Baker reached for a cigarette. His fingers were trembling. “Heaven help them if the mob finds them before we do,” he said.
“If they do, better have your resignation typed,” Strang said heavily. “Mine’s already in my top desk drawer!”
25
There are few places in New York that are resisting the advance of modern low-cost housing aid as successfully as upper Park Avenue. One of the reasons is that this is the shopping mecca of Spanish Harlem. Here below the tracks of the New York Central that speeds the commuter safely to his tiny suburban comfort is one of the last open markets of the city.
The people who shop here are mostly of Puerto Rican descent and they thread their way in their gaily-colored clothing among the pushcarts and sidewalk display, chattering as lightly and as happily, despite their poverty, as they did at home in their tropical island. There are hotels in this section of Park Avenue also. They do not much resemble the hotels farther downtown on the same avenue but they accomplish the same purpose. They are a place to sleep and eat and offer solace to a weary traveler. The main difference between the hotels in addition to the furnishings is the credit card. In Spanish Harlem the hotels are only interested in cash.
Cesare turned back from the window of the Del Rio Hotel as a train shot past them on the tracks outside. He looked at Luke who was seated in a chair, the morning newspapers in front of her. He lit a cigarette. “Isn’t there something else you can do besides read the damn newspapers all day?”
Luke looked up at him. The whole of the last week he had been on edge. Nervous and irritable. It had been more than two weeks since Ileana had left and they had remained cooped up in this room most of that time.
At first it had been fun. They had laughed at all the little inconveniences: the dripping faucet, the squeaking bed, the sagging chairs. Then bit by bit the tawdry room seemed to creep into them until one morning it was no longer fun.
She was aware of what was coming but he had not been. Women were much more adaptable than men. They had a great deal more patience. They were better equipped for waiting. All the way around, mentally as well as physically. She remembered that she had felt a twinge of pain that usually accompanied the onslaught of her period. But nothing had happened. Idly she wondered if she were pregnant. It was more than a week now and she was rarely that late.
“Why don’t you lie down and get some rest?” she suggested patiently.
He turned on her savagely. “Rest? That’s all I’ve been getting in this stinking hole! Eating greasy food and sleeping in that dirty bed! I’m sick of it!”
“It’s better than being dead,” she said.
“Sometimes I wonder,” he snapped, walking back to the window and looking down at the street.
She turned back to the newspaper but his voice came to her from the window and she looked up at him. He was still looking out.
“I used to see people like those down there in the village in Italy when I was a little boy. Look at them. Smiling, shouting as they scratch around in the rubble for something to eat.”
She got out of her chair and joined him at the window. “They seem perfectly happy to me,” she said, looking down.
Cesare’s voice was wondering. “That is what I never could understand. What makes them so happy all the time? What have they got that we have not? Don’t they know this world is for the few who take? They must know this. And still they are content to smile and laugh and make babies. What is it they have, that we have not?”
She looked up at him. She remembered when she had been a little girl. The excitement of going into town on shopping days. Poor Cesare, there were so many things he had never had. “Maybe they have hope,” she said.
He looked down at her. “Hope?” He laughed. “That is a word invented by dreamers.”
She wanted him to understand. “Maybe they have faith.”
He laughed again. “That is a word invented by priests.”
She couldn’t keep her hand from his bare arm. Maybe the knowledge would flow from her touch into him. The way she felt. “Maybe they have love,” she said softly.
He stared down at her, then turned, pulling his arm from her touch. “That word is the biggest fraud of them all. It is a word invented by women to mask their biological needs and duties. Love, hah!”
She walked back to her chair and sat down. She picked up the newspapers but she did not really see them. There was a strangely familiar hurt aching inside her. “Maybe I don’t know then.”
He came over from the window and stared down at her. She didn’t have to look up to know the cruel smile on his lips. She had seen it often enough in the last few days. Each time he turned from her, from the desperate need for him inside her.
“That is right,” he said. “You don’t know. The truth is that nobody knows. But I am the only one who admits it. There is nothing more to men than the desire to exist. And most of them don’t really care how. Just exist. Day to day. Year to year. For nothing.”
She was just about to answer him when there was a knock at the door. When she looked up, there was a stiletto in his hand. “Yes?” she called.
The porter’s voice came through the door. “I have the afternoon papers, ma’am.”
“Leave them at the door,” she called. “I’ll get them in a minute.”
“Yes, ma’am,” the voice called back. They waited a moment until they heard the footsteps go down the hall.
She got out of her chair and walked over to the door. Quickly she opened it, pulled the papers inside and closed the door again. She took them back to her chair and sat down. She began to open one of them.
He knocked the paper viciously from her hand. “Will you never stop reading those damn newspapers?” He walked back to the window.
Patiently she bent over to pick them up when she saw the picture. “Cesare, Cesare!” she cried, holding the paper toward him. “Look! She’s back!”
There on the photo page of the Journal-American was a picture of Ileana, smiling and waving at the camera from the ramp of an airliner. The caption over the picture was simple: Baroness Returns From Holiday Abroad.
The group of men in Baker’s office leaned forward tensely as Ileana’s voice came through the speaker on his desk. “Hello,” she said.
Cardinali’s voice sounded strained and hurried. “This is Cesare. Have you got the message?”
One of the agents picked up another phone and whispered into it.
“Cesare, where are you? Are you all right?” Ileana’s voice came from the speaker.
Baker looked up at the agent on the telephone. “She’s stalling just as we told her. Are you on the trace?”
“We’re moving as fast as we can, sir,” the agent replied.
“I have it,” Ileana said. “But Cesare, I don’t understand it!”
“That doesn’t matter,” he snapped. “Tell me!”
Her voice was hesitant. “The moon will rise tonight.”
A click came through the speaker as Cesare hung up, then Ileana’s voice again. “Cesare! Cesare! Are you there?”
Baker looked up at the agent. “Did you pin him?”
The agent shook his head. “He went off too fast.”
Ileana’s voice came through the speaker again. “Cesare?”
Baker picked up the other telephone on his desk. “He’s off the line, Baroness.”
Her voice sounded frightened to him. “Did I do all right, Mr. Baker?” she asked. “I held him as long as I could.”
“You did fine, Baroness,” he said with a confidence he did not feel. “We’ve got everything under control.”
He put down the telephone and looked up at the agent. “Thank you,” he said to him. “You can knock off now.”
“Surely there’s something we can do if he comes out of hiding tomorrow,” the agent said.
“What?” Baker asked.
“He did send the woman out of the country to get a message,” the younger man said.
Baker smiled. “There’s no law agains
t that.”
The agent shook his head and walked out of the office. Baker turned to Captain Strang who sat opposite him. Strang looked at him. “It was a good try, George,” he said quietly.
Baker smiled wearily. “It wasn’t good enough.”
“You did everything you could,” Strang said.
Baker got out of his chair. Failure tasted bitter in his mouth. He looked down at Strang. “Let’s be honest about it, Dan,” he said. “It’s over.” He walked to the window and looked out. “If Cardinali shows up tomorrow, it means the Stiletto will have gotten away with it. If he doesn’t, well, we lose anyway. We’re no closer to Matteo than we were before.”
He turned back to the policeman, his voice was bitter. “They beat us, Dan. Either way, we lose.”
26
They left the hotel about ten o’clock at night. “It’s not far from here,” he told her as they began to walk. They turned off Park Avenue at 116th Street and headed for Madison. They made several turns more at different corners, then Cesare touched her arm.
“It’s across the street,” he said.
She looked. It was one of those old brownstone tenements that had a bar and grill in the basement floor. A small neon sign blinked on and off over the door. The Quarter Moon Bar and Grill it read in white and green letters.
He led her past the saloon entrance and up the steps of the house. The door was open and they walked into the hallway. A single naked bulb hung overhead and cast a dim yellow light.
She looked up at him. “Who are we going to see?” she asked.
He looked down at her. “Matteo, of course,” he answered matter-of-factly.
“But I thought he couldn’t enter this country,” she said in surprise.
He smiled at her. “So do many others.” He took her arm again. “Come.”
They walked up one flight of stairs to the next floor. Cesare stopped in front of a door. He knocked on it.
“Come in. The door is unlocked.” Matteo’s voice came through it.
Cesare opened the door and they entered the room. She was surprised to see it was a comfortably furnished office. She did not expect it in a building such as this. Cesare closed the door behind him.
Matteo looked up at them from behind a desk. “Don Cesare! And Miss Nichols too. I am surprised.”
Cesare left her standing at the door and walked over to the desk. He stood there looking down silently at Matteo.
Luke looked curiously around the room. It was just like a regular business office. There was another desk in the corner with a typewriter on it. Next to it was a file cabinet and next to that was a small curtained alcove that probably led to the lavatory. The only thing strange about the room was that there seemed to be no windows in it. Matteo’s voice came to her and she looked back at them.
“You have asked for a meeting, my nephew,” he said.
Cesare nodded. “I have come to talk to you about a misunderstanding between us.”
“Yes?” Emilio inclined his head.
“When we last met, you said to me that I have done my work well. That the Society was pleased.” Cesare’s voice was low.
Emilio nodded. “That is true.”
“Then why is it they ask my death?” Cesare asked calmly.
Emilio folded his hands across his stomach and leaned back in the chair. He looked up at Cesare. “You are young, my nephew, and there are many things you do not understand.”
“What things?” Cesare asked.
“The Society owes its existence to one simple rule,” Emilio said blandly. “One simple rule that helped it survive many wars and many difficult times of strife and built it to the power it is today. And this rule is our strength. ‘No one man can exist who threatens the security of more than himself.’”
“I have not broken this rule,” Cesare said quickly. “Except at the request of the Society to protect certain of its members.”
Emilio’s voice was still patient as if he were speaking to a child. “It is regrettable, of course, but that knowledge is now a dagger at our throats. You see, already the police suspect you and if somehow your knowledge should become available to them—” He didn’t finish his sentence.
“They will discover nothing from me,” Cesare said.
“I believe that,” Emilio agreed. “But vast harm would be done if we both are in error. The others have not the same confidence as you and I.”
“Why not?” Cesare demanded. “I have kept the oath. And I want nothing from them.”
“That’s just it,” Emilio said quickly. “That is what concerns them. A man who wants nothing has nothing to protect. You are not like Dandy Nick, or Big Dutch and Allie whom you have already eliminated. They had reason to be loyal, they had something to protect, profits to contribute. While you, my nephew, bring us no profit, produce nothing. You are a dilettante, interested only in the excitement and danger like a little child.”
“So, because of Dandy Nick, they ask my death?” Cesare asked.
Emilio looked up at him. He held his hands apart expressively in a gesture of helplessness. “For that reason you must keep your oath to the Society.”
Luke saw a movement behind the curtain. “Cesare! Look out!” she screamed in sudden terror.
Cesare whirled so quickly that her eye did not follow the stiletto flying from his hand. It plunged into the curtain and into the man hidden behind it in the alcove. The man’s hands gripped the curtain and fell with it to the floor, ripping it from its hanger. A gun fell clattering to the floor near Luke.
Cesare knelt quickly by the man, pulling the curtain from his face. He looked back at Emilio. “It is Dandy Nick!” he said harshly. “Now according to the law there is no one I threaten!”
“There is still one, my nephew,” Emilio said softly.
Cesare stared up at him. “Who is that, my uncle?”
The gun appeared in Emilio’s hand. “Me,” he said quietly. His finger began to tighten on the trigger. In a way, it was a shame, he thought almost regretfully. Cesare could have become one of the great ones, one of the Dons, but there was something missing.
He was so lost in his reverie that he did not see Luke squeeze the trigger of the gun she had picked up from the floor. The impact of the bullet in his shoulder tumbled him backward from his chair, the gun flying from his hand.
In a moment, Cesare was upon him, the stiletto high in the air over his head. “No! No!” Matteo screamed. “I will speak to the council! They will listen to me!”
Cesare was laughing wildly now. “It is too late, my uncle!” he shouted. “Their own rules condemn you! With your death, I am free!”
Luke watched, frozen in horror, as the knife came down again and again into Emilio’s body. “Stop, Cesare!” she screamed. “It’s enough!”
Slowly Cesare rose from behind the desk. He turned toward her, the wild maniacal light beginning to fade from his eyes. He was smiling by the time he reached her. He took her arm and opened the door.
He looked back into the room and then down at her. “You know,” he said softly with a laugh, “he was beginning to believe he really was my uncle!”
He opened the door of his apartment and they went inside. He crossed to his desk and sat down. He pushed aside the stack of mail and took out a checkbook and began to write in it.
Luke came up behind him and gently began to massage the back of his neck. “It’s good to be home,” she said softly.
He finished writing the check and turned around, holding it up to her. “Here!” he said harshly.
She stopped massaging his neck and stared down at him. “What’s that for?” she asked.
His voice was flat and his eyes were the eyes of a stranger. “You said you wanted a Ferrari. Now you can pack your things and go!”
She stared at him, unbelieving. There was a sickness in her stomach, a nausea that was creeping up in her. It was happening again. The same thing was happening again! “You think—” Her voice choked for a moment. She could taste th
e bitter bile from her stomach. “You think that is why I stayed with you?”
He got out of the chair and walked roughly past her to the liquor cabinet. He poured himself a drink and swallowed it. He turned back to her. “It doesn’t matter what I think,” he said. “We are finished!”
She had to tell him. Maybe if he knew she was pregnant, he wouldn’t feel like that. It wasn’t his fault. He had been through so much. “Cesare, what am I going to do now? I am… I don’t…”
He reached behind him in the cabinet, opened the little door and took out the small dark bottle. He placed it on the cabinet near the whisky. “I don’t care what you do,” he interrupted her. “But you have a choice. You know what is in this bottle. A few drops and in three minutes—oblivion! Very painless. I give it to you!”
He walked past her to the door. She followed him. “Cesare!” she cried. “Where are you going? To her?”
He smiled slowly, his voice was cruelly soft. “Yes. I am tired of you. I’ve had enough of lying with you on coarse bleach-smelling sheets, of your plebeian attempts at lovemaking! You were right in what you said the first time we met. She can give me more in ten minutes than you can in ten days. And you’ve just proved it!”
Her hand reached for his lapel. “You don’t want me anymore?” she asked dully.
He brushed her hand away. “That’s not quite right,” he said coldly. “I don’t need you anymore!”
The door closed behind him and she stood there for a moment staring at it. Then she turned and slowly walked back to the couch. It had happened again. She looked over at the vial of poison standing on the edge of the liquor cabinet. He was right. It was the only way for someone like her.
She got to her feet and started for it when the nausea came up in her. She ran to the bathroom wildly and bent over the sink, retching. Tears began to burn in her eyes. She retched again and then her stomach was empty. Slowly she sank to her knees and placed her head against the cool porcelain. The tears came rolling down her cheeks. There was no doubt about it now.
Harold Robbins Organized Crime Double Page 65
