The Gangster

“Or the telegraph. Or Standard Oil and U.S. Steel. But since most criminals have trouble organizing a clean shirt in the morning,” Isaac Bell added with a smile, “it would require powerful adjustments of attitude.”

Bell walked away.

Antonio Branco enjoyed a private moment of satisfaction. Despite the detective’s flattering compliments about his English, to lull him into letting down his guard, he still formed thoughts in Italian. When, and if, you do catch them, Mr. Bell, who will you have caught? Peasants. Contadini. Of which Italy has an endless supply.

Most criminals have trouble organizing a clean shirt?

Mr. Bell, you and your Van Dorn Detective Agency will be amazed when a criminal organization spans your nation.

Suddenly, Bell was back, striding at Branco like a panther, his eyes aglow.

“Mr. Branco.”

“Did you forget something, Mr. Bell?”

“Do you recall when we met before?”

“I doubt we’ve run in the same circles.”

“Eleven years ago. I was a student.”

“Eleven years ago, I was a laborer.”

“In New Haven, Connecticut.”

“Wherever there was work.”

“I was at college in New Haven.”

“As I said, we did not run in the same circles.”

“We were running, all right. Both of us. Running from New Haven Railroad cinder dicks.”

Branco smiled. He looked intrigued. “Not in New Haven. I ran from no railroad police in New Haven.”

“North of New Haven. In the Farmington yard.”

Antonio Branco stared at Isaac Bell. He moved near and inspected him very closely. Then he stepped back and looked him up and down, hat to boots. “Incredibile!” he breathed at last. “Incredibile!”

“You remember?”

“It is incredible. Yes, I do remember. I did not get much of a look at you in the dark, but your stance is the same.”

“So is yours,” said Bell. “And your limp. Do you still carry your knife?”

“What knife?”

“The one you pulled on me.”

Branco smiled. “I recall no need to pull a knife on a college boy.”

“You did,” said Bell. “And you also pulled one on a rail cop in New Haven earlier that night.”

“No.”

“Right before you rode my train to Farmington.”

“No, Mr. Bell. I did not pull a knife on a rail cop. I did steal a ride on your train… I didn’t realize it was your train. I thought it belonged to the railroad.”

Bell could not help but smile back. “I borrowed it. College high jinks.”

“I guessed as much,” said Branco.

“The rail cop was attacked that same night. Did you happen to witness it?”

Branco hesitated. Then he shrugged. “It was long ago.”

“So you did see it.”

“A tramp cut the rail cop and ran away. It did allow me to escape, but I am not the man who cut him. Was the cop badly injured?”

“He survived,” said Bell.

“Then all is well that ends well.”

“He was horribly scarred.”

“Good. I am glad to hear that.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“He ‘scarred’ me, too. Nearly broke my leg. You yourself see, I limp to this day. It aches when storms are coming. Which is not supposed to happen to young men like me and you.”

“Who was the man with the knife?”

“The tramp? I never saw him before.”

“The cop said he was Italian.”

“Many hobos were Italian in those days. Still are. I didn’t know him. But I owe him. Thanks to him, I escaped the railroad cop. You owe him, too.”

“How do you reckon that?”

“Thanks to him, you weren’t caught when you ‘borrowed’ your train, which you would have been if he hadn’t slashed the cop. So we have that tramp in common. He saved us both for better things.”

“What better things?”

“The laborer became a business man. The train thief became a detective.”

Isaac Bell laughed. “Only in America.”

The tall detective and the wealthy grocer exchanged a powerful handshake.

Branco returned to his business, and Bell caught the train uptown.

Harry Warren was waiting in the detective bull pen. “Black Hand?”

“I can’t read him yet. But whatever Antonio Branco wants, he’s capable of getting. A formidable man. Angry man, too, though he covers it. Mostly”—Bell considered Branco’s tale of the tramp and the railroad cop and added—“he’s also a first class liar.”

* * *

Wally Kisley came in the back entrance, still in the costume of a rag collector with dirty hands and face. “I got something for you.”

From his rag sack he pulled a red tube that looked like a dynamite stick. Detectives nearby edged away. Kisley tossed it to them and they dove for cover. It bounced on the floor with a hollow thunk.

Kisley grinned. “I emptied the nitro.”

Bell asked, “Where’d you find it?”

“Under LaCava’s safe.”

“Why blow the safe? It was open during the day.”

“I think it was part of the bundle that blew the wall. But it misfired. Got blown through the wall and bounced under the safe.”

“What does it do for us?”

“Read the name.”

“Stevens.”

“You can’t buy the Stevens brand in New York City. It’s made in New Jersey by a subsidiary of Dupont’s Eastern Dynamite Company and distributed to small-town hardware stores. It’s a short stick, shorter than what you’d find in mining or big excavation jobs. For farmers blowing stumps.”

“Where’d the Black Hand get ahold of it?”