Deep Cover

by Edward Bungert

  "Yeah, I hear ya…." Famantia turned the dial, increasing the volume slightly on his walkie-talkie. "As soon as Mario's team is on the roof, you go in. Wait for his signal."

  "Okay, Joey. I don't see any lights on inside. Are you sure there here?" That question had barely been asked when a bullet ripped through Ricky Moose's skull. He fell to the ground face-forward, the walkie-talkie still in his hand. His team ran for cover while The Henchmen sprayed the yard with bullets. "What the fuck is that? Who's shooting? Moose... Moose, what the fuck?" came Famantia's voice over the receiver. There was no one in the yard still alive to hear it.

  "Boss," Mario Calvecci's voice came over the airwaves. "We're near the stairwells to the roof. I hear shooting. What's happening?"

  In a moment of fearful clarity, Famantia knew that his worst nightmare had come to life. Oh shit, he thought. He quickly turned his head, scanning the street in front of the clubhouse. There's no fucking motorcycles parked outside. There's always fucking motorcycles outside. They know we're coming. In a moment of panic, he stood up from behind the parked car.

  "Mario, listen. Pull ba—" Famantia dropped the hand radio, clutched his chest, and fell. The rest of the team moved quickly toward the house in an all-out assault. Henchmen gunfire picked them off like ducks in a shooting gallery. Their bullets never entered the building. Cemented windows and steel-reinforced walls neutralized the attack.

  Fat Tom motioned for everyone on the roof to stay low. The bikers were lined up on each side, their rifles pointed at the stairwell doors. The shooting at the front and rear of the building had subsided. Silence hung eerily for a moment, while the bikers waited for the anticipated attack. The silence was broken by the crashing sound of the stairwell doors being forced open. The hit squad began to emerge. The bikers waited... waited... then opened fire.

  Within seconds, six of the attackers' bodies lay on the Ramirez roof, five on Mrs. Montali's. The rest, about fifteen men, retreated down the stairwells. Fat Tom jumped over the two-foot wall and scurried to the open door on Montali's roof. Two 'more bikers followed him. They lined up cautiously alongside the doorway. Four Henchmen did the same on the Ramirez roof.

  Fat Tom took a quick look into the stairwell. He jerked back, to avoid a sudden outburst of bullets. He put his forefinger to his lips, signaling the rest of the bikers to be quiet. He then pointed to Grease, in position on Ramirez's roof, motioning for him to do the same. No shots were fired at Grease. The hit squad appeared to have retreated on the Ramirez side, while at least one gunman remained in the stairwell over Mrs. Montali's.

  Fat Tom moved his head into the line of fire again. More shots into the air. Again he moved in and out. Again the shots. He pointed toward the floor and mouthed the word "lower" to his associate on the other side of the doorway. George "Goober" Hodge, also a member of the Philadelphia chapter, understood. He dropped to the floor and rolled out in front of the doorway. He fired, hitting his target dead-center. The force of the bullets from the MAC-10 knocked the man to the wall. His blood stained the white brick as his lifeless body slowly slid down to rest in a sitting position, eyes staring straight ahead at nothing.

  Grease was starting to make his move over on the Ramirez side. "They retreated into the house," he said to his group. "Five of you"—he quickly pointed out five of the bikers—"go down through the clubhouse and come at them through the front doors. Tell the brothers in the rear of the clubhouse to watch for anyone trying to get out. We'll run them down through the top and squash the motherfuckers in the middle." Grease nodded toward Fat Tom, as the defenders now became the attackers. The bikers went down the stairwells shooting at anything that moved. They had killed six more before they'd even reached the second floor.

  On the second floor of Montali's house, Fat Tom cautiously approached the door to the bathroom. He could hear a slight scuffle as he neared the room. He slowly opened the door, to find Mrs. Montali lying facedown on the tile floor. She was gagged, and her arms and legs were bound. He sat her up and took off her gag. "Stay here. I'll be back when it's over." Her eyes widened suddenly, as Fat Tom turned and fired his weapon at the figure in the doorway. Chalk up another one for The Henchmen.

  Near the stairway to the first floor of the Ramirez house, Grease and his team encountered two men preparing a charge of dynamite against the wall. A short, deadly burst from his MAC-10 interrupted their efforts. The bikers sandwiched the remaining men between the first and second floors. Bodies lay everywhere. In Mrs. Montali's house a similar scenario was being played out.

  The victorious Henchmen returned to the clubhouse. It had the air of a pro football locker room after a Superbowl win. Players giving each other the high-five, popping beer cans open, and reliving the successful plays and exciting moments of the game. Or maybe of a fifteenth-century castle—triumphant knights drinking ale, comparing battle scars, patting each other on the back, and embracing in brotherly solidarity.

  Dirty Dan kissed and embraced Whitey. The two chapter presidents were proud of their clubs. "Anybody hurt?" asked Dirty Dan.

  "Stoned Eddie caught one in the leg, and I think Grease's arm is broken. Other than that, just minor shit." Whitey looked at his watch. Nine thirty-five. "Hey, brothers!" he shouted. "Who was on cleanup last party?"

  ***

  It was slow that night at Mike's. Counsel and I had been drinking together for about two hours before Iron Man and Savage joined us. Most of the other members of the Los Angeles chapter were either out with their old ladies or home with their families. Some were at the clubhouse. Two bikers from one of the small local clubs were in the back room, playing pool with a couple of women who sometimes came into Mike's looking for action.

  "You look pretty good for a guy who was recently shot," I said to Savage. His arm was no longer in the sling, but his shoulder and rib cage were still tightly wrapped.

  "I heal quick, Doc. A Henchman's got to. Hey, I'm sorry I missed your party. After Popeye's funeral I had to take care of some business up north." I found out later that Savage was at the Glendale chapter picking up cash. All chapters give a percentage of profits to the mother chapter for the national coffer. These funds are used to buy real estate, finance expansions, and pay expensive lawyers to keep The Henchmen on the street and out of jail. From what I could gather so far, in addition to dealing in drugs and prostitution, each chapter had their own little specialty. Glendale's was loan-sharking, Philadelphia's, murder for hire. The Atlanta chapter made thousands of dollars planting bombs for various white supremacist groups in the South. Savage himself trained most of the Atlanta members in the use of plastic explosives and pipe bombs.

  "You missed a good one, brother," I said. "We really partied hard." I slapped Iron Man a high-five. Under the play-acting, I was still wrestling with feelings of guilt. I had never been unfaithful to Amy, and I kept searching for reasons to justify my actions. It certainly had been against my will. My life would have been lost had I refused. Both reasons were valid. Neither gave me the vindication I was after.

  "So what's up, Counsel? I got your message to meet you here," asked Savage.

  "We got a little situation," Counsel said quietly. We had to move closer to hear him. "It's the San Pagano charter. I'm gonna revoke it."

  "Revoke it?" I said, surprised.

  "Yeah, they really fucked up this time. They bagged a couple of cunts after the Bobby Jones concert. Turns out they did a real number on 'em. Those stupid fucks have the heat on us now. Helmsford called me and said the pressure on the cops is coming all the way from the Governor's office."

  "We fucking own Helmsford, that slimy pig," interrupted Savage. He winced slightly from the pain of tensing his wounded body. I could tell his wounds still hurt like hell. Most people who get shot up like that spend a week or two in the hospital. Savage had spent all of three hours in the doctor's office. I couldn't help but admire something about this psychopath. The look in his eyes would have scared Charlie Manson, but his bravery and loyalty to his brothers were uns
hakable.

  "Helmsford says he can't do nothing about it." Counsel was irritated. He was acting like a disappointed parent. A mixture of anger and hurt over the actions of an offspring he couldn't control.

  Iron Man sat quietly, arms folded, occasionally stroking his unkempt beard. Counsel finished his drink, then continued, "They're too wild. They do too much of their own crank and fuck too much with the citizens. I fuckin' warned them a million times."

  We were all silent for a moment. I made a mental note of Helmsford's name. Again things were falling into place. Having a cop on the payroll made them virtually impervious to any surprise searches. If the cops were planning a raid on the clubhouse, Helms-ford could warn them hours before. I thought to myself, Shit, if every member of law enforcement was honest there would be a hell of a lot less crime. How many other cops, judges, or other officials does this club control around the country?

  "So what's next?" I asked.

  "Next Friday. Six of us go down," Counsel immediately responded. "The four of us, Monk, and Dog. We'll go there during their regular meeting, pull their patches, and that will be that." He looked around the table. Everyone nodded their agreement. I was reminded of the scene in A Clockwork Orange where Alex and his buddies are sitting around the milk bar, and all the toadies are apprehensively saying "Right, right" to their leader's instructions.

  The next morning I called in to Base I again. My Harley needed gas, so I made the call from a gas station near the highway. I told Dalton about Patrick Helmsford. Again, as with the police assistant, they would not move on him immediately. He would be watched and a case built against him. He might even be fed some disinformation to keep him from getting suspicious. When the operation was over, so would his life be as a free man.

  When I'd hung up with Dalton, I took to the road for a thirty-mile solo trip down 425. With the wind in my face and The Henchmen colors on my back, I began to think about the ideal that had helped to forge the club in the late forties. That a man could ride free and do what he pleased, and never have to worry whether his brothers were behind him. As long as you wore those Henchmen colors on your back, you were respected and feared—two words that were synonymous in the world of the outlaw biker. Society's rules and morals meant nothing to you. You were part of a subculture that had its own laws.

  I felt great. At that moment I wanted to be a Henchman. Living fast and furious and never worrying about tomorrow. My fantasy ended with the silencing of my engine in the driveway of my apartment. I was an agent. Trained and sworn to uphold the law. Integrity and brains. But now, a part of me was also Dr. Death, the Henchman.

  During the next few days most of the activity centered around The Henchmen's movie. The documentary crew conducted several interviews with club members under Counsel's watchful eye. The members seemed to get a charge out of it all. Footage was even shot of an evening trip to an amusement park, where we rode roller coasters standing up, shot pellet guns in the shooting gallery, and rode bumper cars like twelve-year-olds during their summer vacation.

  At one point six of us were playing the balloon-race game. The object was to fire a water gun into the mouth of a plastic clown head, thus activating a pump which filled the balloon on top of the head with air. Whoever's balloon popped first won. Dog led the conspiracy by tapping Iron Man with his elbow and motioning his head toward the attendant. Iron Man, in turn, did the same to me, and all the way to the end where Counsel was poised, ready to fire. As soon as the attendant rang the buzzer we fired at her, soaking the poor woman from head to toe.

  She must have signaled for the park security somehow, because two security guards came running up to see what the commotion was all about. When the two young men turned the corner and saw us six grinning bikers, they looked like they wished they'd never gotten out of bed that morning. We teased those poor guys until they had tears in their eyes. Counsel grabbed one of their nightsticks and held it between his legs like a huge erect penis. Dog got on his knees and pretended to suck it off. The camera crew got the whole thing on film. A crowd started to form around us, and we knew it was time to end the little game before any real cops came on the scene. Before letting the guards walk, Iron Man took the handcuffs from one of them, a short, muscularly built guy in his mid-twenties, and kept them as a souvenir. I was troubled by how much fun I was having with the club. The renegade I-don't-give-a-shit attitude was infectious. I had to remind myself that I was here to put these guys away, not become one of the brethren.

  The day before we were to strip the San Pagano chapter of their colors, The Henchmen threw a chili bash at the East L.A. clubhouse for the officers of the Paterson and Philadelphia chapters, to celebrate their victory over the Toritellis. Judging by all the boasting and backslapping that was going on, I guessed that the win had been a decisive one. I wondered what the hell could have gone wrong. I was sure Molly would have found a way to tip off the local police. Again, this was one of those times when I didn't actually regret that the incident had taken place, but was confused as to why. As far as I was concerned, if The Henchmen and Mafia wanted to destroy each other, so be it.

  I also learned at the party that the New Jersey chapter was planning a huge rip-off of military equipment from the army base at Fort Dix. Dirty Dan, the chapter president, had cornered me. My back was to the wall and he had one arm over my shoulder, supporting himself.

  "It's gonna be a tit... a fuckin' tit." He belched right in my face. I could smell the unsavory combination of chili and beer. "My ole lady," he continued, "she's been working as a sec'tery... sec...." He shook his head to clear his thoughts. He was slurring so badly I could hardly understand him. "Sec... re…tary." He winked at me, proud to have finally blurted out the word. He then turned abruptly away, walked over to a corner, and sat on the floor. I found out later that he was trying to tell me about his girlfriend, who worked in the records office at Fort Dix.

  Before I left the party I wished him well on the heist.

  Chapter 18

  "Yeah?"

  "This is Counsel. Who's this?"

  "Yo, Counsel. How ya doin', bro? It's Slip. What's up?"

  "You guys having your meeting tonight?"

  "Sure as shit. Same time every week. Why?"

  "I'm coming by. We have to talk about this Bobby Jones concert thing."

  "Hey, man. Those babes wanted a good time and we showed them one. It got a little wild at times, but—"

  "Wait a second," Counsel cut in. "I don't give a shit about the two cunts. We have to talk about handling the cops now. You brothers collect a lot of bread from the businesses in your neighborhood, and that's all going to dry up if the man turns up the heat." The San Pagano chapter had a flair for extorting money from local merchants. Fifty dollars each week bought them protection. Most of the merchants paid it enthusiastically. Once the word was out that an establishment was under Henchmen protection, robberies dwindled. San Pagano contributed an average of ten thousand dollars each month to the national coffer from this business alone.

  "Sure, Counsel. Everyone'll be here. Later."

  "What'd he say?" asked Iron Man

  "They'll be there." Counsel walked from behind his desk to the wall, where a map of the United States was displayed. He removed the pin from the area of San Pagano. Looking at it pensively, he recalled how six years ago eighteen members of The Commandos had approached him for a Henchmen charter. They prospected for the club for six months. Of the eighteen, only nine got their patches. Two were killed, and one was jailed when three bikers botched a bank robbery. The rest just weren't man enough to don Henchmen colors. Counsel had personally given Beef his Wild Bunch patch for taking out two Outcasts in Nevada. He tossed the pin in the trash.

  "Who was on the phone?" asked Sandy.

  "Counsel," said Slip curiously. "He's coming over tonight. Wants to talk about how we're going to handle the heat from the cops." The two bikers were sitting at a large table in the main room of the clubhouse. Slip was drinking a beer and casually flipp
ing through the pages of Iron Horse magazine.

  "Is he coming alone?" Sandy's sharp instincts caused him to feel uneasy.

  "He didn't say." Slip's attention remained on the magazine.

  Sandy picked at his tooth with his fingernail and looked thoughtfully at the floor. "You still got that little .25?" he asked, still looking down.

  "Sure do, Prez. Right here." Slip lifted his boot to the table and pulled up his pant leg, to expose the handle of a .25 semiautomatic pistol secure in its holster. "You think something's coming down?"

  "Nah. Probably not. Just a feeling, man." The shrewd biker thought for a moment about Counsel's visit. The chapter had been in bad situations with the law before. Counsel had never ordered a sitdown with the entire club. What's on his mind? he wondered. He looked at his Henchmen colors hanging across the back of a chair. "Would you die for that patch, Slip?" "Hell, yeah, wouldn't we all?"

  Twenty minutes east of St. Paul, Little Ferry is one of the most pleasant neighborhoods in Minnesota. Tree-lined streets, single-story ranch-style homes, and small-town hospitality give it the charm of a Norman Rockwell illustration. Frank "Dave" David, president of the Henchmen chapter in St. Paul, was working on the club's books in a small room in the rear of his home. Henchmen paraphernalia and trophies from his motorcycle racing days decorated the walls. An eight-hundred-pound safe, containing many years' worth of sensitive information, stood next to the desk.

  An astute bookkeeper, with two years of business training, Dave did many of the duties normally reserved for the secretary/treasurer. He insisted that it be that way. The club's secretary could handle the files on members and associates. Bookkeeping and all other financial matters would be handled by the forty-four-year-old president. Partly gray and a little overweight, Dave was well suited to his white suburban surroundings. Although he didn't socialize with his neighbors, they all considered him a typical family man, albeit a rather reclusive one. While many men in the neighborhood sported Jaguars and Ferraris, a bright yellow Harley was Frank David's display of boyishness.