Toni Cavaretta seemed to be as perfect a housewife as she’d been an executive secretary. And as perfect a mother, too. Well, stepmother, actually. The boy was Nitti’s only son, only child, by his first wife, Anna. Whose picture, in fact, was on his desk in a gilt frame: a beautiful Italian madonna with a glowing expression. Nitti had worshipped her, it was said. Yet here he was, little over a year after his beloved Anna’s death, married to Toni Cavaretta.
It came rushing back, that business with O’Hare. She’d been Nitti’s “man” all the way, keeping tabs on E. J., probably helping set him up for the one-way ride I’d almost taken with him. Planting that note about the feds in his pocket. I’d only checked up on her once, after the hit. I’d asked Stege, probably in ’41 sometime, what had become of her. He said she was managing an Outfit racetrack in Florida-Miami Beach to be precise-a dogtrack that had previously been looked after by O’Hare. Seemed she had stock in the Florida track, as well as Sportsman’s Park; and some people said she and Nitti were like this. And he held his fingers up in a crossed fashion.
The notion of Nitti having a mistress had seemed crazy to me-everybody knew he kept Anna on a pedestal, that he loved his son, that he was a devoted family man-and I’d dismissed Stege’s implication as hogwash. But I also knew Nitti kept a separate home in Miami Beach. And men in his position-particularly men who kept their wives on pedestals-often had side dishes, somebody warm and female and closer to the ground.
Now here he was, beloved Anna gone. Here he was, married to Toni Cavaretta. In his suite at the Bismarck, that time, back in ’39, days after O’Hare’s murder, I’d heard a woman’s voice…
I slapped myself. Knock it off, Heller! These were dangerous speculations to make. They seemed especially dangerous to be making, sitting in Nitti’s own study, even if I was keeping them confined to my mind.
I got up and looked at the books on his shelves. A lot of leatherbound classics, whether read or not I couldn’t say. Some less fancily bound nonfiction books, on accounting mostly, and a couple of books about Napoleon, seemed well read.
I was tired. I sat on the couch again and looked at my watch-I’d been here half an hour already-and tried to fight my heavy eyelids. At some point, I lost the fight, because sounds in the other room suddenly jarred me awake.
I was stretched out on the couch. The room was dark. Why I’d been left to sleep like that, I didn’t know; why the light had been shut off, I couldn’t say. How long I’d been asleep was a mystery, too. The room was so dark I couldn’t read my watch. But if the film in my mouth was any indication, I’d slept for hours.
Conversation had woken me; and muffled conversation was still quite audible, even though I was sitting on the couch and the door to the living room was across the study from me. Occasionally the pitch of the conversation peaked-in anger? One of those peaks had been loud enough to wake me, anyway.
I got up. Slipped out of my shoes. Crept across the study to the door. I didn’t dare crack it open. But I did dare place my ear up to it.
“Frank,” a harsh voice was saying, “you brought Browne and Bioff to us. You masterminded this whole thing-and it went sour.”
“You didn’t complain at the time, Paul.”
Paul?
Jesus Christ-Paul Ricca. The Waiter. The number-two man. Capone had his Nitti; and Nitti had his Ricca.
And I didn’t have a gun.
“There is no point in all of us going down,” Ricca said. “Remember how Al took the fall for us, and went on trial alone? Well, that’s the way we ought to do it now.”
“It ain’t the same situation, Paul.” Nitti’s voice was recognizably his; but something was different. Something had changed.
The strength was gone.
“Frank,” Ricca said, “you can plead guilty and we’ll take care of things till you get out.”
Right. Like Nitti took care of things for Capone.
“This is not that kind of case,” Nitti said, voice firmer now. “This is a conspiracy indictment. Nobody can take the fall for the rest of us in this one. We all have to stick together and try to beat it.”
Ricca began swearing in Sicilian; so did Nitti. And it began to build. Other voices, in English, in Sicilian, were trying to settle the two of them down. I thought I heard Campagna.
I knelt down. Looked through the keyhole. Just like a divorce case.
I could get a glimpse of them, sitting around the living room in their brown suits, just a bunch of businessmen talking-only among them were Frank Nitti, Paul Ricca, Louis Campagna, Ralph Capone and others whose faces I couldn’t see, but, if I could, whose names would no doubt chill me equally to the bone.
Ricca, a thin pockmarked man with high cheekbones, was pale, panting. He pointed at Nitti, as they stood facing each other, Ricca much taller than the little barber.
“Frank, you’re asking for it.”
Five simple words.
Dead silence followed. Nitti was looking to the other men, to their faces. It seemed to me, from my limited vantage point, that all save Campagna were avoiding his eyes. And even Louie wasn’t speaking up for him.
The lack of support meant one thing: Ricca had deposed Nitti. And without the intricate, dangerous chesslike moves Nitti had used to maneuver Capone off the throne and into the pen. Ricca had, through strength of character alone, through sheer will, toppled Nitti.
And Nitti knew it.
He walked toward the front door.
I couldn’t see it, but I could hear it: he opened that door. Cold March air made itself heard.
He walked into my keyhole view again.
And, his back to me, gestured toward the outside.
The men looked at each other, slowly, and rose.
I moved away from the door and went back to the couch and sat, trembling. I knew what this meant. Nitti’s wordless invitation for his guests to leave was a breach of the Sicilian peasant rules of hospitality they’d all been reared under. It was his way of turning his back on them. It was his way of expressing contempt. Defying them. Ricca, especially.
And Ricca’s words-Frank, you’re asking for it-were a virtual death sentence.
I could hear them out there, shuffling around, getting on their coats and hats, no one saying anything.
Although, finally, when they all seemed to be gone, I thought I heard Campagna’s voice. Saying simply, “Frank…”
Clearly, I heard Nitti, who must’ve been standing just outside the study door, say, “Good night, Louie.”
I slipped my shoes back on, stretched out on the couch and closed my eyes. Wondering if I’d ever open them again.
The light above me went on; light glowed redly through my lids. I “slept” on.
A hand gently shook my shoulder.
“Heller,” Nitti said, softly. “Heller, wake up.”
I sat slowly up, sort of groaning, rubbing my face with the heel of a hand, saying, “Excuse me, Frank-oh, hell. Aw. I don’t know what happened. Must’ve dozed off.”
“I know you did. I was out for a walk, and I got back and you were sound asleep. Snoring away. I couldn’t bring myself to wake you. So I just let you sleep.”
He sat next to me. He looked very old; very skinny; very tired. Cheeks almost sunken. His dark eyes didn’t have their usual hardness. His hair was the real tip-off, though: the little barber needed a haircut.
“I didn’t see the harm,” he said, “letting you sleep. Then, to be honest with you, I forgot all about ya.” He gestured out toward the other room. “I had some business come up all of a sudden, and I sent my wife and boy over to the Rongas, and she said now don’t forget about Heller, and I went and forgot about you, anyway.” He laughed. For a man who minutes ago had heard his own death sentence, and who had in return thrown down the gauntlet to Ricca and the whole goddamn Outfit, he was spookily calm.
“When I first got back from overseas,” I said, “I had trouble sleeping. But lately I catch myself napping every time I turn around. I’m really sorry.”