The Gangster

It seemed to Bell that the first shots were fired simultaneously from both sides. Whichever gang shot first, it triggered a fusillade, and the tall detective found himself in the middle of a shooting war. Bullets splintered the wooden jamb, shattered windows, and ricocheted off cobblestones.

Bell drew his pistol in the event a charging Walloper or a counterattacking Salata gangster ran for his doorway. He was reasonably sure he was better armed with his heavy automatic, but there were at least twenty of them, jerking triggers as fast they could, spraying lead like dueling Maxim machine guns. Best to let them get it out of their systems, or at least run out of ammunition. A quick glance down the street confirmed that the Irish were banging away like the Fourth of July, and would be for a while, as their women were tossing change purses filled with fresh bullets.

The tall detective threw another quick glance at the Italians. They were pawing through their sacks for boxes of ammunition and reloading with the speed of men who had been in gunfights before. Bell pressed into his doorway, which was beginning to feel very shallow.

When he heard a lull, he looked again. A glimpse of the Italians offered a sudden opportunity to get his hands on Ernesto Leone. The terrified counterfeiter was attempting to slither away on his belly, hugging the cobblestones and shielding his head with his hands while trying to pull himself along on his elbows. If ever a man was out of place, thought Bell, it was Leone. And if ever a man could shed light on the alliance of extortionists, bombers, kidnappers, smugglers, and counterfeiters, it was Leone.

Bell pivoted out of the doorway. Bullets plucked his sleeve. One burned close to his shoulder. Hugging the buildings, jumping stoops and ash cans, he ran toward Leone, covered the twenty yards in six long bounds, seized the counterfeiter by the scruff of the neck, and hauled him into the closest doorway.

“You’re under arrest.”

* * *

“No gun, no gun,” cried Ernesto Leone.

The madman who had rescued him was pointing a pistol in his face and frisking his clothing for weapons. “False money. No gun. No gun.”

For days, Leone had had awful forebodings that someone was following him. He had spotted the shadows. Assuming they were Secret Service agents, he would not make counterfeiting charges even worse by getting pinched with a gun.

“Start talking.”

“What?” Leone could barely hear him over the roar of the battle.

“You owe me your life.”

Leone hung his head. “I know.”

“Who’s your boss?”

“I don’t know.”

Charlie Salata charged into the doorway, gun in hand.

Isaac Bell shot first. Salata jerked his trigger as he fell. The gangster’s bullet tore into Leone’s throat, ripping an artery that fountained blood. Bell dove on him, ripped Leone’s shirttails from his trousers and clamped the cloth around his throat in a stranglehold to try to staunch the bleeding. It was hopeless.

Shotguns boomed. Bell recognized the rapid thunder of humpback 12-gauge Browning Auto-5s and wondered where the gangsters had found such fine weapons. Shouts of fear and men stampeding in every direction meant a third party had joined the battle with a vengeance.

He felt Leone die in his hands.

“Isaac!”

The freight train blocking Eleventh Avenue had rolled away. Italians were running east, Irish and their women running west, and a gang of New York Central Railroad cops were charging up the street, pumping fire from the autoload scatterguns. Leading the cinder dicks was the source of the Brownings, white-haired Van Dorn rail yard specialist Eddie Edwards.

“Heard the gunplay. Figured you’d be in the middle of it.”

“Where’s Salata?” The gangster who had shot Leone was nowhere to be seen.

“Halfway to Little Italy by now.”

“I winged him,” said Bell. “Come on! Let’s get him.”

* * *

Elizabeth Street was packed like a festival. The evening was dry and cool, and thousands had streamed from their airless tenements to enjoy the last of autumn out of doors before winter turned nights bitter. A puppet show blocked most of the street with its tall stage. People gathered under its garland of colored lights and spilled off the sidewalks into the street. Traffic was at a standstill. Peddlers were hard-pressed to sell to customers crammed shoulder to shoulder.

Antonio Branco strolled among them wearing a blue suit, a red scarf, and a derby hat. A commotion drew his eye: Charlie Salata, arm in a sling, swaggering behind a gorilla pushing through the crowd. If Salata was expecting a reward for scoring the Wallopers’ dope, he would learn at his next confession that the Boss held him fully at fault for the death of his counterfeiter.