“Have you found any trace of the baby, Salvy?”
“Well, to be honest, I have not. In fact, I’m a little discouraged.”
Rosner cut in. “
The reporters glanced around at each other, their expressions saying,
“The baby is alive and well,” Rosner said, flicking ash off his cigar onto the floor. “I give you my personal assurance that the baby is about to be returned to his folks.”
Even Spitale and Bitz seemed surprised by that.
The reporters began hurling questions at Rosner, hardballs this time, but he held up a hand in a stop gesture; the hand glittered with diamond rings.
“What I’m saying don’t represent my
“Are you negotiating the return of the baby?”
“If I was, saying so would put those efforts at risk, right? So let’s cut this off right here, okay? Thank you, fellas.”
He rose and pushed through the reporters, leaving a confused Spitale and Bitz to field the rest of the questions. Rosner was heading toward the men’s room; nobody bothered following him.
Except me.
I’d driven into Manhattan midmorning, to check in with IRS man Frank Wilson and to meet with Breckinridge after work. The plan was to spend the evening with the attorney and the eccentric Dr. Condon at the latter’s Bronx bungalow, waiting to see if the ad that ran today (“Money is ready—Jafsie”) got a response.
Among a handful of other things I wanted to do while I was in New York City was check out Spitale and Bitz’s speakeasy; I’d stopped in for the free lunch, heard the scuttlebutt about the “press conference” and hung around nursing beers for two hours waiting for Rosner and company to show.
Now Mickey was standing at the urinal. He and I had the small room to ourselves; I hook-and-eye latched the door, waited for him to finish, and as he turned, buttoning up, he sneered.
“What the hell are you doing here, Heller?”
“What do you think, Mickey? Checking up on you.”
He started to brush past me. “Stay out of my way.”
I took him by the arm. “You didn’t wash your hands, Mickey. Stick around a second, and wash your hands.”
He jerked loose of my grasp. “I’ll wash my hands of you, flatfoot.”
But I was blocking the way. “Tell me, Mickey. What was that bullshit about being sure the kid was safe? That he’d be returned any second now?”
He straightened his suitcoat, tried to summon some dignity. “Just tossin’ the newshounds a bone.”
“Are you, or any of your people, negotiating with Capone?”
“Maybe.”
I unbuttoned my coat, put my hands on my hips, letting him get a look at the nine millimeter under my shoulder. “That’s not much of an answer, Mickey.”
“Fuck you. You don’t know who you’re messing with. You can wake up dead, messing with me.”
I grabbed him by his tailored lapels. “Don’t get tough with me, you greasy little fucker. You’re going to spill, or drown.”
“Drown?”
“Guess how.”
Rosner licked his lips, and said, “I don’t know a goddamn thing, goddamnit! Now, back off, Heller—or I’ll tell Lindy you been shovin’ me around.”
I let him go, roughly.
“Why don’t you do that?” I said. “And I’ll tell him why.”
I let him pass. He never did wash his hands.
I’d met with Wilson earlier; the T-man had had little to report on his end: no news on Capone’s missing man Bob Conroy; Agent O’Rourke had infiltrated the Marinelli/Sivella spiritualist church, but had nothing yet to report.
I’d filled the agent in about Condon, and he was furious Lindbergh hadn’t brought him in on it.
“Maybe you ought to shadow the professor,” I said. “He may be tied in with those spiritualists—unless you think Sister Sarah really did pull the name ‘Jafsie’ out of the spirit world.”
“The Bronx and Harlem are next-door neighbors,” Wilson said, reflectively. “You don’t need a Ouija board to get from one to the other.”
“If Lindbergh finds out I tipped you, I’ll be persona non grata. So keep it under your hat.”
Condon lived in the Bedford Park section of the Bronx, just west of Webster Avenue, in a neat, modest two- story white clapboard on quiet, tree-fined Decatur Avenue. Shrubbery hugged the house and the well-tended lawn was brushed with snow.
