The Babe Ruth Deception (19 page)

T
wo tall figures entered the woods behind Clover Farms. Each carried a canvas sack. Without a moon or a flashlight, they walked gingerly, protecting their tuxedoes from branches on all sides and from mud underfoot. If they were going to pass, even for a few moments, as waiters at a deluxe joint like the Brook, they couldn't look like they'd crawled through the wilderness to get there.

Joshua had spent the last two nights in this forest, finding a good path and confirming that Rothstein's gunmen, like Cecil, were city men who preferred pavement to woods. They patrolled the Brook's open grounds without ever venturing into the trees behind them. Most of the people they were guarding against, Joshua figured, were city men, too, also uncomfortable in the woods. On both nights, Joshua had reached the back wall of the casino without being challenged. He had looked in a few windows to confirm what he had learned from a drawing of the building's layout that he had paid one of the Brook's workers to draw. The price had probably been half the worker's monthly pay, but the sketch had the detail they needed, showing doors, stairs, the dining rooms, the high-stakes card room, main casino, even the closets and serving areas. No one knows a building like the people who clean it.

Joshua had heard stories about the Brook—about the luxury, the steaks, the cigars, the shows, the women. Rothstein and his partners provided every comfort that might distract the customers from the crooked gambling. Or at least soften the pain of their inevitable losses.

After twenty minutes, Joshua and Cecil stood where the woods ended. The building lay across a hundred feet of lawn. Two storage sheds provided cover for the perilous trip across.

Quietly, they set their sacks on the ground. Each man tucked a small towel into his shirt collar, then began to apply black makeup to his face, neck, and ears. In the weak light, they checked each other to make sure all exposed skin was covered, then traced on the other the white Sambo smile favored by blackface performers. They tossed the makeup and towels aside and drew long-nosed Mausers from the sacks. The pistols, their streamlined design expressing their lethal purpose, went into the rear of their waistbands, under their jackets. Cecil had so admired Joshua's pistol that he bought one from another veteran. Joshua nodded at Cecil, then led off.

Crouching, the sack in one hand, he started across the open ground. When dog barks erupted, he crouched lower and froze.

“What's that?” The voice carried in the moist night air. It came from Joshua's left, toward the road.

“Ah, probably a damned squirrel,” another voice said. “That cur barks at the wind.” The second voice came from the same direction. The guards had patrolled separately the last two nights, but these two were together.

When the dog quieted, Joshua moved again, pausing behind each shed in turn, then reaching a shadowed stretch of the casino's rear wall. Looking back at Cecil, Joshua was surprised how the painted ivory smile reflected the light from the casino's windows. Joshua hadn't thought of that. He angled his face down while he waited. When Cecil arrived, his breathing was steady, his eyes steady, too. Joshua pointed at the light from a window above them. They both stared at it so they wouldn't be dazzled when they stepped in from the darkness.

A man came out of a door about twenty feet away. He strained to haul a metal trash bin against his right hip. As he had the last two nights, he left the door open behind him and headed back to one of the sheds. Joshua and Cecil stepped inside, their sacks at their sides, heads down to shield their garish makeup. They moved past the kitchen, still bustling at 1
AM
. They stopped at a closet, opened its door to conceal themselves. Each took a silver tray from his sack, along with a wig and gloves.

They had used this blackface stunt before, not only for the irony of it. It worked like a jujitsu move, turning the victims' race attitudes in favor of Joshua and Cecil. If the robbers were in blackface, they had to be white men, right? Colored men didn't put on blackface and wigs. So that was the description that would travel from the robbery.

Joshua felt his heart begin to race. He slowed his breathing and emptied his mind. His whole life turned on the next twenty minutes. If the plan worked, then he'd be in London with Violet in a week, get married, start his business, and wait for the baby. If the plan failed . . . no point thinking about that. He'd thought through some of the dozens of ways things could go wrong and how to deal with each. But they weren't going to go wrong.

He led Cecil down a side passage. “Hey, buddy,” a voice came from a room they passed, “how's about a fresh drink?” Joshua and Cecil kept walking, hoping the man was so drunk he hadn't noticed the makeup and wigs.

They stole up a service staircase and entered the upstairs corridor, advancing on their toes. A colored maid carrying towels came out of a room. She gasped and stared, wide-eyed. Joshua held a finger to his lips. She scurried back into the room and closed the door behind her. They paused at the end of the hall. Joshua peered around a corner.

The man sitting next to the door of suite 201 was studying the
Daily Racing Form
. His cigarette smoldered in one hand. Joshua took Cecil's tray from him and put it under his arm with his own. He nodded. After three running strides, Cecil had the barrel of his pistol against the guard's cheek. Staring at two armed men in blackface, the man froze as the newspaper slid off his lap. Cecil used his free hand to haul him up by the front of his suit.

Joshua reached for the doorknob.

* * *

The wind filled Fraser's ears. It was strong enough to tilt the cornstalks, heavy with ripe ears. Feeling itchy, wondering where Speed was, he got out and walked up the road toward the Brook. He and Speed hadn't set up any specific rendezvous. He couldn't think of anything to do except poke around, trying not to be seen by any of Rothstein's men. When an engine approached from behind, he ducked into the tall corn. The car curved past the Brook. Fraser resumed his exploration, crossing to the casino side of the road.

Reaching the edge of the curve, where the front lawn of the casino began, he knelt down to take in the scene. The Brook wasn't all that impressive from this angle. Fraser decided it must extend away from the road. A low social hum carried through the wind. Cars came and left, all in the direction of Saratoga, though it was past midnight. A porch light showed two men loitering in languid poses, cigarette smoke curling around them. In France, Fraser had heard from the soldiers that the quiet men often were the most violent, the bloodiest fighters.

“You fixing to make yourself a target?” Cook's low voice came from behind him, from the far side of the road. Fraser couldn't see him. “In the ditch,” came the further hiss. “Where you should be.”

Fraser did as directed. The grass in the ditch was wet. “Attell's in there. What's going on?” he asked.

“They're doing it tonight.”

“Jiminy Cricket.”

Cook smiled into the night. “No cause to go blaspheming.”

“What're we doing?”

“Not sure. The boy wouldn't tell me much.” A car pulled down the long drive from the Brook and turned toward Saratoga. They flattened against the side of the ditch until it was gone. “How far's your car away?”

“A couple hundred yards that way.” Fraser pointed.

“That's good. Right direction.” After a moment's pause, he started again. “For getting away, they must have a car stashed, be planning to head straight north to Canada. On the getaway, that's when they'll be vulnerable. The surprise'll wear off. Rothstein's probably got a dozen gunsels around here. They'll be angry, hot to show the boss how good they are. When our boys take off, heading up to Canada, that's where you and me maybe can help.”

J
oshua burst through the door, throwing the trays against the wall to make maximum noise, their cymbal-like clatter both jarring and confusing. Cecil pushed the guard to the floor, then spun on another who sat inside the door, hitting him flush in the face with the pistol barrel. That one fell, deadweight. Joshua's voice rang out: “Hands on the table, chilluns!”

The cardplayers looked into the barrels of two German pistols. Cecil strode to the table, while Joshua announced, “My friend here'll take your guns. If you sit nice and quiet, I won't shoot you.” Cecil held out his sack. Some grudgingly, some quickly, the gamblers gave up their guns. Cecil carried the nearly full sack over to Joshua. He lifted the guns from the guards on the floor and added those to the sack, then left it at the door.

“Now the cash,” Joshua called out. “Don't make us wait. My friend gets very impatient! Ain't nothing in your pockets worth dying over. Don't sweat the jewelry. Just cash.”

Cecil grabbed the bills on the table and stuffed them into a second sack. Then he circled the table demanding wallets.

“I don't know who you are,” Rothstein snarled, color flooding his usually pallid face, “but you're going to be one sorry son of a bitch.”

“Wait, massah—I almost forgots. Y'all need to stand up now. Just you.” He waggled the gun at Rothstein and adopted a singsong tone. “Now, please, suh, would you step back from the table, maybe three giant steps.” Rothstein retreated about half the prescribed distance. Joshua nodded. Cecil pulled up the carpet under the gambling boss's chair. Rothstein's complexion neared purple while Cecil opened a compartment in the floor and scooped up a newly revealed wad of bills. That casino worker had told Joshua about Rothstein's hidey-hole.

Cecil backed toward the doorway, gun in one hand and money sack in the other. Joshua picked up the bag of guns and said, “Y'all's gonna want to count to one hundred before doing anything, seeing how our partner is directly outside this door, holding two guns. He sho' 'nuf has bullets aplenty to shoot anyone's coming out this room, leastways the first fourteen of 'em. If you wants to stay healthy, I suggest you be the fifteenth.”

The two men backed out and closed the door behind them. Joshua turned the lock with the key from inside the door. They dashed to an open window at the end of the short hall. Joshua tossed out the sack of guns. Each man dropped from the window frame to the ground. Cecil never let go of the bag of money.

They sprinted across the lawn to the trees, skirting lighted areas. Angry voices burst from the building.

From the ditch across the road, Cook heard the shouts. The men on the front porch pulled out their weapons and jumped into the night. Gunshots and muzzle flashes showed their progress across the lawn. The chances of hitting a running form in the dark were close to zero. “They're cutting through the woods,” Cook said to Fraser, pulling him up by the arm. “Let's go.”

Cook and Fraser jog-trotted around the curve toward the Stutz. They heard an engine roar in the woods on their left. “That's them,” Cook said. A large car broke from the trees and veered their way. Cook pulled Fraser into the ditch. He didn't want to spook the boys, draw their fire as they sped past. Then Fraser and Cook climbed up on the road. Both were gasping when they got to the car and got it running. Cook hopped in as Fraser started in the direction the boys were going—north toward Canada.

“Follow them,” Cook said, “but not fast.”

“You're sure it's them?”

“Who else?” Cook craned his neck to look for the pursuit. “Get in the middle of the road.” Fraser did. “Weave back and forth, not regular. You're drunk. We both are.” He pulled out a flask and splashed liquor on both of them.

The next seconds, while Fraser wobbled the Stutz down the road, keeping his speed low, seemed to take forever. How could professional hoodlums be so slow? Finally, they heard a car engine. No, several engines. “Okay now,” Cook said. “We're still drunk.”

A car roared up and tried to pass on the left. Fraser swung left to block it, then jerked right, as though recovering from a surprise swerve, then turned back left before the car behind could pass. The driver behind hit the horn, hard. Then again. Fraser turned the wheel in response, as if startled, but still held the center of the road.

When the trailing car pulled right, Fraser slid that way. The honking became more frantic. A second horn joined. Fraser jerked the wheel from side to side, in no rhythm, as if in panic. “Good,” Cook said. “Hang on.”

Fraser veered left to block the second car, which had pulled out to pass both the Stutz and the first car. For a moment, the two pursuing cars advanced side by side. The second car fell back, no longer honking. More seconds passed. Then Fraser heard tires squeal. An engine roared to its limit.

One of the cars smashed into the Stutz's rear and kept accelerating, heaving Fraser into the windshield. He didn't register the smack of skull against glass—it was the steering wheel in his chest that took his breath, then hurt like blazes. Then his brain didn't work so well. He snapped back into his seat, fingers holding the steering wheel but controlling nothing. The Stutz leaned right, then jammed itself into the roadside ditch with another lurch that sent Fraser back against the windshield.

Dazed, Fraser saw a thought float by, wondered what it was. Yes, that's it, cars explode in crashes. He should get out. He pawed his door, wondering where the handle had gone, then heard noises behind him. He swiveled his head to see, a motion that sent a stab of pain through his neck and head. He groaned. Men were jumping out of cars on the road. One was a blue Cadillac. The men had pistols. They ran toward the Stutz.

“Don't shoot! Don't shoot!” he tried to say, but his voice was weak. He lifted his arms in surrender.

Another car engine blasted. A shouted voice surged, indistinct, then faded after the car passed. A flashlight blinded him. More shouts came from behind it.

Squinting against the glare, Fraser asked, “What's going on?” Cotton batting circled his head. The world was slow. Noises muffled. “We, we . . .” The words were in his head. He had to catch up to them. “My friend,” he got out, “my friend and I, we, you know, were in town.” No one answered. “I'm a doctor,” he said. Why did he say that? Some sort of general claim on the goodwill of the universe?

A man leaned down and screamed something at him. Fraser still couldn't make out any words. When the flashlight moved off his face, he looked through flaring circles. Then a face loomed up. It had a Vandyke beard. Maybe it did. Fraser couldn't be sure. There was a metallic taste in his mouth.

The shouts separated into words. “Stop screwing around! Get after those guys!”

Two gunmen turned and started back to their car. A third jammed a gun barrel into Fraser's chest. Yes, definitely a Vandyke beard. “Fucking dumb civilians. You and your friend, count yourselves lucky we don't shoot you and leave you here to die. Goddamned lushes.” He waved the gun at Cook. “Your nigger friend's gone way over his limit.”

Fraser looked over. Cook had been quiet the whole time. That wasn't usual. He wasn't moving. Cracks spiderwebbed the windshield on that side. Cook's head must have hit it hard.

“Hey,” Fraser said, “he's hurt.” He looked over at the beard. “Help us! Please! He needs a hospital.”

“This is your friend's lucky day, Doc. I'm not shooting him and you're a doctor.”