“Not quite yet. Not the most. But I was afraid. She was only about three feet away from me, too close to miss.”
“Why was she doing that?”
“She was crazy, hysterical, screaming, saying things like, ‘Let him go. I love him. You can’t take him away. I won’t let you.’
“For what seemed like a long moment, I could think of nothing to do. I had both hands on the husband and my gun was in my holster.”
“Mom, what did you do?”
“I knew I had to distract her. I pushed her husband hard and he fell to the ground. She shrieked, dropped the gun, and went to his side. She was asking his forgiveness when I snapped the cuffs on her, too.”
Meg stared at her. “Then what happened? Was that it?”
“Not quite.” Claire looked for a place to pull over. She needed to stop to tell the end of the story. She pulled onto a field road, cornstalks rustling in the slight wind. She looked over at her daughter, so happy and easy in her life. A beautiful, healthy girl. How she loved her.
“Then I heard a noise upstairs. I left the two of them sitting on the living room floor and bolted up the stairs to see what was up there. I found a baby sitting in her crib. I almost fainted when I saw her. I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t move.”
Claire reached over and pushed back her daughter’s hair, then said, “She reminded me of you, my own baby home asleep. I’ve never felt such pure panic.”
“I don’t get it. Why?”
“Because there was a hole in her bed, a gunshot hole that had blasted through her mattress and into the ceiling of her room. All I could see was this smiling baby.”
IF YOU HARM US
by Gary Bush
It was dusk as the train rounded the bend and I saw the skyline of St. Paul for the first time in five years. It looked different. I turned to the Pullman porter leaning next to me on the half-open car door. “What’s that big building with the red neon ‘1’ on the top?” I asked.
“Why, that’s where the money’s at. That’s the First National Bank. Thirty-two stories high, they built it in ’31. You’d think there was no Depression on, looking at that, would you?”
“I guess not,” I replied. The train slowed as it approached Union Depot.
“You’re Jake Kane,” he said. “I recall you from the old days.”
“Leonard Charles,” I said, suddenly remembering. “We played baseball together at Mechanic Arts. Class of 1917.”
He nodded. “I heard you got sent up. Nice to see you home.”
I thanked him. As the train pulled to a stop, he swung down with a step stool in his hand and placed it next to the bottom step.
I followed him, carrying my valise with my meager belongings.
“Warm,” Leonard said. “For November, that is.”
But I was cold. I was wearing the same tropical suit the marshals had nabbed me in when I walked off the boat from Havana in 1929. After spending the last four years in Leavenworth, I was glad to be home. I had unfinished business.
I took out my sack of Bull and started to roll a smoke. “Have one of mine, kid—it’s your old brand, Sweet Caporals.” I looked up to see Frank O’Hara.
“How ya doing, Frank,” I said, taking the cigarette. “You look like you put on some weight. The police business must be good.”
“It ain’t bad,” he replied, patting his stomach. “I see you lost weight. That suit is a little loose and probably too light for St. Paul.”
“I guess so. So what brings you down here, Frank?” I asked, bending to light my cigarette from his cupped match.
“You, Jake,” he said, shaking out the match. “We got a wire that they sprung you early.”
“Good behavior. If you dicks got the word, the whole town probably knows by now.”
He chuckled and nodded. Then his demeanor changed. “Jake, the rumor is that you’re gunning for Tommy Macintyre. They say you have a score to settle with him. Talk is, when he disappeared for a year, he left you holding the bag.”
“You shouldn’t listen to rumors, Frank.”
“Kid, I think the world of you and Tommy; I know how you guys kept Frank Jr. alive after he got gassed in France. I’ll never forget it. They called you the Three Musketeers back at Mechanic Arts High.”
I nodded. “Lot of water under the bridge since then. And by the way, how is Frankie? I got a letter from him in the can. He says he’s a new papa and living in Arizona.”
“Yeah, the climate out there is good for his lungs. He’s in the radio business, there’s a big future in radio. Owns two stores in Tucson.” Frank pulled out his wallet and showed me a Kodak of a baby. “That’s the grandkid. Francis X. O’Hara III. Handsome kid, huh?”
“Looks like his mother, not one of you ugly micks,” I laughed, remembering Frank Jr.’s pretty wife, Beth.
“You got that right, boyo.” But he became serious again. “Listen, Jake, this town’s changing. The kidnappings of William Hamm and Edward Bremer brought that on. The rules have been broken. Dutch Sawyer’s on the run, they nabbed his old lady in Cleveland.”
Harry “Dutch” Sawyer had been the number-one fixer in town. He, his predecessors, and the cops kept the O’Connor system going for more than thirty years. John O’Connor had been police chief at the turn of the century. With the city fathers’ tacit approval, he created an arrangement where criminals could seek haven in St. Paul as long as they checked in with the police and kept their noses clean when in town. There were fewer bank robberies and for the most part “honest” citizens were left alone and safe. That didn’t stop us homegrown boys from running our own rackets. Hell, Prohibition made us fortunes.
“Jake,” Frank said, “since Repeal, things have changed. The papers are getting religion, going after corruption. The G-Men are all over the place. Hoover is going to shut this town down.”
“Hoover’s an asshole, Frank,” I said, taking a drag off my smoke. I hadn’t had a tailor-made cigarette since 1929. “Look how his agents shot up Little Bohemia over in Wisconsin going after Dillinger. They shot three innocent bystanders and killed one. They’re the laughingstock of the whole country.”
“Don’t underestimate the Bureau, Jake. Dillinger’s dead, Pretty Boy Floyd is dead, Machine Gun Kelly’s in stir. Hoover’s hot to recover his reputation. I tell you, he’s coming after this town. I’m getting out myself. By New Year’s Day I’ll be retired and living down in Arizona.”
“That’s good, Frank. You been on the force, what, thirty-four years?”
“Yeah. I came in with the O’Connor system and I’m going out with its demise.” He rubbed the back of his neck and I could see how tired he was. Then he looked up. “But I ain’t done yet, and if you go after Tommy Macintyre I’ll have to come after you.”
“I wouldn’t expect any less from you, Frank.”
“I love you boys like my own sons. I don’t want to see either of you die.”
“It will work out, Frank.”
“Jesus, I hope so. Come on—I’ll buy you dinner.”
We took the escalator up to the busy concourse, its high ceiling decorated with carvings of stagecoaches and trains. I noticed the women were wearing their dresses ankle length. The flapper look went out with the crash.
Our footsteps echoed on the stone tile floor of the great lobby as we walked toward the depot restaurant. I glanced at the big clock above the baggage claim; it was 6 o’clock on the dot.
We sat in a booth and a world-weary waitress took our order.
