Walk on the Wild Side by Bob Mayer

Author:Bob Mayer [Mayer, Bob]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-12-08T22:00:00+00:00

11

Friday Afternoon,

12 August 1977

HELL’S KITCHEN, MANHATTAN

Kane said goodbye to Kinsman and Mac, who wandered off to find a bar, then he asked Thao to remain in the diner and meet Plaikos when he arrived, much to the Montagnard’s chagrin. Kane made a quick call to Pope, asking the former newspaperman to dig up what he could on Crawford and James Roosevelt. All that accomplished, Kane stood on the corner of Washington and Gansevoort. A big black Caddy, the car of choice of mobsters, smoothly pulled to the curb.

Kane waited a moment, but no door opened. The passenger window powered down.

“Get the fuck in,” Matteo said.

Kane entered and indicated the cast. “How’s driving with that thing?”

“Fuck you.”

Matteo pulled into traffic and accelerated hard, throwing Kane back in the seat. “Should I buckle up?” Kane asked.

“I ain’t gonna crash,” Matteo said.

“Right.”

The positive aspect of riding with Matteo was he didn’t make small talk, not exactly Kane’s forte. They rode the rest of the way up the west side of Manhattan to Hell’s Kitchen, which was just above the rail yards which Matteo’s boss, Sophia Cappucci, was using Kane to negotiate with Roy Cohn who repped Donald Trump, developer, in order to get a piece of the action for the building of a convention center. It occurred to Kane that while the City was pretty big, it was actually very connected in many intriguing ways on a certain level. He wasn’t sure if that level was above or below, but given recent events, he leaned toward it being closer to hell than heaven. Which reminded him: “Hey, Matteo, do you know why they call this area Hell’s Kitchen?” Kane asked, violating his own small talk instincts in favor of Father Benedict’s history lesson.

Matteo glanced over at him as he leaned on the horn and shouted a curse in Italian at the bus in front of them while flipping an unseen middle finger inside the shaded windshield confines of the car. Matteo didn’t say no, so Kane leapt into the void.

“There are several theories, but the one I like is that Davy Crockett said that whenever he met an Irishman from New York City they were worse than savages and too mean to swab hell’s kitchen.”

Matteo laughed, transforming his face into something almost human. “Davy Crockett? I liked that show. What’s his name? Fess Parker? And the Irish? Yeah. Fuck them.”

Kane decided to quit while he was ahead, given it was just a story and not accurate. Matteo seemed to like it.

Sofia’s muscleman pulled the Caddy in front of a rundown garage.

“Can you give me a minute before coming in?” Kane asked, feeling the shadow of The Magnificent Seven plan that hadn’t worked to perfection in Boston.

“Yeah. Sure.”

As he left the Caddy, Kane wondered briefly whether Matteo could count to sixty. Despite the heat all the doors leading to the garage were closed. The sound of power tools echoed out of the brick building. Kane pulled open a door and entered. Whatever the police raid had been, it certainly hadn’t put the place out of a business.

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