The Complete Cases of Vee Brown, Volume 1 by Carroll John Daly

Author:Carroll John Daly [Daly, Carroll John]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Detective
Publisher: Altus Press
Published: 2014-08-17T11:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER FOUR

Louie Mandozza

LOUIE MANDOZZA! Big, certainly, but not tall. It was the breadth of his shoulders that made him so huge; the length of his thick arms, hanging down so that the ends of his fingers reached his knees. Then the huge, strong, hairy hands. I think it was the hands and the forward bend of his shoulders that first gave me the impression of a huge gorilla. It was in his walk too; a sort of swaying motion to his body. I raised my eyes and looked at his face, his head. It was a large head with a high forehead and jet-black hair smoothed straight back behind it. Sleek, oily hair that shone in the light.

There was nothing of the gangster in Mandozza’s face, unless it was his mouth. Thick, cruel, coarse lips that turned out slightly, like a negro’s. A big, yet sharp beak of a nose and hard, staring, peculiar-colored eyes. No, they weren’t pink, as Brown had said. At least, I don’t think so. The pupils themselves were just two tiny points, and the balls of the eyes behind them were slightly tinged with a dull red streak which, coming and going as it did, gave one the impression of pink—like a Persian cat’s eyes. Soft and kind the eyes seemed until he set those black points in the center on me. But they were hard and cold and steady and maybe cruel, like his mouth—but I couldn’t be sure.

But Brown was introducing us and Mandozza was talking. “Dean Condon, eh? I have read your articles in The Globe and enjoyed them.” He took my hand in one of his great hairy ones, and though I’m a strong man and rather proud of my grip, I felt my fingers give; go limp under his grasp just before he dropped my hand.

Brown motioned the three of them to the long, low couch—so low and soft that it was difficult to arise quickly from it.

Mandozza eyed it a moment, showed his white even teeth in a smile and dropped into the center of it. His men grunted, and sat one on either side of him. He made no effort to introduce them.

Wong brought the whisky and soda. The two guards smiled, stretched hands toward the bottle of Scotch as Mandozza spoke. “My friends don’t drink,” he said crisply, and reached for the bottle as the hands of the two guards dropped back on their knees. It was funny how they sat so. It was quite apparent that they made a point of keeping their hands plainly in view.

“I never drink during business hours myself,” Vee jerked his head toward me, “but Dean will join you of course.”

Mandozza took a generous dose of the whisky, poured the soda into the glass and held it in his hand as he watched me mix my drink. He waited, too, until I drank before he put his own glass to his lips. Mandozza was a careful man.

“That’s not bad liquor for these times.

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