Andrew Vachss - Two Trains Running

“He’s a ferret-faced schemer, no doubt,” Shalare said. “And that’s a plus for him. The minus is, he looks like what he is. And, like you said, television. That’s going to play a big role in what’s to come.”

Beaumont nodded his concurrence.

“The timing is right,” Shalare continued. “The Taft machine pretty much died off when Ike got the nomination away from them. A lot of them crossed over after that. Look at Warren. They took care of him, and, soon as he got on the Supreme Court, he ambushed the lot of them.”

“That was Eisenhower’s mistake. Nixon wouldn’t make the same one.”

“If we all pull together, Nixon won’t get the chance.”

“Tell me again why I should be part of that,” Beaumont said, lighting another cigarette.

“Didn’t I already?”

“Dioguardi? He’s not such a problem, for what you’re asking.”

“It’s not the person, it’s the… situation. Look at this Castro, over in Cuba. The great revolutionary he is, freeing his people from the yoke of oppression. Mark what I say: he’ll be the same as the man he removed. He’ll use different words, dress different, maybe. But he didn’t take over that country to free it, Roy. He took it over to rule it.”

“So, even if Dioguardi… disappeared, there’d be another to take his place?”

“You know that’s true as well as I do,” Shalare said. “It’s not Dioguardi himself who has to disappear; it’s the reason he was sent that has to go.”

“Here we’re talking about elections, and you want to make me a promise,” Beaumont said, smiling to take some of the sting out of his words.

“That’s right, I do,” Shalare said, not rising to the bait. “For starters, there won’t be any more squabbling about jukebox rents. Nobody else trying to handle the pinball machines or the punch cards, either.”

“Pennies.”

“Pennies add up to dollars, don’t they? And nobody likes to pay the same landlord twice. Dioguardi’s people are going to stop selling protection insurance, too. For starters,” Shalare reminded Beaumont.

“Because…?”

“Because he’s going to be told to stop. And he will. Everything. This whole town will go back to its rightful owner. You, Roy.”

“He never took it. And he never could.”

“He never did. But he was coming, and you know it. Now he stops.”

“One door opens and another one-”

“He stops everything, Roy. The only thing Salvatore Dioguardi’s going to do in Locke City from now on is pay his taxes.”

“How’s he going to keep his men, with no income?”

“Then I guess he’ll lose some of them.”

“The way he already has?”

“I told you, we had nothing to do with that,” Shalare said. “Anyways, losing a few men wouldn’t keep him off you-that’s just the cost of doing business.”

“I don’t know how that whole Mafia thing works. Is Dioguardi some kind of big shot, or just their stalking horse?”

“I’m not sure. What difference does it make?”

“If he’s a stalking horse, one they put in here to see if they could find a soft spot, they’ll learn soon enough that they made a mistake. But if he’s a big shot, and this was his own idea, that’s different.”

“Because, if he’s a big shot, he might be too stubborn to pull out? Or even big enough to call in more troops?”

“There’s that. But I was thinking of something different.”

“And that would be…?”

“You know how they sell cattle? Price them at so much a head?”

“Yeah…” Shalare said, cautiously.

“Well, with people, it’s not like that. Because some heads are worth a lot more than others. Especially when there’s a gesture of good faith involved.”

“Ah.”

“My sister always tells me, when someone gives you a gift, it’s low-class to look at the price tag. It’s the thought that counts, you’ve heard that?”

“Sure. I was raised the same way.”

“But that’s gifts, not business. In business, a man never wants to get shorted on a deal.”

“So, if you traded for a… single head of cattle, you’d want to know if you got the best bull of the herd?”

“Wouldn’t you?”

“I would. In an undertaking as big as this one, there’s a lot that has to be overlooked. You deal with men you wouldn’t have in your home,” Shalare said, glancing around the spacious room as if to underscore the bond between them. “The Jews killed Christ, and we’re dealing with them on this. What’s going further than that?”

“What did the coloreds ever do?” Beaumont said.

“I don’t under-”

“You deal with the coloreds, too, don’t you? Maybe not you, personally, but this whole ‘effort’ you’ve been talking about, the people running the show, they had better be doing that, if they want to pull this off.”

“Well, sure and you’re right,” Shalare said. “I didn’t mean we only deal with our enemies, just that we have to go outside the tribe-all of us do, to make this happen.”

“ ‘Tribes.’ That’s just a word, too. Like ‘blood,’ ” said Beaumont, contempt strong in his iron eyes. “Wasn’t it one of your own that shopped the Molly Maguires to the Pinkertons?”

“Huh!” Shalare said, surprised. “You’re a historian, for sure. But he was a-”

“-Protestant? So am I, I suppose. I know I’m not a Catholic or a Jew, so what’s left, being a Buddhist? You’re right, Mickey. I am a man who studies the past. I studied Centralia. I studied the trial of the McNamara brothers. Sacco and Vanzetti.”

“They were-”

“What? Italians? Anarchists? Catholics? Innocent? What does it matter? My point is, when you try and change governments, whether you’re assassinating a dictator or winning an election, you’ve got to be able to carry through after you take over.”

“We’ll have our own-”

“All I care about is my own,” Beaumont interrupted. “Dioguardi getting out of my hair isn’t a fair trade. But getting his people to stay out of Locke City forever, now, that could be one.”

“You have my word, Roy,” Shalare said. “My sacred word. And if that’s not enough, I’ll throw in a head of cattle, if you want. The finest of its kind for many miles around.”

1959 October 06 Tuesday 18:29

“You know what a pilgrimage is?” Rufus said.

“A holy journey,” Moses answered, as if he had been expecting the question.

“That’s right,” Rufus said, surprised. “And I took mine on September 3, 1955. On that day, I went to Chicago. So I could see that little boy, Emmett Till. See him in the coffin where the white man had put him.”

“I remember that.”

“His mother left the casket open so people could see-so the whole world could see-how they had tortured her child before they murdered him,” Rufus said, his voice throbbing. “It was supposed to be because the boy had whistled at a white woman. Not raped her, not killed her-whistled at her. Men came in the night and took him; didn’t make no secret about it. Everybody knew who they were. And they bragged about it all over town, too. Took some cracker jury about ten minutes to find them not guilty. Probably some of them on that jury, they were along for the ride that night themselves.”

“Mississippi,” Moses said.

“Yeah, Mississippi. And then the men who did it, they got paid for it. I read it in Look magazine, the whole thing. After that jury cut them loose, some reporter paid them to tell the true story, because you can’t try a man twice for the same crime. Every cracker’s dream, kill a black boy and get paid for it, too. Like a bounty on niggers.”

“I read that story,” Moses said, evenly.

“Didn’t it make you want to… kill a whole lot of whites?”