by Allan Levine
“I’m afraid it might. I don’t have all of the facts yet. But I can’t tell you how terrible I feel … If I’m responsible for any harm that comes to Bernice…”
Sarah put her arms around his shoulders and drew him close. “It’s not your fault, Shailek. It’s not your fault…”
With his car parked on Powers Street close to Cathedral Avenue, Jack Smythe squinted in the darkness at five-year-old Bernice Klein asleep in the back seat. He grabbed the half-empty whisky bottle lying next to him, opened it, and took a gulp. It had been a very long day. He had kept the kid on a farm in Kildonan where the owner didn’t ask any questions for much of the afternoon. The farmer’s wife had fed her and she seemed content to play with their mutt and watch the cows and horses.
Nevertheless, he felt sick. How had he made such a colossal mess of things? A party to a kidnapping, hitting Joannie, and worse. All because of his stupidity and greed. And for what? He was about to be exposed. In the past week, Nicholas Kingston had been asking too many questions about expenses he had marked in the accounts book. Kingston was smart, Smythe knew that. It was only a matter of time before he figured out Jack had taken $20,000 from the company to cover a margin call.
Six months ago, he had listened to some bad advice from a grain trader. He had assured Smythe that the price of wheat was going to drop below sixty cents a bushel. So, using a fake client name, he and his partner went “short,” selling wheat futures on the Exchange floor, wheat that they did not own. Smythe had anticipated pocketing about $15,000. Instead, when the price started to rise instead, above eighty cents, he had had to come up with the $20,000 to cover his losses. Desperate, he borrowed the funds from his company’s bank account, telling himself that he would be able to repay it over time. That was wishful thinking at best. He had started drinking more and taken out his troubles on Joannie more than once.
His so-called saviour had doled out enough money for Smythe to keep on doing what he was ordered. But not anymore. It stops now, he mumbled under his breath.
“Kid, wake up,” Smythe said, slightly raising his voice. When Bernice still did not open her eyes, he shook her gently.
“I want my mommy,” Bernice said, yawning.
“No more crying. You’re going to see your mommy in a moment.”
“I am!”
“Yeah, it’s Christmas in June. So are you listening to me?”
Bernice nodded.
“I’m going to open the door and you’re going to run down to your house. Look out the window. Can you see it there? It’s the third house.”
“That’s where I live.”
“That’s right, kid. Now get out of here.”
Bernice did as she was instructed and ran into the night. She climbed up the front steps and looked up at the door. “Mama, Daddy. Open up.”
Klein and Sarah were in the kitchen, sitting at the table in silence, exhausted from worry.
“Shailek, did you hear that?” said Sarah, standing up. “I swear it sounds like Bernice.”
“What? It was nothing. Probably a stray cat.”
Again, the cry from outside. “Mama, Mama.”
Klein heard it this time, too.
“Oh my God! Shailek, it’s her, it’s her.”
Klein jumped up and ran to the front door. Sarah was right behind him. He pulled it open and there was Bernice, looking a little dishevelled, but otherwise unharmed. In tears, Sarah picked her up and tightly embraced her. Klein was speechless as he, too, hugged his daughter and wife.
“You’re back, Niecee. You’re back.”
On top of the stairs, wiping the sleep away from their eyes, stood Freda and Mel. Both were smiling from ear to ear.
24
Wednesday morning, Shayna Kravetz walked down Portage Avenue on her way to work with a distinct spring in her step. Alec had called her early with the fantastic news: Bernice Klein had arrived back home safe and sound. Shayna was so happy that she had bawled for twenty minutes.
The story spread through the North End like an out-of-control wild fire. Everyone on the streetcar was talking about it, with, of course, the usual speculation of why she had been returned. One middle-aged woman suggested that the kidnapping had been a hoax concocted by the Jews to gain sympathy while another whispered about a gang of Chinese men she had heard of who sold white girls into slavery. “They did unspeakable things to her and then decided they didn’t want her,” the woman said. Fools, thought Shayna as she disembarked. Nothing, particularly such absurd yammering, was about to ruin her delightful mood.
As she entered the Boyd Building, she noticed a sign in Sarah Klein’s dress shop that indicated the store would be closed for the day. Given everything that happened, that wasn’t surprising. Reaching the fifth floor, she jaunted off the elevator and into the office.
“Mr. Sugarman, have you heard the wonderful news?” Shayna cried out.
But the door to Sugarman’s private office was closed and all Shayna could hear was the sound of objects and paper being strewn about. He was on another rampage about something, thought Shayna. Yet another Sugarman temper tantrum.
A moment passed and then Sugarman, huffing and wheezing, stomped out. “Good, you’re here. I need to be out of the city for most of the day.”
“You’re going out of town?” asked Shayna.
“It’s none of your business. Just clean up my damn office, it’s a mess,” said Sugarman, walking out.
He had decided to take the train to Vera. The matter of the warehouse needed his attention and he could not wait for Lou to recover and deal with it. The liquor had to be moved.
Shayna watched the door slam as he left. Why did she continue to work for him? He was usually miserable and angry and no matter what she did or how efficient she was, he was never satisfied. It, unfortunately, came down to money. Her weekly pay cheque was higher than that of any other secretary she knew in the city. How could she possibly walk away from such a job and salary? Perhaps someday soon, when Alec finally asked her to marry him, she might be able to quit. Until then, she was stuck with Saul Sugarman. It hardly surprised her that he had never married; what woman in her right mind would want to cater to him the rest of her life?
She laughed at the thought as she bent down and began collecting correspondence and notations that he had thrown about the room. Picking up several pieces of paper, a few words jotted on the piece at the top of the pile caught her attention. She scanned it and her eyes widened. Reading it a second time more slowly, she began to tremble. Her hand instinctively covered her mouth. It took her only a few seconds to realize the full extent of what she had read. She went to her desk and picked up the telephone.
“Alec, it’s me,” she said softly into the receiver, her voice shaking.
“What is it, Shayna? What’s happened?”
“I’m coming to your apartment right now. We need to see Sam immediately.”
About forty miles outside of Winnipeg, the train to Vera stopped for no apparent reason. The conductor walked through the cars informing the passengers that he did not know the reason for the delay. He asked everyone to be patient. A handful of passengers grumbled, but the majority resigned themselves to this unintended inconvenience—except, that is, Saul Sugarman.
Sugarman never accepted that his power was limited, that he could not control each and every situation he found himself in. It was the reason why, even now, with incontrovertible evidence supplied by his police sources that Frankie Taylor had sold out Rosen for Piccolo and had been trying to kill him, he refused to accept that Rosen’s scheme—and his own potential for huge profits—had failed. Whatever obstacles Piccolo had put in their way, he would sweep aside. In his mind, the Rosen-Sugarman bootlegging takeover was still intact.
He regarded this trait, what he perceived as determination and the will to win, as his key strength, unaware that everyone else who entered hi
s orbit thought exactly the opposite. In Winnipeg and beyond, Sugarman’s penchant for absolute control merely made him a contemptible bully. And so, as was his style, he berated the poor conductor for more than an hour until the train started moving again.
At the back of the same train car, Reverend John Vivian, with a hat pulled low, watched this pathetic one-sided confrontation unfold. The anger he felt towards Sugarman was intense, he could not deny it. The money Piccolo had paid him was almost an afterthought—or so he had convinced himself. Ridding the world of a corrupt sinner such as Sugarman was surely doing God’s work. He was tempted to pull out his revolver and do the deed right there and then, saving the conductor and the other passengers from this thoroughly despicable human being. But he knew that if he wanted Sugarman’s demise to have meaning, he would have to stick to his plan.
The train pulled into the Vera station almost two hours late. As soon as the conductor opened the door, Sugarman pushed his way through and disembarked. Vivian did the same and followed him down Main Street, though he guessed where Sugarman was headed. When he reached Roter’s shuttered store, he turned left and took the path that led to the warehouse. As he expected, the locks on the door were open and he entered.
In the dim light, he felt a sense of relief and pride. The shelves, from floor to ceiling, were stocked with liquor cases containing thousands of bottles of booze, just as they had been the fateful night Max had been murdered. With that traitor Taylor in police custody, Rosen had arranged for another bootlegger, one he and Katz completely trusted, a hood known only as “Philadelphia Ray,” to bring in a convoy of three trucks and six men that night after midnight so that liquor shipments from Vera could resume. In their brief telephone conversation late last night, Rosen had not told Sugarman what he was going to do about Piccolo’s interference, only that it would be taken care of real soon. Sugarman was to continue making his plans as though nothing had happened.
He could have entrusted Smythe with the task of ensuring that Ray’s trucks were loaded, instead of travelling all the way to Vera, yet Smythe could no longer be trusted. He had, in fact, become a liability.
“Smythe, its Sugarman. Where the hell are you?”
For a full minute, Sugarman stood waiting for a reply. Then a response.
“Back here,” said the familiar voice.
Annoyed, Sugarman made his way down a narrow corridor between two high rows of shelves and followed the flicking light of a lantern. He walked as far as he could and arrived at an alcove with a small desk, where Max had kept his inventory records. He saw Jack Smythe sitting on the chair behind the desk with a gun in his hand. There was an open bottle of whisky in front of him. Then Sugarman looked to his right and was startled to find Klein, Alec Geller, and Joannie Smythe standing there. Klein glared at him, but said nothing.
“What’s this?” Sugarman demanded to know, taking a step back.
“Stay where you are. No sudden movements,” Jack Smythe implored him. His voice was raspy and strained.
“Okay, Jack. I’ll stand here. But would you like to tell me what you’re doing? And what are they doing here?”
“I’m setting things right, that’s what I’m doing, Saul. I decided that I’m no longer your errand boy. That no amount of money is worth what you’ve put me through. I only regret that I found this out so late.” He pointed the gun at Sugarman.
“Jack, stop, don’t do this, please. We can figure it out. We’ll hire you a lawyer,” Joannie pleaded.
Smythe smiled. “I love you, dear, and I’m sorry, deeply sorry for having raised a hand to you. Blame the damn booze—it makes a man do crazy things.” He picked up the bottle in his other hand and took a swig. “No lawyer’s going to get me out of this mess. I’ll hang for sure. So let me first tell you my story.”
“You don’t want to do this,” said Sugarman.
“Yeah, I think I do. As you all likely know, I made some bad decisions. I took money from the company’s bank accounts that I stupidly squandered speculating in the grain market. I was desperate to repay the funds—so desperate that I asked Max for help. He and I worked out an agreement but because of the amount involved, he was forced to consult with you, Saul. By the way, kid,” he said, looking at Geller, “that’s what you found that night you were searching Max’s store. I knew Max had a copy of it and I had been trying to locate it. It was one of the documents tucked into that bundle of papers. I didn’t think you’d still be there and I had no choice but to stop you from finding it. You’ll have to believe me, I didn’t want to hurt you, but I’m glad, truly glad, that you recovered.”
“I’ll live,” said Geller.
“What about Max? Did you kill him?” asked Klein.
“I did. My God, I did. By then, I was drinking too much and Sugarman was dangling all of this cash in front of me. I wasn’t thinking straight.”
“Jack, how could you? Max was our friend,” cried Joannie.
“I know he was. And I’ll never forgive myself. That night I waited until that bootlegger Taylor left and then I put a shotgun through the window and fired. I took the money Max had and just kept it.”
“But why did you do it? What had Max done?” asked Klein.
“Don’t answer that,” said Sugarman.
Smythe laughed. “Too late, Saul. I did it because if I didn’t, Sugarman was going to expose me. There was a lot of money on the table. I couldn’t say no. And why did Max have to die, you ask? Because he had done the unthinkable: he disobeyed the great Saul Sugarman. When Max learned that Sugarman had agreed to be partners with Rosen in this outlandish, outsized bootlegging plan, he argued with him incessantly that it was bad for business. That it would only lead to a gangster war, which they would be caught in the middle of. And that, by the way, is exactly what happened. Max did something he shouldn’t have and told Frankie Taylor of the scheme.”
Klein shook his head. Now he understood who had told Taylor about the plan. It had been Roter.
“He hoped Taylor might be able to talk Rosen out of it,” continued Smythe. “Instead, as I understand it, Taylor went to Piccolo, was bought off, and, well, you know the rest. Sugarman was angry when he found out what Max had done and believed that he could no longer trust him. He berated and blackmailed me until I agreed to get rid of Max. I’m so sorry, Joannie. I don’t know how I could’ve done it.”
Tears welled in Joannie’s eyes. “Jack, put the gun down, please.”
“No, I can’t do that yet. Because there’s more to this sad story.”
“Sugarman next made you kidnap my daughter, didn’t he?” said Klein.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about Klein. You’re as crazy as Smythe is,” said Sugarman. A thick bead of perspiration formed on his forehead.
Klein held up a piece of paper. “You know what this is, Sugarman? It’s a page that was found in your office and given to me by Shayna. From what Joannie learned from Mrs. Tillsdale, I already knew that Smythe was involved in the kidnapping, though not why he had done it. Then I read this and understood that you were pulling the strings. Shayna said you were coming to Vera, so the three of us drove out here in a police car as quickly as we could. I’m only glad that your train was delayed.”
“I don’t know what that bitch gave you.”
“It’s a list of instructions: where my wife’s store is located, what my daughter Bernice looks like, and where she should be taken. If you’re going to kidnap a five-year-old, you should be a lot more careful where you leave such incriminating evidence. I’d like to wring your neck. How could you do such a thing?” Klein shouted.
“I don’t know what…” Sugarman stammered.
“Don’t even bother to deny it, Saul,” said Smythe. “It’s true. I took her, Klein, when your wife was at Eaton’s. This is no excuse, but I did it partly because if I had not done so, he would’ve hired someone else to do it. And God knows what wou
ld have happened to your little girl. I knew I could keep her safe. But when I heard what was going on in the city and how much pain this was causing you and your family, I had to end it. So I brought her back to you. He wanted to keep her for at least another week and then who knows? I’m fairly certain that this was all about punishing your wife for spurning him.”
Klein was stunned. “You did this because Sarah wouldn’t leave me to be with you? You wanted to teach her a lesson? Is that it? Can you be that callous a human being?”
“Sarah deserves better than you. Always has. But when I could see that she would never be mine, I had to make her suffer. It was the only way.”
“You’re mad, you know that?” said Klein.
“He may well be, yet it is me who’s guilty here,” said Smythe, lifting his gun. “I’m a coward at heart. I can’t face a trial and a hanging. I love you, Joannie.”
“Jack, put the gun down, please,” Joannie pleaded. “Don’t do…”
It was too late. Smythe shoved the gun against his temple and pulled the trigger. His head exploded in blood and he slumped forward on to the desk. Joannie screamed and fell to the floor. As Klein and Geller went to help her, Sugarman turned and began walking down the corridor. He had not taken more than ten steps when Reverend John Vivian appeared. He pointed a gun directly in Sugarman’s face.
“Stop right where you are,” ordered Vivian.
“Reverend, what are you doing here?” Joannie Smythe cried.
“I’m here to send this sinner back to where he belongs. You and George abandoned me and the cause…”
“That’s a bald-faced lie. I believed in you,” she yelled. “But everything you told me and George was a lie. This isn’t about morality and ridding the world of liquor. It’s about money. You’re no better than he is,” Joannie stammered, looking at Sugarman. She had to catch her breath.
“What do you mean?” asked Sugarman.
“Not another word,” said Vivian.
“He’s in cahoots with Piccolo to stop your grand scheme,” she said, trying to gather herself. “He’s been paid off. Reverend John Vivian is a charlatan, a fraud, an imposter.”