Glory Boys (31 page)

Willard had checked the freight manifest, and the boxes that were meant to be full of beaver skins had been full of beaver skins. But he hadn’t counted the boxes. Still less had he plunged around in the darkness of the hold checking the contents of every box. At a rough guess, the plane was carrying three-quarters of a ton more than her supposed maximum load – and a full two tons more than her declared cargo.

Of that two tons, a fair portion was the extra fuel Willard had had put on board. But most of it had to be something else. Something that not even smugglers wanted to put in writing.

Booze.

It had to be. Everything about Powell Lambert had fallen into place.
Trade Finance
? You bet. The importation and distribution of alcohol was America’s most booming industry. A prosperous industry needed effective modern financing. That was Powell Lambert’s job. For almost six months, that had also been Willard’s job. That wasn’t to say that everything touched by Powell Lambert had to do with booze. It didn’t. No doubt Powell Lambert did plenty of regular trade finance transactions. Real buyers and real sellers all over America.

But the regular work was the perfect place to conceal the fake stuff. Willard had been working his ass off in order to make sure that the criminal distribution of alcohol was as well organised as any legitimate industry. And the stuff coming in from abroad was only a part of it. Willard had financed plenty of deals made by tanneries, paint factories, chemical plants, porcelain makers. All those businesses stank. Not figuratively, literally. To make whiskey you need to pulp grain into mash, then leave it to ferment. The mash smells. Where better to hide the stuff than in places that already stank? And there was a further advantage. All these places, the tanneries, the chemical plants, already handled liquids on an industrial scale. Tankers, vats and barrels were a part of their business. Why not use some of them to store and transport whiskey?

Looking back, Willard could even admire the little games which must have passed for jokes. The Association of Orthodox Synagogues? What horseshit! The nonexistent, never-existed invention of an alcoholic Irishman. But here was the joke. The Volstead Act had a few exemption clauses. Medicinal alcohol was one (and Willard remembered a few strangely large pharmaceutical deals he’d financed). Sacramental wine was another. Importing seventy thousand dollars’ worth of sacramental wine wasn’t just good business, it was technically legal.

Willard caught up with Powell’s warmly-wrapped figure and stopped.

He wasn’t sure how he felt. On the one hand, the pretence was over. It was pretty darn clear that Powell didn’t intend to kill Willard for his new-found knowledge. As a matter of fact, it was pretty clear that Powell had somehow expected or wanted Willard to find out. So, in amongst Willard’s emotional swirl, there was certainly relief.

But also anger.

The fear Willard had felt! The shock of being watched. The horror of finding out about Arthur Martin’s murder, of seeing Charlie Hughes in jail. And Willard remembered his punishing workload, his debt to Powell, his fear that he’d be a slave to that debt for the rest of his life. Willard was a strong man. He was angry. Part of him wanted to draw back his fist and smash Powell full force in the face.

But he didn’t. Instead, misjudging his pace as he strode up to Powell, Willard found himself going too fast and put up one hand to Powell’s coat collar to steady himself. But the gesture was ambiguous. It was almost as though Willard himself didn’t know if he was leaning on Powell for support or getting ready to punch him.

‘You almost killed me, you bastard,’ he panted. ‘The plane. It was ridiculously overloaded. It almost wouldn’t fly.’

Powell, who seemed oddly ready either to be leaned on for support or to be hit in the face, looked genuinely concerned. ‘The plane? We’ve never had a problem before.’

‘I put more fuel on board her. At that stage, I knew about the untaxed beaver skins. I didn’t know there was booze as well.’

‘The fuel was the problem?’

‘The booze was the problem, Powell. A plane’s meant to have fuel.’

There was a short pause; a pause in which Powell neither grinned nor smoked.

‘I’m sorry, Willard. We never meant to put you in danger. I don’t understand about planes. They shouldn’t have let you take on fuel.’

We.

We never meant to put you in danger.
Powell’s comment triggered a connection in Willard’s brain. He’d thought he had it all figured out, but maybe there was some further part he hadn’t yet seen…

The men by the office buildings had mostly either disappeared inside or come out to the plane to begin unloading. One of the men, well dressed against the cold, had climbed back inside the dark sedan and sat there only just visible in the dying light. Powell was fumbling in his pocket. He brought out a sheaf of documents and held them out.

‘Here.’

‘What’s that? You want a customs stamp, you better ask your goddamn flunkey.’

Willard indicated the uniformed cop, who was helping the others unload the cargo. Willard hadn’t expected to see a cop on the ground, but when he’d thought about it, it hadn’t been a surprise. What was the point in paying them, if you didn’t get some service? The cop was working as fast as anyone in bringing crates out of the airplane.

‘I don’t want a customs stamp.’

Powell continued to hold the documents out. Willard took them. He held them up to the light in the western sky. The documents comprised the original loan contract, signed between the two men, together with every other piece of paperwork related to the loan. The topmost document was a single-page letter, acknowledging receipt of the loan amount in full. The letter was signed in Powell’s unmistakable hand.

‘What’s this? I haven’t paid you.’

Powell jerked his cigar towards the plane. ‘Sure you have, Willard. Sure you have.’

‘You think because I flew that plane out of Ruxion that I’m joining your shitty little racket? I flew that plane out of Ruxion because I didn’t fancy hunkering down there for the winter.’

Willard held out the documents to Powell, nevertheless hoping that he wouldn’t take them.

‘I didn’t say anything about you joining, Will. That’s up to you. One hundred per cent up to you.’

‘Then what about these papers?’

‘They’re yours whatever you decide. Don’t want to force you. It’s the sort of thing a man has to decide for himself.’

He patted Willard on the arm.

‘Arthur Martin? Did he get to decide for himself?’

‘Nah!’ Powell virtually spat. ‘The guy should have been a priest.’

Willard, as so often before, was taken aback by Powell’s bluntness. Willard shook away his distaste. At least he was free of debt. He folded the papers roughly and shoved them into an inside pocket.

‘Thanks for this.’

‘Don’t mention it. Jesus, it’s cold enough, isn’t it? How you kids go flying in this kinda temperature, I’ll never understand.’

Powell began walking back towards the cars. Willard followed him. His anger had subsided once again.
The loan.
He was free of it at last. He could rejoin the world, unfearful and free. The freedom felt good. Felt wonderful, in fact. The hopeful world symbolised by Thornton Ordnance burned ever brighter in his mind. And he knew now that, awful as it had been, his experience with Powell Lambert had made a man of him. He was ready for work now. Ready to follow where his father and grandfather and great-grandfather had gone before.

But Powell, a pace or two ahead, was speaking once again.

‘… got someone here who wants to congratulate you. Thought we’d pretty near freeze waiting.’

Powell strode ahead. Frost nipped in the air and before too long, the ground would be sparkling white beneath a diamond sky.

But Willard didn’t follow Powell. Not to begin with. He thought he’d had it all figured out, but there were more wheels turning in his head: click, click, click. And with every turn of every wheel, something new fell into place. Powell was over by the car now, leaning to speak through an open window. The light was going and Willard could see nothing of the car’s interior, aside from a white face gleaming palely in the darkness. It all made sense now. It was like the moment that comes to a pilot, when he suddenly realises that he’s master of his plane, that he can order it about the sky the way a showjumper orders his horse around the field.

Willard strode quickly up to the car. Ted Powell stepped back. Willard put his gloved hands on the roof of the car and bent down to the window.

‘Good evening, Father,’ he said.

64

Hennessey’s business was general goods in an age when general meant what it said. He sold nails and roofing tin, seed and scythe blades, linens and soaps, sugar and wheat flour, children’s toys and ladies’ hats. But the business didn’t stock itself. Hennessey did.

And so, on the third Tuesday in November, Hennessey was down in Jacksonville meeting his dry goods supplier and his linen merchant. His meetings over, Hennessey rewarded himself, as he always did, with a visit to the Southern Glory SodaBar for a fix of vividly-coloured carbonated milk fats. Already present, in one of the yellow pine booths, was a young woman, sitting on her own. Her clothes were unremarkable: lemony-yellow day-dress, flat shoes, a hat ridiculous enough to be fashionable. She had a paperback crime mystery in front of her. Her arms were tanned, her blonde hair short and mussed up. Her eyes were turned away from Hennessey, but he already knew they were blue and startlingly clear.

He didn’t give her a second look. She gave no sign of looking at him. A few minutes later, she left.

An hour later, his soda and his newspaper both finished, Hennessey left the soda bar, then twisted his way through backstreets to shake any possible pursuit. Once he was sure he was clear, he entered the general freight warehouse down by the rail depot. Up above, a voice called, ‘Up here. It’s, cooler.’

The storekeeper climbed a wooden ladder to the top of a mound of cotton bales. Pen greeted him with a smile. A window behind her let in a draught of cool air. When the three conspirators had met Bosse, they’d arranged a number of different ways to meet up. The Jacksonville soda bar was one of them and this was the agreed rendezvous. Hennessey had a chocolate bar in his pocket. He offered some to Pen, who took a piece.

‘What’s up?’ said the storekeeper.

‘Jim Bosse. That’s what’s up.’

Pen told Hennessey briefly about their successes so far, about their success in reading the mail, about Jim Bosse’s latest request as relayed by Haggerty McBride.

‘Phew!’ The storekeeper whistled. ‘They sure want plenty.’

‘Yep.’

‘What does Abe think?’

‘He wants to know what you think.’

‘And that’s why you dropped in on me today?’

‘I guess.’

That wasn’t quite a full answer. Their usual way of getting in touch with Hennessey was to drop a note into his backyard from the air. If they needed to speak to him, they’d arrange a time for him to call them drug-store to drug-store, so the phone line would be clear. All the same, Pen had brought a freighter all the way up to Marion and she needed more fuel before heading back south, so it had made sense enough to drop in on Hennessey now. The storekeeper took another piece of chocolate and chewed it slowly.

‘You mean, do I think we should place somebody on the inside? I mean, right on the inside? Further in than you or Abe?’

‘Yes.’

The storekeeper took his time with his chocolate, not chewing too hard, not in a race to swallow. At last he was done.

‘OK. Then yes. Yes, I do.’

‘Abe thought you might have some ideas.’

‘He’s right. He knows that there’s a kid… Heck, I didn’t want to do this. I’ve got obligations. Obligations to a friend of mine, dead now, the boy’s father. I know Abe felt much the same… Any case, this man left a son, who’s desperate to help. The boy’s sixteen now, old enough to choose. I’ll talk to him.’

‘Gosh, I’d hate bringing a kid right into the middle of this.’

‘Yes, me too, but like I say, he’s old enough to make his own decisions. And if we need him…’

There was a long pause. Down below them, there was the quick, sharp movement of mice across the floorboards, brown on brown. Hennessey had his hat in his hands, ready to put it on his head to go. On the one hand, they were in a safe place to chat and Hennessey had taken a liking to the young woman flier. On the other hand, the unseen power and threat of Mason’s organisation loomed over them. They knew they were watched. They didn’t always know how intensely or by whom. Every minute they were here was a minute unaccounted for. It wasn’t a good idea to stop for long. But somehow, and for the first time, a peculiar thought had taken hold of him and he couldn’t quite shake himself free of it.

‘Listen,’ he said, ‘this isn’t really my place, but might I ask you a mighty personal question?’ The storekeeper had his hat in his hands and stared down at it like he’d never seen a hat before.

‘Sure. Go ahead.’

‘Is it possible – please don’t take this wrong – is it possible that you have feelings for our mutual friend, Captain Rockwell?’

Pen was taken aback. She wasn’t offended by the question, but had no idea why Hennessey had taken it into his head to ask it. But she tried her best to be honest, staring hard into her feelings. When she answered, she spoke slowly and with careful thought.

‘No. I don’t think so. When we first met, that first time … well, I guess I thought about it. I mean, I’m different from most girls. He’s different from most men. Some of those differences seemed like they were leading in the same direction. So, yes, I thought about it. But now? No. The more I’ve got to know him, the less I find myself knowing him. Sometimes I feel I’m working with a stranger.’

Hennessey quit looking at his hat and stared straight at her. He was old enough to be her father and there was a kindliness and intelligence in his face that Pen had trusted from the outset.

‘Maybe that’s the real problem you wanted to talk about. Maybe that’s why you dropped in on an old storekeeper today.’