Whacking Jimmy: A Novel

by William Wolf

  Mouse noticed the exchange of smiles and nudged Pat i.

  “That’s Bobby Tucci’s girl,” he whispered. “Her name’s Til ie.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Hey,” said Mouse. He had been trying to ingratiate himself with Pat i al day. At Metro Airport, when Pat i asked why Alberto Rel i hadn’t come to pick him up, Mouse had made a knowing face and said, “Catel o wil explain it to you after the funeral.” Pat i had nodded crisply and asked no further questions. It was an executive style, terse and decisive, that Mouse found appealing, style, terse and decisive, that Mouse found appealing, something to emulate when he became consigliere.

  Catel o spot ed Mouse and Pat i in the back of the chapel. The consigliere had been furious at Mouse for his passivity in the warehouse, but now that he had time to think about it, he realized the situation had worked out pret y wel . Bet er than pret y wel , actual y. Rel i and Bertoia were up in Washtenaw County, growing with the corn, and Bobby Tucci had lost his virginity.

  Catel o was sensitive to the lingering damage that kidnapping Don Silvio Mossi’s daughter had done to his image. Going after Vit orio Tucci’s innocent col ege-boy grandson would have been a PR disaster. But by joining up with Rel i, Bobby had become fair game.

  The boy, Catel o realized, held the key to his ambitions.

  Bobby had the two things that stood between Catel o and unchal enged control of the Family—the details of the Ho a hit, and his status as the last living Tucci. Luigi Catel o ful y intended to divest him of both.

  Chapter

  Chapter

  Twenty

  AS THE FUNERAL procession formed outside the cathedral, Carmine Pat i felt Luigi Catel o’s pudgy hand on his elbow. “Let’s ride out to the cemetery together,” he said.

  Pat i nodded. Mouse, standing nearby, was again impressed by the tal Arizonan’s cool demeanor.

  Compared to him, Catel o was a lump of dough in sizzling olive oil. “You want me to bring the car around?” he asked.

  “I’l drive,” said Catel o. “Wait for me at the house.”

  On the way to the cemetery, Catel o said, “Some funeral, huh? The whole country’s here.”

  “Everybody except Alberto Rel i,” said Pat i evenly.

  “Yeah. Poor Rel i.” Catel o paused for dramatic e ect.

  “He’s dead.”

  “I thought he might be,” said Pat i. “How did it happen?”

  “He got shot by his own cousin, Johnny Bertoia. He managed to whack Johnny back before he croaked.”

  Catel o shook his head. “Say what you want about Rel i, he was a rough customer.”

  “What was Bertoia’s beef?”

  Catel o shrugged his round shoulders eloquently. “Some Catel o shrugged his round shoulders eloquently. “Some family thing. I think maybe Al was playing around with Bertoia’s wife, there was a rumor like that. Anyways, he’s gone. They both are.”

  They drove in silence for a while, Pat i looking out the window. Final y he said, “Convenient for you.”

  “Yeah, I can’t deny it,” said Catel o. “Rel i would have had a tough time accepting my authority over the Tuccis.”

  “Don Vit orio picked him, not you.”

  “The don never told me that.”

  “Maybe not, but he told the Commission.”

  “The Commission don’t decide,” said Catel o. “It’s a local mat er.”

  “Unless the Commission doesn’t accept the local decision,” said Pat i. “You know the precedents.”

  “You sound like a lawyer,” said Catel o.

  “And you sound like a defendant.”

  “How does a defendant sound?”

  “Innocent,” said Pat i. “Always innocent.” He laughed and gave Catel o a charming smile that broke the tension.

  “Look, Luigi, I didn’t come out here to bust bal s or interfere in Tucci Family business. I’ve only got one concern—”

  “Hof a,” said Catel o.

  “The don told you?”

  “We didn’t have secrets. I got it under control. You can tel the Commission that it’s gonna go right on schedule.”

  “I need more than that. Don Vit orio’s death has made

  “I need more than that. Don Vit orio’s death has made people nervous. They’re going to be even more nervous when they nd out Rel i’s dead. I can’t convince them things are stil al right unless I’m convinced rst. You understand, right?”

  Catel o drove for a while in silence. Final y he said,

  “Rel i had a meet with Ho a coming up, which is when he was going to hit him. I got the word to Jimmy that Rel i had to go to Sicily for a couple days, to protect the Family’s interests now that the don’s dead, but that he’l be back in time for his meet. When Ho a shows, we’l take him out.”

  Pat i tapped the dashboard with his manicured ngernails. “It won’t work unless you know exactly what Rel i set up.”

  “I got the details,” Catel o lied. “Rel i fil ed me in before he died.”

  Pat i gave Catel o a skeptical look but said nothing. In al likelihood, the consigliere would be the next head of the Tucci Family, and it wouldn’t do to cal him a liar to his face. Not unless Catel o had to be kil ed—and it was stil too early to come to that conclusion. In any event, that wouldn’t be Pat i’s cal ; he acted at the discretion of his client, the Commission. “Who else knows about Rel i?”

  he asked.

  “Only the Mouse.”

  “What about Rel i’s wife and kids?”

  “Rel i was on the revolving-door plan at home,” said

  “Rel i was on the revolving-door plan at home,” said Catel o. “He’d have to be gone for a month for his old lady to notice.”

  “You trust Mouse?”

  “Absolutely,” lied Catel o once more. He had never absolutely trusted anyone in his entire life. Besides, the Mouse had punked out in the warehouse, proving he wasn’t top executive material. As soon as the Ho a business was over and he was set led in the don’s mansion, the Mouse would be a candidate for permanent retirement.

  “What about Bobby Tucci?” asked Pat i.

  “What about him?”

  “I hear he’s some sort of hippie.”

  “He’s a col ege kid. They’re al hippies.”

  “The old man told us he’s not involved in the business.”

  “Correct.”

  “What’s the story on his girlfriend?”

  “She’s a rich bitch from Bloom eld Hil s,” said Catel o.

  “A real piece of ass. I guess you noticed.”

  Pat i winced at the vulgarity. “Are they serious?”

  “Who the fuck knows with kids? I mean, it’s the fucking sexual revolution, right? That’s what they say on Phil Donahue anyway.”

  “They’re not engaged?”

  “Not as far as I know.”

  They rode the rest of the way in silence. When they reached the cemetery Pat i headed straight for Til ie. She reached the cemetery Pat i headed straight for Til ie. She looked up, saw him approaching, and grinned.

  “We seem to be constantly smiling at each other,” said Pat i easily. “Very inappropriate for such a sad occasion, don’t you think?”

  “Shocking lack of decorum,” Til ie agreed.

  “I take it you weren’t close to the deceased.”

  “I’m close to his grandson.”

  “Bobby.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I asked. It’s not a secret, is it?”

  “Secret? The prince of the realm has no secrets from his subjects. Only from his girlfriend.”

  “I think I’l leave that one alone. I know your name is Til ie. Mine’s Carmine Pat i.”

  “You don’t look Italian,” she said.

  “The closest I’ve ever been to Italy is Mulberry Street.”

  “Isn’t that something from Dr. Seuss?”

  “It’s a street in New York. Lit le Italy.”

  “That where you live? New York?”

&nb
sp; “New Jersey, actual y.”

  “Long way to come for a funeral,” said Til ie.

  Pat i smiled. “How come you’re not with the family?”

  “Bobby didn’t want me to come at al . He’s afraid his mother’s going to cast some kind of evil spel on me.”

  Pat i nodded toward Mendy. “Who’s that, your grandfather?”

  “He’s a friend. His name’s Mendy Pearlstein. They cal

  “He’s a friend. His name’s Mendy Pearlstein. They cal him Mendy the Pearl.” She giggled. “That’s his gangster nickname. And he’s courting my mother.”

  “Mendy the Pearl,” Pat i repeated, running it through his memory. He had never heard of Mendy the Pearl. “I guess your parents aren’t together.”

  “The understatement of the year,” said Til ie. “Right now, as we speak, my father is screwing his head o in Zurich. How’s that for originality? I mean, who goes to Switzerland for sex?”

  “Your mother doesn’t mind?”

  “My mother doesn’t have a mind,” said Til ie. “Just a good soul and great legs.”

  “What about your father?”

  “He’s got a mind,” she said. “Sick and greedy and soaked in alcohol, but it’s there. Anything else you want to know?”

  “Lots, but I’d rather find out gradual y,” said Pat i.

  “How old are you?”

  “Twenty-nine. Does that seem old to you?”

  “ ‘Never trust anyone over thirty,’ ” said Til ie, grinning.

  “That gives you a year.”

  “Not that gradual y. Let’s have dinner together tonight.”

  “I don’t do dinner. Besides, I haven’t made my mind up about you yet. Tel you what, you can buy me lunch.”

  “What about Bobby?”

  “What about him?”

  “Won’t he mind?”

  “Won’t he mind?”

  “Lately he’s been acting like a dick. He just mooches around with his big secret spread al over his face like chocolate pie. Suddenly he’s John Wayne, he doesn’t want to trouble my pret y lit le head. That’s not the way relationships work, at least not mine.”

  “Are you going to want me to reveal al my secrets?”

  asked Pat i, with a half smile.

  “Definitely not,” said Til ie. “I want you to keep them to yourself.”

  “How come I get an exemption?”

  “Because I don’t love you,” said Til ie. “God, for a guy as old as you, you’re dumb.”

  MENDY WASN’T SURPRISED when Til ie told him she’d be leaving with Carmine Pat i. He had noticed them irting in church, and on the way out to the cemetery she had asked about him. Mendy had told her that he had no idea who he was, and at the time it was true. But he knew now, thanks to Morty Klein, a Teamsters lawyer with a brown toupee, thick gray eyebrows, and an encyclopedic knowledge of the mafia.

  “What’s Pat i doing here?” Mendy had asked him.

  “Go know what these lokshen got with funerals,” Klein said. “Don Vit orio got a hel of a turnout.”

  “I notice Jimmy’s not here.”

  “Ho a? What are you, nuts? The man’s trying to get his

  “Ho a? What are you, nuts? The man’s trying to get his union back, al he needs is to be consorting with known hoodlums, no o ense. He sent owers. Tea roses in the shape of a rosary. Class al the way, that’s Lit le Jimmy.

  Hey, look who I see.”

  Mendy fol owed Klein’s gaze to an old man wearing a wel -pressed, threadbare black suit and a black stingy brim with a red feather. He was standing alone with an expression on his smooth, hard face that said he wanted to stay that way.

  “Since when does he at end funerals?” asked Klein.

  “Him and Vit orio go back.”

  “You know the guy, right? I mean personal y” There was excitement in Klein’s voice.

  “He used to eat breakfast in my joint.”

  “I remember when I was a kid coming up on Hastings, he was the toughest guy in town. Everybody was scared of him.”

  “Yeah,” said Mendy. “He was plenty tough.”

  Klein leaned forward and said, “Between us, you think he did that police captain from jail?”

  “You’re a lawyer, you know there’s no limit on that.”

  “In other words, you think he did it?”

  Mendy pat ed Klein on the back. “Give Jimmy my regards when you see him,” he said. He walked into the crowd, mingling, and then circled around to the guy in the black suit. “Yank,” he said.

  “Mendy. How you feeling?”

  “Mendy. How you feeling?”

  The question made Mendy pause; it was the rst time al day anyone had asked him. “Sad,” he said. “Vit orio was a friend.”

  “Yeah,” said Yank, “same here.”

  The two old men stood side by side in silence as Vit orio’s co n was lowered into the ground. Mendy cleared his throat and said, “How’d you get out here?”

  “I took the bus.”

  “How about I give you a ride back?”

  “You’re not going to the house?”

  Mendy ducked his head and said, “Nah, there’s nobody there I want to see. Besides, this is an opportunity. I got a situation maybe you could give me some advice about.”

  “I hope it ain’t of a criminal nature,” said the old man.

  “According to the terms of my parole I ain’t al owed to discuss nothing of a criminal nature.”

  “Aw,” said Mendy. Then he looked into the old man’s cold, clear blue eyes and saw they were smiling. “Tel me, you know how to find Nobody?”

  “Nobody Nussbaum? Yeah, he’s living with his daughter out in Birmingham.”

  “You think he’s available?”

  “He’s been available since 1959,” said Yank. “You want somebody tailed?”

  “Yeah,” said Mendy. “I think it might be wise.”

  Chapter

  Chapter

  Twenty-one

  IN ALL THE years the don had lived in the compound at the end of the cul-de-sac there had never been so many cars parked in front, so many people crowded inside the main house. The staid Protestant neighbors watched the activity from inside their gated mansions and told one another that this was the inevitable result of al owing foreigners to move into Grosse Pointe.

  The public reception was Catel o’s idea; he wanted the world to see that he was the new master of the House of Tucci. Uniformed at endants parked the cars. Johnny Baldini prepared mountains of canapés and sweets. There were two bars stocked with the nest liquors and wines.

  Verdi played softly in the background, drowned out by the din of a hundred conversations. When the delegates from the Families went back home, they would report that Luigi Catel o had started out on the right foot.

  Catel o passed among the crowd, shaking hands and greeting the mourners with subdued a ability. When he came to Annet e Tucci he said, “I’m glad you’re here. We need to talk.”

  “You’re glad I’m here,” she repeated in a voice loud enough to turn nearby heads. “This is my father-in-law’s enough to turn nearby heads. “This is my father-in-law’s house, you fat fuck. It belongs to my son, Bobby, now.

  Who in the hel are you, tel ing me you’re glad I’m here?”

  Catel o turned to Tommy Niccola and said, “A scene don’t do nobody no good.”

  The Neck grunted his assent and put a restraining hand on his daughter’s arm. “Catel o’s right,” he said. “We talk in private. There’s people here might be looking to hurt the Family”

  Catel o saw that a few words from Annet e’s father were enough to calm her. He also registered the Neck’s proprietary tone. Chicago imperialism would develop into a problem, unless he could talk sense to Annet e.

  Tomorrow Judge Barbera would be reading the wil . He wanted an understanding with her before that.

  Catel o took a deep breath. “We could go into the don’s of ice right now.”

  “Okay,” said Annet e. “
Daddy?”

  “You two go,” said Tommy the Neck. “This is Tucci Family business. It don’t concern me.”

  Annet e gave her father a look of sheer adoration. By sending her in alone with Catel o he was trusting her with his cherished Center Cut.

  “You’re sure?” Catel o asked the Neck.

  “A hundred percent,” Tommy said. “You sit down with Annet e, you’re the one’s gonna need help, not her.”

  Annet e kept her shoulders straight as she fol owed Catel o down the hal way to the don’s old study. There Catel o down the hal way to the don’s old study. There were tears of pride in her hard brown eyes. Never in her life had she felt more like a Niccola.

  ANNETTE HADN’T BEEN in the don’s o ce since the day she talked to him about Bobby, but except for the absence of cigar smoke and Frank Sinatra it seemed exactly the same.

  When Catel o sat down behind the huge mahogany desk she scowled and said, “What’s this supposed to be? Like when they make some kid mayor for a day?”

  “I don’t want to swap insults,” Catel o said.

  Annet e gave him a contemptuous look and said, “When Al Rel i gets back, he’s going to knock your fat ass right of that chair, gnocchi-head.”

  Catel o gave it an extra beat and said, “Al Rel i’s not coming back.”

  “Bul shit. I got a telegram from him this morning. From Palermo.”

  “ ‘Stay strong, babe, big Al is on the way’? That one?”

  “Where did you read it?”

  “I didn’t read it, I wrote it. I sent it. Rel i’s dead as a fuckin’ doornail, may he rest in peace.” He lowered his eyes for a moment and said, “I guess Bobby didn’t tel you.”

  Annet e shook her head. For once she seemed ba ed and deflated. “What’s Bobby got to do with it?”