Anything But Saintly

Chapter 3

Little Artie Nowak ran a tavern down in the Polish section, only a couple of blocks from where I was born and where my parents and sister Julie still lived. The tavern was the least of his various interests. He ran a drag poker game in his basement, he headed the local call-girl operation and he was a ward committeeman. His political influence extended far beyond his own ward, though, because he was also the right-hand man of Nick Bartkowiak, who politically controlled all thirteen wards on the south side.

Artie’s tavern was a workingman’s joint, patronized mainly by factory workers and floozies looking for pickups. Not hustlers, because Artie didn’t allow them in his bar, even though he was a procurer himself. They were just lonely amateurs out for romance any way they could get it, willing to trade their favors for a few free drinks. I don’t know if all factory towns are like St. Cecilia, but there are so many of the amateur type in our city, it’s a wonder the professionals can make a living.

At this time of morning the tavern was deserted except for one old man at a corner table with a beer before him. Jake Stark, Artie’s bull-necked flunky, was behind the bar. Jake was a sort of general all-around assistant of the ward committeeman. He acted as part-time bartender during off hours, he supervised the basement poker game, he worked as a bouncer on nights the tavern was crowded, and he acted as Artie’s strong-arm man whenever the little man felt someone needed pushing around.

I asked Jake if Artie was around.

Jake yelled in a booming bass, “Hey, Artie!”

Little Artie Nowak appeared from the kitchen with a cup of coffee in his hand. He was a diminutive man, no more than five feet four and weighing about a hundred and thirty. But he had a face like a bulldog and he walked with an Edward G. Robinson swagger. In his youth he’d fought in the lightweight class, and it was a tribute to his skill that he didn’t have a mark on his face. I saw him fight a couple of times, years back. He had both speed and a punch, but the racket boys got to him early and he quit the ring in disgust when he found he had to win or lose on order. I always thought he might have eventually gone for the title if he had been under cleaner management.

Artie was in shirt sleeves with no tie, but he still managed to create an impression of immaculate dress, probably because he wore hundred-dollar slacks, a fifty-dollar silk shirt and shoes with a glittering shine.

Coming over to the end of the bar about ten feet from us, he set down his coffee cup and said, “Hi, Matt.” Then he looked at Carl.

“This is my partner, Carl Lincoln,” I said. “You know Artie, Carl?”

Carl said, “I’ve seen him around.” Artie merely nodded.

Jake Stark said, “You guys want something to drink?”

I shook my head. “We’re on duty.”

Artie hiked his eyebrows. “This ain’t just a social call?”

“Not exactly. We’re looking for a girl.”

Artie took a sip of his coffee. “You won’t find any here now. Come back about ten tonight and you can take your pick.”

“We’re looking for a specific one,” I said. “A call girl named Kitty. Dark eyes and hair, about twenty-five, five feet four, a hundred and fifteen pounds. She has a small heart-shaped tattoo on her left hip.”

Artie’s eyes narrowed. “What makes you think I’d know anything about call girls?”

“Nothing,” I said easily. “Her profession is incidental. We have information she lives in this ward. You know everybody in the ward, so we thought we’d ask.”

“Oh.” His expression was still wary, but his eyes were no longer narrowed. “What’s she done?”

“She rolled an out-of-town businessman at the Leland last night. It’s bad advertising for the city.”

The little man frowned. “She rolled him for how much?”

“Five hundred. On top of a fifty-dollar fee. The guy didn’t object to the fee. It was the fringe benefits she collected that made him mad.”

I had figured that Little Artie wouldn’t like the idea of one of his girls rolling a customer, and his expression indicated I had figured right. His face grew cold. “This John put in an official beef?”

If I hadn’t already known he was up to his ears in the call-girl racket, this question would have tipped me off. The gray world of prostitution has a vocabulary all its own. To prostitutes and procurers, customers are always Johns, but I’ve never heard anyone outside of the profession use the term.

I said, “Uh-huh.”

“That is kind of bad advertising,” Artie said. “We wouldn’t want visiting firemen spreading the word that St. Cecilia is a clip town. I don’t know this girl, but I’ll inquire around and let you hear what I find out. How long’s this John going to be in town?”

“Through tomorrow night.”

“He want her prosecuted for theft?”

I shook my head. “All he wants is his money back. He doesn’t want any part of a courtroom, because he’s a married man and he doesn’t want to advertise his sins. And all we’re interested in is sending him back to Houston with a better impression of the town than he has right now.”

I was being about as subtle as a sledge hammer, but I wanted to leave no doubt in Artie’s mind that we weren’t interfering in his call-girl operation; our only interest was in one girl who had stepped out of line.

The little man mused for a moment, then said to Jake Stark, “You know this girl they’re talking about, Jake?”

Jake gave his head a definite shake. “Not me.”

“Wasn’t there a little brunette named Kitty in here one night a while back?”

Jake, realizing his employer wanted him to remember the girl, let an enlightened expression grow on his face. “Yeah, now that I think of it. Couple of weeks ago. She was a hustler too. I heard her proposition some guy and threw her out.” To Carl and me he said righteously, “We don’t allow that kind of stuff around here.”

The old man in the corner said in a high voice, “I don’t remember you throwing no girl out, Jake.”

Jake said, “You wasn’t here, Dinny.”

“I’m always here,” the old man said. “I ain’t missed a night in three years, except that time I was in the hospital.”

“You probably was in the can, Dinny,” Artie said in an affable tone. “You spend half your time there. Why don’t you go to the can now?”

“Just went a while back.”

“Then shut up and drink your beer.” Artie turned back to Jake. “Know where this Kitty lives?”

The bartender, not sure how he was supposed to answer this, hedged. “I can find out easy. Half a dozen customers seemed to know her.”

Little Artie pulled a thick roll of bills from his side pocket. “How much exactly did she roll this John for?”

“Five hundred on the nose,” I said. “He claims he counted what he had just before she arrived, and there were nine fifties, three twenties, three tens and two fives in his wallet. He paid her a fifty-dollar bill, so that left an even five hundred.”

Peeling off four hundreds and two fifties, Artie laid them on the bar. “I guess we got her tabbed, Matt. You pay off this John and I’ll collect from her.”

Moving up to the end of the bar, I picked up the money. “Sure you’ll be able to collect from her?”

“I’ll collect,” he assured me. “This way you won’t be bothered having to talk to her.”

That was his polite way of telling me he preferred to handle the matter without further police interference. I felt a little sorry for the girl. She had violated the rules and probably was in for a beating. But it had been the only way to handle the matter without being called on the carpet by the police commissioner for treading on powerful political toes.

I said, “I’ll get a receipt from the guy and mail it to you.”

“Don’t bother,” Artie told me. “I know you’re honest.”

“I’ll get it anyway,” I said. “See you around.”

“Sure. Drop in any time. Nice to have met you, Lincoln.”

Carl gave him a meaningless smile.

Outside in the car again, Carl gave me a look of mock admiration and said, “You are bucking for lieutenant. That performance was as slippery as anything the old man ever pulled.”

“Head back to the Leland,” I told him.

It was eleven-thirty when we got back to the hotel. Harold Warner didn’t answer when we had the desk ring his room. I had noticed a sign in the center of the lobby listing the agenda for the Tile and Plastic Manufacturers’ Convention, and we went back to check that. There was a meeting in the Rose Room from 10:30 to 11:30 A.M., then a luncheon scheduled for noon in the dining room.

I said to Carl, “We ought to be able to catch him between events,” then led the way to the Rose Room.

The meeting was just breaking up and delegates were streaming from the Rose Room in the direction of the bar. About sixty men passed us as we stood to one side, but Harold Warner wasn’t among them. When they stopped coming from the Rose Room, I peeked in the door. The room was empty except for a cleaning woman emptying ash trays.

Assuming that Warner must have been among the first out, and that we had missed him, we checked the barroom. He wasn’t there either.

“Maybe he went up to his room for a minute before lunch,” Carl suggested.

We had the desk ring his room again, but there was still no answer. Giving up, I left a note in his box asking him to phone me at headquarters.

Outside, Carl looked up at the soot-gray sky and said, “Maybe she rolled him for transportation out of this stinking town. Seems a shame to louse her up if she did.”

“Don’t disparage my birthplace,” I said.

“Mine too. You know I’ve heard that when an autopsy is performed on a St. Cecilia native, the lungs are gray instead of pink.”

“You’ll feel better after lunch,” I told him. “We’ll go somewhere that has air conditioning.”