Well over six feet tall and so fit he appeared carved from marble, Kenny was in full uniform: blue saucer-shaped hat, long-sleeved light-blue shirt, black necktie, navy riding breeches with a gold stripe along the side, a long-barreled Colt revolver on his hip.
“What did they get, Sooze?” Kenny said as he led her back into the house, much to the disappointment of the nosy onlookers.
“I was afraid to check.”
“You think he’s still here?”
Susan Finnegan, nee Lindemeyer, shrugged.
Kenny Finnegan snapped open his holster with his thumb. “You stay here,” he told her as he edged toward the patio and backyard. The door was open; a lawn chair lay on its side; there were footprints in the grass.
Soon he returned. “He’s gone,” he said. “The kitchen’s a mess.”
She gasped. “Your mother’s silver!”
Kenny wondered if Tommy had told his wife he hit the trifecta at Freehold. Pulled down $959 and change. That was sweet, even if it wasn’t a week’s salary for Tommy.
“You have any cash in the house?”
She sighed. “In the kitchen too.”
Not the household funds, thought Kenny, for the A&P, the dry cleaning, and so forth. “I’ll look upstairs. Maybe start a list, Sooze. What’s missing.” The second Kenny Finnegan entered the bedroom he knew the thief had come for the cash. The mattress was at an angle as if it had been lifted and dropped. The nightstand drawer was open on his brother’s side, but not Sooze’s. His bureau was in chaos; hers was disturbed but not in shambles. Same thing with their closets: Tommy’s hats and clothes were on the floor.
“Sooze,” yelled Kenny, “where’s your fur?”
“In storage,” she replied from the bottom of the stairs. “Kenny, they took the steaks right out of the freezer.”
His big feet thudding down the stairs, Kenny returned to the first floor. He followed his sister-in-law into the kitchen.
She handed him the list he had requested.
“A can opener?” Kenny asked as he scanned.
“Electric. It doesn’t work.”
“Serves them right.” He nodded toward the table. “What’s this?”
“Samples,” she replied, lifting the leather-bound book about the size of Life magazine. “Linoleum.”
On the front, embossed in gold, was the word Armstrong.
“What do you need linoleum for?” He and Tommy had put in the parquet floor a week before Pearl Harbor.
“He said I’d made an appointment,” she replied, passing him the salesman’s business card. “But I didn’t.”
Susan and Kenny were drinking coffee when Tommy arrived. Always unflappable, the gray-haired lawyer in worsted wool placed his briefcase by the coat tree in the hall. He loosened his tie.
Susan rose to accept his embrace. He kissed the top of her head.
Kenny caught his eye. He rubbed his thumb across his index and middle fingers — the universal sign for cash.
Tommy pointed to the pocket of his slacks.
“Ma’s silver. Aunt Ellen’s clock,” Kenny summarized as he stood. “Better call Paolo.”
Narrow Gate’s lone Sicilian cop. Kenny knew Enzo Paolo wasn’t on the take.
As he squeezed by, nudging the refrigerator, he gave Sooze a tap on the shoulder. He punched his brother hard on the arm.
“Where are you going?” Tommy asked.
“Candy store,” Kenny replied.
Mimmo, a.k.a Domenic Mistretta, was sitting at the oval wooden table, the soda fountain on one side, a pinball machine on the other. It was a pleasant afternoon in Narrows Gate, sunny, perfect for stickball, so only a few kids were scanning the comics. Behind the counter, old man Russo was examining the names of the dead in the Jersey Observer. His son had enlisted in the navy on December 8, 1941.
Mimmo, who once held an honored position in the Farcolini Family, had grown old and slow. Still, he ran a productive crew and right now he had $2,802 in a drawer in the table, money dropped off by the bagmen who collected from bartenders, hot-dog vendors, and neighborhood widows who took bets on the numbers for the crew.
When the ding bell rang over the door, Mimmo, who wore smoke-colored sunglasses even indoors, looked up from his copy of Beauty Parade, a girly magazine. He saw Superman who, for some reason, was dressed as a state trooper.
Kenny Finnegan dipped his hand into a jar, took a Mary Jane, and placed a penny on the counter.
“What?” said Mimmo. There wasn’t enough time to summon his bodyguards Fat Tutti and Boo Chiasso, who were at the piers collecting the crew’s share on a shipment of Canadian whiskey.
“I’m Finnegan. Tenth and Cleveland.”
The Irish, thought Mimmo. Their grievances were supposed to go through the mayor’s office.
As he unwrapped the peanut-butter-and-molasses candy, Finnegan said, “Linoleum.” He popped the Mary Jane into his mouth.
Mimmo frowned in confusion, but then the light went off.
The state trooper saw his expression change. “Everything he stole from my brother Tommy goes back. Including the nine hundred and fifty dollars he had in his nightstand.” The cop was in a mood to make trouble.
“Plus the scam ends,” he continued. “It won’t take me but a few hours to pull the reports. If I find your men crossed county lines, it’s a matter for the state. And the superintendent’s got no taste for your kind.”
“ ‘My men,’ ” Mimmo said with a chortle. But for some reason, at that moment, he realized Rizzato had never turned over any cash from any of the burglaries. Not a penny.
“Have it your way,” Kenny Finnegan replied as he retreated. He feared no one, but he knew it was insanity to turn his back on a threatened member of the Farcolini crew. “Next stop, Armstrong.”
Mimmo gave him a dismissive wave with the back of his hand, but the message took. As soon as the squad car peeled away from the curb, Mimmo was up and padding on flat feet to the phone booth.
Old man Russo chased the kids from the candy store.
Santo Rizzato arrived ten minutes later. He was out of breath, having trotted from the Delmenhorst warehouse a few blocks away.
By coincidence, Fat Tutti arrived too.
“You know who was just here?” Mimmo asked.
Gasping for air, Rizzato shook his head. He produced a handkerchief to dab his forehead and pockmarked cheeks.
“The state police.”
“Here?” asked Rizzato. “What for?”
“What’s the point of robbing the brother of the state police?” said Mimmo.
“I don’t know— Who robbed the state police?”
“Who’d you rob today?”
Rizzato had to think. He had three guys out, two who went in with rolls of flooring, glue pots, the works. One was—
“Who?” Mimmo repeated.
“Finnegan,” Rizzato moaned. “I heard he was a lawyer, not a cop.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Fat Tutti saw Boo Chiasso walking toward the candy store. As fit as Finnegan the Cop, taller even, Boo was wearing a nasty scowl, which meant he was primed for work. Fat Tutti waddled toward the door and whispered a few sentences to his colleague. Boo made a U-turn and headed off for the Delmenhorst warehouse.
“Mimmo,” Rizzato said, “what’s going on?”
“You been dry for a while. Why’s that?”
“The Armstrong guys. The salesmen. They don’t know how to case a joint.”
“Everybody knows what money looks like.”
“Mimmo, people with money don’t want linoleum.”
“So why are we in the business?”
Rizzato said, “We were doing all right until the Good Humor man got run over and the cops stepped in.”
Mimmo said thoughtfully, “A risk like that. A state trooper. Your guy, what did he get?”