The Gangster

The four men climbed a flight of stairs. The counterfeiter unlocked his door. The gorillas stayed in the hall. Leone lighted a sputtering gas jet. The broad-shouldered Salata filled the room. Last time he was here, he stole some expensive paper. This time, it seemed to Leone, that he was sucking out the air.

“Listen, Charlie. I told the Boss the money wasn’t ready. He wouldn’t listen.”

“Don’t blame the Boss.”

“I’m not blaming him. I’m just saying… Oh, come on, Charlie. We knew each other since we was kids. You go your way, I go mine, but we’re not enemies.”

Salata slid his fingers inside a terrible set of brass knuckles. A blade jutted from the metal rings. Leone stared at the weapon. Maimed or stabbed? How would Salata do him up?

Salata raised his fist very slowly and pressed the knuckles to Leone’s cheek. Leone could see the blade in the corner of his eye. Salata said, “I got a man in jail. Thousand dollars bail.”

“I’ll get the bail.” Where? He could only wonder.

“What else?”

“What do you mean?”

“What else you going to do to make it up?”

“I’ll do what I can. What do you want? I’m getting better paper. You want part of the new stuff?”

“That was the last time I ever pass false money.”

“Then what?”

“Me and Ferri got something started.”

“Ferri?” echoed Leone. Roberto Ferri was a smuggler. “Since when do you hang with Ferri?”

“Since the Boss said to… You come on this business, make it up to us.”

“What can I do for your business?”

“My guy took a fall. I want you to take a fall.”

“For what? I’m just a counterfeiter.”

“You’re a lousy counterfeiter. But you’re still prominente. Guys know you’re not cafon. If this thing goes wrong, you’ll take the blame.”

“The cops won’t buy that. They know I’m only a counterfeiter.”

Salata pivoted his hand. The knuckles turned away from Leone’s cheek. The blade lined up with his eye. “Not for cops.”

“Van Dorns?”

Salata laughed. “You’ll wish it was Van Dorns.”

* * *

Harry Warren was waiting for Isaac Bell on the platform at Grand Central with news of another Secret Service arrest.

“Agent Lynch is having a banner week. Secret Service just pinched a guy passing the same queer upstate.”

“Salata’s?”

“Nope. A Ferri guy.”

“Who’s Ferri?”

“Runs a bunch of smugglers.”

Bell led the way out of the chaotic terminal, dodging work gangs and skirting gaping holes in the concourse floor. “Why’s a smuggler taking chances passing the queer?”

“Odd keeps piling up,” said Warren. “Like I said about Charlie Salata’s boy pinched in Pennsylvania.”

“Same paper?”

“Same queer, same paper.”

“What are the odds that Salata’s turned counterfeiter?”

“Same odds as a grizzly bear hosting a church supper. Anyhow, Agent Lynch told Helen the stuff was lame. The paper. No surprise they got caught. But the engraving was top-notch. Lynch thinks it was done by a guy named Ernesto Leone. Learned his trade in Italy and has trained a bunch of apprentices here.”

“Helen got a lot out of Lynch.”

“She’d given Lynch a description of Leone shopping on Printer’s Row, so I guess Lynch figured he owed her.”

“Did Lynch happen to tell Helen what the prisoners admit to?”

“That smitten he ain’t. Helen asked. He sent her packing.”

“Permanently?”

“’Fraid so. I don’t think we’ll get any more out of the Secret Service.”

The long-legged Bell set a fast pace across town to the office. Harry Warren trotted to keep up.

“You ever hear of this Ferri teaming with Salata?” Bell asked.

“Nope.”

Bell said, “I never heard of an outfit of all-rounders. Birds of a feather is more the rule, but these guys are combining extortion, bombing, counterfeiting, smuggling, kidnapping. Crimes of brute force and crimes of quick wit. Is it an alliance of gangs — a ‘cartel’ of criminals? Or is a single mastermind forcing a variety of gangsters to do his bidding?”

“Damned-near impossible to whip any bunch of crooks into line,” said Warren. “Not to mention different kinds.”

“Cartel or mastermind, they’d be bigger, tougher, and better organized than the small-timers who call themselves Black Hand to scare folks. Makes me wonder what they’ll turn their hands to next.”

“Anything that pays,” said Harry Warren.

Bell said, “Or what they’ll stop at.”

12

You are hereby invited to Pink Tea

With Captain Michael Coligney

19th Precinct Station House

West 30th Street

3 p.m.

Sharp

A New York Police Department officer wearing a blue coat with shiny brass buttons and a tall helmet strolled the Tenderloin, twirling a nightstick and knocking on brothel doors with printed invitations for the proprietors.