Cage's Crew

by Martin Archer

  “Is that where we’re going tomorrow? Are we meeting someone?”

  “Oh no, Love. I’m just checking something out. I got a tip about an opportunity I want to check out.”

  ******

  The cat that I might be working sort of got out of the bag the next morning. I decided that it would be safer to be prepared if I was going to be prowling around the private club where Giuseppe Martini and his crew hung out—so I got the Priority Mail box out of her suitcase and opened it, the one with my derringer and spring-loaded wrist holster in it.

  Pencie’s face got increasingly red and excited as she watched me put on the holster and push the tiny, double-barreled over/under derringer into it until the holster’s ejection spring clicked, and then put on my long-sleeved shirt to cover it.

  “Show me how it works, show me.” She was breathing hard, almost panting.

  What the hell, why not; so what if she knows? I thought. So I did. She gasped when I extended my right arm and the little pistol suddenly sprung into my hand. Her eyes were sparkling and glued to the pistol in my hand.

  “Oh my God; oh my God. Is that how you do it?” ... “That’s exciting. That’s very exciting; actually, it really turns me on. Could we catch a later train or something? Please, while you’re wearing it.”

  We caught a later train.

  ******

  Grand Central Station was huge and complex for someone like me who’s never been there before. But there were a lot of signs pointing to the city’s many subway lines. It didn’t take long before we found the entrance to the line that would take us closest to the station serving Arthur Avenue in the Belmont section of the Bronx, the area up around 187th Street. It was a venerable part of old New York we would be visiting as tourists, a collection of homes and businesses that used to be the Bronx’s “Little Italy” and still retained an Italian flavor even though most of the Italians have moved on and been replaced by Chinese and other immigrants.

  Arthur Avenue was particularly famous in certain quarters as the home of the long-established, and very private, Arthur Avenue Social Club. Its current leading member was Giuseppe Martini, a.k.a. Joseph L. Martin, one of New York’s more active financial advisors and political contributors despite a series of unfortunate mishaps and misunderstandings in his youth that prevented him from getting a license. As a result, he merely owned the company, kept an office in the financial district, and provided informal advice and assistance to the investors and politicians who solicited it.

  According to the late and much-lamented Robert Martin of Tucson, his uncle Joe was a traditionalist who kept close ties with the old Arthur Avenue neighborhood where he’d grown up, even though he had long ago moved some distance away to a much more expensive community and mostly spent his days at his office in the financial district and taking “deals” and “money to manage” to his friends at Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley.

  On the other hand, according to Robert, as a result of his uncle’s desire to maintain close ties with the old neighborhood, he could be found at the club every Tuesday evening playing pinochle and sharing financial tips and advice with his oldest and dearest friends and fellow members of the Bonanno family, many of whom still lived in the immediate vicinity even though “the neighborhood had gone to hell because a lot of Orientals moved in.”

  ******

  Before his recent and untimely passing, the late Robert Martin had informed me that the club opened for lunch every day including Sunday and that its kitchen and bar stayed open until the last pinochle, backgammon, or poker game ended around midnight. He also told me that the club’s long-time members and their immediate friends and associates were the only ones allowed on the premises, a tradition that had been in effect for many years. Applications for membership were rarely requested and even more rarely granted.

  In other words, there was no way in hell I was getting in while anyone was on the premises, but the coast would be clear until the kitchen help and club members began arriving for lunch. Being a skeptic, of course, I had to see this for myself; having someone like Pencie with me provided excellent camouflage.

  ******

  The subway stop was right around the corner from Arthur Avenue and it was only a short, three-block walk to the club. The Arthur Avenue Social Club did not have an imposing street presence. To the contrary, it was in a dingy, older, two-story brick building in the middle of the block with a one-story building housing a pizza restaurant up against it on one side and an even older three-story brick building up against it on the other side with some sort of Chinese tailor shop on its first floor.

  It would have been hard to find if you didn’t know it was there. The sign on its door didn’t even have the club’s name on it, just “Private Club Members Only.” What it did have was a very formidable iron grating across the front the door. It was definitely a place that did not encourage casual visitors and inquiries.

  We didn’t stop as we walked on the sidewalk past the entrance to the club. Pencie, who had absolutely no idea why I was in New York, never realized that we’d just gone past the place I’d come so far to visit and scope out.

  When we came to the end of the block, I turned right and we walked to the alley that ran behind the buildings that opened on to Arthur Avenue. Pencie’s eyes widened; she stiffened and said, “Oh,” as I took her arm and turned into the narrow alley that ran behind the three buildings and the others that fronted along the avenue. I knew there was an alley running behind the club because I’d seen it on Google Earth.

  The narrow and somewhat smelly alley we walked into was obviously used for deliveries and garbage collection for the businesses whose rear doors opened on to it on both sides. Garbage cans and bins ran all along it and we had to step around a ripped and soggy mattress covered with muddy tire tracks. There were power lines and telephone lines overhead and both sides of the alley were littered with the glass of broken bottles, warped and rotting sheets of old plywood, and other debris that had overflowed the garbage cans and bins that lined it.

  Some of the buildings on either side of it had windows that looked out on the alley. Mostly, however, those on the first floor appeared to have long ago been bricked up. All those higher up, however, could be used to watch the alley, although many of them had closed drapes and several were boarded up. Some of the buildings had security cameras watching the alley behind them.

  The Arthur Avenue Social Club was one of the building that did not have a security camera. Even so, I was taking no chances; I was wearing a baseball cap and dark sunglasses - and just before we entered the alley I began walking with a pronounced limp, slipped on my black tooth cap, and shoved six moldable ear plugs in between my teeth and my cheek on the left hand side of my face.

  I could see, from the expression on Pencie's face that she was not at all happy about where we were walking and didn't understand where I was taking her. She didn't say a word, not even about my sudden change in appearance; she just kept a tight grip on my arm and looked about with bewildered wonderment as we walked down the alley.

  What I hadn’t been able to see on Google Earth was the back of the club building and the rear door that was almost certainly there. I’d asked Robert Martin about the alley and the rear door, but he didn’t know; he’d never been in the alley or used the rear door, not once. All he knew was that the club building had a basement and that’s where the cases of beer and booze were stored along with old furniture and various other stuff. He knew about the basement, he said, because he’d been sent down there to help carry up cases of booze when he first joined the Family as a lowly soldier.

  Martin had laughed, at least to the extent he could under the circumstances, when I asked about the security system.

  “You’ve got to be kidding. No one in their right mind would try to break into the club. Everyone knows who it belongs to and what would happen—we sell protection, we sure as hell don’t have to buy it. It would ruin our reputation if it ever got out.”

  ****
**

  I had hoped that I would find an outside entrance into the club’s basement or, at least, windows that let light into it. It was not to be. All I could see as we walked past the rear of the club was a dirty brick wall, boarded up windows on both the first and second floors—and a very conventional exterior wooden door that looked like it could be opened with a very conventional key. Hot Damn!

  Except for a brief glance that took in the door and let me see the key hole under the door knob, I was pretending to look at my cell phone as I walked down the alley—and aimed it at the door as best I could and repeatedly clicked off pictures of it as we walked past.

  “Why are you smiling, Cage?” Pencie asked as we turned right at the end of the alley and headed straight for the subway station.

  “Because it’s time to get some lunch and go shopping for theatre tickets,” I said. “That’s why we came, isn’t it?”

  Chapter Thirteen

  When Pencie and I got back to Philadelphia and the Four Seasons Hotel after our visit to the Bronx, we spent a couple of hours in bed enjoying ourselves. Then, while she was taking a shower and getting dressed so we could go out for dinner, I called Robbie and reached him on his cell phone at a Pawnbrokers Association meeting. He was in Dallas.

  “Hey, Robbie, it’s Harry Samuels. How ya doing?”

  “Hey, Harry, it’s good to talk to you. It’s been a while. What’s going on?”

  “Well, it’s good to talk to you too, Robbie. The reason I’m calling is that I’m in Minneapolis and I need some battery-powered equipment similar to the gizmo that worked so well for me a while ago. I can forward some pictures of the problem I need to fix if it would be helpful.”

  Before I hung up, I also told Robbie that I’d sure appreciate it if he would try to locate the sub-contractor he’d recommended for my last construction contract and have him call me any afternoon around three o’clock Minneapolis time. I gave him the number of one of my two remaining prepaid burners. It was the same one I was using to call him.

  ******

  Tommy called the next afternoon exactly at four o’clock Philadelphia time, three o’clock Minneapolis time. I knew it was him even before I answered; it was exactly three in Minneapolis and only he and Robbie had the number.

  “Hey, how are you?” I said. “I just wanted to check in and make sure your satisfied with what’s been coming your way, and also to ask you for a little help on something I’ve got going.”

  “I’m good and I’m satisfied with what’s been coming my way from our mutual friend, real satisfied as a matter of fact. But how did you know it was me?”

  “Because only two people have this particular number.”

  “Of course; I should’a known that, huh? Hey, our friend said I should give you a call. What’s up?”

  “I need some help on a non-profit job where I’m bidding against the same company whose guys tried to get our last job away from us. My problem is that I’ve got a tight time window of a couple of hours when I can work on the site to set things up, but it can’t be finished until hours later when I’ll be on another job.

  “This contract is so important to me, even though there’s no profit in it, that I’m probably going to do it all myself to make sure it gets done. That means I need to have everything set up and ready to go, and not one of the many cans I’ll need can be so heavy that it takes more than one man to carry it up a ladder to be assembled.

  “What I’m looking for is a dollar and time estimate for a turnkey set of all the necessary cans and equipment delivered to an accessible storage area somewhere around Pittsburgh, and maybe a little help. If I have to, I’ll put them together myself and do the rest.”

  We talked for a while about the size of the job and Tommy promised to check things out and get a message to me in a couple of days through our mutual acquaintance. He means Robbie.

  ******

  Pencie and I stayed in Philadelphia and went to two expensive Broadway shows and the Trade Center Memorial before we began the long drive back to Denver to return Pencie’s rental Cadillac. We were taking a different route back to Denver from the one we came in on, through Albuquerque.

  I told Pencie we were taking the more southerly route west in order to see a different part of the country. Actually, we were going via Albuquerque in the hope that the Honda’s new title and registration would have arrived at the postal box I acquired as a backup just before we did the Phoenix job. If the paperwork is there, I’m going to take the title to Denver where the Honda is parked and sell it. I hadn’t decided what I’d do if the new title and registration hadn’t arrived yet; perhaps Pencie and I would fly to California together from Albuquerque and I’d come back to Denver later to sell it.

  ******

  We were heading west into the sun on the interstate somewhere in Kansas when a call came in from Robbie. I almost didn’t get it in time because I was driving and the burner cell phone was on the back seat under some snacks we’d picked up at our recent gas stop.

  “Yo, Harry, it’s me,” the voice said as I pulled over to the side of the Interstate and Pencie scrambled for the phone and finally handed it to me just as time was about to expire.

  “You got a moment?” It was Robbie.

  “Sure, I always have time for you. How are you?”

  “I’m doing good for an old man; and I’ve got some numbers for you.”

  “Hey, that’s great, it really is.”

  “Well. My source said he can get everything you’ll need to you in about two weeks for only eighteen since you’re a friend. But he’s really worried about the guys you’re gonna use. He thinks they aren’t qualified and could get hurt by the fumes. He’d also said he’d like to work with you in the future when you need someone like him. Bottom line is, he wants to make a deal. He says he’ll do this job for expenses since it’s for a non-profit, probably less than five plus the eighteen for the cans, but only if I’ll be his agent and bring him additional sub-contracts such as when you need someone like him.”

  “Hey, that’s interesting. I think I like it. What do you think?”

  “I like it too,” Robbie said. “I think he’s the kind of guy you can really count on to always do the right thing by you and your company, if you know what I mean. Experienced men who know what to do, and what not to do, are hard to find.”

  “Yeah, you’re right about that, and it’s likely I will need someone like that once in a while in the days ahead. So I’ll agree to it. Tell him he’s got a deal?”

  ******

  I didn’t go myself to the mailbox I rented in Albuquerque the last time I was here in case it had been blown despite all the precautions I’d taken. I sent Pencie instead, and watched from a distance. No problem. She was smiling as she came out of the Mailboxes USA lobby with my mail. Things were looking up. The title and registration for the Honda had been waiting in the box.

  We promptly checked into the Four Seasons Hotel and Pencie used her laptop to list the Honda on the Denver Craigslist using the number on my burner cell phone. She was happy to do it and enthusiastic; I’d told her she could put the proceeds towards the cost of a new car.

  ******

  The next day we drove to Denver to return Pencie’s rented Cadillac and try to sell the Honda to one of the half dozen or so people who’d called about it. I didn’t take any chances in case the Honda was being watched, even though I was pretty sure it wasn’t. As soon as we checked into the Four Seasons, I sent Pencie in a taxi to get the Honda out of the storage lot and told her the key was on the top of the right rear tire.

  I didn’t tell her why I was sending her to get the Honda instead of going myself, only that I couldn’t touch it or go near it because I couldn’t risk being associated with its former owner. What I did tell her is that, if anyone asked, she should not under any circumstances mention that she knows me or that she is staying at the Four Seasons.

  “Tell them that you just flew into town and some woman said she’d pay you two hundred t
o get the car and deliver it to the Holiday Inn where you’ll be staying.”

  Pencie had no trouble getting the Honda. She just walked in, got the key off the tire, and drove it away. And three hours after she returned with it, and with me once again hovering in the distant background, she sold it for eight thousand cash to the first person who made an appointment to look at it. He got a great deal and never even asked Pencie for identification before she added his name to the title as its new owner, not that he would have gotten any, of course.

  ******

  Pencie and I enjoyed Denver and flew first class to California two days later on American Airlines. Before we left, I ditched the burner cell phones and used a fixed rate Priority Mail box to mail my derringer and various of my back-up IDs and licenses to one of my California postal drops.

  The only problem I had was the inconvenience of having to stand in the long airport security line the feds impose on infrequent travelers; you’ve got to let them take your fingerprints to get a pre-check clearance and I didn’t want to take any chances and do that. God only knows what might have come up.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Norm flew in to California two weeks later and picked me up at the Chino Airport. He landed before I arrived and was in the waiting room when Pencie dropped me off. He didn’t even look up or acknowledge me until she drove off. Even then he didn’t acknowledge me—he just got up and walked out the door heading for the planes in the nearby transit parking area.

  I waited for a couple of minutes, went into the men’s room for a final piss, and then followed Norm out to his plane carrying my little duffle bag.

  “What was all that about?” I asked as I threw my little duffle bag on the rear seat and climbed in.

  “Security cameras, Cage. They’re all over the goddamn place. I don’t want us to get caught together on security cameras, especially when we’re not wearing disguises and I’ve got fake numbers on my plane.”