Exile on Bridge Street

by Eamon Loingsigh

  With a great resemblance in the face to his cousin Sadie, he looks behind him at the ships at dock alongside the pier houses and the sailors awaiting the berth to no avail. Then looks down to his hands in his pockets. Down to his shoes.

  “Jesus, man,” yells a truck driver. “Are ya gonna just stand there? Where’s your men? Where’s anybody round here?”

  Placid eyes Darby turns to the driver. Behind the trucks he sees a youngster walking his way. One of Richie Lonergan’s. Matty Martin, coming closer.

  “Bill’s on a tear wit’ his buddy Flynn and ol’ man Lonergan,” Martin says. “You gotta run things ’til he comes back around.”

  “Come on. We’re still waitin’ here,” screams a deckhand from one of the barges behind Darby. “You bringin’ men’re what, kid?”

  In a monotone voice, Darby points over his shoulder to the ships, “You guys gonna help wit’ this?”

  “Richie wants me back watchin’ over Bill.”

  “There’s ten o’ ya watchin’ over ’em. Can’t you guys at least come an’ help?”

  “Sorry,” Martin said. “Richie’s younger brother died this morning so . . . ya know? I gotta be there for Anna . . . an’ her ma.”

  Darby nods his head, looks at Martin, “Bill know about Wolcott?”

  “Yeah, he quit,” Martin says walking away. “It’s in the papers. Don’ look good for us, I think.”

  “You seen Wisniewski an’ his boys?” Darby yells out to Martin’s back.

  “Nah, Wisniewski went wit’ Wolcott though, right?” Turning away the wind causes the stripling Martin to hold his hat and walk sideways, one hand in a pocket as he turns up Imlay Street and gone.

  “He’s leavin’? The kid’s leavin’?” a man yells from a truck. “Is he goin’ for men?”

  Darby looks toward Truck Row. Does not answer the man. He looks down as the gusts winnow the dirt and sand along the stretch of pavement at his feet. Separates the grains in a natural way into piles. Shaped by the wind. A funnel no larger than a man forms on a long sidewalk and steps down into the street sucking loose garbage and city debris into the air before feebly coming apart in front of Darby’s eyes.

  * * *

  TWO WEEKS AGO, WHEN BILL LOVETT learned Silverman had been murdered in a tailor shop, he’d gone into a frenzy. Darby Leighton did not know how to calm him. Lovett posted Joey Behan, James Quilty, and Frankie Byrne’s boys at the myriad entrances around Truck’s Row with weapons. Wisniewski had come with five warehousemen at Wolcott’s order too, and as much as could be accomplished, Red Hook had been shut down of any and all outsiders—including the throngs of Italians not allowed to work the docks.

  “No I-talians either,” Lovett said to his men while striding across their posts. “They can go down to the Bush Terminal. . . . No fookin’ ginzos ever.”

  Red Hook was sealed all the way down to the Erie Basin. Down to the Gowanus Canal, an impossible extension of waterfront terrain to defend consistently with the number of men at Lovett’s hand. But for the moment at least, anyone seeking passage through the streets were scrutinized, patted down, and their vehicle inspected at checkpoints. Still, it was the endless possibilities of invasion that drove Lovett’s excitement. If Meehan wanted to send killers for him, there were twelve entranceways to the northern terminal alone, not to mention the dozens of corridors and entryways along the tip of the hook and the streets leading to the canal. Then there was always the possibility that Meehan could hide one hundred men in the hull of a ship. Right in through the basin and bulkhead. This possibility drove Lovett to take great measures and every ship that threw a rope toward the Red Hook cleats and bollards was searched at gunpoint. Then there were the trucks.

  “How many men could hide in one truck?” Lovett asked Leighton and Lonergan. “In five trucks?”

  Before Darby could configure it, Lovett had gone off.

  At Lovett’s demand, Wolcott sent a couple Italian-speaking factory workers to the tailor shop on Union Street to find out who killed Silverman. They reported back that it was no more than “two white men.” The diminutive Italian tailor had kept silent under the questioning of his countrymen. But Lovett did not trust the Italians Wolcott sent. Did not believe they cared much for extracting information from a tailor who turned the questioning of him into a sales pitch for his wares.

  Within the boundaries, Lovett talked to every man on the perimeter six and seven times each and every morning. He checked his own gun even more, ensuring it was fully loaded and ready for war. Richie Lonergan limped behind Lovett everywhere he went with his right hand held deep in his pocket, holding his own piece. Darby Leighton there, too. Up to the ship captain to find out what was to be unloaded and how many men he would need, asking Abe Harms to check again the rest of the Lonergan crew to make sure they were keeping aware, meeting each man at his post and reminding them of the two white men that had shot Silverman in the face. Losing sleep himself, Lovett kept a round-the-clock notice and began showing fatigue in his red eyes.

  * * *

  ONE WEEK AGO LOVETT WAS TOLD that Garry Barry had been hospitalized and was expected to die. He found out from Maureen Egan off Hoyt Street that it was “four guys, one black.”

  “Gillen,” Lovett said to Darby. “Dance Gillen. Whitehanders. Killed Garry fookin’ Barry too? Shit.”

  Darby nodded, “He offered to kill Meehan so . . .”

  “I know the fookin’ reason why, for chrissake,” Lovett yelled at Darby’s face in front of the Egan girl. “We gotta double-down, got it?”

  “Yeah . . .”

  “Then let’s do it then,” Lovett screamed and started running back toward Red Hook to the south as Lonergan tried keeping up.

  Darby stood still watching them with a stoic stare, then turned to Maureen Egan, “Thank you.”

  Afterward, more men were taken from longshoremen and loading duties and posted on top of pier houses, in windows of empty tenement rooms and in the back of trucks with holes cut through the fabric. Wolcott provided more guns and more men and Wisniewski, Wolcott’s lone underling, had become entirely dedicated to protecting Red Hook from a similar donnybrook that had passed one year previous. Petey Behan and Timothy Quilty were given guns, which they shot into the choppy channel for giggles. Matty Martin, too, who accidentally shot down his own pant leg and took a flesh wound to the thigh.

  “Dimwits, fookin’ all o’ ya,” Lovett called them.

  It was taking twice as long to unload at the piers, which left ships at their anchor for hours at a time in the Basin. Clogged to the Buttermilk Channel even. Stacking to the north, the mouth of the East River was backed with steamers and barges along the anchorage, yet Lovett was hysterical about his war with Meehan. Fanatical in speculating on the next move of his opponent.

  “Why won’ he fookin’ hit us already?” Lovett would stamp about the Red Hook Terminal.

  “He might’ve made a deal wit’ the I-talians,” Darby said, but Bill had traipsed away.

  * * *

  FIVE DAYS AGO, DARBY LEIGHTON COULD smell alcohol on Bill Lovett’s breath in the morning. After hearing Darby explain what happened to Tanner Smith, Lovett was not able to think clearly and asked, “Why did that happen to Tanner? Thought they was close, them two.”

  “Tanner went to the ILA with the money Wolcott gave to Dinny to kill Carmody for a job wit’ ’em,” Darby said.

  Bill dug the crook of his hand into his eye, then looked Darby in the face, “If Non Connors was here, he’d help me. You. What the fook’re you? The better o’ you Leightons is up in Sing Sing wit’ Connors right now. Both put away by Dinny’s hand an’ you can’t even gimme a straight answer.” Then walked away and sat down at a table with Joseph Flynn, a childhood friend from Catherine Street, and poured a fresh beer from the keg that had been set up inside the Red Hook pier house. Lying next to him were three dogs that Lovett fed and cared for. Darby looked at the dogs as one of them lifted its leg and licked it’s own grommet intently.

  D
arby then looked at Richie Lonergan, then to Frankie Byrne. Between the three it was generally agreed, without a word exchanged, that Lovett was distancing himself.

  When a runner had come later in the day from Johnson Street about Tiny Thomas, Richie and his father left without telling anyone. Abe Harms followed as Lovett watched.

  * * *

  NOW, WITH HIS BACK TO THE Atlantic Basin, Darby Leighton watches the perimeter from Commercial Wharf where not even one man is posted. Lovett’s dogs trotting and smiling and wagging. Alone, he scans the empty entrances between the screaming of ship captains behind him and the screaming of automobile truck drivers ahead. Not even one Italian has shown for work in four straight days. For years they had shown every morning and every year more came and demanded work on the docks only to be run off.

  “An’ suddenly they don’ come?” Darby says aloud.

  Bill Lovett, too, had not been seen in Red Hook for two days.

  “Are you people gonna unload this shit or what?” says a man with a Greek accent walking toward Darby from the dock.

  By the end of the day, two of the five ships have moved north toward the Atlantic and Baltic terminals. Two more south toward the Bush Terminal while one waits for the next morning to see if anyone will show, as it has cargo that needs to be stored in a Red Hook warehouse.

  That night Darby sleeps on the dusty pier house floor next to an empty keg and table with two chairs. He is awoken by the voice of Bill Lovett and five others.

  “The fook ya doin’, Darby? Y’ain’ even watchin’ the entrances. . . . Richie?”

  “Richie ain’ here, Bill,” James Quilty says.

  “Oh yeah . . . Frankie?”

  “Yeah, Bill?” Byrne answered.

  “Man the posts, we gotta unload this ship out here.”

  Confused, Byrne looks at Darby, then leaves.

  “Let’s go Darby, for fuck’s sake,” Bill slurs.

  Walking out with Bill, Darby notices some twenty laborers lined up ready for work, but does not ask where they came from. Keeps his tongue. He immediately finds that a few of them look Italian, points at them, “Wops.”

  “Wha?” Bill says, turns round. “Never fookin’ learn, do yaz? Never learn, no fookin’ wops in Red Hook,” Lovett screams in the face of one man, then pushes another.

  On the deck of the ship above, a lone captain is looking down at the assembly of laborers. Counts the number of them with a finger.

  The Italian man that has just been screamed at looks down the line to his left, then nods. Looks down the line to his right, winks.

  “Il mio nome è Sammy de Angelo,” he says with a boasting, confident stare while pointing at his own chest. “Dis is our neighba’hood, so says Dinny Mee’an. Ora si muore.”

  Sammy de Angelo’s bubbly lips curl as he pulls from his coat a pistol and points it at Bill Lovett’s face, fires. Smoke plumes out from the gun as Lovett falls to the ground holding his head, blood leaking over his knuckles and inside the arm of his coat.

  Sammy de Angelo walks with a swagger and a proud, downturned mouth toward Lovett for another bullet to the brain. He is cocksure amidst the chaos as two other Italians jump out of the line with clubs and knives and beat upon Frankie Byrne’s crew and Joey Behan. All the rest scamper away, wanting nothing to do with the violence.

  “Ga’bye, Pulcinella,” de Angelo says to Lovett, but is tackled by Darby Leighton.

  Another shot and a plume of smoke comes from the brawling group below the ship captain on his deck. He watches the laborers struggle from his belly now, cannot know the difference between them. Who is good and who is bad, wrong and right he would not know.

  From the ground and the scuffling, Bill Lovett stands. The right side of his face and head immersed in blood. Stands quickly, his lips red, cheeks blossomed in a natural rouge, one floppy ear covered in a thick, maroon fluid. He wipes his mouth and spits within the struggle and jumps on the outstretched arm of Sammy de Angelo with his knees. Jumps on the arm that is holding the gun. Ripping it from the fingers, Bill shoots one of the Italians clubbing Joey Behan. Shoots him in the ribs from a very close range. The man looks at Bill gravely and begins running sideways toward Union Street, holding his lower trunk. By the time Bill has turned to the other side, another Italian is running off in a different direction toward the perimeter and the safety of tenements. Lovett throws the gun to the ground behind him and pulls out his own .45.

  Sammy de Angelo looks up to see his Pulcinella standing over him, blood running down the clown’s face and arm, teeth gritting and a terrific stare in his eye. Held by four men, de Angelo is then shown the .45 that is to rip the life out of him. With only seconds, Sammy lips his lone request in a soft whisper, “Save our souls.”

  Darby Leighton hears a deep crack in the air by his ear. Holding de Angelo down by the neck he watches, blinks his eyes as the head bursts. He feels the tension in the body of the man suddenly depart and go loose. He stands, almost losing his balance and looking at the stained pavement where once there was a face. Looks to Bill Lovett who is speaking to him, but he cannot hear a thing.

  CHAPTER 21

  Lonergans’ Tumult

  MAY, 1917

  IT’S A SUNDAY AT THE DOCK Loaders’ Club. Filled to overflowing, yet it’s a muffled crowd. And when the conversations move past the whispering, they are hushed by Paddy Keenan and others. Stilled to respect the occasion for grieving.

  Every man claimed by The White Hand has dressed himself in his cleanest togs on this day, if he has it. The regulars have a place on the bar while the rest spill outside onto the sidewalk and the street, though every man’s movements are gentle, somber. On their faces reside the promise of no faction fighting on this day, yet by the end of it that promise will wane. But for the moment they are shoulder to shoulder with their voices low. Soft sips of beer are pressed to lips in the morning’s mourning, for it’s at Dinny’s order the whiskey and home brew are under lock and key. I’d never seen the saloon so packed with sorrowful men, but with the war here now I’d see many more wakes and rites and processions. The passing of a child, though—it brings the heart out of us.

  The United States government has committed itself to the war in Europe, and so it needs to whip up support, fill the ranks. In the Navy Yard and outer neighborhoods we can hear the patriotic banding through the streets. Hovering over us, it seems. The age-old summoning. Even as we are busy at our ways. Gangs of firemen in their sashes and scepters and banners and brassy, out-of-tune horns and their puffed chests stamping a few blocks away in militant files, with elderly Civil War veterans egging them on. In the background we hear their soldiering with their snares a-rowdy-dow-dowing and their bass drums round the necks a-ploppety-plop-plopping. Though they mostly avoid our neighborhoods for fear of being pelted with stone confetti from the open-windowed mothers above warning them away from their little ones. Patrolmen, too, singing along and joined by army men to stick posters of recruitment on light posts, gluing them to brick walls, the old slogans and the glories of war.

  The papers can’t get enough of the frenzy of going “over there” and with all of it, even some of our own disappear off the docks without notice, enlisting quietly of their own will and slipping on Navy white or Army gray. And off they go to forever, as it’s to be a war that chews up the poor in great bunches yet again. Johnny gets his gun to go and kill the Hun in France for America at England’s gain while the quiet in Irishtown keeps, as long as Dinny Meehan is in charge.

  Next to The Lark and Big Dick at the bar, Red Donnelly looks at his union card, shaking his head. Henry Browne from the Navy Yard ILA at his side, holding his own.

  “My father was killed by a union man,” Red says. “Now look at me.”

  The Lark and Cinders Connolly consoling him from two sides.

  It is on the lips of every man in the murmurs of this Sunday morning. Banding with the ILA and making a deal with Italians to establish a border. Partitioning Red Hook; north for us, south for them. Some
say it is a contract exchanging the soul of us. That letting them cross the Gowanus Canal is a sign. An indication. Don’t see how we are to benefit from it, the gain for us too difficult to wrap heads around or ingest. Some even go on to say that it was the New York Dock Company and Wolcott’s plan all along, dividing our territory.

  “Five short years ago, pushin’ The Black Hand off the Red Hook brought us all together,” I hear one man whisper. “Now this.”

  “Sold us out,” another whispers. “Red Hook was always ours.”

  I sip from my beer, listening to the men.

  “Hoosh now,” Paddy tells them.

  And as the voices lower, I can hear in the distance the whining of bagpipes a few blocks off. Asking for us. Asking more of us. Providing a pedestal for our lonely souls to stand on and be cheered. And to take a bullet for America and England. And then the distant bands and run-tumming and thum-thumping drums are drowned out by a passing train above, ca-click ca-click ca-click and the rolling, thunderous swooshing acoustics over the East River we live with.

  “Hoosh hoosh, I say,” Paddy says to the rising voices as he pushes five or six froth-topped glasses across the mahogany. “A child’s passed fer Godsakes.”

  From the ceiling we hear the creaking of steps. The slow, ominous creaking of footsteps for which every single one of us turns our heads to look upward. We watch Dinny coming, boots first and surrounded by men on the stairwell. Among them are the faces of three I’ve never seen, and if I’m to heed the voices around me, then they are the witnesses the District Attorney will be calling on for the trial of Bill Lovett, who is charged with murdering Sammy de Angelo. One of the men looks moon-faced and from rumor I gather that there’s another witness recovering from a bullet in the ribs.