bedroom which had been converted into an office with several desks and filing cabinets. A big fleshy man in his shirtsleeves and suspenders, his suit coat draped over the back of his swivel chair, was hunkered over a ledger book at a rolltop desk against the far left wall, on which an Old Heidelberg neon sign, unlit, mingled with various black- and-white business-related photos. The man at the desk had shiny black hair and a big flat head.
“Maxie,” Hassel said, tentatively.
Maxie waved at him impatiently, without looking back. “Just a minute, just a minute.”
“Maxie…”
Maxie sighed, pushed away from the desk, and without looking at us, said, “Where’s the fuckin’ money
“Put your hands on your knees,” I said.
Maxie’s eyes were dark and mournful, his mouth a thin cold line in a face that was puttylike, unlined, unused, as if no emotions had left their tracks. As he slowly lowered his hands toward his knees, one hand lingered near the right-hand pocket of the draped-on-the-chair suit coat, a pocket with a revolver-size lump in it.
“You could die in that chair,” I pointed out.
Maxie blinked again, swallowed and put his hands on his knees.
I moved slowly over there, my back to a wall so I could keep my eyes on both Maxes, and flipped the suit coat off the chair; it dropped to the floor with a clunk. Lucky for us all, his coat didn’t go off.
“Is this a rubout?” Maxie asked, like he was asking the time.
“Not necessarily,” I said, moving back near the doorway, just inside of which I’d left his partner. “We’re just going to talk.”
“If the Dutchman sent you,” he said reasonably, “you’re working the wrong side of the street. We pay
“Listen to Maxie,” Hassel advised, with a nervous sidelong glance.
They didn’t seem to see the inherent fallacy of telling a guy holding a gun on them that they could “protect” him.
“The Dutchman didn’t send me,” I said. “A rich lady from Washington, D.C., did. Named McLean.”
The two men exchanged glances. I couldn’t read anything in it. God knows I tried.
“You fellas look smart enough to know Gaston Means can’t be trusted,” I said.
Maxie Greenberg nodded thoughtfully.
“That bastard lies when he prays,” Hassel confirmed.
“You boys need a new man in the middle,” I said. Which was where I was, keeping the gun on them both, Hassel with his mitts up, Greenberg hands on knees. “I’ll give you the money, you give me the kid.”
Hassel gave me another sidelong nervous glance.
Eyes boring into me like a sniper sighting a victim, Maxie said, “Who are you?”
“A guy looking to make a few bucks and put a kid back in his own crib.”
“What makes you think we got Lindy’s kid?” Hassel said.
“I don’t remember mentioning Lindy’s kid,” I said.
A loud banging out in the other room scared shit out of me; I damn near started firing.
“That’s the door,” Hassel said, flatly. “The one you come in.”
The banging continued, and a voice said, “Boss, it’s Vinnie! It’s Vinnie, boss! Let me in.”
Hassel smiled smugly. “Well, there’s our boy Vinnie. I better let him in, don’t you think?”
“If he’s your boy,” I said, “why doesn’t he have a key?”
“Somebody might take it off him,” Maxie said.
“You gotta be named ‘Max’ to get a key,” Hassel said.
Private club.
“We don’t answer it,” fat Maxie said with the faintest of smiles on his thin lips, “he’ll bust it down.”
I took Hassel by the arm; it was fleshy but there was muscle under there. “Get rid of him. No need to get cute—we’re going to make a straight business deal, here. Fewer faces that see me, the better.”
He looked at me with those black dead eyes, and nodded.
I went over to Maxie, and stood just to his left, between several wooden four-drawer filing cabinets and the corner of the wall the desk was up against.
“If this is business,” Maxie said, hands on his knees, his head tilted to one side in a gesture of reasonableness, “why have any guns at all?”
“I like negotiating from a position of strength.”
There was the garbled sound of conversation out in the living room, then the sound of running, the sound of
