Tales of River City

by Frank Zafiro

“What, you think I don’t know business? Who you think you’re talking to?”

  “I know, Uncle Angelo. I know.”

  “You know? Then why you think you gotta tell me these things?”

  “I’m just sayin’, is all.”

  “You’re just sayin’. Give me a break.”

  I resisted the urge to sigh. I knew he was going to make me do it. “I’m just tryin’ to be careful, is all. I got no protection out here. The cops are clean for the most part. And I got hardly anything in the way of muscle.”

  “So hire.”

  “I’d love to. But I can’t afford it. I haven’t even found a guy to replace Isaac.”

  “That the kid that got pinched?”

  “Yeah.”

  “He make it down under?”

  Six feet under, I thought, remembering the pistol in my hand. I wiped a sweaty palm across my slacks. We drove out to the Bowl and Pitcher Park near the river and sent him to hell. Just because he might turn. “Yeah, I heard he did,” I said.

  “How hard is it to replace one guy?”

  “He was smart,” I explained. “Muscle isn’t so hard to find. It’s brains that are in low supply.”

  “Here, too,” Angelo sympathized. “It’s a friggin’ epidemic, stupidity. Some days I think all I have are baccalá around this place.”

  “I hear ya. I got morons here, too.”

  Angelo sniffed in a breath. I imagined him straightening his silk tie as he spoke. “Listen, Dommie,” he said. “I need you to square this, aw’right? This Madeline out there with this problem, she’s the little cousin to my goomah Gabriella, you know? This Gabby, she’s bustin’ my balls when she should be…you know what I mean?”

  I sighed. His mistress. Great. “I’ll take care of it.”

  “You’re a good boy,” he told me and broke the connection.

  I stood up from my small desk off of the restaurant kitchen, shaking my head. I gotta jump through hoops so that Uncle Angelo can continue to get his weasel greased? Wonderful. I walked through the kitchen and out the back door. I stepped on the cloned cell phone, breaking it. Then I tossed the pieces into the dumpster.

  I met Madeline at her apartment. Only the picture postcard of a crystal ball taped under the peephole distinguished her door from the others in the complex.

  “Oh, Christ,” I mumbled, and knocked. This was just what I needed—some kooky broad to protect. Like women weren’t crazy enough already, I gotta deal with one who claims to speak to the dead and know things by magic?

  The lock rattled and she swung open the door. I saw immediately why Uncle Angelo would be after her cousin, if they looked anything alike. She had volumes of flowing black hair and huge round eyes. Follow that up with a nice rack and plenty of curves and it ain’t so hard to figure why I got a call from Jersey.

  She smiled. “Hi. I’m Maddie. And you’re Dom.”

  She said it like I was supposed to be impressed that she knew. Like some other large Italian from Jersey would be knocking on her door, but she knew it was me. Psychic, right?

  “Mind if we talk inside?” I asked her.

  She nodded and stepped aside.

  The outside of the apartment may have looked like all the others, but the inside was another thing entirely. Crystals were everywhere. Some of them hung by fishing line from the ceiling. Candles flickered next to little figurines on most of the shelves. A couple of chairs in the living room and a table draped in a purple cloth stood in the corner. And no lie, she had a crystal ball on the table.

  I rubbed my nose and sat down without being asked.

  “Would you like some coffee?” she asked. “Or some herbal tea?”

  “No, I’m good. But we need to talk, so sit down.”

  She walked past me, her flowing blue dress rippling in the air. Some blonde hair and she could be Stevie Nicks. I caught a whiff of jasmine perfume in her jetwash. I ignored that and the sway of her ass. This woman was nothing but trouble, I figured.

  She sat down and crossed her legs. Her expression remained open, except for the small tension lines at the corners of her mouth. I wondered if her cousin had called and gave her certain expectations.

  “Let’s get something straight,” I told her. “I don’t believe in this voodoo mumbo jumbo you’re selling here. I don’t care that you make a buck at it, but let’s not fool each other that it’s not a scam, aw’right?”

  Her smile collapsed into a scowl. “What I do is not a scam. I am a medium. I commune with the spirits of the dead. Just because you don’t understand—”

  I waved her words away. “Drop it, sister. We both know how it works. You get weak-minded people in here, read them cold and tell them what they want to hear. It’s easy, because they want to believe it anyway. On top of that, you’re nice lookin’, so the con job goes down easier.”

  She stared at me. “Why are you being so…mean?”

  I chuckled darkly. “Little girl, you ain’t seen the beginning of mean.”

  Genuine fear flashed in her eyes, but she covered it up pretty quick. You gotta be some kind of actress in her line of work, I guess.

  I leaned forward. “I’m here as a favor to my uncle. But don’t think that makes you some kind of goomah-in-law or whatever. I’ll help you out, but you gotta do what I say.”

  She nodded slowly. “Okay.”

  “And it ain’t free, neither,” I said.

  “You want me to pay you? But Gabriella said—”

  “What Gabriella said don’t much matter,” I told her. “What I say does. Now, I’ll help you out with this problem or whatever, but we’re going to come to an agreement. This is business.”

  She regarded me carefully. “What agreement?”

  “Nothing extravagant. Twenty percent.”

  She fingered one of the long silver necklaces that hung from her neck. “Of what?”

  “Of everything,” I said. “But I’ve got a cop that’ll keep the fraud unit off your back. And I’ll steer you some business, too. You’ll probably come out ahead.”

  She pursed her lips. Then she asked, “How about ten percent?”

  “This ain’t no negotiation. It’s twenty.”

  She bit her lip, then sighed. “All right.”

  “Good.” I picked up one of the small figurines and leaned back in the chair, examining it. “Tell me about this problem, then.”

  She watched the crystal in my hand with disapproval. “It’s the Gypsies.”

  I shrugged. “So?”

  “They’ve got a spiritual business, too. Palm reading, Tarot cards, and medium work.”

  “Along with about four used-car lots,” I said. “And a whole lotta fencing.”

  “I wouldn’t know about that. But when they saw my ad in the newspaper, the madam and her goons came to see me.” Her eyes teared up. “They threatened me.”

  I suppressed a yawn. If this was a straight-up muscle job, it’d be finished in a day. Not bad, when you include a new revenue stream opening up in the bargain.

  “They wanted you to stop scamming?”

  She pressed her lips together at the word, but nodded. “The old woman told me that if I didn’t give up the business, I’d end up dead.”

  “You go to the cops?”

  She looked surprised. “Are you kidding?”

  “No. Why?”

  “It’s just that a guy like you…I wouldn’t think you’d suggest going to the police.”

  “Cops have their uses sometimes,” I said.

  “What could they do here?”

  I shrugged. “Probably not much. But just reporting it might solve the problem. Maybe a cop goes and talks to them. Now they know the cops know, so they can’t touch you without being suspects.”

  She considered, then shook her head after a moment. “That doesn’t sound too foolproof.”

  “It ain’t a force field or nothin’, but it might work.”

  “It’s not enough,” she said. “I’d rather know for sure that they’ll leave me alone.�
��

  “You mean you can’t see that shit in your crystal ball?”

  She shot me a glare.

  I laughed and let myself out.

  I figured who better to deal with Romanians than a Russian, so I went to see Valeriy Romanov. Val and I were in the same line of work. Sometimes we’d help each other, if the price was right. Since I knew the Gypsies ran some car lots and that Val dealt in hot cars, I figured there might be a connection.

  I found him in his small Russian coffee shop, where he usually spent most afternoons. I didn’t know if he owned the shop or not, though it helped me to have the restaurant. A legit business made not-so-legit business easier to hide. Val sat reading the newspaper and sipping from a small cup.

  “That Pravda?” I asked, sliding into the seat across from him.

  He looked up and extended his hand, unsurprised as always to see me. “Does not matter. News is same everywhere. Americans, they like to think they are so different from rest of world, but is not so. Only difference is who pulls strings.”

  “Guys like you and me?”

  Val laughed. “Maybe. But even we are small fish, nyet?”

  “Medium fish,” I said, and smiled at my own inside joke.

  Val raised his hand in the air and snapped his fingers. “Katya! Bring coffee!”

  A thin woman with dishwater blond hair and Slavic features slid a small cup of coffee in front of me. I didn’t want any coffee, especially not the Russian blend Val drank, but I didn’t argue. I thanked her.

  When she walked away, Val spoke. “So you come see me I think for business, nyet?”

  “Yeah.” I sipped the harsh coffee and leaned forward. “I might need your help with the Gypsies.”

  The corners of his mouth turned down. “What kind help you need?”

  “You have any dealings with them?”

  He shook his head. “Nichego.”

  I raised my eyebrows. “Really? I’d have figured you to be in business with them.”

  “As I say, nichego. Nothing.” He tapped the ashes from his cigarette into the small ashtray. “Why you think this?”

  “They have car lots. You deal in cars. I figured it was a natural fit.”

  Val regarded me without responding. I met his gaze evenly, sipping at the strong coffee and grimacing.

  “You no like?” he asked.

  “Just a bit stronger than I usually drink it.”

  “It is from Turkish blend. You know what Turks say about coffee?”

  I shook my head.

  “Black as hell, strong as death, sweet as love,” he quoted.

  “Well, this stuff is the first two.”

  He smiled and took a sip himself. When he set the cup down, he leaned in toward me and gestured for me to do the same.

  I leaned forward. His breath was sour with coffee and cigarettes, but his voice was cold and deadly. “I think maybe we don’t talk so much about what business I do. Is safest that way.”

  I sat back and shrugged. “That’s fine. But I figured your people had a history with the Gypsies, too. Maybe you can influence them, even if you don’t do business.”

  Val shook his head. “These Gypsies are Romanian, nyet?”

  “Hell if I know. But your people had the whole of Eastern Europe under your heel for fifty years. I figure maybe some of that held over.”

  “Romanians always trouble, even for Soviet government.” Val took a deep drag off his cigarette and stubbed it out. “Sometimes when we have military exercise, Romania not even show up. Even the men like you and me, in that country they are difficult to deal with.”

  “So you can’t help me?”

  “Sure I help you,” he said. “You pay, I help. But I can offer nothing special just because I am Russian and they are Romanian.”

  “I don’t need muscle. I got that. I need influence.”

  “And I no have that. Not with the Gypsies.” He shrugged. “Kak zhal’. I am sorry.”

  I reached out and patted his hand. “Another time, perhaps.”

  “Of course.”

  I stood to leave.

  “Dom?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Do not underestimate them.”

  “I won’t.”

  Val watched me for a second. “I hope not.”

  “I won’t,” I repeated, and left.

  I made a call to my cop.

  “I don’t control the fraud detectives,” he complained.

  “At least keep an eye on the apartment,” I said.

  “That’s not even on my side of town.”

  “Just do what you can, all right?” I shook my head. “Jesus, what do I pay you for?”

  “I’ll try.”

  The Gypsy “storefront” was up in Hillyard, a rough section of River City. Smack in the midst of a residential neighborhood, a statue of some saint stood in the middle of a yard next to a large sign that advertised palm readings, tarot readings, and communion with the spirits.

  I parked up the street a couple of houses away and sat in my car, thinking. This still seemed like a straight-up muscle job to me, but it was times like this that I missed Isaac. The kid had been smart. A little strategy was a good thing. It made matters go smoothly and prevented unnecessary violence. Violence worked, but it could be bad for business, too. It wasn’t like I was making a ton of money as it was. I couldn’t afford for things to go sideways.

  After a few minutes, I realized I wasn’t going to come up with a better plan, so I got out of the car and walked to the converted house. As I passed the statue, I could see that it was a woman. Fresh flowers lay at her feet.

  A bell rang as I swung the front door open and again when I closed it behind me. The smell of incense hung in the air. The living room was laid out almost the same way as Madeline’s. Where Madeline’s layout seemed contrived, things in here seemed more natural to me. Older. More real.

  A small shiver ran across my shoulder blades. The hair on the back of my neck and forearms tickled and stood on end. Madeline was a fake, for sure, but maybe this old Gypsy had something real going on. Hell, there were stranger things in the world and—

  I shrugged away the thought. All that was going on here was that these people were better at theater than Madeline.

  The sound of clacking beads announced the arrival of the madam.

  She was a tiny woman in a simple, dark purple dress. The lines in her face spoke of wisdom but not yet old age. She wore her iron-gray hair pulled back into a tight bun. Long silver necklaces with charms hung around her neck, clicking and clacking as she approached.

  Her open expression faded into suspicion as she drew close. “What do you want?” she asked, her tone guarded.

  “Maybe I want my palm read,” I said.

  She shook her head. “No,” she said. “You want something else.”

  “How do you know?”

  She ignored my question. “Say your piece,” she commanded. “I have work to do in the back.”

  I was already tired of this spooky bitch. “Fine. I’m here to ask you to lay off Madeline.”

  “The şarlatan in the apartments?”

  “Call her whatever. Just leave her be. There’s plenty of business here in town for the both of you.”

  The madam crossed her arms and gave me a disapproving stare. “Are you finished?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “If you’re going to leave her alone, then yeah. Otherwise…”

  “Otherwise what?”

  I shook my head. “Let’s not find out.”

  She shook her head back. “You do not know who you are dealing with.”

  “Maybe not,” I said. “But then, neither do you.”

  She smiled secretively. “I know more than you think.”

  “Whatever.”

  “I know how you will die, Dominic.”

  I paused. The certainty in her voice hung in the room like a scent.

  “How’d you know my name?”

  She smiled and said nothing.

&nbs
p; “Fine,” I snapped. “You know so much, how you figure I’m gonna die?”

  “Alone,” she whispered. “An old man, alone and frightened.”

  “No one can tell the future.” I waved my hand dismissively with more confidence than I felt. “Look, there’s more than enough suckers around town for both of you to make a living. Just let her be.”

  She drew herself up. “I cannot.”

  “Can’t? Or won’t?”

  “Both,” she answered. “For my nephews, it is a matter of money. They will not allow someone else to cut into our business. For myself, I can not allow a şarlatan to bring disrepute and dishonor to true spiritual guides.”

  Her eyes flashed when she spoke about the honor of her trade.

  “Come on,” I said. “Cut the act. I understand about the money, but don’t try to sell me on this other crap. If it’s a financial matter, I can maybe get you ten percent of her take—”

  “Crap?” she asked, almost spitting the word. “Do you tell the priest at your church that his service is crap?”

  “That’s different. Besides—”

  She held up her hand. “We are finished here. You may go.”

  I sighed. “I really hoped we could work something out.

  Otherwise—”

  “Otherwise perhaps you will drive me out to the woods near the river and bury me?”

  I froze.

  “What?” I whispered, my mouth dry.

  She smiled knowingly. “Go. And never bother me again.”

  “What did you just say?” I said hoarsely. Waves of cold washed past my face and down to my toes.

  “Leave!”

  The sound of footsteps filled the room. Three men surrounded me.

  “What is it, mătuşă?”

  The madam’s eyes drifted to my right. “Nothing, Dragos. This gentleman was just leaving.”

  I tore my eyes from the small woman and met the gaze of each man, letting them know they didn’t scare me. Then I turned and walked out of the house.

  I cast a quick glance at the white statue in the yard before I hurried to my car.

  Back at my restaurant, I sat in the office and mulled things over. I still couldn’t see where this was anything other than a straight muscle job. A little pressure and the Gypsies ought to break. I wondered if I should hit the madam’s house or one of the car lots.