Rackets, p.11
Rackets, page 11
He dressed for work in dungarees and several layers of cotton tee shirts covered by an old sweatshirt and laced up his construction boots. He retrieved the bag of guns, wrapping each pistol in a sheet of newspaper. He bounded down the steps out onto the street. He turned left, headed for the A at 207th Street, last stop on the line as dawn was coming to his island. A few people were coming out of their buildings, the odd car started for the trip to work. The air was crisp, but held the promise of warmth. A police cruiser came by, the cops leaning away from each other up against respective doors, fatigued from a night tour.
He bought a token from the silent, disinterested clerk, a fat black man who looked as if he had counted out too much of somebody else’s money. Liam rarely paid but it was not a good day to jump the turnstile, not with his cargo. He remembered Pat Donnelan, a cop from the neighborhood, who grabbed some mook for fare beating. It turned out the criminal mastermind was wanted for a murder rap in North Carolina and was carrying twenty-five grand in a gym bag. Liam had a hard time believing somebody could be so stupid. The clerk was eating a bagel, working change with one hand. Liam thanked the man. When he did not respond, Liam added, “You piece of shit.”
On the train he picked up a discarded Daily News and read, checking the Rangers box score first: 6–0 loss to Detroit. Disgusting. The car filled up as it went south. Most of the riders were not white and all were dressed for labor. They kept to themselves and read papers in languages undecipherable to him. Different people, same dreams. An old Chinese woman pulled a granny cart through the car and, while playing with a glowing yo-yo, chanted, “Battery, one dollar. Battery, one dollar.” No one paid her any mind. Liam wondered about traveling ten thousand miles to sell Duracells on the A train. He got off at Fifty-ninth Street.
At this station the Wall Street crowd waited to pounce on the day, dressed in their suits, carrying briefcases. The faces were drawn tight, indicating stomach trouble, rising blood pressure, unhealthy ambitions. Man, he hated these people. He shouldered his way through them, daring anyone to give him shit about it. He’d love to ruin their day.
He made his way up the stairs to Columbus Circle. Sunlight was slanting low through the towers to the east. He walked in and out of shadow, in and out of warmth. He entered the tavern directly across from the job site, a thirty-eight-story condo, prices starting at a million two, Liam had heard. Unreal. Shit boxes in the sky, contractor cutting corners at every turn. By the look of the walls going up Liam figured you’d be able to hear someone fart from three doors down. A million two. Morons. The concrete gang would be topping off at the end of the week.
A blue haze lay over the bar, cigarette smoke unmoving, heavy. A dozen or so serious drinkers, priming themselves for a day’s work, sat among cops and maintenance guys coming off midnight shifts. Liam recognized Joe Flood from the neighborhood at the front of the bar. Flood sat drinking with another man who might be related to him. Same thick neck and fists. Same type of flinty Irish faces that had been inspiring blubbery confessions in New York for more than a century.
Liam stopped. “Hey Flood. What’s with the suit? DT now?”
“Yeah, hey, Liam. Three months I got the shield.” He turned to his partner. “Hey, Liam, this is my buddy, Sergeant McCabe.”
The man said, “My name is Brian. How you doing? Nice to meet you.”
Joe Flood said, “Me and Liam grew up together. He was my brother Sean’s age.”
McCabe laughed. “Another Inwood guy? My condolences.”
“Ah, bullshit. He’s a Queens guy, Liam. Explains everything.”
Liam laughed. He noticed his customer down the end of the bar watching them carefully.
“Where you living now?”
“Pearly White River. Still in Inwood?”
“Yeah.”
“Christ,” Flood said. “You speaking Spanish?”
“Sí, sí.” Liam laughed. These guys who’d left talking shit about his neighborhood bothered him. He let it slide. “Sean’s coming home from the Marines, I heard.”
“Yeah, going in the fire academy. A home run, far as he’s concerned. What about you, still with the Laborers?”
“That’s it, Joey boy. God’s work.”
“Better you than me. Drinking?” Flood indicated drinks and cash money on the bar in front of him.
“Not this time of day. I like my booze at night. Let me get you guys one, though.” He waved the bartender over. “Do me a favor. Get these guys one on me. Thanks. Take care, man.” He patted Flood on the shoulder. “Tell Sean to call when he gets back, the fucking guy.”
Liam proceeded to the end of the bar and sat next to one of his co-workers from the site. The man was in his mid-twenties and wore a hooded sweatshirt. He had his hard hat on the bar in front of him. His hair was cut short; a gold chain spilled out from his neck. On the crook of his left thumb and forefinger there was a crudely tattooed cross. When Liam sat down, he said, “Friends of yours?”
“One guy’s from the neighborhood, coupla years older, grew up with his brother.”
“New York’s finest.”
Liam did not like the guy’s tone. “Yeah. I remember when he used to eat a bag of mushrooms and try to shoot down 747s from his rooftop with his old man’s service revolver.”
“You got what I wanted?” The guy trying to sound like a tough guy.
“Didn’t I say I would?”
Man sipped his morning beer. “How much?”
“Four a piece, times four. That’s sixteen. My math’s still like it was in Catholic school. Same price I said it was all along.”
“I can only do three.”
Liam snapped his head around to look at him. “You gotta be fucking kidding me here.”
“What can I say? Guy backed out, last-minute kind of deal.”
“Ah, now, that really sucks, ’cause I’m gonna have to eat the other one, for fuck sake. People I get these from don’t like somebody yanking their fucking chain.”
“Hey. We never shook on nothing.”
“Shook?” Liam could not believe what he was hearing. He reached down and took one of the guns from the gym bag and slid it into the inside pocket of his work jacket. He fought the urge to kneecap the idiot. “Next fucking time? Do your shopping somewhere else.”
“Hey, I’m sorry. That’s how it goes.” He used his foot to slide the gym bag closer to his barstool. He reached inside his sweatshirt and pulled out an envelope, looked down toward the DTs, then slid it across in front of Liam, who took it and turned to walk away.
Liam crossed the street to the job site trying to keep his anger in check. A group of men waited by the construction elevator holding cups of coffee, their eyes heavy with the night. Liam opted for the stairs, climbing briskly to the ninth-floor setback to catch the elevator up to thirty-six, where he would be working that day. He took off his coat and placed it in the gang box along with his Daily News. He walked over to the Porta-John with the envelope. He squatted.
The walls were festooned with wild proclamations of sexual escapades with the superintendent’s wife. There were even several well-crafted depictions of these purported acts. Liam opened the unsealed envelope and pulled out the pile of crisp hundreds, bubble-headed Ben Franklins. He counted once and clenched his teeth. He counted twice, he counted a third time—there were only ten hundreds. The guy had shorted him. He punched the door. He folded the money in half and placed it in his pocket and dropped the empty envelope in the hole. He left the shitter and went over to his crew. Down below, the concrete trucks were arriving, rumbling in the early Manhattan morning.
He could not let this guy slide. The concrete was hoisted up onto the deck in a large metal bucket. Liam was on a shovel and stood with three other concrete workers as one of their colleagues steadied the bucket and let the concrete flow. Liam bent to the task and shoveled furiously, imagining the asshole’s face receiving the strikes from his shovel. He worked at a harder pace than usual, the blood pumping through his muscles as he powered his way through the material. The Laborer next to him stood and laughed. “Jesus, what the fuck you eat for breakfast?” Liam ignored him and worked on, his rage focused and pure.
There was a lull while they waited for more concrete. The finishers, Portuguese men in their fifties with large, hard bellies, worked floats across the fresh gray concrete. Liam watched them work, their grace of movement, which belied their physical appearance. There was a deftness to them, and Liam knew that the casual observer would think their task a simple one. Until he tried it. The men were sweating now as the air warmed. Liam thought about the asshole who robbed him. He could hot believe the balls on the guy. He knew what he had to do. His stomach started flopping. Crazy adrenaline energy ran up his legs, made him warm and cold at the same time.
At lunch break he went down to the seventh floor and saw the guy take off his tool belt and head for the John. Liam selected a short-cut two-by-four about three feet long. He hefted it. Its weight felt good. He walked casually over to the Porta-John and waited. He turned to survey the site. Most of the men were scurrying for the exits and a half hour away from work. When no one was looking, he pushed the fiberglass toilet box over backward. It landed with a bang that echoed around the site. He heard a scream from inside and then “What the fuck!! I’ll fucking kill you!”
The asshole popped out of the shit box like a gunner coming out of a tank. He was dripping crap and piss and toilet paper, his face all twisted up, surely the unhappiest minute of his life. Liam stifled a laugh, said, “Douche bag,” and smiled. The guy, his Carhartt jacket twisted around him, lunged at Liam, but it was too late. Liam brought the club down hard like a battle-ax, snapping the guy’s right collarbone with it. He screamed, and Liam, stepping in, punched him hard in the jaw, a crisp left hook that knocked him sideways until he was lying half in and half out of the Porta-John. The man was unconscious. Liam looked around. The few workers left on the floor averted their gaze. The guy taking the beating was known as a ball breaker. It was not their beef. Liam was going to take the man’s wallet but did not want to touch him with all that crap all over him. Instead, he kicked him once hard in the side, laughed, and went to lunch feeling a whole lot better about things.
Jimmy spent the night at his father’s, and in the morning drank coffee as the A train hurtled him downtown. He and Susan had fought the day before, one of their regularly scheduled blowups that were the result, he felt, of her moodiness. As usual, he could not pin down what started it, but it ended up with her launching into a diatribe about his lack (according to her) of professionalism. Jimmy had retaliated by storming out. It was not the first time. The entire scene was part of the rhythm of their relationship. At least it wasn’t boring.
He stopped at the market and picked up some veal scaloppine. He’d get a bottle of wine, clean the place, and have her favorite meal waiting for her when she got home. It had always worked before. She’d be fine. Or so he thought. It pissed him off that she did not back him over the Keefe incident. You should have known better, was her mantra. I do know better. She was all embarrassed by his fall from grace. The woman was gung ho about the Mayor.
As he walked into the lobby, Ramon stood at the doorman’s station with a shit-eating grin. “Yo, Jimmy, I got bad news for you.”
Jimmy laughed and walked past him to the elevators. Ramon had gone to Good Shepherd grammar school two years behind Jimmy. While they had never said a word, to each other in Inwood, here they felt a bond. Ramon stepped in front of him. “Nah, Jimmy, I’m serious. Come on.” He nodded with his head to a supply room behind the desk. Jimmy followed him. Ramon opened the door with a flourish and said, “You been eighty-sixed, Jimbo. That bitch was all sorts of indignant. Said we let you up she was gonna have our jobs and shit. Me, personally, I’d love to see that snotty bitch work my job for one hour only. So’s I can take my turn looking down my nose at her ass for a change a paces.”
Jimmy stared at the boxes and a pile of his suits still on the hangers. Ramon handed him a note. “Sorry, bro, but I read it by mistake.” Jimmy ignored his smirk.
So they had argued. What the hell was going on with his life?
He read the note. It was on her personal stationery, lightly perfumed. Jesus. It was to the point. “I think you need help. I can’t do this anymore.” Ah, bullshit. What is she, nuts? “She here?”
“Bro, I can’t let you go up. Changed the locks. Got her poppy with her. Says shit about a restraining order, the five-oh. Don’t do it. You ask me, she ain’t worf it.”
“Come on, Ramon, you went to Good Shepherd. It’s worth.”
“Yeah, well, speaking of Good Shepherd, I guess I’ll be seeing you up on Broadway, Jimmy. You come by for some beers, we’re still homeys. I don’t mind you couldn’t make it down here, the Big Town, Bright Lights. I’ll have my mom cook you some cuchifritos, welcome you back.” Ramon laughed and laughed.
Jimmy read the note again. Was this some kind of joke? He went out to the street and picked up a pay phone. He dialed her number, looking up at the terrace of her apartment sixteen stories above the sidewalk. She answered the phone on the first ring.
“Hey, Susan. What’s up?”
Silence.
“Susan?”
“I think you should try therapy.” Click.
Therapy? Jimmy dialed again. Susan’s father answered.
“You better listen to me good, fella.” The voice was all heavy and full of heat, the father defending his little girl. “You stay away from my daughter or you’ll rue the day you crossed paths with me, buster.” Click.
Jimmy stared at the receiver. A man dressed in a full-length yellow raincoat and sandals asked him for change. He hung up and handed the man a dollar bill, thinking, What in the hell did I do to deserve this? Her father had had a hard-on for him since day one. Somehow Jimmy Dolan was not good enough for his precious offspring. This, from a slumlord. He considered barging past Ramon, making a scene. Slapping her goofy old man in his tightwad face. He thought better of it. He started for the door and his belongings, then stopped and went back to the phone.
“Let me talk to her, she’s an adult, for Christ sake.”
“Don’t push me, fella.” Click.
Jimmy wondered how often a twenty-seven-year-old woman used her father to help her break up with someone. He dialed once more. “Are you people fucking nuts?”
“I’ve got powerful friends, you little animal.”
“Are you threatening me? You toothless old chiseler. Where do you get off?” He beat Pops to the hang-up this time. He stood for a minute, calming himself. He looked around like maybe someone might jump out and tell him it was all a practical joke.
He started loading his things into the taxi as the driver sat on his ass, eating something out of a greasy paper bag. Ramon did not stop giggling, but at least helped out. Jimmy shoved his last box into the back seat and climbed in after it. “I see you uptown, Jaime.” Ramon slammed the door shut.
“Where now, please?”
Jimmy looked at the driver. “Inwood.”
The driver looked over his shoulder, uncertain.
“Just drive north. Drive until you hit water and that’s it. The top of the island. Last stop. Inwood.”
Mike Dolan sat in the back row of the Marc Ballroom and listened to Frankie Keefe congratulate himself on being a champion of the workingman. What a load of baloney. The room was filled with five hundred Teamsters who were violating the city anti-smoking ordinance with vigor. The men sat and shifted in their seats; others lined the side and back walls. They wore thick flannel shirts, black satin Teamster jackets, bored faces. Mike nodded to the handful of men who dared to support him openly.
Keefe was a lousy speaker, jumping from praise for himself to stifling details about the ongoing contract negotiations. When he asked for comment from the floor there were outbreaks of applause and hoorahs from his favorite ass kissers and leg breakers. Of course there was no rancor, no dissent. Keefe controlled hiring and could easily blacklist a man. Even Harry the Hat, a crotchety Teamster whose dissident rants were legendary, was silent. He sat on his hands and whistled a lost song through broken teeth.
Keefe glanced at his watch throughout, like he had somewhere better to be. Mike knew his only hope was the first secret ballot in the history of the union. It was one obvious benefit of government control. Even Keefe was forced to go along. Keefe moved what little business there was along swiftly. When a motion was made to accept a change in health-care plans, Harry the Hat finally roused himself. Keefe identified him.
“Why can’t we see what this means for us? Who approved this plan?”
Shouts of “Commie!” rang about the hall.
“I’d rather be a Red than a rat! Why can’t these changes be put to the full membership for a vote?”
“I thank Brother Hat for his remarks.”
“I want a vote!”
“On to other business,” called the secretary-treasurer.
Several hulking drivers went and stood in front of the Hat, forming a wall of flesh and muscle. The Hat shrieked on for a few more seconds to no avail. The sound was lost in all the beef before him. Finally, he quieted and sat back on his hands.
Keefe went on. “Now I want to say something here that I probably shouldn’t, ’cause nothing’s signed. And this might be unusual, but between you me and the wall over there, I got a guarantee on this from the contractors.” He knocked his knuckles on the lectern. “Just to show the kind of work your negotiating committee is doing on behalf of the membership, we got—and this is only part of what the final contract will be—we got a two dollar-an-hour jump in your annuity accounts.” Keefe held up his hands as if he had just multiplied fishes and loaves. A murmur rolled over the crowd and applause broke out. “That’s right,” he shouted. “Two bucks more.”
Mike sat stunned. There was only one more meeting before the election, and the contract was not to be signed until after it was over. So Keefe could be boldface lying, and it did not matter. He was buying off his members, and there was nothing Mike could do about it. It was just another advantage of incumbency.
