A Bloody Business Page 8

  He says, “Little Jewish Navy, my ass. This guy’s the real deal.”

  “Whadya mean?” Sammy says.

  “We’re freezing our butts off in tin cans picking up crates while he’s sittin’ at the Ritz calling the shots.” Benny runs his finger along Long Island, then through a sea of dots and numbers. “He knows where all the ships are all the time.” Benny lifts the headset of the wireless. “He’s talking to the ships. No wonder he prances around town acting like he owns the place. He’s got one helluva cock to think he can stick it wherever he wants. Fucking Rothstein. This is his doing.”

  Benny slides the wireless headpiece over his ears and fiddles with the dials.

  “Hello…hello?” he says into the transmitter. “Take out those shtarkers in the 45’ cruiser.”

  A voice comes back, “Who is this?”

  Benny flips the switch ‘off’ and flops into the Louis XIV side chair. “You suppose those pirates were Waxey’s guys?”

  Sammy says, “Maybe. Why would Waxey attack us?”

  “Don’t be stupid,” Benny says. “What a bunch of schmucks we are.”

  Sammy picks up a code book. The orchestra in the ballroom strikes up again, a waltz to keep the crowd moving through the stifling heat. Someone shoves a key into the front office door. Benny flips off the lights and scrambles for a side door leading to the hallway and finds it secured with a steel bolt.

  Someone is in the front office and is working his way toward the inner door.

  “Hide,” Benny says.

  Sammy takes shelter behind the floor-length drapes and chokes back a dusty sneeze. Benny ducks into the bathroom and draws his Colt, pointing it at the door.

  The door between the two offices opens. Someone flips on the light. Sammy peeks out from the dusty drapes. It’s Arnold Rothstein. Rothstein rustles through batches of papers stuffed in the cubbyholes of the rolltop desk. He thumbs his way through a log book then pulls a pad from his breast pocket and begins to scribble.

  A giggle in the front office gives Rothstein a start. It’s Waxey and his broads. Waxey barges through the inner door eager to catch the thief rummaging through his operation.

  Waxey says, “What the hell are you doing in here?”

  Arnold waves his little black book, “Did you think I wouldn’t find out?”

  Waxey laughs. “You keep your hands clean, don’t you? What’s your beef?”

  A row of pearly white teeth shine in Arnold’s stiff grin.

  “I make the connections; you make the deliveries. Cutting the booze wasn’t part of the deal. We’re serving high-class customers.”

  “Things change,” Waxey says. “This way there’s plenty to go around.”

  Arnold shakes his head. “You think like a two-bit operator. The whiskey I ship is top shelf. You don’t have to find customers. They find you. The rich know the difference. You cut the quality and you lose the customers who protect us from this wretched law.”

  Waxey says, “Shemozzle back to your poker game, Arnold. You think your goy wife makes you one of the boys. You’re still a dirty little kike as far as they’re concerned. Now if you’ll excuse me, the broads and me would like to get down to business.”

  Waxey plays a little grab-ass and somewhere between Angie’s silk-covered bottom and the contour of Edie’s ample breast, he notices Sammy’s shoes poking out from under the curtain. He grabs the closest thing to him sure to cause damage, a heavy glass ashtray with hard corners, and sends it sailing toward the curtain. The ashtray finds its mark with a sickening thud.

  Sammy falls to the floor and into the light. He clutches his arm and writhes in pain.

  “One of yours?” Waxey says to Arnold.

  Benny jumps from the bathroom, his .38 aimed at Waxey’s head.

  “One of mine,” Benny says. “You said come by, so we did. Now what?”

  Sammy cradles his arm and struggles to his feet. Gordon reaches for the baseball bat behind the rolltop desk.

  Benny says, “I wouldn’t.”

  “You got beytsim, kid,” Waxey says. “I’ll give you that. You see what kinda business I got. If you got any brains, you’ll come in with me. What you’re doing with that small-time mob on Cannon Street don’t make no sense. I could use a kid like you but don’t get the wrong idea. I ain’t no wet nurse. Next time you pull a prank like this, you’ll be licking the bottom of the East River with a bloated, purple tongue.”

  Benny maneuvers to Sammy’s side then hustles him from the hotel room. Back on the sidewalk, he hails a cab and together they head for Meyer’s flat.

  “We had a little trouble,” Benny says rifling Meyer’s refrigerator. “Where’s the steak?”

  Sammy nurses his arm. Meyer peels Sammy’s shirtsleeve back and winces.

  “What’s wrong with ice?” Meyer says.

  Meyer chips away at a large block of ice until the shavings fill a dish cloth. He puts the cold pack on Sammy’s arm.

  Benny says, “We saw Gordon’s setup.”

  Sammy says, “We broke into his office.”

  Benny says, “It’s a helluva setup at the Knickerbocker.”

  Sammy says, “It’s true.”

  Benny says, “Rothstein showed up while we were having a look around. He wasn’t happy with whatever it was he found in the rolltop. Then Waxey came in with his broads. Rothstein accused him of cutting the booze.”

  Meyer says, “So what?”

  Benny says, “They fought. The Brain is in way over his head. Waxey’s got ex-cons to do his dirty work. What’s a guy like Rothstein gonna do with that?”

  Meyer says, “Gordon’s a regular patron saint of ex-cons.”

  Benny says, “He’s on top of the world, Meyer. He struts around Manhattan like some kinda peacock. And he’s got cash. He can afford to put streetwise guys to work.”

  “We’ve got allies. He can’t push us around without a fight.”

  Sammy tries to flex his swollen arm. It’s no use. Purple has spread clear down to his elbow.

  “You ain’t goin’ home,” Benny says.

  “I have to,” Sammy says.

  “What the hell do you think you’re going to tell your mom? You went a few rounds with Harry Greb?” Benny says. “I never knew a Yid could hold his own in the ring. You can try. They might buy the story.”

  “I’ll just tell ’em that a bunch of canned goods fell on me while I was stocking shelves. It happens all the time.”

  Meyer says, “Waxey wants to rule over everybody but his mob has no cohesion. He can’t fight all of us. That’s a fact.”

  A week passes. The summer heat swelters at 95 degrees. Fruits and vegetables rot on the pushcarts. Flies swarm the putrid alleys. Sweatshops become death shops.

  Reluctantly and with no other discernible option, Arnold Rothstein schleps down to the Lower East Side where rotting garbage and the stench of windowless tenements make his eyes water. He finds Meyer in a stiff-back chair in front of the garage reading. Moe Sedway leans against the brick wall and watches the traffic go by.

  “How can you stand it?” Rothstein says.

  “What can I do about it?” Meyer says.

  Rothstein looks tired, humbled, and tormented.

  He says, “Humans are nothing but dubs and dumbbells.”

  “Is that a personal reflection?” Meyer says. Meyer turns to Moe, “Give us a minute, will ya, Moe?”

  “Sure,” Sedway says, leaving them to their discussion.

  “See the corpses of Jerusalem,” Rothstein says, gesturing to the over-crowded ghetto.

  Meyer says, “This is the army that lost the war. Now they’re stuck doing factory work. The slaves have been chained to the sewing machines.”

  “My father was a cloth merchant.”

  “My father is a tailor,” Meyer says.

  “Discontent,” Rothstein says, “the stuff scandals are made of. It was the loophole in major league baseball. They settled out of court, you know. All those ball players got acquitted. The league didn’t
want anybody looking too closely at where all the money goes.”

  Meyer says, “You didn’t come to talk about baseball.”

  “What are you reading now?” Rothstein says.

  “It’s a Roman thing. This guy, Machiavelli, tried to sum up the principles of war.”

  “Any good?” Rothstein says.

  “It’s O.K.,” Meyer says. “Not sure it’s useful for here.”

  Rothstein says, “I have a proposition. I need you to put a little fear in Waxey Gordon. I’m sure by now Benny told you about the scuffle at the Knickerbocker.”

  “This business is between you and your gaunef friends. I can’t step into the middle of that.”

  “One hand washes the other,” Rothstein says. “I found a guy with certificates of withdrawal. He started in business with a pharmacy. Now he’s a lawyer. He’s got a setup for medicinal alcohol. This guy reads the Volstead Act for pleasure. You two would get along like gangbusters. You could make a bundle.”

  “No deal,” Meyer says. “On the street, I protect my interests. If you want me to protect yours, you’d have to give me a piece of the business so it becomes my business. That’s the way it works. Why would I start a war over something that’s none of my business?”

  Rothstein looks at his watch, “Can we get out of here? Lunch? Uptown, in a real restaurant?”

  Meyer stands and hails a cab.

  The “real restaurant” is a private club that occupies a narrow building six stories high. It is one of Rothstein’s favorite haunts. They walk up six steps to an arched doorway that gives way to a room lined with quarter-sawn oak panels and fine leather chairs. Heavy beams span the ceiling and rest on ornately carved corbels. Bookcases filled with leatherbound tomes line the walls. The place is full of White Anglo-Saxon Protestant men. Period.

  Two Jews entering the establishment for lunch make no sense whatsoever.

  “You just have to be on speaking terms with John Knox,” Rothstein says, referring to the C-note that gets him into the high-stakes gaming tables behind these closed doors.

  They climb a flight of stairs to a dining room. Rothstein settles into a small table. The waiter arrives promptly.

  “Brandy for my friend,” Rothstein says to the man in the white jacket.

  “I prefer whiskey,” Meyer says.

  “Trust me,” Rothstein says.

  Meyer looks around. Snifters are the badge of courage, the telltale mark of a successful swindle.

  “Whiskey on the rocks,” Meyer says. “How about you?”

  Rothstein says, “I never touch the stuff. It dulls the senses.”

  The waiter departs as silently as he arrived.

  “Have you ever been to Saratoga in August?” Rothstein says.

  “No,” Meyer says.

  “The sport of kings brings in the real gamblers. Everything is out in the open. It’s all chafing dishes and Champagne glasses. I married Carolyn in Saratoga Springs…on a Thursday…1909. Come up. I’ll show you the Brook. It is a magnificent gambling house.”

  “That your joint?” Meyer says.

  “The Brook is no joint,” Rothstein says. “And, yes, it’s mine.”

  The waiter brings whiskey and runs through the choices of the day.

  Rothstein says, “You should try brandy. If I drank, that would be my poison. You can’t cut it with more alcohol. What you get is useless. Nobody would buy it. Know your customers, the guys sitting around you. They make the laws…and bend them to protect their interests.”

  “Brandy?” Meyer says.

  “Among other things.”

  Meyer says, “I can’t help you with Gordon unless you bring us in on your end of the business. My associates agree. You bring us in and we will sit down with Gordon and let him know about our association. We’ll take care of your customers. Let Waxey and Maxey have the cheap customers. It’s not going to hurt your business. Those people will buy from the cheapest distributor anyway.”

  The man in the white jacket returns. Lunch at the club is the gentlemen’s version of a hot dog on Coney Island and a crisp pickle from Gus’s. Meyer looks down at the club sandwich of toasted Wonder bread spread with mayonnaise, crisp bacon, chicken, and tomato slices and the side of fruit cocktail. It makes Coney Island look regal.

  Rothstein pushes at the meager sandwich removing the bacon, chicken, and tomatoes. He dabbles with the food and finally says, “Deal.”

  After the dull lunch in WASP heaven, Meyer hops a cab back to Little Italy and calls on Charlie Lucky in the Mulberry Street garage. He breaks down the story of the gentlemen’s club. He tells him about the certificates of withdrawal and the pharmaceutical angle. But the real topic of conversation is Waxey and Maxey’s operation and Rothstein’s discontent.

  Charlie has a good laugh.

  “You know what Rothstein is good at?” he says. “He knows if you’re goin’ to Saratoga in August, you should bring a white suit cause white’s what you wear after Memorial Day.” He laughs again. “And he’s good at handling them high-society types which is something you and I ain’t no good at. He’s got class. So, what? He’s a gambler. No shit Waxey and Maxey took advantage.”

  Charlie shows off a cache of forged whiskey labels and tax-paid stamps. Meyer admires the handiwork.

  “A guy from another family came by the Exchange this morning. Not bad, huh?”

  “It’s good,” Meyer says.

  “What were you sayin’ about Waxey?”

  Meyer says, “He’s been taking Broadway shows to Sing Sing to create goodwill with the inmates. When the guys get out of the can, they go looking to him for work. He’s got a tough mob. It’s stiff opposition.”

  Charlie says, “Yeah? Plenty of guys come outta Palermo, too. They ain’t no dandies. They only speak Italian. Where do you think they go for work? Besides, the stiffer the opposition, the better the fight. What’s your plan? You gonna pair up with Rothstein?”

  Meyer says, “He’s got value…connections. I’ll meet with him when I’m ready. Rothstein’s gotta cough up his certificates of withdrawal and agree to a split on the booze profits.”

  Charlie shrugs. “I got business to take care of before I can put my gang onto this. Joe the Boss wants a spaghetti dinner. Then we deal with Waxey.”

  “Who’s the target?” Meyer says.

  “A guy named Rocco Valenti. Somehow Lupo the Wolf’s nephew got shot, now Joe’s gotta take revenge.”

  Meyer says, “I read about that in the papers. They opened fire on city streets. The papers chalked it up to bootleggers but it was Black Handers.”

  Charlie says, “Yeah. Terranova was gunned down in front of his own house. Joe is his ally. Joe has to take revenge or the Morello family will never line up behind him. That’s the way these things work. He ain’t got no choice.”

  “I’m not telling you what to do but if you can, Charlie, try to keep the violence off the streets. We don’t need the government handing law enforcement a blank check to clean things up.”

  “I hear what you’re sayin’,” Charlie says. “It’s a spaghetti dinner. The odds are things will be settled in the restaurant. Who’s this guy with the certificates of withdrawal? Can we trust him?”

  “The guy’s name is George Remus,” Meyer says. “I checked him out. He’s a lawyer. He scoured the Eighteenth Amendment for loopholes. They weren’t tough to find. Lawyers live for this stuff. Seems he’s something of a celebrity among the upper class in Cincinnati. He’s been around the pharmaceutical business all his life so when the law made prescriptions exempt, he got into the certificate business. I don’t know how he and Rothstein connected but you can be sure he’s looking for two things: doctors willing to write phony prescriptions and tough guys able to persuade them.”

  Charlie laughs.

  Meyer says, “Remus was in the news a month or so ago. His farmhouse was raided and six of his men were arrested and indicted for violation of the Volstead Act so he must be running booze, too.”

  “You gonna me
et him?”

  “Sure, why not?” Meyer says.

  * * *

  After working out the arrangement with Rothstein, Meyer meets Remus at the Red Head, a small speakeasy on the west side of Sixth Avenue where doctors, politicians, bohemians, and entertainers hang out. Rothstein says the lawyer will feel right at home. Jack Kriendler, the proprietor, greets Remus and Meyer at the door. Filled with boozed-up flappers and tipsy college blades, the speak reeks of a fraternity hall atmosphere.

  “It’s all about the loopholes,” Remus says over a teacup of hooch. “I worked in a pharmacy when I was a kid. I owned a pharmacy when I was nineteen. You can get away with a helluva lot.”

  Remus is gruff. A permanent scowl hangs over squinting eyes. Deep creases run from the edge of his prominent nose to the down-turned corners of his lips. His suit has that slept-in look, pressed-in wrinkles wherever his large frame bends.

  “Welcome to the Red Head,” Jack says, pouring a second round.

  Jack keeps the lights dim. An overhead fan labors to expel the heat. The embossed tin walls are washed in yellow paint. The kitchen, what little there is of it, is in a curtained-off alcove. Jack fills the place with small wooden tables and straight-backed chairs, throws sawdust on the floor and calls it a party. Café society can’t get enough of it.

  Meyer notices a couple of reporters interviewing Irving Berlin. George Remus notices three women stacked along the wall sipping cocktails and trying to grab Mr. Berlin’s attention. They are fashionable by Broadway standards, hair pulled back away from the face, simple black dresses, and long, black gloves.

  Remus stares at the cluster of crossed, stockinged legs.

  Meyer says, “Let’s get down to business.”

  Remus says, “Business is a simple yes or no.”

  The proprietor brings a large plate of sliced roast beef, cheese, and onion rolls.

  Meyer says, “Business is never that simple, as any good lawyer knows.”

  Remus says, “Business is Title II, Section 3 of the Volstead Act. The right to withdraw alcohol for medicinal purposes. On my way down here I saw a sign in a pharmacy window, ‘Closed for one year due to violation of the Prohibition law.’ That’s the risk. A year out of your business. You must be sure to dot your i’s and cross your t’s. If you do, there’s a considerable profit to be made. That’s where you come in. I sell the certificates to your company, which I will set up legally, a company that allegedly distributes alcohol to pharmacies. As you know, ‘Liquor…for non-beverage purposes and wine for sacramental purposes may be manufactured, purchased, sold, bartered, transported, imported, exported, delivered, furnished and possessed.’ Be sure you read the law so you know when you’re stepping over the line. A bribe never hurts but it doesn’t necessarily help, either. What your company does with the certificates is up to you.”