THE DARK CITY (Eliot Ness)

by Max Allan Collins

  "Fine by me. You still interested in the job?"

  Heller shrugged. "Money's money. Where are you getting the equipment? That stuffs expensive. Don't tell me, some of your federal pals?"

  "Yeah. They loaned me some Pam-O-Graphs. You can attach them to telephone lines and monitor conversations. I'll expect comprehensive field notes from all of your men."

  "I bet you will." Heller sighed. He glanced up at the sky, where clouds now blotted out the sun. "You're wading into murky waters, friend. Crooked cops who been that way since Prohibition passed. Gangsters who murder some pitiful punk over the numbers racket. Anybody take a shot at you yet?"

  "No. I get the occasional death-threat phone call. Same old stuff—'we'll cut off your wang and dump you in a ditch.' That old song."

  "Yeah. And I'm sure they're just kiddin'. Your Mr. Wiggens didn't get his wang cut off, after all. Of course, when you're in Mr. Wiggens' condition, having a wang is small consolation, right?"

  Ness looked at the sky. Where had the sun gone? It seemed like dusk and it was early afternoon.

  Heller shook his head. "Let's walk on back. This fucking cold town of yours, I'm getting frozen stiffer than that stiff in the ditch."

  They walked back.

  "Thanks for coming, Nate."

  "Ten bucks a day," Heller said, "and expenses."

  Ness smiled and nodded. He opened the squad car door for Heller and the officer drove the private detective back to the dark city.

  CHAPTER 16

  The Murray Hill district, a somewhat isolated compact area often referred to as Little Italy, was considered home turf for the Mayfield Road mob, although many of the chieftains had moved to better, less claustrophic digs farther to the east. The closely grouped brick buildings tended to be narrow across the front while going back endlessly, built on the slope of Murray Hill Road itself, or the intersecting slope of May-field Road. The cold kept people indoors. In warmer weather, old men would sit on the steps of neighborhood shops arguing politics—national more than local—while younger ones would discuss work, or rather their lack of it. Although the neighborhood produced the occasional lawyer or doctor, as well as a good number of successful merchants, the majority of Italian men here were manual laborers. But about the best a laborer could hope for in these times was working a couple weeks a month for the W.P.A. for seventy bucks or so. During the day, in weather like this, the only activity on the street was the usual stream of women and children going to and from Holy Rosary, praying for better times. Nonetheless, crime wasn't much in evidence here, even at night. You might see some teenage boys playing craps under a dim street light, and occasionally a kid might steal coal from a railroad car to heat the family home. But that was about all. The speakeasy days were over.

  In a cozy, unpretentious restaurant called Antonio's, a second-floor walk-up over a grosseria Italiana on Mayfield Road, Eliot Ness sat at a small round table. A thick red candle, its steady flame providing a modest glow in a room dark with atmosphere, dripped wax onto the red-and-white checkered table cloth. Across from him was Gwen Howell. They touched wine glasses.

  Gwen looked as lovely as she had that first night at the Hollenden, even though this was the end of a long work day. She still wore the same light blue woolen sweater over a pale pink silk blouse and black skirt that she'd worn to the office twelve hours before. But she'd let down her lighter-than-honey blonde hair so that it brushed her shoulders. And she'd tucked her glasses away in a purse and freshened her lipstick, which again was stop-sign red. She looked like a million.

  Ness told her so.

  "Thank you, boss," she said, as their glasses clinked.

  Across the room, serenading a couple at another table, a man in a waiter's tux played "O sole mio" on the violin with lots of vibrato.

  "My pleasure," Ness said, smiling at her, quite taken with her.

  Gwen sipped her red wine. "You said you wanted to celebrate. What's the occasion?"

  He sipped his. "Your first day on the job, of course."

  "Now that I'm your secretary," she said, "will we need to go to out-of-the-way places like this?"

  Two evenings last week they'd wined and dined—late evenings, of course, since Ness tended to work till at least seven and often much later—at the Vogue Room at the Hollenden. They'd wound up in bed in a room at the hotel on both occasions. The morning after the President's Ball at the Hollenden, they did not wake up ashamed, nor had they felt compelled to blame their conduct on the champagne. Theirs was a grown-up affair from the start, and was now in full swing.

  "No," Ness said. "We'll still take in the Vogue Room. And the Bronze Room at the Hotel Cleveland, too."

  "What about reporters? They're thick as flies around those places."

  "I'm thicker than that with them—the newshounds, that is. They'll leave me alone."

  "What makes you rate?"

  Ness shrugged. "Friendship and headlines, not necessarily in that order."

  She smiled wryly, a single dimple's worth. "So you don't think being seen out with your new secretary is going to make the papers?"

  Ness shook his head. "Why, does it bother you being out with a married man?"

  "It would if you weren't separated. Have you talked to her lately? Evie, I mean."

  He looked into the glass of wine. "We speak on the phone. Once a week or so."

  "If you don't want to talk about it . . ."

  "I really don't. What about your father? Does he know you're seeing me?"

  She smiled less wryly, shrugged. "I think so. We haven't talked about it. I think he'll approve."

  "He may not like you’re seeing a married man."

  "I think he'll understand your situation. He thinks the sun rises and sets on you, you know. He sees you like some white knight who's charged into gray ol' Cleveland, to clean up his beloved police department."

  Ness laughed, softly. "Horseback riding is one sport I stink at. Ah, here's the waiter."

  Antonio's reminded Ness of his favorite restaurant in Chicago, Madame Galli's in Tower Town, in that there was no menu, just spaghetti served with a choice of entrees: chicken, squab, filet mignon, or lamb. Gwen chose the lamb, and Ness ordered the filet. The middle-aged waiter, whose broken English charmed Gwen, was abrupt but polite and wrote nothing down as they ordered. Then he disappeared into the kitchen.

  "Are you always out of the office as much as you were today?" she asked Ness.

  "I'm at my desk more than I like," he said. "But we did have a good afternoon out in the field today, yes."

  "You certainly seemed in a good mood when you got back. You still do. Are you sure it's my first day at work we're celebrating?"

  He laughed a little. "I'm celebrating this afternoon, too. We pulled a little raid."

  "A little raid?"

  "Well, not so little."

  It had, in fact, been the first successful raid of a Cuyahoga County policy bank in anybody's memory. With no notice at all, Ness had bundled two squads of Cooper's detectives into unmarked cars, with Sam Wild along for some press coverage, and drove to the headquarters of policy king Frank Hogey, located in a deceptively crummy-looking two-story house on Central Avenue South East. Ness shouldered the door open and Cooper's dicks followed him in, arresting Hogey, his two brothers, and a woman, apparently living with Hogey. His "housekeeper," he said—a twenty-one-year-old redhead with a cute, sulky face and a nice shape, for whom any red-blooded man would gladly provide a house for keeping.

  When Ness barged in, Hogey had been standing at the open door of a squat square safe in the study-cum-office of the house. He'd tried to shut it, but Ness stopped the door with his foot and Hogey with a right cross. Hogey, a stocky guy of forty or so, had sat on the floor and licked blood out of the corner of his mouth and thought about it. The floor around him was littered with clearinghouse slips and long rolls of adding-machine tape, curling like wood shavings.

  A little over two thousand dollars was found in the safe, as were the day's records
. Most policy operators burned their records nightly, so, not surprisingly, no others were found.

  "This fella Hogey is the biggest numbers operator in the city," Ness explained to Gwen. "He's tied in with the Mayfield Road mob now."

  She looked both amused and dumbfounded. She pointed out toward the street. "As in that Mayfield Road out there?"

  "Right," Ness smiled. "We're in the midst of their home territory. This place used to be a speakeasy."

  "And you frequent it?"

  "Sure. Why not? It's legal now. Have some more wine."

  He poured for her and she smiled and shook her head. Then her expression turned serious, interested. "What's so important about this guy Hogey? Will he go to jail a long time?"

  Hogey, who also ran a chain of butcher shops, was a former Police Court bondsman who knew his way around the legal system.

  Ness lifted an eyebrow. "Probably he'll just get a slap on the wrist and a fine. The judges are so corrupt we can't hope for more. But by raiding him, we're putting him on notice."

  "What sort of notice?"

  "That he'll be raided again. And again. That his life will be made pretty much miserable, from here on out."

  "That sounds like harassment."

  "That's exactly what it is. If the courts aren't behind me, what other recourse do I have? I'd like to catch Hogey on a murder rap, but that'll never happen."

  "A murder rap?"

  Ness nodded. "Just a week ago today, a former policy writer of his wound up dead in a ditch."

  "My. I think I read about that in the paper . . . ."

  "Yeah. From the evidence at the scene, it's clear the guy was shot by a friend or associate. From other things we know, we believe Hogey and his people were responsible, probably bumping the guy off at the May field Road mob's behest."

  "I'm glad you're naturally soft-spoken," she said, rolling her eyes, glancing about the restaurant, "or we'd probably be in a ditch by now ourselves."

  He grinned, and swirled his wine in his glass. "Not everybody in Murray Hill is a part of the mob. I promise."

  "So you raided Hogey to get back at him for the murder? It didn't have anything to do with this policy racket?"

  "Well, I had Hogey on my mind because of the murder, yes. But cracking down on policy is a priority, anyway."

  "This policy you're talking about . . . that's what they call the numbers racket, isn't it?"

  "Right."

  "I don't even know how you play the numbers."

  He shrugged again. "It's simple. The bettor takes a 1,000-to-1 chance that he'll pick a set of three digits between 000 and 999, as they'll appear on some prearranged daily newspaper statistics. Locally, they key off racetrack results. A winner gets, at most, a 599-to-1 payoff."

  "That's a lot of money."

  "It sounds like it, but the odds are impossible. It's a sucker bet."

  "So it's sort of like a lottery."

  "That's right."

  She made a face, as though this all seemed ridiculous to her. "Still, I don't understand why something so harmless would be anything you would want to expend your valuable time and energy on."

  "A lot of people have the idea that the numbers racket is harmless. Maybe it is. I do know that nickel-and-dime bets aren't as common these days as quarter ones, and dollar ones aren't unusual. And most bettors bet daily, or anyway six days a week. That means real money in times like these. I've got crime figures from New York that show over a hundred million dollars gets gambled away every year in that city on numbers alone. A city the size of Cleveland is going to be playing in the same ballpark. How would you like to be the mother of seven, and your husband plays his entire relief check on the numbers?"

  "No, thank you."

  "And the mob into whose pocket this money goes is using it to finance labor union infiltration, loan-shark syndicates, and expansion of organized crime activity of every stripe . . . prostitution, narcotics, you name it."

  "I never thought of it that way."

  He grunted. "But the real problem with the policy racket is that it encourages cops to go on the pad."

  "The pad?"

  He gestured with his wineglass. "The pad's a police-okayed list of spots, of locations, where a policy writer can operate. It might be a grocery store, it might be a luncheonette, a bank of elevators in an office building, or a newsstand on any street corner."

  "And these 'spots' can get a police 'okay'? How?"

  "It starts with the cop on the beat. Precinct detectives get a taste. So do lieutenants, sergeants, and especially the captain. It makes crooks out of cops, and it lends itself to the forming of a structure, a, network of crooked cops, within a police department."

  Hence, Ness thought, the need for an "outside chief" to coordinate all the corruption. But this he didn't mention to Gwen. He and Wild hoped to make the concept public once the "outside chief" himself had been nabbed.

  "I really shouldn't be boring you with this," Ness said. He wondered what it was about the girl that made him open up so. He had rarely talked so openly to Evie about his work. Not since the days when Evie was his secretary back in Chicago, anyway.

  But Gwen, as worldly as she apparently was, was naïve about cop concerns, for a cop's daughter. Cooper had obviously sheltered her from it all.

  "I don't even know how you can find time to do all this police work," Gwen said, starting in on the antipasto that the waiter had delivered during their discussion of the numbers racket. "Just your speaking engagements alone take up enough of your time."

  That was true. In the past two weeks, he'd shared his "experiences as a G-man" in addresses to the Advertising Club, the Auto Club, Cleveland College, and the Boy Scouts of America—Wild had a laugh on that one.

  "It comes with the territory," he shrugged. "The mayor wants me visible. We're trying to pry a big budget out of a largely unsympathetic city council."

  "So you have to be a star."

  "If that's what talking to the Boy Scouts of America makes you." He nibbled at the antipasto plate. "How are the other girls in the office treating you?"

  "Very nicely. I'm surprised that they are, since I'm a young upstart put suddenly in charge of things."

  "I've had some experience in that line, myself."

  "Didn't your former secretary resent being shuffled out?"

  "Betsy? No. She didn't like the pace of my office. She's working in the City Hall Library now. Much more restful."

  "Eliot, maybe I shouldn't say anything ..."

  "What?"

  She was looking past him. "There's a man at a table in the corner. He's been watching us. Or at least I think he has."

  Ness turned and looked.

  A small man in his late thirties dressed in a gray suit and blue tie sat with a blonde even more lovely than Gwen, at least superficially so. They were being serenaded by the violinist waiter—"Come Back to Sorrento." The blonde was big and buxom, wearing a lot of make-up and a tight, dark blue gown. She was perhaps eighteen years old. The small man was balding and had a bulbous nose and squinty eyes and a pleasant smile. He put his fork down to smile at Ness and lift his hand in a gentle wave. Then he returned to his spaghetti.

  Ness, who had not waved back, turned and looked at the food which the waiter was putting before them. Gwen was looking at him with concern.

  "What's wrong?" she asked.

  "Nothing."

  "Who is that guy?"

  "It's not important."

  "Don't go tight-lipped on me now, boss. My curiosity's killing me."

  "It's Mo Horvitz."

  "Who?"

  "He's a gangster."

  "Really?"

  "Really." Ness couldn't stop the frown. He shook his head. "He's the one they should call 'untouchable.' Come on. Forget it. Let's eat."

  Later, as they were finishing their meal, the violinist waiter finally came around to their table, but not to play the fiddle. He wasn't fiddling around at all, actually.

  "This is from Mr. Horvitz," the v
iolinist said softly, handing Ness a note.

  Ness took it but did not tip the man; that was Horvitz's job. The note read, "A few moments of your time. In the parking lot. M.H." Ness nodded to the violinist, who departed. He wadded up the note and tossed it in a small glass ashtray.

  "Have some spumoni," Ness told Gwen, smiling tightly and rising. "And wait for me here."

  She reached out to him. "Eliot ..."

  "Have some spumoni," he repeated.

  As he got his topcoat and left the restaurant, he noted that the gaudy young blonde was still at the table. She was smoking. She looked bored. He wanted to feel sorry for the child, but couldn't quite.

  The parking lot, behind the three-story building, was small and secluded. There was no lighting at all, and the night was typically overcast and cold. Ness glanced around, looking for Horvitz, and heard the honk of a horn.

  It led him to a black Lincoln, parked, its motor going. Behind the wheel sat a pockmarked thug in a chauffeur's uniform. The back door swung open and Horvitz's nasal voice called out, "Please join me, Mr. Ness."

  Ness slid in beside the dapper little man. It was warm in the car. Horvitz had apparently instructed his chauffeur to keep the motor running while he and his bimbo ate.

  Horvitz offered a slim, diamond-heavy hand. Ness thought about it-then, what the hell, shook it.

  Horvitz had a pleasant smile. It wasn't particularly sincere, but it was pleasant. He sat with his arms folded, his head back, the gesture of a small man who wants to look down at you.

  "Some of my business associates," he said, "are concerned about your little hobby."

  "My little hobby?"

  "These raids. The gambling joints. And today, the policy bank. Really. They're annoying. Like bee stings."

  "Then you and your business associates better buy some heavy clothes. Because you're going to get stung again. And again."

  "You're certainly a determined young man."

  "Did you follow me to Antonio's? Or did the manager call you, or what?"

  The smile widened momentarily. "Does it matter? Perhaps the hand of fate brought us together."

  "What do you want, Horvitz? I don't like to talk to gangsters unless it's in a courtroom or a jailhouse."