The Gangster

“Not likely. Bribing witnesses and jurors is more a boss’s strategy. But here’s the thing that strikes me. Look at the order of when they were killed — each stiletto victim stood a rung higher on the ladder of political power — Ghiottone, at the bottom; then Quiller, a heeler and block captain, one step up; then Lehane, the district election leader’s heeler. Makes me wonder who’s next.”

“District leader?”

“More likely his heeler.”

Helen Mills rushed into the bull pen. Detectives straightened neckties, smoothed hair, and brushed crumbs from their vests. She spotted Bell and handed him a small envelope.

“What’s this?”

“Claypool.”

Bell slit it open with his knife. Out fell a photograph, so recently developed it smelled of fixer. The picture was slightly blurred, as Claypool was turning his face, but it was him for sure, and anyone who knew the camera-shy lawyer would recognize him.

“Where’d you get this?”

“I snapped it. Some girls from school came into town. We pretended we were tourists, and I snapped him while snapping them, when he left his office for lunch.”

Bell slipped it into his memo book. “Nicely done, Helen. Take the girls to Rector’s Lobster Palace. Tell Charlie it’s on me and I said to give you the best table in the house.”

Detectives watched her leave.

Fulton said, “Quiller four days ago. Then Sullivan, Lehane’s heeler, yesterday.”

“Working their way up to a full-fledged alderman,” said Kisley.

Isaac Bell put down the knife and picked up his fountain pen. “Which of them are under investigation?”

“Which ain’t?” asked Kisley, holding up the Times

with a front page column headline that read

TWO ALDERMEN HELD IN BRIBERY SCANDAL

“Of the forty crooks on the Board of Aldermen, James Martin’s in deepest at the moment. Alderman Martin was always looking for patronage. Ten years if convicted, and sure to be convicted. Word is, he won’t make bail.”

“Why can’t an alderman make bail? The whole point of serving on the Boodle Board is to get rich.”

“Broke,” called Scudder Smith, who was nursing a flask in the corner. “Lost it all to a gal and poker.”

Bell said, “Are you sure about that, Scudder?”

Scudder Smith, a crackersjack New York reporter before Joseph Van Dorn persuaded him to become a detective, said, “You can take it to the bank.”

“Hey, where you going, Isaac?” asked Kisley.

The tall detective was already on his feet, pocketing the knife and his memo book, clapping on his hat, and striding out the door. “Criminal Courts Building. See if the gal and the gamblers left Alderman Martin anything to trade for bail.”

Midway through the door, he paused.

“Harry?”

“What’s up?” asked Harry Warren.

“Would you go downtown and find a way to shake hands with Antonio Branco?”

Harry Warren exchanged mystified glances with Mack Fulton and Wally Kisley. “Sure thing, Isaac. Care to tell me why I’m going to shake hands with Antonio Branco?”

“Do it and I’ll tell you why,” said Isaac Bell. “Just make sure he’s not wearing gloves.”

* * *

Alderman James Martin shielded his face from the newspaper artists with a hand clutching a half-smoked cigar while an assistant district attorney told the magistrate that he should be jailed in the West 54th Street Police Court Prison unless he put up a bond of $15,000. The DA’s sleuth who had arrested him on the Queensboro Bridge after he left the Long Island City stone mason’s yard, where he had received the money, stood smirking in the doorway. Thankfully, thought Martin, the DA had set the bribe trap in a stone yard, where he had legitimate reason to be. He was a building contractor, after all, wasn’t he, like many a New York City alderman. He prayed the magistrate would buy that defense at least enough to reduce his bail to an amount low enough to borrow.

“Twelve five-hundred-dollar bills,” the assistant DA raved on. “One for each of his fellow aldermen he would pay off to shift their votes on an issue critical to the health and well-being of every man, woman, and child in New York.”

Alderman Martin’s lawyer asked that his client be admitted to a more reasonable bail. Martin waited to hear his fate. Home for supper or weeks in jail.

The magistrate fixed bond at $10,000. The DA’s assistant protested that it was too low, that Martin would run away, but it was, in fact, far more than he could raise, and the alderman pleaded with the magistrate, with little hope.

“Your Honor, I’m not able to furnish a bond of ten thousand.”

“The charge constitutes a felony. If convicted, your sentence could be ten years and a five-thousand-dollar fine. Ten thousand dollars bail is reasonable. I can reduce it no further.”

“I don’t have ten thousand — I had six thousand, but the DA sleuths took it.”

The magistrate’s eyes flashed. “The District Attorney’s detectives did not ‘take’ the money. They confiscated evidence, which happened to be in bills marked ahead of time to ascertain whether you would accept a bribe.”

“That money was given to me in connection with a business deal.”