We were cruising down Charles Street when the driver slowed for the stop light at Beacon Street. I saw Benny blanch. I turned around to see what he was gaping at. A black Lincoln with shaded windows pulled around the cab in back of us. It nearly sliced off the rear bumper of our cab while cutting in between us and the cab carrying the two Cro-Magnons behind us. I couldn’t help noticing the coincidence of another shaded Lincoln pulling in behind that cab.
The four cars pulled to a stop at the light in tight formation. I couldn’t see what was going on in the cab that had been following us, and neither could Benny. But when the light changed and we pulled away, the two Lincolns never moved. The cab was boxed in.
I told the driver to make a quick right onto Beacon and step on it. Once we were out of sight of the trio of cars standing like rocks in a row, we backed off to a slow cruise. I had the driver just drive around the labyrinth of streets that crisscross Beacon Hill.
Benny took it all in with a look of disbelief, and while I gave thanks to the Lord and whoever was riding to my rescue, Benny just stared at me like an abandoned puppy. I was back in control. I had no idea how I got there. I knew that when I left the office, I stupidly opted to go with the bluff instead of calling Tom Burns for protection. I was beginning to wonder if Tom had waves of mental telepathy. For the moment, that had to do for an explanation.
I turned back to Benny.
“Let me lay it out for you, Benny. You screwed up. My presence makes that clear. Forget the denial. For once we’re going to talk straight to each other. Now picture this scene. I send a message to Fat Tony Aiello that you and I worked out a deal. More than a few bucks changed hands, and you tipped me off to what Aiello was planning for me. I could even say you did it as a matter of professional courtesy, if you can imagine that. Either way, you wind up pleading for Fat Tony’s tender mercies. Are we in agreement that that’s the worse of two evils no matter what the other one is?”
He just looked at me.
“This is a conversation, Benny. You get to speak next.”
He blinked, and I welcomed the beads of sweat that stood out from his neck to his forehead. To his credit, he went one more round. “What the hell makes you think he’ll believe you?” “I’m alive, Benny. If you did your job, you and Respa, I’d be otherwise. Respa’s dead, and you and I are not. You don’t think I can make Tony wonder about that?”
He took about ten seconds to factor that in before testing the waters.
“What do ya want?”
“Open your cell phone.”
He froze in position.
“The first alternative is still on the front burner. I’m running out of time. Open your cell phone.”
He opened the phone slowly as if he was afraid to let something out of it.
“Good. Here’s the plan. You call Fat Tony. Tell him you heard from me. Apparently Vespa missed the mark. But that’s good news. You tell him I said I had information about the number you found in the locker. The number you delivered to him was the wrong one. I’ve got the right one. I’m ready to make a deal. It’s pure business, and there’s no other way he’s going to get to the goods. Are you taking this in, Benny?”
I put a slight emphasis on “the goods” to imply that I knew what the goods were. I figured I was on safe ground there, since the odds were a hundred to one against the insiders letting Benny know what the goods were either. I also figured that Tony Aiello was under pressure to get whatever that number led to. Otherwise, why risk killing a member of the Boston Bar with no connections to the mob — to wit, me? They say in hockey that when a goon fights a goon, it’s crowd entertainment. When a goon attacks a clean player, there’s hell to pay.
Benny looked down at his knees and the beads of sweat became drops that fell on his pants. I knew he had a deathly fear of Tony Aiello. From what I’d heard, Aiello would kill in a flash, at times with his own hands. I’d also heard that the one thing that could rein in his taste for violence was his own sense of what was good for business. Benny was even more aware of that than I was.
“That’s the deal, Benny. When we reach the next corner, either you’re making the call or I bounce you out of this cab and do some cell phoning myself.”
He turned to me with a look somewhere between anger and desperation. “Listen, Mike—”
“Two choices. Pick one.”
We slowed down at the stop sign at the end of the street. I told the driver to pull over to the curb. When he pulled in, I reached over Benny and threw open the cab door.
“Out of the cab, Benny. Poor choice.”
Benny reached frantically for the swinging door and pulled it shut.
“All right, all right. What do you want me to say?”
I went through it again.
“All right. I’ll tell him you’ll meet him at his office.”
I looked at him with a grin that asked him how dimwitted he thought I was.
“All right, then where?”
I’d actually been giving that some thought, and I was getting the first amusement of the day out of my choice.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Just before Benny made the call to Fat Tony Aiello, we were on Beacon Street, crossing Charles Street. Both of us took in the scene to the left on Charles. The cab that had been following us was pulled into the right curb at a peculiar angle. The cabbie was sitting on the sidewalk yelling into a cell phone. Two police cars were pulled up in front of the cab, and one beside it. An ambulance was screaming up Charles Street from the direction of Mass. General Hospital. There were two figures in the back of the cab, heads cocked at an odd angle, neither of them moving. The final touch was that neither of the black Lincolns was in sight.
I was close to vomiting. Two more men had just lost their lives, and in some odd way, I felt responsible. This was not what I bought into when I applied for law school.
While Benny gaped at the scene, I pulled it together enough to give him an elbow.
“Make the call, Benny. You might mention that the score looks like three to nothing, my favor. It’s getting expensive. We can end it with one ten-minute business conversation.”
Benny hit the last number and I could hear the ring.
“Mr. Aiello, it’s Benny.”
Whatever was said blanched Benny’s olive complexion to a new shade of white.
“Something happened, Mr. Aiello. Michael Knight—”
“Yeah, I know, Mr. Aiello. Well listen, here’s the thing. Knight’s here with me. He wants a meeting with you.”
I didn’t need the phone to hear Fat Tony’s response. The words reverberated. “What the hell? You tell that son of a bitch—”
I had nothing to lose, so I took the phone away from Benny.
“Mr. Aiello, this is Michael Knight.”
After a slight catch, the voice on the other end went from tear-his-head-off wild to what sounded like an almost bemused smirk.
“You got big ones kid. I’ll give you that.”
“Thank you, Mr. Aiello. I’ve heard the same about you.”
Again a catch followed by a roaring laugh. I heard him say to someone there with him, “This little creep breaks me up.”
Then to me. “So you got me on the phone, kid. What do you want?”
“I want you to take me seriously enough to talk business.”
“Why should I take you seriously enough for anything? You got nothin’ I need, kid.”
“You apparently think you need me dead. You’ve made two tries so far. By my count, it’s cost you three men. I don’t think you want to keep this up. You need what I’ve got more than you know. And I need something from you. It’s time we did business.”
“Listen you little—”
I’ll omit the flavorful string of allegations about my parentage and sexual orientation that was flowing half in English, half in Italian. It ended with “— You got nothin’!”
“Mr. Aiello, the numbers on that card that Benny brought back from the locker in South Station—”
That brought him back to earth.
“Take a look at the card, Mr. Aiello.”
There was a cautious pause.
“What about it?”
“Look at the top right. See the little mk up there in pencil?”
“So what?”
“It stands for Michael Knight. I made up those numbers and put the card in the locker. They’re all wrong. I have the right ones. You need them. Can we cut through the macho crap and get down to business?”
I could hear him cuff his hand over the phone. I couldn’t make out the words, but he was talking to whomever was with him. It took a minute, but he came back. “Put Ignola back on the line.”
I put the phone back in Benny’s shaking hand. He put it to his ear but he was looking at me. I heard what sounded like a question over the line. Benny spoke into the phone in a hush, for whatever good that would do. “We’re in a cab. Heading down—”
I grabbed the phone out of his hand. It was no time to be mousy. “To hell with that. You’ve had two chances. You don’t get a third. If you want those numbers, we do it my way. Yes or no?”
There was a calm on the other end that could have been encouraging or terrifying.
“You know who you’re dealing with, kid?”
“Yes. Do you? You’re dealing with the only one in this world who can give you that code. Maybe you don’t need it. I think you do. I’m ready to deal. On my terms. What’s it going to be?”
I heard a discussion going on behind a hand-muffled phone on the other end. I didn’t think they were planning for my welfare.
“Mr. Aiello. Are you there?”
“Yeah, what?”
“I can save the strain on that brain trust you’re talking to. I have insurance that runs directly to Dominic Santangelo and beyond. So far I haven’t tipped your name. If any ten minutes passes that I don’t give the right signal, that will change. On the other hand, one ten-minute meeting — my way — and we both get what we want.”
There was a silent pause, but a short one.
“What do you want, kid?”
“A meeting.”
Another pause.
“Where?”
I gave him the time and the place of the meeting, snapped the phone shut, and settled into swallowing the lump of burning coal that had risen into my esophagus.
CHAPTER TWENTY
The Parker House, on the corner of School Street and Tremont, is one of the grand old ladies of Boston. She is the oldest continually operated luxury hotel in America. Her dining room has served Parker House rolls and Boston cream pie to political and financial titans of every degree since 1855. My favorite table in the dining room is the one at which President Jack Kennedy proposed to Jacqueline. I savored the irony in the fact that this grand old lady was about to offer the same hospitality to Fat Tony Aiello and Michael Knight.
This time I was at a far corner table, concealed behind the sports section of the Boston Globe, when the Aiello entourage appeared at the maître d’s station. Fat Tony, aptly nicknamed, led the delegation of four sides of beef, each stuffed into a pin-striped suit that was cut to the dimensions of a more svelte form. The entire tailor’s nightmare lined up behind Frederick, the maître d’, who, to his credit, maintained his cool while he escorted the entire herd to the table I had reserved for them.
I gave Frederick a nod, and he delivered my note to Aiello requesting that he join me alone at the table to which Frederick would lead him. At first, Aiello balked, particularly with me nowhere in sight. Eventually he threw his napkin on the table and followed Frederick with reluctance.
By the time he reached my table, the bands of fat that gathered over his shirt collar were nearly tomato red. He was not quite in his element, and the idea of following dutifully in the footsteps of the somewhat disdainful Frederick to comply with the whims of some little pissant lawyer — me — obviously sent his blood pressure off the chart.
I savored every bit of it. The sight of that bull moose reluctantly weaving his way through the glances of the noontime Parker House diners convinced me all the more that I had some serious leverage in that string of coded digits.
When he arrived at my table, I lowered the newspaper. Leverage or not, I found myself looking into the bloated face of a man who would, with pleasure, have had me killed at the very first lapse in precautions. I nodded to the seat opposite me without a word.
Frederick, as was his custom, unfolded and placed the napkin in what he could find of Fat Tony’s lap. I thought for an instant Tony was going to punch him out in defense of his manly honor. I believe Frederick caught the same signal, because he summoned a waiter and withdrew at quick march to his station at the entrance.
The waiter appeared and began describing in florid terms the chef’s specials of the day. I cut him off in mid-appetizer and suggested that ice water would do for the moment. The sooner we could get to business, the more likely we could disband this little gathering of misfits. I thought I’d better take the lead, and fast.
“Mr. Aiello, I’m Michael Knight.”
He gave me a nod and a glare that said we could dispense with the customary handshake.
“Let’s agree on something, Mr. Aiello. We both need information.”
He was up on his elbows, oblivious to where he was, and barking.
“The hell I do!”
I matched him elbow and bark.
“The hell you don’t. You didn’t come here for the clam chowder. Let’s not shadow box. Neither of us has time to waste.”
The waiter stepped in to pour ice water. We both sat back in silence. Aiello let the steam pour out over his damp shirt collar. I just thanked God that no one was dead yet. When the waiter left, I picked it up at a more subdued pitch, and the other diners went back to their schrod.
“Let me tell you how it is, Mr. Aiello. I don’t give a damn in hell about you or Santangelo or any of your business. I’m defending Peter Santangelo for the murder of John McKedrick. Nothing more. I think whatever that code of numbers leads to is at the heart of his murder. When I find out how, I’m out of it. You get whatever the thing is, and you’ll never see or hear from me again. That’s all I want. I’m no threat to you or your business. Are we clear on that?”
Aiello reached for his ice water and took a long slug. He didn’t say yes or no. I plowed on. “Here’s the deal. I give you the right numbers in exchange for your telling me what the numbers lead to. An even swap.”
It was his move. He was still sweating, but no longer glowing red. He seemed to have settled into his surroundings more comfortably than I wanted.
He wiped his mouth with his napkin and slowly came forward on his elbows. His voice was low. “Now I’ll make you a deal, you little piece of crap. You’ll give me the numbers and maybe you don’t spend the rest of your life wondering when your luck runs out.”
It was my turn at the ice water. The pause was for more than dramatic effect. It gave me time to regroup and realize that I was so deep in the hole that any direction was up.
I leaned forward and cut it to a whisper. “See, here’s the thing, Mr. Aiello. I never depend on luck. I told you once. Maybe you didn’t catch it. If I should miss giving the right signal to someone, you have no idea who, everything I know, and a few things I made up, go directly to the ear of the father of the man I’m defending. I don’t know if you’re ready for an all-out war with Mr. Santangelo and the families who’ll back him. I can guarantee that’s what you’ll have.”
He looked me right in the eye and I could see a grin, closer to a smirk, creeping across his face. He put his right hand on the table in a fist with the index finger pointed at my chest.
“You’re dead, kid. You want to know something? I’m gonna do it myself. You try to bluff me? You bring me down to this lousy joint. Who the hell—?”
Damn it, that did it! I lost it.
“Do you know where the hell you are, Aiello?” I was spitting the words out between clenched teeth. “Some of the peop
le who built this country did it right here in this room. People whose boots you couldn’t lick. And a bum like you calls this — Did you ever have one single thought that went beyond your damn pocketbook or your stomach?”
I was seized with the abandon of one who was certain that he would not live to walk through the door. There were no wrong moves now. They had all been made.
I came straight up out of the chair as if I had been launched. My napkin hit the table and my knees drove back the chair. My feet were clearly in gear for an exit.
I had one last line. “That’s your choice, Aiello. You’ll never see those numbers in this life. Watch out for what’s coming, Buster. Après moi le déluge.”
I always wanted to use that line. The problem was it went right in one fat ear and out the other. On my way by, I bent down and whispered close to his ear. “It means, when I go through that door, the gates of hell are going to let loose the beasts.”
I was never in my life so certain I was going to die. I only knew that come hell or high water, by damn I was going to walk tall through the Parker House door. From that point on, I had not one single clue. I only knew I couldn’t stop.
Something in that previous insane minute must have registered with Aiello. I took one more step when a hand that felt like a vice grabbed my arm. It held me in a grip that I can feel to this day.
“Sit down.”
I froze.
“I’m telling you to sit down.”
I turned back to the chair, and the grip loosened.
It took every ounce of willpower to walk calmly back to my seat, sit calmly in the chair, and calmly replace my napkin as if I had just arrived for luncheon with Prince Charles.
Intuition told me that the storm had passed, and we had both weathered it. This was a new game, and it was his serve.
“Like you said, Knight, this is business. What’ve you got for me?”
“You know what I’ve got for you. The question is, what does it open?”
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