listening to this as he threaded through the receptive crowd of mostly working-class jo
es in their caps and coats and heavy work shoes, Connor Looney—in a tan camel’s hair topcoat and green Stetson fedora that a month’s pay from any of these hicks wouldn’t cover—smiled, well aware that everything the mayor was being accused of, Connor’s father could match sin for sin.
Cheers and applause met McCaskrin’s attacks, and fliers demanding the mayor’s recall were circulated by Looney’s news boys, some “boys” as old as Connor. The body odor of these lowlifes got to him after a while, and he paused in his efforts—looking for the Looney shills in the crowd, to encourage them on—to have a smoke on the edges of this madness. Leaning against a feedstore window, he watched as McCaskrin bellowed—these orators could really work up a head of steam—and reflected on the brief conversation between his pop and himself, right before Connor headed over here.
Did the Old Man really think Connor could find an over-the-hill floozie like Helen Van Dale attractive? Sure, by some men’s standards, the Van Dale dame still had it; a shape, a nice face, a sassy manner that a guy might go for.
Personally, Connor found it repellent to be with a woman older than himself, and was repulsed by the idea of being with a woman who’d borne a child. To him, only the budding beauties of the early teenage years really appealed. He was no pervert: he wouldn’t be with a girl under, say, twelve.
That was about right, he thought, just as they were becoming women—flat chests, round little bottoms, innocent faces, tiny flappers in the making. Such living dolls were his passion; were, in fact, the only females he could achieve excitement over.
Helen Van Dale knew that, and she kept her eye out for him, when a new young thing came on the market. She saved such morsels for Connor, and she never charged him a dime—out of respect. Connor realized Helen knew which side of the bread the butter went on: that he would one day be the boss of the Tri-Cities, and she had best keep him happy.
And he would rule from Looney’s Roost one day, though it galled him to see his father cater to that underling, Mike O’Sullivan. No question Mike was a good guy and a real top hand with a gun. But the man was Shanty Irish trash, and Connor was blood.
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