Ball Park

by John Farrow

  ‘Kill cops?’

  ‘Their funeral.’

  ‘Everybody’s already calling in,’ the Rabbit told him. ‘They scream it in.’ He was better informed as to the scope of the operation against them. ‘It’s fast. We hear about a raid two minutes after they bust down the doors.’

  ‘I’ll make a call,’ Giuseppe Ciampini said. ‘Leave me alone. Let me stop this.’

  He dialed Captain Armand Touton’s number, and when Touton picked up, he said, ‘Old friend, hello. We talk?’

  As a reporter remarked, a crook could incriminate himself with a sigh. A deeper inhalation? Pull an overnight in the lockup. Blink? Be roughed up.

  Typically, detectives and the serious bad guys were acquainted. On occasion, they’d have breakfast together. They talked baseball in summer, hockey once the snow flied. Inquired about each other’s kids. That night, courtesies were set aside. Both camps knew that someday the status quo would be interrupted, but for that to happen right across the board created a shockwave. Cops knocked on the doors of criminals they monitored, said hi to their wives and kids, then hauled the hoods in.

  ‘On what charge?’

  ‘We’ll make something up along the way.’ Another shock.

  ‘I’m calling my lawyer.’

  ‘You can try. He’s probably under arrest.’ Alarm bells.

  The news burned across mob networks like a pyromaniac’s fantasy. Detectives pulled in anyone who was mobbed up, and Cinq-Mars set out to provoke an incursion of his own. Overdue. A chat with Ezra Knightsbridge. He intended to go soft, be physically benign yet tactfully and psychologically invasive. As he stepped inside the pawnshop, the jangle of the overhead bell announced his presence twice – once when struck by the door, and again when the tall man’s head knocked it.

  The old proprietor glanced up. Only a minute before closing, Cinq-Mars flipped the sign on the door to read FERMÉ. ‘I decide if I’m open or closed,’ Ezra Knightsbridge informed him. He chose to speak English as he was more adept in that tongue. His tone carried only faint authority, a surprise to both men.

  Cinq-Mars stared down his impressive beak at the fellow. Hawk-like, this glare, as some were wont to say. Eagle-like, according to others. He could never parse the difference. He never told a soul that he had learned the gaze from a psychiatrist encountered on his travels. The physician believed that a severe look drew the bare truths from his patients that they were loath to impart. ‘Another advantage,’ the doctor quipped, disguising if he was serious, ‘I can fade away yet look engaged.’ Cinq-Mars, for his part, looked engaged. He introduced himself, omitting his rank and any reference to being police.

  ‘Should I know you?’ Knightsbridge answered back.

  ‘Let me remind you of the times we’re living in.’

  A look of abject innocence.

  ‘It’s not possible that my name has not been mentioned to you recently. Yours has been mentioned to me by the same person.’

  He stopped short of identifying Quinn by name. He wanted Knightsbridge to reach that conclusion on his own.

  In his head, the pawnbroker ran down a shortlist of lies. None worked for him. ‘Cinq-Mars. Formerly Night Patrol. Part of tonight’s police rabble gone wild. Is that what you mean by the times we live?’

  ‘That covers it, in part,’ Cinq-Mars agreed.

  ‘You’re alone? No storm troopers?’

  ‘On hold.’

  ‘Beware the blessing in disguise,’ the shopkeeper intoned. Then he had a thought. ‘Maybe you should lock the door behind you.’

  Cinq-Mars twisted a small nub. Serious deadbolts, requiring keys, were lower down.

  ‘I’m glad you did that,’ Knightsbridge stated.

  ‘How so?’

  ‘It suggests you’re not here to haul me in on some ridiculous trumped-up charge.’

  ‘That remains a possibility. We’re trumping-up a lot of charges tonight. I thought we could have a quieter chat here than at the station. Utter chaos down there.’

  Cinq-Mars crossed to the counter. He looked around as though something might be on view for him to evaluate. He processed details of the layout.

  ‘How may I be of service, Detective?’

  ‘Quinn’s been abducted.’

  Ezra Knightsbridge did not appear to know that.

  ‘Your old cellmate is a suspect.’

  The man was clearly taken aback that his life in prison was known to anyone. Let alone that anyone was aware he’d shared a cell with a criminal of consequence. He believed that era had been obliterated by the dust of time.

  ‘Before we go one inch further, Detective, consider, please, the Cubans.’

  Cinq-Mars stared down his beak at him again. The old man had more hair on his knuckles than on his head. Bushy white eyebrows, a gleam to his gaze. He knew him to be clever.

  ‘You’ve lost me.’

  ‘In part, you made your reputation thanks to the Cubans. The explosives.’

  A secret story. In 1970, Cinq-Mars and Touton had been integral in disrupting the Front de libération du Québec, a terrorist cell devoted to the independence of Quebec. During that investigation, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police stumbled upon an arsenal of munitions protected by the Cuban embassy and meant to aid a clutch of terrorists. Enough explosive to level city blocks. The Cubans established the warehouse as embassy property, and therefore part of their sovereign territory under international law. Consequently, the cops were compelled to leave, and the Mounties were doing so when Touton arrived on a tip and refused to oblige. Cinq-Mars stood by his boss. Their puny pistols against a battery of high-powered weaponry. A stalemate ensued, one that was not resolved until the Prime Minister of Canada telephoned Fidel Castro. The Cubans stood down and surrendered the munitions, while the Canadians accepted a stipulation that they would keep the matter secret. The Prime Minister talked about an “apprehended insurrection” when speaking to the press and was mocked because he could explain himself no further, snared by an edict to never reveal what had happened. He never did.

  Knightsbridge understood Cinq-Mars’s reticence to discuss the episode.

  ‘Ask yourself,’ he suggested to the policeman, ‘how the Mounties arrived on the scene in the first place. Ask yourself, who tipped them off. Then ask, who tipped you off.’

  ‘I have no way of knowing.’

  ‘And yet I know what happened. I’m not supposed to know.’

  ‘What does that have to do with the price of milk?’

  ‘Don’t assume I’m not sympathetic. All I wish to convey, Sergeant-Detective.’

  Cinq-Mars took a stroll amid the flotsam that had drifted into the store. More mental notes.

  ‘How may I be of service?’ Knightsbridge asked again.

  ‘You attended Dietmar Ferstel’s funeral. Wandering among the tombstones. I’m curious. Did you consider him one of yours? Did you set him up with Quinn? Hypothetical questions. No need to reply.’

  ‘A man who answers his own questions is probably confused.’

  ‘Ferstel was one of ours, too. Did you know he planned to be a policeman?’

  Knightsbridge considered the news. ‘Now I am the one confused. Touché. One wonders where his heart lay. With the police, or with a wilder society? Who was he preparing to betray? Tell me, Cinq-Mars, why are you here?’

  ‘Without the storm troopers? They may yet make an appearance. Here it is. Quinn’s been abducted. We don’t want another funeral.’

  Knightsbridge contemplated a reply. ‘My scalp is in play,’ he remarked.

  ‘Be brave. One of those times. Look, you’ve lived a long life.’

  ‘Well spoken. But I don’t consider being foolish an adequate substitute for bravery.’

  ‘I will keep your secrets.’

  Knightsbridge remained still a moment. Then asked, ‘You attack Ciampini on every front?’

  ‘Every front we know.’

  ‘And still you don’t find her. Giuseppe Ciampini is weaker than in the past. His punks pete
r out. Old age. Death. Retirement. Key men incarcerated. Lesser powers establish satellite gangs. The young are impetuous.’

  ‘You’re saying he’s weaker?’

  ‘Yet powerful as ever. How can this be?’

  The man was posing a riddle. ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Alliances, my young detective. Perhaps you and I can form such an alliance. Be beneficial one to the other one. In the future, the world will turn according to what alliances are formed. Ciampini is weaker now, yet equally strong. Where is his muscle? It’s not in-house. It’s no longer one hundred percent Italian.’

  This seemed like a motherlode. ‘Who then? What alliance?’

  ‘The Rabbit.’

  The policeman drilled him with the full force of his stare. Hawk-like, eagle-like, or just plain cop-like. The pawnbroker had a history of deflecting his own shenanigans onto the Rabbit, but this seemed different. Cinq-Mars could readily imagine a scenario where the Rabbit courted the favor of the Mafia and vice versa. They had much to offer each other: high-end organization and vicious street muscle conjoined.

  ‘The Rabbit,’ Cinq-Mars said at last.

  ‘Hurry,’ Ezra Knightsbridge implored him.

  The man certainly had a knack for getting cops off his back. Cinq-Mars had to salute him for that. Still, this was a lead. He did as he was told. He hurried.

  Touton expected the call.

  ‘How’s your health, Joe. Good?’

  ‘Not so bad. Armand, I ask myself, how did things get this way? I ask, how do we make a truce to happen here tonight? I want your opinion. Your health, how does it go?’

  ‘I’m fine. As for tonight, total capitulation will work,’ Touton suggested.

  ‘Don’t be so ambitious in your old age, Armand. For argument, let us say it’s not in the cards.’

  ‘A truce won’t work for me, Joe. It’ll buy you time. You’ll crank your lawyers up to speed, slide judges into place. Get your politicians and journalists on the warpath. What’s the advantage for me?’

  ‘I heard you retire. Pack it in soon. Congratulations.’

  ‘Thought I’d go out with a bang. You’re an old man, too. Why not pack it in?’

  ‘You don’t want me to retire, Armand. Like you, I might go out with a bang.’

  ‘You could go fish, like me. Hunt and fish.’

  ‘This could cost you your pension, Armand. Maybe I see to it.’

  ‘Joe, that’s only in the movies. Maybe other jurisdictions. Here, I’m in a union. My pension is rock solid. The Police Brotherhood took care of that before you. Now, I can shoot the Pope and still collect. What else you got?’

  ‘Other ways exist to cut off a man’s pension, Armand. You follow?’

  ‘Try it. Maybe I’ll enjoy shooting back. Like I said, I’ll be hunting. I’ll be armed.’

  ‘What do you want from this, Armand. Just me?’

  ‘I’ve wanted you my whole working life, Joe. You’re my one big failure. Still, I can live without nailing you. But only if I get the girl. You know the one I mean. Harm the girl, this won’t end. No further negotiation. The girl out, no harm done to her, then we can negotiate. Otherwise, this never ends.’

  Touton hung up on him. The best way to deal with the man. An ultimatum backed up by refusing to share another word.

  In the quiet of his office, he got to thinking and called Ciampini back for an encore. He phoned the Mafioso’s office. Voices in the background sounded in full battle mode.

  ‘I was just talking to him. We got cut off. Tell him to call me back.’

  If nothing else, he might be able to trace where the call out of that office located their boss and go from there. Or trace the call coming in. Touton set all that in motion, then waited by his telephone. He waved off officers wanting to see him. For now, only this mattered. Two minutes later, Ciampini was back on the line.

  ‘On me you hang up, why?’

  ‘The phone slipped out of my hand. Look, I meant to offer you an incentive.’

  ‘You put me in a shit mood, hanging up.’

  ‘Calm down. Keep the girl safe and release her. That’s number one. My part, if I can get you the baseball, I’ll get you the bloody baseball. I know how much it means to you. You know how much it means to me. Remember, a cop died that night. I mention this to show how serious I am. I’ll get you the baseball if the girl’s released. Otherwise, it goes straight to New York City, to friends of yours. Relations. Cousins. Curious people like that.’

  Captain Touton hung up on him again. He wasn’t close to certain that he could deliver on a promise to return the baseball. At least, he had planted the thought that he was in possession of it, which might curtail any counteraction, stop Ciampini from hunting for it himself. Stop him from torturing Quinn to find out where it had gone. If he failed to deliver on the baseball, that might not be the end of the world – except that the girl, if freed, could be in jeopardy all over again.

  In a curious way, this was like the exploding ship at Dieppe that never actually exploded. A bold gambit either works or it fails. In either scenario, if a few unfortunate people get held captive for the duration, so be it. Though he’d prefer that the girl not be held captive for the duration. For this ruse to pan out – for the girl to be safe after her release, if she was to be released – he had to place his trust in Cinq-Mars, in whatever scheme the kid had in mind. If he himself, and the department, the courts, and others, had to pay a price, so be it. He’d been down that road.

  Not easy, to let go, to place one’s trust in a protégé. Was Émile Cinq-Mars ready? Had he been properly prepared? Could he pull this off? Did he really have a clue? Or was he still a naïve wide-eyed choirboy, a failed priest with a degree in animal husbandry, of all things, with a wild idea?

  Soon enough, they’d find out.

  The whole city would find out.

  The Rabbit slammed the door open so hard it smacked the side wall.

  ‘Her white ass! Out! I mean like now!’

  ‘What, are you talking to me?’ Ciampini snarled. He was unaccustomed to anyone telling him what to do. Partnership required an adjustment. Especially when your new partner was a psychopath. ‘Who you talking to?’

  ‘Your fault, Joe. We’re next.’

  ‘For what are we next?’

  ‘Dino’s! My place. That pimp cop from Mount Royal, Giroux, called it in. We’re next. I’m being fucking raided because of you, Joe. You make a fucking phone call to the police? What do you think? They don’t trace the call? They don’t look up the address? Fuck you!’

  ‘Take it easy. I’m taking her out.’

  ‘You take it fucking easy! This is my place. Get her ass out of here! Like right now. Out. Go!’

  The night was not progressing well for either man.

  Ciampini made a call, then beat it out of there in a big Chrysler.

  Quinn rode in the plush rear seat, behind the driver.

  Her hands were tied in front of her. Otherwise, she sat unbound.

  Ciampini rode in the back beside her.

  He poked a pistol into her ribs.

  ‘In case you get an idea. I like to put one in the gut first. Hit the liver, too. Unbelievable, the hurt from that. I watch them roll around in their pain. So much pain, so much blood. Then I finish them off. You don’t want that. It’s not so quick.’

  She had no argument.

  Instead, she asked, ‘Where are we going?’

  As if they were out on a date.

  ‘Don’t play smart with me,’ Ciampini warned her.

  And yet she believed that that’s what she had to do. Play smart. Or die young.

  The Airwaves

  (Pure virgin white)

  By mid-morning, the corridors of the municipal courthouse were a shamble. The press likened the situation to the aftermath of a riot. Many argued that the police were the rioters.

  Mafia lawyers fulminated over the airwaves. Judges, some rumored to be in their pockets, sympathized from lofty benches but could make neither
head nor tail of the night’s events. Were they experiencing an out-of-control police rampage? Or an orchestrated scheme to take down organized crime? To compound the confusion, dozens of crooks who’d been hauled in were released without a preliminary hearing, the charges evaporating, while line-ups for those waiting to be processed remained interminable. The entire system was befuddled, and then a shift-change complicated the chaos.

  The Mayor of Montreal, commonly an ally of Armand Touton’s and vice versa, turned on his office TV to listen to the pundits. His days were obsessed with preparing for the Olympic Games in a year’s time and nothing was going well. Unions stymied him daily and the mob took a cut of every action, particularly in the construction industries. In Montreal, no crime had become more lucrative than pouring concrete. Commentators who praised the crackdown in the early going were equal in number and intensity to those who railed against it. Both viewpoints found impassioned audiences, and a theory coalesced that the mayor was eviscerating the unions and the mob to save the Olympics. The idea interested him. He called in advisors to discuss how to take advantage of this fortuitous development.

  Emerging from his back-room lair, Ezra Knightsbridge responded to the bell above his pawnshop door as a tawdry youth who shouldered a backpack entered.

  ‘Solace in a dire time of need. If you seek that,’ Ezra told him, ‘travel elsewhere. Common sense says be fleet afoot, dear Leonard. Go away.’

  ‘Why?’

  The pawnbroker sighed with genuine weariness. ‘Am I too old for this?’ he asked while rubbing his eyelids. ‘Do I remain the only person in the trades who has not been vandalized by the authorities? One of their number did pay a visit. I was preyed upon. Others might soon ring my bell. Do you want to be here when they do? This is not a day for me to consort with persons such as yourself, or you with me. Today, you do not know me. I cannot know you.’

  ‘Such as myself?’ Leonard objected glumly.

  ‘Petty criminals. No slight intended. Did I not include myself? I am wary of my own company, Leonard. What will happen this evening? The Night Patrol is on a rampage. Not my desire to give them an excuse to glance my way. My lights will be off. Go in peace. We’ll talk when the mood becomes less ominous.’