Divide the Dawn- Fight

by Eamon Loingsigh

  Daniel steps forward over the desk, in front of Brosnan, “Harry Reynolds, Liam Garrity and Thomas Burke.”

  Wolcott stands, “Show me who they are.”

  Daniel turns the wheeled chalkboard round where there is a large chart of opposing gang members by name written on it. He then unfurls a large, leather-bound atlas of the waterfront wards from the Navy Street down to Red Hook. Focusing, Daniel pushes on the location of the Atlantic Terminal as if he were crushing a bug with one finger. “Harry Reynolds is right here, he is the dockboss o’ the Atlantic Avenue Terminal for the White Hand.”

  Wolcott mumbles, “I know of him. Notorious as ‘The Shiv.’ He is lethal with a knife. The quiet one, the outsider.”

  “Sure but—” Culkin casts doubt on Wolcott’s assumption, then runs a finger north along the East River, up the atlas to Bridge Street’s Dock Loaders’ Club where Dinny Meehan’s name is listed at the top of an index card. “He’s been wit’ Meehan longer than any other livin’ member. They met in Elmira Reformatory back in nineteen ought-five.”

  “He’s loyal then,” Wolcott admits. “Watching over his incarcerated boss’s home.”

  “Very loyal,” Culkin agrees.

  My son knows what he is doing, Brosnan realizes as he listens to them bat round the gang’s inner workings. My son is coming into his own.

  Daniel grabs a book of mugshots and flips through. “Here, this is William Garrity, also known as ‘Liam’ or ‘Poe.’ He didn’t come off the boat ’til nineteen fifteen.”

  “Yes, I believe he came with Meehan one time when I was with the New York Dock Company,” Wolcott says as Wisniewski nods his head, remembering the face.

  Daniel agrees, “His uncle was Joe Garrity, the ILA recruiter loyal to Thos Carmody who was killt after a melee in a saloon that was burnt to the ground in the Donnybrook in Red Hook, 1916, six months after the kid arrived.”

  “So Poe Garrity murders his uncle and gains status, interesting.”

  “Seems that way,” Daniel agrees. “Before Meehan was released from the Poplar Street Station today, Garrity ran the Jay Street Terminal and the Fulton Ferry Landin’ to fill in for the loss o’ their leaders.”

  “On the way up, I see,” says Wolcott, one hand spread across his belly, the other strokes a drooping jowl. “And the last one, Burke was it?”

  “Thomas Burke. Low level,” Culkin says. “Got four kids, one of them’s a cripple. He lives below Garrity in an Eighth Avenue tenement.”

  “Pakenham said an old friend of Meehan’s paid his bail?”

  “Tanner Smith from the West Side o’ Manhatt’n, Meehan’s old haunts. An’ Dead Reilly representin him in court.”

  “How does this Tanner Smith fellow come up with that amount of money?”

  Daniel looks at Wiz the Lump, then back to Wolcott, “Not sure o’ that.”

  “And now Lovett’s back,” Wolcott pinky-points toward Red Hook on the pencil-colored colored atlas, then points it out the window. “And most like by now he has asserted control over all of Red Hook. We must hand it to him, he chose to strike at the moment the Black Hand in the Erie Basin were least likely to be able to defend it. How many men support Lovett?”

  “Fifty, I’d say. Meehan’s got over a hundret he can call up, but here’s the catch; Dead Reilly works for both Meehan an’ Lovett,” Daniel walks away from the chalk board and opens up the book of mugshots to a man with one eye. “If Reilly can get Pickles Leighton out of Sing Sing, then Lovett would have a lot more men. Parolees an’ scofflaws, but still lots o’ men.”

  “We need to even up the odds,” Wolcott smiles and the extra layers of skin under his chin jounce like bulbous folds of blubber as he laughs. “Go to Reilly and find out what he needs to ensure the trial ends in Pickles Leighton’s release.”

  “Will do,” Daniel assures.

  Wolcott points to the mugshots, “Concurrently, I need you and Barry to hunt down Harry Reynolds and Liam Garrity.”

  “We will come at them when they least expect it, an’ they’ll never know who hit them.”

  Jesus, Mary and Joseph, Brosnan thinks. My son is evil.

  “Oh woe betide the unwary,” Wolcott smiles. “What is Lovett calling his gang?”

  Daniel raises his eyes up to Wolcott and smiles too, “The White Hand.”

  “Perfect,” Wolcott turns toward the window, “I couldn’t have asked for a better name. Let them fight over the title and control over the headquarters in Irishtown while from above divine providence will reign fire down on them all.”

  Daniel clears his throat, “We need more guns. But if we wanna make all the groups in Brooklyn turn against each other, an’ we make sure it turns into a true blood feud, we need to—” Daniel gazes at his father-in-law but walks away and flips the wheeled chalkboard and pushes it into the corner. “I have a plan, but—”

  “Bollix,” Brosnan bellows and stands tall, his chest puffed out. “Ye’re in over yer head, Daniel. Goddamnit ye don’t even know what’s at stake here. Ye’re my daughter’s husband. Daniel! Think o’ yer children, are ye thick? The weight o’ that fam’ly is on yer shoulders. An’ on top of it all Doirean is heavy with child, ye gobshite eejit, ye.”

  “Dad, ye just don’ understand. I ain’t like ya. Never was. Time’s’re changin’ an’ ya ain’t keepin’ up. Ya worked for the gangs all ya life. Now I’m movin’ past that. This is the future,” Daniel raises both palms and looks round the executive room. “This is my future. An’ I’m makin’ it my own. Wit’out ya.”

  “Jaysus ye’re a dryshite, ain’t ye? I never wanted a copper penny from that god’amn gang,” Brosnan repeats and holds his stomach as his voice cracks. “I was forced to go on the tug.”

  “So what did ya do wit’ it all, donate it to charity?” Daniel moves closer.

  Saving it for my little Doe to have, Brosnan thinks and turns away eyeing the black smoke through the window until he notices the white moon that watches him from the blue sky beyond. It’s time, he recognizes. It’s time I speak my mind. My time. “Daniel,” Brosnan towers over his son-in-law. “Daniel, the mayor’s civil pension commission has met—”

  Wolcott interrupts, “And have concluded that pension funds for the police, firemen and teachers are bankrupt.”

  “Ye make yerself quiet,” Bronsan roars at the fat man. “That was a few years ago, last year the commission proposed a new retirement system thanks to police commissioner Enright. It’s the most scientifically devised system ever created in America. It’ll pass the assembly next year, I’m told, an’ at that point I’ll be eligible for a payout since I’m superann. . . Superann. . .”

  “Superannuated,” Wolcott finishes the sentence and touches Daniel’s sleeve again. “Also-known-as too old for service. Obsolete. And it is this same police commissioner that you quote who is compelling the older generation of policemen, such as yourself, to resign to his vaunted retirement system.”

  “I’m eligible to retire, Daniel,” Brosnan corrects.

  Wolcott laughs.

  “Whether I’m alive or not, next year, my family is eligible to receive my pension—”

  Wolcott’s laughs turn to sniggers now.

  “Keep laughin’ ye fat-arsed bowsie glutt’nous smug cunt ye. While the people down in Brooklyn are starvin’ half to death, ye’re up here rollin’ round in laughter. But go ahead, then. Cackle it up while ye can, ‘cause what ye’re about to hear’s gonna choke ye! I hoped it wouldn’t come to this, but all along I’ve had an ace in the hole. Ye’re a greedy fecker though, I know ye’d rather peel an orange in yer pocket than share a slice, ye stingy bollix. But I’d be a fool an’ a terrible detective if I hadn’t foreseen that ye’d hoard the harvest and leave my fam’ly mere scraps.”

  “My weight should have no bearing—”

  “Ah lookit, don’t get upset about fat jokes, ye’re much bigger than that.”

  Wisniewski shyly smiles at that one.

  “When I found my retirement money could be left for
my family, I marched directly into Captain Sullivan’s office and filled out a report concernin’ the illegal payoffs the Waterfront Assembly has been forcin’ patrolmen and detectives to take.”

  “Ya did what?” Daniel cuts in, though Wolcott just watches with a veneer of a smile on his face.

  “But that ain’t the all of it,” Brosnan leers at the fat man. “It appears not all reporters at the daily are like yer Pakenham feller. I met a cub there who said he’d love to write a feature article on the topic, and so I’ve provided them him with damnin’ evidence. Ye know Wolcott, it might take ye a year or so to get used to the prison food up in Sing Sing, but ye can always give sexual favors to the other prisoners for extra rations. They like the soft. They’ll love wrapping their hands round the hips of a big, pink girly-lookin’ chap like yerself an’ thrustin’ their seeds up yer hole, one after another.” Brosnan bears his teeth and pounds his fist on the executive desk, “There’s only one way ye can convince me not to go forward with my complaints to Captain Sullivan an’ the daily. Only one thing ye can do to save yerself now, fat man.”

  Wolcott happily stares back, “Let me guess, I should allow your son his leave of my service?”

  Brosnan turns to his son-in-law, “With the money I’ve saved, I bought a house for yer family, Daniel. On top o’ that, I’ve secured yer transfer to the Peekskill Police Department, where the house is four blocks from headquarters.”

  Daniel shakes his head and touches his forehead, “What do ya mean? Ya. . . Ya can’t do this, Dad. I’m in charge o’ my fam’ly. Doirean is my wife an’ I make the decisions for our fam’ly.”

  “It’s a new life for ye Daniel,” Brosnan presses forward. “The house is paid in full, ye just gotta pay the taxes annually. It’s a two-story home with three bedrooms an’ two bathrooms, a front yard an’ a back yard an’ warm water heated by a brand new electric-goddamned-boiler. An electric boiler, Daniel. Ye can’t tell me Wolcott’s offer is better than mine. Now this is what we’re gonna do,” Brosnan puts his hand on Daniel’s elbow, apprehending him, and turns to Wolcott. “Daniel an’ I are leavin’. Ye owe me a rake o’ money for jailin’ Meehan, an’ ye owe Daniel more for scarin’ up Garry Barry. But we’ll call it even, then. And ye’ll let us leave in peace. Now.”

  Wolcott moves his eyes from Brosnan’s to Daniel’s. The fat man rubs his knuckles gently and bites his plump lip. He looks again over to Daniel and smiles, then slowly opens a palm toward the door. “How can I argue with the superstitious?”

  Unexpected, Unannounced

  March 1919

  I make sure that we are between cars and wait in line for the train car door on the left, allow others to go ahead of us, then pull Burke’s sleeve to enter the car on the right.

  “Why’d ya do that?”

  “Don’t look round.”

  “Why?” He cranes his neck round the train car.

  “We’re going to be the first ones off the train when we stop at Atlantic, then we’re going to run to Fulton Street Elevated at the Flatbush Avenue station, understand?”

  “Why?”

  I wish Harry were here, not you.

  But the plan seems to have worked and I no longer feel eyes watching.

  A few blocks from Borough Hall under the barren scarecrow trees that sprout from the sidewalk, we walk toward Atlantic Avenue, until—

  There it is again, that feeling.

  Just then a sullen face emerges from a three-foot space in a shadow between two close-cropped buildings.

  “Liam?”

  “Jesus wept,” Burke whispers with eyes big as pies.

  “Liam, I ain’t here to hurt ya,” he gives me his palms as if to show he is unarmed. “Just wanna talk is all.”

  There is something familiar about the man’s face. The dark rings under his impassive eyes and the shards of hair falling out the side of his flat cap offer up a bewildering presence. His shirt is buttoned up to his thin neck and the dark rust-brown stains on it are evident since he wears no tie. But it’s his eyes that give him the haunting look. And when he speaks, the words don’t seem to relate to the vacant expression in his face.

  “I’m just here to pass on a message, is all,” says he.

  “Darby?” I lower an eye at him. “Darby Leighton?”

  “Bill’s back,” he says. “I’m sure ya know that by now.”

  Burke glares into Darby’s eyes as if it were the shadow of a man. “What. . . message?” Burke manages.

  “Bill’s gonna come to the Dock Loaders’ Club. Around quittin’ time. Peaceful-like though. No bad blood. He comes under a white flag and requests safe quarter an’ drink. Rules o’ hospitality, ya know?”

  “White flag? Hospitality?” I mock. “What happened to Mickey Kane?”

  Through skeletal cheeks, Darby glares into the distance with a stark stare.

  “I’m just hear to tell yaz we’re gonna come by tomorrow. Shake hands maybe.”

  “So why do you follow us round? Why can’t you just come up and say that?”

  “I. . . I didn’t mean to startle yaz. I'm just here to say—”

  “Alright, you already told us.”

  “Listen Liam,” Darby struggles with words. “I. . . I don’ want trouble either. Like ya’self. But ya know, The Swede’n Dinny, they done some bad things on us. The Swede beat me to death’s door, ya know. Ya seen me runnin’ from him before, remember?”

  In truth, that was the only time I ever saw Darby Leighton.

  He continues, “Times’r changin’. Maybe it’d be best Dinny an’ his followers walks away, ya know? His time’s passed. It’s Bill’s time now, an’ he’s red in tooth an’ claw.”

  If he is nervous behind those lifeless eyes, I can’t tell. Yet he mumbles and stammers as if the words are new in his mouth and his own voice is strange to his ears. He’s been away for too long. Unmoored and alone too long.

  “The storms have come and left this place stricken, its people hungry,” he says in a distant voice as if reading or repeating. “Only the cruelest can survive. Can ya plunder? In the grand scheme, it’s all for the best that yaz step away. Does that make sense? Sometimes the worst acts are the most benevolent.”

  “It does make sense,” Burke nods. “Not all o’ us have that ability to plunder.”

  “There’s only one person who cares about the people what need caring for,” I say as Darby leans an ear in my direction. “That’s Dinny Meehan. I heard what you did to Sadie. Your own cousin. You and Anna harangued her and her son. Threw rocks through her window. Didn’t you go round telling people that Sadie had been forced to marry Dinny? Was that a lie, or are you after stalking mothers?”

  Darby watches my mouth closely as I speak, and when I finish he turns his eyes away in thought. A clacking sound comes from his teeth. A strange thing since he does not seem particularly cold, or nervous.

  He speaks, “I bet ya never knew that I was a disciple o’ Meehan back when we was just little water rats livin’ under a rotted pier. We needed a new leader when the old one off’d hisself, an’ I felt like Dinny had destiny on his side. But my little brother Pickles is the begrudgin’ type. He wanted Dinny outta the way, or dead,” Darby turns back to me with wonder in his eyes. “What do ya do when caught between ya own beliefs an’ ya fam’ly’s?”

  I know that feeling all too well.

  “A man’s s’posed to make his own mind,” Darby says. “But that decision was made for me. My fate may well be to bear the weight o’ my brother’s ills, but my cousin Sadie is Dinny’s hostage. Mark it.”

  “In no way has Dinny ever held Sadie hostage. I lived with them. You’re lying.”

  “Ya weren't here when everythin’ when Christie the Larrikin was murdered back in ‘twelve, nor for the trial in ‘thirteen when Pickles was set up for it. I played a role in Dinny’s ascension. Even Judas Iscariot was an apostle, right? Have ya ever talked wit’ Sadie about them days? Have ya? Nah, ya haven’t. She only chirps out parts o’ her verses, never the ch
orus. Things ain't always as they appear, Liam. An’ sometimes the caged bird sings a love song for her captor, an’ that’s the truth about Dinny an’ Sadie.”

  “I name you a liar,” says I.

  “Then why’d she marry Dinny ain’t even—” the words catch in Darby's mouth until he swallows them.

  “What?”

  “But ya can’t ask her about it now, can ya? Ya opened her cage and let the bird fly away. She told ya Anna an’ I threw rocks through her window, eh? Maybe it was the perfect time to make her escape while her captor was away. But she’d need someone naive to pay for her passage, just like when I paid for her passage back in 1910 from London. She duped us both, Liam. She hides innocent-like behind all them feathers. But ya can’t stay innocent forever.”

  “Is that true?” Burke turns to me.

  “No.”

  I had underestimated Darby Leighton. He looks a sodden mess, but his ploy to plant the seeds of distrust grow. The wound of doubt sticks in my belly like a shiv.

  “Things ain’t always as they appear an’ history ain’t nothin’ but stories told by victors,” dead-eyed Darby flings kernels of yet another story to pollinate. “Maybe my Pickles didn’t kill ol’ Christie Maroney the Larrikin, as a jury found. There was a witness to the murder, ya know. But she lied on the stand, which turned history in Dinny’s favor all on account o’ the witness was bulled by The Swede. Imagine it. Imagine the witness told the truth about what she saw. My life’d be very different right now. All o’ our lives’d be different. But here we are. Me, I’m tryin’ to right a lie, an honorable pursuit. While the both o’ yaz want to maintain a lie, the most dishonorable thing anyone can do.”

  My hand goes quickly to the pipe in my coat as I grit my teeth at those words.

  “An’ they call Dinny a fam’ly man? He ruined mine. The Leightons are scattered, an’ its because o’ Dinny Meehan. We’ll see who wins though. I got Dead Reilly on the case an’ Pickles’ got a re-trial an’ we’re gonna prove Pickles’ innocence. Guess what then? A hundret or more parolees immediately become soldiers in Wild Bill’s army the day they let my brother outta Sing Sing.”