King Conor’s face abruptly shifted into a smile, a little too quickly for Burns’s liking. “Well, all right then,” he said, sitting back down. “What are we going to do now?”
“Election’s in two days,” Honest Jim said. “We’ve just got to keep on. Get them votes out. All the usual tricks.”
“The police are ready?” Burns asked.
“When the voting starts, we can count on the support of three-quarters of the constabulary,” Honest Jim replied.
“It cost me enough,” King Conor said. “It better be worth it.”
“What do we do if they turn those fellows loose?” Burns asked. “The ones they’ve got cooped up in the hotel?”
“They won’t dare do it now,” Honest Jim said. “But even if they do, our boys have been in scraps before. They’re ready.”
Burns shook his head.
“What?” Honest Jim said. “You scared?”
“There was something about this German,” Burns said. “He wasn’t mean. It was more like he was hurt somehow. Damaged. He was a wild one in a scrap.”
“Ours are wilder,” Honest Jim said. “Plus we’ve the police.”
“I’m worried, Jim,” Burns said. “I don’t want to spread ourselves too thin. Maybe we ought to pull out of some of the touchier neighborhoods. The Polish ones …”
“Fuck off,” King Conor said.
“Mickey,” Honest Jim said patiently. “It’s those ones as are most important. We can’t just give ’em to the Republicans. Come on now. Buck up, my son. You just do your part in your district and get the repeaters out there on the street. Get all your tough boys organized and ready. It’ll be quite a scrap, but you just trust old Honest Jim. It’ll all turn right in the end.”
43
When Dusty Kingsley woke up, there was a dull throbbing behind his eyes and his mouth was dry, but all in all it was one of the mildest hangovers he’d had since he’d moved into the Michigan Avenue Hotel. He dressed quickly and made his way down the stairs to the dining room. What he saw when he arrived made him stop short in his tracks.
“Jesus, Bill. Didn’t you go to bed last night?”
Bill sat at the bar. At the sound of Dusty’s voice he turned around, very slowly, with exaggerated care. The whites of his eyes were orange and he was slick with sweat. As Dusty approached he caught a whiff of urine and wrinkled his nose.
“Oh my god,” Dusty said.
A half-empty bottle of gin stood at Bill’s elbow. Dusty snatched it away. Bill made no move to stop him. It did not look like Bill could make any sudden movements at all without toppling from his stool.
“Just hold tight,” Dusty said. “I’ll be back.”
A gilded mirror hung behind the bar. Bill Bread slowly lifted his eyes and looked into it. You could try to look at other things, sitting at this bar. The label of the bottle in your hand, the slick zinc surface of the bar, the flickering light of the gas lamps. But you couldn’t hide from yourself.
At the beginning it had been sort of sadly amusing. He would wake in the morning, appallingly sick, and the game would start. Attempting to take a day off. Just one. Part of him knew that he would lose the game every time he tried to play, and after a while, Bill didn’t see the point in playing. But when the game ended, when the force of his own staring and bloodshot eyes in the mirror stripped away all his illusions, and he stopped pretending that he was not going to get drunk, Bill discovered that his self-delusion had been restraining his behavior far more than he had guessed.
When Dusty returned to the dining room, bringing Johnson with him, they found Bill lying stomach down on the bar, blindly fumbling for another bottle.
“Bill! Quit that!” Dusty said.
Bill surrendered as they took him by his armpits.
“He stinks,” Johnson said.
“I’m gonna be sick!” Bill said, and both Dusty and Johnson dropped him. Bill helplessly threw up on the floor.
“Fagh,” Dusty said.
Johnson only frowned.
They waited a while after Bill was done, just to be safe, and then they carried him to his room. Dusty went to draw a bath while Johnson carefully laid Bill on his side.
“I’m sorry,” Bill said.
“No you ain’t,” Johnson said.
Johnson brushed the sweaty black hair out of Bill’s eyes, a gesture devoid of tenderness. “You don’t even know what it means to be sorry, Bread. You ride with a cold bunch, but you’re the coldest.”
Bill smiled. “I can’t help it.”
“So it would appear,” Johnson said. “I’ll say this much for your sorry ass. It ain’t good for you to be cooped up like this. If Noah was trying to kill you I don’t know if he could have found a surer way to go about it.”
Bill said, “I feel guilty about my uncle.”
“You were drinking before your uncle died,” Johnson said.
“I don’t mean it like that,” Bill said. “It’s not to do with that.”
“Hmm,” Johnson said.
“He wasn’t an imaginative man,” Bill said. “I keep wondering what he’d think if he could see all this. I don’t reckon he could have even conceived it. Conceived any of it.”
Dusty came out of the bathroom with a pint bottle of whiskey in his hand.
“He had it stashed behind the toilet,” Dusty explained.
“Let’s get him cleaned up,” Johnson said.
When they were halfway through undressing him, Bill looked up at Johnson and said, “Men aren’t meant to know that everything is possible.”
A noise was coming from outside, a kind of murmur, rising above the normal din of the busy streets.
“You’re quite the philosopher today,” Dusty said.
They got Bill naked and tossed him in the tub and left him there.
“Do you think we should do something about him?” Dusty asked.
“We already did,” Johnson said.
“I mean about the drinking in general.”
Johnson said, “Let him go to hell in his own way.”
The noise from the street was louder. Someone laughed—the sound of it cut through the drapes—and then a knocking came from the ground floor.
“What is that?” Dusty said.
They pulled back the drapes. Johnson had enough sense to be subtle about it. That was when they saw the mob of newspaper reporters, policemen, Democratic agitators, and general miscreants gathered at the front door of the hotel.
44
The tailor’s shop in downtown Chicago was well lit by the windows facing the street. Men’s clothing hung on the racks and a mirror leaned against the back wall. The bell rang. John Jones, an elderly Negro with bright white hair and a long, smooth mustache, looked up from his sewing. A man and a boy had come into his shop. The man had fine pale hair, milky skin, and golden eyes. The boy had pistols hanging from his hips. They were both raggedly dressed.
“May I help you?” Jones said. His voice was slow, calm, deep.
“We need a suit for the boy,” Winter said. “Before the end of the day.”
“Well now,” Jones said. “I’m not sure I can have something ready for you by then.”
Winter dug into his pocket and tossed a cloth bag onto the table in front of the tailor, landing on the jacket on which Jones was working.
“You go on and name your price, old man,” Winter said. “And don’t you make me ask again.”
Jones dumped the contents of the bag over the table. The coins were mostly gold, with some larger silver ones scattered through. Jones carefully separated a number that seemed fair to him and then looked back up at Winter speculatively.
“Don’t suppose you want one too?”
“No,” Winter said.
“Aw, come on Auggie!” Lukas said. “Think how good we’ll look, n’how surprised they’ll be! They’ll be tickled to see us’n suits! Get yourself one!”
“Those clothes are just about falling off,” Jones said. “You’ll need some new ones soon anywa
y.”
“Fine,” Winter said.
Jones separated a few more coins and dropped them in his pocket. Then he put the rest of the coins in the bag and walked it over to Winter.
“Here you go,” he said. “Come into the back with me.”
Jones took their measurement with firm, strong hands, taking no notes, repeating the numbers under his breath only once.
“I suppose you gentlemen don’t have any particular kind of suit in mind.”
“You sure got that right,” Winter said.
“Well, all right then,” Jones said, glancing at the clock. “It’s nine thirty. You get on back here round three o’clock or so. Then I’ll make some minor adjustments and try to have you on your way by five. Meantime if you want to get a shave and a haircut, just head on down the street.”
The bell rang again as the door shut behind them. Jones drew the curtains and flipped the sign from OPEN to CLOSED.
“What are we going to do, Auggie?” Lukas asked. “Want to get a haircut?”
“All right,” Winter said.
They walked down the street to the barbershop in the Palmer House. As they waited, Winter read the newspaper and paid particular interest to the various exposés concerning Mickey Burns. Lukas, who could not read, kicked his legs back and forth in his chair and whistled with effortless skill.
A stout barber called Lukas to his chair, and a few minutes later Winter was summoned by a tall, thin man with an effeminate manner.
“So what were you thinking?” he said as he gathered Winter’s long hair and pulled it behind his neck.
“Wasn’t thinking of anything in particular.”
“I take it you are accustomed to simpler haircuts?”
“You are correct.”
“You don’t mind if I try something a little different, perhaps, than what you are used to?”
“Knock yourself out,” Winter said. “If I don’t like it I’ll say so.”
“Very well,” the barber said grandly, and spun Winter away from the mirror and tilted his head back into the sink. The warm water rose up around his ears and the barber sank his fingers into his scalp.
“You have the most beautiful hair,” the barber said. “It’s fine, but strong, like silk.”
Winter said nothing. He looked at the ceiling and relaxed. I’m in the city, he thought. Sinful old Chicago. Getting my hair done at a two-dollar barbershop. What would he think of that, I wonder.
The barber raised Winter out of the sink, spun the chair around, and began to dry his hair vigorously with a towel. Again he deeply massaged Winter’s scalp and the back of his neck with his strong fingers. Then he ran the comb through Winter’s hair and snipped away, taking a little bit at a time. Eventually the barber was satisfied. He then applied a hot towel to Winter’s cheeks, rubbing gently back and forth, and laid on the lather from a brush.
The razor glided across his flesh again and again. It was strange that an act so close to being deadly could be so soothing.
“No mustache,” the barber said. It was not a question and Winter did not demur.
He applied scented aftershave to Winter’s face and the back of his neck, and then he used hair cream to shape Winter’s shortened hair into ringlets against the side of his face.
“Voilà!” the barber exclaimed.
Lukas, whose haircut was done, brayed with laughter.
Winter came very close to telling the barber to cut it all off. Yet something stopped him, as if he caught a glimpse of something he remembered faintly but could not identify. He ought not to like the haircut—it was pretentious and affected. It made him look ridiculous. And yet. It was not precisely weak looking, so much as wholly different. Alien. He liked that it was tightly controlled, carefully designed, that it was urban, that it was modern, that it was fashionable. He liked that his father would have despised it. He liked that by wearing it he was showing he did not care what men thought of him.
“All right,” Winter said.
“All right!” the barber said.
In the hotel’s restaurant, Lukas ordered a series of desserts: fruit pies, cakes, and ice cream. Winter had a coffee and bacon and eggs. They drew many stares but no one approached them. At three they returned to the tailor.
“Hello, gentlemen,” Jones said. “You’re looking mighty fine.”
“Auggie’s a dandy now!” Lukas giggled.
The boy put his suit on first. It was a little long in the legs, so Jones pinned it up and drew on it with chalk and muttered numbers to himself under his breath, and then took it all off. Lukas stood stark naked in the shop with his hands on his hips while Winter tried his suit on.
“It don’t fit right,” Winter said.
“It fits you like a glove, son,” Jones replied.
“The shoulders are tight,” Winter said. “The sleeves are short.”
“Excuse me,” Jones said, “but I’ve been a tailor in this city for thirty years and I’ve put a lot of uncivilized men in their first suits. I’m telling you it’s supposed to fit like that and I think I’d know.”
Winter seemed momentarily at a loss.
“Put your tie on,” Jones said, “and pull your pants up.”
“I don’t like ’em that high.”
“You’ll get used to it,” Jones said. “Use the suspenders.”
Winter did as he was instructed, slowly and reluctantly. His movements were stiff with anger. Jones seemed oblivious, focused entirely on Winter’s clothes. For his part, Lukas wasn’t laughing anymore. Instead he stood with his mouth gaping open, his eyes wide, like he had fallen into a trance on his feet.
“Go on,” Jones said. “Take a look. You look like … well. I’m not exactly sure.”
Winter walked up to the mirror and stopped in his tracks.
“There it is,” he whispered. “There.”
The suit, indeed, fit him well. It clung to him tightly but it was still composed of crisp, straight lines. As if it had hardened him, made him into something geometric. Unnaturally clean. An entirely new thing. His appearance now was to his old like what a cut gem is to a rough stone: the ordinary refined through artisanship to a higher form of nature. Extraneous parts removed to catch the light and to set a fire inside.
Winter took a few steps forward and reached out and touched the mirror.
This was it. This was what he had been looking for all his life without realizing it. This look, this studied, practiced, contrived look, was the truest outward expression of his inner being.
“Well?” Jones said.
“Okay,” Winter said. “Okay.”
45
When Reggie Keller arrived at the Michigan Avenue Hotel, a large crowd of newspaper reporters were standing around the front step in cheap suits, smoking and spitting and laughing. The shutters were fastened and the door was locked.
“Well son of a bitch,” Reggie said.
He was now a tall, broad man with good teeth and wavy golden hair. He smiled—handsome and healthy and unconcerned, and of slightly less than average intelligence, and wanted for murder—and strolled up to the reporters.
“What’s all the fuss about?” he asked.
“Don’t ya read the papers?” one of the reporters said.
“Hell no,” Reggie said.
“The Republican Party brought in a pack of criminals from down south for the election.”
“Those fuckers,” Reggie said.
“No one’s allowed in or out,” the reporter said. “They say the place is under renovations. The police are going to kick in the door any minute now.”
“Well,” Reggie said, “we’ll just see about that.”
He hammered on the front door with both of his muscular arms.
“Hey!” he cried. “Hey! Open up in there!”
There was no answer, and so he drummed harder.
“Let me in, you fucking mercenary sons of bitches!”
When his arms got tired he stopped. Some tittering came from the reporters. But t
hen a bolt shifted on the other side of the door and it cracked open a bit and Reginald slipped inside.
“Why, Dusty Kingsley,” he said. “As I live and fucking breathe.”
Dusty held a finger to his mouth and bolted the door as the reporters rushed forward, shouting in surprise and amusement. Dusty beckoned and Reggie followed him through the darkened lobby into the dining room.
Most of the crew were lounging around drinking and playing cards. The waitstaff had vanished.
“It is you!” Quentin cried.
Reggie smiled, innocent, open. They crowded around him. Quentin, in the center, banging his spoon against his goblet. Dusty Kingsley with his ironic smile. Charlie Empire, swaying on his feet, holding a bottle of bourbon by its neck, Johnny grinning madly. The only ones who were not smiling were Fred Johnson and Jan Müller. Johnson was leaning up against the bar, drinking soda water and shaking his head in disgust. Jan sat stiffly at a table. He nodded once at Reggie but said nothing.
“Do you have a drink?” Quentin called. “Someone get him a drink. All right. Gentlemen, gentlemen. A toast! I give you Reggie ‘Babe’ Keller. To the Baby!”
“To the Baby!” everyone called, and they drained their glasses.
When they were done Charlie pivoted and whipped his bottle up at the chandelier, missing it by a good three feet but causing general hilarity. Dusty smashed his glass on the ground and the other men followed suit. Then Charlie ran across the room and flipped over a table, knocking chairs left and right and sending a crash of silverware onto the floor.
Everyone laughed, but when Charlie turned back toward them, his face was twisted with a rage so black it was almost insane.
“You laughing at me?” he shouted, pulling a knife from his belt. He loped toward them but fell down a couple of times on the way and was easily restrained by Johnny.
Reggie chuckled, then said, “So’d you hear the news?”
“About the mercenaries in the Michigan Hotel?” Dusty said. “Yeah, we heard it.”
The Winter Family Page 18