Driving back to Dunetown, I realized I had left the safe places behind forever.
42
FIGHT NIGHT AT THE WAREHOUSE
I drove back to the Warehouse, and into bedlam.
A dozen men, including a couple of brass buttons, were jammed in the doorway. There was a lot of
shoving, pushing, cursing, threatening. The Stick was standing outside, back from the crowd,
watching the melee with a smile.
“Be goddamned,” he said as I rolled up. “Dutch?s put the arm on Costello and all his merry men!”
I jumped out of the car and we ran into the building.
A lot of racket from the back.
A cop stopped the Stick long enough to tell him they had Costello; his number one bodyguard and
shooter, Drack Moreno, who looked and talked like a moron but had a genius IQ; two of his top
button men, Silo Murphy, a.k.a. the Weasel, because he looked like one, and Arthur Pravano, whose
moniker was Sweetheart, for reasons I?ll never understand; and two other musclemen. In addition,
they also had Chevos and Bronicata on tap with their various gunsels. Nance was missing, as was
Stizano.
A small army of twelve, all of them but Costello raising almighty hell.
We headed for the war room, which is exactly what it had turned into from the sound of things.
The hooligans were well represented: Pancho Callahan, Salvatore, Chino Zapata, Charlie One Ear,
Cowboy Lewis, and Dutch Morehead. Everyone but Kite and Mufalatta, who seemed to have
vanished from the earth. With the Stick and me, it kind of rounded the teams off at eight to eight.
The yelling, cursing, and threats had continued down through the Warehouse and into the war room,
which was as chaotic as the floor of the stock exchange at the closing bell.
Dutch had separated the big shots and shoved them into one of the cubicles. The gunsels were all in
the war room. Dutch was standing in front of the room bellowing like a wounded whale.
“Everybody ease off, y?hear me, or some heads are gonna get loosened!” he roared.
The room settled down to a low rumble.
With Costello?s bunch and the hooligans, the room was full of the meanest-looking gang of cutthroats
I?ve ever seen gathered in one place.
I was standing in the doorway, eyeballing Costello and Chevos. In all the years I had been bonded to
this gang, I had never seen either of them closer than fleetingly and from across the street or through
binoculars. Now they were both fifteen feet away. I made no attempt to conceal my contempt for
