The Case Of The Little Italy Bounce (Woody Stone, Private Investigator Book 1)
The Case of The Little Italy Bounce
(A Woody Stone, Private Investigator, Novel)
By R.D. Herring
Text copyright © 2011 R.D. Herring
All Rights Reserved
Cover by R.D. Herring
Barn Dog Art
The Case Of The Little Italy Bounce
This is a work of fiction. All characters, organizations and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Preface
Prologue
Chapter One: She was a Doll
Chapter Two: Gina
Chapter Three: Mack The Knife
Chapter Four: 53rd Street Station
Chapter Five: Hotel Taft
Chapter Six: Summer of ‘49
Chapter Seven: The Weakley County Press
Chapter Eight: Zucca’s Italian Garden
Chapter Nine: Twenty-Five Blocks South
Chapter Ten: George Washington Grille
Chapter Eleven: 23 Lexington Avenue
Chapter Twelve: Summer of 1953
Chapter Thirteen: Monday Morning
Chapter Fourteen: My Plane Landed
Chapter Fifteen: Ginger
Chapter Sixteen: I Parked the Hawk
Chapter Seventeen: Some Sit-ups
Chapter Eighteen: Hey, Leatherneck
Chapter Nineteen: Favorite Watering Hole
Chapter Twenty: Blaze of Morning Sun
Chapter Twenty-one: Dempsey’s Oval Bar
Chapter Twenty-Two: That Scumbag
Chapter Twenty-Three: The Business
Chapter Twenty-Four: She Didn’t Want to Talk
Chapter Twenty-Five: Far Rockaway
Chapter Twenty-Six: City Politics
Chapter Twenty-Seven: Jigsaw Pieces
Chapter Twenty-Eight: Energy Oozed
Chapter Twenty-Nine: How to Spell, ‘Deposit’
Chapter Thirty: Soaked With Sweat
Chapter Thirty-One: Life Depended on It
Chapter Thirty-Two: Changes of a Personal, Marital Nature
Epilogue
PREFACE
‘Twas a cold winter’s evening, the guests were all leaving,
Bob Mullan was closing the bar.
He turned and he said, to a lady in red,
Get out; you can’t stay anymore.
She shed a sad tear in her bucket of beer,
As she dreamed of the cold night ahead.
When a gentleman dapper, stepped out of the crapper,
And these are the words that he said.
Her mother never told her, the things a young girl should know ,
About the ways of Continental Marines,
And how they come and go.
Age has taken her beauty; sin has left its sad scar.
So, remember your sisters and mothers, boys,
And let her sleep under the bar…
Sung (with gusto) at Tun Tavern, Philadelphia on 10 November 1775.
PROLOGUE
(Thursday, May 27, 1954. Burlington, Vermont.)
‘Dreck!’ Smith cursed under his breath. He recognized the sound of a .45 automatic slide slamming against the breech, chambering a round.
“Frankie, show me both hands.” The gruff voice came from everywhere in the late afternoon rain.
He threw off the lap blanket, dropped the dog-eared paperback and ran off the cabin porch into the cold liquid needles. He ran splashing towards the woods. Fast, for an old man, but not... SPLAT! The half-inch bullet streaked at 285 yards a second and mushroomed as it struck his skull. Franklin Smith sprawled on his belly staring at the wet ferns to his right with one lifeless eye. Not the finest day for the fledgling Federal Witness Protection Program.
The assassin shrugged against the cold wet breeze puffing off Lake Champlain, but a fire burned in his gut. Squinting and peering through the rain, looking for other signs of life, he broke from the tree line and trotted to the far edge of the small clearing where the body fell. Pushing a wet pine branch aside, he ensured success by putting another round through Smith’s right temple. The dead head jumped up an inch when the big slug exploded the dirt beneath it.
Nothing personal, just business. He used his handkerchief to wipe down the automatic. The corners of his mouth rose a little when he felt the heat at the end of the barrel. A phone rang inside the building. Looking around, he threw the piece on the wet gravel by the corpse and instinctively reached for the reassurance of the .38 Special he carried in his coat pocket. He lifted the old man’s billfold and pulled out the New York driver license – proof of death.
“Dipshit, we could a’ been comfortable doin this in da cabin, out a’ da rain.” He jerked his collar tight and continued muttering as he hiked back down the muddy road to his stolen Cadillac.
CHAPTER ONE
(Friday, June 10, 1960. Lower East Side, Manhattan.)
She was a doll, the kind of gal that regular guys dream about but never get close to. I watched the dish drape herself on a barstool. Why was she in a shithole gin joint at that time of night? She ordered Dewar's neat. The practiced look of poise and confidence melted to fear when she saw the black sedan pull up to the curb. She downed the shot like a longshoreman. The queasy feeling I get just before something bad happens twisted my guts. I eased my hand under my jacket and felt the cool, comforting butt of the heavy automatic.
Campo di Pesci, hell of a name for a bar. Eyetalians! I didn't even like hanging around the waterfront, much less some goombah watering hole.
I turned my back to her, opened a fresh deck of Luckies and peeped her by way of the smoky back-bar glass. I could tell that her attention was on the same fat dago I’d spotted 20 minutes earlier when he showed and took a booth. Like a fly to a carcass, the grease ball from the black Hudson slid in opposite Vito Rossi. The new guy wore a suit that could only be state issued.
The mutt's had the face of a madman, as scared as it was cruel. The scarred, pock marked pan and the cheap shoes screamed Big House. Rossi lit a cigarette with a gold lighter and talked with the goon in low tones. The ex-con's dead-fish eyes shifted to the doll. He looked like a man with a job to do.
The skirt looked sideways at the barkeep and seemed to shake her head. The mirror gave away the weasel-faced bartender when he caught Rossi's eye and shot a quick nod toward my end of the bar. Someone was going to die with a belly full of lead on the filthy floor of that dump. It wasn't going to be me.
A sudden headlight shaft caught the new scumbag in profile. I knew that broken nose; hell, I broke it! I half-shielded my face as I took a slow drag on my Lucky. Christ on a stick, it was Poor Jack McCoy. I had a hand in sending him up the river four years earlier - same day Ike was re-elected by a landslide. It was well known that Poor Jack did odd jobs for Rossi; the oddest of all, he could make people disappear. Yeah, Poor Jack was tough.
***
When I tracked him down in '55, word was he had iced some stoolie schmuck hiding out on the government's tab in upstate Vermont. I took a little starch out of Jack’s toughness when I laid a length of lead pipe across his face. That still didn't keep Jack from shooting me right through my First Marine Division lighter that had belonged to my brother; lighter fluid stings in an open wound. The irony that Poor Jack ended up going to the joint for Grand Theft Auto and assault wasn't lost on me. I had given him an extra whack.
His nose and face had to be sewn back together. I had worried that McCoy plugging me might not outweigh the damage I did to
his kisser in the eyes of the law. His zygomatic arch was crushed. In layman terms, I almost tore his face off. I hadn’t wanted the Feds to take too close a look at that whole adventure. My New York State Private Investigator ticket was brand new and I didn’t want to risk it.
The goon showed up in court looking like Claude Rains. To tell the truth, I guess my handling of that situation had something to do with why they let the Invisible Man cop a guilty plea short of homicide.
***
The ferret behind the bar squeaked the floorboards as he moved to ask Red if she wanted another. When he spoke, it was a little too casual and a little too loud. Five people in a smoky bar, I had never been in a more crowded room in my life.
I knew, from some hard times in Korea, that sleep deprivation could do funny things to a man. But, how do you know when it starts? Calmness came over me. The smoke from my Lucky drifted and snaked into my eyes. I pressed the frosty steel of the Pabst can against one eyeball then the other. That helped. I opened my eyes and the room was bright - brighter than day. Everything was 3-D, just like those movies. That’s it; it was a well-lit movie set. I watched all the actors in the sunlight. Hell, I was ONE of the actors. We all moved at three-quarter speed.
Red lurched when the barkeep spoke, as if at the sound of something revolting. The deadly con had begun. I took my gun hand off the Pabst can and leaned back on the barstool, watching, waiting. The dive got quiet… real quiet. The first man to move would be the first to die. The rat-faced bartender won the prize. I could smell the fear from his pores when his eyes shifted from Red to a shelf under the bar. He started to reach, then hesitated. Bad move.
I stepped off the stool, swept my jacket, and pulled the Colt from its custom leather in one fluid move. The sound of the hammer clicking back from the half cock notch shattered the silence. Weasel-eyes reached for the sawed-off but never had a chance. The big piece bucked and twisted in my hand. It belched blue flame and thunder.
At that range, there was no missing. The heavy slug hit his face and pink mist sprayed the back-bar mirror. He dropped to the floor like a dirty shirt. Poor Jack jumped from his booth with a deftness I didn't expect from a man that had grown fat in stir. The deadly .38 snubby came out of his suit coat pocket and I heard the pop and felt a hot sting across my cheek. I was clipped.
Not again, you bastard! I flashed on memories of my brother’s lighter as I put my front sight on his belly and rolled the trigger. The .45 jumped in my hand, again and again. Hot brass casings rained down and danced on the scarred wooden bar. The snubnose flew from his hand when he slumped face down on the linoleum. As foaming blood spilled out of his mouth, he said, "It's over, gumshoe," before life passed from his cruel eyes.
I glanced at my automatic; it was dry. A wisp of smoke drifted from the empty chamber. The smell of stale beer and cordite was in the air. I thumbed the magazine release. The empty dropped and hit the brass foot rail with a clatter. I reached for my spare and jammed it home, the slide making that all-familiar ‘chunk’ as it snapped closed on a live round. Rossi was next.
I had to admit the dago son of a bitch was cool as a cucumber. As he fired up another Chesterfield, the glow of his gold lighter perfectly profiled my front sight blade. The sweat was stinging my eyes. I pulled out my handkerchief. A quick wipe and the room was dark again. I sat on my stool with my roscoe back in its shoulder holster. Amazingly, Poor Jack Mack had managed to re-seat himself in the booth and was mumbling in Rossi’s direction. His fat thumb was crooked and pointed in my direction. I was losing the bubble.
In the dim light, I saw the redheaded twirl’s reflection hold up its hand to decline a refill. The telephone at the far end of the bar rattled. Rat Face slithered to answer and took Rossi’s eyes with him. As much as I wanted to know what was going on, I knew it was time to take a powder. When the gold lighter lit up Rossi’s hog jowls again, I bounced like a rubber check. I faded through a back room and a side door to the safety of the darkness beyond the street light cone. The room behind the bar smelled like urine-soaked bread.
I thought it was a strange twist of events how the wop boss of the East Side showed up where I was having a nightcap; I had shadowed him and his for most of the week. Rossi did have a rep for being screwy in the noggin; however, to have him sitting thirty feet from me in a backwater toilet that would embarrass a cockroach – there were no coincidences. Last I’d seen him, he had been stuffing his face at Umberto’s Clam House in Little Italy three, four hours before.
I had tailed Crazy Joe Gallo, a young up-and-coming gangster, on orders. The rumble had it he was meeting Rossi. Crazy Joe didn’t work directly for Rossi, but he specialized in the same extortion, racketeering and general mayhem. This kid, who was barely a made member of Rossi’s family, had asked for the meeting.
I had wondered why Rossi didn’t think that unusual, but then, Rossi, a vicious thug, was also a known kook. Umberto’s was neutral ground. There was an unwritten agreement amongst gangsters; Little Italy was off-limits to bloodshed. I had it mapped that Rossi must’ve had his own reasons.
I wasn’t keen on coincidences, and events were stacking up fast. For now, it was aces with me just to be out of there, to be standing in a dark alley. I could make out the worry lines on the snazzy skirt’s face through the half painted window. Frankly, her worries weren’t my main concern. The booth was masking the fat guinea and his newly sprung crony. I thought.
Focus returned when the black Hudson roared to life and disappeared in the light rain. When did the rain start? Had to think, what was Poor Jack Mack up to? Was Rossi with him in that car? Did I somehow save Red’s life that night? How grateful would she be? Who the hell was she?
It was a surprise that both those jamokes had skipped in the sedan. I knew that Rossi went nowhere without Big Nig, his driver and personal army. Too many questions hanging, but it was all too much after 30 hours with no sleep.
I just wanted to grab a hack and cop some shuteye at my office. I needed to check in and make some phone calls. Maybe I could sweat Weasel Face the next day. Maybe the dame with the greats gams would show her gratitude.
I snapped around at the wet noise in the alley behind me, complete darkness. Yet, somehow, someone had suspended a set of bloodshot eyes seven feet off the deck. Rumor had it that Big Nig was technically Sicilian. He couldn’t have looked any more like a dinge.
Regardless, when that big black ham hock gripped my trench coat and flicked me against the brick wall, I was not concerned with his pedigree. His ugly face loomed in the semi-darkness and I saw only mean, pure menace. That snarling face would run a bulldog off a pork chop. I pulled the switchblade out as quickly as I had buried it in his leg. He went down like a cow struck by lightning.
“Be cool, Vecchio,” I said, “or two things will happen. I’ll plug you... and your fat boss will have to learn how to drive.”
The weight of the .45 auto in my hand surprised me. Had I carried it out of the bar? Probably not. I rousted Big Nig up on his size 14’s and relieved him of a Beretta Modello 34 automatic he carried in his overcoat pocket.
I slid my gat into its underarm rig and wiped the blood off my shiv on the mutt’s shoulder before dropping it back in my coat pocket. I lit a Lucky and studied the rancid toad bending, gripping his thigh. The light from my Zippo showed me a dark meaty face with jet-black circles around the eyes. That face now looked more resigned than menacing.
I smelled garlic, and the same smell as the back room of the bar. I guess the pool of black ice that had spread under the ape wasn’t all blood. I had never heard Big Nig speak, and I was pretty sure I wasn’t going to get him to barber at that point.
Where’s a cab when you need one? I thought briefly about my Studebaker Hawk garaged two blocks away on Delancey at T & J Auto Repair, another Marine Corps bud. Long-term storage, dirt-cheap. No, the Hawk had been put away once that night; she was safe. Hard to think!
“Beat it,” I said to the folded statue and he lumbered away then disappeared
into the darkness as I slid back onto the lighted sidewalk. I knew I was on Water Street; I could see the ball fields. I could look north and see the towers of the Williamsburg Bridge hidden by a bend in the East River.
Hell, I saw the Brooklyn Navy Yard across the East River and I could have walked. It wasn’t that far, but I was dead tired. There, below the sputtering neon on the Campo di Pesci, I spotted ‘684’. Got it. I dropped the Beretta automatic down a storm drain and went to look for a phone booth.
Dan Logan, who had been my Platoon Commander in Korea, was a New York County Assistant District Attorney, and, I guess, out to make a name for himself. He had called in a marker the prior week. Suddenly I was up to my pant cuffs with Vito Rossi, a scumbag who had more local juice than Con Edison. Too many unanswered questions. After a little sleep, I’d get some answers.
CHAPTER TWO
(Saturday, June 11, 1960. 481 Wythe Ave, Brooklyn.)
Gina usually came in to the office for a couple of hours on Saturday morning. Not my requirement, but I did appreciate it. At 8:30, I wasn’t surprised when she glided in sweeping her long black hair over her shoulder and turning on her baby-blue high beams. After two years, she wasn’t surprised to find me in my skivvy shirt watching the Percolator bubble.
She had been the little sister of my best friend, Ed Kowalski, who caught a sniper round one frozen morning in Korea - about a hundred years before. I had moved to the City a couple of months after his memorial and had stayed in touch with Ed’s mama and baby sister over the years.
Gina had showed up two years before and announced her graduation from secretarial school. Against my better judgment, I hired her, and it was the best thing I ever did. Gina Kowalski turned out to be a firecracker. She was the glue that turned what I did into a business. She was like family, but damn, she was easy on the eye. I glanced over as she stretched to park her hat on top of the rack. Her calves were like granite wrapped in silk. The sight would stop a grown man’s heart.