Night Passage

Chapter 39

They went north from Boston over the Mystic River bridge, Hasty driving the big Mercedes, Jo Jo looming beside him. It was a high bridge and at the peak of its arch you could look east down the long harbor where the city seemed to rise directly from the water, or west, up the river where the vast Boston Edison plant sent white vapor into the bright blue air. Neither Hasty nor Jo Jo paid any attention to the view.

Jo Jo was worried about the way the meeting had gone with Gino. He was bothered by the crack about how he couldn’t spell cat. It had been a mistake for Hasty to call the receptionist a fairy. He probably was. Gino was probably scoring him. But it wasn’t smart to talk like that to a guy like Gino. He didn’t like the way Vinnie Morris always watched him. He never looked at anyone else. Hasty had no idea what these people were like. If Gino simply nodded his head, Vinnie would have shot both of them dead. They always said with Vinnie at least it was quick. No lingering. No pain. One right between the eyes and sayonara. Hasty didn’t get that. Gino had laughed at them both. Jo Jo knew that he had. But Hasty seemed to think he was some kind of stand-up guy because he got to have war games behind the high school every week or so. He wouldn’t be so fucking stand-up if Vinnie put one right between Hasty’s eyes.

Jo Jo didn’t know what Gino would do, but he wasn’t going to let that fairy remark go. Jo Jo was willing to bet the ranchos grande on that. He hunched the muscles in his back, felt them swell and press against the fabric of his shirt. He often did that when he was scared. Made him feel impregnable. As if the wall of muscle he’d created could keep him safe.

Hasty felt good about the way he’d stood up to Gino Fish. You have to be firm. And he was pretty sure they knew that he was firm. He wasn’t just some suburban banker in over his head. He commanded armed men. Once they realized who they were dealing with, Fish had been as nice as pie. Good meeting, Hasty thought. The arms deal seemed firm and Freedom’s Horsemen could at last be fully combat-ready. He couldn’t stave off what was to come, perhaps, but, properly armed, he and his men could keep their little piece of America safe and free. They went over the crest of the bridge, where the toll booths had been before it was toll-free northbound, and sloped down toward Chelsea. Hasty needed to clear Tammy Portugal from the agenda. He could not have his life’s work contaminated by a mercenary woman, just as his life’s work was to reach fulfillment. He was a little worried about the new chief. Jesse didn’t seem to be what he was supposed to be when Hasty hired him. He seemed to have his drinking under control. He seemed to be a lot tougher and maybe a lot smarter than they had thought he would be when he had sat in the hotel room in Chicago smelling of booze, trying not to slur his speech. But that wasn’t clear yet, and aside from manhandling Jo Jo, which Hasty had actually rather enjoyed, Stone hadn’t gotten in the way, and maybe would not. If he did he could be dealt with. If one were steadfast, one could deal with what came along. It was the girl that needed tending. He knew it was as much his fault as hers, his own weakness, to throw himself into the arms of this cheap tramp, like he had. But he was a man, and a man needed things. Cissy seemed unable to give him those things. He didn’t know why, and after a while had stopped thinking about it. Women were women. So he’d made a mistake, but he could rectify it.

He glanced over at Jo Jo sitting vastly in the passenger side of the big Mercedes. Someday, perhaps, when he was no longer of use, he might be rectified as well. But not yet. For all his loutish stupidity he was handy.

They reached the flat where the roadway curved through Chelsea before it split off to go north along Route 1 or east along the Revere Beach Parkway.

“Jo Jo,” Hasty said. “I need you to fix something for me.”