by Debra Dunbar
She reached for her father’s shoulder. He lifted a hand and gripped her fingers. The whisky was taking hold, calming his lungs.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I got scared. I’ll just lay low for a bit, and everything will be okay. I just panicked, that’s all.”
“Only…natural,” he wheezed.
Hattie withdrew to her bedroom and shut the door. No, she couldn’t leave. She’d probably overreacted. It was the very first time she’d ever met a real pincher besides herself. And with the guns and bullets and nearly getting shot, her nerves were raw. Yes, her illusions had failed, but he hadn’t seemed to put two and two together. If he had, she was pretty sure he would have called her out on it right then and there. She was safe. She had to be. That pincher wasn’t coming after her.
As she lay down on her bed, she winced. What a grouse she’d been to him! The things she’d said…. It was utterly uncalled for how she’d treated him. So impolite. Her mother would have been mortified. If she ever saw the man again, she’d have to dig deep for an apology.
If.
As she drifted to sleep, having been deprived of it for long hours, she thought of Bimini Island, and the magic elixir. The Water of Life. If only she had a dram of it, she could cure her father. He’d be better. They could save a little money. They could move as far away from these mobsters as possible. It was a fantasy, she was sure. But what a fantasy it was.
Chapter 14
Vincent stepped off the streetcar and onto Charles Street. The traffic was brisk, both pedestrian and vehicular. Bright and sunny Sunday afternoons meant everyone was out and about, particularly the churchgoers. Vincent stared up at St. Eustace, wondering how much longer Lefty would be. He hadn’t attended Mass in a tree’s age, personally, and wasn’t sure how it really went anymore. When he’d been sold to the mob at the age of two, he spent most of his childhood in the care of priests as he learned how to read and write. Their peculiar approach to his spiritual education was somewhat more ascetic than he figured was the average person’s. Prayers three times a day. Confession. Studies. And very little time for anything else.
Someone laid on his horn two blocks up the road, and a pair of older ladies hopped off the street and onto the sidewalk. The driver jerked the car to a halt alongside a shabby row house. When he stepped out of the car to give the old women a bit more what for than was called for, Vincent held a breath.
Cooper.
The squat man bustled to the alley between buildings and disappeared. What had Tony said? Cooper ran one of Vito’s gambling parlors in a basement near St. Eustace. Vincent thought once more about Fern’s bruises. Someone needed to teach this man a lesson. And here was his opportunity. There would no doubt be some retaliation on Cooper’s part, but would the man really risk making himself look weak by going to Vito and whining that Vincent had threatened him? The Capo didn’t appreciate men who couldn’t take care of their own business, but Cooper was family, where Vincent was not.
No, he’d probably be more likely to stab Vincent in the back some night. And that prospect seemed a whole lot less unpleasant than the thought of facing Vito’s anger. Either way…
Might as well go out knowing he’d done something good for once in his damned life.
Vincent checked the church. Doors still closed. He turned up the block and wove between cars near the intersection to cross the street. The thin alley revealed a single basement stoop, covered in a green-painted tin awning. A flight of brick steps led beneath the street level to a thick wood door below. Clacking down the steps, Vincent rapped on the door. A panel swung open, revealing bulging eyes and bushy eyebrows.
“Yeah?” the doorman shouted.
Vincent removed his fedora and lifted his face to the daylight.
“You know who I am?” he said with cold detachment.
The eyes bulged even wider before the panel slid shut. A bolt threw open, and the door opened. The doorman eased to the side, ushering Vincent into the smoke-filled cave of a space. Three tables ran alongside one another, each illuminated with a hurricane lamp. Cards sprayed across each table, side-by-side. Coins and cash sat in messy stacks. Men in suits and worker’s jackets sat with their cards clutched to their chest, or chin, or even resting neatly on the tabletops.
The doorman grumbled, “Sorry, I…uh…I check everyone.”
Vincent waved him off. “Don’t sweat it, big boy.”
He eased into the room, blinking at the cigar smoke.
A young man—a boy, really—stood in sleeves and a vest behind a makeshift bar top. He lifted two corked bottles. One was amber, the other was clear.
“Drink, sir? Dollar each.”
Vincent grinned, reached into his pocket, and dropped a quarter onto the bar top.
“What say we skip the drink and I tip you, anyways?”
He beamed and snatched the coin. “Thank you, sir!”
Vincent nodded to a narrow hallway acting like a chokepoint between the front room and an even darker back room. “Those the big spenders?”
“Ah, I believe so, sir.”
Vincent stepped toward the hall. A drowsy, unshaven fellow sat in a chair nearby, balancing on its back legs. As Vincent approached, his eyes popped open, and he dropped his chair onto all fours to stand up.
“Keep your shirt on, fella,” Vincent said.
The man replied with a stiff arm directly into Vincent’s shoulder, checking him back a step. He rattled off three quick sentences in Italian. Vincent had never actually learned the language—just a few choice phrases from his dealings with the family.
The doorman rushed around the poker tables, nearly bowling one of the steelworkers off his chair. He jerked the bearded man aside and whispered into his ear. Vincent picked up the word “stregone,” and the bearded man leapt backward, eyes wide and dark.
Vincent nodded to the doorman again, stepping into the hallway.
He checked the door nearest him…a broom closet of sorts. Another door revealed a sort of storeroom with wood-plank shelves bearing boxes and bins of this and that.
When Vincent reached the back room, he had to squint to make sense of the sight. Two wall-mounted gas sconces flickered through a haze of tobacco fumes so thick it looked like a London fog. A long table reached through the length of the space. About six people gathered around, three women and three men. A tuxedoed fellow with eastern features presided over the table, reaching to gather dice as one of the women shot them.
Vincent shook his head. He hadn’t figured Cooper was well-connected enough to mount a craps table in this miserable crawlspace, but there it was.
Speaking of which, he spotted Cooper guzzling some hooch alongside a dark-haired, Slavic-looking gent and an older man. Cooper nodded profusely as the old guy droned on about some arrangement he’d made with “John D. Rockerfeller himself, by God.”
The Slavic man patted Cooper on the shoulder and went to place a bet. At length, the old man’s interest drew toward the table and a scandalously clad young lady who seemed young enough to be his daughter, but whose posture toward the man seemed anything but daughterly.
In a space of a few seconds, Cooper was alone, and no one had eyes on Vincent.
Wiping his fingers along his jacket, Vincent snapped time to a halt. The bubble was tight, efficient. He reached for Cooper’s lapels, snatching them both with one hand and jerking him along the warped floor boards as Vincent made his way to the store room. Vincent pulled the door open, shoved Cooper inside, then joined him in the darkness. He reached into his jacket for a box of matches he’d palmed from the Old Moravia bar, then snapped his fingers again to release the time pinch.
Cooper’s breathing returned, then halted again. It returned with a grunt, then another.
“What?” he blubbered.
Vincent struck a match.
Cooper jerked back with a hiss, striking his head against one of the wooden shelves. His eyes were wild and panicked. The man released a string of vulgarities suitable for only the sal
tiest of sailors. Once his eyes had registered the scene before him, and he’d taken a second or two to figure out where he was, Cooper’s face adopted a red cast.
“What in hell’re you doing here?”
Vincent held the match vertically alongside his own face and said nothing.
Cooper caught his breath.
“You…you scared the shit outta me. Freak. What’s this all about?”
Vincent replied, “You’re going to leave Fern, Coop.”
“What? What’re you—?”
“You think you’re a big man because you hit women? Make you feel strong?”
Cooper’s eyes narrowed, and his mouth set hard. “What’re you butting into my business for? What I do with my dames is none of yours.”
“She’s bringing your calling cards into the hotel. Sportin’ a nice shiner for all of us to see. You think we’re just going to let this happen?”
Cooper grinned and jammed a finger into Vincent’s chest. “You ain’t family, freak. You get no say in nothin’.”
The match burned low, and he released it to fall to the floor. The flame extinguished on its way down.
Vincent spoke into the darkness. “If you lay another hand on Fern, either kindly or unkindly, I’ll find you again.”
He heard a rustling in the darkness. On instinct, he struck another match to find Cooper pointing a pistol at his face.
Vincent grinned.
He pinched time…he didn’t even snap his fingers.
From Cooper’s point of view, it would have been instantaneous. One second he was holding a gun to Vincent. The other…he was holding a match, and Vincent was the one holding the gun.
Vincent asked, “Is this yours? Remember. You’ll never see me coming. It’ll happen in the space between seconds. Maybe you’ll blink, and you’ll end up facedown in the harbor. Maybe you’ll find yourself falling off a six-story building. Maybe I’ll take my time and get real creative.”
Cooper’s face blanched, and a fine bead of sweat popped up across his brow.
Nodding, Vincent uncocked the pistol. “You’re cutting her loose. Today. And you’ll never hit another woman again. Are we crystal clear?”
Cooper nodded dumbly.
From Cooper’s angle, he was suddenly standing back with the big rollers. His pistol sat heavy in his holster. The craps table erupted with a lucky roll. And Vincent…was gone.
The Slavic man turned to Cooper, then lifted a brow.
Cooper followed his stare. He was still holding a lit match.
Vincent hopped up the street toward St. Eustace, a sappy grin on his face. As a child the priests had driven into his skull that Vincent was never to use his powers for self-advancement. Only in the service of the family.
This wasn’t precisely self-advancement, but it sure felt good. It felt more than good.
The doors to the church were open, and a few people were stepping down the stone stairs to the street. He found Lefty leaning against a light post with a newspaper double-folded in his hand.
Lefty lifted his eyes and scowled. “Where’ve you been?”
“On a walk. It’s a cherry day. Thought some fresh air’d do me some good.”
Lefty nodded, then took a sniff next to Vincent’s lapels.
“Uh, huh. You smell fresh, alright.”
Vincent sighed. “So, I had a drink.”
“I don’t care,” Lefty said. “Come on. I’m hungry.”
They walked up the street toward Alfie’s. The restaurant was open only a handful of hours each week, and Lefty made sure to carve himself at least one of those hours each Sunday.
As they were seated at a corner table, Lefty smirked at Vincent. “You oughta come to Mass with me next Sunday.”
“Thanks but I’ll pass on that.”
“Ain’t you a Catholic no more?”
“Only when it counts.”
Lefty shook his head with a weary grin. “Someone like you oughta put more thought into his immortal soul.”
Vincent shrugged. “I didn’t have an army of Huns firing machine guns at my sorry hide to give me religion.”
“Don’t forget the land mines and the mustard gas.”
They ordered iced teas and sat in silence for a while. Lefty eyed Vincent hard.
Vincent squinted. “What now?”
“I was just wondering what your angle was with redheads?”
“Don’t have no angle I’m aware of.”
Lefty smirked.
Vincent sucked in a breath, then released it in a sigh. “You mean that river rat?”
“I saw the two of you chewin’ fat up the front of the boat. Pretty girl, but didn’t think she was your type, ya know?”
“She’s not,” he snapped back, appalled. “And that fat was more like shoe leather. She’s a shrew.”
“What can you do? She’s a redhead. They got tempers and they don’t hold back tellin’ you what they think.”
Vincent reached for the glass of tea and took a long pull, gathering his thoughts. “I don’t know what crawled up that little hellcat’s drawers, but she had it out for me from minute one. I’m trying to put that behind me. Besides. She’s Tony’s problem.”
Lefty nodded thoughtfully. “Problem, for sure. Vito’s spittin’ nails over this Deltaville nonsense.”
“How’d he take it?” Vincent asked.
“I gave it to him, well…let’s say less straight, more in a wide curve. Kept it business. Didn’t mention the weird symbols and the Hell pincher mumbo jumbo.”
“Probably a good decision.”
“You ain’t telling me twice!”
Their meal arrived and all thoughts of sharp-tongued red-haired women and Hell pinchers took a back seat to the food as Vincent tucked into his breakfast.
Chapter 15
It was a sunny Sunday afternoon. Springtime in the city was always welcome, particularly after a bitter winter. Hattie watched passersby from her bedroom window. They strolled up and down the street in their dresses and jackets, taking in the bright blue sky and the fresh air. She reached out and placed a hand onto the pane of glass, wondering when she’d feel safe enough to join them.
“Oh, for the love of Mary,” her mother called from the doorway, “just go outside.”
“I don’t know who’s watching,” Hattie muttered.
“It’s been four days. I think if something was going to happen, it’d happened by now.”
In the four days since Hattie had met Vincent and had nearly uprooted her entire life to run away, she’d stayed holed up in her house. Lizzie stopped by that Thursday, urging her to get out onto the water to fill some of the orders from the Crew, but Hattie simply told her it wasn’t safe.
That was three paydays she’d foregone in the name of safety. Much more of this, and they’d have real problems making rent.
“Go to church, at least,” Branna urged. “You’re sick to your soul. It’ll do you good.”
Hattie grinned. Church. Well, that was an idea.
She knocked the dust and wrinkles off her dress and shimmied into it. On her way out the door, she gave her mother a kiss on the cheek. “Tell Da I’ll try to bring home some meat.”
“With what money?” she asked.
“I’ll find some. Strangle something myself, if I have to.”
The sunlight was glorious. Bright yellow and bold, not the dry-sifted white light of wintertime. It warmed her arms as she stepped out onto the street, turning south for what she told her mother was church.
Church, as it turned out, was actually a speakeasy tucked into the side of an old retail shop down on Orleans. It was called the Fontainebleau, and though its owner, Leon, insisted on referring to it as a speakeasy, it was open to the public and unmolested by the police. On Sundays, Leon kept a fellow on the piano most of the day. It was a fine place for Hattie to hide out and still feel like she belonged to the human race.
Hattie stepped through the white-painted French doors of the Fontainebleau and slid behind the tabl
es in the center of the space to a spot at the far end of the bar…her spot. There were about ten people haunting the place, each with a glass of something clear. Gin, probably. That was a Sunday drink.
A dark-skinned fellow in a bowler hat sat at the rickety upright along the far wall, tickling the keys to some Chicago style jazz. It was languid and calm—not dancing music. This was drinking music.
A lean black man stepped through a pair of drapes concealing the back room. He smiled to Hattie as she settled onto a stool nearest the wall.
“Hattie!” Leon called with reserved volume as he approached behind the bar. He’d learned that she didn’t want anyone calling her name out in public and was an excellent guard of discretion.
“Leon,” she replied as he reached over the bar and gave her a peck on the cheek.
“It’s been too long, ya?” he said in his Caribbean drawl. “Where ya been hidin’?”
“On the water,” she replied. “Making an honest living. Much like yourself.”
He chuckled. “I won’t water my gin, if you won’t pass no slugs.”
She smirked. The first time she visited the Fontainebleau, she’d ordered a second drink without enough money to pay for it. She managed to pinch light over a wood slug. It fooled him at the time, but when she’d left he put it together. To his credit, he didn’t kick her out the next time she stopped by. Hattie wasn’t sure why that was. Still, he never skipped an opportunity to bring it up, and she never actually apologized for it.
“Speakin’ of,” he said with a lean and a leer. “Ya got any real money today?”
She fished a nickel out of her clutch and slapped it onto the bar top.
Leon lifted it to inspect against the light from one of the windows.
