Come Morning

Chapter 14

When Runyan entered the storefront office on Mission off Fifth, around the corner from the old Mint, a little bell screwed to the top of the door tinkled. A secretary with greystreaked hair and a long nose was pounding an antique electric typewriter as if it were the chest of an unfaithful lover. Runyan’s clothes and chess set were under his arm in the supermarket bag the hooker had brought back to him.

The secretary stopped typing, her mouth slightly open so he could see an inverted V of rabbit teeth behind her upper lip.

“He’s expecting me,” said Runyan.

She pointed over her shoulder with a pencil she jerked from her hair, jammed it back, and assaulted her paramour again as Runyan crossed to the door.

The inner room was a windowless box with an old-fashioned bottled-water stand against the back wall next to an equally old-fashioned coat rack. Nothing old-fashioned about the steel-set-in-concrete under-the-floor safe; not even oxyacetylene would touch that baby.

A fleshy red-headed man with his shirt sleeves rolled up almost to his shoulders was sitting behind a desk with a brass plaque on it: PATRICK DELARTY. He had freckled muscular arms with fine red-gold hairs glinting on them. A cigar jutted from the center of his mouth as if he’d seen too many old newsreels of Franklin Roosevelt. Red brows which he pulled down over hard blue eyes in a frown made him look like a clown with only half his makeup on.

“Something?”

Runyan’s eyes roved across the room to the other, empty, desk. Its plaque read ANGELO TENCONI. Angelo Tenconi was one of the names given him that morning by Cardwell.

“Tenconi.”

“Workin’ North Beach today,” said Delarty.

Out on Mission Street, Runyan checked his watch. He’d made another appointment with his parole officer to report his change of residence. By the book. That way, nobody could claim he’d violated his parole and send him back inside.

Benjamin Sharples was a bland-faced mid-thirties, with a stubborn chin and mean eyes and the habitually irritated expression of a Persian cat. He was reading in a stamp dealer’s catalog about a pair of 1893 Columbia Expositions, unused. Seven-hundred catalog, a thousand retail. Not the sort of thing you find in the post-office booklets on the memorial first day covers currently available, but he wanted them. Very badly.

His secretary opened the door and stuck her head in. On the outside of the glass was:

“Mr. Runyan,” she said.

Sharples felt a tightening in his stomach. He nodded, quickly shoving the stamp catalog under some folders on his desk. He was studying one of them at random when Runyan came into the room. After a full 60 seconds, Sharples clapped shut the folder and looked up snappily.

“Runyan — is that it?”

“Same as three days ago,” said Runyan. “I have a new residence address. Sixteen-Twenty Bush Street.”

“Why have you moved from the... um...” Sharples was finally consulting Runyan’s file. “The Westward Hotel?”

“They’ve received a demolition notice. The building is going to be torn down.”

Sharples closed the file. Runyan continued to stand there. Sharples looked up with irritation which seemed laced with nerves. “Was there anything else?”

“I’m waiting for you to write it in the file.”

Sharples flung the file open almost petulantly and wrote the new address on the COMMENTS sheet with a ballpoint pen. He turned the file around so Runyan could see the address and the date written there.

“That satisfy you?”

Runyan turned and left the office without speaking.

Sharples blew out a long pent breath, then wrote the address again, this time on a sheet of scratch paper which he folded into his morning newspaper. He picked up a porkpie hat with a red feather in it off one of his filing cabinets, put the hat on his head and the newspaper under his arm, and walked out.

Sharples maneuvered his white-bread tuna and his coffee, white, through the noontime office workers to one of the standup counters at the rear of the little sandwich shop on Mission and 18th. A slouchy mid-forties man, finishing a cup of coffee while reading his newspaper, grudgingly made room for him.

Sharples laid down his newspaper to arrange his sandwich and coffee fussily. The slouchy man put his newspaper down beside it to wipe his mouth with a napkin from one of the shiny metal dispensers, picked up Sharples’s folded newspaper while leaving his own, and walked out. He had sleepy eyes and an unmemorable face and a slightly toed-out walk.

Sharples removed from the newspaper the sealed white envelope containing his bribe money for Runyan’s new address. He put the envelope unopened into his inner suitcoat pocket and started eating his sandwich while reading the newspaper. Maybe this would be enough for one of the 1893 Columbia Expositions.

Runyan’s room on Bush Street was almost half again what the Westward Hotel had cost, but it was neat and clean and sunny, with real lace at the windows and a nice framed Audubon print on the wall. He sat on the edge of the bed and, with the Phillips-head screwdriver on his Swiss Army knife, loosened the two tiny screws holding shut the shallow secret compartment of his handmade chess board.

Inside he had hidden the nearly $800 he had saved during his seven years in San Quentin. Since any money a prisoner is trying to remove unofficially from any California State penal institution is considered contraband, no matter how honestly accumulated, Runyan had chosen this method of bringing out his meager hoard. Others used the backing of photos or paintings, the bindings of books, the heels of their shoes.

Perhaps Runyan should have tried one of those more common methods. The compartment was empty. His money was gone. By flashing his ace around to show he had only one day left, he had given whichever con had ferreted out his secret enough time to grab Runyan’s stash.

Big Art Elliott had planned to be back to his office by three, but it was closer to four-thirty when he walked in. Gladyce was typing a letter he’d given her last week, handwritten on lined yellow paper. His mind seemed to go blank when he tried to organize his thoughts aloud, and besides, the blond secretary didn’t take shorthand anyway. She had the job because her husband Hank was a long-haul driver in the union.

“Any calls or anything?”

She jerked a thumb at his private office. “Or anything,” she said darkly. “The auditors were here waiting when I got back from lunch.”

He remembered then. He made a disgusted but resigned face.

“They give you any idea of how long they’ll—”

The phone rang and Gladyce held up a hand for him to wait.

“Amalgamated Truckers Local Number Eight-Seven-Three.”

Art stared moodily at her as she covered the receiver with her hand. “A man calling long distance, says he’s your brother?”

“Oh yeah, sure.” Art grabbed the receiver and talked standing beside her desk. “Where the hell are you, kid? I thought you were coming up after you got...” He paused, shooting a glance at Gladyce. “After, you know...”

“Something came up, I’m still in San Francisco,” said Runyan’s voice. There was an embarrassed pause. “I hate to ask, Art, but is that offer of a loan still good?”

“Hell yes, whadda ya need? Five-hundred? A thousand?” Art winked at Gladyce as he listened. Gladyce had a nice jiggly chest and wore blouses that showed plenty of it. Maybe he’d take a crack at her one of these days when her old man was out of town on a run. “You got it. Give me your address, one of the guys in the local down there will drop it by in a hour.”

Runyan gave him the Bush Street address, which he wrote on Gladyce’s scratchpad. Runyan thanked him and promised to get the money back as quickly as he could.

“Whenever — or never,” laughed Art. “Remember, I’m expecting you up here in a few days.” He hung up and gave Gladyce the slip of paper. “Give Tandis a call down in San Francisco, tell him to have somebody drop five hundred from petty cash around there this afternoon. My kid brother’ll be waiting. Tell him I’ll send him a check to cover it this afternoon.”

“Sure, Art.” Gladyce leaned forward, a wistful look on her face and her best attributes offered for inspection. Art inspected. Nice. Damn nice. “I wish somebody would give me five hundred bucks just like that,” she said.

“Maybe we ought to talk about it sometime,” said Art.

“Hank’s not coming until tomorrow night.”

“Well, maybe I’ll come tonight,” he said, straight-faced.

“Count on it,” said Gladyce.

Going into his office, Art realized that Gladyce looked a little like his ex-, Dolly. Even had that look in her eyes like she was gonna pop the weasel any second when she was talking about money. Fucking broads, they were all the same.

Angelo Tenconi turned in at a tiny Italian deli a few doors down the street from a large supermarket on Columbus Ave. He was just about finished with his rounds. He had collectors and, if necessary, muscle to make collections in the rest of the city, but North Beach was home base for him. Keep in touch with his roots. Local boy makes good — or I’ll break your freaking arm.

Inside, he swaggered through the rich Italian smells of garlic and tomato paste and onion and salami and peppers and basil and olive oil and dried anchovy. Behind the little sandwich counter the old Mustache Pete and his broadbeamed wife, both in their sixties, were chattering volubly in a patois of English and Genovese as they covered the cut meats left over from the noon sandwich trade.

The old man looked up as Tenconi loomed up beside the counter, starting, in a heavy accent, “Can I helpa...” then stopping and going on in a different tone, “Oh. You. Tenconi.”

Tenconi thrust by them without speaking and punched NO SALE on the old-fashioned ornate scrolled cash register. As he did, another customer entered the front of the shop. Tenconi paid no attention; in North Beach, he did what he wanted.

He took out the thin sheaf of bills held with a rubber band and counted them. He looked up scowling when he had finished.

“There’s only the vig here. Nothing on principal.”

The wife burst out despairingly, “E che vuoi. Sempre l’interesse, sempre piu interesse...”

Tenconi shrugged in cold indifference, meanwhile fighting hidden laughter. Actually, he didn’t want these old jerk-offs ever getting to their nut. They’d pay him interest forever.

“Hey, Mama, that’s your problem. The supermarket, they got lower prices, good fresh produce, Italian run, they get the business, capisce?” He added coldly, “Nobody asked you to borrow money to keep this dump going.”

He went out of the store shoving the money in his pocket, savoring the moment as he did every week. He’d worked as a delivery boy for these old sciagurati, they’d ordered him around plenty then. Now it was his turn. Jerk-offs.

When he was gone, the other customer appeared from the other aisle. He seemed not to notice their humiliation; instead, he gestured after Tenconi. “Wasn’t that Angie Tenconi?”

“Da big man,” muttered the old Italian.

“Where’s he living these days?” the man asked idly.

They knew, of course. Despite everything, North Beach was still an Italian community where people knew each other’s business. Runyan had counted on that.