Tosca had and the more people flocked around him, the less power the other bosses would have. He would become the first among equals, and then, ultimately, the boss of bosses- Il capo di tutti capi. Soon they would have been paying percentages to him for the privilege of running businesses, and after that, they would have begun to take orders from him and serve at his pleasure. Many of them must have been delighted that he had not made it home from Arizona.
None of that would help his killer. Getting the killer would be a way to overcome their new image problem and keep their power from leaking away. By killing the Butcher's Boy, they would console any of their own men who had been hoping a new golden age for the Mafia would start when Tosca took over. They would complete this single small accomplishment in concert with all of the other families who had agreed to it, and maybe acting together would bring better things later. These were men who killed on a suspicion, an impulse, a whim. Death always seemed to be the solution to every problem.
If only the Butcher's Boy was astute enough to understand his predicament, he might be ready for an approach from her. He just might be feeling the right kind of desperation. If she offered the kind of sanctuary that only the U.S. government could offer, he just might take it.
As her plane banked and leveled its wings for the approach, she was already trying to think of a way to contact him. He would be watching television and looking at newspapers to find out anything he could about the aftermath of his killing Tosca. She needed to let him know that she understood his predicament and sympathized. She stopped herself. No, that wasn't right. Did she feel sympathy for him? She detected a temptation to feel sorry he was going to suffer, even though she knew the feeling was wasted on him. There were insane serial killers who murdered fewer people than he had just since he'd turned up again, and they served as the models for horror movies.
Still, there had never been an underdog who had worse odds. His opponents were all grown-up men who had needed to commit a murder in order to be 'made,' and they all had been trying to kill him when he'd attacked them. But she had to resist the impulse to defend him. It made her confused and, if anyone knew, would make her seem crazy, like the women who wrote love letters to convicted serial killers.
The plane landed, gave its usual bounce and shudder, rattled down the runway to a stop, then taxied toward the terminal. By the time the lights came on to illuminate the impatient passengers popping up to get their bags from the overhead compartments, she had composed what she wanted to say.
'I've known about you for twenty years, but only met you on August 30. You've got troubles, so talk to me.'
She wrote it out on a page torn from her address book while she was in the cab to the Justice Department building. She got out in front of the building, paid the driver, and went inside, still thinking about what she was going to do. When she walked into the office, she almost handed the little torn page to Geoffrey. No, she thought. This has to be unofficial. No unwitting accomplices to get destroyed if it blows up. She said to him, 'Hi, Geoff. Give me fifteen minutes before I see Hunsecker,' and went into her office and closed her door.
She sent text messages to her children. 'I'm back and will be in the office for the day. If you need me, don't hesitate to call. Love, Mom.'
Then she turned on her laptop and went to the site of the Arizona Republic in Phoenix and placed her personal ad. Next she went to the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, and the Chicago Tribune.
20
It took him two days to drive the eleven hundred miles from Houston to Denver and a night to recover, but now it was morning and he was a guest in the Brown Palace Hotel in the center of Denver. The hotel was old, with lots of dark, polished wood. He had always thought of it as what some of the old hotels Eddie Mastrewski had stayed in must have looked like before they fell into ruin. Eddie had liked those old hotels, and he would have loved the Brown Palace, with its old-fashioned wallpaper and the antique architecture of the place. It had a central stairwell, so a person on the upper floors could look down into the square enclosure of railings all the way to the lobby.
A few of Eddie's hotels were built that way, but they were all creaky, with stains on the worn carpets that the boy could only make guesses about. Eddie had liked them because they were so devoid of paying guests that he could go to the upper levels and occupy a floor of his own. That way he could use the hallway as his front porch, sit in a chair, read the papers, and look down to see if any of his horde of enemies showed up. He was especially partial to the places where the management wouldn't be too shocked if he left suddenly. He always paid in cash at the start of a stay so any consternation he caused was emotional and had no legal implications.
This morning he missed Eddie more than usual. He would have loved to have Eddie out there in the hallway, tilting back in a desk chair with a cigarette burning in the big sand-filled ashtray and the two. 45 automatic pistols in his coat.
Schaeffer took the elevator to the lobby, went into the hotel shop, and bought the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and the Chicago Tribune. He walked into the hotel restaurant and went to a booth near the back where he could see the doorway. He was aware of the two other ways out of the dining room-through the bar and past the men's room, and through the kitchen to the alley. He had scanned the room from the doorway and seen no reason to worry, but he looked at all the faces once more before he opened the New York Times.
He ran his eyes down each page, looking for some reference to what had happened in Arizona. He saw nothing. By now the federal cops must have identified the men they had cornered in their raid. It seemed odd that more wasn't being made of it. Maybe the right person at the Times had not yet seen the list and noticed that many of the names were recognizable names of New York gangsters. He opened the Tribune. There was a brief story that said FBI officials had raided a compound in Arizona and arrested 'dozens of men' on weapons and drug charges. The story was out. In a day or two, when reporters saw the names, it would probably blow up a bit.
It was possible the L.A. Times would be ahead on this one because Arizona was a bit closer to their orbit, but he found nothing. When the waitress came, he ordered his breakfast, then looked idly at the papers he'd already seen. He wondered if any of the old men still used the personal ads. That had once been the way that people like Eddie knew they were wanted for a job. Eddie would not have liked it if a couple of Mafia soldiers had come to his butcher shop to offer him a contract.
Something caught his eye. An ad said, 'BB: Sorry I missed you at the ranch. I'll see what I can do, if you want. VP'
VP had to be Vincent Pugliese. They always used the guy you liked best, the one you'd trust if you had to trust anyone. Pugliese worked for the Castigliones, so the one who had ordered Pugliese to do this was a Castiglione, probably Joe, the oldest brother. He would have asked if anybody thought he could be the one, and Vince had done that silent nod of his-a serious man's gesture, not bobbing his head up and down like a windup toy, but a single dip of the head.
Schaeffer remembered that nod from the old days, when the Castiglione family had summoned him to Chicago. Old Salvatore Castiglione hired him to go to Milwaukee and demonstrate to the small Mafia contingent there that their way of declaring independence from the Castiglione family in Chicago had been a bad idea. Instead of paying their regular percentage, they had killed the bagman. Salvatore had decided that the one who should pay was Tony Fantano, the boss of the Milwaukee crew.
The boy was twenty years old and he didn't know Tony Fantano by sight or where to find him. He was already resigned to having to find the right bar and start asking questions. But Castiglione said, 'We'll give you a guide.' The old man looked around the room at the men who were sitting there. That was the first time Schaeffer had seen the nod. Vince Pugliese was the same age as he was, but he had an intelligent, quiet gravity even then. Vince simply nodded once. 'Done,' said the old man. 'Vince will go with you.'
They drove to Milwaukee that night. They had a Chevy Impala stolen from Oklahoma City with Illinois plates that were also stolen. They had a pair of. 45 pistols, two among the millions of copies of the Colt 1911 model that were issued by the U.S. Army until the end of World War II and then passed from hand to hand for forty years until there was no way of guessing who the recorded owner had been.
He remembered riding into Milwaukee while Vince drove the car. They had talked about everything but the
