Warren Murphy: Mafia Fix

Don Dominic could not control the laughter, and he apologized as he guffawed.

"You see, it is nothing," said Pietro.

"Tell me about this god."

"Well, it's not like a god, like a saint. It's like olden times God."

"Zeus. Jupiter. Apollo?"

"Like Chinese," Scubisci said. "A crazy thing. Angela sends away to this old lady in Greenwich Village, because the stars Angela cannot read. And comes back more confusion. What is the word the Jews use when they mourn their dead. Sit on boxes and do not shave and things?"

"Shiva" Verillio said.

"Yah. That's him. Except it sounds like sleeve."

"Shiva? Well, I'll be on the lookout for any eastern gods," Verillio said.

Pietro Scubisci smiled and shrugged. "I tell you it crazy. It's just that sometimes Angela. . . ." and his voice tailed off as the two men left the shop together and Willie the Plumber made his five thousand dollar purchase.

That night, Don Dominic Verillio made a mental note to look up the god, Shiva, in an encyclopaedia.

CHAPTER SIX

Remo Williams waited in the sedate outer office of Dominic Verillio, chairman of the Hudson Action Council, and dawdled his note pad on his knee. Through one window he could see the vague outline of New York City's skyscrapers reaching up into the noonday smog of carbon monoxide and factory wastes. Through the window opposite him, across the spacious panelled room, he could see Newark, a distant blotch of buildings that seemed to blend together in a conglomerate of despair, but which he remembered with warmth.

And he was in Hudson, the land mass between them, separated by the Hudson and Hackensack Rivers, the opening of America. The room smelled faintly of aspen pine and an attractive, conservatively-dressed woman pored through a very fat and rather old book at her desk.

On the wall was a painting of strawberries that Remo did not know had been purchased the day before for five thousand dollars, but if told that, he would have believed it. The artist had the kind of vision beyond sight, the kind of control beyond genius.

Remo's plan was simple, as were most incipient disasters, he thought. He would make his presence known in town. He would annoy, browbeat and insult. Someone would come to him. And that someone would talk. It was a simple process. Unlike movie actors, people-brave people and cowardly people-would disclose anything to stop pain. The mysterious interrogation technique of the Russians consisted of punching people; Henry the 8th had them beaten with sticks; Genghis Khan ordered them kicked.

Only the mental defectives of Hollywood and Hitler found it necessary to use hot coals, organ crushers and skin peelers. Professionals just hit.

And if no one came after him, Remo would go after them. He'd start with the most likely candidate-Police Chief Brian Dugan, a man of ready wit and warmth, and a thief. According to CURE, he had paid $80,000 for his job from a previous administration. A man didn't pay that much for that job to bring law and order to a town. And if Dugan didn't have the lead, then it would be Verillio or Gasso or Palumbo or the mayor or the local editor, or any of the people whose names Smith had given him.

But that was Phase Two. This was Phase One, interviews and annoyance. And first on the list was Verillio who, according to CURE, was either the Mafia kingpin of Hudson and maybe the nation, or was just an unwitting dupe of Mafia interests.

Which was something like the report to the German general staff that the allies were going to land at Normandy on June 6, 1944. They had the exact time and the place. Fortunately, they also had thirty-nine other exact times and places ranging from Norway to the Balkans and from 1943 to 1946. So much for intelligence.

"I've got it," said the secretary. "I've got it."

Remo smiled. "Got what?"

"Shiva. I'm looking up Shiva." She began to read: "Shiva. One of the three major gods of Hinduism, also known as the destroyer." She looked up.

Remo was definitely interested. He had heard that word before. "I heard he was called the shatterer of worlds, too." He said slowly, from memory: "I am Shiva. . . ." but he could not remember the rest of it.

As he said that the door opened and a strong faced businessman poked his head out of the inner office.

"Joan, may I speak to you a moment, please? Oh, hello. You must be the magazine writer. I'll be with you in a minute."

"I've got Shiva for you right here," said the secretary.

"Destroyer of worlds, I am Shiva," said Remo. "What?" said Verillio, his eyes widening. "I was trying to remember a quote. I've got it now. I am created Shiva the Destroyer; death, the shatterer of worlds.'"

"Are you Shiva?" asked Verillio solemnly. Remo laughed. "Me? No. I'm Remo Barry. I'm the magazine writer you spoke with last night."

"Oh, good. Be with you in a minute. Joan?" Remo watched the secretary grab a pad and pencil and disappear into the office. In five minutes, he was allowed into the office and pretended to write down the canned corn Verillio was spewing. Hudson faced the problems of all other cities: fleeing industries, rising crime and welfare, and, of course, a lack of hope. But Verillio saw great hope for Hudson. He saw great hope for nearly half an hour, then he invited Remo to lunch at the Casino at the Lake.

He saw hope through his baked stuffed clams and his veal Holstein. When Remo ordered rice, just rice, he became very interested. Why did Remo order just rice? Was it an eastern custom? A special fad diet? What was it?

"Would you believe I like rice, Mr. Verillio?"

"No," said Dominic Verillio.

"You acquire a taste for it."

"When you started eating it though, you didn't like it, right?"

"I didn't particularly like it."

"Then why did you start?"

"Why did you start eating baked stuffed clams?"

"Because I loved them."

Remo smiled and Verillio laughed.

Remo shrugged: "What can I say other than that you're a Mafioso?"

Verillio guffawed. "You know if it weren't so funny, it would be serious. I think that the Italian community at large suffers because of the greed of a few men of Italian ancestry. Doctors, lawyers, dentists, professors, salesmen, hard-working people like myself. I honestly believe that whenever the FBI has an unsolved crime, they arrest the first Italian they can lay their hands on. I honestly believe that. Are you Italian, of Italian ancestry, that is?"

"I might be. I don't know. I was raised in an orphanage."

"Where?"

"I'd rather not go into it. It's not too pleasant, not knowing who your mother and father are, not even knowing your ancestry."

"Could it be eastern? Oriental of some sort?"

"I don't think so. I figure the Mediterranean on the south to Germany on the North, from Ireland on the west to Siberia on the east. That's kind of not knowing, isn't it?"

"You Catholic?" Verillio asked.

"You deal in heroin?"

Verillio did not laugh this time. "I think that's insulting. Now what did you mean?"

"I'm trying to find out if you're in the Mafia and if you deal in heroin."

"This is too insulting," said Verillio and threw his napkin down into the egg on top of his veal, gave Remo a hateful stare and left. So much for Verillio, Remo thought. One seed planted.

Police Chief Brian Dugan couldn't be needled. He dropped fifteen references to his standing in the Catholic church, the Little League, the "Clean Up-Paint Up-Fix Up" program, and community relations. He was very proud of his community relations program.

"We teach our police how to deal with them better."

Chief Brian Dugan sat behind his desk with a picture of Franklin Delano Roosevelt behind him. It was a desk cluttered with trophies, statue paperweights and an American flag on a little holder. The picture of Roosevelt had lost its color to the decades.