Commack, Long Island, house that Germaine had been renting under an assumed name. When the cops walked in, Germaine insisted they had the wrong man. He showed them his identification. He insisted he was a freelance writer. He showed them the book he was writing. In the precinct, of course, his fingerprints proved otherwise. When Bobby's true identification was tossed over to Mann's desk, it was a minute or two before the detective had a chance to read the badly Thermofaxed record sent down from Albany. When he saw that 'Bobby' from the Hill wiretaps was Robert Germaine Sr., he thought that he had somehow mixed up the papers on his desk. But he hadn't. Robert Germaine Sr. was none other than the father of the nineteen-year-old confidential informant whose information had started the entire investigation in the first place. The youngster had started by giving up Henry Hill but had ended up turning in his own father.
It was then that the three burly detectives came into Mann's office, all of them smiling. They were carrying large cardboard boxes marked 'Evidence' in big red letters. The boxes were filled with Robin's kitchen. There were spoons, sieves, mixing bowls, scales, and strainers. The cops gathered around and began wiping their fingers around the insides of the mixing bowls like children swabbing up batter and then rolled their eyes into their heads. It was their way of telling Mann that Robin's kitchen utensils were covered with traces of drugs. Danny Mann had suspected the kitchen would be covered with a thin layer of dope. He had listened to too many hours of Henry and Robin's conversations about cleaning up the residue of evidence after mixing and cutting a batch of stuff. Robin had always hated to do dishes. No matter how many times Henry had warned her to wash the bowls and strainers after mixing, she just wouldn't do it. Henry had even bought her a dishwasher. But it had done no good. Danny Mann found it amusing that Henry was facing a sentence of twenty-five years to life because his girl friend hated to wash dishes.
Twenty-One
For Assistant U.S. Attorney McDonald and the Strike Force prosecutors Henry Hill was a bonanza. He was not a mob boss or even a noncommissioned officer in the mob, but he was an earner, the kind of sidewalk mechanic who knew something about everything. He could have written the handbook on street-level mob operations. Ever since the first day he walked into the Euclid Avenue Taxicab Company, back in 1954, Henry had been fascinated by the world he had longed to join, and there was little he hadn't learned and even less that he had forgotten.
Within twenty-four hours McDonald began making arrangements with the Nassau prosecutors to turn their routine drug pinch over to the feds in order to snare bigger fish. Henry was about to become a prize catch, a player in a larger game, even though at first he did not know it.
When the feds first arrived at his jail cell, Henry thought he could use them to help con his way out Residues of coke and optimism were still in his system. One day he would tell his parole officer he might be willing to talk if he could get back on the street, and the next day he would deny having made the suggestion. He stirred the interest of the FBI by giving them tips on hijackings, murders, and Lufthansa, but he never delivered a punchline.
Henry continued to scramble, hustle, and con for days after his arrest, but these were the last spastic jerks of a hood whose time had expired, the final reflex actions of a wiseguy who did not yet know that he was already dead.
karen: On the night he got arrested, two detectives rang the bell. They had a search warrant. I didn't know that they had just arrested Henry and everybody. I didn't know what was going on. So even though I was surprised by the cops, I felt safe. I felt that I had nothing to hide.
I asked them if they wanted coffee. I had just put on a new pot. Some of the wives, like Mickey Burke, used to curse at the cops and make nasty remarks and spit on the floor. That never made any sense to me. It was better to be polite and call the lawyer.
First the detectives wanted to know where everyone in the house was, and they wanted us all to go into one room while they searched. They never said what they were looking for. The kids, who had been through it all before, just kept watching television.
The detectives were very polite. They asked us to be calm and said they would try to get finished as quickly as possible. They went through everything. Closets. Bureau drawers. Kitchen cabinets. Suitcases. Even the pockets of our clothes hanging in the closets.
I figured out what was going on after some other detectives came over from searching Robin's house. Our lawyer, Richie Oddo, called and said Henry had been arrested for drugs and would be arraigned in the morning.
I didn't think it was such a big deal at first. They found some traces of drugs at Robin's house but nothing on Henry or at our place. I thought maybe we could beat the case. Especially after Henry gave me a signal in court the next morning. He just arched his hand a little bit, and I knew immediately where the drugs were hidden. That's what comes from seventeen years of being married. I knew that that motion meant that the drugs were on a small ledge behind some recessed lights we had installed inside a wall bench at the entrance to the bedroom. The cops had searched there, but you would have to know that you had to reach down and then up to find the ledge. Right after court I ran home, got the stuff-it must have been about a pound of heroin-and flushed it down the toilet. Now they had no proof.
They were holding Henry in $150,000 bail, and he said that he wanted to stay inside for a couple of weeks or so to clean out his system. He had been taking so many pills and snorting so much stuff that he couldn't think straight. I thought that sounded like a good idea. And I also thought that with no evidence, we had a good chance of beating the case.
That's why I couldn't figure out why Henry was so nervous when I went to visit him and why Jimmy and Mickey were acting so strange. Everyone was edgy. Then I went to see Richie Oddo, the lawyer. Lenny Vario was there. The Oddos and the Varios are related. Richie said he had not been able to see Henry for a couple of days. He was Henry's lawyer. What was wrong? Was Henry hiding from his own lawyer? Richie didn't understand. I could see it was making him suspicious.
Lenny Vario said he had known Henry all his life. He said that Henry was a standup guy. It was as though he was reassuring the lawyer, but he was really sending a message through me. Lenny said that
Henry would never talk against certain people, that he'd commit suicide first.
Mickey Burke called me every day. She kept asking when Henry was coming home. I knew she was calling for Jimmy. I told her what Henry had told me to say-that he was drying out and trying to get the bail reduced.
One day during the first week, Jimmy called and said he had some material for the T-shirt factory we had in the garage. He said I should pick it up at his shop on Liberty Avenue. I said I couldn't, I was in a hurry, I wanted to get to court, Henry was making one of his appearances. He said for me to come by anyway, it wasn't out of my way.
When I got to the shop, Jimmy asked about things. He was smiling and asked if I needed anything. I said I was in a hurry, and he said the material was in one of the stores down the block.
Jimmy walked outside with me and stood on the street as I started walking down the block toward the store. I noticed that all of the stores along the block had their windows painted out. It gave me a funny feeling. I kept walking, and when I looked back I could see Jimmy standing there pointing for me to go inside one of the stores.
Inside I could see this guy who was always around Jimmy. Once I had seen him on a ladder painting Jimmy's house. He was very creepy. I always suspected that he did Jimmy's dirty work. He was just standing around inside. He wasn't completely facing the door, so I could get a look at him without him seeing me. He looked like he might have been doing some work inside. Who knows? I don't know why, but something struck me as being wrong.
So instead of going inside, I waved back at Jimmy and said that I was late for court and that I'd pick the stuff up later. Jimmy kept pointing me to the store, but I kept going. I jumped in the car and took off. It was not a big thing. I was in a hurry, and I didn't like the look of the store and that guy. I didn't think of it again until much later.
The next day I went to see Paulie. He was very upset with Henry. He was scowling. He was at Geffkens Bar, on
