Hooligans (8 page)

“Yeah,” Salvatore chimed in. “When‟s the final?”

More laughter.

“Give him a chance,” Dutch snapped.

“Okay,” I said, “let‟s forget the bureaucratic bullshit. Here‟s what you‟re dealing with. In the Freeze

we spend most of our time working with the locals, tying known LCN racketeers to ICC, and the ICC

to legitimate sources that have been corrupted. That‟s what I‟m after—I want to know how they got

their hooks into Dunetown and who they had to buy to do it. I‟m not interested in making individual

cases for prostitution or gambling or even homicide. Anything I get that can help you in those areas is

yours.”

“We‟ve heard that song before, old man,” Charlie One Ear said caustically.

“Enough of this true-and-false crap,” Dutch said. “Let‟s get to the meat and potatoes.”

I gave them a brief history of the „Triad, very brief so they wouldn‟t fall asleep.

“Franco Tagliani was very cautious,” I said. “Before we nailed Skeet, Franco had made quite a name

For himself. He was a big shot in Cincy. He contributed to the, ballet, symphony, local sports teams,

everything including the humane society. He loved animals. Everybody‟s lovable old Uncle Franco,

right? When we dumped Skeet, we figured Franco would have to come out of the closet, so we started

a matrix on him. What we call a link analysis. We charted every scrap of information that came our

way that related to the Triad, even the most insignificant stuff. Bits of bullshit from snitches,

restaurants they frequented, social gatherings, weddings, pals, acquaintances, habits, police records,

vacation trips. Hell, we even had Interpol checking on them when they left the country. It all went on

the matrix, and we kept refining it, and finally we ended up with this.”

I took a chart out of my briefcase and pinned it on the wall.

CINCINNATI TRIAD

“There it is,” I said. “The Cincinnati Triad. Anybody thinks they came here for their health should g

back to school.”

No grumbling this time. I had their attention.

I started down the list while I was still ahead, beginning with Franco, once the
consigliere,
the legal

brains, for Skeet, and until a few hours ago, godfather to the Triad.

“Tagliani was a classic
Mafioso,”
I said “His religion was family, friends, and hick everybody else;

Tagliani‟s three daughters are all married to family
capi.
The Triad‟s respected in La Cosa Nostra.

Nobody messes with them. At least nobody has until now.

“Stinetto was Franco‟s executioner, the official enforcer for the outfit, and Tagliani‟s bodyguard. One

of the few people Tagliani trusted. All the other
capi
were under Stinetto‟s direct command. Stinetto

was an old-timer. He made his bones in the fifties, about the time Buggsy Siegel bought his. So what

I‟m saying, they were both tough old pros. Taking them out together like that was ingenious and

gutsy.”

Dutch jumped in at this point. “Whoever pulled this off poisoned two guard dogs and got past three

armed guards. Nobody laid an eye on him or them.”

There was another face that was not on Dutch‟s board: Leo Costello, Mr. Clean, the
consigliere
of the

outfit, summa cum laude graduate of Chicago Law School, mid-to late thirties, married to Tagliani‟s

daughter Maria.

“Costello was a major in Nam,” I said. “Adjutant general‟s office. He never saw combat, spent most

of his time preparing court-martial cases. The man won‟t touch a gun, doesn‟t even hunt. He prefers

the country club set to his own family.”

“Mazzola put us on to him,” said Charlie One Ear. “Him and his friend.

“Lou Cohen?” I asked.

“The same,” said Flowers.. „Neither one of them changed their names.”

“That sounds like him,” I said. “Costello avoids as much contact as possible with the rest of the mob.

He doesn‟t have any shooters around him. And Cohen is a quiet, reclusive accountant. The money

brains and the bagman for the outfit. The Lepers‟ve been trying to burn Cohen for at least ten years.

Zip. But Costello may have to show his colors now.”

“How come?” asked Zapata.

“Because he‟s the most likely one of the bunch to take over as
capo di tutti capi
now that Franco‟s

bought the farm. That‟s unless there‟s something we don‟t know,” I added.

“Such as?” asked Dutch.

“Such as somebody else in the family pushing the old man across and taking over.”

“Oh,” said Dutch, “
that
such as.”

I went on, running down the list of felons who were now in residence in Doomstown:

Johnny Draganata, the tough, no-quarter Moustache Pete from the old school, and professor and priest

t all the Tagliani soldiers, the final authority on tradition and protocol; Rico Stizano, also known as

the Barber, because that‟s what he had once been in Chicago, until he married Tagliani‟s sister. Now

his speciality was gambling. A big family man. They all were.

Tony Logeto, Tagliani‟s son-in-law, „as a cannon and a muscle man, married to Tagliani‟s oldest

daughter, Sheila, and a specialist in loan sharking, extortion, and anything that required more muscle

than brains. Logeto saw himself as big ladies‟ man. A lot of ladies apparently did too.

“Anthony Bronicata is another old-timer,” I told them. “He‟s a onetime soldato with a lot of notches

gun his gun. In dope circles he‟s known as the Peg, short for I1 Pegiore, which means the Worst, and

that—in the trade—means don‟t mess with him. He‟s king pusher, pipeline to the street, and we‟ve

never been able to put a finger on him for anything—possession, conspiracy, distribution, nothing.

Bronicata‟s front is always a restaurant. The only good thing I can say about him is he mikes pretty

fair fettuccine. You want him? If we can nail his ass, Lie‟s yours.”

I had very little recollection of O‟Brian. In my mind I remembered him as a short little Irishman with

a blustery red face and had teeth. Dutch‟s photo showed that lie had a pug nose and a go-to-hell smile,

and his picture was the only pleasant one in the hunch, but I didn‟t let that fool me for a minute. As

the newest member of the clan, he still had to prove himself, and that made him more unpredictable

than any of the rest.

Dutch observed, “All these guns around, and it didn‟t help Tagliani for a minute.”

“Never does if they want you bad enough,” I said.

I pulled two new photographs out of my briefcase and held them up.

“These two look familiar to anybody?” I asked.

There were no takers.

I held up the clearer of the two photos, that of a round-faced man in his sixties with a pleasant smile,

his snake eyes hidden behind sunglasses.

“This is Tuna Chevos,” I said. “We‟ll turn him up.”

“How would you know that?” Charlie One Ear asked.

My stomach started to churn just thinking about Chevos and Nance, his personal assassin.

“I have this little buzzer inside me goes off whenever I‟m within fifty miles of the son of a bitch.”

“Something personal?” Charlie One Ear asked, raising his eyebrows.

I stared at him dead-eyed for a full minute before he looked away. Then I held up the other picture, a

somewhat fuzzy photograph of a lean, hard, ferret-faced man in his mid-thirties, his eyes also

obscured by sunglasses.

“You see Chevos, this one is close behind. He‟s the Greek‟s numero uno, your friendly little

neighbourhood assassin. His name is Turk Nance and he‟s the deadliest one of the lot, a psychopath

with a temper as thin as a shadow. They‟re both cobras. Chevos married into the family but they‟re

outsiders. They play by their own rules.”

“Maybe they did the old bastard in,” Zapata suggested.

“Maybe, but I don‟t think so.”

“Why not?” Dutch asked.

“I don‟t say I‟m ruling them out,” I replied. “I said I don‟t think they did it. It‟s still family. Salvatore,

you know what I mean?”

“He‟s right,” Salvatore said. “I mean, what you say, this Chevos was the old man‟s brother-in-law.

Unless there was real bad blood He let the sentence dangle.

“So where do these two bombos fit in?” Cowboy Lewis asked.

“Chevos brings the stuff in, Bronicata gets it to the wholesalers,” I said, “Nance is Chevos‟ personal

soldato If Chevos says go flush your head in the toilet, Nance‟s head is as good as in the bowl.

There‟s one other thing—don‟t let Chevos fool you because he‟s got Nance for backup. The story

goes that Chevos killed his own brother to make his bones for Skeet. I don‟t know if his brother

needed killing, hut if he was in the same league as Chevos, it was no big loss.

“Nance started in the streets, got a postgrad course in Vietnam, probably killed at least half of the

Bannion gang himself. He favours a nine-millimetre Luger with a twelve-inch barrel and hollow

points soaked in arsenic. A real sweetheart. He‟s also a muscle freak. Sooner or later, when he can

plant Chevos someplace safe for an hour or two, he‟ll show up at the best fitness centre in town.

Everybody in the family is scared shitless of both of them.

“Turk Nance. Remember that name. If you have trouble with him, shoot first.”

“You keep tellin‟ us what you don‟t want,” Callahan said in a dead monotone. “What the hell do you

want?”

I thought about that, about why I was here and what had happened to Dunetown and was going to

happen to it. I thought about a lot of things in the next few seconds.

“1 want the whole damn bunch off the street. I don‟t care if you do it or I do it or we do it together.

They‟re the cockroaches of our society.”

1 looked at Charlie One Ear. “You ask me is it personal? I got five years invested in this bunch. In the

whole rat pack only Costello and Cohen are clean. The rest of them have rap sheets that‟ll stretch

from here to Malibu and back.”

I started pacing. I had lost my temper for a moment, not because of Charlie One Ear or because Dutch

Morehead‟s hooligans didn‟t trust me. I was used to that:. It was because of Cincinnati. I stopped and

looked at each of them in turn.

“Yeah, fuckin‟-A it‟s personal,” I said. “One of my partners on the Tagliani job was Harry Nome,

Wholesome Harry we called him. Best inside man I ever met. He was undercover in Chevos‟ dope

operation. Nance tumbled him. They took him for a ride and Nance stuck his gun up Harry‟s nose,

ripped it off with the gunsight-.--I mean he ripped it off. Then he tossed Harry out of a car doing

about fifty. Harry came out of it a paraplegic.

“We had another man, on loan from the Drug Enforcement Agency. He tried to burrow into the

operation at the New Orleans end. We never saw him or heard from him again. Nothing. He just

disappeared. That‟s been three years now.

“1 had an informant, a hooker named Tammi. She was eighteen years old, recruited by Stizano, who

hooked her on horse when she was fifteen. They had her working interstate and she wanted out, so she

agreed to talk to the attorney general about how hookers are moved around on the national circuit,

who runs it, that sort of thing. Very strong stuff. Nance got her away from us. He cut off her nose and

both ears, stuffed them down her throat, and strangled her with them. Costello—Mr. Clean? He was

Nance‟s mouthpiece. The bastard wasn‟t even indicted.”

I paused for a minute, letting it all sink in.

“Naw,” I said, “it isn‟t personal. It‟s never personal, right? I mean, why should I be pissed? I was

lucky. When they took a shot at me, the bullet went in my side, here, just below the ribs, popped out

my back, and went on its merry way. The bullet hurt, but not like the arsenic it was soaked in.”

I sat down.

Not bad, I thought. Not bad at all. Save up the rough stuff until the end.

Nobody said anything else for a minute or two.

I didn‟t know it at the time, but there was another name I should have added to the list that night:

Longnose Graves.

I would get to know him well in the next few days. I would get to know a lot of people well in the

next few days, very damn few of them for long.

9

Dutch stood in front of the room, a Teutonic frown etched into his heavy features.

“Thanks,” he said.

“Any time.”

“I don‟t want to upset anybody,” he said, turning to his troops, “but these..,
ash lochers
have been

under our surveillance two weeks. A whole family of them, and we didn‟t even know it!”

The group looked stricken, none more than Charlie One Ear.

“I can‟t believe it,” he said, shaking his head in disbelief. “Not so much as a hint from any of my