“Do you know you’re bleeding from the eyes?” she asked. I swiped at my face and she said sweetly, “That’s just a figure of speech, Boss. You look like crap. When was the last time you shaved?”
“Thanks, Doll Puss. That’s why you’re the public face of the firm,” I said as I poured a cup of the black medicine.
Gina turned to answer the light tapping on the door glass, the one that read, ‘W. R. Stone, Private Investigations’ in painted black and gold letters. 481 Wythe Avenue was a second floor walk-up. Not many wandered in off the street, especially on a weekend. Gina opened the door to the same knockout redhead, hair piled high, whose reflection I had been watching nine hours earlier on the Manhattan side of the East River.
Maybe God did take care of Marines and drunks, and I guess I had spent my share of time being both. I lit a Lucky and took my first sip of joe as Red somehow conveyed herself from the doorway to directly in front of me without moving a muscle. That morning she looked like an angel, but I knew she could drink like a dockworker. Her alabaster face showed the memory of fear and my jaw slacked. She stuck out her hand.
“Kathryn Margolies. Call me Kate. I believe we almost met.”
I pushed aside a stack of papers, my .45 automatic and a sweat-soaked shirt that smelled like garlic. I set my cup on the desk before taking her hand. Electric. “Woodrow Stone. Call me Woody. How did you know where to find me?”
“Mr. Stone, you can’t remain anonymous with your picture on the front page of the Journal American.”
I KNEW that would come back to haunt me. The year before, my picture, bleeding from a scalp wound, carrying the little blonde girl to be reunited with her parents, covered everything below the fold in the local fishwraps.
“Call me Woody. Come on in my private office,” I said, pointing the way with my Lucky.
I retrieved the coffee cup with the other hand and got a pleasant eyeful following her. I removed the 25-pound dumbbell from one of the two straight back chairs that fit nicely in my office along with my desk and got her seated.
“Sorry, not much of a view unless you like the backside of a warehouse.” I pulled a clean shirt from the bottom desk drawer and ripped the paper laundry tape.
“I love what you’ve done with the place,” she said. “Where do you keep the coats now?”
That took a second for the penny to drop. I liked this broad. “Funny stuff from a dame who had one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peel a few hours ago.” I motioned her to stay put while I slipped sideways between my desk and her chair and walked into the outer office to tuck in my new wardrobe.
“Sweet cheeks, any messages for me?”
Gina had already thrown my ripe shirt in the corner, laid my heater on the windowsill, rearranged her paper stacks and poured herself a cup of java. She was busy reading something that looked official.
“Yep.” She popped her gum. “You got a call from the District Attorney’s Office Thursday. The guy said to tell you to call the Lieutenant. Who’s the Lieutenant?”
“That’s Dan Logan, my old Marine buddy. Nice guy. Short, but a hell of a dancer.”
***
Of course, she didn’t get my joke. Who would? First Lieutenant Dan Logan, USMC, medically retired, had lost his left leg at the knee onboard an amphibious ship. My whole unit, what was left of us, was underway in transit from Korea to San Diego when the typhoon hit in the summer of ‘53. Good old Dan, our Platoon Commander, was a law school grad from Philly. He had volunteered for the infantry. Dan was tough. I don’t mean tough acting; I mean long haul, oak tree tough.
What he was doing during that storm was as natural to him as taking his next breath. He headed to the troop compartment to check on his boys. Below decks, it was bad juju that he took a shortcut between two vehicles chained down on an inclined deck ramp. The big gray ship bucked, rolled and yawed. It bobbed like a cork in the typhoon-whipped high seas and took blue water over the bow. The deadly dance of nature transferred to the feet of a Jeep and then to its tie-down chains. The heavy hooks caught the rhythm and divorced themselves from the holes in the slanted steel deck. The Jeep lurched forward and made a carom off the vehicle to its front.
In a split second, Lieutenant Dan Logan lay on that cold steel ramp, with both legs crushed, sucking at the fetid air. Wide-eyed, his blood mixing way too fast with seawater, he gave in to the shock.
A Gator Navy sailor, down there doing his job, witnessed the horror. Except for that, Dan would be just another wartime memory. Instead, seven years later, he was a scrappy New York County ADA and dyed-in-the-wool gym rat who swore wheelchair basketball someday would be an Olympic sport. Yeah, right, and I was gonna get a Dick Tracy two-way wrist radio.
After surviving more than a year in that meat-grinder-hell-hole, Korea, Dan got greased while checking on his troops on the way home. He did leave Korea with a Silver Star. He knew, and we knew, his combat actions should have rated the Blue Max - the Medal of Honor. He had been a Second Lieutenant at the time, and, well, that just amounted to another snuffy who pulled down an extra $62.50 a month. Expendable was a fancy new word we all learned. Semper Fi, Mac…
***
“Say, listen, Gorgeous, if you’re going downstairs to pick up dry cleaning this morning, how’s about turning in that trench coat laying on the couch?” I saw Gina’s eyes widen without face movement as she focused on the coat.
“Don’t ask,” I said. “Tell em I cut myself shaving.”
“Uh-huh, shu-wa, you bet,” she said in that New York accent that I found alien and exotic.
Or was it just Gina that I found strangely exotic? She was far from the knobby-kneed fifteen year old I first met seven years before. The accent appreciation thing was not reciprocal. She had nothing even resembling a compliment for my Memphis drawl.
Reading from a steno pad, in her business monotone, “Yesterday, a Miss Ruby Lamont called and wanted to know, and I quote, ‘Did he find the baby daddy yet?’ Oh, and your mutha needs a ride to the eye doctah on Tuesday for an appointment at 1:30.”
“Lamont.” The name wanted to ring a bell. “Say, that dame just called a few days ago. I haven’t even interviewed her yet. Besides, wringing child support out of some lowlife would be a miracle. Miracle’s are extra.”
Mama... I moved her to Jersey to be closer so’s to keep an eye on her. I had wanted to find her a place out of the city. Truth is, I looked in Englewood cause I heard Tony Bennett was from there. I found her a nice little house on Orange Street in a quiet neighborhood with lots of trees around. At first, I looked further north in the Upper Saddle River area just to get out in the country. It was way out of my league - houses were going for most of thirty thousand up there. Anyway, on that particular Saturday morning, I was thinking she might enjoy a place in Arizona more.
“Hey,” I said in a stage whisper, “I’ll buy if you fly.”
“Shu-wa.” There was that accent again. Hot damn! “Cannolis?”
I winked at her. “There’s money in my trench coat. Careful, don’t get none on ya.” She was so cute when she squidgied up her nose like that.
“Coffee for your guest?” She recovered and nodded at my office.
I just held up my hand as a stop sign. I returned to the mystery gal. As I walked in, she was flicking a platinum pencil lighter at the far end of a filtered Old Gold. The pack lay on the corner of my desk beside my coffee mug.
“I hope you don’t mind I took a sip of your coffee,” she said in a husky voice. “It’s been a rough night.”
There it was, a perfect red lower lip print right above the eagle, globe and anchor on my cup. “Course not,” I said. “The emblem looks good with a lipstick smear.”
“I saw the same thing tattooed on your shoulder when your shirt was off. Is that a fraternity?”
“Sister, you got no idea. Listen here, I’m going to be straight with you. If you’re straight with me, everything will be jake. I just woke up from the sleep of the dead and my head is trying to
get back to my hatband size. My client thinks a man in that gin mill last night knocked off some accountant who had turned state, then Fed stool pigeon. I do, too. That happened six years ago in Burlington, Vermont.” Her gaze was steady. I continued.
“The trigger man was sitting there with Vito Rossi. You prob’ly don’t know Rossi. Guarantee ya, you don’t want to. What I don’t know is why a classy dame is frequenting a waterfront dive like the Campo di Pesci. Guess that could just be your favorite gin joint except for two things. The dirtballs there didn’t treat you like a regular, and, well, here you are at my doorstep.”
I squeaked the springs as I leaned back in the heavy wooden chair. She had burned the Old Gold down to the filter and was snubbing it out in the floor stand ashtray. Filters! Why smoke if you can’t get the pleasure and benefit? Her full red lips opened as if to speak. That only turned on the waterworks. Other than commies, there were only two things I had no use for, and a dingbat broad crying was both of them.
“Say, reach under your chair. Grab that box of Kleenex.” Even I recognized the curtness in my voice, but the act of doing something seemed to return her composure.
“I’m sorry,” she said from behind the tissue. “I haven’t slept. Do you know the name of that stool pigeon accountant?”
“The dead one? Sure, it was a Frank Smith. He was two weeks away from testifying to a Grand Jury. It was all over the papers”.
“No, it was Franklin Margolies, my father, Franklin Margolies”.
Again, that old gut feeling of uneasiness, maybe danger, came over me, a new player in a game where the rules change themselves.
“Believe me,” I said, “I’m quite familiar with the case. I’ve never heard mention of a daughter. What’s your angle? How is it that I found you clubbing with the assassin responsible for Smith’s murder, or Margolies...?” I was not that familiar with the case, but that snapped her pretty head up.
“Ordinarily, I wouldn’t piss on Rossi’s head if his hair was on fire.”
I felt my own eyes grow wide. I really liked that broad. “I was talking about Jack McCoy.”
“Do you know whose books my father kept?” She leaned forward, “Do you know who he was going to testify against?”
In the absence of any light in my eyes, she said, “Vito ROSSI!”
She continued, gaining strength and momentum, “I’ve been trying to gather evidence against Rossi for so long, it finally became obvious that I had to establish some kind of contact with him. That bartender last night used to be an acquaintance of my father. He actually used to work in reputable places before he started drinking the profits. I had him get word to Rossi that I had some of my father’s ledgers, that I’d be willing to turn them over. Rossi returned a message that he would meet me in that horrible place at 11:30 last night.”
I was intrigued with her story and with the black streak down her left cheek and with her crossed legs...
“I got there a little early and saw a stranger sitting at the bar. You were obviously interested in Rossi, too. For all I knew, you were with him. I went up to the bar and ordered a drink. My legs were buckling. I thought by that point, I’d have a plan. Truthfully, I guess I did have a plan; I had a .25 automatic in my purse. When that low-life from the black car came in and sat at Rossi’s booth, I was beside myself with fear. THEN, everybody jumped up and ran out different doors! My first thought was, they must know I have a gun. Not to be indelicate, Mr. Stone, my concern then turned to changing my wet step-ins,” a mocking twinkle was in her eye.
I really, really liked that dame, “Call me Woody.”
“Woody, I doubt you knew much at all about Frank Smith. The government was supposedly getting together a program to give witnesses aliases, hide them, protect them...”
Again the word ‘expendable’ drifted into my mind. “How they doing with that?”
“Not too good, Woody. Not too damn good. Look, once I got away from that horrid place last night, I realized the stupidity of my actions. When I finally remembered who you were, it occurred to me that you might have something on Rossi. If so, I want in.”
“It doesn’t work like that, Kate. You’re playing in the bigs with these creeps,” I said as I squeezed my way between the desk and her chair. “Be right back.”
I returned with hot coffee in a mug that proclaimed ‘UT MARTIN’ in big letters. Her eyes said thank you. What she said was, “Who’s U. T. Martin?”
She lit another Old Gold and seemed to genuinely mellow as I spoke briefly about the University of Tennessee. As I lit a Lucky Strike and slid back into my chair, she launched again.
“Woody, if you have anything, anything at all, on Rossi, please give it to me. I’ll pay you. Or just let me help! I’ve been fighting this alone for so long. The police just run me off. My friends think I’m gonzo. When I have a belt or two to calm my nerves, my mind goes right back to that crazy idea you saw last night. I should be committed for even thinking that, much less acting on it.”
Her smoky voice trailed off... I thought. “MY FATHER was trying to do the right thing. The system let him down! The system gained his trust, then killed him!” That sent coffee splashing on the front of my desk.
‘Uh-huh. Bad ol’ system’.
“Kate, easy. I appreciate your honesty. You’re a brave one, and yes, I do have a recent case involving Vito Rossi. The DA’s office, across the river, is trying to close his dago ass down. Excuse my French. But you... you need to steer clear and lay low. Last night, those two cutthroats were not there to make a deal, and they certainly weren’t there to take you to a cotillion. Just give me your phone number. I’ll keep you updated and I can contact you if I have to. The bone-head stunt Rossi tried to pull last night because of you might be close to the final nail in his coffin.”
When she searched in her purse, the sunlight through my one small window drilled back at me from a chrome-plated barrel. She handed me a business card. The feel of the raised lettering told me it was engraved. Nice. I saw that it read, ’Kathryn Margolies, League of New York Theatres, New York, New York, Hy 9-3331’. I recognized the trade association for the Broadway Theater Industry. I sure wished I had that number under different circumstances.
I did not elaborate about Poor Jack McCoy, his connection, his incarceration, or Rossi’s incredibly stupid move in setting her up the night before. The gal was intelligent and worked hard at seeming intuitive; we’d see just how practical she was. Then, there was the dangerous position she was still in. She was strung tight. I didn’t know which way she’d jump when provoked. Any jumping to be done, I wanted to do it. As she was slipping her deck of Old Golds back into her purse, I heard Gina returning from the bakery, and my stomach growled.
Kate and I managed, single file, to exit my private office. Again, I told her to lay low and I assured her I’d be in touch. She was past the gold lettering on the glass door when I thought to ask if she’d like a cannole. She said over her shoulder, “Those things will kill you, Mr. Stone.”
I watched her as she walked down the hall - looked like two coons fighting in a gunnysack.
“Call me Woody.”
When she hit the top of the stairs, she turned her pretty head and shot a quick smile, I think.
CHAPTER THREE
I scratched my stubbly chin as I pushed the door closed and turned to the radio squawk of Gina fiddling with the AM dial. Bobby Darin’s ‘Mack The Knife’ was good, but I was still partial to Satchmo’s jazz version.
“Gina, how come when I tried to call my mama the other day, I could only get a buzzin noise? Is our phone doin okay?”
“Yeah, it is. What numba you dialing?”
“Same number I been usin for three years, 1-1-Englewood 4-2600.”
“That’s it, Boss. Englewood and Teaneck got a new thing called an Area Code. It’s 2-0-1. You got ‘a dial 2-0-1, then your numba.”
Why me, Lord? “That’s a bunch a’ malarkey!”
“Hey, don’t blame me. Blame Jersey Bell,” sh
e pretended to pout. “Don’tcha read the paypas? Didja know the Russians put another Sputnik in owda space last month?”
The Dodgers moved to California; Ike made a chunk of ice called Alaska a state; baseball players had to wear their names on their backs; to top it all off, they were taking George Gobel off the air. The world was going to hell in a hand basket and she wanted me to read about it.
“Okay, Honey Bunch. Do me a favor and write all that dialing stuff down for me, will ya? Meanwhile, ring up Dan Logan at the DA’s Office on Line two. Let me know. I assume their number is still Chambers 4-8260, unless they got some kind a’ aerial code.”
I grabbed my wing tips by the couch trying not to think about what was splattered on them. Round-shouldered, I headed back to my private office. It suddenly seemed small, very small.
I tied up my shoes, buffed them off, and grabbed my dumbbell. I stood and stared out the window behind my desk doing arm curls. Recent events whirled behind my eyeballs. They were like a Rube Goldberg set-up without the fun factor. The brick wall was still 15 feet away. Red lipstick, Poor Jack Mack, Gina Kowalski...
***
Gina’s mama and grandma were still living over in the Bath Beach Neighborhood of South Brooklyn, near Dyker Beach Park, very nice, very big lawn. Her daddy had passed even before her brother, Ed, joined the Corps.
The Narrows are the shipping lanes that mark the entrance to New York Harbor. You could walk two blocks from the Kowalski’s to the Dyker Athletic Fields and get a great view of Staten Island across The Narrows. Only the Belt Parkway that hugs the shoreline interrupted it. Change was coming soon; the City was building a steel monster across to Staten Island they plan to call the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge.
Gina had gotten her own place in the Webster Apartments on West 34th Street eight months before. The hotel was exclusively for unmarried working women. She said she had a nice second floor room with affordable rent and meals included.
The Webster also provided sewing machines, an infirmary, a roof garden, and a library with books ‘selected by a trained librarian’, according to an article in the Times. Sure, I’d checked it all out. I figured her brother, Ed, would want me to.
The Case Of The Little Italy Bounce (Woody Stone, Private Investigator Book 1) Page 2