Father Divine's Bikes

by Steve Bassett

  “Same here. Dropped my slips off at a shoeshine parlor on South Orange. Only pennies, but sure helped my mom and dad.” Jerry picked up his phone and dialed in a three-digit number. “Let’s see if we can get Nick and Kevin in here.”

  Ten minutes later, the pair of exhausted detectives dragged themselves into the press room, and went immediately to the freshly brewed coffee.

  “Chrissakes, don’t you ever wash these fucking cups,” McClosky said.

  “Adds to the flavor,” Saunders said. “And you can’t bitch about the price.”

  “Can’t tell you much,” Cisco said, then filled a mug with coffee, and after noting his report on their desks added, “That’s all we have right now, but don’t worry we’ll keep you in the loop.”

  “I smell a tie-in between Scarlatti and the dead pimp and whore,” Lucio said. “Convince me I’m wrong.”

  “And the ice pick, first the soldier boy and then the pimp,” Saunders said. “No way you can tell me it’s just a god damn coincidence.”

  “No way? Do you know something we don’t?” McClosky said. “Then spill it, put our minds at rest. You two clowns are doing real good without us. You already got John Q. Public convinced that there’s an ice pick killer in every alley.”

  “Whoa, let’s keep our god damn cool,” Cisco said. “If you want to listen, we’ll give you what we’ve got.”

  It took little time to see that these two savvy street reporters weren’t about to be brushed off. Lucio and Saunders never shared their sources, but it was obvious they smelled a gangster turf war in the making, and pushed the two detectives for answers. After fifteen minutes of bad coffee and profanity, an uneasy truce was declared with neither side backing off.

  After leaving the press room, Cisco and McClosky stopped briefly at their desks on their way to the detective bunk room. They removed their jackets, unfastened their shoulder holsters, kicked off their shoes, and collapsed onto two rock-hard cots. Two and a half hours later, they were back in their car headed toward the Third Ward, with Cisco referring to notes scribbled during calls from Gazzi.

  They drove a half-block past the Peace barbershop on Spruce and parked on the other side of the street. It was about the time that policy writers dropped off their slips. Cisco pulled out a pack of Chesterfields and offered one to McClosky. They lit up and waited.

  An elderly, white-haired Negro man in patched dungarees smiled in their direction as he strode past, then crossed over and entered the barbershop through its front door. He emerged ten minutes later, nodded in their direction and headed off down the street.

  “Well, I’ll be god damned,” Kevin said, “It looks as though they actually give haircuts.”

  In about fifteen minutes, a Negro woman walked past the barbershop, took a quick look around, then turned into a walkway along the south side of the building. During the next twenty minutes, six other Negros, three men and three women, repeated the routine.

  The pattern was broken when a muscular, olive-skinned kid, no more than fourteen, pushed his bike from the walkway, jumped on and pedaled away.

  “Gazzi is right so far,” Nick said, then checked his notes. “One down, one more to go.”

  As if on cue, a clean-cut white boy, about the same age as the first, pedaled his bike out of the walkway and rode off in the same direction.

  “That’s the kid I pointed out to you the other day on Kinney,” Nick said.

  “Yeah, the one in front of the Beacon office.”

  “That should be it,” Nick said as they watched three black runners enter the walkway, and a few minutes later exit the same way. In less than ten minutes, a matronly, middle-aged black woman came out carrying a brown leather valise.

  “There she goes, everything on its way to the bank,” Kevin said.

  “Well, that’s it,” Nick said. “Let’s give the backroom paper-pushers time to empty out and head home before we move in.”

  When they stepped into the shop, they were immediately greeted by the larger of two black men impeccably dressed in starched white jackets, matching white trousers and black dress shoes. The man eased himself from one of the three barber chairs, smiled and said, “Welcome. God’s Tall Timber, and this other fine fellow is Righteous Reckoning.”

  “Homicide, not Vice, so you can stop sweating. Lieutenant Cisco, and Sergeant McClosky.”

  The two detectives scoped the room. Cisco gestured toward an empty barber’s chair with an identical white jacket draped over the back, and a barber’s cape neatly folded over its left arm.

  “We were told there were three of you. I see that it’s ready and waiting, so he must be expected. Does he have a name?”

  “That would be Darn Good Disciple,” the big black man said. “Afraid he won’t be among us for a while.”

  “Darn Good Disciple, God’s Tall Timber, and Righteous Reckoning…suppose we throw out three other names for you,” McClosky said. “See if they ring a bell. Buck Barton. Wilber Fontaine, and John Travers?”

  “This could take a while,” Cisco said as he and McClosky eased themselves into the two end chairs.

  “Help yourself,” Tall Timber said. “We’ll just take those chairs by the door.”

  “So let’s connect the dots,” Cisco said. “Tall Timber, you’re….”

  “Wilber Fontaine.”

  “And Righteous Reckoning…?”

  “John Travers.”

  “Now tell us why you don’t expect Buck Barton any day soon?” McClosky said. “And you can drop all that sugar and molasses bullshit.”

  “Afraid Buck slipped and fell down some stairs. Fractured his skull and broke his right wrist,” Fontaine said.

  “When did it happen?” Cisco asked.

  “Tuesday night, leaving his flat. Treated at County, spent the night, checked himself out the next day, and we ain’t heard a word since.”

  “Give us your best guess,” McClosky said. “Hauled his ass back to Atlanta, didn’t he.”

  “There’s no way two homicide dicks give a good god damn about a nigger bookie joint,” Travers said. “Whatcha want, and what’s in it for us?”

  “You’ve got rapsheets a mile long, and we can make it real nasty. So be real careful what you tell us, and maybe we’ll look the other way,” Cisco said. “Tell us about Vinnie Scarlatti, Clyde Barton and his whore, and what your partner Buck had to do with any of it.”

  “Don’t need to tell you how things work around here,” Fontaine said. “We answer to Scarlatti.”

  “So you waltzed into town, and all of this just dropped into your laps?” McClosky said, gesturing over his shoulder to the rear door. “That’s what you want us to believe.”

  “Only after Jimmy Rossi, our man in Atlanta, put in some calls,” Fontaine said. “Boiardo’s people listened. One was to your Tony Gordo. Looking back, that meeting with Gordo might be the reason Buck slipped and got hurt real bad.”

  Cisco and McClosky exchanged glances across the empty chair in the middle. They were getting more than expected from the bookies.

  “Let’s get it straight, Gordo’s not our man. Where was this meeting? Did he have any other cops with him?” Cisco said.

  “It was over on Broadway. We were new in town, and had a hard time finding it, Caffé Palermo. Gordo was pointed out all alone in a big corner booth.”

  “So no other cops,” McClosky said.

  “Yes and no,” an anxious Travers said.

  “What the hell does that mean?” Cisco demanded. “The Palermo’s a mob joint.”

  “There were two guys sitting at a table close to the booth,” Travers said. “Big and mean lookin’. Never took their eyes off us, enough for me to think maybe this ain’t a good deal after all.”

  “Ever meet with Gordo or see those mean and nasty men again?” Cisco said.

  “Know this is gonna piss you off, but again, we gotta say yes and no,” Fontaine said.

  “We’ll say it just once.” McClosky leaned forward in the barber chair, anchored his
elbows on his thighs, and jabbed his index fingers at the two bookies. “If you two don’t stop fucking around, Gordo and his two goons will seem like choir boys. Start talking.”

  “First, we never met again with Gordo, not official anyway,” Fontaine said. “A week after Palermo, we were cruising downtown. You know, getting the lay of things. Walked out of Swifty’s and bumped into Gordo pounding the living bejesus out of this white man. The same two guys at Palermo’s that night were holding him up, and man-oh-man, it looked like Gordo was about to kill him. We poked our heads in and out of that alley real fast, nothing there we wanted a part of. We’re about to cut out when Gordo spotted us and recognized who we were.”

  “Christ, this is like pulling teeth,” Cisco said. “Our patience is running out.”

  “They dropped this guy to the ground and turned on us,” Travers said. “Gordo warns us we didn’t see or hear nothing, and if he gets word otherwise, we’d wish that we’d never hauled our nigger asses into town. They take off and leave us with this guy moaning real loud and bleeding like a stuck pig.”

  “So you listened real good. What about the guy on the ground?” McClosky said.

  “Called the cops and said there was a guy in the alley next to Swifty’s, that they better come real quick,” Fontaine said. “Then we hauled ass.”

  “And that’s it, you just hauled ass. You never found out who he was?” McClosky said.

  “Yeah, nosed around and found out his name was Frank Marsucci, a low-grade punk, lucky to still be alive,” Fontaine said. “Did some checking and found he was a pimp who got on the wrong side of Richie the Boot. And that night Gordo was taking care of the problem.”

  “Anything more you want to tell us about Marsucci?” Cisco said.

  “Only that he’s working for us and the Beacon right now,” Fontaine said. “Jes’ like our two new runners, white boys on bikes, smart as hell and learning fast.”

  “That’s Vice’s problem for now, and whether it bites you in the ass or not depends on where we go with this,” Cisco said. “Now tell us about Buck Barton and Gordo at the Palermo.”

  “Buck’s never one to listen, and he got uppity,” Travers said. “He wants to know ‘why this’ and ‘why that’ and ‘why we have to talk to the cops at all.’ Easy to see he was pissing the man off.”

  The two detectives knew that Gordo, a bully with a short fuse, had over the years used his fists to settle scores with other officers. There is no way he would ever suck it up and accept any lip from a nigger bookie just new in town.

  “What the hell did your buddy Buck say that put him on a train back to Atlanta?” McClosky said.

  “Buck had too many questions,” Fontaine said. ‘When he asked Gordo why we need to talk to him and not just go to the big man himself, our meeting was over, and I mean it was over real quick. You could see the big, fat cop was really burning.”

  “Any talk by Buck about moving some working ladies into town?” Cisco asked. “Street pussy can pay real big. Was Buck getting the itch, and invited brother Clyde and Ruby to set up shop?”

  “No sir, Lieutenant,” Travers said. “Paid pussy is too risky. We can’t vouch for Buck, but for Wilber and me, playing the numbers is safer than playing the ladies.”

  “Tell you about something that’s even easier,” Cisco said, “It’s how you can make us happy. Do you want to hear?”

  “We’re all ears,” Fontaine said.

  “All this is Vice business,” Cisco said. “If I know Dino and his gang, they’re already taking their bite out of your bank. We’ll be taking our bite out of you.”

  “What do you want out of us?” Fontaine said. “We’re sliced real thin already.”

  “We’ll make it plain and simple. Information,” Cisco said. “Stiffs pile up faster in the Third Ward than anywhere else in town. You and Righteous Reckoning here are gonna be our street canaries.”

  “Snitches?” a suddenly relaxed and relieved Fontaine said. “Is that all you want from us?”

  “Any problem with that?” McClosky demanded. “If not, keep your fucking mouths shut and listen.”

  “We talked to Lieutenant Peters in Atlanta the other day, and he said that as a trio, you two and Buck Barton, were at the top of the stoolie chart,” Cisco said.

  “Played both ends against the middle,” McClosky said. “What would happen if that got out to any of Boiardo’s wise guys? And then back to Jimmy Rossi?”

  “Don’t need to say any more,” Fontaine said. “John and me are singers at your beck and call. You can bet on that. Just need to know how.”

  “Don’t worry, when we want something, you’ll know,” Cisco said. “The beat cop, Frank Gazzi, will also be poking his nose in on a regular basis. Don’t be shy.”

  “In fact, you should be kissing our asses,” McClosky said as he joined his partner at the front door. They walked out, crossed the street, and got back in their car.

  It was only a short wait before Travers and Fontaine, no longer dressed in white, emerged from the shop, locked the front door, and after a nod in the cops’ direction, quickly stepped it out and disappeared around the corner.

  “So, unless they clammed up on us, they didn’t know about Scarlatti,” Kevin said. “What do you think?”

  “I’m not sure, but if they don’t, it won’t take long,” Nick said. “And when they do, they’ll probably wish they were with Buck in Atlanta.”

  “Do you trust them?”

  “Hell, no, but we’ll use them. They know what happens if they hold out on us.”

  “Heartless bastards that we are,” Kevin said.

  “We still have the junk dealer on Quitman,” Nick said. “Don’t know how he figures in all this, or if he figures at all.”

  “Gazzi’s sure he supplied the bikes to the two kids,” Kevin said. “Maybe it was just for a few extra bucks, that’s all. Do we really want to mess with him?”

  “Right now, I say no. With Scarlatti added to the mix, we have four stiffs on our hands. To go where we have to go with three of them, we’ll be tearing the department apart.”

  “Are you saying free passes for everyone?” Kevin asked, his unease apparent over the prospect of another police cover-up.

  “If we take this to Chief Riley, what the fuck do you think will happen?”

  Kevin reached for his pack of Old Golds, tapped one out for Nick, and waited until each of them had taken a couple deep drags before answering. “Nothing.”

  They sat in silence. Each breathing deeply. They stared down the grimy, debris-strewn street that defined the city they had sworn to protect, but at that moment had decided to betray. Nick broke the silence.

  “We know the pimp snuffed Sergeant Locklee,” Cisco said. “But Scarlatti, the pimp and the whore, there’s no way we’re gonna be able to stick Gordo with these three. Got anything to change my mind?”

  “Not a thing.” McClosky took a final drag on his cigarette, tossed it out the window, turned on the ignition, and glided their car from the curb.

  “Let’s swing past the Beacon office on Kinney,” Cisco said. “Nothing special, just curious.”

  Stacked on the sidewalk in front of Marsucci’s office were bundles of Parade magazine and other material to be inserted in extra copies of the Sunday Beacon. Each of his carriers would be picking the bundles up the next day. These would be delivered free to potential new subscribers living in exclusively Clarion territory. The turf war to decide who would be circulation and numbers top dog in the Third Ward was about to begin.

  “At first I thought it was crazy, but after talking to the bookies today, I’ve changed my mind,” Cisco said. “I’m sure those two kids we saw had just dropped off their policy slips and bets. It’s not our worry. We’ve got enough on our plate.”

  “What the hell would we do with it anyway, call Dino?” McClosky said. “He and his gang at Vice have been punching their mob meal tickets forever. There’s no way that’s gonna change.”

  McClosky pulled their car
into a vacant space in the parking lot behind headquarters, and got out as Cisco slid across and took the wheel. He pulled his car keys from his jacket pocket and headed toward his De Soto convertible, then stopped and turned back toward Nick.

  “How about a night out, Nick? Gotta good one opening at the Empire tonight,” he said. “The headliner’s Myrna Dean. God damn if she doesn’t have the longest legs in the business. Hell, you can tell Connie I dragged you out screaming and kicking.”

  “I guess you forgot that we’re on weekend rotation. We’re back here at six tomorrow morning. I’ll take a pass,” Nick said. He waited until Kevin drove off before switching on the ignition, turned left out of the parking lot, then headed south to Ivy Hill Park and Grace DeMarco. He knew that his wife had long ago silently rejected his lame excuses for not coming home, and that it was only a matter of time before she confronted him. He also knew he couldn’t help himself.

  Earlier that Friday afternoon, Bancroft left the office of Clarion publisher, Herb Bix, feeling uneasy, to say the least, about what he had just been told. He had already reluctantly turned over his beloved Morgan to his wife, and with her Packard had canvassed four of his circulation districts around the Third Ward.

  “Hensley, I’ve got some good news,” Bix had said, then gestured to the woman seated to his right at the conference table. “You know Wendy, of course.”

  “Hi, Hensley, it’s been a while,” the pretty blond feature reporter said.

  “Hi, yes it has, I’d say about four or five months.” From the start, Bancroft was never comfortable around Wendy Talbot whose desk was across from his during his short tenure in the newsroom. While he labored over obituaries, she turned out one news feature after another with seeming ease.

  “I’ve decided to go all out in our little skirmish with the Beacon,” Bix said. “Wendy will write a story that profiles a Clarion Circulation Bureau, and how the dedication of the lowly paperboy makes it all possible.”

  Bancroft waited for the inevitable hammer to fall.

  “One of your managers and his bureau pops out loud and clear, Jim McDuffie. He runs Bureau 12 in the Third Ward. McDuffie worked his way up from delivery boy, a true-blue Clarion man if there ever was one. His bureau includes all those swanky Clinton Hill apartments. It’s where all the rich Jews hang their hats.”