Bitter Truth (44 page)

“Sure,” I said.

“What’s with that fish jelly that jiggles on the plate? Whatever it is, it ain’t blood sausage. I hate it down there. It’s hell all right, hot and steamy and the sinners they wear lime green jackets and white belts and eat pompano every night at four o’clock and play canasta and talk about hurricanes and bet on the dogs. ‘Welcome to Florida,’ the sign says, but it should say ‘Abandon hope all of yous who fly down here.’ What the hell made Raffaello think he could send me there to sweat and die?”

“So that’s why you came back?” I said.

“That’s right,” said Calvi. “That and the money. You sure you don’t want a cigar?”

I shook my head.

“Never understood why you’d drop a fin for a cigar when you could buy a perfectly good smoke for thirty-five cents.”

“You got me,” I said.

“I’ll be right back,” said Calvi, placing the cigar on the table so the end with the ash hung over the edge. He stood and hitched up his pants. “I gotta pinch a loaf.”

He ambled through the living room mess and into the bathroom. The cat followed, sneaking between his legs just as Calvi shut the door on himself. As soon as we heard the first of his loud moans, the bell to my apartment rang.

“That must be them,” said Cressi. “Can I just buzz them up?”

“No,” I said. “You have to go down the stairs and open the vestibule door.”

“What kind of shithole is this you live in, Vic?” said Cressi as he stood up and slipped the long barrel of his gun into his pants, buttoning his jacket to hide, though not very convincingly, the bulge. “And you a lawyer and all. You expecting anyone?”

“I don’t think so,” I said, though I wondered if maybe Morris or Beth had come by to check on me.

“Let’s hope not for their sakes,” said Cressi, as he started around the table and toward the door, the pistol in his pants turning his walk into a sort of waddle. He stopped for a moment and turned to us.

“Don’t either of yous move or you’ll piss the hell out of me.”

Then he turned again and disappeared around the bend of the living room.

50

W
HAT THE HELL is happening?” asked a frantic Caroline as soon as we were alone.

I turned to her and put my finger on her mouth and whispered. “You came to me because of my connections with the mob. Well, there’s a battle going on for control of the organization and, somehow, I’m in the middle of it.”

“Who are they?” she asked, whispering back. “Those two men?”

“They’re the men who killed your sister and brother.”

“Oh, Jesus Jesus Jesus. I’m scared. Let’s get away, please.”

I took hold of her and stroked her hair. “Shhhh. I’m scared, too,” I said, “but it will be all right. I took care of some things.”

“They knew who I was. What do they want with me?”

“I don’t know,” I said, lying, because I was pretty certain that what they wanted with her was for her to be dead.

“Why did he want the stuff in my grandmother’s box?”

“I don’t know, except maybe it’s not your grandmother’s box after all.”

“I thought about what you said, in the car.”

“That’s good, Caroline, but we have a more immediate problem. We have to get you out of here.”

“I know I need to change things, but it’s harder than you think. You don’t reorganize your life’s story like you reorganize your closets. You need something to reorganize it around. What is there for me but the horrors of our past?”

I took her face in my hands and I looked at her and saw the struggle playing out on her features, but then the toilet flushed and a terror washed the struggle away with a consuming bland fear. I jumped from my chair and went to a kitchen drawer, slid it open with a jangle of stainless steel, pulled out a small paring knife. As I slammed the drawer shut I dropped the paring knife, point first, into my pants pocket. Then I went back to the table, took hold of her shoulders, and leaned over her.

“You’ll have a chance to get away,” I whispered. “Sometime. Keep your eyes open. Keep alert. I’ll give you the sign. When I do, run. All right?”

She was staring at me, her eyes darting with panic. The water started running in the bathroom sink as Calvi washed his hands.

“All right?” I asked again.

She nodded her head.

“Now pretend to smile and be brave.”

I let go of her and turned to sit on the tabletop. I was sitting casually, an arm draped over the pocket to hide the outline of the knife, when Calvi came out of the bathroom, shaking his hands. The cat ran out of the doorway ahead of him and jumped onto a cushion. Calvi looked around with suspicion. “Where’s Peter?”

“My bell rang,” I said. “He went to answer it.”

Calvi went back to the table, sat in his seat, picked up his cigar from the edge where he had left it. He sucked deep. “Good,” he said, exhaling. “They’re here.”

Cressi came back, not leading Morris or Beth by gunpoint, as I had feared, but with three men, apparently allies. Two I had never seen before, they wore dark pants with bulges at the ankles and silk shirts and had sharp handsome faces and slicked hair. The third I recognized for sure. The long face, the wide ears, the crumbling teeth and bottle cap glasses and black porkpie hat. It was Anton Schmidt, the human computer, who had kept Jimmy Vig’s records in his head.

Anton Schmidt, his hands in his pockets and his mouth pursed open to show his rotting teeth, stopped still when he saw me. “I didn’t know you were with us, Victor.”

“It looks like everything’s changed,” I said.

“Not everything,” said Anton. “The same rules, just a different opponent.”

“How’s your chess?”

“I’m seeing deeper into the game every day.”

“Good. Maybe your rating will rise,” I said.

So Anton Schmidt was now with Calvi, and might have been all along. Of all the people in that room, me included, Anton, the chess master, was by far the smartest. Calvi was more powerful than I had thought if he had Anton doing his planning. Maybe Raffaello was right to step aside.

“Everything ready, Schmidty?” asked Calvi.

“The Cubans are in, waiting for orders. I sent them over the bridge where the bus won’t attract any attention. They’re at a diner in New Jersey.”

“They got good diners in Jersey,” said Cressi. “Tell them they should try the snapper soup.”

“We’ll know in a few minutes,” said Calvi.

Schmidt leaned over and spoke a few lines of Spanish to the two men, who nodded grimly and shot back some words of concern. Schmidt answered their questions and then turned to Calvi.

“Let’s do it,” said Calvi.

I had two phones in the apartment, a portable in the bedroom and one by the couch with a cord long enough to reach the table. I sat at the table with the corded phone, the line stretched taut from the outlet. Schmidt sat next to me and next to Schmidt was Calvi with the portable handset. Cressi sat across from us, his gun out of his pants and back in his hand. Caroline was sent to the bedroom, the door guarded by one of the two Cubans. Before she shut the door, Sam the cat scampered in after her. From behind the closed door we heard a shout.

“She has a thing about cats,” I said.

“Make the fucking call,” said Calvi.

I dialed the number I had memorized from the Rev. Custer message.

“It’s Victor Carl,” I said into the phone when it was answered. “Let me talk to him.”

“Who?” said the voice at the other end.

“Just shut up and put him on or I’ll rip off your face.”

Cressi broke into a big smile. Calvi and Schmidt remained expressionless. After a few moments of dead quiet I heard his voice.

“Hello, Victor,” said Raffaello. “What have you heard?”

“I’ve been approached about a meeting,” I said flatly.

“Who? Tell me who?”

I looked over at Calvi as he listened on the portable. He nodded.

“Walter Calvi,” I said.

“That bastard, that shit-smoking bastard. Is Cressi with him like we thought?”

Calvi nodded.

“Yes,” I said.

“Who else, Victor? Tell me who else.”

Calvi shook his head.

I looked at Anton Schmidt and said, “I don’t know who else. That’s all I’ve seen.”

“Dammit, that bastard. How strong are they, Victor, tell me.”

Calvi nodded. I looked at the Cubans and thought of the bus in New Jersey. “Strong,” I said. “They’re ready for a war.”

Raffaello sighed into the phone. “Did you tell them my offer?”

“Yes.”

Calvi looked at me and mouthed, “I want full control.”

“They’ve agreed to your proposal so long as you turn over full control,” I said.

“Of course. That is what this is all about.”

Calvi mouthed something else. “And you’ll have to leave the city,” I said.

“I understand. But he agrees no reprisals, no war, and he’ll guarantee my safety and my daughter’s safety?”

“Absolutely,” I said.

“All right. When is this meeting to take place?”

I put my hand over the mouthpiece as Calvi conferred with Schmidt. “Tomorrow morning,” said Schmidt. “Five-thirty. Before the city awakes.”

I relayed the message.

“Fine,” said Raffaello. “That’s fine. We’ll meet at Tosca’s.”

Calvi shook his head. “The old RCA building in Camden,” said Schmidt into my ear. I repeated it into the phone.

“I’m too old to go to Camden,” said Raffaello. “No. It must be on this side of the river. Packer Avenue Marine Terminal, South Gate.”

Anton Schmidt shook his head and whispered in my ear. “The Naval Shipyard,” I said. “Pier Four.”

“That’s interesting,” said Raffaello. “Good neutral territory, the Naval Shipyard. But how are we going to get in? There are guards.”

“The Penrose Avenue gate will be open and unguarded,” said Schmidt.

“That Calvi he’s a rat-fucking bastard,” said Raffaello after he heard what I relayed, “but at least it’s not one of those Young Turks who don’t respect the traditions. Calvi I can trust to keep his word. Tell him tomorrow morning, five-thirty at the Naval Shipyard, Pier Four, is acceptable. Tell him I will leave town that afternoon. Tell him after all these years the trophy, it is finally his.”

“So,” said Calvi after Raffaello had hung up, “it’s exactly as you said, Vic. We’re all going to make so much money it will bring tears to our eyes.” He turned to Schmidt. “Is that the place we wanted?”

Schmidt nodded. “Get me a piece of paper.”

I found him a yellow pad and Schmidt quickly sketched a pier sticking out from a straight shoreline.

“This is Pier Four,” said Anton Schmidt. “It reaches out into the Delaware River. Docked on either side of the pier are two old Navy ships, mothballed for future use. Between the two ships is a giant hammerhead crane. We’ll have our men here, here, and here.” He placed X’s on either side of the pier, where the ships would be, and an X in the middle of the pier, where the hammerhead crane sat. “If we set up the meeting so you confront Raffaello here,” he said, placing two circles on the pier between the crane and the shore, “then during the whole of the exchange you’ll both be covered.”

“Who will be with the Cubans?” asked Calvi.

“Domino and Sollie Wags will be on the deck of this ship here, Termini and Tony T will be on the ship there, and on the crane will be Johnny Roses, keeping an eye on everyone.” These were all names of minor mobsters, generally known as the most vicious and impatient of the Young Turks, who had apparently switched allegiances to Calvi to hasten their rise. “With our men set up like I say, we’ll dominate the center.”

“That’s good. I don’t want no trouble until I get what I came for.”

“Raffaello’s a man of his word,” I said. “There won’t be trouble.”

Calvi looked at me and sucked deep from his cigar and let loose a stream of smoke that billowed into my face, leaving me in a spasm of coughs. “You’re dead right about that, Vic,” he said. “There won’t be no trouble.”

“The crossfire here,” said Anton, “could wipe out a division.”

“There won’t be no trouble at all,” said Calvi. “Now we need a signal, so everyone’s on board at the same instant. What’s Spanish for ‘now’?”

“
Ahora,
” said Anton, rolling the “r” like a native.

“A-whore-a,” said Calvi. “Good. That’s the signal. A-whore-a. When I say a-whore-a I want all hell to break loose.”

Schmidt turned to the Cubans and gave them instructions in Spanish. The only word I caught was
ahora,
a number of times,
ahora
from Schmidt and then
ahora
repeated by the Cubans with smiles on their faces.

“I’ll call Johnny Roses on the cell phone,” said Schmidt, “and set it all up. They’ll be on site in an hour.”

“Good work, Anton,” said Calvi. “We’re going to do great things together. You’re going to be my man in Atlantic City. Together we’re going to rule the board-walk.”

Schmidt nodded, a small smile breaking through those pursed lips. Then he went off to the corner with his cell phone.

“What about the girl?” I said.

“Forget about the girl,” said Calvi. “We’re taking care of her. She’ll stay right here while we wait, what could be safer?”

What indeed? I stood up and headed away from the table.

“Where you going?” asked Cressi.

“I’m going to the pot, do you mind?”

“Well, hurry up, ’cause I gotta drop a load myself.”

I walked across the living room, the dark stares of the Cubans following me, and stepped into the bathroom. As soon as I closed the door I locked it and dropped down to the seat on the toilet and shook for a bit. Then I stood and went to the sink and ran the water cold and washed my face and let it tingle for a moment before I dried it with a towel. I took the towel I had just used and stretched it across the crack at the bottom of the door. There was a window in the bathroom, and I thought for a moment of climbing out and jumping, but the window was small and the fall was three stories and Caroline was still imprisoned with Sam the cat in my bedroom. So what I did instead of climbing out the window was reach for the light switch, turn it off, and then click it on three quick times, on again for three longer times, and then three short times again. On the last short burst of light I heard a banging on the door that scared the absolute hell out of me.

“Get the fuck out of there,” yelled Cressi through the door.

“What’s the matter?” I shouted back.

“I told you I gotta go.”

“Give me a break. I’m still on the pot.”

It was a good thing just then I was already in the bathroom.