“Supposing that Costello is real greedy,” I said. “Maybe he decided to scratch out everybody except
the ones he needed, which would be Tuna Chevos, who controls the waterways, Lou Cohen, his
financial wizard, and Bronicata, who?s the narcotics pipeline to the street. Maybe they got together,
made a front-end deal to waste all the rest of the family, ruin Graves? credibility, and split the town up
three ways.”
“It?s not as strong as the case against Graves,” Dutch said. “He?s fighting for his life and he?s got a
revenge motive to hoot.”
“Either way, we need that dope,” the Stick said, “Without the coke, all we got is speculation.”
One thing we all agreed on: If the dead black man wasn?t Stitch Harper, or somebody from Graves?
gang, Dutch?s hunch would be colder than an Alaskan picnic. We decided to table all further
discussion until the pictures arrived.
While we were waiting, I went looking for Charlie One Ear. He was sitting in his cubicle, dressed in
his best with a cigarette bobbing at the end of a fancy holder, touch-typing a report at about a hundred
and twenty words a minute.
“You do that like you know what you?re doing,” I said.
“My mother believed in the broadest kind of education,” he said.
“Do me a favour, will you?” I asked. “I?m trying to get a line on a Tony Lukatis, thirty years old,
dark...”
“I know Lukatis,” he said. “Did time in Little Q. Pot smuggling.”
“That?s him.”
“Is he in trouble again?” Charlie One Ear asked.
“His sister?s a friend of mine,” I said. “She thinks he may be involved in another—”
I stopped in midsentence. My stomach was doing slow rolls.
“My God,” I said, and ran back to the telex room with Charlie a few steps behind me. Dutch was
sitting beside the machine, leafing through some reports.
“These things are embarrassing,” he said as we entered the room. “If anybody else read them, they?d
swear Salvatore and Zapata were illiterate.” Then he looked up at me and said, “What?s wrong with
you?”
I handed him the Polaroid of Tony Lukatis.
“Know him?” I asked.
He took a look. “Sure, that?s Tony Lukatis. He did a deuce for smuggling grass. Titan nailed him.”
“Titan? I got the impression he more or less tolerated pot.”
“Smoking, not smuggling,” Charlie One Ear said. “What?s this all about?”
