She poked at her Hawaiian salad. "It's been over a month since you told me you 'finally had something.' Remember?"
"You're right. And what else did I say?"
" 'Just don't hound me about it.'"
"Right."
She poked at her salad some more. Then she looked up and her eyes got wide. She leaned forward. "Glance back over your shoulder."
I did.
"Now what?" I said.
"Don't you see who that is, walking toward us?"
"Oh. yeah. It's Walter Winchell. He and Damon Runyon and all the big-shot New York newshounds are in town. So what?"
"Didn't you say you met him in Florida?"
"That's true."
"Here he comes! Introduce me. Nathan! If I had a mention in his column, well, it could mean- " She shut up. Winchell was nearing us.
As he went by, I said, "Hello."
He glanced at me, smiled without smiling. "Hiya," he said, not recognizing me, and was gone.
The smirk settled on the left side of Mary Ann's face. "I thought you said you knew Walter Winchell."
"I said I met him," I said "I didn't say I knew him."
"Well, you know who this pickpocket is that Jimmy hitched a ride with, don't you?"
"Yeah."
"Well, why don't you/?«rfhim, already?"
"Jimmy or the pickpocket?"
"Nathan!"
The people at the next table looked at us and Mary Ann, uneasy about center stage all of a sudden, said, "You know who I meant."
"Mary Ann, this pickpocket is a guy we used to bust all the time. He was good, one of the best, but he had a bad habit of hitting the same few places over and over again. The train stations. The Aragon. The College Inn. And he ended up getting busted so often, he left the area."
"But he came back here with Jimmy."
"Apparently, but that doesn't mean he stayed. In fact, according to my old working buddies on the pickpocket detail, he was run in by 'em shortly after the time he would've brought Jimmy into town."
"Why didn't you tell me this before?"
"I didn't want to get your hopes up. They also told me they haven't seen hide nor hair of Dipper Cooney since. Word is he's stayed in the Midwest, but is floating city to city."
"Oh. Then why did you tell me you thought he would turn up, eventually?"
I gestured toward the fair, spread out across the lagoon before us like Frank Lloyd Wright's scattered toys.
"That," I said. "The fair. It's pickpocket heaven. He won't be able to resist it."
"You think you'll find him here, at the exposition?"
"Of course. I got two hundred helpers, don't I?"
The two hundred helpers were the fair's private police, the men I'd been training the better part of the month and a half since the Tri-Cities trip. The General was paying me good money, so I was giving him value for the dollar. I had taken the two hundred men- many of them ex-cops and out-of-work security people, but none of whom were pickpocket detail veterans, like yours truly- and handled them in classes of twelve in the fancy trustee's room in the blue box that was the Administration Building, using three of them who I'd known before, when they worked for the department, to act out some standard pickpocket techniques.
"There's one hard-and-fast rule on the pickpocket detail." I'd start out. " 'Look for people who seem inconsistent with their surroundings.'"
That meant, in a department store, you looked for people walking around looking not at the items displayed for sale, but other shoppers. At a prizefight, you looked for people studying not the action in the ring, but the crowd. At the El stations, you looked for people not looking in the direction of their train, but at the guy standing next to 'em.
And at the world's fair, you looked for people not looking at the futuristic towering pavilions or the exhibits therein; you looked for people on the midway whose attention was not drawn to the Fort Dearborn Massacre show, or Carter's Temple of Mystery; you looked for people in the Streets of Paris show whose eyes weren't on Sally Rand: you looked for people looking at people. And a lot of em would turn out to be pickpockets.
I trained the three ex-cops- pickpockets usually work in teams of three- to demonstrate some of the typical routines. For instance, a whiz mob- pickpocket team- will spot a wealthy-looking dame walking along with an expensive shoulder-strap bag hanging like it's fruit and she's the tree, and guess who's harvesting? The whiz mob, who decide to "beat her on the stride," as it's called. Two fairer-sexed members of the mob- moll buzzers, in the dip's own vernacular will walk in front of the mark, then suddenly stop or maybe back up a step, as if avoiding stepping in something. The mark will unavoidably bump into them, and as the mark is being jostled, and being profusely apologized to, the third member of the mob- the hook- will have come up from behind to open the mark's bag and have at.
There are a lot of variations on this, and I taught as many of 'em as I could to my pupils. Common ones at the fair would include action at the refreshment-stand counter, with the buzzer reaching across for some mustard and jostling the mark as the hook works the mark from behind.
Of course there would be the occasional solo artist, and redheaded, freckle-faced Dipper Cooney. a man of thirty-five or forty who unless you looked close looked twenty, was one of the best. A real live cannon, a dip deft enough to take a wallet from the back pocket of a prosperous, alert mark- without benefit of buzzers to jostle said mark's attention.
A live cannon like Cooney would never be able to pass up the fair; he would see it as duck soup, and he'd be right… normally.
Of course he wouldn't know that each and every one of the two hundred boys in white pith helmets, red jackets, blue trousers, and bolstered sidearms would have seen his police file photo; that each was instructed, if catching the Dipper in the act, to hold him for me personally.
This was about as far as I'd gone in putting word out I was looking for Cooney. The boys on the pickpocket detail were among the few on the Chicago department who had not come to view me as persona non grata for having talked against Lang and Miller in court; but I still didn't trust the boys so far as to let them know how urgently I was looking for Cooney. One of the reasons Cooney had left Chicago was that my superior on the detail had demanded a percentage of the cannon's take to allow him to have free reign at the train stations; Cooney had unwisely turned the offer down, and had been collared so many times by the detail thereafter that Chicago became a place he didn't want to be anymore. I let the guys on the detail know only that Cooney was a guy I needed to talk to, regarding an insurance matter I was tracking, and that if they caught him and called me, it was worth a fin. If I'd made more out of it than that, well, Cooney might get told I was after him: the pickpocket detail knew very well that a live cannon like Cooney was worth more than a private cop like me, and he or Billy Skidmore would pay well for the information.
And of course I avoided talking to Skidmore himself, the portly, bowler-wearing junk dealer/ward heeler/bail bondsman with whom most serious pickpockets, gamblers, and shoplifters did their bonding business.
I had to keep it low key if I wanted to reel my fish in; the boldest move I made was to ask one of the pickpocket detail boys to lift Cooney's file photo for me, so I could borrow it and get some copies made. But I just made a couple; I wasn't going to go handing them out. If word got out on the streets I was after him, Cooney'd spook, sure as hell.
I considered calling Nitti and using up that favor he said he owed me. It was pretty well known that Cooney, through Skidmore, had done occasional work for the Capone/Nitti crowd; he was that good a dip, the kind you could send on a specific assignment, to pick a key out of somebody's vest pocket, or slip something incriminating into somebody's wallet.
But I couldn't risk it: Nitti seemed a dangerous last resort, as his loyalty to Cooney might outweigh any sense of obligation he felt to me; and besides, he was in Florida, on his estate, resting up, still recuperating.
I did go to two of Cooney's favorite h
unting grounds: the Aragon Ballroom on the North Side, where Wayne King the Waltz King foisted watered-down Chicago jazz on his public between rounds of Viennese schmaltz in a mock Moorish setting; and the College Inn. where the Old Maestro Ben Bemie and his Lads performed in front of a dance floor that resembled a big backgammon board, while couples danced in the dimmed lights of a room where radium-painted fish glowed off pastel walls, turning the room into a sort of aquarium. But my fish hadn't shown, the bouncers told me, when I showed them his picture, promising anybody a fin who called me if Cooney swam in.
And now it was weeks later, and Ben Bernie was playing at the Pabst Casino- which was run by the College Inn management- and none of my efforts to turn Cooney up had done a bit of good. Still, the fair had opened today; he'd show. He'd show.
Or so I thought. May turned into June, and I found myself several days a week, supposedly as a function of my role as pickpocket adviser, haunting the fair. My pith-helmeted pupils would nod to me as I'd pass, and whenever I'd remind them about that specific pickpocket I was looking for, I'd get a shrug, and a "Can I see that picture again?"
At the same time, my relationship with Mary Ann was getting a little strained; I was on the verge of telling her to hire another detective- but the part of me that wanted to stay with her, to sleep with her, to maybe God-help-me marry her, was afraid to say so.
She didn't go to Barney's big fight, June 23.1 wanted her to, but she pretended she didn't want to see my friend Barney get hurt, which was horseshit, because she didn't give a damn about Barney. I'd introduced them months ago, and Barney had loved her on first sight ("What a terrific girl you lucked on to, Nate!" he'd told me, later); but Mary Ann, I'm afraid, was jealous of Barney, not so much because he and I were close- but because he was somebody I knew who was more famous than she was.
So Eliot and I went, and sat in the third-row seats Barney had provided us, in the same Chicago Stadium where FDR got nominated and Cermak got eulogized. We were watching the second prelim, in which one light heavyweight was knocking the stuffing out of another. I was watching, but I wasn't really seeing. This was Barney's big night, his big fight, and I was nervous for him. Somebody had to be- the cock)' little bastard was cool as a cuke at his speak this afternoon, or pretending to be, and the butterflies in my stomach were in full flight.
Barney couldn't have had a better, more beautiful starry summer night for it, and the turnout should have been terrific- Barney was, as the sports page put it, "the most popular fistic figure to develop in these parts in years" but the stadium was only half-full. The massive floor of the arena was spectator-covered, but only the first few rows of stands were filled, and I wondered if the fair had hurt tonight's attendance, or maybe it was just the price of a ticket in times like these, for a fight you could hear on the radio free.
Whatever the reason, it wasn't because Barney was a shoo-in. In fact, it was almost the opposite: the odds favored the champ, Canzoneri, to hold on to his title. But by no means was Canzoneri a shoo-in, either (the odds were 6 to 5 in his favor), and the mostly male crowd here tonight, the stadium air turned into a hazy fog of cigarette and cigar smoke caught in bright white lights, seemed confident the fighters would fan the smoke to flames. Christ, I was nervous. Eliot picked up on it.
"How much dough you got on this fight?" he grinned.
"A C-note," I said.
"On Barney?"
"On Seabiscuit, you jerk. What do you think?"
"I think you're going to take some money home. Relax."
"Does it show?"
"You're damn near shaking, son. Ease up."
"I just want this for him, that's all. He deserves this one."
Eliot shook his head, smiled. "That isn't the way it works. He's going to have to earn that title, in that ring, in just a few minutes… but I think he can do it."
"Is that who I think it is?" I said, pointing discreetly.
"Your old buddy Nitti? Sure. Who else? Canzoneri's got a big following in the Italian community."
"Nitti's Sicilian."
"Don't set technical. The mob guys are big Canzoneri boosters."
"Do they own him?"
Eliot shrugged. "Not that I know of. Just ethnic pride."
"I thought Nitti was in Florida."
-
"He's pretty much living down there right now, yeah. But he had another matter in court to attend to, so he's back for a few weeks."
"That's Dr. Ronga, his father-in-law, next to him, you know."
"He's staying with Ronga, I hear. It's nice to have a doctor around the house, when you're recovering from bullet wounds. Did you see who's over on the other side?"
"Who?"
"Mayor Kelly and his boss Nash and bunch of other big political muckety-mucks."
"I'm so impressed I could shit."
"Well, they're here rooting for Barney, no doubt. Kelly called him 'Chicago's pride and joy' the other day."
"Yeah, well, I guess it's all right for 'em to stick around, then."
The bell sounded and the last of the prelims was over; there had been no knockout, but one of the fighters was battered and bloodied. From the way my stomach was jumping, you'd think I was the one climbing in that ring next.
And a few minutes later the ring announcer was yelling into his microphone: "In this corner, ladies and gentlemen. Tony Canzoneri, world's lightweight champion."
Canzoneri, dark, moonfaced, neck and shoulder muscles bull-like, grinned at the audience, clasping his hands over his head in a prediction of victory; he got a good hand. Nitti, Ronga, and a brace of bodyguards did their share.
"In that corner, Barney Ross, his worthy opponent- "
And the thousands of friends Barney had in the arena- myself included- went berserk. Maybe the house was only half-full, but it sounded packed when Barney's cheer went up; he waved at the crowd, grinning shyly, looking almost embarrassed. He caught my eye and grinned a little more naturally and nodded at me. I smiled, nodded back.
"Barney's faster than Canzoneri," Eliot said. "That's going to make the difference."
"Could," I said. "But pound for pound, Canzoneri's the hardest-hitting puncher in boxing. I hope Barney can take it."
Eliot nodded; we both knew that Barney, despite a hard-fought, impressive record, which had earned him this shot, had never had an opponent in the champ's league.
When the bell sounded. Canzoneri, wanting to get it over with quick, rushed out to meet the cool, cautious Barney midring, and swung a wild right, then another one, both of which Barney ducked so easily it was as if Canzoneri had done it on purpose, to prove Barney was, as reputed, one of the hardest fighters to land a glove on in the business.
Then Barney tore into him, not playing it at all safe, as if to prove he didn't believe Canzoneri's reputation as a killer-puncher; suddenly it was like Barney was champ, and wanted to put this pretender away as fast as possible.
And by the end of the third round, Barney had a nice early lead. Canzoneri landed some, including a series of lefts and rights to the head that made Barney's cheering section groan and wince en masse; but Barney was landing more often, and usually staying out of harm's way.
Maybe a little bit too much.
"Barney's too careful tonight," I told Eliot, having to push it to be heard over the crowd noise. "He's missed a couple perfect opportunities to really put that guy away."
Eliot nodded, leaned toward me, and said, "Yeah, but he's taken the hardest stuff Canzoneri's got to give, and it isn't slowing him up any."
But Canzoneri was a champ, no doubt about it; and in the next round, he took command, and started working on Barney around the eyes. By the fifth round. Barney was bleeding. And slowing down.
So was Canzoneri. The two of them boxed, trying to outpoint each other, clinching often; they'd been trading blows like flyweights, but hitting like heavyweights, and they were getting tired- and saving up for the final rounds.
Then in the ninth round, and I don't know if he'd been playing p
ossum or not, Barney came alive, turned into a left-hook machine. Canzoneri didn't know what the hell to think; he did his best to dodge the onslaught, barely retaliating at all. Barney backed him into the New Yorker's own comer and whaled away at him and the bell rang.
Round ten; final round. The crowd on its feet, yelling, cheering.
Barney landed a light left to the face and a hard right, rocking Canzoneri's jaw, and followed quick to the face, jab, jab, jab. But Canzoneri found a hard right hand somewhere and sent it to Barney's cocky face and the two fell into a lover's clinch. When they came out of the clinch, they went into a brutal slugfest; the killer side of Canzoneri was clear, now, but Barney's left, bless it, kept the champ off-balance, and the damage to a minimum. When the flurry ended, it was Barney who'd landed the more, the better, blows. Canzoneri looked tired, but angry, and he swung a stiff right to Barney's midsection; Barney started in slugging with both hands, and suddenly Canzoneri found himself on the other side of the ring. In the midst of backing away, though, Canzoneri lashed out with a hard right to the head, which looked like it had knockout written all over it, from where I stood.
Then again, Barney wasn't standing where I was; but he was standing, and he was coming back with,
Jesus! A great fucking right to the head and the bell rang.
They kept fighting and the ref had to pry 'em apart.
Barney trudged over to his corner- the southwest comer, his lucky comer, the one he worked out of to beat Bat Battalino and Billy Petrolle, in his climb to this night.
We. the crowd, were still on our feet, but we weren't cheering; there was a hush over the stadium like somebody died.
True Detective Page 32