He twitched a sick smile. “I didn’t think ‘she’ was in town.”
“No, but her sisters are.”
“Good-looking girls?”
Now I twitched a smile. “Sam, don’t ask me to tell you who I talked to up there.”
“Did I ask? I don’t remember asking.”
“You see, the way this works, Sam, is I don’t inform on anybody, on either side. I’m not playing—I’m not even in this game.”
One shoulder shrugged. “If you don’t want to tell me you talked to Robinson and Halley and Kurnitz and Drury’s pal O’Conner, that’s fine. But I would like to know what you told them.”
I shrugged both mine. “I told them if they’re dumb enough to call me as a witness, my amnesia will recur. Or I’ll plead the fifth, or attorney-client privilege.”
The cold eyes were studying me. “That’s all you told them?”
“That’s all…. Well—you saw Rubinstein, I take it?”
“Am I gonna not notice another Westsider? I saw the prick.”
“Well, I told them Jake went way back with Tubbo, and if he told ’em anything, they should consider the source. And that’s all the help I gave them,”
“That’s all?”
“That’s the boat.”
He nodded slowly. “I appreciate this. Your frankness.”
“Can I ask a favor?”
“Ask.”
“I told Charley Fischetti I wasn’t going to cooperate with these clowns; I think he knows I can be trusted. Sam, would you make sure Guzik knows? And Accardo, and Ricca?”
“I can do that.”
“I don’t need anybody thinking I’m a problem.”
“Like your friend Drury is a problem?”
“Like that.”
“What
“He’s still my friend, Sam. But you probably heard, I fired him.”
“I did hear. That’s for real?”
“That’s for real.”
“Okay. Appreciate it.”
I knew this friendly, even charming little man could turn on a dime, but I had to risk it….
“Sam—these guys, these Crime Committee guys, you know they’re not worth killing anybody over.”
He had his shark eyes fixed on me. “What are you trying to say, Heller?”
“Bill Drury—and Tim O’Conner, for that matter—are just a couple of cops trying to get their badges back. Bill’s still flogging the Ragen shooting. Two of the shooters are long since missing, and the other one, well…that’s your world, not mine.”
“Seems like yesterday’s news to me.”
“I’m just saying, these committee guys—they got no power of arrest. The FBI wants no part of them. All Kefauver can do is turn what they find over to local law enforcement. So suppose they come up with some stuff, and then what? Turn the evidence over to Tubbo Gilbert?”
Giancana laughed, once. “You make a good point. But these things sometimes got a way of getting out of hand.”
“Well, Frank Nitti used to say, ‘Don’t stir up the heat.’ That’s good advice, Sam. ’Cause if this turns bloody, all bets are off.”
Kefauver wouldn’t even have been in the crime-busting business if somebody—probably Charley Fischetti— hadn’t ordered the slaying of slimy politico Charley Binaggio in Kansas City, last April. Binaggio had failed to deliver a post-’48-election wide-open K.C. to his out-of-town mob investors. The classic gangland hit—Binaggio and his top goon were found with two bullets in the head each, in the straight-row “two deuces” formation that signified a mob welsher’s ultimate payoff—made embarrassing national headlines…in part because the bodies were found in the local Democratic headquarters under Harry Truman’s picture.
“Are you saying if Drury has an accident,” Sam asked, “your attitude toward testifying might change?”
“Draw your own conclusions, Sam.”
Giancana reached out and gripped me by the arm. He was smiling and his voice hadn’t changed tone…he was still his charming self…letting his words convey the menace.
“You want to be careful, Heller, about threatening me. I like you, you’re a smart guy, and I like that smart mouth; it’s cute. But you don’t want to fuckin’ threaten me.”
