The Strangler

38

They were like vampires, these Mob guys. They came out at night. Lunch was breakfast, supper was lunch, the workday ended anytime before sunrise. The big boss, Charlie Capobianco, would drive himself into the city from his sprawling oceanfront house in Swampscott after noontime. His workday began at the “clubhouse” on Thatcher Street. Around seven he might sweep into a favored restaurant with his retinue, like a feudal lord paying a call on a vassal. Then it was on to C.C.’s, a bar he owned in the Combat Zone where he kept an office. Sometime around two or three in the morning Capobianco would drive himself home. Hardly anyone knew when he left; hardly anyone was still around.

BPD Station Number One was in the same North End neighborhood, a couple of blocks off Hanover Street, the main drag. It was not unusual for Joe to recognize these guys on the street, big shots like the Capobianco brothers or Vinnie Gargano, or schools of bottom-feeding plug-uglies that cruised the area. Some he knew by name, many more by face. Long before Joe had enlisted in-or been impressed into-the Capobianco organization, he had made it a point to ignore them. Most cops did the same. Leave the gangbuster crap to the movies. In real life, there was only danger for a cop in tangling with these guys. Better to keep a respectful distance. And now that he was lugging around his Big Secret, Joe avoided the North End altogether, lest a wave or a nod betray him.

A shit-cloud had settled over Joe. Every day, bad luck all around. Every fucking day, more trouble. It was all around him, it was inside him, this fucking Trouble, like a virus, and now he would have to ride out the illness right to the end. He was so damn tired. He needed a good long sleep was what he needed. If he could just sleep, then- then -maybe he could think this thing through.

After working a last-half, around one in the morning, Joe guided his big Olds Eighty-Eight to a stop behind a fancier black Cadillac on Mass. Ave., across the river in Cambridge. He turned off the ignition. Nearly a full minute passed. Inside the Cadillac the dim silhouette of Vinnie Gargano threw up his hands, and Joe figured he had better get going. He slipped into the passenger seat of Gargano’s Caddy.

“What was that with the sitting? What, are you listening to the radio?”

“No. I was making sure nobody was going to see.”

“Who the fuck’s going to see?”

“I don’t know. People.”

“What people? I got things to do. I’m sitting here thinking, What’s with this guy? Is he waiting for me to come to him or what? This is some crazy fucking cop I found!”

Joe shifted in his seat.

But Gargano was in a lighthearted mood. “If I was that broad from Joe Tecce’s with the tits out to here and the hair out to here, you wouldn’t be able to get in the car fast enough. You’d’a jumped through the window, pshoo, with your pants around your ankles.”

“I took care of that thing.”

“Listen to you, ‘I took care of that thing.’”

“I took care of that thing you asked me.”

Gargano gave Joe a disappointed look. All business. This big, dumb mick was rejecting his friendship. Again. So be it.

“I talked to the prosecutor at the BMC. He’s going to file a nol pros.”

“Speak English.”

“He’s going to shit-can the case.”

“What else?”

“What else what?”

“What else do you want to tell me?”

“Nothing.” Joe puzzled over what Gargano might be fishing for. What the hell was Joe doing here with Vinnie The Animal Gargano? Why would Gargano take the time to oversee Joe’s case personally? There were bigger tabs to collect. There were also better ears to occupy Gargano the spymaster. As a fixer or an ear, Joe Daley was not worth the trouble.

Gargano handed him an envelope. “A little walking-around money.”

Joe checked inside. Two hundred. Two or three days’vig. Walking-around money was all it was. Then again, why would Gargano help Joe out of the hole he had dug? You’re a dummy, the little voice said. Taking the money would do nothing but seal Joe in further. He took it anyway. He needed it. Dummy.

“I got something else for you. You know about that Copley job? Half million in diamonds.”

“Read about it in the papers.”

“I need those stones. They belong to a friend of mine.”

“Diamonds? What do I know-? I don’t know from diamonds.”

“I said they belong to a friend of mine.”

“I don’t know about that kind of stuff.”

“I thought you were a detective.”

“Not that kind.”

“The fuck’s the difference? You’re a detective-detect.”

“It’s just, I can’t promise…I don’t know how, where to start.”

“You don’t know where to start? Here, let me give you a fuckin’ clue. Start with your fuck-up of a brother.”

“My brother?” Joe tried to deliver the line in a natural way.

“‘Oh, my brother!’ Yeah, the thief. Something gets stolen, you start with the thief. Whattaya think?”

“But-”

“Just get the stones, Joe. Your brother didn’t do it, fine, I don’t give a shit. I really don’t. Just get the stones, that’s all I care.”

“You want me to squeeze my own brother? I can’t do that.”

“You can. You will.”

“Give me something else. Anything else.”

“They figured you’d say that.”

“Well, they figured right. I’m not gonna do it.”

“They also give me this.” He dug in his jacket pocket for a folded piece of paper and laid it on the dash in front of Joe.

The paper listed Kat and Little Joe’s names, the family’s home address, and Little Joe’s school, all in neat Palmer Method handwriting.

“Let me tell you something about how this thing works. Don’t ever tell me no. You got me? I don’t ever want to hear that word out of you. Just get those stones.”