Light of the Diddicoy

by Eamon Loingsigh

  “He’s wit’ me, not to worry,” Dinny answers.

  I quickly learn that a handshake is not needed for my introduction and though he has an Englishman’s accent, I can see that he pretends to be more of a snob than his American background suggests.

  “Jolly good then, let’s have a seat, shall we? And how are you, Mr. Gilchrist, still counting those numbers in your head?” he asked at first with a genuine smile, then finished his sentence in a mocking tone.

  “Yeah,” Lumpy says innocently.

  “Have you ever seen one of these, Edward?”

  The fat man points with ruling class pride to a machine sitting on a table behind his large desk, “It is a thing of the future, surely. It is called a Dalton Adding Machine, Edward. It does all the work for you. All you have to do is type in the numbers and it regurgitates the answer for you. Isn’t it a smash?”

  Gilchrist looks with interest at the machine’s black and green body where thirteen little push-button fingers stick out with black and red pads on them. He then looks up at the fat man as if he’s been spooked.

  “Don’t be scared of it Edward, it couldn’t harm a fly,” the fat man then points to the seat he wants Gilchrist to sit in. “Good, then,” he bellows while rubbing his soft fingers together. “Mr. Swede, how are you, sir?”

  No answer.

  “Always a delight, how about you, Vincent?”

  “I’m fine, thank you, sir,” Maher replies.

  “How does a Mick get a name like Vincent anyhow, can you say?” The fat man laughs aloud. “I am kidding, you know. Surely you do. . . . Must have something to do with being a papist, how would I know anyhow?”

  Vincent’s face turned from respectful to confused, but the man walked right past him and continues his talking.

  “Come sit down fellows. Over here, we have some chairs for everyone.”

  Behind the fat man is a large window with a view of the Atlantic Basin and masses of ships docked next to each other on the piers. Behind the basin in the distance across the Buttermilk Channel is Governor’s Island where warships dock. At the front and center of his desk among neatly organized and polished trinkets I notice a gold-rimmed rectangular name plate:

  JONATHAN G. WOLCOTT VI

  VICE PRESIDENT, WAGE AND LABOR

  NEW YORK DOCK CO.

  “Mr. Meehan, is there truth to the rumor that you no longer will allow cranes to operate in some territories?” Wolcott asked. “There is a lot of money in those cranes. I will have you know.”

  “I’ve seen men get kill’t,” Dinny said. “A man got kill’t at the Baltic Terminal not long ago ’cause the boom hit ’em in the head. As far as I see it, men need jobs. Not cranes. Cranes don’ have kids.”

  “Mr. Meehan,” Wolcott said, sitting forward. “I have always seen you as a man of some intelligence. You know that. Mr. Swede? He knows that, doesn’t he, Mr. Swede? But I think you may have a touch of the Luddite in you.”

  “What the hell is that?” The Swede demanded.

  “Luddite? It means he doesn’t approve of change, Mr. Swede. New things? Technology?”

  “The more things change, the more they stay the same,” Dinny mumbled.

  “Oh, how dreadfully obvious an allusion. And I shall say, that mentality is going to get you in trouble, dear sir,” Wolcott said, then leaned back and showed a sarcastic frustration. “Oh, the whole lot of you then too, I dare say. May I tell you of a trip I only just weeks ago made? To a place called Japan, have you heard of it Mr. Meehan?”

  Dinny refused to answer.

  “Well then, I promise to make it brief, while at holiday on that most intriguing island nation, I noticed there lived a subgroup among them . . . Below the very dignified culture of the Japanese. Yes, subgroup we can call them. They are considered clever thieves. And I may venture, that’s what you are as well, Mr. Meehan and here is what so reminded me of your own, eh . . . community I suppose one could name it. Stealing from those who work and earn for their livings. From people like me. Living off the hard work of others, they do. With a great cunning. Just like you and your band of tinkers, Mr. Meehan. So clever you are, in fact, I allow myself to indulge in some sort of friendship ritual with you, don’t I? Yes. Even paying you for services, hither and yon. For services you should be doing on your own. Very clever indeed. This Japanese subgroup are violent too. And unbearably fertile, as similarities go. For the Japanese ruling class, they too have a similar fate as the American, eh . . . ‘swells,’ to use your diction. True it is impossible to even consider any form of eradication. Not only due to the disgusting fertility rates, but because people are infatuated, even fascinated with your evil practices and trickery and transience. Fascinated why? Oh I believe people appreciate the base in all of us as entertaining.”

  “What type o’ yokes are they?” Vincent Maher asked, interested.

  “The Saru.”

  “Saru?”

  “Yes, Saru. Thieving bands of primates. They are better known as macaques.”

  The Swede looked at Dinny, then back at Wolcott. “You’re tryin’ to be like that on purpose. Why don’ ya talk straight’n quit wastin’ time.”

  “Well Mr. Swede, I will speak bluntly then. They are not human at all, this subgroup. Have I not clarified this already? My mistake then. Snow monkeys! My dear Mr. Swede,” Wolcott boomed with a snide turning of the nose. “They are commonly known as snow monkeys. Now, may I ask a rather important question? Mr. Meehan? Have you ever heard of a man named Thos Carmody?”

  No answer.

  “I am certain you have,” Wolcott said, sitting back in his chair. “Mr. Carmody . . . well. May I speak frankly? I will. Mr. Carmody is a man I would like dead. Will you, please Mr. Meehan, will you look at my face? Thank you then. I would like him dead, is that at all unclear?”

  “Who’s Thos Carmody?” Maher asked dumbly.

  “Thos Carmody is antibusiness,” Mr. Wolcott answered quickly. “He does not want stevedoring companies to supply jobs to you and your people, Mr. Meehan. He wants to tell us how to run our business. Indeed, he aspires to put you out of business, Mr. Meehan. I can promise you that. A promise. But still, Thos Carmody is alive.”

  “Yeah, and?” The Swede said.

  “You were born on the West Side of Manhattan, is this true, Mr. Meehan?”

  Dinny nodded as he watched Wolcott weave through his strategic presentation.

  “Why don’t you ask your people over there who Thos Carmody is?”

  “Why don’ you save us a trip?” The Swede barked.

  “Thos Carmody is the muscle behind the International Longshoreman’s Association, Local 856. He struts up and down Chelsea and the Hell’s Kitchen docks behind the likes of King Joe Ryan with a big stick, Dinny. He kills morale, he kills strike-breakers, he kills profits, and he kills business, and guess where my people saw him just three days ago, Mr. Meehan? Would you care to guess?”

  “Where?” Maher asked.

  “Sackett Street, here in Brooklyn,” Wolcott said, leaning back in his chair and fingering a long cigar from a wooden box at the end of his desk, then lighting it slowly, allowing the imagination of all those watching him to overtake them.

  “In your neighborhood,” Mr. Wolcott exclaimed.

  Dinny sat unfazed at the pitch.

  “In our neighborhood,” The Swede repeated who stood up and began pacing. “A union guy in our neighborhood?”

  Dinny smiled when he saw The Swede become undone.

  “Yes,” Wolcott said. “And I’m sure you are well aware of the topic of conversation. Aren’t you Dinny? If you won’t answer, I’ll say . . . Huns!”

  “What about ’em?” The Swede asked.

  “One million dollars to the ILA.”

  “Wha?” The Swede tilted his head.

  “For a general strike,” Wolcott said. “You think Thos Carmody’s just comin’ around Brooklyn for St. Patrick’s Day? No, he is organizing the German plot. Mr. Swede? Have you ever been run out of your own nei
ghborhood? Hmm? Have you? By your own people, no less. Another Catholic, but with a much different agenda. The Irish union’s will take power with this strike and you and your’s will be left as waterfront scabs, nothin’ more. How does that sound, Mr. Swede? A general strike for guaranteed salaries, limited hours, better working conditions, sick days even! Worker representation . . . union cards! All these promises to the very men that work for you currently. Who could deny them their right to better their conditions, Mr. Swede? What laborer would deny such gentrification and luxury? All paid for by the Hun, America’s enemy! Why Mr. Swede, maybe you could get a job in crowd control when Mr. Eugene V. Debbs comes for a speaking engagement! That is your line of work, is it not? Crowd control? Security?”

  The room was taken by the story.

  “Mr. Meehan?” Wolcott asked, addressing us all. “Do you know how many piers the New York Dock Company owns?”

  “Yes.”

  “I will tell you then,” Wolcott ignored. “Thirty-five piers from the Brooklyn Bridge down to the bottom of Red Hook. That is close to three miles of waterfront property. More than one-hundred-fifty storehouses. Close to six million square footage of covered storage area. Four large terminals at Fulton, Atlantic, Baltic, and right here where we’re sitting on Imlay. Every day we employ thousands and thousands of laborers. You, Mr. Meehan,” Wolcott pointed, raising his voice. “Represent about ten percent of our workforce, which are nothing more than stevedores. Not counting the warehouses you extract premiums from, for which I am not in the least in agreement, though that is a topic for another discussion entirely,” Wolcott turned his back and paced in front of the large window, “Mr. Meehan, can I ask you a question?”

  “Mmm,” Meehan mumbled patiently.

  “Do you need help? Are you losing your grip? I’m sorry I have to ask you these questions, but it doesn’t change the fact that I have to ask these questions. Is Mr. Lovett pressuring you? You know he has an exquisite reputation. Has he taken over Red Hook? Is he coming back?”

  “I sent ’em down here,” Dinny said, playing the game. “He works for me. He’ll be back.”

  “But not in the same sense as Mr. McGowan, am I right? I mean, Mr. McGowan was loyal to you. Is Mr. Lovett equally as loyal as Mr. McGowan was before death came knocking on his cell wearing police blue?”

  Dinny didn’t answer.

  “You see the two gentlemen standing at the door behind you?” Wolcott requested.

  “I know them.”

  “Those two men work tirelessly to control ninety percent of our work-force from even uttering a single word concerning unions. Those men are not allowed to pass wind without us knowing it ahead of time. That’s two men. We have succeeded in controlling thousands with only two men. We have utterly closed the ranks on any possibility of worker organization. And you know where our company’s weak spot is, Mr. Meehan? Our weak spot is in the ten percent you watch over.”

  “That’s easy for you to say, not easy to prove,” Meehan said. “I’ve seen union guys in their midst. The warehousing units? They’re union, a lot of ’em are. You can’t prove nothin’.”

  “Thos Carmody is making my case for me,” Wolcott again turned his back.

  I watched Dinny. There he was, sitting solemnly in his chair and taking such a verbal beating without so much as a word in return. The Swede ready for murder, Maher and Gilchrist confused by the wordiness of it all, I sat behind with only pity for Dinny and what does he do but slowly turn in his chair and look upon me and my shocked face. Why, I couldn’t know but it would be soon I’d be finding out.

  “When’s the last time ya went down to Florider, Wolcott?” Dinny asked abruptly.

  Standing high over his desk now after he had created his tension like a chess player, Wolcott paused before answering the question. Then started to laugh. “Why do you ask, Mr. Meehan?”

  “To me, Florider don’ suit ya. The heat and the dirt roads. I don’ think you like Florider.”

  “Alright then,” Wolcott started to secede, then sat down at his desk, held his hands together, then opened them to Dinny. “Tell me about Florida, Mr. Meehan.”

  “Who gave you them cigars?”

  “What, these?” Wolcott said, pointing to the box on his desk.

  “The box says they came from Ybor City,” Dinny said. “That’s I-talian territory.”

  Wolcott knew that if he lied, Dinny would know it. Instead, he calculated that letting Dinny know the truth would be to his advantage, “What? Can a man refuse a gift?”

  “A couple guinea stinkers’ from Frankie Yale s’all it takes for you to listen to’m, is it?” The Swede said, pointing to the box.

  Dinny stared at Wolcott, and then looked up at The Swede who had stopped his pensive pacing.

  Dinny’s hands were weather worn and tan. They were also very muscular. They told a story. They sat evenly on the arms of the chair in front of Wolcott’s desk. In fact, Dinny’s posture, his head, eyes, and shoulders all sat evenly. Directed toward Wolcott, you could say. While staring ahead at the fat man with a watch hanging from his breast and his thinning pate greased back like a Wall Street big shot, Dinny called out to me, “Kid?”

  Gilchrist, sitting next to me, looked in my direction. Then so did Maher and The Swede. I became nervous, “G’ahead Liam,” Maher said.

  I looked up.

  “Tell the man your first and last name.”

  “William Garrity,” I replied.

  “Now, Wolcott,” Dinny continued. “Do you know the name of the man Thos Carmody was visitin’ last week?”

  Wolcott cracked a smile. His smile then turned into a laugh and then the laugh turned into a howl and as he began opening up I noticed his English accent had faded away, “I don’t know about you, Dennis Meehan, you old son of a bitch you. To answer your question Mr. Meehan, yes, I do know the name of that man. How could I have ever doubted you wouldn’t know something? I apologize, Dinny. From the deepest part of my cold heart! I didn’t mean disrespect. Doubt you? That was my mistake and you have played your hand well, I should say so! I see you have a plan in place then and I will trust that plan will be carried out successfully. To make sure,” Wolcott snapped his fingers toward Wisniewski and Silverman. “To make sure we are together in our thinking, I have assembled a nice little package. . . .”

  “How much?” Dinny asked.

  “Oh, well considering . . .”

  “How much?”

  “Five hundred dollars . . .”

  “Fine, give it to Gilchrist,” Dinny said.

  As we all stood up to leave, Dinny then looked back at Wolcott. “Frankie Yale?”

  “What about Mr. Yale?” Wolcott suddenly became defensive. “Oh, am I going to work with those gentlemen? Is that what you are intoning? No, I can’t work with those fucking animals,” Wolcott said, while enjoying the hand-rolled he drew under his nose. “Unless I can . . . that is. You know Dinny, a man can only work so hard and stay happy. It’s the pleasurable things in life that make it all worth living for.”

  Vincent Maher nodded his head slowly in agreement.

  “That’s funny,” The Swede started berating the fat Wolcott. “I thought we was the reason ya able to enjoy dose pleasures. I can’t wait to see the day when ya gotta bunch o’ fookin’ dagos tellin’ ya how to run the docks and when ya disagree with ’em, ya find ya family in danger. That’s the way dem guineas do. And you know dat. You walk wit’ dem, we’ll burn this place to da ground.”

  “They send me presents. You send me threats,” Wolcott said for the first time showing his frustration. “Dinny! If I was you? If I was Dinny Meehan? Nah, I wouldn’t worry about me making a deal with those fucking ginzos. If I was Dinny Meehan? I’d worry more about a deal with Bill Lovett.”

  And after retaliating with his own threat as we began to walk toward the door where Wisniewski and Silverman stood guard, Wolcott’s forehead and upper lip drenched in sweat from his sudden anger, he then mocked Dinny’s Brooklyn accent, “Take care o�
� ya nayba’hood, would ya. I wanna see Thos Carmody’s name in the obits within two months! Two fookin’ months, Dinny Meehan!”

  CHAPTER 11

  The Code

  IT WASN’T FOR ME TO KNOW at the time, but The Swede was at his his wit’s end and in Dinny’s ear on a Saturday night along the stretch of a pier below the Arbuckle warehousing stores.

  “Lovett’s gotta go,” he yells while pacing around Dinny, rubbing his head agitatedly. “He’ll deceit us as soon as he can! Soon as he’s outta the workhouse. Fuck Lovett! Fuck Non Connors, I’ll run Red Hook, me and Dance will. We give them too much string and it’s all o’ us that’ll lose out, Dinny.”

  Dinny listens as its The Swede who thinks more about the angles than any other. Aside from himself.

  “And Brosnan? Fookin’ tunics in the Dock Loaders’ Club? Thos Carmody and the ILA in our neighborhoods recruitin’ an’ talkin’ strike and millions o’ dollars from the Germans? Frankie Yale and them pinchin’ in on us. And Wolcott givin’ us orders? Us? Dinny, the fuck we doin’? We’re losin’ it, Dinny. We’re losin’ control and ya know we can’t afford to ease up, not even for a second. . . .”

  “Lovett’s valuable,” Dinny said, folding his arms. “He can be swayed. He’s only twenny one. But the man can run Red Hook with fire on his side. That’s our border, the Red Hook. You know that. We need only the best down there, but I need you wit’ me and available up and down the territories. I can turn Lovett around, just need to control those whisperin’ in his ear.”

  “Connors,” The Swede said. “They take McGowan, we take Connors. . . . Me or Vincent.”

  “Just wait.”

  “Why? Why, why, why . . .”

  “Because I don’ jump before I know where I’m gonna land, that’s why. Don’ touch ’em just yet. Hands off. Death is a message to the livin’, the only message we’ll send by killin’ either of ’em now is that they scared us. They don’ scare me. They scare you, Lovett, an’ Connors. Frankie Byrne an’ them?”

  “No.”

  “Let’s do some maneuverin’ in the Red Hook. That don’ work, we’ll show everyone that we gave ’em a chance. Show ’em that we tried and that we’ll try for them too. But when we try and we don’ get the response we’re lookin’ for . . . that’s when ya send ya messages.”