Sally Spencer - Blackstone and the New World

‘Listen, kid, I’m sorry O’Brien got killed,’ O’Shaugnessy interrupted. ‘An’ I’m sorry for his wife and children, too. But any man who goes around disturbin’ existing practices is just askin’ for trouble.’

‘And deserves what he gets?’ the Limey asked, with a voice you could have cut diamonds with.

‘Yeah, I suppose you could say that,’ Captain O’Shaugnessy agreed, because he was sure as hell not going to be intimidated — or made to feel he’d been put in the wrong — by an Englishman .

‘Did you know that a large part of the investigation that Inspector O’Brien was conducting just before he died was focused almost exclusively on you — and the bribery you’re involved in, sir?’ Meade asked.

So what? O’Shaugnessy asked himself.

Why should that bother him, when there wasn’t a captain in the whole of New York City who made a secret of the fact that he accepted payments for the services he performed?

How could it be a secret, even if he wanted it to be, when there were so many people involved in the process — the saloon keepers and brothel owners who paid the bribes; the patrolmen who collected the bribes; the sergeants who peeled off their percentage before passing the bribes up to the captain; the inspectors, superintendents, judges and politicians at the end of the chain, all of whom, unlike hard-working precinct captains, did virtually nothing to earn their share. .

The inspectors, superintendents, judges and politicians!

O’Shaugnessy felt his heart beating just a little faster, because it could be argued, if you were of a mind to, that some of their share — which they didn’t earn, but certainly expected — had never actually reached them, and was now residing in the bank account with the name O’Shaugnessy on it.

If that snooping son of a bitch, Inspector Patrick O’Brien, had found out about that, and if the information ever did actually reach those people higher up the chain. .

But then Captain O’Shaugnessy realized it was never going to happen, because after O’Brien’s death, certain actions had been taken which made it impossible for it to happen.

And it was this realization which immediately turned what could have been a stressful meeting into an opportunity to have some good bullying fun at the expense of the hoity-toity sergeant and the skinny Limey.

‘So you’re sayin’ Inspector O’Brien had some files on me, are you?’ O’Shaugnessy asked.

‘A great many files,’ Meade said.

‘In fact, there’s a whole drawer-full of them,’ the Limey added with conviction.

‘An’ have you got them now?’ O’Shaugnessy asked.

‘We have.’

O’Shaugnessy smiled. ‘Do you know, boys, I simply don’t believe you.’

Meade turned to Blackstone. ‘Captain O’Shaugnessy must have heard the rumour that all the files which were in Inspector O’Brien’s office have disappeared,’ he said lightly.

‘Perhaps he even went so far as to help them to disappear himself,’ the Limey suggested.

O’Shaughnessy’s grin widened. ‘An’ let’s just say you’re right in suspectin’ that I had somethin’ to do with their disappearance,’ he told the Limey. ‘Let’s go even further, an’ say I had a big fire in that stove over there in the corner — even though it is midsummer, an’ almost hot enough to roast a pig on the sidewalk — how are you goin’ to prove that what I burned was Inspector O’Brien’s files?’

‘The good captain thinks that he’s completely in the clear,’ the Limey said to Meade.

‘But that’s because he doesn’t know about all the files that Inspector O’Brien kept in his office at home,’ Meade said to the Limey.

O’Shaugnessy felt another twinge of misgiving.

‘So just what was in these files of his?’ he asked, praying that Sergeant Meade wouldn’t suddenly start quoting certain bank account numbers or lists of property deeds.

And Meade didn’t!

All he did say was, ‘I’d prefer not to reveal that at the moment.’

Which, as far as Captain Michael O’Shaugnessy was concerned, was a mistake.

A big one!

‘You ever play poker, Alex?’ the captain asked.

‘I have been known to.’

‘An’ I’ll just bet that every time you do, you go home with a hole in your pocket. See, boy, the second you said you’d prefer not to reveal that, I knew you were bluffin’ — I knew that though you were pretendin’ you’d got a full house, you were holdin’ no more than a pair of deuces. At best! An’ you ain’t gonna bring down Bull O’Shaugnessy with a pair of deuces.’

‘Perhaps you’re right,’ Meade agreed quietly. ‘Or perhaps I’ve got such a good hand that I don’t want to lay it on the table yet.’

‘And anyway, the poker analogy doesn’t really hold up,’ the Limey said calmly.

‘The what don’t hold up?’ O’Shaugnessy asked.

‘The poker analogy. If you’re playing poker, then the hand you have is the hand you have. It’s fixed — unless you’re foolish enough to try and deal off the bottom of the deck — and there’s nothing you can do about it. Bribery and corruption isn’t like that at all. Firstly, there are many more cards in the deck, and secondly, you can draw them at any time.’

‘Am I just being a dumb ole Irishman, or is this guy talking a load of horseshit?’ O’Shaugnessy asked Meade.

The sergeant smiled sweetly. ‘Oh, he’s definitely not talking horseshit, sir, and if you didn’t understand it that’s probably because he didn’t explain it clearly enough.’ He turned to Blackstone. ‘Try again, Sam,’ he suggested.

‘If we lay out all the mistakes you’ve made on the table for you to see,’ the Limey said, ‘you’ll immediately start going round cleaning them up. And once you have cleaned them up, they won’t be mistakes any more. Which is the last thing we want — because without your mistakes, you’re no use to us.’

‘Let me be quite clear on this,’ O’Shaugnessy said. ‘You’re threatening me, ain’t you?’

Meade turned to the Limey again. ‘Told you he’d be bound to catch on eventually,’ he said.

They seemed so sure of themselves — so much at ease — O’Shaugnessy thought. So maybe they really did have something on him. But, hell, he was a precinct captain , and he was damned if he was going to be threatened by a detective sergeant and a Limey .’

‘I’ve had enough of listening to your crap!’ he said. ‘I want you out of my office. Now!’

Those few words — delivered harshly by a captain renowned for his violence — should have been enough to have the two men scurrying away like a pair of frightened rabbits.

Yet they weren’t! Meade stayed perfectly still and the Limey actually crossed his legs as if he was settling in for a long session.

‘Have I got to call in a few of my boys to help you out of the office?’ O’Shaugnessy demanded.

‘You could do that,’ the Limey said.

But there was something in his voice which suggested that doing it would be a mistake, and almost against his own will, O’Shaugnessy heard himself saying, ‘You’ve got five seconds to come up with a reason why I shouldn’t.’

But it was at least ten seconds before Blackstone spoke again, and when he did, he said, ‘A smart man would cover all his options. Are you a smart man, Captain O’Shaugnessy?’

‘Smart enough,’ O’Shaugnessy said. ‘Smarter than any goddamn Limey, that’s for sure.’

But he didn’t quite believe it himself. And even if he was smarter than Blackstone, he still felt uncomfortable. There was a power about the Limey that went beyond mere brute force — a power which meant that even if you were beating the shit out of him, he would, somehow, still be in charge.