It was an open secret around Franzini Olive Oil Com that Philomina was "seein' a lotta that new guy, Nick, the guy Louie brought back from over there." It was simple. We just made a big deal of going to a David Amram concert that night at Lincoln Center. It's almost impossible to get tickets to an Amram concert in New York these days, so it was natural we should brag a bit about the ones I had gotten. Only no one knew they were from Jack Gourlay at the News.
I waited until the house lights went down, then left. Amram may be the finest contemporary composer in America, but I had a lot of work to do, and not much time to do it in. I wanted to be back before the performance ended.
It took less than fifteen minutes to take a cab from Lincoln Center down to Soho, 417 West Broadway, next to the Counting House.
It was a similar building, four floors of apartments with a big loft on the upper floor. It lacked the freight elevator that marked the building next door, but it also lacked those guard dogs on each floor, to say nothing of the steel gratings on each landing. There was no way I was going to try going up the stairway in the Counting House. It's virtually impossible to pick the lock of a steel grating with one hand while fighting off a blood-mad Doberman Pinscher with the other.
I entered the building at 417 and scanned the names next to the doorbell buzzers. I picked one at random — Candy Gulko — and rang the bell.
A moment went by before a voice issued from the built-in speaker. "Yes?"
It was a woman's voice, happily. "Fremonti Flower Shop," I answered.
Pause. "What?"
I added a touch of impatience to my tone. "Fremonti Flower Shop, ma'am. I've got some flowers for Candy Gulko."
"Oh! Come right on up." The buzzer went off, releasing the automatic lock on the inner doorway, and I went in and upstairs, swinging my brand new attaché case like any solid New York businessman.
I didn't stop at Candy Gulko's floor, of course. Instead, I climbed straight up, past the fifth floor, and up the last small flight of stairs that led onto the roof.
It was only a matter of minutes before I was crouched on the roof of 417 West Broadway, contemplating the ten feet of open air between the two buildings, and my imagination plummeted to the ground with no difficulty.
I looked around the tar-papered roof and, lying against a brick chimney, finally found what I wanted, a long narrow plank. I wished it wasn't so narrow, but there was no hope for it. I had to have a bridge. When I was in college I broadjumped twenty-four-feet six-inches, but that was a long time ago, it was in daylight, with a good runway, spike shoes and — most importantly — on ground level I wasn't about to try jumping those ten feet between buildings that night.
The plank was only about six inches wide, wide enough for purchase but too narrow for confidence. I pushed it across the gap between the two buildings so that it rested equally on each roof. Holding my attaché case in both hands in front of me, I placed one tentative foot on my shaky bridge, braced myself, and ran across in three steps.
I had to run. I don't normally suffer from acrophobia but if I'd tried to edge my way across, I would never have made it. Fear would have forced me into a misstep, and there was no room for a misstep. I stood stiffly for several minutes, composing myself, still trembling but sweating with relief.
Once I had calmed myself, I went over to the doorway leading to the staircase. If it were bolted from the inside, I would have to get into the Counting House offices through the skylight, and that would be difficult.
The door was unlocked. I had merely to open it and push my way through. It was somewhat like the British had done at Singapore: All their guns pointed to sea to stave off any naval attack; the Japanese took the overland route, came in the "back door" and captured Singapore. Similarly, the Counting House's defenses were all geared to preventing entrance from below; they had never considered that a raid might come from above.
I thought about knocking at the door of the Counting House office on the fifth floor just to give Big Julie and Raymond something to think about in their barricaded little nest, but I couldn't afford to alert them just to please my own perverse sense of humor.
I slipped a black nylon stocking over my face, opened the door and walked in, my attaché case in one hand, Wilhelmina in the other.
Two men stared at me, paralyzed by surprise. They were sitting on either side of a steel-topped desk, on which they had been playing cards. A half-empty bottle of gin stood on the desktop along with two glasses and a couple of overflowing ashtrays. To one side the remains of a sandwich rested on a brown paper bag. Smoke hung in the air under the low-hanging desk light. In the shadows around the huge room, a great computer stood silent guard over the rows of motionless desks and silent typewriters.
A few feet away from the desk, two old-style army cots had been set up, side by side.
One of the men at the desk was huge, his great muscled body gleaming in the light. He was wearing a sleeveless undershirt with a pair of ratty looking gray slacks hooked loosely under his spreading paunch. The butt of a fat cigar was clamped in yellowed teeth beneath a great bush of a mustache. Big Julie, no doubt.
His companion was more average in size, a real street dude with a wide-brimmed green felt hat, a bright red silk shirt open almost to the waist, and flaring trousers in an Aqueduct plaid. Two oversized diamond rings gleamed on Raymond's left hand, contrasting with the blackness of his skin. He surprised me. I hadn't expected that one of Chickie Wright's boys would be black. If the lower-class Italian with the big-time ideas was finally beginning to lose his innate prejudices, the world was indeed becoming a better place to live in.
The paralysis of surprise lasted only a moment. Raymond's left hand suddenly flashed toward the shoulder holster hanging over the back of a typist's chair next to him.
Wilhelmina barked and a bullet slammed into the chair, jerking it backward a few inches. Raymond's hand froze in midair, then slowly returned to the table.
"Thank you," I said politely. "Just remain right where you are, gentlemen."
Big Julie's eyes bulged and the cigar stub moved spasmodically in the corner of his mouth. "What the hell…" he croaked in a guttural voice.
"Shut up." I waved Wilhelmina at him, keeping a close eye on Raymond. Of the two, I had decided that' he was the more dangerous. I was wrong, but I didn't know it at the time.
I laid my attaché case on a neat desk in front of me and opened it with my left hand. I took out two long pieces of rawhide I'd picked up that afternoon at a shoe repair shop.
Somewhere downstairs a dog barked.
The two guards looked at each other, then back at me.
"The dogs," Big June croaked. "How'd'ja get by the dogs?"
I grinned. "Just petted them on the head as I went by. I love dogs."
He grunted in disbelief. "The gates…?"
I grinned again. "I burned them down with my super ray gun." I took a step closer and waved the gun again. "You. Raymond. Lie down on the floor on your face."
"Screw you, man!"
I fired. The shot hit the top of the desk and ricocheted. It's hard to tell where a bullet bounces, but from the mark it put on the desktop it must have missed Raymond's nose by millimeters.
He reared back in his chair, hands high above his head. "Yes, sir. On the floor. Right away." He got slowly to his feet, hands held high, then lowered himself gingerly to the floor, face down.
"Put your hands behind your back."
He obeyed instantly.
Next I turned to Julie, and had to laugh. He still held the deck of cards in his hand. He must have been dealing when I came in.
"Okay," I said, tossing him one of the rawhide thongs. "Tie your buddy up."