“It could have happened that way. But you can’t make that presumption. I rolled out of my car into a shooting position with the Colt in about one second flat, and it was that first shot that stopped the gunman from closing on and finishing the two troopers. If I’m running back to the trunk, pulling a big gun, inserting the drum, running the bolt, then heading to the crest, maybe those cops are dead. Then maybe I bring ’em down with the Browning or the Thompson or maybe I don’t. I get one, say, and by that time they’ve got three or four Thompsons on me. Sir, believe me, it’s tough to stand against three Thompsons. Two cops and an agent dead, maybe Nelson is only wounded, and all of the outlaws make it out. That’s another risk that has to be considered. It would sort of fit in with the Little Bohemia thing.”
Sam spoke for the first time.
“You’re positive it was Nelson?”
“Now I am. But the source just said ‘big boys,’ whatever that means, another reason Chicago Gang Intelligence wasn’t interested in it. But I could tell he was shooting that machine-pistol thing, short-barreled, with no shoulder stock to brace it, and a whole lot of muzzle flash, more flash than a Thompson. That’s why I’m alive. If he’d have had a Thompson himself—and I’ll bet there were several in them cars—he’d have planted it on his shoulder, aimed carefully over long sights, and I’d be goose crap now. So the fact I ain’t dead is proof that it was Nelson, because according to our findings, he’s the only one with that custom machine pistol. Agent Baum learned that the hard way at Little Bohemia.”
“I wonder if we haven’t gotten enough out of Agent Swagger,” said Purvis. “I think he’s made good account of all decisions, and while it could have had a better outcome, it also could have had a worse outcome. Much worse. We ought to consider this event closed, report to Washington, move on.”
“One last question,” said Clegg. “Your source: I think it’s time for you to formally identify him so that we can vet and approve. I don’t like being led by the nose by someone we don’t know a thing about.”
“It’s not even really a source. It’s a cop who I knew in Hot Springs and did a favor for. He got his big-city job here, and he’s worked his way up to the new headquarters, where he hears things. Anyhow, he heard that Chicago Gang Intelligence was sitting on this rumor of something someone overheard in some chatter in a known Italian joint and he went to me with it. It’s not a thing we can count on. Now, maybe this cop is just telling us a story and he does have a source and we will get more out of it. But I can’t say. But if I roust him, if we ruffle Chicago for his records, if I haul him up here or set up a meet with you fellows, it could all go off the tracks. It’s the sort of thing where patience is better than action. It happens that way sometimes.”
Like most police officers, Charles lied easily and without tremor, swallow, gulp, or shifty eyes, and he had no reason to believe anyone was on to him.
“I think that’ll have to do it for you, Hugh,” said Purvis. “We’ll let it rest. Maybe if we’re in a jam, we’ll press Charles to press Officer X, but right now let’s just enjoy a minor triumph, his good judgment in keeping his own name and the Division out of the papers, and, as I said, let’s share this provisional success with our friends in Washington.”
So that was it. But Purvis indicated with a nod that he wanted Charles to stay.
“Don’t worry about Clegg, Charles. He’s just a bitter blowhard. By rights, he shouldn’t even have been there.”
“Thank you, Mr. Purvis.”
“Mel. Anyhow, you must be beat. Want to take the rest of the day off?”
“Got lots of stuff set this afternoon.”
“Fair enough. Tomorrow.”
“Same. I’m fine.”
“Okay, Charles.”
He clapped Charles on the shoulder and Charles left. He got back to his desk, and as he half suspected it would be, there was a note from the agent on his phone.
“Charles . . . Your Uncle Phil called. Wants you to get back to him right away.”
20
NORTHWEST COOK COUNTY, ILLINOIS
July 1934
ANOTHER COUNTRY ROAD, another hot night.
The discussion: the last country road, the last hot night.
Les was morose. It was one thing for two State Troopers to show up, and the papers said they made a habit of taking back roads home at the end of the duty day to look for people in trouble off the main roads. Their appearance was simple luck of the draw, unpredictable. It represented nothing in the cosmic scheme of things.
It was the guy—a federal, Les was convinced—who got there just in time to save the troopers’ hash and almost put one through Les’s face. What the hell was he doing there? That had to be more than coincidence, even if the papers said nothing about his arrival. In fact, that alone convinced Les he was federal, and he saw him as a sort of night-riding phantom, a man of mystery, who had magical ways of knowing, and always, just like on the radio or at the picture shows, got there in the nick of time.
“You didn’t say anything?” he queried his pals. “I mean, how could he know?”
With J.P., it was about his girl in Sausalito, Sally.
“You didn’t say a thing?”
“Why would I? She thinks I’m a tractor salesman.”
“Could she have eavesdropped or gone through your pockets, sniffed a reward, and come up with the tip.”
“Sally’s not that kind of girl. She’s pretty, and like a lot of the pretty girls, she don’t get it. She isn’t a noticer, a rememberer. She just thinks I’m a handsome guy, a salesman on the road, lots of fun, knows stuff, and that’s it. She never heard of any big-gangster crap. She doesn’t read the papers or listen to anything but music on the radio.”
Les always had a thing about women. He didn’t trust them. He felt the same about Mickey Conforti, Homer’s honeybee. But he could get no satisfaction out of J.P., so he moved on.
“It couldn’t be wiretap,” said Fatso. “Les, we’re on to that. You can always hear the click when they come on to listen. There were no clicks. It’s impossible.”
“Think! Think! Think! Did anyone overhear you? Did you talk in public? How could they get inside if—”
“Les, if it had been federals, they would have had a whole outfit out there, with machinos and Browning rifles and the works. It would have been the Fourth of July. It was one guy. He was driving by, remember, he wasn’t there at the start. He wasn’t hiding by the road. He heard your fire, turned, raced to the top of the hill, piled out, and opened fire on you. If he was planning anything, it wouldn’t have been shooting at you from a hundred fifty yards out with a pistol. He couldn’t have known. It’s just coincidence.”
“One coincidence, I get,” said Les. “First the cops just happen to show up, then this fed shows up. That’s two, one on top of the other, back-to-back. That don’t make no sense. The world don’t work like that.”
Nobody was interested in arguing how the world did or didn’t work with Les, whose ideas were pretty much etched in stone, unchallengeable, unchangeable. He might go off if you pressed him too hard with your system of logic against his. Fatso backed off fast, as did Jack, when his turn came, and finally Carey.
“You haven’t noticed anything odd at the garage?” said Les. “You got the only fixed address in the bunch. Maybe they’re on to you? Maybe they followed you?”
“Les, I swear, I’m being careful. I double-check every move, every day. I come and go by different routes. I don’t conduct any of our business over this phone. I keep that part of my life completely separate. I got a nose for guys fishing around or peeping. I don’t have a record, except for juvie shit no one cares about. I’m perfect for you! I’m good at this! That’s why I want to be with you guys, I have a talent. I don’t want to spend my life changing oil in cars I can’t afford for people who treat me like a monkey. Man, if they knew I was in with Baby
Face Nelson, they’d shit a brick.”
For once Les didn’t explode when he heard the name the papers had pinned on him, which always slapped him raw since he didn’t have a baby face, he wasn’t a half-pint or a squirt, but pretty much average-sized, and good-looking, as everybody said, and he always turned out well in suits and ties. But Carey’s sheer bliss at being this close to Baby Face Nelson was enough to keep Les from throwing punches, as he’d been known to do.
“All right,” Les said. “You’re still on with the cars? And you can boost that bus?”
“Yes sir,” said Carey.
“Good kid,” said Les.
He returned to the tourist cabin he’d rented just outside of Glenview for Helen, not far from Curtiss Airport, though the planes were an annoyance. Wasn’t much to do. She shopped every day and bought the Tribune or the Herald-Examiner, going out again at night for the Daily News. He read, he listened to the radio, and every once in a while they snuck out to the movies. One night they went to Manhattan Melodrama in Mount Prospect, surprised that it was still hanging around, since it had come out two months earlier, in May. But he liked it, and it really felt good to leave his troubles in the old kit bag while he watched Gable act it up as a gangster, unlike any gangster Les had ever known, and he’d known them for years, going back to his teenage days as an errand boy for the Capone and then the Touhy mobs. Gable was too likable, too charming. Your real gangster was a man of extreme toughness, and no matter how old and how much dignity he had, he would go to fists or knives or pistolas at the drop of a hat where matters of honor or business were concerned. Edward G. got that, and Cagney, but as handsome a palooka as Gable was, he wasn’t any gangster. He wasn’t tough enough. He was big, not tough, and there’s a difference, as Les’s whole life had proven. That’s why he liked the gangsters so much: they took shit from no man and gave shit when and where it pleased them, never looking back, always having the best dames, cars, clothes, and pals. He fashioned himself on that image, if his stronger ethic was to Helen, whom he loved almost as deeply as he loved being the gangster, and she had never, ever once told him to quit his ways. How great was that?
Their only contact was J.P., who came by every day to see if anything needed doing. He had liberty and flexibility because he wasn’t famous like Les was after South Bend and he could still live a normal life. One day he and Les drove west and tracked by map the Des Moines train as it came in around 5 p.m., as per Jimmy Murray’s scouting report. They were looking for a spot to heist it and had found a good enough place just outside of Wheaton, a long straightaway with a road that led quickly enough into a forested area with lots of crossroads. They could stash a car there, hit the train, disappear back into the woods, change cars, and get out with nothing showing to give them away. Following wider circles in the farming community, they came across a lady dropping off kids in a big yellow school bus. They followed her and, sure enough, she kept it at home, outside. It would be easy for Carey to jump it that day and lay it across the tracks to get the train halted, and then the guns would come out.
“If Johnny comes in,” said Les, “it should work fine. We need a gun to hold the engineers, we need four guns to take the mail car and blow the safe and conk the crew out—and no telling how many are in a mail car. I don’t count Carey—nice guy and all—because he ain’t been in this neighborhood and I don’t know which way he jumps if it goes hot. Four guys with guns should get ’em quieted down fast, and then we’re out of there. I figure no more than five minutes flat.”
“I wouldn’t mind another gun,” said J.P., and Les always listened to his sagacious advice.
“Homer?” queried J.P.
“That piece of crap,” said Les. “He said rude stuff about Helen. I was going to kill him.”
“Les, he was cool as air-conditioning in South Bend, I hear. Some are saying none of you would have gotten out of South Bend if he hadn’t plugged a cop and kept the others back.”
“Hey, I was out there too,” said Les. “Talking about cool, I took one in the chest and didn’t bat an eyelash. Now, that’s cool.”
“No doubt. But you don’t want to work with Charlie Floyd, do you? I mean, if your choice is Charlie or Homer, who do you pick?”
“Got a point,” said Les. “It don’t make me happy, but it is a good point. We do need another gun, and as long as Homer ain’t spongy from that shot in the head, maybe if he swore to keep his yap shut, we could take him aboard. Only, I’m doing the planning. This one, I’m running. He has to get that.”
“He’ll get it. I’m going to see if we can’t get Johnny up for another meeting real soon. I can reach him through that lawyer. He’s in contact with Homer, he can bring him.”
“Say, the twenty-first?”
“That should be enough time.”
“We’ll meet at the Matty’s Wayfarer Inn, on Waukegan, in the back room. It should be clean now.”
“Got it. I’ll make it happen.”
That was pretty much it. Radio ate the time: the Cubs or Sox games devoured afternoons, and the bands on the networks nights. Neither of the ball teams would win a pennant, but the boys played hard, and Les liked to lose himself in their fortunes. In time, as the meet-up with Johnny approached, his spirits lifted some.
“Well,” said Helen, “someone is out of the dumps.”
“I’m feeling better, sweetie. Things are going along smoothly.”
“You’re not scared?”
“Sure, a little. That damned federal spooked me. Another couple inches and I’m wearing a bullet hole where my forehead used to be. I sure heard that one when it whizzed by and took my hat off. I hope that was the one with my name on it.”
“Did it get you to thinking?”
“Sure, and I know this is no good with our kids at your pop’s place. I want to raise my kids, I don’t want Pop doing it. I miss ’em bad. We haven’t seen ’em for three weeks, since just after South Bend. But I can’t get out without a big score, so we can go someplace, live nice, buy a little business, and be regular people. You need a bankroll to finance a move like that. You can’t start cold.” He wasn’t sure if he meant it. He said it frequently, sometimes meaning it, sometimes not.
“I love it when you talk this way.”
“Helen, I know how hard this has been on you. You’ve been great. You’re my girl, always there for me. You’re the heroine of this picture show. I love you so much, I think I’ll die from it, if the cops don’t get me. I am the luckiest man in the world.”
There followed some private between-couple baby goo-goo talk and then some private between-couple fucking, both great fun.
21
COCKEYSVILLE, MARYLAND
The present
“AND WHAT DO YOU DO, YOUNG LADY?” asked Mrs. Tisdale.
“I’m a news producer for Fox News in Washington,” Nikki said.
“I hate Fox News,” said Mrs. Tisdale.
“I hear that a lot.”
“Well, I shall try not to hold it against you, dear. People have to take what’s available. Anyway, who’s this fellow? Does he talk?”
“He’s my father. When I was late getting home from dates in high school, he sure talked. Not so much now. I think he sort of dried up.”
Mrs. Tisdale turned and fixed hard eyes on Swagger. He felt underdressed, even if he was wearing a suit and tie.
“You’re the hero? The letter said you were highly decorated military.”
“He doesn’t consider himself a hero,” Nikki said. “He considers himself lucky. He says all the heroes were killed. But he did do three tours in Vietnam, though one was cut short by wounds. On the other hand, one was extended.”
“Can you say something, please, sir?”
Mrs. Tisdale’s room labored at cheer, but the gloom of death hung everywhere. It was all yellow with artificial flowers and pictures of lambs and brooks and meadows.
But it also boasted about a million dollars’ worth of equipment, most of it gleaming, with gauges and tubes and knobs everywhere, to keep people who were supposed to be dead alive for another few seconds. Some of the equipment was electric, some just mysteriously inert. Every few seconds, something beeped. Bob, as one might expect, did not care for hospitals or anything that reminded him of waking up in the Philippines with his hip shattered and his spotter, Donnie Fen, football hero and all-around good kid who had already finished his tour, gone forever.
“Hello,” said Bob. “Thank you for seeing us on such short notice.”
“Short is the only kind of notice I have.”
The detective firm had quite expensively located ninety-four-year-old Mrs. Tisdale, née Mary S. Bridgewater, in this place, where, having outlived or gotten bored with all her tribe, not that she seemed to notice, she lay abed in a cheerful yellow gown that spoke of lively memories. She was a look-forward-to, not a look-back-at—that was clear from the proud jut of her chin, even though tethered to an oxygen tank by nose nozzle and tube, and monitored by a dozen robot contrivances, so that she looked like a creation of Frankenstein’s lightning. She’s alive!
“I’m grateful,” Bob said.
She turned back to Nikki.
“Why are you here and not in D.C. making up lies?”
“I only make them up on Tuesdays. This is Thursday.”
“Excellent riposte,” said Mrs. Tisdale. “I enjoy a girl with some snap, crackle, and pop.”
“I’m really here because I’m cute and likable and an experienced interviewer. My father is none of those things. So he asked me to come up and sort of, you know, make it go more smoothly—that’s how he put it.”
“Well, you’ve succeeded. You must be something, Mr. Hero, to raise such a lovely, smart daughter. When does she move to CNN?”
“They’ve offered. She’s too stubborn to budge. Hardheaded girl. Can’t tell her a thing.”