by John Knoerle
I didn’t do as any self-respecting veteran of the Oh-So-Secret should have done. I didn’t tear those train tickets in two. I had risked my neck for two years, I had been honorably discharged. I was going to play that for whatever it was worth. So I boarded the 11:47 to Cleveland the next day.
The Cleveland District Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation is located on the 9th floor of the Standard Building, corner of Ontario and St. Clair. The elevator operator was an old man with a big Adam’s apple. I asked him what the ‘Standard’ stood for.
“Standard Trust, first labor bank in the country.”
“I didn’t see a bank downstairs.”
“Went bust. President did eight years for crooked loans.”
“Was it the FBI who busted him?”
The elevator operator spat tobacco juice into a brass spittoon and feathered the car to a stop on the ninth floor.
I announced my name at the front desk and was swept through a zigzag of corridors on a tide of smiles and bent back doors until I came to rest in a dimpled leather club chair across from the Special Agent in Charge. Chester Halladay stood up, I shook his soft plump hand.
I thought all G-men were jut-jawed tough guys who ate nails and pissed rust but Chester Halladay, with his fleshy jowls and wavy hair, looked more like a floor walker at Higbee’s. All he needed was a pink carnation.
“How was your journey?” said Halladay when we had settled back in our chairs. “The trains run on time?”
I smiled and nodded. Nothing like a little Nazi humor to break the ice. A file folder sat open on Halladay’s desk. I recognized the upside down picture. Yours truly. Halladay leaned back in his spring-loaded chair and launched himself to his feet. He walked over to the credenza on the far wall, turned around and walked back.
“Organized crime in the greater Cleveland area prospered while you were busy making the world safe for democracy, Mr. Schroeder. War rationing opened up a lucrative black market and they took full advantage, full advantage. But now, they’re hurting.”
Halladay walked over to the window above St. Clair Avenue, turned around and walked back. A pink carnation was all he needed.
“The mob doesn’t do well in times of freedom and prosperity. Prohibition gave them bootlegging, the depression gave them loan sharking, war rations gave them the black market. But now, they’re hurting.”
Halladay leaned over and flattened his lunch hooks on the desk blotter which skidded forward, dumping an empty ashtray on the carpet. I bent down and picked it up. It bore the official seal of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
“The mob can’t make ends meet as racketeers these days,” said the Special Agent. “So they’ve reverted to form, to what they truly are - gangsters. They’ve robbed four banks in as many weeks.” Halladay fixed me with a meaningful look. “That’s where you come in Mr. Schroeder. We want you to help them along.”
This got my attention. I sat up straight in my dimpled chair.
The phone rang. Halladay answered, cupped his hand over the mouthpiece and said, “Assistant Special Agent Schram will give you the particulars.”
I was whisked away to an adjoining office. Agent Richard Schram was more like it. Ropey and crew cut as a drill instructor. A crooked smile but straight teeth. The handshake we exchanged was just this side of Indian wrestling. He x-rayed me with a look. I got the feeling whatever cockamamie scheme I’d been summoned here for wasn’t Richard Schram’s idea.
“War hero are you?” said Schram through clenched teeth. Teeth, hell, the guy had clenched hair.
“No sir, I’m not a war hero.”
“No?”
“No sir.”
“What then?”
“I was an agent for the OSS sir. A spy.”
“A spy!”
“Yes sir.”
“Of course. That makes you a perfect fit.”
“A perfect fit for what? Sir.”
Agent Schram’s eyes got sly. “You know.”
“Just what the Special Agent told me sir.”
“Which was?”
“That the mob was doing bank heists and he wanted me to help them along.”
“And what did you say to that?”
“Nothing sir.”
“Nothing?”
“No sir. Agent Halladay took a phone call before I could reply.”
Agent Scram cranked up another crooked smile and held it for several seconds. I must have passed some kind of test. In any event the swollen vein in the middle of his forehead stopped pounding four beats to the bar and we got down to cases.
“We know who pulled those bank jobs,” said Schram. “The Fulton Road Mob. They’ve been acting up lately.”
“If you know they did it why don’t you arrest them? Sir.”
Agent Schram ground his teeth. “You are asking the wrong man that question.”
“Yes sir.”
“The plan, the concept is to insert pre-arranged heist plans, use them to ladder up the chain of command and bring down the mysterious Mr. Big.”
“Mr. Big?”
“Theodore Briggslavski, a.k.a. Teddy Biggs. Now that he’s the head magoo he’s known as Mr. Big,” said Schram. “The man’s a phantom. All we have in his jacket is one grainy old photo.”
Agent Schram handed me a file folder containing a picture of a tall pot-bellied man with a big mop of hair. I closed the folder and handed it back.
Schram’s watery blue gaze turned inward. I kept my hands in my lap and my thoughts to myself. Someone in the Cleveland District office of the FBI would eventually get around to telling me what they wanted me to do. Wouldn’t they?
A fire engine honked and wailed its way down Ontario. The sweep second hand on the electric wall clock rounded third and headed for home. The potted philodendron on the windowsill sprouted several flowering tendrils.
“Sir…”
“So what have you decided?” said Schram, snapping to.
“About what?”
“About signing on to become an undercover mob informant! I thought you were briefed?”
“No sir.”
“No you’re not interested?”
“No I wasn’t briefed. Sir. But I am interested.”
I don’t know why I said that so quickly. I hated being a spy. But it opened my eyes. Good guys? Bad guys? Once the shit-storm starts there’s not much difference. When I was behind German lines everyone was trying to kill me. What I wanted now was to get away, far away from the chest-beaters and the speechifiers before they found a way to start it all up again. Preferably to someplace warm. Preferably with Jeannie.
Hey, you never know.
So I was interested. Still, I couldn’t resist twitting the Fan Belt Inspectors. “Why not get one of your own boys to do this job? Too dangerous?”
“Don’t be ridiculous. We can’t use our agents because they’re known to the enemy.”
“But why a broken down spy from the OSS?”
Agent Schram breathed deeply though his nostrils. He started to speak, cleared his throat and started again. “Because your training and experience,” he said in a low voice, biting off the words, “make you uniquely qualified for this mission.”
I smiled and thanked him and said I was in.
Chapter Four
People are so depressingly predictable. The guy from the gambling club, the scowling guy with the downsloped mug, yanked his nickel-plated .45 from his armpit holster when I mentioned that I was working for the FBI.
The barrel felt warm against my temple. I sniffed and made a face. “Your gun smells like BO.”
He cocked the hammer.
“Jimmy,” said The Schooler. The gun got holstered.
Jimmy? The name didn’t fit somehow. I had Slopehead figured for a Rocco, or a Big Louie.
“Why should we trust you?” said The Schooler in his soft voice. A voice that didn’t need to push or shout, a voice that was accustomed to being heeded.
“You shouldn’t. You should trust t
he results. The feds are gee’d up to nab the head of your operation - Mr. Big they call him - and they’ve ponied up a fat wad of bait money to do it.”
“And how does that work?”
“On the installment plan. Down payment, the C notes I gave to…Jimmy. Second payment, an armored car job courtesy of the FBI. Final payment, a six figure factory payroll heist where they plan to drop the hammer and spring the trap.”
“And your proposal?”
“A pure double cross.”
The Schooler looked amused. He chuckled in a mirthless way. Heh heh heh. Heh heh heh. He shined his flashlight at the ceiling. A rusted eyehook hung from a rolling track. I got the message and realized my mistake. I hadn’t properly introduced myself. People care more about who you are than what you say.
“I’m not a G-man. The feds recruited me because I was a spy for the OSS.”
“And why would a clean cut agent from the Office of Strategic Services want to turn to a life of crime?” said The Schooler, hiking his eyebrows.
I hiked mine back. “If I’m going to risk my life again I’d like to get paid what it’s worth.”
No response. My wit and charm weren’t having their customary effect.
“The money’s for real,” I said. “The richer the prize, the higher the stake. It’s the cardinal rule of undercover work. Mr. Big’s a rich prize. To win his trust the feds have ponied up a huge fund of bait money.”
Repeating myself, The Schooler inspecting that hook again and Jimmy’s ragged hungry breath on the back of my neck. Not good, not good at all. Say something genius.
“Perhaps you’re wondering how I plan to get away with this.”
The Schooler’s stolid face flickered to life for half a second. I gathered myself, weight on the balls of my feet. If this didn’t work it was time to go.
“The Bureau won’t try too terribly hard to find me,” I said, breezily, hopefully. “J. Edgar’s not going to want the world to know that a former OSS agent, and the Fulton Road Mob, played America’s Bulwark of Freedom for suckers.”
The Schooler liked that. What crook worth his salt doesn’t want to put one over on the Bulldog?
“Let’s take a walk.”
He led me to a small room off the factory floor, a foreman’s office. Jimmy stayed put and lit a cigarette against the darkness. There was a battered metal desk in the little room. The Schooler parked a haunch on a desk corner and set the flashlight upright like a candle. Mice scurried underfoot. The Schooler examined me for a good ten seconds. “I find you an interesting young man.”
What was I supposed to say to that? And I find you an attractive older gentleman?
“It’s an interesting proposition, what you suggest. Before I take it upstairs I want to set you straight on something. Even if everything you say checks out you’ll still have to pay your dues.”
“Meaning what?”
The Schooler shrugged. “You’ll have to make the rounds, prove your loyalty.”
This wasn’t what I wanted to hear. I had already proved my loyalty, already made my rounds. Basel to Freiburg to Ulm to Karlsruhe. Spies do that, double agents don’t have to. Double agents have superior knowledge.
“The Krauts inserted dozens of spies into England during the war,” I said. “The Brits turned every one. But that’s not the point, their…”
“How?”
“What’s that?”
“How did the Brits turn them?”
“Uh, most were turned by capture, a few gave themselves up. And some just plain liked to play the game.”
“What game is that?”
“The double cross game,” I said. “But their Kraut spy-masters in Berlin never sniffed it out. They kept believing the horseshit troop movement and industrial production reports their agents sent back. Kept believing them right through Normandy, right up to VE Day.”
The Schooler ran the back of his index finger across his cheek. “You said there was a point.”
“Yeah. Loyalty is for saps.”
There was a grimy window in the little room. The Schooler turned to look through it. Jimmy was playing with his lighter. His jagged profile lit up and went dark, lit up and went dark. “Then fake it,” said The Schooler.
“What’s that?”
“Loyalty. I’m riding herd on an itchy group of young men. They start thinking they can freelance and all hell breaks loose. Can you do that?”
Me? Pretend to be something I’m not? “Sure.”
The Schooler didn’t budge from his desk corner. He had something more to say. I watched Jimmy firing his lighter through the grimy window, the tongue of flame throwing lurid shadows on his face, making him look like Bela Lugosi. Or Lucifer.
“Which type are you?” said The Schooler. “The type who likes to play the game?”
“No sir, I’m a post-war double agent. I’m just looking for a payday.”
Chapter Five
My digs are in what they call the Angle, a slice of west side real estate just below St. Malachi’s Church and just above the river, corner of Winslow and West 25th. My room overlooks the ore docks and Whiskey Island. From what I’ve heard about the housing shortage I guess I’m lucky, if you can call a third floor walkup with a down-the-hall bathroom in Mrs. Brennan’s rooming house - just room, no board - lucky.
Why not? Six months ago I didn’t have a roof, a bed, clean clothes or steam heat.
I looked at the wall mirror where I’d stuck the creased and spattered photo I had carried through hell and back. It didn’t do her justice. I told my pals in Youngstown that I didn’t know where Jeannie was and didn’t care but only the first part was true.
I could track her down. I knew her husband’s name, Pappas. Old enough to be her father, so I was told. What the hell was she thinking? Those old country Greeks might come on ‘all wool and a yard wide’ but once the knot’s tied it’s back to the twelfth century. I could track Jeannie down, but what would be the point?
I clomped down two flights of stairs to the parlor, hoping to cadge a newspaper and a cup of tea. Mrs. Brennan always had a kettle on. She had a thriving business, Mrs. Brennan, a biblical number of freckle-faced kids, a kitchen that doubled as a laundry and a no-nonsense manner. Mr. Brennan was ‘away.’
I leaned across the Dutch door to her kitchen. She was using a wooden paddle to haul sheets from an enormous pot of boiling water. “I’ll take a cup of Bewley’s and a corned beef sandwich.”
Mrs. Brennan did not dignify me with a look. “You’ll take a boot in the arse and like it.”
I opened the Dutch door, walked over to her and took the wooden paddle firmly in hand. “This is not a suitable task for a woman of your quality.”
Mrs. Brennan snorted. “Sure of yourself, aren’t you?”
“Always,” I smiled. “Now what am I supposed to do with this thing?”
“You’re the smart one, you figure it out,” said Mrs. B and went off to pour tea. She brewed it black and strong as any java. I yanked a soaking sheet from the pot with the wooden paddle and held it up. It weighed a ton. Now what?
“Twist it, twist it around.”
I rotated the paddle so that the sheet wrapped around it.
“Hold it there and let it drip.”
I did that too, shoulder muscles groaning.
It wasn’t the precise moment I would have chosen to have Jimmy appear. Yet there he stood, hands resting on the ledge of the Dutch door, wearing a dark fedora and a smirk.
-----
We drove down Lorain Avenue in the black Buick. Apparently I had passed muster with Mr. Big, though Jimmy hadn’t said so. So far his end of the conversation consisted of “Let’s go” and “Get in.”
The neighborhood was old and well-established, red brick apartments above corner stores with striped awnings. Irish pubs, Hungarian restaurants, German Bäckereis. We stopped at every one and collected envelopes. The owners didn’t say much and Jimmy said less, just fixed them with that Cyclops stare and put out his paw. I s
tood back with my hands crossed and felt like a heel.
We even stopped at a shoeshine stand. Who shakes down a shoeshine stand? But it wasn’t like that. The stand was a sports book the mob bankrolled. Moe the owner had a bad weekend, something to do with the Cleveland Rams not covering the spread. Jimmy had to fork over a wad of bills. This put him in a foul mood.
We drove on. Jimmy pulled to the curb across from a block-long yellow brick building with a tall clock tower. WESTSI DE MARKET was spelled out in green letters along the roof-line. “Wait here,” said Jimmy and crossed the street. I counted to ten and followed him inside.
The place was a riot of shoppers pressed cheek to jowl at arcades of stalls in every direction. If Jimmy was here to collect protection money it would take a week. I spotted him elbowing his way through the crush.
I threaded my way past Sielski Poultry, Barbo’s Pies and The Pierogi Palace. The aromas made me weak with hunger. Jimmy pushed his way to the front of a stall named Baleah Meats. The man behind the counter greeted him like a long lost friend.
Jimmy nodded and spoke an entire sentence, maybe two. The man behind the counter hurried off and returned with a package wrapped in butcher paper. Jimmy paid him with one bill and didn’t wait for change.
Well, well, Jimmy was human after all. Just another Cleveland ethnic with a taste for the old country. But what the heck kind of name was Baleah? Seemed like I’d heard it before.
I hustled back to the Buick. Jimmy returned and stashed his package in the trunk. His mood had improved, he hummed a little tune as he hung a U and drove west on Lorain. He picked up speed, honked his way through an intersection and sang the words to the tune he’d been humming, a kid’s song from the ‘30s.
“When I grow up I wanna be a G-man, and go bang bang bang bang bang. A rough and tough and rugged he-man, and go bang bang bang bang bang.”
Cute. I was about to join in when we screeched to the curb in front of Papa’s Deli.
The place had a white porcelain deli case front to back, framed travel posters of The Parthenon and The Blue Aegean and no customers. A short swarthy man wearing a cheap hairpiece came running up.
