by Michael Mayo
“All right,” I said. “You got me. It was your girlfriend.”
He took a swing at my head, but I ducked and stifled a laugh.
A little later, with a quickly packed bag, I unlocked the door to a room on the fifth floor. It wasn’t as big or as nice as mine. Just a bed and two chairs with a small table between them. My knucks and .38 were on a bedside table. Connie Nix was asleep in one of the armchairs and woke up right away. I was more than halfway sure that she’d be ready to take me up on my offer of a ticket back to California. I sat opposite her and explained that I’d talked to Ellis and he wasn’t happy with what I said, but I kept her name out of it. “I also told him I don’t know what’s going on, but that’s only half true.”
“Is this something illegal that you’ve cooked up? Marie Therese says it’s not, but she won’t say anything bad about you.”
I had to think a second before I answered. “It is illegal. I guess. I didn’t start it, and I don’t really know how or why I’m involved, but as they say, my name has come up. It boils down to this—there’s a hundred thousand dollars, or maybe seventy-five thousand in cash floating around town, and it’s got my name on it. At least that’s what some people think, and they’re willing to do whatever they need to do to take it. That’s what just went on in my room, and, somehow, Jacob Weiss is involved. Do you know who he is?”
“Sure, Jacob the Wise. He runs the numbers. I never win. Marie Therese won five dollars about a month ago. Second time.”
She was picking things up. “Did you know that he shelled out a hundred thousand dollars to ransom his accountant, Benny Numbers, who got kidnapped out West?”
She shook her head and gave me a quizzical look. “No, I heard Benny ran off with Jacob’s mistress, and he killed them both, but I didn’t believe it.”
She got up, tossed her coat on the bed, and walked around behind my chair. Her hands came around and loosened my tie and pulled it off. She took off my coat and tossed it onto the bed over hers. Then she started rubbing my shoulders. I guess she could tell I was tired and tense, and her fingers dug in up near my neck where I was really tight.
“Poor Jimmy,” she said. “All he’s trying to do is sweet talk his waitress into the sack and bombs blow up and guys bust into his room.”
She came around the chair to face me and got on my lap, her legs straddling mine, stretching her skirt tight across her thighs. She put my hands on her hips and when I moved them higher, she pushed them back down. “What’s a girl to think about something like that?”
She leaned in and gave me a long serious kiss that started soft and warmed quickly.
I didn’t know exactly what was going on, but I understood that Anna-Sophia-Sugartits was a professional at this kind of thing and Connie was still an amateur—an enthusiastic amateur, but not in the same league. And where, you ask, was Jimmy Quinn on that scale? Somewhere behind both of them, to be sure.
As Connie kissed me and pushed my hands down again, I realized that she wasn’t ready to go as far or to be as persuasive as Anna had been, but right then, that wasn’t important.
Like I said, such things may happen to millionaires and movie stars all the time, but they don’t happen to guys like me, and when they happen twice, you just appreciate every second of it.
Believe me, I did.
Chapter Eleven
Mr. Quinn,
If you wish to continue our discussion of last evening, please join me downstairs. There are additional matters of mutual profitability that we might wish to consider.
Johann Klapprott
That was the note, written on thick textured stationery. Tommy from the front desk handed it to me. There was a Germanic-looking JK engraved in one corner. Boy, that was my week for fancy invitations. Get your name associated with a big stash of cash and everybody wants your company.
Tommy whispered, like it was a special secret, “This gentleman arrived in a Cadillac Phaeton.”
I could tell I’d just gone up in his estimation if somebody was calling for me in a Phaeton.
Connie was asleep, on top of the covers and under her coat. Yeah, she was still a good girl, maybe not quite as good as she’d been before, but still good, dammit. I’d had my catnap, shaved and showered, hoping that the sound of the water might wake her up and tempt her to join in, but it didn’t. I was almost dressed when Tommy knocked on the door.
“He’s in the lobby,” he said, suggesting that I was some kind of low-class dickweed to keep such a fine Phaeton owner waiting. “What do I tell him?”
I thought a bit more. “Tell him I’ll be down directly.”
By then, Connie was awake but groggy at the edges. She sat up, pulled the coat up to her neck, and said, “You’re going to have a mouse under that eye.”
She got up off the bed, gave my mouse a kiss, and took over the bathroom. I told her I’d see her that night. She didn’t answer.
I finished dressing with a fresh shirt, a deep-red silk tie, knucks, pistol, and stick. I was wearing a light gray suit, one of my best.
As I was leaving, I realized that sometime in all the commotion downstairs, I’d lost my hat. I stopped at my room on the third floor and saw that the cleaning crew was at work. The hat was on the desk, where I’d left it.
In the lobby, Klapprott was chatting with a couple of older ladies, and judging by the way they smiled and giggled, he had turned on the charm. He wore a black pinstripe three-piece, red-and-black striped tie, and spit-shined black shoes. He had a calfskin glove on his left hand and held the other along with his decorative stick. When he saw me, he made excuses to the happy ladies and extended his hand. No gent would shake hands wearing gloves.
Smiling like sunshine, he said, “Mr. Quinn, a pleasure to see you. Again, allow me to apologize for Luther’s behavior last night, though I hardly need to. Few men have handled him as efficiently as you did. Though, perhaps”—he gestured toward my bandaged face—“someone else was more successful.”
“Yeah,” I said. “I’m a popular fellow. Something about me just attracts attention. I wonder what the hell it could be.”
“What, indeed? Perhaps we could discuss it over coffee. I have some outside. Shall we?”
Out at the curb sat a nicely turned out Caddy with the top down. A guy held open the door to the back seat for us. He wore a simple dark suit, not the full chauffeur’s getup, and black gloves. I’d never seen him before. He got into the driver’s compartment, maneuvered the long car into traffic, and turned south. The back seat was more luxurious than my room upstairs, even before the fight. There was a wicker picnic basket on the floor.
“Do you mind if we drive while we talk?” said Klapprott. “Perhaps I am overly suspicious, but I would like to be sure that our conversation is completely private. I have reason to believe that I have been followed recently.”
“There’s a lot of that going around.”
“And we could do worse than touring the city on an autumn morning such as this, could we not?”
It was a good fall day, still cold even though the sun was up, and I remember his conversation, part of it anyway, as being genuine. The driver knew the city, and we meandered down toward Battery Park without stopping too often in the early traffic. Actually, the truth is I usually wasn’t up at that hour, so I wasn’t familiar with the traffic and I wasn’t behind the wheel in those neighborhoods very often either, so what did I know?
“Have you thought about my offer?” Klapprott asked.
“Not really,” I said. “Since you went to all this trouble, I thought you’d want to talk about the money.” He gave me a look of phony befuddlement, and I said, “Don’t say ‘What money?’ You’ll disappoint me.”
He chuckled. “You’re right, of course, but I must add that my interest in your establishment is completely genuine. This really is a matter of two birds, but my first concern is the fifty thousan
d dollars.”
“Fifty thousand? All right, tell me about it.”
“It is an inheritance. A new member of the Free Society, a particular zealous young man from Chicago, wishes to donate it to the organization. His name is Justice Schilling, and he is a younger son in a large and fractious family. He was always his grandmother’s favorite, and when she died, she left him the largest portion of her estate. While his parents, uncles, and brothers received property or real estate, his bequest was cash. I assure you he has all the documentation to prove his claim. He had received the money and contacted our organization when his sister simply stole it. And for reasons about which I can make only the most insubstantial conjecture, she sent it to you, Mr. Quinn.”
“She sent me fifty thousand dollars? That’s some story.”
“I must admit that, at first, I did not believe this young man, but as I said, he has proof and he gave me this.”
Klapprott fished a folded bill from his vest pocket. It was a ten-dollar gold certificate, stained with some kind of brown wax. He said, “I see by your expression that you are familiar with this sample. Excellent. You have accepted delivery then?”
I let that pass and said, “I’ve heard a lot of stories. Why should I buy this one?”
“When you hear what this young man has to say and you see his documents, I have no doubt that you will accept the legitimacy of his claim, and, of course, you will be compensated, well compensated. If you are amenable, we could speak with him now. Would that be convenient? It won’t take long, no more than an hour, I assure you.”
I shrugged. “All right.”
He tapped the back of the driver’s compartment with his cane and coughed out a few curt words in German. Settling back in his seat, he produced a green thermos bottle and two silver cups from the picnic basket. He messed with pouring coffee as he spoke. “In your office, I noticed that you read a great many newspapers, so perhaps you know something of the changes that are going on in Europe these days. Tell me, please, what are your politics?”
“I’m a saloonkeeper. Anything that lets me do my business and make a decent living is fine with me.”
“Excellent,” he said, clapping me on the knee. “That is precisely what the party is attempting to bring to Germany.” He handed me a cup of coffee and poured another for himself.
“A toast,” he said, holding up his cup. “To our mutual good fortune. You will find this somewhat unusual. It is a special Austrian blend not often found in this country. The flavor you will notice is Prussian cinnamon.”
It was strong with a bittersweet edge not to my taste, but I sipped it to be polite.
“Tell me, what do you know of National Socialism, the Nazi party?”
“I’ve seen the little guy with the Charlie Chaplin mustache, and I’ve read a few things in the papers, but I don’t know anybody overseas, so I don’t pay much attention.”
“The newsreels make us look like crazed fanatics, but that is not the case. For years, there has been so much anti-German hysteria.”
“Yeah, the war had something to do with that.”
I thought he’d be insulted, but he wasn’t. His expression became grim.
“I know exactly how stupid that war was. I was right there in the middle of it. I know the fools who ordered us to go up out of the trenches. The politicians, the priests, the bankers, the industrialists, the newspapers, the professors, all the bosses, they lied to us. They lied to get us into it, and they lied about the conduct of the fighting. It was a horrible, wasteful war, so terrible that there can never be another. We veterans understand that. You may have read about the mutiny at Kiel that helped to end it. It was primarily an action by sailors and naval officers. I was in a position to take a small part, but by then it was too late. They forced us to accept a peace that has been more damaging than a true military defeat.”
By then, I think he’d forgotten that I was sitting next to him. And, to be honest, I’ve got to admit that I can’t really remember everything he said, but I do remember his tone and his emotion.
“Even so, we might have survived all that, but then the goddamn French occupied the Ruhr and everything went to hell. Nobody had a job. Our money was worthless. As bad as things are here, you can’t imagine what it was like in Germany. But now we’re changing that. We want stability, a return to simple values and simple truths. We want an economy that is fair to everyone, not just the ones at the top. The first slogan you see on the wall in any of our party offices reads simply, ‘Freedom and Bread.’ That’s what we’re working for. It really is that simple.
“We want to put Germany back together. Return the economy to its former strength and then become self-sufficient. We have no wish and no need to conquer anyone. We certainly don’t go around like anarchists, throwing bombs. Ours is a movement of the young people. Herr Hitler is many things—a visionary, a man who can inspire a nation and revive the middle class. He’s only forty-three years old. That may seem old to someone as young as you are, but in Germany we have a tradition of allowing senile old men to tell us what to do. Herr Hitler will be different, I promise you that. More coffee?”
He poured more. A sniff told me it hadn’t got any better. I didn’t touch it.
“No one will give us a new Germany. We must create it ourselves. We want to give the German people a new ideal. We use the language and music of the military because that is what the average German is used to hearing. It gets his attention and it works on his emotions, but those of us who are doing the real work don’t need all of the Sturm und Drang.
“The talk of racial purity is exaggerated and, besides, much of it comes from America. Have you read Grant’s The Passing of the Great Race? No? I’ll loan you my copy. I’m sure you will find it illuminating. I know that some Jews put loyalty to their fellow Jews above Germany, but any Jew who is a good German has nothing to fear from us. If you listen to Father Coughlin on the radio, you understand what I’m saying.
“The Communists, anarchists, and Reds—they’re another story. I’ve seen what they can do to an organization, the way they can destroy from within and the cowardly tactics they use with their bombs. There will be no place for them in a new Germany. If we’re going to go to war with anybody, it will be those bastards.”
By then, I couldn’t understand him. The car stopped. Klapprott got out and another guy, somebody I’d never seen, got in. Klapprott said something to him, tipped his hat to me, and walked away. I tried to say something but couldn’t make my mouth move. Like the greenest clodhopper that ever fell off the turnip truck and stumbled into a clip joint, I’d let him slip me a Mickey.
If I’d drunk much more of that goddamned Prussian cinnamon, it would’ve knocked me out. That’s what a Mickey is supposed to do. As it was, I was so dizzy I could hardly sit up. My hands and arms got tingly and flapped around like flippers. When I tried to speak, the sound that came out was a kind of groan, not words. I didn’t black out completely, but I couldn’t focus my eyes or my attention. Everything became kind of liquid. So did I.
I don’t know how long we were in the car. I do know they stopped and put the top up. When they did that, I knew I should try to get out. I managed to get halfway off the seat and slid to the floor. They left me there. One of them went through my pockets and took the .38. He missed the knucks. I heard them talking more German, and I tried not to go under. Bad things happened to guys who got taken for a ride. How bad was this one going to be?
The car stopped again, and some time later, the driver got out. Feeling was coming back to my arms and hands, and I thought I might even be able to get to my knees. I waited and thought that I smelled saltwater and creosote and understood that I was probably back at the warehouse. Made sense to go back to a familiar spot to do the dirty work. My guts turned to water.
The driver came back and started the engine. A moment later, I heard a rumble and felt it through the floorboar
d. When the rumble ended, the car rolled forward a few yards into darkness. More rumbling ended with the crunch of heavy doors rolling shut against each other. There was more talk I couldn’t understand, and as the jungle juice wore off, I realized things had gotten quiet. If the cops had finished their work and let the warehouse open for business, Klapprott had probably sent everybody home.
When they dragged me out of the car, I didn’t resist or even look at them. It was easy to stay limp. Too easy. They left me lying on an oil-stained concrete floor and snapped on a light. I saw a wooden table and a wheeled office chair. Most of the loading dock was dark.
It was quiet for what seemed like a long time, and finally I heard more men speaking German, and a few lights came on. Rough hands hauled me into the office chair, and a couple of beefy-looking guys in worn-out, fraying suits used a roll of friction tape to strap my forearms to the arms of the chair. When I looked at them, I let my head wobble and my eyes roll. They argued in German about what to do with my feet and wound up taping my left ankle to one of the chair’s little wheels and my right to the table leg. One of them noticed my brace then. They talked about it, and from their tone, I think they decided that I wasn’t going to be running anywhere, so they didn’t need to worry about me.
They left me alone, and my eyes grew accustomed to the dark. I could make out the hallway that led to the office and part of the warehouse floor with shelves and pallets. I was street-level. Most of the storage area was behind me. Over the next twenty minutes or so, six more guys wandered in. Like the first two, they were big, thick-necked, and thick-shouldered, blond and balding, wearing clothes that were a long way from new. Four of them brought grinders of beer. Two drank from flasks. They polished off the beer fast enough and a couple of them went out for more.
They lazed around, smoking cigars and cigarettes. Once in a while, one of them would walk over and give me a thump on the head, and the others would laugh. I had no doubt they were looking forward to working me over. I didn’t look directly at them. I let my head loll and tried to act like the knockout drops were still working. I was also twisting my arms and legs to test the tightness of the tape. They hadn’t stripped off any of my clothes, so I had some play in my arms. I could push them forward several inches. Given a minute or so to twist and tug, I might have been able to pull my arms free from the coat sleeves, but I didn’t think any of these guys were going to give me a minute. Since they hadn’t been as careful with my legs, I thought I might be able to get the left one loose from the chair wheel. With a little leverage, I might move the table with my right. It wasn’t that heavy. But it wasn’t going to do much good against six Kraut bruisers.