“Joseph,” he began, “I can’t take this not knowing. I think you should get out and start checking those casinos right now.”
“That’s not a good idea. Guys like that don’t show before sundown. Asking around now will just cause someone to tip them off. They’ll blow for sure, then we’ve got niente.”
“Yeah, but you might get the jump on them when they come in.”
I made a fist with my free hand. “I don’t want to get the jump on anybody. I want to watch them quietly and pick off whichever one I can, preferably Spazzo, when I get a chance. We’re trying to do this thing low profile, remember?”
“Well, my girl is still missing, remember?”
I gripped the phone a little tighter as my blood pressure came off simmer.
“Yes, I do. But these guys are a direct link. Let’s not screw the pooch here by being too anxious.”
“Anxious? Lilah’s missing, her girlfriend got deep-sixed, and these guys tried to clip you. Am I anxious? You’re damn right I am, Joe! I want her back.”
“Let me handle this thing. You sing, I fix shit—it’s been working. Let’s keep it that way.”
“Well, I already sent a few boys out.”
“What?” Now I was positively choking the orange handset as my pulse hit full boil.
“A couple of Johnny’s boys are at all their usual hangouts. You can check with them when you get to each place.”
“Roselli’s boys? Mobsters? Jesus H. Christ. Those idiots will blow the lid off this thing. They don’t fix things; they break things and kill people. I said send a man or two out, not an army of goons.”
“Hey, listen, she’s my girl. What are you—?”
“Goddamn it, Frank, this isn’t going to help. I’m out the door. I’ll make the rounds, but have Roselli call his dogs off. We do not want to blow this chance, okay? Good-bye.”
I banged the phone down in its cradle.
“Figlio della puttana!” I shouted out. “Why did he do that?”
I balled up both my fists and whacked the credenza a good one, the little pile of Camels spilling over both sides of the dish and rolling across the countertop.
I stewed for a whole ten seconds. Then I shifted gears—there just wasn’t time for hand-wringing or histrionics. I threw on the midnight-blue suit and the dark wingtips, strapped on the holster, and blew out of the room.
This time they gave me the Lincoln. Dark blue, black top. Straight eight, easy on the chrome. An evening car, as Frank might say, something to match the suit. I swear to God he probably called it that way. Him and his fucking rules.
I mashed the pedal leaving the parking lot, whipping the car onto Las Vegas Boulevard so hard that it skidded sideways a good two feet, my arm waving in the air like a lunatic as I tore off into the evening.
23
The Flamingo was my first stop. God only knows why I drove—it was right next door. But I was so bent about Frank calling in the goon squad I wasn’t thinking straight. It felt good to burn a little rubber anyway.
Keeping to the corners, I worked my way around the rooms. I didn’t really expect to see either guy, but hoped I might turn up something about them by chatting up a few dealers and bartenders. Five bucks well played can buy a surprising amount of information in Las Vegas and is a damn better bet than trying to fill an inside straight.
I pulled up a seat at the bar in the Tropical room and struck a Lucky. The bartender came over, said, “What’ll it be, son?”
His craggy, weathered face told a tale of long years in the desert sun, lots of busted plans, and too many ugly women. It was all there for the reading. But he looked like he might know a thing or two about Las Vegas, like he might have worked this bar for a few years, like he might have served Lewis and Clark somewhere along the way. I ordered a whiskey sour.
When he returned, he pushed the drink toward me and I threw a bill on the bar. I was halfway through the first word of my first question when a side of beef in a pale-blue sharkskin suit enveloped the chair next to me.
I gave the mauler the fish-eye, but I already knew who he was. I’d seen him before behind the scenes at some private affairs in town. He was muscle, worked for Roselli. Name of Sal or Nunzio or something.
I tilted my head, took in his dimensions. He was a good three hundred all the way—neck like a capstan, hands like hawsers. The mitts were tanned, gnarled, and folded together on top of the bar, one of them crowned by a pinky ring that checked in at maybe a pound and a half. Subtle.
He gave me a knowing look, rasped, “Joe Bones,” in a voice like gravel in a cement mixer.
I looked up, waited until Methuselah walked away toward the cash register, then acknowledged him.
“Yeah. Got anything?”
“They ain’t been in all day. Usually come in around ten. Like to show off at the craps table.”
No shit, they haven’t been in. It’s six p.m. I grimaced internally, said, “Thanks. Drink?”
“Blatz.”
I signaled the tender, called out the order.
“You guys pick anything up, I’ll be at the Frontier next. Or call the Sands, leave a message with Jack E. I’ll get it.”
I wasn’t going to ask the barman any questions now, not with Tony Galento next to me. It was just too obvious. I tossed back the whiskey, threw down another buck, said, “See ya.”
He nodded. I got up and walked out of the bar, cursing Frank Sinatra out loud.
* * *
The Tropicana was more of the same. I played some craps, made some small talk, ventured a few questions. Got nothing. Lost twenty bucks, too. Next to the slot machines I saw a couple of Outfit boys having drinks together. When I walked by, I nodded at one of them. He shrugged, mouthed the word nothing, and went back to his story.
Around seven, I headed over to the Dunes. Things were still fairly slow. I talked to a couple of blackjack dealers, got my twenty dollars back, made ten more. No one from Roselli’s crew showed his face. I hoped that meant those hounds had finally been kenneled.
On my way out, I bumped into a guy coming through the door. He was Oriental, but other than that, looked like just another Vegas tourist, right down to his Stacy Adams shoes. I said I was sorry and started to move on. The guy gave me the once-over, however, when I apologized. I took another step then looked back.
He was still standing there, looking at me. I didn’t know him from Stacy or Adam, so I left. He was going to have to start a fight with somebody other than me tonight. Must have been related to the guy at the Chinese laundry—what was it with these Asian guys all having a hard-on for me lately?
Next I tried the Stardust. I learned, to my relief, that Mr. Raspiller would not be in that evening. In fact, he was off all week. I didn’t get anything else on Carmine or Johnny other than a few employees saying they knew them. I waited around, caught a show. I waited around some more, then gave up.
I got in the car and drove a little. I knew that the whole night was a prick-pull, but I decided to hit the Flamingo once more. Along the way I stopped at a pay phone and called the Sands because I was still too pissed to speak with Frank. Jack said he had reported “No news” thirty minutes earlier. I slammed the phone down in frustration, then punched the brick wall it hung on. That hurt. I decided I wouldn’t do it again.
* * *
Back at the Flamingo, I stopped in the dining room for a cup of coffee. I dropped down onto a stool, lit a smoke, and reached over for the newspaper on the countertop. It was the evening edition. I grabbed the front section and snapped it flat, then said, “Fuck me,” under my breath.
In block type above the fold the headline cried out: “Local Jeweler Shot to Death!” A picture of Murray Fine accompanied it. I ran my fingers through my hair, let a deep breath out, and read the story.
Mr. Fine had been found dead in the back of his store with two bullet wounds in his back. The front door was unlocked and no jewelry or money was missing so robbery was not a motive. The police had no suspects, but a tal
l, dark man in a beige suit who left the area in a late-model Cadillac shortly after shots were fired was listed as a possible suspect. His identity was as of yet unknown.
The shooter’s rounds must have penetrated the wall behind me and caught Fine as he turned away from the door. Tough break; he probably didn’t have anything to do with Ratello and Spazzo, even if he was a bit of a weasel.
I folded the paper and put it on the counter with the story facing down, shaking my head in disbelief. Odds were ninety-nine to one in favor of Ratello and Spazzo being long out of town. Funny thing about wiseguys, they’re usually pretty caught up on the local news from killing time watching TV in bars. They would’ve known. I should’ve, too.
I decided I should get myself the hell out of town as well. Vegas was a dead end now anyway—for me and Murray Fine. I stubbed out my cigarette, eased off the stool, and headed for the front doors. I made a final, futile glance for Carmine and Johnny, then walked out of the casino into the neon night.
* * *
Dejection gnawed at me as I headed for the Sands. I’d connected Ratello and Spazzo to the case but I didn’t know what their in was or where they’d gone, and I still had no idea where Helen was. Oh, yeah, I was wanted for another murder now, too.
I parked in front of the hotel, tossed the keys to the valet, then headed upstairs to gather my things. From the ruins of the pyramid I scooped up several Camels and put them in my pocket. They still smelled fresh—it probably would’ve made the evening newspaper, too, if they weren’t.
Twenty minutes later I spun the number one engine on the DC-3. Four minutes after that, I pulled the old bird into the sky as runway 1 fell away below in the dark, the lights of the strip blazing beneath me as I pitched up into the night sky and rolled into a thirty-degree bank to the west.
I’d pretty well crapped out in Vegas, but I did get two new suits out of the deal. At least they’d have something nice to bury me in after the hanging.
24
It was just after eleven when I touched down in Long Beach. I whipped the Gooney Bird around in front of the hangar and cut the motors. Down the ramp a ways, several huge DC-6s sat silently in the dark. They were slumbering elephants now, but I knew they’d be waking up for night hauls within an hour.
I turned my key in the lock, pushed my hangar door open, and stepped into the oil-soaked darkness. A pull on the light chain threw a pale yellow circle on the floor, enough to lead to the office area in the far corner. I made my way across the hangar toward it, my heels clicking emptily on the concrete as I walked.
Once inside the room, I snapped on the lamp, powered up the radio on the invoice-layered desk, and spun the dial until it locked on Cannonball Adderley. That was a start. Surveying the various bottles of hooch that adorned an otherwise empty shelf, I decided I was a little long on Old Overholt. I poured some into a paper cup from the water cooler and ambled over to the carpeted “living room” Roscoe and I had set up against the far wall, pausing along the way to spark up the cigarette I’d stuck between my lips.
I dropped into the ridiculously out-of-place Eames recliner that Frank had given me, put my feet up, and threw back a swallow of the rye. Its smooth fire burned just right with the cool rush from the Camel. I closed my eyes and pulled some smoke in.
Helen had been missing for two days. Her girlfriend was dead and somebody had tried to send me over today, too. Forty-eight hours earlier I was a guy jocking boxes around for good money and hanging out with Frank Sinatra for laughs. All I’d done was give some girl a lift as a favor to a friend and I’d been ducking haymakers ever since. I never even heard the opening bell.
I blew the smoke out and drained the cup. “Goddamn you, Helen Castano,” I said. “What the hell are you doing to me?”
25
I sat there for a long while trying to make the pieces fit, playing back the events from Sunday night forward in my mind, searching for some clue to where Helen might be or what might have taken place. Nothing clicked.
I’m close, she had said. Come get me, baby … Come to where? Close could be anywhere in Southern California: Los Angeles, Hollywood, Burbank, Santa Barbara. Where?
I poured another slug of the whiskey, leaned back in the chair thinking, thinking.
* * *
Her face came to me slowly, in soft focus. There was fear in her eyes, but also faith.
“Helen,” I said, “tell me where you are. I’ll come to you.”
Yes, I know you will.
The background looked vaguely familiar, shapes moving in rhythm behind her. There might have been a note of music. A trace of recognition dawned on me. She smiled at me then.
Yes, Joe, now you know. I’ll be—
Something ground in my ears. A faint scuffling sound—a shoe on concrete, then the ca-chuk of the light chain. I awoke with a start, staring into the dark depths of the hangar, the empty paper cup falling from my hand.
A shadow stirred in the darkness. I struggled to focus on it—then detected rapid motion near the shape. I flung myself clumsily to the side and out of the recliner as something whooshed past me and thudded home in the chair back. I made out another shape moving toward me as I hit the concrete.
My holstered gun lay on the desktop, maybe ten feet away. I rolled once, then sprang up and lunged for the weapon as phantoms closed in on me from the dark.
I got to the holster and ripped the .45 free. As I swung my arm toward the emerging shapes, something barreled into me at high speed, propelling me into the desk, the impact launching the gun into the air.
It was a man, thin but powerful. We hit the floor together, along with the swivel chair, the lamp, and the radio. I felt a sharp pain as a blow landed on my neck, then another on my shoulder.
In the half-light I could see now that there were two men, one pinned to my side by my arm and another raining blows on me from above. I threw my forearm up, blocking another strike with my right arm while holding the other man tightly around the neck with my left.
The standing man got too close in the scrum and I snapped a leg out toward him, clipping him right in the crank. He dropped with an ooof, just as the other attacker slithered out of my grasp and slipped on top of me.
It was a good move, but I was a light-heavy and he was a welterweight all the way. He struck me a glancing blow on the cheek before I rolled and tossed him clear. Even in the blind confusion I was beginning to draw a bead on who I was up against—and didn’t like it one bit.
A high-pitched “Haiiiiiiii” cut through the air behind me as I rose to one knee. I grabbed the upended swivel chair, then spun and swung it in one motion at the wiry man bounding toward me like a frenzied panther. I caught him flush in the chest, smacking that cat yowling over a workbench.
Then the other assailant struck me in the back with what had to be a karate kick. I staggered forward, lost my balance, and fell down, rolling onto my back as I landed.
He was upon me in an instant. As he dove down, I coiled my legs, grabbed his wrists, and kick-flipped him over my head into the wall ten feet away. He hit hard and rattled down in a heap.
There was a creak at the far end of the hangar, and then I saw that the first attacker was at the door and already slipping through. I leaped up, reaching for the one in the corner, but he lashed out with a quick foot-sweep and tripped me. By the time I scrambled up, he was already halfway gone. I’d only made a few strides when he reached the door and thrust himself through it.
Outside there was a muffled thump. A half second later his limp body flew backward into the room and accordioned to the floor, out cold. I stood there, slack jawed in the dim light, wondering what to expect next.
Then the glowering face and cocked right fist of Roscoe Montgomery appeared in the doorway, demanding, “Just what in the hell is going on here, Buonomo?”
26
Roscoe Montgomery was my partner in Nighthawk Aviation, the freight company we formed after several years of beating each other’s brains out competing for the s
ame customers. It wasn’t that tough of a decision since we’d always been friendly rivals and shared some common history, having both been fighter pilots during the war.
The similarities stopped there, though, since I was Navy and Roscoe flew for the Army Air Corps’s 332nd Fighter Interceptor Group. And whatever my issues had been, I always knew that I’d served a nation that respected me and was grateful for my service. Roscoe had volunteered knowing full well that America and the U.S. Army didn’t give a damn about him or any other Negro servicemen, regarding them as too dumb, too lazy, or just too unskilled to be of any value to the military.
During the last six months of 1944, nine German pilots had found out in the hardest way possible that Roscoe Montgomery was neither too dumb, nor too lazy or too unskilled, to man a P-51 Mustang in combat. He was brave, tenacious, and unflappable, and he had bailed me out of jams on more than one occasion. A guy could do a lot worse for a partner.
We stood there together a moment and looked down at the unconscious Asian man at our feet.
“Someone you shot down who’s got an ax to grind?” he asked with a smirk.
“No, much worse I’m afraid. Close the door quick, he’s got a partner who might be back.”
“I don’t think so. That little man tore out of here like he’d met the devil in this hangar,” Roscoe said, lowering his eyes just a little, giving me that dubious glance of his.
“He’s running in bad luck today—he got me instead. Step back out of the light, buddy, I have to see something.”
I bent down toward the battered little man, lifted his right arm, and pushed back the sleeve of his tailored suit coat. The one thing in the whole world I least wanted to see at that moment was etched in green on the inside of his forearm: a tattoo of a phoenix and the Chinese characters for integrity, wisdom, and honor. The markings of the Ching Hwas.
In truth, the Ching Hwas had none of these attributes, but that didn’t make them any less dangerous or stop them from being a never-ending pain in my ass.
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