Infamous (23 page)

She held on to his strong arm as they moved from the sluggish heat off the river and into the big ape’s mouth, Kathryn thinking instantly about that monkey Kong and feeling like she was being swallowed whole in the beast. Fay Wray slapping away those big fat fingers that groped her day and night. But Wray knowing that the big beast was just lovestruck over her and that he’d protect her from those crazy darkies with spears, and damn well even climb up the Empire State Building for her. She patted George’s hairy knuckles with her free hand, and they were out of the gorilla’s soft throat and into the belly, and the whole joint was hopping. A nigger orchestra had the room on its feet, and women danced on white-linened tables, kicking plates and champagne bottles, and men knocked back whiskey and smoked, while a ball of excitement grew in Kathryn’s stomach. You felt that way when you were in the place that you were meant to be. This was the heat, this was the action. The bee’s knees in the belly of the beast.

“Oh, George.”

“What’d I tell you?”

“You crazy mug.”

“Whatta ya’ think, a girl or a boy?” he said, pointing to her stomach.

This the tenth time he’s told the same joke.

“It’s a monkey, for sure.”

George snatched a waiter by the arm and thumbed through a fat wad of cash in a silver clip. He tucked a few bills in the man’s open pocket and told him to bring a bottle and a setup. And the waiter was back in two seconds with two more waiters, hauling in a table from the back and a couple chairs because there wasn’t a free place to sit. George turned and waved to someone, and then Kathryn noted a little man standing near the tunnel to the bar, a short, little Jewy fella with grease-parted hair, puffing on a big fat cigar. He reminded her of a fighter, short and mean and tough as hell because his height had made him that way.

“Who’s the gimp with the donkey dick?”

“That’s the Kid,” George said.

“No foolin’?”

“No foolin’.”

The waiter made a big show about the whiskey being bonded and not like that sorry hair tonic colored with wood chips they used to sell at the Boulevards of Paris. They brought ice in a silver bucket and crystal glasses and bottles of ginger ale, and George passed out more wads of bills, all of that money floating away making Kathryn feel just like who she should be, wanted to be, and was. She felt a little hand on her shoulder and saw Kid Cann, grinning, his other hand on George’s shoulder, whispering for a moment in George R. Kelly’s ear, and then trailing away, with a firm pat on her back, like she was A-OK.

“What was that?”

“Keep smilin’, doll.”

“What?”

“Bailey’s here. Verne Miller, too.”

“Goddamn. Son of a bitch.”

“You said it.”

“Whatta we do?”

“We can amscray or you can birth that baby. We’re in a pinch.”

Kathryn felt the fat mound on her belly and readjusted the heft. She took a long sip of the whiskey and ginger ale, and contemplated. “Okay. Okay. Only five g’s, and don’t you dare ask ’em to join us. Those two bastards are going to stink up this whole town for me, ruin my fun, and I’d just as soon be back in the Cadillac halfway to Cleveland.”

“Still stuck on Cleveland.”

But Kathryn wasn’t listening, only taking a breath, knowing the Kellys were cornered, and it was best to brass the son of a bitch out and wait till the next job.
Goddamn George
. She moved her hand from underneath his, thinking how nice it would be if some airplanes would knock him out of his big tree.

“ ’ Twas beauty,” she said.

“What?”

“I want a convertible.”

“A what?”

“In Cleveland, I want you to trade out your car for a convertible. Cadillac makes the most darling coupe. I saw the ad in
Redbook
.”

George reached for the whiskey, pouring it like it was a glass of milk at the end of a long day. The nigger band stopped and then started again with some booming jungle beats, a naked white woman wandering onto the stage holding only a big fat balloon, her pale ass hanging out for all those musicians to see.

“What’s this?” Kathryn asked. “The sacrifice?”

17

T
hey brought ’em into Kid Cann’s office, a cavern carved behind the club’s stage. The walls were smooth blond wood slapped over the sandstone, the joints expertly sealed so that the orchestra sounded like they were playing a hundred miles away or under the river. Harvey nodded at Kathryn Kelly and George, too, but wanted them to know this was all business. The Kid had a small bar padded in black leather by his desk, and Harv helped himself to a little refresher of bourbon with club soda, a little ice and bitters. He stood near the desk and waited for the Kid and his boy, Barney Bernbaum, to get on with the show, take their money, trade it out, and let the whole deal be settled.

“You unnerstand the twenty percent?” the Kid asked.

“Yeah, yeah,” George Kelly said, finding a soft, curved leather chair to park in and cross his legs and smoke, resting his hat over his big foot.

“And I don’t want no trouble,” the Kid said. “What you got goin’ with Harv and Verne don’t have a thing to do with me.”

“It’s decided.”

Harvey smiled over at George, letting George know the two of them were settled but that he also knew that George was trying to muscle him out.

“Can I see it?” the Kid asked.

George thought for a moment and ran a hand over his big jaw and nodded. Kathryn stood behind him by the door, and Harvey had to look real good to see if she’d gotten fat or if George hadn’t knocked her up.

“Yeah,” George said, snapping his fingers. “Give it to ’im, Kit.”

Kathryn waddled up to the desk, her long, painted fingers on her swaying stomach, and she dropped her big belly on the desk, turning her back to all the men in the room and hoisting her dress. Harvey thinking
Oh, shit, here we go, what’s this broad about to pull
, but then the dress reached high over her legs, showing her ass, and stretched over her stomach, and with a big thud on the desk out flopped the ninety g’s.

The door opened and in walked the other Jew, Barney Bernbaum, and he was all smiles, holding the door for Verne Miller, who followed, with a tight, twitchy mouth, and coldly looked to each one of ’em before resting his back against the far wall, scouting, and placing his hat back on his head, slow and delicate. All of ’em knowing Miller packed two Army-boy .45s on each flank and could take each one of ’em out without dropping his cigarette.

Barney joined the Kid at the desk and thumbed through the big stacks of dough. Harvey knocked back the drink, poured some more. George was looking up at the ceiling like he was trying to count the tiles. The orchestra played louder now, and you could hear the muffled notes a bit more, the ceiling shaking, and from the minuscule cracks in it came a fine white powder, looking like dandruff or cocaine, splatting Harvey’s drink until he looked up to what George saw and knew it was just that natural sand shaking loose.

Barney nodded to the Kid. The Kid’s wide-set snake eyes took in the room, and he screwed up his Jew mouth, nodding back. The Kid picked up a big, ornate phone and spoke a handful of words into the receiver before hanging up. “Drink up. Money’ll be here in a jiff. Go play the wheel.”

“You think we’re soft?” George asked. “I prefer to leave this joint with all my money.”

The Kid shrugged. “Suit yourself, Georgie.” Miller uncrossed his arms, and left his lookout by the door. He joined Harvey at the bar, and Harvey filled a glass with ice and some tonic. Miller lit a cigarette to go with his ice water.

“So you boys gonna tell me the score?” the Kid asked. “You know I’m dying to know.”

“You don’t know?” Harvey Bailey asked, kind of laughing to himself and taking a last puff from a cigarette and squashing it in a glass ashtray. “You got the most wanted man in America right here in your establishment. Our little boy Georgie has grown up. Look at him—
the mastermind, the criminal genius, the man with nerves of steel . . .
”

“You don’t mean
. . .
?” the Kid asked. “Come on.”

“You betcha,” Harvey said. “Can you believe it? Remember how this mug used to stutter, ‘S-s-sir, c-c-can I tag along on a j-j-job?’ You know he puked in his hat before we robbed that bank in Sherman?”

George played with his hat and would not look at him.

Verne Miller laughed.

George played with his hat and wiped some imaginary dust from his shoe.

“Remember that one job where he double-parked that ole Packard and attracted every traffic cop in that podunk town?” Harvey asked.

Miller nodded and gave a sliver of a smile, knowing what Harv was doing, and took a sip of ice water, rattling the glass. You take a man like George, play with his head a bit, get him off his game, and he’ll start thinking sloppy and not worrying about things like counting or watching where fat satchels of cash were laid.

A cloudy head just plain neutered a fella.

HARVEY BAILEY WAS A TWO-BIT ASSHOLE. KATHRYN COULD RUN down her boy on occasion, but George R. Kelly was still her man, and this was school-yard bullshit that she didn’t care for a bit. She prayed to the Lord in heaven that George would just reach into that beautiful tailored jacket, pull out that .38, and plug that big-nosed bastard in the forehead.

“Whatta they call you now, George?” Verne Miller asked, his jaw muscle flexing like walnuts.

George wouldn’t look at them.
Look at them, George, meet their gaze, and don’t back down an inch.
George wouldn’t look at ’em.

Harvey smoked, all delicate and womanlike, and said, “ ‘Machine Gun’ Kelly. Rat-a-tat-tat.”

“You even know how to fire a chopper, George?” Miller asked. “I can teach you sometime.”

George would not look at them.

The big guy just picked a space on the wall behind those two hoodlums and watched it like a cultured man might sit in a museum, or some such fancy place, and contemplate the lines and dots in a painting and make some kind of gibberish remark about the lines and dots forming a whole image. Kathryn had read of such four-flushers in
Collier’s
.

“Most wanted man in America,” Harvey said. “Got to take off my hat. We didn’t think you had the nuts.”

“Why don’t you shut up, old man,” Kathryn said, walking the room and standing behind George and placing her long fingers on the back of his chair and then touching his shoulder. “You think ’cause you stole a bunch of loot in your day? Let me tell you something. Back in the old days, my granny could’ve busted a jug wide open. Look at you. You can’t even walk without a cane. Like an old woman.”

Bailey raised his eyebrows and straightened his tie, running the silk through his fingers and sliding the silver clip tight. That nut job Miller just stood beside Bailey, staring at Kathryn, like the staring was gonna do one bit of good and like she hadn’t seen that intimidation show a thousand Saturday nights with him and Vi when he’d slap her silly and send her to the powder room with paint running off her eyes.

“Whatta you lookin’ at?” she said. “You crazy hophead.”

George wouldn’t look at ’em.

Not one damn bit.

Wouldn’t meet the men’s eyes. He reminded her of a schoolkid taken to task.

“Miller, you wanna know why you can’t find Vi?” Kathryn asked, the veins running hot and feeling her heart beating double time. “It’s ’cause she don’t wanna be found. She’s prowling New York with some Hollywood producer with a fat wallet while you and Harvey play grab ass for the dregs of what we earned. You know what? She told me you never could please her. Said holding your prick in her mouth was like playing with a kid’s pencil.”

Miller lurched forward. Harvey Bailey caught his right arm.

Harvey laughed and checked his watch.

“C’mon, George,” said the Kid. “Harvey’s just having some fun. Drinks on me.”

George took a big breath, and put his hands to his knees and stood tall, holding his hat.

“We’ll wait outside,” George said, mumbling.

He followed her from Kid Cann’s fancy-ass office and down a long, long sandstone hall and back into the smoky air and nigger music and ladies who didn’t give a shit that midnight was long since over.

“Look at all them knucklehead Cinderellas.”

“You got a strange way of talkin’, Kit.”

She grabbed his arm, feeling his labored breathing against her ribs, as they headed back toward the big ape’s mouth, seeing the big ape teeth, and Kid Cann’s goons making a show of parting as they came on through, and stepped out of the cool and into the heat. Over the Mississippi, you could see Saint Paul and a couple of rusted-out drawbridges real clear, one of ’em holding a passing freight, with a lot of racket and strain, red lights flashing and flashing.

George sat on the hood of his midnight blue sixteen-cylinder and started a Camel. He motioned to her, seeing if she wanted one. She shook her head and walked near him, kicking away the river gravel with her fine slippers and holding the hem of her dress, catching in the summer wind. The action still playing out the ape’s mouth, and if you looked over at the Mystic Caverns you’d think the beast was alive, with those glowing eyes, and the heat and smoke coming from between those picket teeth.