“Interesting interrogation technique,” Michael said.
Drury, startled, said nothing.
“Don’t hit the suspect with a rubber hose,” Michael said. “Hit him with everything you know, and see if it breaks him down… Do I get my phone call now?”
Still poised in the doorway, Drury sighed. “You don’t need it. A lawyer’s already been around. Should be here with your writ of habeas corpus any time now.”
“Your friend Ness looks like he’s been drinking.”
Drury stepped back in; shut the door. His tone shifted to conversational. “He’s had a tough go of it lately. Washington thought he was spending too much time in Chicago; been running him ragged all ’round the country. Only reason he’s back in town now is some joint workshop with the FBI.”
“America’s most famous Prohibition agent…a drunk?”
“Eliot’s no drunk. He’s still a good man…and he’s concerned about you. You should let him be your friend. You should let me be your friend.”
It sounded genuine enough, but Michael knew what both men wanted was to use him.
“I’ll think about it,” Michael said.
“All I ask,” Drury said.
Then the cop slipped out, and a uniformed cop ushered Michael back to the cell.
Less than an hour later, Michael was on the street, in his military-style gabardine trenchcoat over the brown sportcoat and tan slacks—same as for his dates yesterday with Patsy Ann and Estelle. The .45, returned to him by the police, was back in its shoulder sling; he was, after all, licensed to carry a concealed weapon.
He found the Ford sedan where he’d left it, parked by the hydrant, wiper wearing three parking tickets; at least it hadn’t been towed. He was about to get in when a car behind him honked.
Glancing back, he saw Louie Campagna at the wheel of a dark blue ’41 Chevy. The lumpy-faced little hood curled a finger.
Michael got in on the passenger side, shut himself in, and wondered if this was a one-way ride. He said, “Did you arrange for that mouthpiece, Louie? Thanks.”
“Actually, I didn’t. Guy that sprung you was Bulger.”
Michael frowned. “Joe Bulger? He’s Ricca’s attorney!”
“I know. Things are…upside down. I’ll fill you in.”
The heater was on in the car, and the stocky gangster was not in his topcoat, nor was he wearing a hat, exposing his thinning black hair. He looked awful, pasty white and baggy-eyed—not as bad as Ness and Nitti; but bad enough.
“Sorry about the Carey dame,” Campagna said, but his mind was obviously elsewhere.
“Yeah. Thanks.”
“We need to talk. Diner down the street.”
Within minutes they were in a booth and, as they waited for coffee, Campagna asked, “You hear about the indictments?”
“You were expecting it, right?”
Campagna nodded. “But it’s like death, kid—you can’t get ready for shit like this, even when you know it’s comin’… Something bad happened last night. At Frank’s. Counsel meeting.”
Michael leaned forward in the booth. “Tell me they didn’t vote to have Estelle killed.”
“No! No. Hell no. I figure that was Ricca.”
“Not Mr. Nitti.”
Campagna smirked mirthlessly. “Does it sound like him?”
Michael had already thought this through; he knew a murder of this kind was against everything Nitti believed in, where public opinion was concerned.
Still, he said, “Lot of pressure on him lately, Louie. Ricca breathing down his neck. These indictments.”
Campagna shrugged, as if they were discussing baseball scores of not very important games. “Word I get is it was a couple, a man and wife, old friends of hers. Named Borgia.”
Michael raised an eyebrow. “As in Cesare and Lucretia?”
“No, I think their names are John and Olivia. John’s a small-timer, on the fringes of the Outfit, worked with Nicky Dean at the 101 Club. Olivia was a 26 girl, there.”
“Is this solid, them doing it?”
“No. Just talk. But John’s got ties to Ricca.” Another shrug; Campagna seemed vaguely annoyed to be talking about such a trivial matter.
A waitress brought coffee and, after a sip, Michael asked Campagna, “You still up for a little preventative medicine, where the Waiter is concerned?”
Campagna sighed. Shook his head glumly. “I think we missed our moment.”
“Why do you say that?”
“I said somethin’ bad happened last night.”
Campagna described the counsel meeting in the living room of Nitti’s Riverside home.
Ricca took over the meeting, out of the gate. He reminded Nitti and the others that hiring squealers Bioff and Browne had been Nitti’s idea; that Nicky Dean was also Nitti’s man. That Nitti had “masterminded the whole scam and it went sour.”
“No point in all of us goin’ down this road,” Ricca had said. “Al took the fall for the rest of us and went on trial alone. You can do the same, Frank—you plead guilty and we’ll take care of things. Till you get out.”
“I’ve told you, Paul,” Nitti said wearily. “It’s conspiracy. Nobody can take the fall for the rest of us—we gotta stick together, and try and beat the thing.”
Sipping his coffee, Campagna told Michael, “It got heated, then—harsh words, back and forth. Thought it might come to blows…or worse. Finally Ricca says, ‘Frank, you’re askin’ for it.’ ”
Michael frowned. “What did Mr. Nitti say?”
“Nothing. He…Mike, I ain’t proud of this…Frank looked around the room at us and…” Campagna had tears in his eyes. “…we all looked away. Nobody stood up for him.”
“Not even you, Louie?”
“No. Mike, there was one strong man in that room. One leader. And it sure as hell wasn’t me. But it also wasn’t Frank.”
“What did Mr. Nitti do?”
“That was the worst of it. He got up, went to the front door, opened it, and pointed to the outside.”
“What was so bad about that?”
“Ain’t you Sicilian, kid?”
Without missing a beat, Michael said, “Sure I’m Sicilian…a Sicilian raised in DeKalb, Illinois. What was so bad about what Mr. Nitti did?”
“In the old country, when you open the door on your guests, indicating you want ’em to leave…it’s a breach.”
“Breach.”
“Of Sicilian peasant rules of hospitality. It’s like Frank spit in all our faces.”
“But mostly,” Michael said, “he was answering Ricca.”
“When Ricca said Frank was gonna get it, you mean? Yeah. Yeah, that was the main meaning.”
“How did Ricca react?”
Campagna gestured elaborately with both hands. “It was so…so goddamn dramatic, that we all just got up, got our hats and coats and went out into the cold. Without a word from Frank. Without a word from us.”
“So, Louie. Where do you stand?”
“I wish I knew, kid. Do you know?”
Michael said nothing. Then he took the check, and paid at the register. Campagna tagged along.
“Kid—where do you stand?”
“Take me to my car, Louie. Would you?”
Campagna sighed. “Sure. Sure, Mike. Right away.”
Like Frank Nitti, Paul Ricca had moved to a suburb, River Forest; but the Waiter’s heart, Michael knew, remained on the Near West Side where many workers in various legit and not-so-legit Outfit enterprises made their homes. Sluggers, drivers, and (yes) waiters lived in these well-maintained two- and three-story tenements, in a neighborhood of cast-iron porches, broad sidewalks, and no lawns. Here, in this longtime breeding ground for Outfit soldiers, Ricca could court the Young Turks coming up.
Bella Napoli was a corner building, a one-story brown-brick structure with a row of narrow, shuttered windows extending around its sides; during Prohibition, these windows had been blackened, no doubt, whereas these days (in summer and spring, an
yway) window boxes of colorful flowers offered a friendly, family feel. In the gravel parking lot in the back, Michael left the Ford among a few other vehicles, one a 1942 black Pontiac sedan he recognized as Ricca’s.
Michael had been to the Bella Napoli restaurant once before, with Nitti and Campagna, for a tense meeting with Ricca, whose favorite hangout this was. The Waiter made a point of lunching at this old-fashioned Italian joint, rather than in the Loop with politicians and reporters.
The only entrance was around front, double doors beneath an unlit horizontal neon. Stepping inside, Michael was pleasantly assaulted by the rich aroma of spicy tomato sauce, taking him immediately to Papa S.’s spaghetti house in DeKalb, although the resemblance ended there.
This was a neat, open dining room punctuated by dark woodwork but with an overwhelmingly bright ambience: tables wore white cloths, walls bore murals of ancient Rome under blue skies, and decorative wine bottles were everywhere, shelved above doors, lining the red button-tufted booths. The lunch crowd was thinning—it was after one thirty—but perhaps half the tables were inhabited.
Michael raised a hand to forestall the hostess and walked toward the rear, where at a table with his back to the wall sat Paul Ricca. On his either side were Sam “Mad Dog” DeStefano and Sam “Mooney” Giancana, the most notorious of the Young Turks aligned with this Outfit elder statesman.
Knife-blade thin, his short hair as white as the tablecloth, Ricca—in a beautifully tailored charcoal suit with a lighter gray tie and lighter-yet gray shirt—had pushed away a small plate with half a cannoli on it; he was sipping espresso and had a cigarette going. With his high cheekbones, narrow nose, and mouth like a cut in his face that refused to heal, Ricca had a visage oddly reminiscent of an American Indian’s. Obviously he saw Michael approaching, but he reacted not at all, his dark brown eyes unblinking.
At right, Giancana—in a well-cut chocolate suit with orange tie—sat back in his chair, arm slung over it, smoking a cigar. His dark eyes hooded, small, nondescript-looking, with severely thinning black hair, Giancana had a bland oval face that took on a vaguely sinister aura when a sneer formed, as it did upon his seeing Michael.
At left, DeStefano—bigger than the other two, by far—sat wolfing down a dish of spumoni with a spoon. If he’d noticed Michael walking toward them, he was hiding it well. Fleshy but not fat in a black slept-in-looking suit, a red-and-blue food-stained tie loose at his collar, DeStefano had a cantaloupe-shaped noggin with a full head of hair thick with Brillcream yet still as unruly as a bucket of worms. The tiny close-set eyes, nose like a wad of clay a sculptor stuck there (and hadn’t got ’round to finishing yet), and thin-lipped permanent scowl all suited him perfectly: he was widely considered to be the biggest lunatic in the Outfit, surviving only at the whim of Ricca.
Both of these Young Turks were graduates of the street gang, the 42s—vicious punks who stripped cars, held up stores, and raped high school girls. Giancana was currently Ricca’s bodyguard and chauffeur. DeStefano was a loan shark, but was also Ricca’s personal assassin. According to Campagna, Ricca would just turn to DeStefano, point to somebody, and say, “Make him go away.”
And that somebody would go away.
If there hadn’t been so many civilians present, Michael might simply stride up and shoot the two punks right at the table, to make a point with Ricca and to save himself the trouble, later.
Instead, he just walked up to the empty chair opposite Ricca and stood there expectantly. DeStefano, ice cream dribbling down his chin, finally noticed Michael, and his natural scowl exaggerated itself into something that would have been comic, had it not been worn by a psychopath. Giancana leaned back, smiling a little, as if he found Michael mildly amusing.
Both men, Michael noted, wore shoulder holsters: he recognized the cut of their coat (most of the Outfit guys used the same tailor). Ricca appeared unarmed.
“Sit, Michael,” Ricca said genially, gesturing with a cigarette-in-hand.
“Thank you, Mr. Ricca,” he said, and sat.
“You show a good deal of courage, coming in here. Of course, a Medal of Honor winner like you, small potatoes, right?”
DeStefano seemed frozen, his brow grooved deeply, as if a thought trying to form had curdled there; spumoni in its various colors dripped down his chin like a messy flag.
“I take you very seriously, Mr. Ricca,” Michael said, nodding toward both men. “And your friends.”
Nodding gravely, Ricca said, “Respect is an important thing, Michael…Sam, wipe your face. We have a guest.”
DeStefano hung his head and picked up a napkin.
Michael said, “May I speak frankly?”
Ricca raised a hand in “stop” fashion, like a traffic cop. “I prefer you and I speak in private, Michael.”
“I would like that.”
DeStefano, his face wiped clean of spumoni but not confusion, said in a rough baritone, “Mr. Ricca, you want Mooney and me should move over a table?”
“No, Sam. Mr. Satariano and I are going to speak in the back room. Alone.”
Giancana sat forward so quickly, Michael thought the little man might lose his balance. “Boss—you’re not gonna go off with that…this…Demonio fucker by yourself?” The nasty little hoodlum curled his upper lip as he said to Michael, “Everybody knows you’re Frank Nitti’s lapdog.”
Michael said, “And whose son of a bitch are you?”
Giancana was half out of the chair when Ricca reached out and gripped him by the arm. “He’s my guest, Momo,” Ricca said, using another of Giancana’s nicknames. “He showed us respect, we must do the same.”
“He didn’t fucking show me respect!”
Ricca made a gesture with an open palm. “You insulted him. You were in his place, wouldja’ve ignored such an insult? Of course not. Now, you two boys sit here and behave yourselves. Sam, order some more spumoni if you like.”
DeStefano seemed to like the sound of that; but Giancana was frowning, his eyes locked on Michael like unfriendly magnets.
Ricca got up, and this time Giancana was the one who reached out, gripping his master’s arm. “At least make him leave his biscuit behind.”
By that, Giancana meant Michael’s weapon.
Michael met Ricca’s gaze and shook his head: no way will that happen.
Ricca nodded, then said to Giancana, “I don’t think the management would appreciate it if Mr. Satariano were to display his ‘biscuit’ in public.”
“I think that’s wise, Mr. Ricca,” Michael said. “There’s always a chance it could go off.”
Giancana’s sneer was in full bloom as he said, “War hero. Remind me to piss myself, when you scare me.”
“I won’t have to.”
DeStefano started to giggle, and Giancana glared at him.
“So sue me, Mooney,” DeStefano said, through sniggers. “Funny’s funny!”
Ricca stepped around the table and gestured toward the double doors into the kitchen. Michael, walking sideways to keep an eye on the two young lunatics, followed him through. A number of bustling cooks, under the supervision of a chef, were hard at work, steam rising, pots and pans clanking, and again the restaurant smells triggered memories in Michael, who followed Ricca into an office off the kitchen.
It was just a cubbyhole with a small desk and a file cabinet; the only decoration was a framed photograph of the restaurant on opening day. Despite a chair opposite the desk, and one behind it, neither man sat.
Ricca, hands on hips, stood perhaps two feet from Michael and cast a hard unblinking stare at him. “Why did you come here, Michael? After what Frank Nitti did last night, this could be viewed as enemy territory.”
Michael was thrown by Ricca’s manner. The man’s voice was flat, uninflected, and the ganglord seemed unafraid, though Michael could easily have withdrawn the .45, shot Ricca, and then run out through the kitchen to the parking lot, where he could position himself behind the Ford and pick off the two Sams as they came after him…
“Is there going to be a war, Mr. Ricca? Have the battle lines been drawn?”
“Yes to the second question. The first question I can’t answer yet.”
Michael frowned. “That doesn’t make sense.”
Ricca smiled enigmatically. “It will.”
Frustrated, Michael snapped, “Why the hell did you bail me out?”
“Technically, I didn’t bail you out. That wasn’t necessary. Mr. Bulger merely delivered a writ of—”
“You know what I mean.”
“I had my reasons.”
“Obviously. What were they?”
Ricca sat on the edge of the desk; he folded his arms and smiled gently up at Michael. “Let me tell you why you came around here. You think I had your girlfriend killed…Well, I didn’t.”
“Really?” Michael gestured with a thumb toward the restaurant. “Your resident Frankenstein monster, Mad Sam, is known for torturing his victims before he kills them. He’s a sadistic bastard.”
“Yes. But he’s my sadistic bastard, who does what I tell him. And I didn’t tell him to kill Estelle. I liked Estelle.”
“I suppose you want me to believe Frank Nitti ordered it done.”
Ricca shook his head. “No. It’s not his style. We both know that, just as you know that I’m not a fool, and I know you’re not a fool…I’m afraid I have disappointing news for you, even though in a way it’s good news.”
“Disappointing how?”
A tiny shrug. “I know what makes you tick, Michael. It’s revenge, isn’t it? That’s your whole reason for living.”
The back of Michael’s neck tingled. “Estelle was my girl, like you said—I want to even the score.”
“Oh I know you do. I’m afraid that’s the disappointing part. You see, a couple named the Borgias were responsible.”
Michael’s eyes tightened. “I heard that from Louie Campagna. Where can I find them?”
Ricca lifted his hands in mock surrender. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. First, these two were freelance; just a couple of greedy lowlifes who were after Estelle’s money. You know—the money Nicky Dean embezzled and left with her? It had nothing to do with anybody Outfit making an example of her. Notice I’m not trying to pawn this off on Nitti—this is the truth, Michael.”
Road to Purgatory Page 25