The Vaults (34 page)

“I know, Frank. I’ll be as quick as I can.”

Floyd’s well-earned reputation for discretion paid off and Frings was only kept waiting for the better part of an hour. Floyd’s man was dressed in expensive silk slacks—black with light blue pinstripes—suspenders, and a white undershirt. His arms were strong and scarred, his hair matted together into little nubs. Underneath his beard, his obsidian face was hard, his eyes yellow around the pupils and red around the edges.

“This is him,” Floyd said to Frings.

Frings extended his hand, but the man didn’t even look at it, instead zeroing in on Frings’s eyes.

“Floyd tell you why I want to talk to you?” Frings asked.

The man nodded.

“Who do you get your supply from?”

The man gave Frings a hard look. Frings wondered how Floyd had persuaded him to come.

“I don’t see that it makes sense for me to tell you.” His voice was thick and carried some kind of accent. African?

“Why’s that? I guarantee that none of this comes back to you. Floyd’ll vouch for me.”

The man shook his head in disgust. “Why would I turn in this man? If he’s gone, how do I make my money? Where do I get the mesca?”

Frings had anticipated this. “I know where they grow it. If they go down, I’ll show you where the fields are and then you can cut out the middleman. It’ll be more for you. You’ll control the whole process.”

The man stared at Frings. Without moving his eyes, he asked Floyd, “He on the level?”

Floyd said he was.

“Better be,” the man said. “Better be.”

“So?” Frings prompted.

“Ofay. Big. Calls himself Mr. Green. Not his real name. Don’t see him much. Usually sends some hard men with the pounds. But Mr. Green is the man in charge.”

Frings described Smith.

“That’s him.” The man spoke as if half-asleep or drugged. His eyes still held Frings’s.

“How does it work?”

“His boys come with a shipment once every two weeks. I pay them for the last shipment and then I spread the supply around to the people who sell it.”

“Like Floyd.”

The man nodded.

“Does he deliver to anyone else?”

“Sure. Plenty of others down here.”

“East Side?”

“Yeah.”

“What about other parts of the City?”

“Just here.”

“Not in the white parts of the City?”

“No.

“How do you know?”

“You buy mesca in Ofaytown?”

“I . . .”

“No. That’s why you come here to buy. Because there isn’t any mesca in Ofaytown. Mr. Green told me that I was not to distribute to Ofaytown. I told him maybe someone I give it to decides to take it there themselves. Mr. Green says he’ll take care of that. I should just worry about where I sell.”

“So you stay on the East Side?”

“No angle in crossing Mr. Green,” the man said with a sad shake of his head.

Pesotto, Red Henry’s tailor, was on his knees, marking with chalk where the hem of the mayor’s tuxedo pants should be let out. This was the usual ritual before any black-tie event in the City, and tonight’s celebration of the Poles’ decision to locate their factory in the City was to be a black-tie affair. Henry was obsessive about how he looked at such occasions and had his tux altered the day of, so that it would fit perfectly. Often, Pesotto merely went through the motions, the tux fitting perfectly as it was. The important thing was for Henry to feel for his satisfaction and confidence that some minute adjustment had been made.

As was the case at all these fittings, Pesotto had followed instructions and Berlioz flowed tinnily from the Victrola. Henry stood with his eyes closed, seemingly lost in the music as the stooped tailor made chalk marks on his pants.

Henry’s rapture was broken by the arrival of Peja, along with Smith and Feral. Henry opened his eyes slowly, keeping the rest of his body motionless. Pesotto ignored the interlopers and continued with his work.

“We need to talk,” Peja said.

Henry nodded.

Peja said, “In private.”

Henry grunted. “Pesotto is discreet. Aren’t you?”

Pesotto did not answer because he was deaf.

“You see?”

Peja looked uncomfortably at Feral and Smith, both of whom ignored him, then said, “First, we got some of the kids and we were right, they
are
the bombers.”

“Some?”

“Some got away. It was chaos, apparently.”

“Chaos?”

“I’ll get to that.”

“Did you at least find out why they’re bombing the houses of the most important goddamn people in this City?”

“Yes, they—”

Smith interrupted, “One of the boys broke down in the wagon on the way to the station. It was a little hard to get exactly what he was saying because he . . . well, he doesn’t seem to know a whole lot of words. But we have the basic story. He says that several months ago—that’s our guess, he couldn’t be more specific than not a long time and not a short time—anyway, someone went to the orphanage to visit the boys. He said it was a man who had red and gray hair and big wide chops.” Smith scratched his cheeks to make the point.

“Christ almighty,” Henry said. “Whiskers?”

“We’re pretty sure. I’ll get to that in a minute. So this gink—probably Whiskers—visits the kids and lays out the whole Navajo Project to them, if you can believe it. The whole bit. You can guess how this goes over with a pack of boys, and they get all belligerent. Then this gink tells them he has a present for them, and, according to this kid, he has a trunk with him that turns out to be filled with dynamite and everything else they need to make those bombs. He shows these kids how to make them, you know, wrap them in rope, tie a long fuse. Then he takes one of them, the leader I guess, on a trip around the City. Shows him all the points of interest.”

“Block’s house. Altabelli’s, Bernal’s, mine.” Henry still hadn’t moved.

“Those and some others. That’s how you get at these people who have ruined your lives, he says. You bomb their fucking houses. So when this kid gets back to his buddies, they decide to screw the orphanage, and they head out to the warehouse village with their trunk and start putting the bombs together.”

Pesotto straightened and Henry obligingly stepped out of his pants. He now stood in only his boxers, socks, and a sleeveless undershirt. Pesotto took the pants and, with a nod to Henry and the others, shuffled into a back room.

“Where’s Whiskers?” Henry asked.

“Well, that’s another thing,” Smith said. “Once we heard this, I got in touch with Kragen out at Freeman’s Gap and he went by Whiskers’ and says he’s not there. I said to go check Otto’s place, and Otto isn’t there either. He’s checking on the others right now.”

Henry was reddening. “What else?”

“You remember Poole?” Smith asked.

“The Red dick?”

“That’s him. I worked him over a little a few days back. Told him to lay off the Prosnickis.”

“I remember.”

“Well, funny thing, he turns up at the warehouses as we’re taking the kids out.”

“The hell’s he doing there?” Henry’s shoulders were becoming mottled with red patches as his blood pressure rose.

“Didn’t I tell you? The leader of those little shit kids is Casper Prosnicki. He was there looking for Casper, just like I told him not to.”

Henry sighed with impatience. “So you have Poole.”

Now Smith looked nervous. “No. We went after him, but he got away.”

“You’ve got the Prosnicki kid?”

Smith stared at the floor.

“You don’t have the goddamn Prosnicki kid?” Henry roared.

Smith kept his gaze on the floor.

Henry calmed himself a little. “How the hell did you let that happen?”

Smith shrugged, knowing that nothing he could say would do him any good.

“You’ve got people looking for Poole?” Henry asked quietly, a deliberate attempt to keep his temper in check.

“Everybody. ASU, police, the whole bit. We have his place staked out and people on the street.”

Henry rubbed his bald scalp thoughtfully. “That it?”

Peja answered this time, getting it out quickly. “We think Frings might have gone to see Otto.”

Henry didn’t answer. His body tensed, producing visible fear in Smith and Peja. Feral continued to stand silent and relaxed.

“He was seen coming back on the road to Freeman’s Gap and then straight to the Palace.”

“And Whiskers and Otto are missing.”

“That’s right,” Peja said.

“Where is Frings now?”

“He’s at the
Gazette
.”

Henry looked at Feral. “Hurt the girl. Send Frings a piece of her. He doesn’t take us seriously, but we can change that in a hurry.”

With his eyes, Feral acknowledged that he had heard, a display of unresponsiveness that would have infuriated Henry if it had come from Peja
or Smith. But from Feral it just confirmed Henry’s impression of efficiency and ruthlessness; and it helped him relax somewhat.

Henry looked at Smith and Peja. “Take care of these things now. I do not want anything going wrong at the signing or the party tonight. Understand?”

The Berlioz had ended and the needle skipped, filling the silence with its rhythmic banging against the center of the record.

In Little Lisbon, merchants were setting out their wares as blue sky emerged from the clouds and the remnants of the deluge washed into the storm drains. The streets were so congested with pedestrians, merchants, and delivery trucks that the hack let Poole out at the fringes.

Poole waded through the crowd, holding his hand gingerly against his body. His wet, disheveled appearance drew occasional glances. There was, he knew, a café in the neighborhood that was a headquarters of sorts for the Portuguese communists. If Enrique was not there, they would at least know where he could be found.

The crowds made the maze of narrow streets even more disorienting, and he had to ask directions several times. The smell of fish and unfamiliar spices assailed him. At last he found the place, no sign above the door and no windows, but three tables on the sidewalk outside.

He drew instant attention from the five men, small and lean and hard, who sat inside drinking pungent tea. Poole walked to the counter where an old man with a white beard that hung to his waist said something to him in Portuguese.

“I’m looking for Enrique.”

“Don’t know him,” the old man wheezed.

“I don’t have time for this. I’m Ethan Poole. Carla Hallestrom is my girl.”

The man stared at him impassively.

“I was at the strike.”

A man at one of the tables got up and walked over to Poole. His breath stank of garlic. “I saw him there. The police cracked his head with their nightsticks.”

The old man looked at the man with the garlic breath and then at Poole. “Upstairs.” He motioned with his hand for Poole to go back to the street, then around to the left.

She must have heard his footsteps on the stairs because when he reached the landing, the door was open and Carla was waiting for him. They embraced, Poole lifting her off the floor so that her feet dangled around his shins.

“I was so worried,” she said, letting go of his neck, as he lowered her to the floor. “How did you . . . oh my God.” She noticed his hand.

“They were at the warehouses, arresting kids.”

“Casper?”

Poole shrugged. “Could be.”

“And you?”

“They chased me. I got away, but they got a good look at me. They know I was there.”

Enrique was in the doorway. “Come in. We’ll clean your wounds.”

Later, his hand cleaned and wrapped in gauze, Poole sat on Enrique’s ancient couch with Carla. Enrique was in the kitchen with his wife, and the smells wafting from there had Poole’s stomach grumbling.

“Tranghese from the apartment above us met me on the street and warned me,” Carla explained. “He said they came asking questions about us.”